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  Recent commentary from National Journal: Social Studies: America Celebrates Earth Day 1970 -- for the 31st Time, by Jonathan Rauch (May 2, 2000) Gloom has brought environmentalism to a dead end. The movement must swallow its pride and concede victory. Legal Affairs: Victims' Rights: Leave the Constitution Alone, by Stuart Taylor Jr. (April 28, 2000) Amending the Constitution for popular causes is rarely a good idea. And victims' rights is no exception. Media: Random Harvest, by William Powers (April 27, 2000) Is it any wonder that nobody's making money from online news? Political Pulse: The Big Dig and the Shovel Brigade, by William Schneider (April 26, 2000) It's the costliest public works project in American history and a triumph of old politics. More from National Journal. Discuss this article in the Politics & Society conference of Post & Riposte. |
 Political Pulse:What About a Bush-McCain Ticket? May 3, 2000 Would George W. Bush want John McCain on the Republican ticket? That's simple. Of course he would. That's because there's only one thing on Bush's mind right now -- winning in November. But would McCain want to go on the ticket? That's not so simple. There are 10 reasons a presidential nominee picks a particular running mate. Reason No. 1: You want someone who will help you win. The other nine reasons don't matter. A Bush-McCain ticket is Al Gore's worst nightmare. No, it's his second-worst nightmare. Vice President Gore's worst nightmare would be a Bush-Colin Powell ticket. Either running mate would give Bush a decisive edge -- something that cannot be said about any other prospective choice. Powell insists he's not interested. What about Sen. McCain of Arizona? "He said he's not interested," Texas Gov. Bush remarked last week. "But [when] I talk to him, I'll find out how uninterested or interested he is." The two are scheduled to meet for the first time since the primaries next month in Pittsburgh. Would it be in McCain's interest to take a place on the ticket? Maybe, because it would legitimize him to Republicans. Most Republicans opposed McCain in the primaries because they saw him as an alien invader trying to remake their party. Where did they get such an idea? From McCain himself, who warned Republicans that they couldn't win unless they adopted a different message -- his message. As McCain put it to fellow Republicans: "If you want to regain the majority that we had in the 1980s, then you've got to change the party." By going on the ticket with Bush, McCain would become a team player, but in a supporting role. Bush would be calling the shots. Suppose Bush loses. Would he bring McCain down with him? Probably not. Running mates are never blamed when the ticket loses, because people don't vote for Vice President. There is one huge downside for McCain if he goes on the ticket: He could win. Then he would be Bush's man. And his reform message would be lost. McCain's interest is to do enough for Bush to show Republicans that he's a team player. But not so much that he actually helps Bush get elected. It usually takes three losses for a party to figure out that something is wrong with its message. Democrats lost with Jimmy Carter in 1980 and with Walter Mondale in 1984. When they nominated Michael Dukakis in 1988, Democrats honestly believed they were moving to the center. "This election is not about ideology," Dukakis declared at the Democratic National Convention that year. "It's about competence." But it didn't take voters long to figure out that Dukakis was not the real thing. The Democrats had nominated another out-of-the-mainstream liberal. A ferocious anti-Dukakis campaign exposing the Democratic nominee's positions on the Pledge of Allegiance, prison furloughs, and the death penalty gave the voters some assistance in reaching that conclusion. After three losses, Democrats finally got the message: This isn't working. The party has to change. And lo and behold, a candidate named Bill Clinton soon came along with just that message. This year, Gore intends to expose Bush as an out-of-the-mainstream conservative. If that strategy works and Republicans lose for a third time, they might just get the message: This isn't working. The party has to change. That happens to be McCain's message. It's Bush's message, too, in a way. He says he's a "compassionate" conservative. In his stampede to the center, Bush has already embraced an expanded federal role in education, health care, and low-income housing. In fact, he has always kept his distance from conservative hard-liners. He endorses their issues, but he embraces their adversaries. As he did this month when he met with a delegation of gay Republicans. But are Bush's gestures enough? Gore will say no and point to Bush's positions on hate crimes and guns and abortion. And the Confederate flag, on which McCain has confessed betraying his principles for the sake of political expediency. Unsuccessfully, as it turned out. When it comes to moving the party to the center, McCain sounds like the real thing. He even says he wants to do for the Republicans what Clinton did for the Democrats. As he put it during an interview on his campaign bus in February: "You can't help but admire the job President Clinton did in assembling coalitions and moving to attract the great center in American politics." Conservatives such as Steve Forbes assert that Republicans lost in 1992 and 1996, not because the party's message was too conservative, but because it wasn't conservative enough. "Twice [the GOP establishment] has lost," he told a conservative audience in 1999, "and if we allow ourselves to be seduced by the siren song of these mushy moderates, make no mistake, they will take us down to defeat again." But Republican primary voters also rejected Forbes this year. Most Republicans believe that nominating Bush makes the right statement: "Sure, we want to move back to the center. A little. At least, that's what's in our hearts." If Bush loses, McCain's case will be made. Bush was not the real thing. He was a Republican Dukakis. After three losses in a row, Republicans might be ready to listen to McCain. He would become Mr. I-Told-You-So. What do you think? Discuss this article in the Politics & Society conference of Post & Riposte. More from National Journal. More on politics and society in Atlantic Unbound and The Atlantic Monthly. William Schneider is the Cable News Network's senior political analyst. He is also a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., and a contributing editor for the Los Angeles Times, National Journal, and The Atlantic Monthly. His column appears every week in National Journal, a weekly magazine covering politics and government published in Washington, D.C. For information on National Journal Group publications, see NationalJournal.com. All material copyright © 2000 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved. | ||||||||||||
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