Right Wing Nut House

As far back as 1999, it was apparent to anyone who listened closely to what he was saying that George Bush was not much of a conservative. This despite the lip service he gave to some conservative ideas (I wouldn’t say he was a study in advocating conservative principles), and his ability to excite the party’s evangelical base.

True, he was “more conservative” than Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004. But so was about 70% of the country. It took about 5 years for the scales to fall from the eyes of many conservatives (some have never lost their true belief) for them to see that George Bush was a crony loving, big government elitist whose tangential connection to conservatism was more for convenience and political calculation than any belief in the efficacy of its principles.

Were we taken in? Partly, yes. But an honest appraisal of my former support for the man must include the fact that I was fooling myself more than anything. The writing was on the wall all along regarding the man’s faux conservatism - not to mention his many screw ups including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the prosecutors fiasco, justification for torture, and his curious habit of promoting and appointing incompetents for important jobs in government who also happened to be big campaign contributors or other cronies.

Now a book has been written by a former Bush speechwriter which has pretty much confirmed what most on the right now think of the ex-president. Matt Latimer reveals Bush to be an arrogant, self centered, elitist who looked down his nose at the conservative movement:

Latimer is a veteran of conservative politics. An admirer of Republican Sen. Jon Kyl, for whom he worked for several years, Latimer also worked in the Rumsfeld Pentagon before joining the Bush White House in 2007.

The revealing moment, described in “Speechless: Tales of a White House Survivor,” occurred in the Oval Office in early 2008.

Bush was preparing to give a speech to the annual meeting of the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC. The conference is the event of the year for conservative activists; Republican politicians are required to appear and offer their praise of the conservative movement.

Latimer got the assignment to write Bush’s speech. Draft in hand, he and a few other writers met with the president in the Oval Office. Bush was decidedly unenthusiastic.

“What is this movement you keep talking about in the speech?” the president asked Latimer.

Latimer explained that he meant the conservative movement — the movement that gave rise to groups like CPAC.

Bush seemed perplexed. Latimer elaborated a bit more. Then Bush leaned forward, with a point to make.

“Let me tell you something,” the president said. “I whupped Gary Bauer’s ass in 2000. So take out all this movement stuff. There is no movement.”

Bush seemed to equate the conservative movement — the astonishing growth of conservative political strength that took place in the decades after Barry Goldwater’s disastrous defeat in 1964 — with the fortunes of Bauer, the evangelical Christian activist and former head of the Family Research Council whose 2000 presidential campaign went nowhere.

Now it was Latimer who looked perplexed. Bush tried to explain.

“Look, I know this probably sounds arrogant to say,” the president said, “but I redefined the Republican Party.”

Yes, Mr. Bush. You certainly “redefined” the Republican party by showing the GOP could be even more careless with the public purse than Democrats, as well as being a political cynic of the first order by pandering to the base of the party - the “movement” - while sneering at what it represented.

The charge of “patrician” made against his father back in the day should also be applied to the son. Here, the blue blood shows why you can’t trust elites. At bottom, their arrogance directed toward ordinary people is so profound as to cloud their judgment.

Given everything we now know about Bush, would I have pulled an Andrew Sullivan and voted for Kerry in 2004? Definitely not. But, as I did in 1992 when his father ran for re-election, the chances are pretty good that I would not have voted for president at all.

True, Bush’s fiscal profligacy was known back then, but weighed against the war on terror and what most of us believed was a slowly improving situation in Iraq, it would have been enough to dissuade me from voting against him.

Now we have a different story - that of Bush the hypocrite who had few, if any, guiding principles save “Whatever’s best for George Bush, is best for the party and the country.” That kind of selfish conceit may be endemic among presidents - it certainly was for Nixon, and probably Johnson - but it explains a lot as far as Bush’s cronyism as well as his cozying up to Wall Street, his sticking with Rumsfeld long after he had outlived his usefulness, and other stubborn acts that many conservatives still mistake for resolve. Quite simply, it didn’t matter if all the wise heads in government were telling him to change course in Iraq. He, George Bush, knew better. And the United States paid a bitter price in blood and treasure because of this hubris.

And, it explains Karl Rove to some extent. No doubt that Clintonites like James Carville had vast knowledge about the intricacies of American politics. But Rove is a human computer - a veritable font of information about the most arcane, and fractional tidbits of political trivia. There may never have been his like in the White House.

But Rove was decidedly not a creature of ideology. He possessed a burning desire to win as all good political consultants have. Beyond that, Rove eschewed the idea of using the movement for anything except what he termed a “permanent Republican majority” that combined massive numbers of evangelical Christians energized by relying on “wedge” issues like gay marriage and abortion to turn them out, as well as the foreign policy hawks. Fiscal conservatives could come along for the ride if they wished but it was clear that neither Rove nor Bush gave a tinker’s damn about them. Add supply siders and libertarians and Rove believed he had his “permanent” majority - a majority not based on conservative issues as much as on political expediency.

