A few weeks ago, David Karol argued that “Romney’s very inconsistency was a necessary, if not sufficient, condition for his success in capturing his party’s presidential nomination this year.”
As proof, he wrote:
To believe otherwise one would have to find it a reasonable counterfactual that a candidate who was pro-choice, pro-gay rights, not a fan of the NRA, not a fan of Ronald Reagan and one who believed that an individual mandate for health insurance should be the foundation of health care reform at the national level could be nominated by the Republican Party for President in 2012.
My first inclination, upon reading this, was to point out that Romney’s win deserved an asterisk — it was, of course, a very weak field.
On the other hand, Karol produces plenty of evidence suggesting that Romney’s changing positions is hardly unique for a modern politician:
The same LBJ who once backed Jim Crow said We Shall Overcome. The same Ronald Reagan who aligned the GOP with the pro-life movement signed a bill liberalizing abortion law in California even before Roe v. Wade. The first President Bush was once for the Equal Rights Amendment, gun control, abortion rights and called cutting taxes at all costs “voodoo economics.” On the way to the White House Bush dropped all these stands. It’s doubtful he would have been Reagan’s successor had he stuck to his original positions on these issues. Similarly, the Al Gore who served in Congress representing rural Tennessee and who was closer to the NRA than NARAL would have had trouble being nominated for President. The Al Gore who aligned his stands with the dominant views in his party was nominated in 2000.
Ultimately, I disagree with the Machiavellian notion that political success depends on such flexibility. Certainly, some have strategically climbed (as Disraeli might have said) that greasy political pole — by changing positions.
But not every flip-flop is as cynical. The best case for inconsistency, it seems to me, is that intellectually honest leaders learn, grow, and yes, evolve. The issue isn’t that people change. But the hope is that they sincerely change in the right way (and ideally for the right reasons).
Churchill changed parties. Whittaker Chambers, the author of “Witness” — perhaps the most powerful critique of Communism of the 20 century — was himself a communist, before becoming one of the early writers for National Review. And G.K. Chesterton dabbled in the occult — before becoming one of the great Christian apologists of his time. The best converts were often the worst sinners.
As such, rather than depressing us, this should give us hope. It implies there is at least a chance that Romney could be another Reagan.