GOP reform

In the wake of Tuesday's election, some will argue that voters have rejected Republican principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism.

They might have a case had the GOP spent the past eight years actually advocating for such ideals. Instead, its recent history is defined by big-spenders who managed to thoroughly ruin the brand name.

Think Barack Obama would have been elected president if he had promised tax increases instead of tax cuts for 95 percent of Americans?

The GOP has already started the process of regrouping and rethinking its place in the political landscape. The early, inescapable conclusion is plastered across the signs and bumper stickers that helped put so many Republicans out of office: change.

The party needs changes in identity and leadership. It needs to revamp its message to voters. It needs to re-energize the country's fiscal conservatives and come up with a counter to President-elect Obama, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi -- and it needs to do it quickly.

An encouraging first sign: House Republican Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., announced he would not seek re-election to the party's No. 2 post in the lower chamber. Rep. Blunt was a leadership holdover from Tom DeLay's days running the House, when instead of curtailing government power and spending, Republicans threw pork at anyone who would write a check to the party's re-election campaigns.

Rep. Blunt said it was time for a new generation of Republicans to deliver the party's marching orders.

Hallelujah. Perhaps the few remaining Republicans in Congress were paying attention Tuesday night, after all.

Republicans need to identify principled lawmakers who can credibly sell the party's traditional goals of limited federal powers, responsible stewardship of taxpayer money, and economic growth through the creation of wealth -- not the redistribution of it.

"We're finally untethered from the big-government conservatism that defined the Bush administration," said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., one of the party's stalwart anti-pork warriors and a candidate for a leadership position. Rep. Flake also wants to move the party away from the wedge issues that alienate independents and moderate voters.

"If the Republican Party is a right-wing party, it cannot win. It has to transcend ideology to address the common sense problems with common sense solutions," said Republican strategist Frank Luntz, a former adviser to one-time presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani. "This is a center-right country, not a right-wing one."

Exactly. The 2008 election is history. And if big-spending Republican old-timers such as Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska don't step aside, the 2010 ballot will be, too.