Republican Suicide Pact Growing in Strength, Number

I said earlier today that the Republican Party seems to have formulated a "suicide pact" among the leadership. And their ain't no end in sight...

From the Weekly Standard blog today comes a link to a memo circulated to the Republican leadership by Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia.

Instead of learning the lessons of 2006 and since, Dr. Davis also prescribes hemlock for what ails the Republican Party:

Charley Cook put it best: “The GOP playbook is obsolete. Spouting an undiluted conservative message doesn’t consistently work anymore, even in some of the nation’s reddest districts.”

When was the last time we saw an "undiluted conservative message?" We saw a few in congressional races in 2004, and a "generally conservative message" in the presidential campaign in 2004.

So what does Davis suggest? Throw the conservative base under the bus, just get rid of this unwelcome baggage:

...remember that this election is about independent voters. Even if we get every Republican out to vote, we lose without Independents.

I've got news for Rep. Davis: if you bank hard-Left and embrace the mushy middle, even more conservative Republicans are going to abandon the party--and you STILL lose!

Davis suggests this for energy policy:

The President should send an emergency energy package to Congress and dare them to act. It should include some global warming initiatives to keep it credible...

So the Republican Party should veer Left and indulge in some global warming fantasy to "keep it credible"? Ooooooooookay!

On illegal immigration and border control:

John McCain, being from a border state, may be out of sync with many Republicans but he has standing among Hispanics.

In other words, McCain may be out of sync with the base, but hey, he panders well to minorities and illegal alien voters.

Health care? Not much leadership from the GOP here, either:

Health Care is the weakest issue for Republicans. After all, aren’t we the ones who opposed extending health care to children of the working poor (S-CHIP)? Never mind the policy arguments. Voters have made their choice. What we have not done is talk about the Democratic failings in Health Care.

So Davis' plan is to criticize Democrat failings. Wow. That's impressive leadership. I'm sure Independents will be overwhelmed with this innovative new idea to solve the problem.

How about some actual solutions? Maybe to expand Medical Savings Accounts? Maybe to encourage greater private industry competition? Maybe programs to encourage more cost-cutting involvement from the customer--the patient? But no; let's criticize.

And like Cole, Davis wants to embrace John McCain and his mushy-middle agenda. John McCain, the candidate many in the Republican Party can barely hold their nose long enough to vote for, much less get enthusiastic about.

With leadership like this, the Republican Party deserved what it got in 2006, and it deserves what it's almost certain to get more of in 2008.

Did the Republican leadership ever stop an think for just a moment that maybe their woes aren't because independents and liberals don't like them, but that their conservative base is sick and tired of platitudes, lip service and cowardly tail-between-their-legs compromise with liberals.

They can't seem to get their beltway-befuddled heads around the fact that they lost the confidence of their base in 206--and they haven't done anything to get it back.

Independents are a fickle bunch. The ones that aren't just liberals afraid to admit they're liberals don't really have a consistent ideology. Show them some leadership and throw in a dash of principle and they'll back you.

But if you lack LEA-DER-SHIP and act like a bunch of liberals-in-waiting, the conservative Republican base is going to stay on hiatus.