The results were predictable; a fracturing of the “permanent” coalition within two years of his 2004 victory. The corruption, the spending, and the war between libertarans and evangelicals over the Terri Schiavo matter exploded any hope that Rove’s makeshift, rickety political construction would outlast his boss.

So here we are in the wilderness with many conservatives still clinging to the notion that Bush made some mistakes but was still a good president. I have said in the past that fingering Bush as the “worst president in American history” is ridiculous. In the bottom ten, yes. But I abhor those who would use history for political purposes and the facts simply do not bear that judgment out.

Until conservatives can let go of Bush and his checkered legacy, we will not learn the lessons from supporting him and probably end up voting for someone similar. That is the mistake Democrats made when they were in the political badlands and we would do well not to repeat it.

(Note: Please do not crow in the comments “I told you so.” What - you expect me to listen to partisan lefties at the time? That’s unreasonable and you know it. Your verdict on Bush was reached looking through the prism of partisanship just as mine was. Just because the left was right about some of Bush’s shortcomings does not mean they had - or have today - a corner on truth when it comes to criticizing him. I would also add that their hate of the man - as virulent a hate directed against another politician I had not seen before, even against Clinton - disqualifies most on the left from making any rational judgment on Bush that a reasonable person could agree with.)

I’m with the left all the way on this one. What Joe Wilson did by screaming, frothing at the mouth, and rabidly drooling while accusing the president of lying is the most destructive, the most ill mannered, the MOST UNPRECEDENTED occurrence in the history of this planet or any other.

“YOU LIE! the crazy man screeched at the top of his voice. Only his colleagues holding him back prevented him from assaulting the president in the House chamber with a bloody ax he had just used on his child.

What has happened to our country when Republicans, who obviously knew what he was going to do before hand, failed to stop this goober chewing yahoo from interrupting Jesus Christ on the cro…oh, wait. I mean President Obama during his VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY, important speech on socialized (oops! sorry) I mean government mandated health insurance?

Surely we must come back to civility in our public discourse. Surely forms of etiquette must be preserved. Surely it should be a crime punishable by 20 lashes to not stare in doe eyed worship and hang on every word that our Glorious Leader imparts to us masses.

Absolutely. But please don’t call me Shirley.

I fully back efforts to investigate this rogue, this roue, this dunderheaded clodsop of an inbred Congressman who thought he was at a Gamecock football game and not the Sermon in the House Well. (”Blessed are the bureaucrats for theirs shall be the Kingdom of Obama.”).

How dare he? No one has ever, ever, ever interrupted another president or booed him, or called him a liar, or accused him of going to war for bloodlust and oil. What political party could possible countenance such evil?

If it were up to me, I’d banish him. Exile the fool. Send him to another country like…like…Utah or Montana or some other foreign country where his discourteousness would go unnoticed and he could mingle with those other bible thumping, straw eating, sister loving, gun toting, immigrant hating yahoos.

And while we’re at it, let’s send his friends with him; you know, the ones whose fear mongering and lies about GL’s perfect health care reform bill are causing the rubes out in rubeland to scratch their balls, spit, and then scream at their Democratic Congressman?

This kind of demagoguery is outrageously unacceptable. We shouldn’t stand for it - not for a second. DON’T THEY KNOW THAT PEOPLE ARE DYING BECAUSE OUR GLORIOUS LEADER - WHO TRULY LOVES US ALL AND WISHES ONLY THE BEST FOR US - CAN’T GET HIS HEALTH CARE REFORM BILL PASSED? It’s a crisis, I tell you. A crisis. Forget war. Forget Hurricanes, Earthquakes, Tornadoes, Floods, Wrack and Ruin. Forget Manmade Natural Disasters that we used to call acts of terrorism but don’t anymore because Our President has banished that scourge - or at least the word - from the face of the earth.

This is a REAL crisis - not a made up one like that other fellow had.

Perhaps we should consider executing Wilson. Hanging’s too good for him of course. Tar and feathering is environmentally unfriendly (Didn’t you know that tar is made from the Devil’s Brew - OIL? Besides, little birdies might eat the feathers and be unable to crap. Horror!). Waterboarding is illegal (but wouldn’t it be fun?) And guns…EWW!

I think Wilson should be sentenced to listen to our Glorious Leader’s inauguration speech - 10,000 times. It wouldn’t be torture. We’d give him one hour’s sleep every day and only make him stand for 12 hours at a time. Cheney said that kind of thing works wonders.

And after all, he’d be transformed. I’ve listened to it about 500 times and there’s nothing wrong with me - fit as a fiddle and twice as twangy. Listening to GL’s words of emptiness and nothingness fills the soul with sublime hollowness. It’s done wonders for my digestion and my bowels are as right as rain. Better than a high colonic in cleaning out the system. You should try it.

People like Wilson need to get out of the way and let our Glorious Leader fulfill his destiny. All of this talk is worthless and should be outlawed somehow. After all, we won, didn’t we?

No 9/11 remembrance post for me this year. I’ve done four 2000 word articles about where I was when it happened, how it impacted my thinking, how the attacks changed America - I even wrote a 9/11 post on 9/10 Democrats.

