Damek.

There’s an interesting post on DailyKos noting the apparent death (or coma) of the GOP in New York state. It’s true, the NY GOP is pathetic and has become a joke. It doesn’t make me happy, for as much of a liberal as I am, and in fact because of that, I believe we need other voices in our political system, and the disparate voices within one party do not necessarily qualify. We need a vibrant GOP — but what sort of GOP would it be? How to resuscitate them? Not necessarily so I’d vote for them, but so somebody would?

I think two things are at work here. First, as kos notes, is the nationally dominant strain of Republicanism; “New York-style Republicans have become obsolete in the DeLay-Lott-Bush Republican Party.” So, part of it is simply an unfortunate association with other, genuinely corrupt and wrong individuals.

Second, I would argue, any 20th Century style of Republican is becoming obsolete in the 21st Century, particularly in an already traditionally blue state, its less-blue northern areas notwithstanding.

What do I mean by this? OK, consider some of the important issues of the 19th Century. Slavery, women’s suffrage, federalism, etc. These things were largely “resolved” to the extent that they were not things anyone would really argue about in the 20th Century. By the time Kennedy came along the big issues were very different.

Throughout American history, conservatism has been the skeptical conscience of a nation forged in reckless progressivism. A nation of radical colonial separatists! A tradition of experimentation and progressive, liberal solutions to political and social problems. Experiments which aren’t always a success and solutions for which there is no shame in being cautious and conservative at the time of their conception.

As Andrew Sullivan writes, “conservatism is fundamentally rooted in skepticism about the human mind and its capacity to change society,” and that, therefore, “it’s basically resistant to large-scale change, but, on the rare occasions that such change happens, is necessary and turns out okay, conservatives can live with it.”

Unfortunately conservatism has gone off-track, with whole swaths of the GOP refusing to accept most of the successful solutions of the 20th Century (New Deal, civil rights, etc.). Not only are they uninterested in new ideas which have been demonstrated successful in other countries, they wish to tear apart even those which have been successful here.

The major questions of the 20th Century have been answered. Pretty much the main things conservatives have opposed have not turned out to be worth opposing. A new conservatism needs to, as Sullivan says, learn to live with them, and focus on the future.

In New York, the GOP will find new life in throwing off its allegiance to the now (hopefully) dying strands of 20th-Century Goldwater/Reagan/Thatcher/Bush/Limbaugh/Rand (heh) conservatism, embrace the 20th Century liberalism citizens have come to expect from their government, and worry about the new, untested ideas people may be putting forth.

Conservatism is rightly the human conscience, human skepticism, but it must remain rooted in science, reason and the Enlightenment, rather than miring itself in long-dead arguments, opposing long-proven & accepted policies on long-dead principles. For starters, get past Econ 101 and embrace modern economics.

You know, thinking about this, I can’t help thinking it would be better for the GOP to really, truly, just die. Know what would happen then? The Democratic Party would split and we’d be back to a healthy, liberal government with the more conservative skeptics vs. the more gung-ho progressives. But the national GOP won’t let that happen. Probably to New York’s detriment.