In April, Roy Wenzl of The Wichita Eagle wrote a story about former Senator and Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole. It was a fascinating look at Dole’s life and his take on politics in 2013. On Sunday, Fox News Sunday’s Chris Wallace conducted an interview with Dole, now 89, which received lots of play on the cable news networks.

Today’s Republican Party should be listening to Dole.

Dole was asked what he thought about the Republican Party today, and he said, “I think they ought to put a sign on the national committee doors that says closed for repairs until New Year’s Day next year and spend that time going over ideas and positive agendas.”Then he was asked, “Could people like Bob Dole, even Ronald Reagan, could you make it in today’s Republican Party?” Dole responded, “I doubt it. And I — Reagan wouldn’t have made it. Certainly Nixon couldn’t have made it, because he had ideas and, we might have made it, but I doubt it.”

Wallace then asked, if they were “Too moderate? Too willing to compromise?” Dole said, “I just consider myself a Republican, none of this hyphenated stuff. I was a mainstream conservative Republican, and most people are in that category.”

I met Dole in 1996 while I was in Washington – just a day or two before he resigned from the Senate to devote all of his time to the Presidential campaign of 1996 against Bill Clinton. The meeting took place in the Senate Majority Leader’s office. I have a photo from that meeting tucked away in a box somewhere. I was honored to meet Dole not only because he was the Senate Majority leader but because he was a fellow veteran – and a hero to me.

I also met Jack Kemp (Dole’s running mate) when he came to Montana that year – I was in charge of getting drivers for the motorcade that would take him to a farm east of Great Falls for a campaign speech. Dole/Kemp were creamed by Clinton/Gore in 1996 – but they carried Montana!

There’s some good news today: One of the problems with today’s Republican Party is departing. Today when I woke up there was a Fox News alert on my phone saying that Congresswoman Michele Bachmann had announced that she will not run for re-election in 2014. That’s a start.

The Montana Republican Party is holding their convention June 7-8 in Bozeman. They should play the Dole interview a few times during their convention so it’s engrained in their minds, and print the article and place it in everyone’s packet. So far the convention line-up does not appear to be that exciting – The keynote speaker for the banquet Saturday night is first-term Congressman Steve Daines (of Montana) and the secondary speaker is Montana Public Service Commission (PSC) Chairman Bill Gallagher. I bet tickets are still available…

The Republican Party that gave us great political leaders like Ronald Reagan and Bob Dole has faded away. The art of compromise is long gone as are most of the moderate voices in the Party.

Roy Wenzl of The Wichita Eagle closed his article with a great Dole story. Dole told Wenzl, “Politics is a tough business.” Dole told him about being in Colby, Kan., during a time they were debating the farm bill in the senate. He talked about a group of wheat farmers who were against his position on the farm bill. He said, “They were all seated in the front row. They all had caps that said ‘Dump Dole.’ And I said, I’ll put you guys down as undecided.”

God Bless Bob Dole.

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