ANALYSIS/OPINION:

It’s the 21st century. We’ve got robots. Genetic engineering.
Artificial intelligence. Hypersonic transportation.
Nanotechnology. Human cloning. Hydrogen-powered cars. We’re
even working on antigravity machines.

So where are the candidates of the Grand Old Party? They’re
busy trying to be a movie actor born more than 100 years ago,
in 1911. And a mediocre one, at that (he really didn’t make a
smooth transition from radio to those newfangled “talkies”).

Sure, that “Bedtime For Bonzo” guy turned out to be Ronald Reagan, and sure, THAT
Ronald Reagan (not the
Democrat he was in the 1950s) turned out to be a pretty darned
good president. But that, people, was 30-some years ago. Back
then, a Macintosh was an apple, not an Apple. Those on the
cutting edge of technology were using that dynamic new
communication device — the pager. And the Internet was the mesh
inside your swim trucks.

But, for some reason, the Republicans want to go back to the
idyllic 1980s — acid-washed jeans, the Cold War, Milli Vanilli,
“Dallas,” yuppies, the 10-year war in Afghanistan (that time it was the
Soviets), political correctness, the Commodore 64, Swatch.

President Reagan was not a
genius; he was a very smart man, but no genius. Still, he had
lived through heyday of the ‘20s, the depression of the ‘30s,
the Great War of the ‘40s, the Baby Boom of the ‘50s, the
social turmoil of the ‘60s, the excess and explosion of the
‘70s. It doesn’t take a genius to learn the lessons of a
half-century of just paying attention to the world. Reagan was smart enough to keep
his pores open and absorb all that knowledge through a life
filled with simple experience.

He was simply a man for his times, just as Margaret Thatcher was a woman
(and every bit a man) for her times. America had just gone
through the drama of a president resigning in shame, and along
came this man, this virile, striking man, who saw America —
still, despite its dramatic fall — as a shining city on a hill.

The image struck Americans in the heart; they saw it too,
always. But Reagan didn’t
say he was like anyone else, trying to be someone. Like few
others before him, he was simply himself.

Some say this year’s GOP nomination battle is just a rerun of
Nelson Rockefeller, a liberal Republican, running against
arch-conservative Barry
Goldwater. Of course, Rockefeller — that era’s Mitt Romney — lost the nomination to
Goldwater — that era’s
Ronald Reagan. Goldwater went on to lose in one
the biggest landslides in history, but never mind that.
Ideologues will fight that fight, damn the consequences to the
party.

But the bigger issue is the soul of the Republican Party.
George Bush the First got
crushed in 1992 by a superliberal who proclaimed “I feel your
pain.” When it came time for the GOP to post up a candidate
against Bill Clinton, they came up with — Bob Dole? Beholden to
the Christian coalition, he got crushed. George Bush the Second won as a
“compassionate conservative,” but only because America was sick
of Mr. Clinton — and especially his veep, Al Gore.

Mr. Bush turned out to be
(surprise) a big-government Republican, spending every bit as
wildly as any Democrat. Then, in 2008, the GOP, as in 1996,
went with the next in line, posting up another liberal
Republican (albeit a self-described “maverick”). The
Establishment Republicans and the Socially Conservative
Republicans and the Fiscally Conservative Republicans beat each
other down until all that was left was the LCD Candidate (the
least common denominator). Again, crushed.

Mr. Romney is that LCD
Candidate, many argue. Despite the emergence of a powerful new
conservative faction (the tea party), Republicans are about to
embark on a trip they’ve taken several times in the past
half-century. The party is more splintered than ever, thanks in
part to Newt Gingrich’s scorched-earth campaign.

Should Mr. Romney lose, all
segments of the Republican Party and conservative movement will
have to step back to reassess. They may simply decide then that
the party is broken beyond repair, say goodbye to Mr. Reagan’s “big tent” and
shatter into a hundred factions.

All over who really is the next Ronald Reagan. In 2012. You can’t
make this stuff up.

• Joseph Curl covered the White House and politics for a
decade for The Washington Times. He can be reached at
jcurl@washingtontimes.com.

© Copyright 2012 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint
permission.

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CURL: The end of the GOP as we knew it