Right Wing Nut House

An interesting piece in yesterday’s Boston Globe by Drake Bennett on some youthful (so to speak) conservatives who are trying to inject some new blood into the right’s intellectual firmament that lately has seemed to be suffering from some kind of iron deficiency according to liberal critics.

To be sure, the idea that conservatism is “dead” (Tanenhaus), or “exhausted” (Borosage) has been a favorite hobby horse of liberals for a few years. But for purposes of dealing with the reality of what is happening with conservatism, I prefer the notion that we have simply lost our way - politically, intellectually, and as a social nexus.

Tanenhaus (who actually had some relevant thoughts about the too ideological nature of the conservative “movement”) believes that conservatism’s decline is actually a boon to the right because the philosophical framework had been hijacked by decidedly un-conservative forces.

This is actually recognized by a couple of Bennett’s up and comers:

Luigi Zingales says it’s time for conservatives to fall out of love with businesses, and fall back in love with the free market. In an argument that’s begun to catch the ear of a few conservative thinkers, Zingales suggests that it’s often business itself, rather than the government, that the market needs protection from.

“I’m very strongly pro-market and very strongly against business,” says the Italian-born economist, a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Separating the support of free markets from the long Republican alliance with business isn’t easy, says Zingales, but it’s important. As he and colleague Raghuram Rajan laid out in their 2003 book, “Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists,” powerful companies, given the chance, work hand-in-glove with government officials to craft laws and regulations that protect them while limiting competition and transparency.

Many conservatives have been sensing this for years but either through cowardice or simple practical politics, refused to recognize the fact that corporations have become as supportive of statism as any far left Democrat you can name. In this way, they stifle competition, give themselves unfair advantage through regulation, and give money to candidates from both parties so that they can mitigate the effects of unfriendly legislation - usually through the earmark process but sometimes by their congressional lackey slipping an amendment into a bill in the dead of night when no one is noticing that favors them to the exclusion of others.

The Bush administration invited corporate lobbyists into government in order to regulate the businesses they most recently were employed by. Mr. Fox, meet Mrs. Hen. Zingales believes such a set up contributed to the financial meltdown last fall as financial corporations developed rules and regulations favorable to themselves and not necessarily good for regulating their activities.

The Zingales critique is not new but some of his solutions should raise eyebrows on the right, like helping “workers” instead of businesses during he current downturn and dispensing any stimulus based on an algorithmic solution rather than the kind of cronyism we have seen to date.

Four years ago I would have wondered what Zingales was smoking in order to call himself a conservative and not support business. But the Democratic takeover of congress should have convinced anyone on the right that big business cared little about markets and more about being able to control government for their individual aggrandizement. The latest example: Wal-Mart hopping aboard the Obamacare train before it left the station. By supporting the public option and the insurance mandate for companies to supply health insurance to their workers, Wal-Mart gets to influence the final package so that it is tailored more to their needs.

Bennett also explores the efficacy of the blogosphere in acting as a feeder program for conservative ideas - a function reserved in the past for the few conservative mags like NR and Human Events as well as some think tanks like AEI and Heritage. He uses as an example, the Atlantic’s excellent Megan McCardle as someone who has slipped into the role of gatekeeper and facilitator of conservative ideas:

“[Blogging] is decreasing the power of being part of the feeder system and feeder schools, and of being part of the ecosystem, which I certainly wasn’t,” says Megan McArdle.

McArdle, whose politics make her more a libertarian than a classic conservative, is one of the most prominent voices in the political blogosphere. Also an editor at the Atlantic Monthly, she came to both journalism and blogging somewhat sideways, after working at a series of failed Internet start-ups and going to business school.

[...]

McArdle and bloggers like her, in other words, have created their own intellectual ecosystem. William F. Buckley was widely admired for his determination and ability to bring a diversity of conservative voices into National Review, and similarly, McArdle’s blog is among the best at organizing the cacophony of the political blogosphere into something closer to a conversation. Blog posts on the Sonia Sotomayor Supreme Court nomination or the outlines of the stimulus package alternate with links to the insights of artificial-intelligence expert Jim Manzi, who writes on science and environmental policy, or Daniel Larison, a politically minded scholar of Byzantine history.

For all the connections she creates, McArdle is an often vehement disagreer as well, and a believer in the blogosphere’s power to kill off wrongheaded arguments on the way to something new and important. “It can take a long time,” she says, “but bad ideas do tend to die.”

No, McArdle is not a conservative in the classic sense but her blog is one of the best at collating right of center ideas and disbursing them around the internet. Her own analysis of economics is the best “plain English” explanations you can find - certainly better than any MSM business section writer and surpassing the Wall Street Journal by plenty. She has a first class mind and an excellent sense of being able to cut through the chaff and find the essence of an idea. A rare bird indeed.

Bennett hightlighted a couple of other “new” conservative thinkers but the only other one I was interested in is Reihan Salam, a former research assistant for David Brooks and someone whose writings have influenced me over the last few months.

It’s hard to peg Salam as a true “man of the right” for many ideological conservatives today. That’s because he is not in favor of repealing the Great Society and the New Deal.

He and I came to the same conclusion independently of one another; that a more pragmatic, realistic conservatism is necessary for political success; that conservatives should embrace government in order to reform it and make it as conservative as is practically possible.

If big government is necessary, Salam asks, and can even help create a society more agreeable to conservatives, then what should it be doing? Drawing in part on the work of scholars such as Wilcox, Salam and Douthat craft a vision of a government that is activist in a different way, putting priority on stability and responsibility, along with opportunity. They push for child-care subsidies, market-friendly healthcare reform, more affordable housing, and for wage subsidies to boost the incomes of poor young men and make them more eligible for marriage and stable fatherhood.

“The idea is, let’s actually reduce the scope of government in some areas, where it’s kind of pernicious, but let’s increase its role in some areas, insofar as increasing the role can actually increase freedom,” Salam says.

Under the Obama administration, Salam has continued to press the case for big-government conservativism in articles and as a blogger for both the National Review and the online Daily Beast.

Salam was an early Sarah Palin supporter which should give anyone pause about accusing him of being anything other than a pragmatic conservative. His argument is the same I have been making for many months on this site; the road back for conservatism is not through the ideological terrorists who have set themselves up as arbiters of conservative dogma, condemning those they determine to have strayed from their extraordinarily narrow minded and confining definition of conservatism.

Rather, it is through advocating the reasoned and pragmatic application of conservative principles to government as it exists today that will bring the right out of the darkness. And a couple of the conservatives mentioned in Bennett’s article will probably be leading the way.

By the way, that may be the first article I’ve read on conservatism in a while that made no mention of Ronald Reagan. Many ideological conservatives have deified Reagan while failing to recognize where The Gipper’s true genius lay.

Ronald Reagan did not create a conservative government during his 8 years in office. Government grew substantially (although at a slower rate than the previous decade) during his two terms as president. Neither did Reagan always stand fast on his principles as the 1986 tax increase proved - the largest tax increase in history at the time. He also made several other compromises including cutting deals on social security and numerous budget items.

When one considers that he ignored the vital principle of not negotiating with terrorists when he exchanged arms for hostages, it is difficult to understand why conservatives today can say that they wish contemporary politicians were “more like Reagan” in adhering to principled stands on issues in Congress.

Selective memory when it comes to Reagan and his actual governance gets in the way of returning to a more pragmatic conservatism that The Gipper supported in practice, even though his rhetoric sometimes belied his realistic approach to governing.

Ronald Reagan was a pragmatic ideologue who tried to make government as conservative as was possible during his time in office. Striving but falling far short of the kind of government those who invoke his name so reverently today envision as “true” conservative government. This continuously angered the conservative purists in and out of government - a fact long forgotten by those who see the historical Reagan as a civic saint and who believe conservative politicians should emulate everything from his personae to his agenda in order to find success at the polls.

The conservative mentioned in Bennett’s article - along with a few others like Conor Friedersdorf, Ross Douthat, (who collaborated with Salam in writing a book about how the right can make a comeback) and because he’d probably feel bad if I left him out, David Frum - are on the cusp of the new media’s attempt to recalibrate conservatism so that it reflects a more dynamic, and pragmatic, reality.