In other words, I’ve said it all. I’ve got nothing original to add. About the only thing I feel on 9/11 anymore is a wearying sadness to the bone brought on by the realization that it is going to happen again because we haven’t learned a damn thing. The borders are still porous, the enemy is if anything, more determined to cause us pain (yes - even with Barack Hussein Obama as president). And I’m still waiting for an intelligent discussion regarding civil liberties and security. The absolutist position taken by both sides is depressing to me as we careen wildly between too much in the way of security that infringes liberty and not enough which invites disaster.

So we are going to get hit again - not because Bush isn’t president and Obama is. Not because liberals are in charge and not conservatives. Not because anyone wants it to happen. And not because one side or the other in our childish and destructive politics is incapable of protecting us.

It will happen because our enemies are determined to make it happen. They are willing to die to make us bleed. That makes them impossible to stop. We can foil their plans a hundred times. They only need to succeed once. Torture doesn’t make us safer. Phone taps won’t make us safer. Increased cooperation with other countries won’t make us safer. Prosecuting terrorists - if any survive - after the fact won’t deter them or make us safer. Bringing economic development to poor countries won’t create fewer terrorists or make us safer - not when most terrorists attacking the west come from well to do, middle class families. Negotiating with them won’t make us safer.

Using law enforcement and international cooperation to break up their cells may give us the illusion of safety but for everyone we bust, of how many are we unaware? How many take their place?

The temptation to say “kill them all” is great, despite the fact that we couldn’t do it, even if it was politically viable. And we’d only end up creating an even bigger problem when the inevitable civilian body count inherent in such a strategy skyrockets. For proof of that theory, I present Afghanistan/Pakistan where we are making more enemies daily by striking at the heart of the jihadis.

For the time being, we just have to get used to the idea that there are some things beyond our control in this world and one of them is the timetables and plans of terrorists. It’s either that, or sacrifice our liberty in ways that aren’t necessary to survive as a nation - yet. Once the terrorists get their hands on weapons of mass destruction and use them on us - something almost every expert is predicting will happen - that will almost certainly change.

This may be pessimistic but I think it is well justified. We can’t kill them all, we can’t realistically stop them, and we can’t trade liberty for security in any way that might actually matter. We refuse to guard our own borders, or treat them enemy as “the enemy,” or prevent nations like Syria, Iran, Yemen, or Pakistan from harboring the very terrorists that might strike us at anytime.

If you can come to any other conclusion except we will be hit again, I’d be interested in hearing it.

Please take a moment today to remember the fallen. The least we can do is recall their deaths and vow never to forget how it felt to be an American that awful day.

John Cole of the blog Balloon Juice and I used to have a rather cordial relationship back in the day. A few angry back and forths later - not so much anymore.

Cole’s party switch over torture and the mismanaged Iraq War (along with GOP corruption and the excessive ideology of the base) endeared him to some on the left but I think even they may be uncomfortable with his demonstrated independence from orthodoxy from time to time. Sadly, his blog has morphed by and large into a collection of bitter denunciations directed at most conservatives who fail to meet his rather stringent ideological standards for relevance and correct thinking.

That said, now that he is a self-identified Democrat, Cole himself can be guilty of being as nasty a partisan as any on the left:

Rick Moran is a libertine the same way Glenn Reynolds is a libertarian. They are both Republicans. Moran occasionally chastises some of the obviously crazy nonsense on the right, but only when he can also include a false equivalency about the Democrats. It sometimes seems like he is making sense, but ignore his schtick of not being a party man. Ask him if he voted for McCain or Obama? For Bush or Kerry? For Bush or Gore? For Clinton or Dole?

I read him for years and finally gave up reading him regularly, because the only core principle I could ever find from him was “The Democrats are worse.”

First of all, I am a libertine the same way the dictionary defines the term:

1. One who acts without moral restraint; a dissolute person.
2. One who defies established religious precepts; a freethinker.

adj.  Morally unrestrained; dissolute.

The first definition could certainly have been applied to my behavior in my dissolute youth. And my atheism would meet the definition of defying “established religious precepts.”

But it is a large part of my self image that I consider myself, and strive to be, a “freethinker.” I make an effort to eschew a dogmatic approach to life and politics - not always succeeding but finding that it is in reaching for the goal that we learn the most and better ourselves. Some may glimpse sophistry in such an admission - nothing I can do there. You either take what I write as being what I think and feel or not.

In Cole’s case, he views my writing through the prism of partisanship. By dismissing my attempts at fully vetting a subject by presenting both sides, or pointing out that whatever nuttiness has been perpetrated on the right finds an equal or almost equally loony counterpoint on the left, Cole himself is guilty of dogmatic thinking.

It is the idea that I am guilty of “false equivalence” that betrays Cole as a less than neutral - and honest - observer. I will admit that there are times that I may, in fact, stretch to make the equivalence point. But does that make it “false?” Only if you have an agenda beyond trying to be objective. I have never knowingly perpetrated a fraudulent analogy and don’t think I ever have. Sometimes, it’s not possible to find an exact counter to the idiocy one side has engaged in. I expect if you were to really examine my 3,200 posts, you would probably find some inexact correlations on both sides. Demanding perfect symmetry is unrealistic and proof that Cole is unwilling to accept the fact that the excessive ideology and hatred of the opposition he so rightly condemns is a mirror image of the same idiocy found among his friends on the left.

