Patrick Ruffini has the solution for what ails the party.
Guess what? They’re all logistics, folks:
Face it, Barack Obama’s web team did not beat John McCain. John McCain (and the GOP baggage he carried) beat John McCain. If McCain and Obama had swapped their web development teams, Obama still would have won.
Consider that you are constructing a building. While the building can’t be built without the right tools for the job, it takes a lot more than tools (even neat hypothetical power tools like the “rightroots”) to get the job done.
It takes people, and lots of them. Carpenters, plumbers, electricians, delivery drivers, equipment operators, investors, supervisors — and someone in charge to make key decisions and direct the operations. Without people to operate the tools, the tools themselves are relatively worthless.
It takes architectural drawings and blueprints. Without a coherent plan which everyone can follow, the result will be a disaster. The Republican Party could build a socially conservative and fiscally liberal house. Alternately, the GOP could decide to build a socially tolerant but fiscally conservative house, or even a socially liberal and fiscally liberal house. However, fiscally conservative fixures built upon a socially conservative foundation only lasted a generation or so. It might be time to rethink the concept of fusionism.
It should also be noted that if the leaders provide reasonable plans but immediately deviate from them, the workers will quickly lose confidence in their bosses. It doesn’t matter whether it is a project manager substituting a lower grade steel or a congressman voting for an increasingly bloated federal budget.
Eventually the workers are either going to stay home or find work on a liberal or libertarian project.
It takes a winning plan. It takes people willing to work together to develop the plan. It takes leaders — but many of them will emerge from those developing plans or working to make the plan reach fruition. Then we can start purchasing tools. Otherwise, we are putting the cart in front of the horse.
I’ll stop there. The rest follows as a long digression about nuts-and-bolts campaigning, but mostly on substance and much on getting away from style, echoing many of my comments about the Virginia Republican Party earlier in December.