In a trailer for his new movie Apocalypto, acclaimed actor/director Mel Gibson explains, “Apocalypto means to have a new beginning.  Unfortunately to have a new beginning, something else has to end.”  The film details the cataclysmic destruction of the corrupt, decadent Mayan civilization in Central America 600 years ago.

Ironically Apocalypto opened on December 8^th, 2006, almost exactly a month after the GOP had an apocalypto of it’s own in the 2006 elections, a GOPocalypto if you will.  Twelve years after the historic 1994 elections brought them to power, the GOP lost control of both the U.S. House and Senate to the Democrats in only a slightly less dramatic fashion.

In millions of disgruntled traditionalists and conservatives there exists the hope that 2006 will mark a new beginning for the GOP.  But before we answer the question, “Where do we go from here?”  prudence dictates that Republicans analyze the reasons for our loss so that we may go forward in a more informed manner.

In the first days after the GOP’s November defeat, I heard a lot of four letter words bantered about.  All of them were “Iraq”.  I don’t think anyone can deny that the war did in fact play a key role in GOP’s misfortune.  Attacking Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, a proven state sponsor of terror, with the idea of building a freer, more democratic (whatever that means) Middle East may have been a noble idea; an idea that most national Democratic leaders agreed with at the beginning I might add.  But in reality it has proven to be a much longer, harder, even self defeating road than most of us really expected.  And the policy is most associated in the national mind with GOP President Bush.

But a bad turn of events in an otherwise honorable endeavor was not the only aspect of the war that turned voters off.  The Bush administration’s seeming inflexibility and misunderstanding of the war contributed to the electoral defeat also.  We all remember the president flying to the aircraft carrier to proclaim, “Mission Accomplished”, or Dick Cheney’s characterization of the insurgents as “a few dead-enders.”  Sectarian violence waxed and waned, but mostly waxed as the months progressed.  But most of what we heard from the White House was “stay the course.”  Even when the President’s team clarified they really meant stay the course, but adjust to the situation on the ground as required, little of the stated policy was backed up with meaningful action.  Whatever one’s thoughts are on the justification for Operation Iraqi freedom, there’s little doubt the mishandling of it added steam to Republican electoral woes. 

Scandals certainly played their part bringing about November’s shift in partisan power. That the Republican Party is responsible for these faux paws however is much more misperception than an accurate gauge of what’s right and wrong in America today.  Sure there were a lot of Republicans that were touched by Abramoff money.  But many Democrats worked with Abramoff and associates too; his corruption crossed party lines.  On a separate item, Tom DeLay, former Republican speaker of the House was indicted for violating campaign finance laws.  But from what I’ve read of the charges, DeLay’s actions never once crossed the line of any particular statute.  His only crime was to live under the jurisdiction of a highly partisan Democrat-appointed judge.  Certainly there was nothing remotely more onerous with DeLay than was commonplace in the financial dealings of the Clinton White House.

Oh, and then there’s the Congressman Mark Foley scandal.  Granted, the GOP leadership’s and their staff’s response to Foley’s abhorrent behavior reflected a little too much forgiveness and a little too little tough love.  But in the final analysis, when exposed, Mark Foley resigned.  Republicans called their leaders to account for not dealing with him in stronger manner.  They did NOT hold a press conference defending a homosexual relationship between a man and a boy, live in a home from out of which a gay prostitution ring was being run, or get in America’s face and say their colleague’s behavior “was nobody’s business but ours”, all sins for which leading Democratic officials have been guilty in the last 20 years. 

Facts and hypocrisy notwithstanding, Republicans were in power; and as such they bore the brunt of the American public’s wrath over a scandal-ridden Washington culture of corruption.

So we have Iraq.  We have scandals.  Maybe even add bureaucratic mishandling of the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.  But that’s not the big story.  The number one reason for Republican losses this November large scale Republican betrayal of its core principals and its base.

Soon after the election, former GOP presidential candidate Gary Bauer wrote a post mortem that appeared in Investors Business Daily and is printed on http://www.ouramericanvalues.org/.   He argued that although values voters put the GOP in power in 2002 and 2004, little emphasis was placed on values issues the past two years.  Indeed he is correct.  There was some work on a federal constitutional amendment to protect traditional marriage and legislation to stop the death of Terri Schiavo.  But there was other legislation that was largely ignored.  A federal bill to define personhood as beginning at conception went nowhere, even in the GOP.  Efforts to limit court jurisdiction over 10 Commandments emblems on public property or to protect home schooling were heard of only in conservative publications, not the halls of Congress.  Gary Bauer was right on the mark.

And then there’s the 1000 pound gorilla that’s about to break through the basement cellar ceiling where it’s kept.  Spending.  Republican platforms have long called for limiting the size of government, but overall government outlays continually exceed the heights of the Clinton administration’s excess these days.  And need I remind we HAD a Republican President, House, and Senate by a reasonable margin.  Earmarks, previously identified as pork projects are out of control.  This year, according to http://www.cnsnews.com/ citing Citizens against Government Waste, there were over 10,000 earmarks costing a total of $29 billion. Republicans were cited over Democrats as the “Party of Big Government” by a margin of 39.3% to 27.9 according to a November poll by the Club for Growth, http://www.clubforgrowth.org/.  Indeed, fiscal irresponsibility reigned supreme under the Republican Congress and President.

So Republicans lost power this year because of Iraq, scandals, and perhaps even Katrina.  But nothing trumps the betrayal of core values and base voters as causing November’s defeat.  Fortunately there’s only a 51 to 49 Democratic margin in the Senate and it’s woefully large in the House either.  The way I look at it, this November was a warning shot; let’s hope Republican leaders got the message.  We wouldn’t want the party to go the way of the Mayans in Apocalypto.