The ideologues dismiss their ideas at their own peril.

Salon’s “Dear Abbey” for hilariously confused and clueless lefties who ask questions of Glenallen Walken about conservatism - “Dear Wingnut” - is one of the most entertaining things about that publication. The childlike and simple minded questions asked by liberals of the author (and the comment threads his column generates) remind me of a kid asking his dad, “Why is the sky blue?” or maybe “How many stars are there, daddy?”

This week’s entry is typical:

Ronald Reagan left office 20 years ago and died five years ago. When are you conservatives finally going to move on?

Walken patiently tried to explain that Reagan’s convictions and principles were timeless and that “moving on” would be impossible because the Gipper showed conservatives how to win:

Part of that is because Reagan was, to borrow a phrase from Lady Margaret Thatcher, “a conviction politician.” He operated out of a set of deeply held beliefs that governed his view of the world, of morality and the presidency. Unlike Nixon or Clinton, Reagan’s concerns about public opinion were addressed in the way he dealt with issues and crises, not whether he dealt with them at all.

Ronald Reagan came into office in 1980 promising to do three things: 1) Restore America’s national pride; 2) Revive an economy crippled by stagflation; and 3) Win the Cold War. He did all three even though, thanks to Tip O’Neill and friends, he had one hand held behind his back. At the same time he cruised to re-election in 1984 with the largest Electoral College majority in history, winning 49 states while losing only the District of Columbia and, by 7,000 votes, his Democratic opponent’s home state of Minnesota. That is a feat that may never be matched.

[...]

Most importantly, it was Reagan’s achievement of building or at least maintaining a successful political coalition composed of social conservatives, libertarian-leaning voters concerned about the economy and the size of government, moderate, “birthright” Republicans, working class Democrats and voters worried about foreign policy issues that make him the enduring standard against which the party and conservatives measure their success today. The ongoing debate between many national Republican leaders and pretenders over what the party should now stand for, following back-to-back routs in 2006 and 2008 — is really a discussion of how best to replicate the Reagan model of campaigning and governance.

Walken also points out that asking the GOP to abandon Reagan would be like asking the Democrats to abandon FDR - neither party can escape the shadow cast by those two giants.

Walken has it about right although I wonder how might one replicate Reagan’s “model of campaigning and governance.” George Bush tried to emulate Reagan’s style of White House management to some extent by giving his underlings and cabinet secretaries enormous leeway in accomplishing broad goals set out by the president. It worked quite well in Reagan’s first term, much less so in the second due largely to poor choices in picking personnel. Bush had even less success, I think, due to his incuriosity about so many things. Reagan was known to grill his people about policy while Bush was, from what we know, much too trusting of his staff.

Also with regard to Reagan’s governance, there is one thing that the base never tires of pointing out to me; that Reagan stood on his principles. This is true - as far as it went. Reagan was also a master compromiser who was a lot less ideological than his critics ever gave him credit. According to many conservatives today, compromising with the Democrats is is worse than making a deal with the devil. Those who work with the other side are RINO’s or misguided fools and have no principles. They point to Bush’s No Child Left Behind and Medicare drug programs as the result of consorting with the enemy. Reagan himself was snookered once or twice by Speaker Tip O’Neil. But on the really big issues, where the Gipper needed Democratic votes to pass his agenda, both Reagan and Bush compromised in order to realize success.

I might mention that so far, I have yet to see any competence by President Obama in governance. The breathtaking reversals, the piss poor communications strategies, the laughably incompetent congressional liasoning, and the fact that most of his administration does not seem to be on the same page on many issues reveal a White House in turmoil with Obama uninterested in anything but campaigning for his agenda. If it had been a Republican administration, the press would have declared it a failure already.

This incompetence is manifested by the fact that nothing - I repeat, nothing - is getting done in Congress with all of his major initiatives either bottled up (health insurance) or dead in the water (EFCA, and TARP II). Everything that is happening in the Obama administration is the result of executive fiat. Anything that needs congressional approval is nowhere to be seen despite the fact that he has massive, overwhelming majorities in both chambers.

And as far as using the Reagan campaign “model,” as a path to victory for Republicans, that would really be sweet - if there was another Reagan hanging around somewhere. Unfortunately, such world-historical figures saunter by only once every several generations. And being able to excite the base (Palin, Huckabee) does not always translate into being able to win over a majority of voters.

But Walken does not address something that I feel many conservatives insist is also a lesson that should be culled from the Reagan playbook; that his agenda should be grafted on to a modern political campaign and that this is the key to victory.

The mantra of tax cuts, increased defense spending, and “small government” (whatever the hell that means) is repeated by many conservatives so often that it almost seems they think that sheer repetition will make it so - sort of like clicking your heels together 3 times and mouthing “I want to go home” except we ain’t in Kansas anymore.

With nearly 50 million families not paying any taxes at all and a budget deficit that will be close to a trillion or more dollars for the foreseeable future, it seems to me that someone who calls themselves a fiscal conservative might want to walk very quietly when talking about tax cuts - unless we are still in a bad recession in 2010 and they are designed to stimulate the economy in which case they will be targeted and perhaps even temporary.

As far as defense spending, that’s a subject that deserves its own post but suffice it to say, we’re already spending half a trillion - much of it buying weapons to fight the Soviets in the cold war. Temporary increases to make up for losses from the wars are needed but we have really got to get serious about changing our thinking on defense spending to address the needs of a modern, 21st century military.

My feelings about running on a “small government” platform have been made known on this site in numerous posts but a summary would be, I am 100% for that concept except no one who spouts about it ever gets around to truly, realistically defining it. It’s one thing to get rid of the Department of Education. But is it the position of small government conservatives that the hundreds of programs administered by the Department of Education are a waste of money and should all be terminated?

I am constantly amused by conservatives who say we should lop off one department of the federal government or another without realizing that one man’s “waste of money” is another’s lifeblood. And the reason many of these programs have been federalized is that the states won’t or can’t deal with the problems of special education and the like. You can’t just yank $62 billion from education spending and believe kids, teachers, and schools wouldn’t be catastrophically affected.

Does that mean we can’t take a very sharp scalpel and start cutting? Absolutely not. Reducing the size and scope of government should be any conservative administration’s top priority. But most conservatives are revanchists on the subject of cutting government, wishing to repeal the Great Society and even the New Deal in order to realize some mythical America where everyone is self reliant and if you needed help, you went to your church or your family. Such nonsensical thinking ignores the reality of living in a 21st century industrialized democracy of 300 million people.

So yes, adopt Reagan’s principles which are timeless artifacts of conservative thinking. Adopt his optimism about the future, his belief in the wisdom of crowds, his determination to overcome obstacles to achieve goals. But beyond that, there is not much the Gipper can teach us about society today that would help Republicans back up the ladder.

I’m absolutely convinced Newt Gingrich would love to be president. But every time he starts making noises like a candidate, he seems to back off as if remembering his sky high negatives and problematic personal life.

This is a shame because if ever we needed an idea man in the White House - someone who could grasp the essentials of a problem and offer a solution (some more viable than others), it is the former speaker, public intellectual, and I believe, the primary carrier of the Reagan legacy today.

Listening to Gingrich speak is a treat for the mind and his columns are equally thought provoking. His latest points up something that many in the MSM and pundit class are ignoring; that the vote in California rejecting tax increases was, at bottom, a vote against the political establishment and a victory for the grass roots:

This vote is the second great signal that the American people are getting fed up with corrupt politicians, arrogant bureaucrats, greedy interests and incompetent, destructive government.

The elites ridiculed or ignored the first harbinger of rebellion, the recent tea parties. While it will be harder to ignore this massive anti-tax, anti-spending vote, they will attempt to do just that.

Voters in our largest state spoke unambiguously, but politicians and lobbyists in Sacramento are ignoring or rejecting the voters’ will, just as they are in Albany and Trenton. The states with huge government machines have basically moved beyond the control of the people. They have become castles of corruption, favoritism and wastefulness. These state governments are run by lobbyists for the various unions through bureaucracies seeking to impose the values of a militant left. Elections have become so rigged by big money and clever incumbents that the process of self-government is threatened.

