Minnesota Governor Pawlenty Not Running For Third Term
Minnesota’s Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty, the only blue-state Republican survivor of the 2006 bloodbath, has announced that he will not run for a third term in 2012. Speculation is already rampant that this presages a potential Pawlenty run for President. Given Pawlenty’s demonstrated ability to maintain a moderate-conservative image sufficient to hold office even in reliably Democratic Minnesota, this read is fairly reasonable.
Other analysts are saying that this also means Pawlenty will likely adopt a no-surrender approach in favor of Norm Coleman in his continuing election contest against Al Franken. Such a reading is suspicious on two counts. First, some of the primary pushers of the idea that Pawlenty will adopt a dead-ender extremism are partisan Democrats. One should always be suspicious when those who clearly hate conservatives make predictions about conservatives’ motivations and likely behavior. Second, such an approach would not, as the anti-conservatives claim, endear Pawlenty to the Republican base so much as it would fly in the face of his long-term strategy of conservative-leaning pragmatism. Why would Pawlenty adopt a quixotic quest in the service of the doomed Coleman when any reasonable political strategist could tell him that tying one’s wagon to a falling star is very dumb politics? If Democratic strategists aren’t just fantasizing here and if Pawlenty is really about to latch on to Coleman’s doomed effort, it is the worst thing he could do both for himself and for the Republican party.
It seems at least possible that liberals fear Pawlenty’s demonstrated ability to position himself as a moderate conservative and are trying to set up a preemptive meme that he is a dead-ender extremist. It is hard to forget how quickly the liberal blogosphere transformed their interpretation of John McCain from moderate maverick to the second coming of Dick Cheney once McCain actually got the nomination. And the early months of the Obama adminstration have been striking for the attention lavished on trying to exaggerate powerless Republicans’ reputation for extremist vices. The permanent war against conservatism has a very aggressive propaganda arm when it comes to trying to create easy strawmen out of any and all potential Republican resistance to permanent single-party rule by Democrats. It is not unreasonable to suspect that Pawlenty may already be in the gun sights.
I would guess that Pawlenty will run in the Republican primary in 2012.
On the Coleman issue it doesn’t look like his support for Coleman to date is such that he would actively oppose the ruling of the Minn SC. It might be some small help to him in the primary if he did, but would be much more damaging in the general. I think that he is a smart enough politician to give Coleman enough support so as not to torpedo his chances in the primaries, but distance himself enough so as not to damage himself much in the general.
Just as McCain became the 2nd coming of Cheney during the election so Obama became the second coming of Che. Both men were caricatured and their actual differences magnified well beyond reality*. Our primary system and the fact that all political differences are boiled down to R v D disputes all but guarantees this outcome.
* I only see a handful of issues where there would have been significant policy differences.
Wyoming. It is one of the most Republican and Conservative states in the union. Yet it has had many, many democratic governors over the years including now.
The reason is they seem to be able to separate their local politics and the democrats that succeed in the state are moderate. Pawlenty is the type of politican that I think will not do well on the national stage because hes going to have to change who he is to succeed.
We shall see.
In what way will he have to change who he is in order to succeed?
In what way will he have to change who he is in order to succeed?
The GOP put forth a moderate politician in 2008 and got thumped. They are going to return I believe to more conservative, right leaning ways which does not bode well for a moderate.
Maybe. I hear a lot of chatter about how the republicans need to move more to the right to shore up the base, but that is largely in right wing echo chambers so I don’t know how much that reflects popular opinion in the Republican primary electorate.
Our democracy needs a strong opposition party to function at its best. I think that moving hard right will further weaken a republican party that is already at its weakest in over 25 years and would likely lead to a longer period in the wilderness. While I don’t think that there is much problem with short periods of one party rule balanced by short periods of alternate party rule, extended periods of one party rule inevitably result in an even more insular political class that is even more prone to cronyism and corruption and that serves none of us on the outside well.
I know some will not believe it, but I do hope that the Republicans can get their act together in short order and become an effective opposition party. I think that in order to do so, particularly in the long term, some social conservative positions will have to take a back seat but YMMV.
Pawlenty has now stated that he will abide by the court’s ruling on the Franken Coleman affair.
This whole extended battle over what was essentially a tie is yet more evidence that we should institute instant runoff elections.