 "Photo: Natalie Carillo")
When Barack Obama's former campaign manager, David Plouffe, visited the university last month, he said the Republican candidate he fears most as Obama's 2012 opponent was Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, Jr. Plouffe feels Huntsman's open-mindedness on issues such as civil unions and global warming would make him a serious threat.
The next presidential election is a long way off, but as of Saturday, Huntsman's name can be all but struck from the list of candidates Obama will have to worry about. Why? Obama will be sending the Mandarin-speaking governor to China to serve as America's next ambassador.
Political calculations were played strongly on both sides. Obama took a step toward a second term and scored some bipartisan points in the process, while Huntsman can further develop his foreign affairs credentials and can also demonstrate his ability to serve his country while not serving his party.
Perhaps most telling, however, is what Huntsman's acceptance of the post shows about his feelings in regards to his, own as well as his party's, chances for the White House in 2012. The loss of another important moderate voice raises questions about the future of the GOP, and conservatism in America more broadly.
Certainly there are principles that right-leaning politicians must hold on to if they are to maintain their political identity, however many still feel religious conservatives can not be won over unless politicians play to issues like opposing gays in the military, and even the idea of evolution.
Huntsman calculated that the Republican Party will unlikely be ready to accept his moderate views and the country is not ready to broadly embrace his party. Even though many in the party only begrudgingly accepted John McCain's moderate views, the country was not accepting of a Republican in 2008 and may still not be ready in 2012.
The conservative embrace of traditional social values will likely always be attractive to people of religious faith. However, until the party somewhat jokingly referred to as God's Own Party stop making the case for social policy in religious terms, the non-devout will represent a continually shrinking contingent of the party in number and in voice.
Morality should never be lost from government, and all Americans should be respectful of religious faith even if they have none. However, conservatives must consider the consequences of making political arguments that have little appeal to those outside of the religious community.
Meanwhile, lost in the argument over the role of government today is a viable conservative alternative. Conservatives are not fighting for today's kids who are seeing opportunities go down the drain because liberals are putting special interests before student interests.
Conservatives need to counter liberal populism that attacks success. However, rather than embracing their own brand of populism that attacks "elites," conservatives need to re-establish a respect for those successful people and institutions that in playing by the rules create wealth, prosperity, and innovations improving life for themselves and others. Respecting the successful is important not because we should be subservient to them, but because trying to tear them down simply for their success discourages people who take great risks in search of great achievements. We must encourage the best and brightest among us because doing so pays dividends for society as a while.
Yet conservatives must always remind people that their embracing of those who obtain success and wealth through the free market is not a rejection of those who do not. Where Liberalism seeks to steal from the successful to give to the unsuccessful, conservatism seeks to encourage freedom so that anyone who works hard enough has a chance to become successful themselves. Conservatives know not everyone will succeed, and those who fail should be helped, but by private charity before public. Government is there to provide equality of opportunity, and attempts to force equality of outcome through bureaucracy result in corruption, less equality, and less prosperity.
Conservatives have a powerful argument to make and must make it in a new way to our generation, which will, like our parents' generation, soon tire of government intrusion into our lives. However, until conservatives reject arguments based on theocracy in favor of those based on liberty, they will not be given the privilege of leading this country. Perhaps Jon Huntsman thinks his fellow conservatives will figure this out by 2016. If not, he can rest assured liberals know how to be just as irrational and he will still likely have his chance.
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