Charles Krauthammer: Republican Party doesn't need an ideological shift

Ignore the trimmers. There's no need for radical change. The other party thinks it owns the demographic future — counter that in one stroke by fixing the Latino problem. Do not, however, abandon the party's philosophical anchor. In a world where European social democracy is imploding before our eyes, the party of smaller, more modernized government owns the —eological future.

Romney is a good man who made the best argument he could, and nearly won. He would have made a superb chief executive, but he (like the Clinton machine) could not match Barack Obama in the darker arts of public persuasion.

The answer to Romney's failure is not retreat, not aping the Democrats' patchwork pandering. It is to make the case for restrained, rationalized and reformed government in stark contradistinction to Obama's increasingly unsustainable big-spending, big-government paternalism.

Republicans: No whimpering. No whining. No reinvention when none is needed. Do conservatism, but do it better. There's a whole generation of leaders ready to do just that.

Charles Krauthammer's email address is letters@charleskrauthammer.com.