Sacramento politicians will now reject the voters’ call for lower taxes and less spending and embrace the union-lobbyist-bureaucrat machine that is running California into the ground, crippling its economy and cheating residents. This model of high-tax, big-spending inefficiency has already driven thousands of successful Californians out of the state (taking with them an estimated $11 billion in annual tax revenue). The exodus will continue.

Gingrich points out that this anti-establishment mood is exactly what powered Ronald Reagan into office as his victory followed closely on the heels of the 1978 anti-property tax revolt in California that then swept the country.

And Newt has some choice words for the Democratic party and their bevy of unions, interest groups, and bureaucrats who are pushing states like California and New York into bankruptcy:

This system of ruining communities on behalf of interest groups first appeared in Detroit. Bad government, bad politicians and bad policies drove a city that had, in 1950, the highest per capita income of any large American city to No. 62 in per capita income as of 2007. The population has declined from 1.8 million to fewer than 950,000. Recently, 1,800 homes were sold for under $10,000 each. The human cost of bad politics and bad government in Detroit is staggering.

Now President Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid want to impose on the nation this style of politics in which interest groups, politicians and bureaucracies dominate. Look at their record: a $787 billion stimulus no elected official had read, 8,000 earmarks, an Environmental Protection Agency plan to control the economy through carbon regulations, the government threatening retaliation against those who would protect their property rights against theft in the Chrysler bailout — again and again, this team is moving toward a government that owns the country rather than a government that is owned by the people.

Watch Sacramento politicians and interest groups work to overrule the people of California. Watch Albany politicians and interest groups continue to undermine the economy of New York. Watch the arrogance of the elites in Washington as they impose their costs and special deals on the American people.

Then look again at the 62 percent-plus majority in California in favor of smaller government and lower taxes.

In the great tradition of political movements rising against arrogant, corrupt elites, there will soon be a party of people rooting out the party of government. This party may be Republican; it may be Democratic; in some states it may be a third party. The politicians have been warned.

I find it interesting that Gingrich doesn’t play any favorites when it comes to bashing the establishment. Clearly, a GOP governor in California, not to mention Pataki’s terms in New York (which differs from Paterson’s reign only in the fact that George had an “R” after his name) matters little in his broad criticism that the political elites from both parties are dragging this nation down.

On my radio show the other night, Stacey McCain talked about  shifting the debate in the Republican party from moderate vs. conservative to elites vs. the grass roots. There, he said, is the real divide. The elites are ignoring the very people who elect them by promulgating policies that go against the principles and beliefs held by the base. In this, I somewhat agreed, pointing out that most politicians are forced to show at least some pragmatism or they would be voted out of office. Stacey countered that this doesn’t excuse their abandonment of small government, fiscally responsible policies that would mirror the desires of their constituents.

And that may be the key to bringing factions together. Washington and statehouse elites must find a way to compromise on issues without abandoning what should be their core beliefs. I have said many times that this would require give on the part of the base in that “small government,” while a desirable goal, is quantified in different ways, in different areas of the country. At the same time, elites have to recognize this populist feeling for what it is; a true demonstration of how the base feels about the direction that the elites are leading the country.

Gingrich strongly supports the tea party movement and ties it in with the California vote, citing these twin protests as evidence there may be a groundswell of anti-government sentiment waiting to be tapped.

Is he the politician to do it and by doing so, ride that wave all the way to the Oval Office? As for the former, I have no doubt. But if he runs, he will reopen old wounds as well as bare his private life which at times has been pretty sordid. Moreso than Clinton’s? No, but what does that matter when he will have the MSM gunning for him in ways they never went after Clinton.

All of this I’m sure he is taking into account as he ponders his future while directing his intellect and energies toward fighting Obama and his ruinous policies. In the end, he may find that he can be more effective outside the political arena than in it.

True to my newly minted oath to report only good news about the Republican party, I am pleased to tell you that the popularity of the GOP is the highest its been - since yesterday:

The decline in Republican Party affiliation among Americans in recent years is well documented, but a Gallup analysis now shows that this movement away from the GOP has occurred among nearly every major demographic subgroup. Since the first year of George W. Bush’s presidency in 2001, the Republican Party has maintained its support only among frequent churchgoers, with conservatives and senior citizens showing minimal decline.

Hooray! We are now officially the old, white, male, southern, protestant party! Well, that might be a little optimistic.

Here’s a handy map of state party ID from a Gallup poll taken back in January:

Those three little red blotches look pretty lonely, don’t they? And my, my, will you just look at all that blue! Reminds me of spring and Robin’s eggs.

Of course, that map doesn’t tell the whole story. Like, how far the GOP has collapsed in party ID since 2001:

My question is where are all the conservatives hiding? I mean, according to the current logic being propounded by a lot of smart people, the key to a GOP comeback is to run candidates that the base finds acceptable. (If they can find any. Their ever narrowing definition of “conservative” and vastly expanded definition of “RINO” would make finding enough candidates to fulfill that mandate an exercise in futility.)

Then, people will come flocking back to the GOP like geese returning from their winter quarters in Tijuana. Those invisible northeastern Republicans will take off their magic cloaks and show up at the polls to vote for “true” conservatives. Those midwestern conservative farmers who buried themselves in the rich loam of the prairie will dig themselves out and rush to the polls in order to cast their ballot for “real” candidates from the right.

And all those college graduates and holders of secondary degrees will come out of their coma and realize what they’ve been missing in life; voting for a “genuine” conservative.

Of course, if all those candidates were, by some quirk of fate or turn of bad luck, lose their elections it would force “real” conservatives back to the drawing board where they no doubt will come up with the brilliant idea that the reason for the defeat was that those candidates just weren’t “conservative enough” which will require an even narrower definition of who can wear the non-union label of “true” conservative.

Eventually, there will be so many litmus tests for who can call themselves a conservative that the base will start eying even Rush Limbaugh with suspicion. Do real conservatives smoke cigars? And what about all those divorces? I don’t know any true conservatives who have ever been addicted to anything.

The point is simple, my friends. There aren’t enough “true blue” conservatives in the country who would vote for your idealized, highly (and rigidly) ideological conservative candidate to win many elections outside of the old south and the Goldwater west. Stacey McCain makes sense here but I don’t think even he grasps the difficulty of creating a coalition where membership is so exclusive that running candidates that appeal to only one segment of the group will lead to failure:

This is something that the Nutroots figured out in 2004: If the Democratic Party’s liberal base were going to sit around passively while the out-of-touch party elite and the “expert” consultant class kept “reaching across the aisle” (and predictably losing) then they were on the superhighway to political irrelevance.

Nothing succeeds like success, and nothing fails like failure. A political party that is disloyal and disrespectful toward its core constituents, as the GOP was during the Bush/Mehlman era, will not attract new adherents. Who wants to sign up to be treated like a doormat?

The Bush-era GOP believed that its base would be satisfied with superficial gestures (e.g., the Terri Schiavo drama) and ignore the party leadership’s pursuit of policies (e.g., McCain-Feingold, No Child Left Behind, Medicare Part D) which were directly at odds with the party’s fundamental principles.

I don’t recall national Democrats “reaching across the aisle” at any time in the last 25 years. And the liberal party picked up 50+ seats in the House and 10 senate seats in the last two elections not by running Ned Lamont type candidates but rather Heath Shuler kind of Democrats who are strong 2nd amendment advocates, oppose gay marriage, favor tight controls on spending, and are business friendly. While some of the base grumbled, the netroots largely got behind the effort to find attractive, more moderate candidates to defeat conservative Republicans.

If the national Democrats had listened to their base, they would still be in the minority. As it is, the lure of power convinced activists like Kos and others that they should swallow some of their opposition to the Blue Dogs and embrace Dean’s 50 state strategy.

