Ronald Reagan Would Lose Today

If Ronald Reagan were running in today's GOP primary, would he have a chance at winning? This is the question that former Reagan adviser and speechwriter Peggy Noonan asks in a Wall Street Journal column. Much to her dismay, the current race for the nomination has been reduced to a single issue: religious faith. As epitomized by the rise of Mike Huckabee, the Republican party is reaping the harvest of Karl Rove's master plan to insure a permanent majority by forever branding it as inextricable from overt religiosity. Noonan's former boss, as is well known, disdained public displays of religious affection the likes of which have hijacked the contest in Iowa:

I wonder if our old friend Ronald Reagan could rise in this party, this environment. Not a regular churchgoer, said he experienced God riding his horse at the ranch, divorced, relaxed about the faiths of his friends and aides, or about its absence. He was a believing Christian, but he spent his adulthood in relativist Hollywood... ...I'm not sure he'd be pure enough to make it in this party. I'm not sure he'd be considered good enough.

Of course, with the exception of the horseback sighting of God, this passage also perfectly describes Fred Thompson, the man whose entry into the race was heralded as the second-coming of "Dutch." Thompson's anemic showing in the polls might just provide the answer to Noonan's rhetorical question. No. And she's right to bemoan the rank-and-file, mob mentality that prizes religious purity over leadership abilities. Every moment we continue on this course, we edge closer to theocracy, and the governing philosophy of our purported enemies.

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Other right-leaning pundits are sounding the alarm, too. Take the National Review's Rich Lowry's bit on what he terms his party's headlong rush to commit "Huckacide":

Huckabee has declared that he doesn't believe in evolution. Even if there are many people in America who agree with him, his position would play into the image of Republicans as the anti-science party. This would tend to push away independents and upper-income Republicans. In short, Huckabee would take a strength of the GOP and, through overplaying it, make it a weakness.

You see, you can lead all those conservative Christians to water, but you can't be sure they aren't going to tip over the bowl and make a huge mess of things for the rest of the party. Lowry explains that it's fine to employ religion on behalf of the GOP if it makes Rovian magic, but not OK if any of the candidates really start taking its precepts seriously:

The GOP's social conservatism inarguably has been an enormous benefit to the party throughout the past 30 years, winning over conservative Democrats and lower-income voters who otherwise might not find the Republican limited-government message appealing. That said, nominating a Southern Baptist pastor running on his religiosity would be rather overdoing it. Social conservatism has to be part of the Republican message, but it can't be the message in its entirety.

So W.W.R.D. (What Would Reagan Do) to restore the proper balance of spices to the G.O.P. stew? Maybe he'd start by hiring Peggy Noonan to write a speech.

More information on David Knowles can be found at his website.