Any reasonable analysis of “movement conservatives” and “movement progressives” would find a vast kinship in paranoia, the use of logical fallacies, slippery slopes, strawman arguments, as well as a quest for ideological purity, and other manifestations of a kind of absolutism regarding their political opposites that has infected our politics and made it extraordinarily difficult for presidents over the last 20 years to get anything done.

Guilty as charged, on occasion. I am not immune to emotionalism and spite and I apologize for being human. But it is dishonest for Cole to issue a blanket condemnation of my writing based on his idea of “false” equivalence when I take both sides to task for acting idiotically or saying insane things. You can nitpick my analogies and no doubt find differences in the examples I utilize to make my point. But substantively, I don’t believe you can argue that there isn’t at least a rough symmetry involved in my analyses. Denying such marks one as a partisan more concerned with scoring minor points in disagreement than in taking a hard look at the actions and beliefs of one’s own side to discern the truth.

By the way, why not voting for Clinton makes me a party man is beyond me. And Holy God almighty what conservative in their right mind would have voted for Kerry? Cole certainly has a limited idea of what does or does not constitute blind party loyalty. Perhaps John hasn’t voted much in his life. Most ballots I’ve marked in the polling booth have contained dozens of candidates for dozens of political offices. If Cole’s end all and be all definition of “party man” starts and stops with who I voted for president, that is pretty shallow indeed.

I did not vote for president in 1972 or 92, I wrote in Reagan’s name in 1976, did not vote in 88. I voted for Paul Simon twice because he was the most honorable politician I ever saw (Wellstone runs second there). I have voted for local Democrats for town and township races in the past although not in the last couple of election cycles. I vote for Democratic judges every few election cycles based on the theory that judges should not be career politicians.

I may vote for Rep. Debbie Halverson if the GOP runs Ozinga again (”Everyone in America has health care. All they have to do is go to an emergency room.”). She seems harmless enough and is thought highly of here in Streator, IL. She got on my good side when she introduced legislation when she was state senator that would have effectively killed the white elephant of an airport out in Peotone being pushed by Jesse Jackson Jr.

No, I am not a party man. I am a nominal Republican in that the GOP fields candidates more regularly who reflect my views. Give me a Democrat who does so and I will seriously consider voting for him/her as I have in the past.

For Cole, it would be interesting to find out the last Republican he voted for since he switched sides.

The left is discovering that unhinged speech directed at Obama is a very bad, very destructive thing.

Wow. I mean, like, Wow.

This is surreal. If Joe Klein really believes that this is some kind of recent phenomenon, then we must assume that he agreed with the vast majority of the Democratic base when they accused Bush of going to war for Haliburton and oil, for being like Hitler, for wanting to kill black people in New Orleans by deliberately withholding aid, for plotting to take over the government and set up a dictatorship…

Since Klein (and the rest of the hand wringers on the left who are currently upset at the idiocy being demonstrated by right wing talk radio listeners who think Obama is a commie) didn’t write similar warning screeds when the kind of talk above was not only commonplace, but accepted as part of the lefty narrative against Bush (and supported by many, many Democrats on the Hill who fed these nutters by hinting that they were right), it makes bullsh*t like this ring hollow indeed:

The amazing thing remains not only the unwillingness of responsible Republicans–a term that is in danger of becoming an oxymoron–to call bull– on this, but also the willingness of many prominent Republicans to join in the slinging of garbage. Michelle Cottle reports that there are Republican-sanctioned efforts afoot to have parents not send their children to school on September 8 because the President is scheduled to address the nation’s school-children that day and they are afraid that he will fill their little heads with socialist propaganda. That is somewhere well beyond disgraceful.

Could I just say that the intensity of this getting pretty scary…and dangerous? We are heading toward a cliff and the usual brakes of civil discourse are not working. Indeed, the Republicans have the pedal to the metal–rushing us toward a tragedy far greater than the California health care forum finger-biting Karen describes below. I’m usually not one to panic or be overly worried about the state of our country–even when we do awful things like invade Iraq and torture people, we usually right our course before long–but I have a sinking feeling about where we’re headed now. I hope I’m wrong.

WHERE HAS JOE KLEIN BEEN FOR THE LAST 8 YEARS? “Stolen elections” ring a bell, Joe? That one was advanced not only in 2000 (despite massive evidence to the contrary) but also in 2004 - to the point that Members of Congress actually challenged the electoral vote! Talk about intensity!

I am at a total loss in understanding such blindness. The left spends fricking 8 years in refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the Bush Administration, and then Steve Benen has the gall to write crap like this?

Birthers, Deathers, Tenthers. Beck, Palin, Limbaugh. Bachmann, Inhofe, DeMint, King, and Broun. A scorched-earth campaign intended to tear the country apart, questioning the legitimacy of the president, the government, and the rule of law. It’s all very scary.