Stacey knows all this which is why I am puzzled about why he is insisting that more pragmatic candidates are not “true” to GOP principles (which doesn’t include getting the federal government to intervene in the Schiavo matter) and should be, if not drummed out of the party, then shunned as candidates not worthy of support. (I exclude Crist from this criticism because of the dishonesty of the NRSCC and Crist’s own chameleon-like political nature.)

So the base should support small government conservatives? Absolutely yes.

But how small?

And low tax, low spending conservatives? Yes please.

But what level of spending is “low?” And can taxes be so low that they cause the deficit to soar and damage the economy?

Stacey believes this is more a fight between the “elites” (who are apparently mostly RINO’s) and conservatives in the hinterlands who, it seems to me, view anyone who isn’t 100% at war with Democrats with a jaundiced eye. They chalk up such cooperation and nice talk to the idea that the elites have liberal friends and don’t want to be unpopular at DC or New York cocktail parties. This presupposes that the “elites” have no principles whatsoever and are shameless self promoters who want nothing more than to exercise power.

No doubt there are some GOP leaders who fit that bill. But to use a recent example, how about Jon Huntsman in Utah? I made a stink yesterday that many who consider themselves true conservatives were tarring Huntsman as a RINO despite the fact that his approval ratings in the most conservative Republican state in the Union is in the 80’s and he proved himself every bit the tax cutting, spending hawk, government shrinking conservative that the base loves.

However, Huntsman committed the sin of pragmatism by not only taking money from the Stim bill but actually saying nice things about the president in the bargain. He has also mentioned that perhaps less emphasis should be placed on social issues - not that they should disappear which some numskull social cons believe he said (If abortion and gay marriage can’t be front and center as national GOP issues, there appears to be a large minority of the base who believe that this would be “abandoning” conservative principles). “Less emphasis” means exactly that and no more. And yet, the litmus testers take that as a sign of apostasy.

Building a winning coalition means allowing more than those ideologically attuned to the positions on issues advanced by the base. As it stands now - and the base talks a good game about being “inclusive” but when push comes to shove, they do both in order to make people who don’t think like they do disappear - the only acceptable candidates who would receive the “Good Conservative Seal of Approval” are just as ideological, just as rigid and uncompromising on everything (not just principles) as the base.

And that’s the reason the GOP is in such a bad odor. Not because the majority of Americans agree with GOP pragmatists on the issues. They do. But because conservatism is seen as too rigid, too ideological, too white, too southern, too Christian, and too old.

Change that perception and the party’s fortunes will rise.

Ideological definitions on the right are fluctuating so wildly lately I am almost afraid to see where I am being pegged today. Having been drummed out of the party for my suspect committment to Obama hatred as well as my lack of enthusiasm for Rush worship, it has become something of an entertainment to discover where my critics are placing me on the ideological spectrum at any given point in time. It really doesn’t matter, I suppose, because the spite generated in my direction is usually illogical and not based on what I write or think but rather what some nitwit divines of my intent. Some of them need to undergo a high colonic and get rid of all that constipated spite welling up in their bowels else they will explode and make a smelly mess - something they are quite adept at doing without the benefit of colon cleansing.

Scatological humor aside, I am constantly amazed at the shifting definitions of who or what is a “good conservative” from people who themselves haven’t a clue of first principles and are especially ignorant of politics and governing. When you hit your knees tonight, you may thank God that none of these jamokes were present at the founding. Can you picture some of these purists at the Constitutional Convention? Holy Jesus, we’d still be operating under the Articles of Confederation - or worse.

“No compromise with that reprobate Hamilton, by God! And tell Madison he’s nothing but a squishy FINO (Federalist in Name Only)! How dare they compromise with those lickspittles from New Jersey to reach an agreement. Why do they always ignore what the Federalist base wants? They’re nothing but a bunch of elitists (Note: They were.). Not one red cent to elect any of them until they put up true Federalists for office.”

My broadly exaggerated point is that there would have been no Constitution without compromising closely held beliefs on the part of both sides. In fact, there is no governance without compromise as the Democrats are amply demonstrating these days in spades. The GOP may be the party of “no,” but that is only because none of their concerns about legislation are being taken into consideration. And, quite rightly, some issues cut so deeply as far as conservative principles are concerned that no compromise is possible. But on issues like health insurance and climate change, Republicans don’t even have a dog in the hunt to recommend changes that would both address the problems and be true to conservative principles. And that goes for legislation likely to be addressed down the line on education, trade, basic research, and social programs.

But these issues won’t be addressed by Republicans because it is believed that anyone who tries to cooperate with the Democrats gets nothing but the back of their hand and besides, those aren’t “conservative” issues anyway. No self respecting man of the right thinks about education in any way except by shouting at the top of their voice “Vouchers! Vouchers! Vouchers!” This mindless adherence to shallowness and closed minded arrogance leaves the political impression that Republicans don’t care about the concerns of ordinary voters - the overwhelming majority of whom are not as conservative as they are and are worried about their families and their jobs.

Case in point is the celebration by some conservatives that Utah Governor Jon Huntsman is eschewing a run for president in 2012 by accepting President Obama’s invitation to serve as Ambassador to China.

Utah, if you are not familiar with the state, is the most Republican outpost in the nation, regularly racking up 65-70% majorities for GOP candidates in national races. Needless to say, no squishes need apply if you are going to run for statewide office in Utah.

But apparently, Huntsman just isn’t conservative enough for some on the right - especially those who have taken on the job of policing the Republican party and trying to marginalize or, if possible, destroy those they consider insufficiently wild eyed and committed to the “cause.”

To refer to Huntsman as anything but a conservative is an indication of just how far right conservative activists have lurched since the election. It’s as if the defeat at the hands of a radical liberal has driven the base mad and any deviation from their extraordinarily narrow definition of “conservative” is cause to cast the luckless perpetrator into the outer darkness.

Incredibly, many in the base have referred to Huntsman as a RINO. The governor of Utah - the most socially conservative state in the nation - has been branded an apostate because…well, he accepted stimulus monies from the federal government for one. And he supports civil unions for gays. And he has doubts that climate change is a crock. And most egregiously, he thinks that the GOP should stop pushing social issues front and center in every election. He doesn’t support gay marriage or abortion. His values are as right wing as any conservative’s outside of very right wing Utah.

Other than that, the guy is more conservative than Reagan (he’s a tiger as a tax cutter and spending hawk not to mention an innovator in shrinking the size of state government). But being a governor in a severe financial bind that threatens to disable government services in his state, he can’t afford to posture like House GOP members and make the easy call (easy politically) and refuse the monies. So he was grateful for the cash and despite his record and conservative bona fides, his pragmatism gets him called a RINO by many who obviously don’t even know what a conservative is if they think Huntsman isn’t good enough. (My guess is he is conservative enough for about 90% of the country - maybe more.)

And yet, here’s some reaction from the conservative base to his being named Ambassador to China and the fact that the job will cost him a shot in 2012:

With all the RINOs in the Republican Party, it’s good to see whenever one of them bails. Latest is Utah Governor Huntsman who’s takin the ambassadorship to China:

That’s why I’d prefer Obama to “take out” all the RINOs. If the ony people left are true conservatives–in the same genre as Ronald Reagan–then Obama may yet go the way of “Jimmy” Carter–out in 1 term.

Oba-mao shuttles another rino into a post where he can dictate to him. Another rino turns his back on the USA for perceived self-interest.

Governor Jon Huntsman, RINO-Utah, who earlier this year was introduced to South Carolina Republican leaders at a dinner hosted by Attorney General Henry McMaster, has won praise from the leading homosexual advocacy group, Human Rights Campaign, for his support of civil unions. The liberal, Mormon Governor, who is expected to be a leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012, is a close associate of John McCain and Lindsey Graham.

Lest ye think that this is not a representative sample of what the base thinks of Huntsman, I suggest you simply Google up “Jon Huntsman RINO” and tell me if that belief isn’t widespread.

This is nuts. I know that there are many in the base who do not agree with that assessment but when so many are so quick to condemn a conservative for…what? Being a responsible governor? Believing that when Americans say they are sick of the devisiveness that social issues bring to the fore that a politician should listen to them? Having a different opion about gays than many in the base?

