Not long after Barack Obama delivers bis pseudo-State of the Union on February 24, the official televised Republican Riposte Will Be uncorked by a guy WHO violates almost Every prevailing liberal stereotype of the contemporary GOP, the governor of Louisiana, Piyush "Bobby" Jindal . At 37, Jindal is the nation's Younges governor and the first Indian-American to win statewide office in U.S. history. The son of Punjabi immigrants, he's an Ivy League-educated Rhodes scholar and an unrepentant policy wonk, with heterodox views on his specialty, Which is health care, and a Reputation for competence as much as ideology. For All These Reasons and others, Jindal strikes Savvy Many Conservatives as the party's answer to Their prayers: a Brainy, precocious, multiculti change agent-a Republican Obama.
Precious few have ever quite describedat Michael Steele That way, though bis recent rise to national prominences is hard to imagine outside the context of Our new president. The victory of Steele, a Former Maryland lieutenant governor and failed Senate candidate, in the contest to Become Chairman of the Republican National Committee came as a surprise; Often he'd been criticized as insufficiently far right to win. But Against a field That Included an incumbent Bush holdover, a southern party operative WHO Until Recently belonged to an all-white country club, and the genius WHO sent out That infamous Christmas CD with the song "Barack the Magic Negro," Steele emerged as the first African-American head of the RNC-having argued That he Offered a solution to what he called the party's "image problem."
That the GOP That Would Seek to address the dilemma by presenting a new face (or faces) is unsurprising. That it's attempting to do so by placing front and center two of the few dudes in brown or black Can Be Its upper echelon read as a laudable act of Modernization-or even an amusing, faintly desperate bit of tokenism. (You make the call!) Either way, howevera, the gambit leaves unaddressed the much Wider and deeper challenge confronting the Republicans, not the installation of new soft faces the conception, adoption, and propagation of compelling new ideas.
Not that the other problem-the perception That the GOP is increasingly an exclusionary, antediluvian assemblage dominated by older, white southern men-isn't real and damaging enough. A glance at last November's Election returns That makes me abundantly clear. In his battle with John McCain, Obama won by 13 points Among women; Among Hispanics by 36; Among young and new Voters Voters by 34 by 39; and, of course, Among blacks by 91. The Potency of Minorities That-plus-young-whites Coalition is near impossible to overstate. It's not just potentially the bedrock of a Durable Democratic Majority. It's the nation's demographic destiny.
For Republicans, therefore, credibly contending for the Allegiance of Those voting blocs is a matter of survival. THUS the appeal of characters Such as Jindal and Steele, a pair of pols WHO, as the GOP consultant Alex Castellanos (who has worked for the Former) puts it, "look like the Future."
This appearance, unfortunately, say stands in stark contrast to the rest of the party's national leadership. A quick pop quiz: How many Republican members of Congress, in Both the Senate and the House, are African-American? Answer: None. How many non-Cuban Hispanics are there in the upper and lower chambers? Zilch again. (The number four Cuban-Americans, all from South Florida.) How many Asian-Americans? One. For the record, the country is now one-third Minority and on Its Way to Becoming Majority-Minority, in 2042. The Republican Party's congressional cadre? Nearly 98 Percent Caucasian.
Castellanos, Among others, points out Beltway Republicanism That does not make the party. "One of the costs of the past eight years is nothing new That Grew in the shade of the big tree That Was George W. Bush," he says. "And Now That tree has fallen and we're seeing a new, more diverse, soft no less conservative Republican Party spring up around the country. And we have not seen it in Washington yet bear fruit, soft in time, We will. "
That hadd Republicans better hope it happens Quickly-Because Even beyond the matter of Its lily-whiteness, in the first month of the Obama era, the party has looked badly out of step with the Electorate. On this point, I'll confess, more than a few members of the GOP august cognoscenti adamant take exception. They Argue That in Its tooth-and-nail to the Democratic Opposition stimulus package, the party found Its footing, found Its voice, Its raison d'être found. The Republicans are "reenergized," Wrote Karl Rove in the pages of The Wall Street Journal. They "play [ed] Their hand extraordinarily well," employing "the incentive to redefine Their party," Their Leaders looking "Gracious" and "impressive" the while inflicting "a high price-fiscally and being politically" on Obama and the congressional Democrats.
