I know they are going to kowtow to their base but I think that Paul Begala makes a really good political point as to what the GOP needs to do right now. Mind you this in the wake of the Bush Administration:
The GOP will rebound, to be sure. Politics is cyclical, but sometimes those cycles take decades. Republicans can hasten their comeback by following the Clinton model: Challenge established orthodoxies, overturn outdated dogma and modernize their movement.Clinton committed the heresy of supporting welfare reform, tough anti-crime policies, free trade and fiscal discipline. In so doing he paved the way for President Obama. No one today is attacking President Obama on crime or welfare; Clinton took those Republican-dominated issues off the table.
If the Republicans were smart, they'd find a principled compromise on health care and energy -- take those two Democratic-dominated issues off the table -- and then work on rebuilding their fiscal credentials.
This ain't 1994. The GOP can't stand on the outside and shout about issues as if they had no chance to enact different polices. The Republicans have been discredited on almost every issue they normally campaign on (with the exception of riding the fence on some social issues) and should heed Begala's advice. A principled (as much as possible) compromise on issues that Obama is likely to win will give them leverage to make their case for better policies, but until then "the Party of No" will be around for a while.