The battle is not between conservatives and moderates but between ideologues and pragmatists. When I am told I am not a good conservative because I think waterboarding is torture, one has to marvel at the mind that posits that notion. Since when does a conservative litmus test rest on whether one believes that a strict definition of the law should be applied in torture cases? Or is it just that you can’t be a good conservative unless you believe that inflicting pain on another human being is more than alright, that you also must believe they deserve worse?

Can you be a good conservative and not be a Christian? To many, no. Can you be a good conservative and believe in a government that must function in a 21st century industrialized democracy of 300 milion people and not some pie in the sky, radical “small government” paradise that no one can precisely define? Can you be a good conservative and believe that there’s more to environmental protection than opposing climate change, condemning the EPA’s very existence, and believing that environmental legislation and regulations should be written by business interests?

I could go on and on. The point being, there are conservative alternatives to liberal overreach on every issue congress will address. But as I mentioned earlier, the conservativebase doesn’t even want to make an effort to address the issues because even thinking about them is verboten. It makes you a RINO, or a “moderate,” or a “centrist,” if you see government as a sometime solution to problems and that Washington has a role to play in many areas that the states have either abrogated responsibility or refuse to address.

This attitude is so pronounced on the right that by the time these folks are done, the Republican party will truly be so insignificant that we will be 50 years trying to make our way back:

Too often, labeling one’s self as “centrist” is just the moral shorthand of saying, “I don’t care.” When asked about abortion, candidate Obama stated that questions about the beginning of life were above his pay grade. Translation: “I don’t care.”

I’m not calling Obama a centrist, he’s clearly not, but centrist do share with him a lack of moral conviction. Centrists avoid the hard work of forming opinions, preferring to let the “cool kids” tell them what they believe. Back to the subject of abortion, centrists will often say that they are personally opposed to it, but they are just okey dokey with other people killing babies. Translation: “If I answer, they’ll make me sit at the dork’s table in the cafeteria.”

If centrists have any credo at all it is, “let’s sit back and see how it all shakes out.” RS McCain points out more clearly than I ever could why cozying up to centrists is a loser’s game. Broken down, you can’t shape opinion by relying on people who have no interest in holding an opinion.

I debunked this nonsense here. But the ignorance is so ingrained that I fear equating pragmatism with unprincipled politics will be part of rote conservative dogma for the foreseeable future. Presently, the idealogues in the party have the upper hand in that they will make or break a candidate’s chances on election day. Pragmatists have no such power as will probably be proved when the last of them is tossed out into the cold for some apostasy real or imagined.

Will the last moderate conservative who leavese the Repubican party please turn off the lights?

They might want to call it “Death Wish 2010,” or perhaps, “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Embrace Disaster.”

Just don’t call it “The Way Back.”

The Florida senate race, featuring moderate conservative Governor Charlie Crist being challenged in the GOP primary by former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, is shaping up to be a cage match between the party pragmatists and the litmus test conservatives. The contest will be played out before the entire nation and with the media gleefully watching as their newest made for television spectator sport — a real time broadcast of the Republican party’s destruction — comes to an HD flat screen near you.

Rubio, an attractive, dynamic, true blue conservative is the kind of candidate for which the right has been praying. John McCormick of The Weekly Standard got a little carried away in this panegyeric to Rubio, comparing the 37 year old to Barack Obama:

In some respects, Rubio is a little like another state legislator who ran for the U.S. Senate, Barack Obama. Like the president, Rubio points to his biography as a testament to the American dream. The son of Cuban immigrants who fled Castro’s regime, Rubio grew up in a working-class home–his father was a bartender and his mother a factory worker, casino maid, and Kmart stock clerk. He spent a year at Tarkio College in Missouri on a football scholarship before transferring to earn his bachelor’s degree at the University of Florida and his law degree at the University of Miami. He married his longtime girlfriend Jeannette, once a Miami Dolphins cheerleader and now the mother of their four young children. Raised and confirmed a Catholic, Rubio worships with his family at an evangelical church.

A compelling history indeed. Moderate Reihan Salam describes Rubio as something of a Republican Atlas with his “square-jawed all-American looks,” and a “deep belief in the healing power of tax cuts.”

Meanwhile, Crist had been the target of an intense lobbying effort by several top level GOP pols who believed that the governor would have the best chance of holding the seat being vacated by Mel Martinez. They convinced Crist to drop his re-election effort and enter the senate race thereby assuring the enmity of many conservatives in Florida and around the country.

To make matters worse, National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman, Senator John Cornyn, flip flopped on his promise to remain neutral in the senate race and 15 minutes after Crist’s announcement, he threw the resources of the NRSCC behind the governor. No doubt the endorsement was part of the deal to get Crist to run for the senate but it still makes the NRSCC look weak and untrustworthy.

Already, calls for Cornyn’s head are making the rounds in the conservative blogosphere and Eric Erikson of RedState started a Facebook Page “Not One Penny to the NRSCC.”

Rubio himself has already drawn blood by releasing an ad showing Crist with President Obama and a voice over of doom accusing him of being in favor of spending trillions of dollars and piling up debt for our children and grandchildren. It is very effective and gets to the nub of why conservatives are angry with Crist, who participated in a dog and pony show with President Obama, appearing with him at a town hall meeting supporting the stimulus bill.

But that’s not the only problem the base has with Crist. The guy is a political chameleon who a decade ago found it advantageous to portray himself as a Reagan conservative when it was kewl to be a man of the right. He even earned the nickname “Chain Gang Charlie” for his tough law and order personae during his stint as Attorney General.

Now, the political winds are blowing left and Crist is blowing with them. Salam has some choice words for Crist in his Daily Beast article:

One of the key conservative charges against Crist is that his decision to back President Obama’s stimulus package was utterly bankrupt. Crist seemed more interested in currying favor with the state’s army of public-sector workers than keeping the faith with conservative principles. And honestly, that’s exactly right. Crist is not a conservative. With his permanent tan and slick white mane, he’s more like a kinder, gentler Latin American caudillo, who wants nothing more than to be cheered on by adoring throngs. Crist would be right at home with Juan and Eva Peron, dancing the night away and promising free T-bone steaks to the impoverished masses. As governor, Crist has enjoyed tremendous popularity—he has Obama-like job-approval numbers—and he’s done it by hardly ever making tough calls.

There’s no question that Florida is trending Democratic, and it doesn’t help that the state’s economy is sinking into the marshy deep from whence it came. Crist is keenly aware of this, and he’s moved accordingly. In flush times, a decent number of Florida’s must-win Latinos, notably Miami’s highly influential Cuban-American community, were open to small-government Republicans. A punishing wave of foreclosures—which hit Latino families particularly hard—has changed all that. Earlier in his political career, when hard-edged conservatism was on the rise, Crist was known as “Chain Gang Charlie” for backing extreme punishments for convicted felons. Now he’s better known for his efforts to fight climate change and save the Everglades. There’s little doubt that Crist looks himself in the mirror every morning and sees a future president. So why not run for reelection as governor?

Why not, indeed, Salam points out that the next Florida governor will have to make some very tough calls as the tax base shrinks and needs grow. Crist decided to get while the going’s good in order to remain “the most popular political figure in Florida.”

Of course, his wooing by the NRSCC and establishment Republicans did not take into account that his run for the senate would leave a huge vacuum in Talahassee that a Democrat is very likely to fill come election time. Crist was a near sure thing for re-election and his playing musical chairs with GOP politics in Florida could very well cost the Republicans a governorship in a crucial swing state.

So instead of re-election, Crist will rain on conservative’s parade by elbowing Rubio aside. This is sure to anger Rubio’s mentor and cheerleader Jeb Bush who, despite being out of office, still maintains a great network of fundraisers and political operatives across the state. Will Jeb join in the civil war and choose sides, backing Rubio by steering money and political know how his way? I think it will depend on whether Jeb Bush wants to run for president himself some day. Going against establishment Republicans and openly supporting Rubio would anger the very people he would depend on for a presidential run down the road. Prior to Crist’s entrance in the race, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he would give a boost to his disciple. Already he had steered some fund raisers his way, resulting in a haul of about $360,000 in a couple of weeks. But the smart money says that Jeb will play a behind the scenes role while urging his supporters to do all they can to help Rubio.