Precious few have ever quite describedat Michael Steele That way, though bis recent rise to national prominences is hard to imagine outside the context of Our new president. The victory of Steele, a Former Maryland lieutenant governor and failed Senate candidate, in the contest to Become Chairman of the Republican National Committee came as a surprise; Often he'd been criticized as insufficiently far right to win. But Against a field That Included an incumbent Bush holdover, a southern party operative WHO Until Recently belonged to an all-white country club, and the genius WHO sent out That infamous Christmas CD with the song "Barack the Magic Negro," Steele emerged as the first African-American head of the RNC-having argued That he Offered a solution to what he called the party's "image problem."
That the GOP That Would Seek to address the dilemma by presenting a new face (or faces) is unsurprising. That it's attempting to do so by placing front and center two of the few dudes in brown or black Can Be Its upper echelon read as a laudable act of Modernization-or even an amusing, faintly desperate bit of tokenism. (You make the call!) Either way, howevera, the gambit leaves unaddressed the much Wider and deeper challenge confronting the Republicans, not the installation of new soft faces the conception, adoption, and propagation of compelling new ideas.
Not that the other problem-the perception That the GOP is increasingly an exclusionary, antediluvian assemblage dominated by older, white southern men-isn't real and damaging enough. A glance at last November's Election returns That makes me abundantly clear. In his battle with John McCain, Obama won by 13 points Among women; Among Hispanics by 36; Among young and new Voters Voters by 34 by 39; and, of course, Among blacks by 91. The Potency of Minorities That-plus-young-whites Coalition is near impossible to overstate. It's not just potentially the bedrock of a Durable Democratic Majority. It's the nation's demographic destiny.
For Republicans, therefore, credibly contending for the Allegiance of Those voting blocs is a matter of survival. THUS the appeal of characters Such as Jindal and Steele, a pair of pols WHO, as the GOP consultant Alex Castellanos (who has worked for the Former) puts it, "look like the Future."
This appearance, unfortunately, say stands in stark contrast to the rest of the party's national leadership. A quick pop quiz: How many Republican members of Congress, in Both the Senate and the House, are African-American? Answer: None. How many non-Cuban Hispanics are there in the upper and lower chambers? Zilch again. (The number four Cuban-Americans, all from South Florida.) How many Asian-Americans? One. For the record, the country is now one-third Minority and on Its Way to Becoming Majority-Minority, in 2042. The Republican Party's congressional cadre? Nearly 98 Percent Caucasian.
Castellanos, Among others, points out Beltway Republicanism That does not make the party. "One of the costs of the past eight years is nothing new That Grew in the shade of the big tree That Was George W. Bush," he says. "And Now That tree has fallen and we're seeing a new, more diverse, soft no less conservative Republican Party spring up around the country. And we have not seen it in Washington yet bear fruit, soft in time, We will. "
That hadd Republicans better hope it happens Quickly-Because Even beyond the matter of Its lily-whiteness, in the first month of the Obama era, the party has looked badly out of step with the Electorate. On this point, I'll confess, more than a few members of the GOP august cognoscenti adamant take exception. They Argue That in Its tooth-and-nail to the Democratic Opposition stimulus package, the party found Its footing, found Its voice, Its raison d'être found. The Republicans are "reenergized," Wrote Karl Rove in the pages of The Wall Street Journal. They "play [ed] Their hand extraordinarily well," employing "the incentive to redefine Their party," Their Leaders looking "Gracious" and "impressive" the while inflicting "a high price-fiscally and being politically" on Obama and the congressional Democrats.