Dont miss Andy Krolls longform piece on the next Sarah Palin, up at Mother Jones today. Heres how it begins: -Erika As she likes to tell anybody wholl listen, Susana Martinez, the governor of New Mexico, didnt start out a Republican. She and her husband, Chuck, like most everyone else in Las Cruces, had always been Democrats. But shed long dreamed of running for office, and when word got out that she had her eyes on the district attorneys seat, two local Republican activists asked her to lunch. At the meeting, the story goes, her suitors didnt talk about party affiliation or ideology. They zeroed in on issues—taxes, welfare, gun rights, the death penalty. Afterward, Martinez got into the car, turned to her husband, and said, Ill be damned, were Republicans. Its a tidy little anecdote, and Martinez has put it to good use. During her prime-time speech at the 2012 Republican National Convention, the biggest stage of her 18-year political career, the Ill be damned punch line brought the crowd to its feet, getting more cheers than anything said by the partys presidential nominee, Mitt Romney. Its not hard to see why the story is appealing: It suggests that Republican ideas can win over voters, perhaps especially voters who look like Martinez. If only those voters saw through pesky Democratic talking points like the War on Women and recognized what the Republican Party actually stands for, the logic goes, they would embrace the party. Just like Susana Martinez and her husband did. These are trying times for Republicans in search of inspiration. Sure, it looks like they have a shot to take back the Senate. But if the escalating civil war between the establishment and the wacko bird tea party wing doesnt tear the GOP in two, changing demographics threaten to push it toward extinction. Every four years, the party turns in poor showings with young people and cedes more ground among unmarried women and Latinos—the fastest-growing parts of the countrys population. In the 1988 presidential election, minorities made up just 15 percent of voters; by 2012, that number had risen to 28 percent, and they supported Obama by a 62-point margin. Devastatingly, the partys 2012 post-mortem concluded, we have lost the ability to be persuasive with, or welcoming to, those who do not agree with us. No wonder, then, that many see Martinez, who turns 55 in July, as the partys future.
Posted on: Wed, 16 Apr 2014 19:09:34 +0000
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