Allow me to substitute: “”No blood for oil” conspiracists, Diebold rigging voting machines, Bush-Hitler, agents of Israel running government, re-instituting the draft, Bush a tool of the Saudi Royal family, HALIBURTON!, a staged terrorist attack so that the 2008 elections would be canceled, FEMA built sites to house anti-war protestors…and on and on.

Not to mention McKinney, Conyers, and half the Democratic caucus who worked tirelessly to undermine the Bush presidency, attacking him in the most vile personal manner, tearing the country apart with their unhinged opposition to anything and everything he did. And while legitimate criticism of our war effort in Iraq could have been tolerated, very few of the rhetorical bombs tossed at Bush from the left was of the “legitimate” variety and much of it was gross exaggeration, hyperbole, dishonest, and deliberately provocative.

Yes Steve, It’s scary now and it was equally scary back then.

There is no excuse for the unhinged nature of dissent on the right - something I have written about at great personal and professional cost for years. But when lefties like Klein, Benen, and their hand wringing ilk invade the public discussion with their weeping about how extreme the opposition is without even acknowledging the dangerous, delegitimzing, depressing, maddening, and yes, scary rhetoric coming from their cohorts during the Bush years, one can not only question their judgment but their sanity as well.

Who are they trying to kid? I will continue to assault irrational, and shallow conservatives like Beck, Limbaugh, and their rabid listeners. But I expect to see a little context from the opposition as well. Nothing in politics happens in a vacuum. For every action, there is an equal or greater reaction.

These vacuous, easily misled talk show adherents spent 8 years listening to the opposition say the most outrageous, the most putrid stuff about their president. And I have seen it more than once in comments on various blogs (and some have taken me to task for writing against the idea), that now it’s our turn for a little payback.

My response has always been “Why ape the absolute worst in your opponents? How dumb is that?” Of course, such logic doesn’t seem to get anywhere except that these same fruitcakes accuse me of being a liberal.

I see very little difference in how unhinged the opposition is acting towards Obama and those who pilloried Bush. Klein, Benen, and the rest are just being drama queens, solemnly informing us how frightened they are at such rank emotionalism in politics, while intoning warnings of these times being the “worst” this, or the “most dangerous” that. It’s pure poppycock. They either slept through last 8 years of the left’s assault on decency and rational discourse or they have the balls to ignore it in order to make a political point.

Get real guys. You’re still part of the problem. The overwhelming number of people who oppose Obama do so in a rational, respectful manner. They are not birthers, or deathers, or any other unhinged faction. They are ordinary Americans and for you to lump them together with the wild eyed fanatics brands you as being equally culpable for the state of political discourse in this country.

Try the truth. It would be a nice change after 8 years of bombastic lies.

As my regular readers know, I have written in the past that I believe the actions of the Bush Administration in authorizing torture broke American and international law and some accounting is necessary in order for us to confront what the government did in our name.

I will not rehash the arguments for and against torture. Suffice it to say, I reject the notion that the ends justifies the means for a variety of reasons, and that I believe those who are sincere in their support of Dick Cheney’s rationale for “enhanced interrogation techniques” have lost sight of one of the things that makes us an exceptional nation; our respect and reverence for the rule of law.

That said, I have also rejected the idea of torture prosecutions - not because I believe the guilty should get off scott free but because any reasonable and fair minded person looking at the matter knows that the administration believed they were acting in the best interests of the nation, and that they honestly believed they had finessed the treaties and statutes by their stretched, and ultimately legally incorrect justifications for torture. Was it wrong for the Bushies to try to extend a fig leaf of legality over what turned out to be serious violations of domestic law and international agreements? I believe they felt they had little choice. To my mind, that doesn’t make it right, nor am I convinced (nor are interrogation experts) that non-torture techniques couldn’t have elicited the same information.

Yes, torture was probably responsible for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed spilling some secrets. But what we’ll never know is if the professional interrogators would have been able to break him down using legal methods. Rejecting the “ticking bomb scenario” as unrealistic, I and many others - including many in the military and intelligence communities who interrogate for a living - have come to the conclusion that the plots broken up because of our waterboarding KSM would probably have been foiled using perfectly legal means of interrogation.

But this doesn’t answer the question about prosecuting or not prosecuting offenders - including high level officials who ordered underlings to break the law. Fred Hiatt, writing in WaPo today, has a thoughtful, but ultimately flawed analysis and recommendation:

On the one hand, this is a nation of laws. If torture violates U.S. law — and it does — and if Americans engaged in torture — and they did — that cannot be ignored, forgotten, swept away. When other nations violate human rights, the United States objects and insists on some accounting. It can’t ask less of itself.

Yet this is also a nation where two political parties compete civilly and alternate power peacefully. Regimes do not seek vengeance, through the courts or otherwise, as they succeed each other. Were Obama to criminally investigate his predecessor for what George W. Bush believed to be decisions made in the national interest, it could trigger a debilitating, unending cycle.