What kind of a chance does he have? Better than you’d expect. A recent poll showed Crist far ahead with 54% to Rubio’s 8%. But that same poll showed only 23% of Republicans in the state who would “definitely” vote for him in the primary. And more than 65% of the state’s Republicans don’t know enough about Rubio to make a judgment.

With a solid base of support among Cuban Americans, Rubio may surprise - if he can raise the millions of dollars to compete with Crist’s proven fund raising acumen. Florida is a very expensive state to run a race and Rubio’s challenge will be to raise enough money - not as much as Crist but enough to be competitive - and hope that the anti-establishment attitudes that some pollsters are already seeing in the electorate will translate into victory for him in the August, 2010 primary.

The new conservatives have the race they say they’ve always wanted; one of their own versus a “moderate.” If the evangelical, family values, small government, low tax Rubio pulls it out it will shake the party establishment to the core. Not a bad thing necessarily although if Rubio gets slaughtered in the general election, where will the new conservatives be then?

Maybe they’ll say that Rubio wasn’t “conservative enough” and try again. One thing’s for sure, if the new conservatives can’t win in Florida, the question will be asked how they can possibly pull off a victory anywhere else?

I suppose it could have been worse. Instead of passing a resolution officially branding the opposition the “Democrat (sic) Socialist Party,” the RNC might have voted the GOP out of existence.

In the end, the one will hasten the day that the other is realized.

This may be the silliest thing a political party has ever done in American history. I’m with Allah 100%:

More than anything, this reeks of impotence, operating almost as a concession that the right’s argument on the merits that the left is evolving towards socialism isn’t working to shift public opinion. So now they’re going to up the ante by trying the hard sell: Just repeat “socialism” as much as possible to try to drive it into people’s skulls, never minding the fact that that term’s already lost some of its taboo and might well lose more as it goes further mainstream. Or at least, I hope that’s the GOP strategy here. The alternative, that they’re simply sticking their fingers in their ears and repeating “socialist” over and over out of spite like a five-year-old, is too depressing to contemplate. What’s next, a formal resolution declaring french fries “freedom fries” in the Republican Party henceforth and forevermore?

Unfortunately, I believe their reasoning for passing this resolution is more attuned to the latter rather than the former. There is no sense, no rhyme, no reason to “officially” branding the opposition socialists. It is nothing more than a cry in the wilderness; a pathetic ploy (and a childish one at that) to inititate a round of name calling and finger pointing when what is needed are policy alternatives.

This is truly the party of Limbaugh now. The casual use of the word “socialism” on talk radio, the internet, and anywhere the “new conservatives” gather is an affront to common sense not to mention proof positive that the party is in the control of ill-educated, anti-intellectual brigands. Since around 99.9% of American businesses are NOT being taken over by the government and a similar percentage of workers are NOT having their salaries and bonuses manhandled by the feds, one wonders where the idea that the Democrats want “socialism” came from in the first place.

What Obama is doing should be opposed with every fiber of our beings. But Obama is corrupting the free market, not eliminating it. Here’s George Will today:

This is not gross, unambiguous lawlessness of the Nixonian sort — burglaries, abuse of the IRS and FBI, etc. — but it is uncomfortably close to an abuse of power that perhaps gave Nixon ideas: When in 1962 the steel industry raised prices, President John F. Kennedy had a tantrum and his administration leaked rumors that the IRS would conduct audits of steel executives, and sent FBI agents on predawn visits to the homes of journalists who covered the steel industry, ostensibly to further a legitimate investigation.

The Obama administration’s agenda of maximizing dependency involves political favoritism cloaked in the raiment of “economic planning” and “social justice” that somehow produce results superior to what markets produce when freedom allows merit to manifest itself, and incompetence to fail. The administration’s central activity — the political allocation of wealth and opportunity — is not merely susceptible to corruption, it is corruption.

Not a peep about socialism from a man who was fighting the expansion of the federal government when most new conservatives weren’t even a lacisvious gleam in their father’s eye. If you wish to call what Obama and the Democrats are doing “socialism,” then petition Webster’s to change the definition. And what is that definition?

1: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.
2 a: a system of society or group living in which there is no private property b: a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state

3: a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done

Considering that a minuscule part of the economy is, at the moment, being run by the Feds, the grossly exaggerated (and, I would add, hysterical) notion that the Democrats desire to close Wall Street, seize all private property, convene an industrial production board to set targets for economic activity, prevent the creation of new businesses, and control capital on a much grander scale than they do now - can only be explained by a shocking ignorance of politicl theory and the lack of even a beginner’s overview of the nature of the political economy shown by new conservatives from the RNC down.

Are Obama’s moves troubling? You betchya. Not because he is instituting socialism but because he and the Democrats are ignorantly corrupting the free market. The more they fiddle with it the more they screw it up. That much should be obvious even to the Keyenesians at Treasury and the White House. But the basic principles of the free market as it relates to the macro economy are still well in play. If you doubt me, pay a visit to the Chicago Board of Trade where capitalism - real devil take the hindmost capitalism - still rules the roost.

The laws of supply and demand still propel our economy despite the Fed’s best efforts to muck things up. And that’s what makes this move by the RNC to brand the Democrats as socialist so silly. Not only are they tarring tens of millions of Americans (and potential voters) with the slimey appellation, but they are lowering the bar on the definition of socialism to the point that about the only people in the US who wouldn’t be considered socialists are pie in the sky libertarians and corporate Republicans like Limbaugh and his ilk on talk radio.

And what of our illustrious leader, RNC Chairman Michael Steele? A cigar store indian has more influence with the RNC than he does:

A member of the Republican National Committee told me Tuesday that when the RNC meets in an extraordinary special session next week, it will approve a resolution rebranding Democrats as the “Democrat Socialist Party.”

When I asked if such a resolution would force RNC Chairman Michael Steele to use that label when talking about Democrats in all his speeches and press releases, the RNC member replied: “Who cares?”

Which pretty much sums up the attitude some members of the RNC have toward their chairman these days.

Steele wrote a memo last month opposing the resolution. Steele said that while he believes Democrats “are indeed marching America toward European-style socialism,” he also said in a (rare) flash of insight that officially referring to them as the Democrat Socialist Party “will accomplish little than to give the media and our opponents the opportunity to mischaracterize Republicans.”

I can hear my new conservative friends already: “We shouldn’t care what the media and the opposition will say about us. Anyone who does is a cowardly wretch who willingly plays into their hands by accepting their characterization of conservatives and Republicans.”

Okay, you win. I totally and completely reject the characterizations of conservatives by the media and the Democrats. I’ll even agree that even thinking about the subject should be cause for being kicked out of the Republican party. We don’t want pantywaists who wet themselves if the media and the Democrats successfully paint conservatives as a bunch of loony tunes nitwits who smear 60 million potential voters by calling them socialists. Be a man. Stand up. Look like an idiot, go ahead.

Lord deliver us.

Michael Gerson calls it “A Driving Desire to Lose:”

Witness the reaction to the National Council for a New America — an anodyne “listening tour” by Republican officials recently kicked off at a pizza parlor in Northern Virginia. Social conservatives attacked this forum on education and the economy for the offense of not being a forum on abortion and the traditional family. Neo-Reaganites searched the transcript for nonexistent slights: How dare former Florida governor Jeb Bush criticize “nostalgia” for the “good old days”? Why didn’t he just spit on Ronald Reagan’s grave? Other conservatives criticized the very idea of a listening tour, asking, “What’s to hear?”

During a recent conversation, Bush described himself as “dumbfounded by the reaction.” He added: “I don’t think listening is a weakness. People are yearning to be heard. Perhaps we should begin with a little humility.”

[snip]

Each of these policies — carbon restrictions, universal health insurance and immigration reform — could eventually be important to the Republican recovery. But would a candidate carrying these ideas transform the Republican Party, or be destroyed by it? The hostile reaction to the pizza parlor putsch provides one answer.

