Bereft of Ideas

The common theme from Republicans as to why they lost the presidency is because they quit being "conservative." I'll agree that's part of the reason. But like Zakaria I believe "movement conservatism" is as dead as Nixon.

The Republican Party has become a party bereft of ideas or trapped by the wrong ones. The Reagan-Thatcher revolution of low taxes, deregulation and tight money isn't relevant to the problems of under-regulated financial products, huge deficits and a deepening recession. Add to that the Republican Party's social program is out of tune with an increasingly young, diverse and tolerant electorate.

For the Republicans to survive they will need more than mere hope the Democrats screw up but also new ideas. The American people are not dumb and they know when things aren't right with their government. Like Zakaria says, Bush was extremely unpopular long before the economy went sour. The Republican-branded policies that we should privatize social security-- a very unpopular idea-- along with the insistence small government means more Constitutional Amendments controlled by a one party system that infuses democracy with occupation and regime change is not mainstream whatsoever. Americans are tired of being told government's not the answer especially when sometimes it is. The GOP must move closer to the center and come in out of the rain or be forced to deal with even more defeats.