The eastern liberal-establishment Republicans have always pretended to pose as political pragmatists rather than as ideologues. While invariably supporting Presidential candidates who would continue big government deficits , they argue that their choice is determined by a magic formula guaranteed to appeal to party professionals: “The liberal candidate can win; the conservative cannot.”
Thus in the primaries of 1952, the eastern liberals hammered with the slogan, “Bob Taft can’t win,” until they froze him out of the presidential nomination he had earned as Senate Republican leader. The liberals successfully argued that Taft was too closely tied to controversial legislation such as the Taft – Hartley Act and that a fresh face without such impedimenta, Dwight Eisenhower, was more electable.
In 1964 the eastern liberals again urged the Republican National Convention to nominate a candidate from outside of Washington, either Nelson Rockefeller or William Scranton, predicting that conservative Senator Barry Goldwater couldn’t win. In the November election , the eastern liberals made this a self-fulfilling prophecy by supporting a Washington politician, Lyndon Johnson.
I n 1968 the eastern liberal Republicans, echoing the same refrain, said that Ronald Reagan couldn’t win, while Richard Nixon was more electable because he was more liberal . That practical consideration was persuasive with enough conservative Delegates to the Republican National Convention to nominate Nixon.
In 1976 the shoe is on the other foot. On purely pragmatic political criteria , the western conservative Ronald Reagan is obviously more electable than Nelson Rockefeller’s candidate Gerald Ford.
Whereas President Ford is hopelessly hung with the triple albatross of Washington, Watergate, and Kissinger , those are all non-issues against Reagan. If one thing is clear from the 1976 primaries it is that the American voters are systematically voting against Washington politicians (such as Ford), and/or those who hail from the hinterland (such as Carter and Brown).
While the subject of Watergate has been quiescent this spring, the Democrats will surely resurrect this obvious issue in the fall campaign. The ghost of Richard Nixon will forever bang over Ford because no explanations can erase the acts that Nixon made Ford President of the United States, and Ford saved Nixon from going to jail.
There is no way Ford can get out from under the burden of carrying the Kissinger policies on his back: the troublemaking hypocrisy of the recent African statements, the planned giveaway of the U.S. Canal in Panama, the obvious lopsidendness of detente with the Russians and allowing them to overtake our former lead in missiles and submarines, the Sonnenfeldt sellout of eastern European hopes, and the senseless snub of Solzhenitsyn. As Congressman Ed Berwinski recently said: “The President is a captive of Henry K. The subordinate is controlling his chief.”
Against the now-probable Democratic nominee, Jimmy Carter, Ford would have to write off the entire South, whereas Reagan would have a good chance. Finally, Reagan is clearly superior to Ford in articulating the issues, fielding questions from reporters and voters, and communicating via television.
As push comes to shove in the final weeks before the Republican National Convention, the non-ideological party professionals are climbing aboard the Reagan bandwagon because they know that he has a better chance to win than Gerald Ford.
