Chris Christie, Brian Sandoval, Mitt Romney and Thomas Jefferson: One size does not fit all

Said here earlier, a representative Western candidate for president in 2016 would carry 30 Western and middle states while Hillary Clinton carried only New York and New Jersey for sure. But with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) today bolting to the front of the parade, he would take the Northeast. And with an inspired choice like the popular and able Hispanic governor of Nevada, Brian Sandoval, for vice president, Christie would fully engage the West and institutionalize a new conservative paradigm.

But what conservatism really needs is a philosopher king to bring it into a post-Tea Party era and bring the issues awakened in that maelstrom — states’ rights, sound money, constitutional government — to a more mature, practical working model. Mitt Romney would be the right man for the job. 

{mosads}I am always impressed by Romney’s incredible attention to detail. He sees more; he collects more. Like Don Draper on “Mad Men,” he “sees everything.” And I was impressed that Romney’s office would take the time to call and discuss and return mail to a cold caller when he was governor of Massachusetts.

I’d been proposing here a Jeffersonian approach for New England, a devolution of power to the states in about as many things as possible. It is an idea I felt then and now fits the contours of the times. The Hamiltonian “one size fits all” was a great fit when America consisted of three cities and a forest in 1776. But we are filled up now with regions mature and healthy, some booming and beginning, like the delightful and dynamic San Antonio, Texas, and the newly wealthy North Dakota towns, while others like Boston and northern New England, where I live, advance to mature aging. These many Americans have different needs and requirements today and an overriding, generic and hovering central government no longer fits any of them, as we are finding today with the televised debacle which is ObamaCare.

RomneyCare in Massachusetts would work generally in Boston and I would suggest greater New England, but it would not work elsewhere in America in the same way because one size does not fit all.

The Tea Party evolved this idea when my local New Hampshire state representatives challenged ObamaCare from a states’ rights perspective in 2009. I’m not sure anything is left of the Tea Party of importance and necessity. But Romney in this regard should be considered the first to advance the Jeffersonian ideal of a regional approach.

As The New American reports:

“I think the president [Obama] failed to learn the lessons that came from the experience of Massachusetts,” Romney said. “First of all, the Massachusetts experience was a state-run plan. The right way to deal with health care reform is not to have a one-size-fits-all plan that’s imposed on all the states, but recognizing the differences between different states’ populations, states should be able to craft their own plans to get all their citizens insured, and to make sure that preexisting conditions are covered.”

This perfectly states the Jefferson ideal and this is a major departure from the centralized government tradition of both political parties.

Christie brings new images, new archetypes and a positive new collective personality to America. But Romney’s is a new vision of Jeffersonian conservatism. It is essential to the continued development and advancement of the varied American regions over the new century.