Believe it or not, I’m a big believer that America is at its best when the liberal and conservative parties are balanced. Neither side holds a monopoly on the truth, and the answer is often found somewhere between the positions of the two major parties. The marketplace of ideas allows for us to hone our positions and arguments. If we are never confronted with potential weaknesses in our logic and reasoning, we leave every conversation believing that we’re always right, but I can’t imagine anyone is arrogant enough to believe that they’re batting 1.000 when it comes to ideas and choices, although I’ve met plenty of people who think that they’re hitting .999.
But the marketplace of ideas only works when the political movements are balanced. That’s why one of the major problems in American politics today is that there isn’t a conservative party. Some of you just checked the byline to make sure you’re reading the right column and that it isn’t Cindy’s week to write. But I mean what I say here, America has done its best work when there are strong liberal and conservative movements that are willing to engage with each other and find solutions between their two starting points.
But today’s Republican Party cannot be considered a conservative political movement. Think about what it means to be a conservative, or at least what it used to mean. Conservatives used to believe in free markets and free enterprise, but now the Republican Party is the party of tariffs and the party that has used taxpayer money to buy stakes in private companies. Conservatives used to believe in free expression, but now they want to deport people for protesting against the actions of another country and get people fired for social media posts they disagree with. Conservatives used to believe in a free press, but now the president kicks media organizations out of the White House press pool that he doesn’t like and calls everything that is critical of him or his policies “fake news.” Conservatives used to believe in transparency and accountability in government, but now actively hide the Epstein files and protect the powerful whose names are within those files and refuse to hold the president accountable for the now litany of laws and norms that he has defied.
Based on this list, it’s hard to call the Republican Party a “conservative” party. All of the available polling indicates that this is going to be a bad mid-terms for the Republicans, which is not out of the norm for the party in power during the mid-terms. But the Republicans who end up surviving this election cycle need to do some soul-searching. What does the Republican Party stand for? What will it stand for moving forward? Because right now they are the party of “what he said,” “he” of course being Donald Trump. It has become a party that has been taken over by the cult of personality and has aided, abetted, and appeased the president’s worst impulses.
Trump won Wisconsin in two of the last three presidential elections. Two years ago, he won because he promised to end foreign wars, close the southern border, end government waste, and bring down the cost of living. Instead, he has started a foreign war, that now seems like yet another endless war in the Middle East, which has driven inflation sky high. Instead of restoring order at the border, he sent unqualified, undertrained military wannabes into our cities and states to engage in cruel and indecent immigration raid campaigns. DOGE barely put a dent in government spending and two years in, the president has not kept any of his promises. In fact, in almost every area he has made things much, much worse.
Democrats lost two years ago because poll after poll said that voters were worried about the economy and the message from Democrats was, “look at the numbers, the economy’s fine.” Telling voters that they’re wrong is a great way to lose elections. And now the Republicans are doing the exact same thing. They know that inflation is out of control, they know that gas prices are skyrocketing, they know that mortgage rates are high, but they can’t say anything that goes against Trump’s messaging.
If the polls are right, and the Republicans lose big time in this mid-term, they should use it as an opportunity to turn their backs on Trump and recommit themselves to free enterprise, free markets, and individual rights. There’s still time to bring back conservatism to the Republican Party and restore balance to the marketplace of ideas.