GOP Can Capitalize on Obama's Reign

“Never allow a crisis to go to waste,” Rahm Emanuel told a reporter after President Obama’s election. “They are opportunities to do big things.” That’s candid talk, but it might have been premature, writes William Kristol in the Weekly Standard. Emanuel assumed that Bush would be blamed for the crisis. “But what if the crisis becomes Obama’s crisis?” asks Kristol. “Then the opportunities can be Republican opportunities.”

So far, Republicans have done a good job picking themselves up and mounting a full-throated opposition to Obama. But it’s not enough. “The GOP should begin looking for opportunities to think anew about big issues,” while simultaneously advancing small initiatives. They could fight Obama’s closing of Guantanamo, for example, or put ROTC back on college campuses. “Republicans aren’t going to govern,” he says. “But they shouldn’t assume they’ll be powerless.” (More William Kristol stories.)