The Great Republican Rebranding

[kurth]

The Great Republican Rebranding
By E. J. Dionne Jr.
Saturday, May 6, 2006; A17

Sen. Rick Santorum wanted to talk. His purpose, he said over breakfast earlier this week in the Senate dining room, was to "tell the other side of the story" about his record, which his foes use to cast him as -- these are his words -- "a mean-spirited, hard-right country club Republican." Santorum wanted to describe the work he had done on "nontraditional Republican issues," including faith-based initiatives to help the poor... Santorum is nothing if not shrewd. Running with the 1994 conservative tide, he won his seat from then-incumbent Harris Wofford after characterizing AmeriCorps, the national service initiative and a Wofford legislative monument, as a program "for hippie kids to stand around a campfire and sing 'Kumbaya' at taxpayers' expense."

Santorum is not alone. All over the country, Republicans are engaged in a massive effort at rebranding, reframing and, in some cases, wholesale retreat from past positions. The surest sign that the nation is in the middle of an ideological transition is that Republicans don't want to sound like -- well, Republicans. Thus are those who once derided Al Gore's environmentalism now painting themselves in very bright shades of green. Last month Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) took a drive in a hydrogen-powered car to show how much he cares about conservation and the planet.

Members of Congress who once eagerly showered tax breaks on the energy companies now want you to know they're tough on Big Oil. Last month House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) urged federal agencies to investigate possible price gouging by the petroleum giants. Of course, turning on a dime is not that easy, and the GOP leaders -- under pressure from their business allies -- have been all over the lot on changes in accounting rules that would have levied higher taxes on the energy companies. For the moment, they seem to have dumped the idea...

The current reaction is not simply to President Bush's low poll numbers. It's also a response to the failure of conservative policies and to the declining appeal of conservative rhetoric. Conservatives are trying to save themselves by offering progressive-sounding criticisms of the status quo, much as liberals offered ersatz conservative critiques two decades ago. If Rick Santorum wants you to look at his record in a way that makes him a paladin for the poor and if Dennis Hastert wants you to know that he's suspicious of the oil companies, the political weather is changing. When one side starts making the other side's argument, you don't need to be a pollster to know which belief system is in the ascendancy.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...