But this is a snapshot, not a prophecy. As the years pass, the kingdom of irrelevance seems less and less pleasant, even to its rulers. Policy shifts that seem incredible become inevitable. This is how a party prepares to win.

Fighting over who should rule this “Kingdom of Irrelevance” is all we have left. There are issues of vital importance to almost all Americans that the GOP continues to ignore not because there aren’t conservative alternatives to what the Democrats are offering but because the ignoramuses currently in the ascendancy in the party have deemed them “Democratic issues” and anyone who advocates conservative solutions to those problems is automatically branded a “moderate” - a virtual death knell in today’s purest atmosphere. The notion that addressing vital issues is nothing more than acting like a Democrat is so absurd on its face that it is little wonder serious people do not take the party seriously.

Steele has got to go. He’s been emasculated already so putting him out of his misery would seem to be the charitable thing to do. And as for the RNC members who want to make an irrelevant statement by passing an irrelvant resolution, from an irrelevant group representing an irrelevant party with irrelevant ideas - they should all be forced to take their pants down and a great big “I” for “Irrelevant” branded on their rumps. That’s my idea for “rebranding” the party.

That way, when they pass a resolution requiring Republicans to moon Democrats whenever they see them, people will know where they’re coming from.

Judge Richard Posner has written something of a vanilla essay, trying to answer the question “Is the Conservative Movement Losing Steam?”

I appreciate the fact hizzoner may have been a little busy since the November election and may have missed the 5,000 blog posts, articles, tweets, and books that not only noticed that very fact but have actually tried to find a cure for what ails the movement.

Nevertheless, any time someone of Judge Posner’s eminence and brilliance turns his attention to diagnosing the illness afflicting the right, we should pay attention if only to glean nuggets of truth from someone a whole helluva lot smarter than anyone reading this (or writing it for that matter).

No, we shouldn’t automatically accept as gospel what brainy people have to say. But given that Posner will no doubt be labled an “elitist” by the base for being cursed with the ability to view the world in an unemotional, analytic manner, I thought highlighting his views on the problems of conservatism would give them the exposure they deserve.

In essence, Posner makes the same point made by most pundits - conservatism is a victim of its own success:

By the end of the Clinton administration, I was content to celebrate the triumph of conservatism as I understood it, and had no desire for other than incremental changes in the economic and social structure of the United States. I saw no need for the estate tax to be abolished, marginal personal-income tax rates further reduced, the government shrunk, pragmatism in constitutional law jettisoned in favor of “originalism,” the rights of gun owners enlarged, our military posture strengthened, the rise of homosexual rights resisted, or the role of religion in the public sphere expanded. All these became causes embraced by the new conservatism that crested with the reelection of Bush in 2004.

My theme is the intellectual decline of conservatism, and it is notable that the policies of the new conservatism are powered largely by emotion and religion and have for the most part weak intellectual groundings. That the policies are weak in conception, have largely failed in execution, and are political flops is therefore unsurprising. The major blows to conservatism, culminating in the election and programs of Obama, have been fourfold: the failure of military force to achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives; the inanity of trying to substitute will for intellect, as in the denial of global warming, the use of religious criteria in the selection of public officials, the neglect of management and expertise in government; a continued preoccupation with abortion; and fiscal incontinence in the form of massive budget deficits, the Medicare drug plan, excessive foreign borrowing, and asset-price inflation.

Yes, that just about covers it. I would niggle a bit with the good Judge in his example of global warming as evidence that will has been substituted for intellect. While there is something of a knee jerk reaction to the idea of man made climate change among many conservatives, there is also a solid, growing body of scientific evidence that skepticism with regards to global warming is well founded - even more so when one considers the “solutions” being offered.

That said, Posner has a couple of very interesting, and original causes for conservatism’s decline as an intellectual force.

The realization that, for all our expensive military hardware, not very much of it is useful on the modern battlefield, may be the most lasting and best lesson learned from our troubles in Iraq. Only a fool like Saddam will challenge us in the future to a stand up battle which makes a lot of the equipment we designed and built to fight the Soviet Union obsolete - and a waste of defense resources at that. Given the unholy deficits we will be running in the future, a massive contraction of defense spending is in the offing. National defense is one of the only budgetary items where savings in the hundreds of billions can be achieved and given the trillions of red ink Obama will be running, you can bet he will cut there before he goes after entitlements.

But have we learned the lesson that military force has its limits - again? One would have thought that after losing 55,000 men in Viet Nam, the lesson would not have needed repeating. Alas, we may be condemned to repeat this exercise in wasting blood and treasure as long as we seek to maintain superpower status.

Another interesting point made by Posner was “the neglect of management and expertise in government.” For a variety of reasons - some good, some horrible - George Bush insisted on staffing his government with cronies.

If you are going to make appointments of cronies, the least you can do is appoint competent ones. While many of Bush friends and supporters were people he could trust, a legitimate question could be asked as to how competent were many of them?

The evidence suggests that Bush appointed people who were not up to the tasks assigned to them. By sticking industry hacks into regulatory positions (a long and shameful list), the president put the foxes in charge of watching the very henhouses they were supposed to be regulating. There was cronyism and partisan appointments everywhere in government during the Bush years and efficiency suffered as a result.

But Posner’s real gripe - and the gripe of many less ideological conservatives - is that “the new conservatism [is] powered largely by emotion and religion and [has]for the most part weak intellectual groundings.”

Amen and Hallelujah. What Posner refers to as “new” conservatism (a term I will be shamelessly stealing from now on), calls on such intellectual luminaries as Hannity, Limbaugh, Coulter, and Beck, for sustenance. In this, the leading lights of the new conservatism dole out philosophy and rationale the way a Baskin Robbins ice cream server spoons whipped creme on to his concoctions. The result are that ideas and concepts with the heft of cotton candy, but extremely palatable to the narrow minded, are passed off as conservative dogma.

Religion has been confused with “traditional values” in order to justify the infallibility of many positions on social issues. Posner points specifically to abortion but might have also included gay marriage, embryonic stem cell research, and the teaching of creationism in schools. And the slice of conservatism that also identifies itself as “evangelical” - influential beyond their numbers - makes these “values” the centerpiece of their political universe.

Judge Posner has correctly diagnosed most of what’s wrong with conservatism today. He makes mention in his article that the intellectual giants of the past or gone and few recognized public thinkers have stood up to take their place. That’s not to say they aren’t out there The question of when and how they will step forward to define a kind of “post-conservatism” that builds on the past while laying the groundwork for the future will be hard to answer as long as the right continues to wander aimlessly in the wilderness.

From long time commenter and center left Obama lover Michael Reynolds left on my post yesterday about Reagan’s toleration for moderates in the GOP:

Rick, you’re an atheist living in sin. You’re a rational man. You believe in evolution and understand that gay rights are coming, like it or not. You don’t think torture is fun. You’re not ant-intellectual. Why are you a Republican?

Face it Rick: you’re not a Republican.

You would get no argument from half (or more) of the commenters who shared their thoughts with me on that post. But allow me to answer that and several ancillary questions while debunking some surprisingly ignorant myths and suppositions about what moderate conservatives believe.

First of all, let’s dispense with the term “moderate.” I much prefer “pragmatist” or even “rationalist” although the latter is a belief system all its own and not generally applied to a set of political precepts or principles.

“Realist” doesn’t cut it either because I think that a lot of conservatives are “realists” in the sense that they have created a false reality and define their politics according to a skewed and often paranoid world view. Please don’t try to tell me they don’t exist because they pollute the comments section of this and other blog sites with their “Obama is deliberately tanking the economy so he and his communist friends can establish a dictatorship,” memes.

If you can’t see that’s a false reality which is a little twisted and paranoid, you need a new pair of glasses.

A related question to Michael’s query is why bother? My demise as a blogger and as someone who has lost even the minuscule amount of notoriety as a political commenter that I once possessed can be traced directly to my calling out conservatives for being too rigid, too ideological, and beholden to who I refer to as “pop conservatives” of the Rush, Glenn Beck, and Ann Coulter variety.

