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OPINION

Next election offers redemption for the Republican party

Andrew's Assessments

By Andrew Geisler, For The Miami Student

In the recent weeks and months, the conventional wisdom on the 2016 Republican presidential field has shifted toward a showdown between Wisconsin governor, Scott Walker, or another right wing challenger and former Florida governor, Jeb Bush. The thinking goes that Bush will represent the moderate conservative, corporate GOP, while Walker, or another, will speak for the base of the party.

In 2012, this formulation is precisely how the race played out. Mitt Romney sat in the center-right of the party and knocked down everyone who came near him on the right with television advertising.

In the rush to simplify the race - Jeb versus Walker for the heart of the conservative movement! -too many are ignoring the absolute force of nature in the 2016 race, who is Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

The Rubio boomlet came and went last year when he undoubtedly made a fool of himself in his handling of comprehensive immigration reform. He began a cosponsor of the now long-forgotten Senate comprehensive package then when he took heat from the right he backed off. Now he's apparently pro securing the border before all else. This is the GOP's myopic orthodoxy on an issue that's more about bureaucratic failure - our immigration system is terribly broken - than lawlessness of those who seek to live out the American dream.

But I digress. When you set immigration aside, Rubio is the dream candidate of the Republican base and the Republican donor. It also doesn't hurt that he's the dream candidate of conservative intellectuals who would staff up the foreign and domestic policy staff of the next Republican administration.

When you consider what it takes to win the presidency - truly giving people a forward-looking vision for the country - it is hard to beat Rubio's ability to communicate the message of conservatism in this way.

Break it down further and it gets better for Rubio. The Republican Party is broadly hawkish. Rubio sits in the position as the most rational hawk in the race. He takes the threat of ISIS and a nuclear Iran seriously. These will be highly important issues to both the Republican primary voter and the general election voter.

The party is also exceedingly conservative on domestic policy issues. Rubio won his Senate seat as a Tea Party insurgent. He took out the then Rockefeller Republican - and now Democrat - Charlie Crist, in 2010.

He also speaks to the establishment of the party by taking domestic policy seriously. Rubio isn't simply a pro-growth tax cutter. He told an audience at CPAC last week he and Utah Senator Mike Lee would have a tax reform plan out sometime this week. Based on his past rhetoric, this should be a smart and conservative, pro-family proposal. Broadly, Rubio has been for a brand of domestic policy termed reform conservatism by its adherents. Their theory of the case is to make public policy more middle class focused.

With these factors in mind, it is clear the current view of the field by most in the press is silly. Yet it does advantage Rubio. Since most are either saying Rubio has too much to lose by running against his political mentor (Bush) and doesn't have much space in the race, he goes under the radar in raising money and setting up his staff.

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2016 will still be a hotly contested race on the right. Open seat presidential elections against a likely weak and out of practice Democratic candidate don't come around often.

All the contenders will also have the ability to stay in for the long haul. Bush will have a lot of money. That is staying power. He's also shown, since he began to campaign in earnest, an impressive capacity to talk with passion about the imperative for economic growth as a means to lift all Americans up.

Whether Jeb wins or not, this type of rhetoric, and real belief, is highly important to the future of Republicans. Walker - or, if he's never able to get his foot out of his mouth, other right wing challengers - will have staying power, too. The same is true of Kentucky Senator Rand Paul. Like his father, Paul likely has the highest floor and the lowest ceiling of any candidate in the race. This high floor will keep him in for a while.

But with Jeb in middle, and a serious candidate on the right fringe, there will be a space for someone to run up the middle of the party. This candidate can and should be Marco Rubio.

When you game out the state of play in the Republican Party, it is hard to see why voters and donors would pass up the chance to contrast Rubio with someone like Hillary Clinton. Your old and damaged versus our new, serious and impressively experienced for his young age, looks like a good macro set up for the right headed into the 2016 general election.

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