Is the Reagan Era Over? Rush Examines Newt's Infatuation with Huckabee

Rush Limbaugh has fine-tuned his Fingerspitzgefuehl to the point that he appears prophetic when his on-air analysis pans out days, weeks, even months later to be true. He discerns the cloud no bigger than a man's hand before anyone else. Here he is on Newt tooting his own flute:

I have suspected -- I've not known, but I have suspected -- that Newt is advising the Huckabee campaign.

I don't know this. It's just a wild guess, but based on this comment, "The Reagan era is over. The George W. Bush era is over. We're at a point in time we're about to start redefining, as a number of people have started talking..." Yes, they are. Every one of these Republicans is starting to talk about redefining the party, and this has been going on since the early days of this, not just now. If you recall, all during last year, I told you this was my big concern: that Reaganism and conservatism were going to be redefined so as to fit the mold of whoever these guys on our primary roster are. One of the things that Newt said is "redefine the nature of the Republican Party in response to what the country needs." Something about that rubs me wrong. Something about that sort of grates on me. The Republican Party is supposed to sit out there and I guess (slurps) moisten its index finger, stick it in the air, find out what people want, and be that? That's not who we are! Now, it may be who populists are. In fact, it is exactly who populists are. Even if you have no intention of following through on what you plan to do as you promise all these wonderful things to your supporters, as a populist. But this is not what the Republican Party has been. It's what the Democrat Party had been.

Cue Fred Thompson, who is coming out in S.C. and hitting his marks suddenly with vim and vigor.

Fred used the very line about Huckabee that Rush is implying about the new populism: that it's the old Democrat Party, the party of failure and corruption that is now seducing Republicans hankering for another bite of the apple like Newt. Huckabee is Democrat social programs with a Republican cultural bias. And Newt seems to like that.

Unless Rush is wrong, and he seldom is. Check the link above for more salutary wisdom from Limbaugh about Mark Steyn's stout defense of capitalism---that much derided economic system that still puts the USA as producing 25+% of the world's goods and services. Why do Americans forget how great and strong we are?

[Newt] said, "The era of Reagan is over. ... It's the end of the Reagan era." It is not. If the Reagan era is over, if the Reagan coalition is dead, what replaced it? Could somebody tell me? Precisely nothing has replaced it, and that's why so many people are scratching their heads, why so many people are a little nervous, because there isn't any real leadership out there that causes people and inspires people to get behind it and go rah-rah and make certain things happen.

I mean, is there a Gingrich coalition that has replaced the Reagan coalition? For that matter, what is the McCain coalition? If we're going to have a new era, what is the McCain era? What is the Huckabee era? What is their winning coalition? They don't have one. You know, all this sounds like Third Way kind of talk, the triangulation of the Clinton years in the nineties. But I don't know what the McCain era would be, and I don't know what the Huckabee coalition is. They don't have a coalition. They're out trying to get votes of independents and Democrats. They're pandering to moderates and independents. Folks, I just want you to think about this: What happens if either of these two guys happen to win, attracting the votes of independents, moderates, the Jell-Os, and Democrats? Does that not equal the demise of the Republican Party? Do you think McCain's out there actually trying to get Republican votes? Is Huckabee trying to get Republican votes? Romney is. Giuliani is. Fred Thompson certainly is. But if we have a nominee that is a nominee on the basis of moderate and independent and Democrat voters, then what happens to the Republican Party?

Do they not know this? If they do know this, is this their aim? Is their objective, for whatever reason -- sour grapes, they don't think they can win as Republicans because they're really not Republicans. Is this the objective here, to redefine (or maybe ruin) the Republican Party? Even so, the coalition of Democrats, independents, moderates, the Jell-Os, that is not a coalition. They don't have a coalition. McCain doesn't have one. Huckabee doesn't have one. They want to transform the party into a center-left party like these so-called conservative parties in Europe, and to do that, they've gotta say, "The Reagan era is over," and they have to embrace expediency, which, in the end, of course, is a losing proposition. Let me hit you right between the eyes here. If you want to find out what would happen to the country with a McCain or Huckabee president, take a look at what's happened to Governor Schwarzenegger in California. Here was a guy who actively ran as a conservative and as a Republican and, as you know, was elected. We all know now what has happened to him.

Schwartzenegger is turning California into a Canadian socialist wannabe province like Michigan, a state which has taxed itself into economic penury. A state where businesses rush to get OUT of its high-tax, high-politically correct environment of Euroweenie mediocrity. Does Rush see any hope on the horizon?

this Republican roster of candidates has always been somewhat disquieting, and we know that it is because if you look at it, it's pretty much evenly spread, the support around all the top-tier people. Look what happens, by the way, when one of them happens to pipe up. Look what happens. I have a headline: "A Combative Thompson Sways Voters -- 'But then last night -- we hadn't even been thinking about him -- all of a sudden it was clear he was the one,' said Mr. Berenberk, a retired teacher. 'The bluntness, the forcefulness. He was really impressive.'" He's talking about Thompson in the last South Carolina debate. So candidate aside -- put Thompson aside for a moment -- when conservative truths are heard, it's an affecting and effective message. People have revelations when they hear it. They just haven't been hearing it from people who want to lead the party and who want to lead the country. So what's lacking here is not ideas and not principles, but the right people to speak them and the right people to develop strategies to win elections based on those ideas and principles. What's lacking, if you will, is intellectual and political leadership.

This jives a bit with the ditzy girl O'Reilly has on to analyze body language and gestures and facial expressions. Last night, she judged Fred Thompson to have "terrible body language..." So Fred has the message, but so far he hasn't revved up enough to deliver the message effectively? Or will he be the last man standing in the OK Corral after the primaries wreak their havoc?
Mark Steyn may have the answer to what we need, and the hope for change might be trumped by the common sense of the American people, many of whom don't know how good they have it.

Rush's lament might presage enough cognitive dissonance to get voters to examine what sort of "change" and "hope" the various snake-oil salesmen, of whom Newt appears ready to join along with Ah-Noooold, are really peddling.