To my mind, I had only one choice; fight for what I believe to be the correct course for conservatism and the GOP. There simply isn’t an alternative. There might be a half dozen Democrats in the country I could ever vote for so switching parties is out. And I am not one to throw away my vote and cast a ballot for libertarians who I find remarkably obtuse anyway. So it’s either shut up or fight. I chose the latter.

So let’s go with “pragmatist” to describe the kind of conservative who I believe is in big trouble in the Republican party. The reason? A lack of “fire in the belly,” when it comes to the ideology espoused by many on the right. It’s not enough to agree with these conservatives; you must “believe” wholeheartedly and beyond that, attempt to destroy your opponents. “No retreat, no surrender,” is their motto and if such an attitude results in harm to the country, so be it.

Now I like a good cock fight with a liberal any day. And frankly, they present such a lovely target most of the time that it is sometimes impossible not to make fun of them - their “riot of conceits” as R. Emmett Tyrell refers to their own ideological excesses. But I have come to realize that neither ideological extreme has a corner on truth nor do the ideological right and the left understand that there is more to politics than the exercise of raw power.

Politics is a means to an end. And for me, that end is applying broad conservative philosophical principles to the art of governing so that a just and moral society is created, which is adequately protected from those both at home and abroad who would do it harm, and that those unable to fend for themselves are cared for.

That last doesn’t sound very conservative. But we as a nation rejected social Darwinism during the last great economic upheaval 80 years ago. Overturning the New Deal (or some of the social programs initiated over the last 40 years) may be the goal of some of the radicals on the right but it will never, ever happen. I firmly believe that most social programs that aid the poor can be improved immensely by applying conservative principles like prudence, self reliance, and fiscal discipline to their operation. Other government assistance programs can devolve to the states where they can be run more efficiently.

Is that apostasy? Or simple pragmatism?

I want a government as conservative as can realistically be achieved without destroying it. And frankly, there are some on the right who scare me with their callous disregard for the effect on ordinary people some of their plans to dismantle the welfare state would bring about.

As a conservative, I don’t think that government should be “empathetic.” It should, however, work as well as any utility we use such as phone, electric, or gas. (A government that operated the way my cable company is run would have experienced several bloody revolutions.) Recognizing that the state has a role to play in the economy, in maintaining social stability, in protecting the weak from society’s predators - all of this fits very comfortably into a pragmatic conservative’s worldview.

We live in a nation of 300 million people - the majority of whom do not agree with many conservative ideologues who think the government is the enemy and should be dismantled to effect what Jefferson wanted; a “government that governs least governs best.”

The Sage of Monticello said that at a time when there were barely 6 million Americans (2 million in bondage). There was no IBM or AIG or any other multinational corporation whose interests sometimes conflicted with those of the American economy. There were no companies who deliberately poisoned the air and the water. There was little crime. There were no unions to hold up small businessmen or companies that would knowingly place their employees in dangerous situations because it was cheaper than protecting them.

There are a million reasons we need government and conservatives rarely offer any rationale for it beyond national defense. Some, like my friend Ed Morrissey, wish to establish some kind of “Super Federalism” where states could handle environmental concerns, workers’ safety, aid to the poor, road building, and other government functions currently handled from Washington.

In principle, I can’t disagree - especially if there was even a chance of it working. But as a practical matter, most of Ed’s vision is unattainable. Certainly a much better effort should be made to find those federal government functions that the state’s could take over. Some programs that aid the poor would no doubt be more efficiently run at the state level. But in the end, most federal programs are run out of Washington because the states are unable or unwilling to take the responsibility.

This is not to say that you cannot apply conservative principles to manage the behemoth. And recognition of that singular fact is what separates the ideologues from the pragmatists.

To say that moderates or pragmatists don’t have a set of principles that guide their politics is just plain wrong. The same principles that animate the ideologues inform the opinions of pragmatists as well. The difference is in how one interprets those principles as they relate to one’s worldview, which is informed by different criteria for all of us. Our own life experiences shape the interpretation of principles and, depends on temperament, personality, and perhaps even how open we are to new and different ideas.

I am not saying there is “flexibility” when it comes to principle in that they are at the core of all of our beliefs and in a semiotic way, their meaning is set in stone. But I think a pragmatist has a more expansive view in relating those principles to how the real world works. Principles are not meant to engender absolutism but ultimately, that is the trap into which the ideologues fall.

I have said before (and will keep making the point) that there is a difference between ideology and philosophical principles. Excessive ideology leads to putting those principles in a strait jacket, where all issues and personalities are judged according to a very rigid set of definitions. When reality proves elusive to these definitions, the rationale to describe them stretches beyond comprehension. Hence, both right and left ideologues are constantly forced to twist themselves into logic pretzels to defend themselves.

We have been taught since high school civics class that compromise is necessary in a democracy. But there are some issues where no compromise is possible; abortion, gay marriage, perhaps war and peace, and certainly most of the statist, collectivist solutions this administration is trying to implement in order to “fix” the economy. For conservatives, those issues are “no go” zones and I agree that a stand must be taken and battles fought to preserve a free market economy not to mention simple, human liberty.

But to posit the notion that no rapprochement with the opposition is ever possible, that compromise is a dirty word akin to being a traitor, and working with your political enemy is a sign that you aren’t a real Republican is ridiculous - as is the idea that if we let liberals get everything they want and the country goes to hell, conservatives will be swept back to power.

That is fantasy, of course. Some Republicans have to act responsibly and help govern the country. Otherwise, you end up with a situation such as we see with the “climate change” bill with the far left trying to compromise with the not so far left and everybody loses.

You don’t win by not playing the game. Yes, there will be instances where the Democrats shove the efforts at bi-partisanship back in the GOP’s faces. So what? And what do I care that the Democrats have fewer pragmatists or “moderates” than the GOP. What has that got to do with anything? Do you want to ape the absolute worst qualities of your opponent? Not smart.

If nothing else, you can recognize the fact that whoever you define as “moderate” (with obvious exceptions) have principles they adhere to just as conservatives do. The ideologues and close minded galoots will never understand this because they “mirror judge” everyone, holding the glass up to see if their own ideology reflects back at them. But for the rest of you, I would hope that you grant us pragmatists the benefit of our convictions.

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media and it’s already attracted the usual cast of thick headed numbskulls who think that “moderate” is a dirty word.

A sample:

RNC Chairman Michael Steele is trying. But his comments at a recent party conclave in Wisconsin point up the difficulty in translating that idea into any kind of practical program:

Eh … OK. Everyone can come in and sit down for the feast but if you are pro-choice, or pro-gay marriage, or pro-amnesty, kindly realize that no one is going to listen to you so you might as well keep your mouth shut. Meanwhile, your cousins and other relations can publicly chastise you for your different opinions, actively seek to undermine your re-election by running a primary challenger against you, deny you party support, and will stay at home on election day so a Democrat will probably defeat you anyway.

One jamoke in the comments:

Sorry, Rick. That’s nonsense.

Try being a Democrat today with some positions, shall we say, somewhat center-or-right of Kos.

You are political dog meat.

The hogwash you put forth is the Meggy McCain “why-can’t-we-all-just-get-along” mush which brought us liberalish McCain in 2008…as an “alternative” to (Chicago’s version of) Madison Avenue’s polished soap ad du jour.

Reagan HAD principles and stood by them, bending at times to compromise under the reality of DC politics.

What you propose HAS NONE.

Why should Republicans care if the Democrats are as narrow minded as they are? What possible benefit would accrue to the party by aping the worst instincts of their opponents?

And referring to John McCain as anything except a moderate conservative is nonsense. If he is “liberalish” the commenter is to the right of Attila the Hun.

And how about the myth that moderates have no principles? Nonsense. As I make clear in the article.

But this is the kind of ignorance the Republican party and conservative movement is up against in its efforts to reform. I don’t hold out much hope that anything constructive can happen until the Ed’s of the party and movement are either co-opted or simply shunted to the sidelines where they can rant to their heart’s content and do no harm in the meantime.