By attempting to navigate between these two principles, Obama has satisfied neither. Last week his administration took another step down a path of investigation and recrimination, without coming any closer to truth-telling or justice as most Americans would understand it.

Even with the best of intentions - and I do not grant the Obama administration that desire based on the rank partisanship they have demonstrated from top to bottom - any prosecution would necessarily be perceived as being politically motivated. The same holds true for any congressional hearings. The idea that the Democrats could conduct anything approaching non-partisan, or at least fair hearings on this issue, involving the Bushies, is laughable. The pressure on Democrats in Congress to turn the hearings into an inquisition from their rabid, partisan base would be overwhelming.

Hiatt suggests a presidential commission:

There is a better, though not perfect, solution, one that the administration reportedly considered, rejected and should consider again: a high-level, respected commission to examine the choices made in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001, and their consequences.

Such a commission would investigate not just the Bush administration but the government, including Congress. It would give former vice president Dick Cheney a forum to make his case on the necessity of “enhanced interrogation techniques.” It would examine the efficacy of such techniques, if any, and the question of whether, even if they work, waterboarding and other methods long considered torture ever can be justified.

Some on the left would object because the goal would not be prosecution and punishment; as in South Africa, amnesty might be promised in exchange for truth-telling. Some on the right, and some in government now, would worry about damaging national security with public airing and rehashing of past misdeeds.

Hiatt bases the idea for this commission on what he believes is a pre-requisite for such a body to be effectve: that “the two political parties compete civilly…” I don’t know where Mr. Hiatt has been spending his days these last couple of decades but it certainly hasn’t been in Washington if he truly believes what he wrote.

There is no civility between the parties. It is all out partisan warefare on any and every issue of consequence - and usually on trivialities as well. Both sides blame the other for this state of affairs, which would be amusing in any other context. The parties are locked in a death grip, driven to hold on with bulldog tenacity by their rabid, uncompromising, unforgiving bases of support whose influence is all out of proportion to their numbers.

But these hysterical party men are also their most reliable voters, as well as being a significant source of volunteer campaign help, and a wellspring of donations for the member’s re-election. It doesn’t take much for the base to turn against a member and given how organized they have become, can turn out a primary candidate to challenge the member on a whim.

For civility to return to politics, there must be a basic recognition by both sides that the other side has the best interests of America at heart. This does not seem possible when the leadership of both parties toss around epithets like “evil mongers” or “culture of death” to describe the other side.

A presidential commission of the kind suggested by Hiatt might succeed in gathering relatively non-partisan members, but couldn’t help being caught up in the vortex of partisan wrangling. Every finding, every witness, every statement made would be filtered through the unique prism found in the base of both parties. It would be marginally different than a select congressional committee and much better than prosecutions. But it would ultimately fail to satisfy either side because it’s mandate would not be to score political points but to find some elusive “truth.” Rather than serve to illuminate what happened and heal the nation, such a commission would eventually be seen by both sides as favoring the opposition.

We live in a different country than existed at the time of the 9/11 Commission. The undisguised hatred of President Bush and the virulent reaction of his supporters to defend him by trashing the opposition over the last 8 years has made the atmosphere in Washington worse than it was in 2002.

It may be that Hiatt’s idea will turn out to be the best option in a universe of bad choices. But it is not a solution as long as neither side trusts each other enough to put aside the massive distrust each holds for the other and see the wisdom of trying to come to grips with this unique, and to my mind, tragic interlude in our nation’s history.

To call the hysterically exaggerated, paranoid rantings of some talk radio personalities and conservative bloggers “whining,” as David Frum does in a series of now 4 articles on conservative despair, is being generous. These overwrought ninnies are the flip side of lefty loons who spouted about Bush turning the US into a Nazi state.

I wrote dozens (perhaps hundreds) of posts about this culture of hysteria on the left during the Bush years with many on the right wholeheartedly agreeing with me. I posed the question more than once, “If I really believed the country was descending into a fascist dictatorship, don’t you think that most of us on the right would be the first on the front lines to combat this evil?” Perhaps it’s time to turn that question around and ask if our freedoms really are being lost, what are you doing sitting at home writing spittle flecked rants about the dangers of dictatorship rather than taking your rifle and going out to battle this scourge?

So once again, I take my rationalist pen in hand and attempt to inject some reason into critiques of the Obama administration and debunk the hysterics who speak of the Republic as if it were in the past tense - or headed there full speed ahead.

Positing the notion that we are marching toward a socialist dictatorship or are losing our freedoms under Obama is just not supported by the facts. And Frum wrote in his second “Whine” post exactly what I have been writing and thinking since Obama took office:

The extremity of conservative pessimism attacks the foundational rules of the American political game. Since 1865, the United States has enjoyed amazing political stability. Americans have achieved this stability via tried and tested rules of the road, including the unquestioning acceptance of election results, an acknowledgement of the basic good faith of the other political party, and an absolute acceptance that people of all points of view are committed to the shared constitutional system.

