Robb: Even if Donald Trump wins, GOP will survive

I just can’t work myself into a frenzy that Donald Trump represents an existential threat to American conservatism and the Republican Party.

That’s in part because I continue to believe that Trump will deflate as actual voting takes place. I may, however, be colossally wrong. In fact, the odds that I am are growing.

So, let’s assume I am wrong and Trump is on his way to be the Republican nominee. Is he a neutron bomb for conservatism and the GOP, as a recent political slam in National Review argues?

Modern American conservatism was created by William F. Buckley, Jr. in the 1950s mostly through the pages of National Review, which he founded. It has three principal tenets: a limited federal government, except for national defense; free-market economics; and traditional cultural values rooted in religion.

Trump certainly stands apart from the realignment of the Republican Party began by Barry Goldwater and completed by Ronald Reagan.

Trump is no conservative

Prior to Goldwater, the GOP was dominated by what he derisively labeled “Me-Too Republicans” – those who wanted to do the same thing as Democrats, just a little less of it and a bit slower.

Reagan finalized the realignment not only of the Republican Party but the Democratic Party as well. Today, liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats are basically extinct.

Trump is not an adherent to any of the conservative tenets enunciated by Buckley. In fact, he has spent his adult life denouncing, ridiculing and flouting them.

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But here is the important point. Trump offers nothing in the way of a political philosophy to compete with or replace Buckley’s conservative tenets. The only thing he has that approaches an organized way of thinking about political economy is a half-baked, warmed over mercantilism regarding international trade. But even with that, he sort of winks and hints that it is just a negotiating tactic.

Moreover, there is no evidence that Republican voters expressing support for Trump have abandoned conservative principles. They are just overlooking Trump’s lack of documented fealty to them for the moment.

Trump is presenting himself as the anti-politician to an electorate disgusted and angry at politics as usual. For the moment, it is enough for Trump to suggest that he’s sort of with them philosophically.

But the Donald is no Mussolini

One of the National Review essayists wrote that Trump was a budding American Mussolini. If Trump were to become president, it is far more likely that he would resemble another Italian leader, Silvio Berlusconi. Another billionaire businessman, full of bombast and big claims, who accomplished nothing and whose entertainment value steadily deteriorated.

As president, Trump would have to come up with actual proposals, with specifics, to reify his bombast. For example, about how to check the religious views of each one of the 75 million annual foreign visitors to the United States, to make sure none of them are Muslim. That would be kind of fun to watch.

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And if Trump became president, liberals might rediscover the virtues of our constitutional system of checks and balances. That would be both fun and a benefit.

If Trump were a disaster as a nominee or as president, Republican political power would undoubtedly wane. But after the Trump tsunami was a fully spent force, would anything have fundamentally changed?

I don’t see what or how.

And there are still plenty of conservatives

There are enough people who believe in conservative principles to remain a political force. And there is no reason to believe that the Republican Party won’t remain the vehicle through which that political force finds expression.

The Republican electorate remains conservative. Trumpism is an attitude, not a set of competing governing beliefs.

The political leaders of the Republican Party would still be fundamentally conservative. And the Republican brand would quickly become defined more by whoever rises in Trump’s aftermath than by Trump’s fading, and ultimately unlamented, political persona.

If Trump is a disaster, Republican political fortunes would dim for a while, perhaps considerably. But ultimately, the American electorate will want a conservative correction to liberal governance. That’s the modern rhythm of American politics. There’s no reason to believe that Trump represents a permanent disruption.

American liberalism survived Jimmy Carter. American conservatism will survive Donald Trump.

Reach Robb at robert.robb@arizonarepublic.com.