The Quest for an Electable, True Conservative

With some regularity I'm hearing voices in the media declare, "There is no true conservative running for president yet...we need Newt Gingrich or Fred Thompson to enter the race!" My first reaction to this is incredulity -- there are tons of candidates in the race already, so how could none of them be "true conservatives" when the conservative voting bloc is so significant? Is this base of American voters really being ignored and neglected? The truth is, I expect, that there are a number of candidates who are basically conservative but yet also have something wrong about them, a fatal flaw, and the candidates who are closest to being "true conservatives" face an uphill battle to win votes simply because they are not big names.

The big name issue is an interesting one. The most famous candidates are among the most popular at the moment: Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, and John McCain. Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are the only top candidates that have really emerged out of relative obscurity, although I was aware of Obama's speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention even though I was not following politics closely at the time. Anyway, Gingrich and Fred Thompson are names -- bigger names for sure than Mitt Romney and most of the other Republican candidates. Gingrich was Speaker of the House! Thompson is an actor! Their politics almost seem to be a secondary thing relative to their names for those that really want them in the race. However, the Gingrich and Thompson backers have a point: people won't vote for a candidate they've never heard of before. Gingrich and Thompson would enter the race with name recognition already -- a big advantage compared to those who must struggle to build that name recognition from the ground up.

That said, I can understand why some conservatives are uncomfortable with the present list of candidates. It's hard to be perfect at anything, including conservatism. Giuliani is not the candidate for those who want to see abortion outlawed as soon as possible -- as I mentioned in a previous post, Giuliani is really more of a mix of liberal and conservative than one or the other. McCain doesn't want the Constitution amended to ban gay marriage. Romney changed his mind about abortion (and became more conservative), perhaps for political convenience. What surprises me, though, is that even candidates I once considered to be absolute conservatives also have chinks in their armor. Jim Gilmore is awful close to being a "true conservative," but he thinks women should have the right to an abortion in the first eight weeks of pregnancy, a deal-breaker for some conservative voters. Mike Huckabee gets my vote as the most likable "true conservative" in the race, but there's already an anti-Huckabee site that criticizes the man for having "a history of poor judgment and unethical behavior" although its arguments aren't particularly convincing. There probably won't be a perfect "true conservative" in the race even if Fred Thompson and Newt Gingrich officially announce their candidacies, but perhaps all that is really wanted by conservatives is a candidate who can beat Giuliani both ideologically and politically.