If I lived in a country in imminent danger of a Bolshevik or Fascist seizure of power, I’d be a cowardly fool if I failed to use every means to prevent it, including violence if need be. If it were true that our political opponents wanted to impose tyranny on the United States – if (as Rush Limbaugh said the other day) a vote for the other party was a vote for “totalitarianism, dungeons, and torture,” then what patriot could possibly abide a political defeat?

Happily, none of those things are true. As wrong and harmful as the Obama administration’s plans are, the administration is playing by the rules of the game. To agitate people into thinking otherwise is to corrode the foundations of the American constitutional regime.

It is also to act and look like sore losers. If America has been sliding gently but irresistibly into soft despotism, where were all the valiant defenders of liberty before November of 2008? Soft despotism begins to look less like a profound sociological trend, more like undulations of the sine curve: It’s despotism when we lose, freedom when we win. We should have more confidence in the people and the country than this. We should also have more charity to our political opponents – who after all are contending with hideous problems bequeathed to them by … by … well suddenly we Republicans cannot seem to remember who preceded Barack Obama in office.

Frum is picking on Mark Levin whose book Liberty and Tyranny has sold 900,000 copies. Levin had a few choice words in reply but frankly, the Great One should know better. Frum’s point about conservatives being relatively sanguine when Bush passed the prescription drug bill, as well as No Child Left Behind is spot on. Sure, there was some grumbling and name calling, but Levin and other pop conservatives never spoke in apocalyptic tones about the massive intrusion of the government into the education of our children nor did many righties see the expansion of Medicare as the forerunner to today’s attempt to take over the health insurance industry.

This is what I’ve been trying to get across to those few conservatives who read this blog and are open to argument. Barack Obama is not a communist, or a socialist, or a fascist, or an anarchist. He is a child of the New Left, and most if not all of his agenda reflects ideas and programs that have been floating around liberal salons, think tanks, and symposiums for nearly 40 years, if not longer.

These ideas weren’t socialist then and they aren’t socialist now. Taking over the auto industry to save the jobs of his union supporters is stupid economics, not a slippery slope to communism. Buying preferred stock in big banks is government strong arming, not the end of capitalism in America. Spending and taxing us until we are a second rate economic power is bad governance, not the prelude to an attempt by Obama to destroy the country in order to set up a dictatorship.

I refuse to accept the liberal critique that this kind of opposition to Obama is largely race-based. That’s absurd on its face. Surely there is a small minority who harbor hate for Obama’s skin color, but this kind of paranoia and hysteria about Obama’s agenda is being fed by the need of many to be part of a great drama where our heroes on the right must save the Republic from its enemies. In short, the Levins, Limbaughs, and the rest of the pop conservative brigade who are standing up and screaming “Fire” in a crowded theater because some idiot lit a cigarette, are turning their listeners into a bunch of 11 year old drama queens.

It’s not enough that our political opponents have ideas that are wrong headed, illogical, resistant to reason, and profligate with the people’s money. These ideas must be evil, insidious, and transcendentally malignant - all the better so that the self-appointed watchdogs of democracy can ride to the rescue and save us from the Evil Lord.

It is, at bottom, an adolescent critique of the Obama administration because, as Frum points out, it substitutes emotion for reason, hyperbole for measured responses, and wildly accusatory rhetoric for a pragmatic approach to combating bad ideas.

Politics is not an exercise in self-expression. It’s an exercise in persuasion. The targets of that persuasion are not the already persuaded but the as yet unpersuaded. It is their concerns that need to be understand, their questions answered, their values appealed to. Harry and Louise did not denounce Clintoncare as fascism. They explained how it would harm the people it purported to help, and they made their case in calm commonsense terms and tone.

In today’s debate, conservatives could show that a public option will invite private employers to end their coverage and dump their employees into the government plan. Americans are practical people, and they’ll respond to practical sense. Because Americans start with a bias in favor of free enterprise, they’ll respond especially well to sensible conservative arguments. But if we elevate everything to an immediate 11 on the Spinal Tap sound amplifier, we’ll lose, and not just elections, but the deepest values we are trying to defend via elections.

In this year 2009, it often seems that liberals offer policies and conservatives offer emotions. True, the liberals offer bad policies and conservatives offer understandable or anyway pardonable emotions. Rick Santelli expressed something real and true in his famous CNBC outburst.

I think Frum is a little harsh with Levin, whose book - what I’ve read of it - is much more than a dark, emotional screed against Obama. There is an elegant defense of the free market as well as a passionate portrayal of conservatism as the antidote to Obama’s government overreach. But Levin can’t leave it at that and be successful. Talk radio is all about eliciting an emotional response from the listener, and urging conservatives to counter Obama with reason and pragmatism rather than gut busting anger and hyperbolic fear mongering cannot be done and still remain atop the talk radio ziggurat.

If I seem a little harsh with some of my fellow conservatives who see Gorgons and dragons behind every tree in Washington it is because the perception is gaining ground - fed by a media eager to falsely portray all conservatives as unbalanced weirdos - that we can’t be trusted to run the country because we are too angry, too emotional to govern dispassionately. I know that a majority of conservatives are not into the kind of over the top nuttiness exhibited by many on the right. This moronic cacophony is especially prevelant on the web where these memes are endlessly recycled and regurgitated in a kind of perverse feed back loop. It has become a contest to see which blogger or commenter can outdo the last one in spouting a riot of nonsense about Obama’s dark plans to cancel elections, round up opponents, even turn the country over to the Muslims.

