Over the weekend, Newsweek speculated that John Huntsman, the former Utah governor who is now the ambassador to China, might be considering a run for the White House in 2012. This was greeted with a round of "Oh, please" by most people, not just because Huntsman is a relatively moderate, non-crazy member of the GOP, but because he actually took a job working for Barack Obama for heaven's sake, which means he probably hates America. Not only that, he speaks fluent Mandarin, and we all know that knowledge of a foreign language is evidence of insufficient love for this land of ours. (Don't tell anyone, but Mitt Romney speaks -- cover the children's ears -- French. He learned it the same way Huntsman learned Chinese, on his mission for the Mormon church.)
James Fallows, the wisest person in Washington, says that Huntsman "is indeed a very attractive long-term national prospect for the Republicans, whenever they have gotten to the other side of their current Palin/Limbaugh/Gingrich phase." But my question is: when will that be?
The last real-live moderate Republicans nominated for the White House was Gerald Ford in 1976, and they didn't have much choice, what with him already being president. Ford was actually pro-choice, if you can believe it. But ever since they've gone with either serious conservatives or candidates like George H.W. Bush, who had long since purged any trace of moderation from their political beings (and don't get me started on John McCain -- he was never a moderate).
Nothing is forever in politics, but from the perspective of today it's hard to wrap your mind around the idea of Republicans nominating a moderate. How would such a thing play out? I suppose it's possible that a crushing defeat for the 2012 Palin-Wurzelbacher ticket, 2016 could open the door for someone committed to creating a new image for their party, in the way Bill Clinton was in 1992. But it's awfully tough to imagine.
-- Paul Waldman
