Rich Lowry on the elections at NRO

I am not that jazzed about endless election post mortems, but this one caught my attention, primarily because I rarely disagree with Lowry on anything of substance (Though I doubt he scores his success on what I think).

The points I disagree with (Link to article in headline):

Lowry says conservatives lost because independents broke against them, not conservatives; this is true to the extent that independents did vote in larger numbers for democrats last week. However, I think an argument that independents who cannot distinguish between the republican congress and democrat moderates, coupled with a general dissatisfaction drove the independents into waiting democratic arms. Now stay with me for a minute before saying I missed the point.

In the very next segment he says republicans not being fiscally conservative enough was not a factor and then goes on to ask what meaningful cuts republicans could have made. This is the liberal argument for unfettered spending. Republicans could have spoke with one voice about earmarks, about bridges to nowhere, about out of control agriculture spending and the endless, endless list. Lowry has been around long enough to know how perception in politics works.

Where were the republicans speaking out against out of control spending on pet projects? When I sent a letter to my Senator, Kay Hutchinson, inquiring about her stand on spending transparency, I received back a rather snotty and condescending letter (about three months later) more or less saying government was transparent enough and since she was not on that committee, she had no stand on the issue anyway (I am going to find, scan and post the letter).

So the two ideas (independent flight and a lack of conservative representation in the congress) tie together in my eyes. I think denying this leads republicans away from the path to power, not closer.