Obama Derangement Syndrome is well established now. It is up to those conservatives who are more interested in returning to power than in despairing over how the United States has become a socialist country, to rationally critique the abominable policies of this administration, and regain the high ground in the debate.

Otherwise, we will continue to wander in a dark, depressing wilderness - one of our own making.

When the “Torture Memos” were released a couple of months ago, President Obama took what I thought was the correct course; acknowledge the episode in our history, condemn it, pledge that it won’t happen again, and move on into the future:

This is a time for reflection, not retribution. I respect the strong views and emotions that these issues evoke. We have been through a dark and painful chapter in our history. But at a time of great challenges and disturbing disunity, nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past. Our national greatness is embedded in America’s ability to right its course in concert with our core values, and to move forward with confidence.

I still believe this is exactly the correct course of action, albeit with one caveat; investigate this “painful chapter in our history” so we can discover how this happened.

It is obvious to any rational, thinking, fair minded individual that the Bush Administration did not undertake this torture regime lightly, nor did they carry it out for self-aggrandizing purposes, nor did they believe they were in the wrong. Their motives were to protect the country - as it turns out, at too high a cost. They were not looking for political advantage. They were looking for information.

There is a dispute over whether they got anything of value from their illegal actions, but using hindsight to judge the torture regime purely on efficacious grounds is nonsense. In their view, they had to try. That was the whole point of what even they acknowledged several times was shaky legal activity.

I don’t happen to think it was that close of a call legally but others have made some cogent arguments that the Bush administration did indeed walk a fine legal line. I reject those arguments as sophistry because they are given “after the fact” as justification for actions already taken. There were enough lawyers in the Bush Justice Department who knew better and protested prior to the illegal torture that there should be little doubt that the fig leaf of legality supplied by Yoo and others was inadequate to the situation.

Surely, there must be some kind of investigation into how the Bushies arrived at the decision that what they were doing wasn’t torture despite ample evidence that it was. Their overriding argument appears to be that “it really didn’t hurt that much” because they took precautions (such as limiting the time a prisoner would be forced to undergo waterboarding) and that the pain they inflicted left few marks and healed in a matter of days.

Once the psychological barrier against torture was broken, it appears that things got out of control from there. So yes, let’s investigate. But prosecute?

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. is leaning toward appointing a criminal prosecutor to investigate whether CIA personnel tortured terrorism suspects after Sept. 11, 2001, setting the stage for a conflict with administration officials who would prefer the issues remain in the past, according to three sources familiar with his thinking.

Naming a prosecutor to probe alleged abuses during the darkest period in the Bush era would run counter to President Obama’s oft-repeated desire to be “looking forward and not backwards.” Top political aides have expressed concern that such an investigation might spawn partisan debates that could overtake Obama’s ambitious legislative agenda.

The White House successfully resisted efforts by congressional Democrats to establish a “truth and reconciliation” panel. But fresh disclosures have continued to emerge about detainee mistreatment, including a secret CIA watchdog report, recently reviewed by Holder, highlighting several episodes that could be likened to torture.

Holder’s decision could come within weeks, around the same time the Justice Department releases an ethics report about Bush lawyers who drafted memos supporting harsh interrogation practices, the sources said. The legal documents spell out in sometimes painstaking detail how interrogators were allowed to subject detainees to simulated drowning, sleep deprivation, wall slamming and confinement in small, dark spaces.

Prosecutions would no doubt please some on the left who want a pound of flesh from Bush administration officials. But is the administration really that keen on reigning in Holder and preventing him from looking at this “dark chapter in our history?”

Methinks the Obama administration doth protest too much. A distraction like this is just what the doctor ordered to take people’s minds off the fact that the stim bill isn’t working, that there is a growing call from Obama’s left flank for a second stimulus measure, that his cap and trade bill is in big trouble in the senate, and that it is far from certain that his his health care plan will come out the way he wants - with a public option that will be paid for without taxing the middle class.

Rallying his base to the cause of prosecuting Bush administration officials for torture will also take their minds off how he has betrayed them on a host of issues from gay rights to his agreement to indefinite detentions of terrorists.

So might this unleashing of Holder on Bush era torture crimes be nothing more than a distraction from the woeful economy that is resisting the president’s importunings to improve? Obama wouldn’t be the first president to use the tactic and he wouldn’t be the last if that is his game.

A good old fashioned investigation with strategic leaks and the spectacle of Bushies marching into the Justice Department to testify would serve as excellent bait for the media who no doubt would go overboard in their coverage of the hated Bush administration’s torture policies.

Bread and circuses worked for the Roman pro-consuls who used the spectacles to distract a populace constantly on the verge of starvation.

Why not Obama?

Conor Friedersdorf receiving some words of wisdom from one of his many strawmen.

A few days ago when the Levin/Dreher/Friedersdorf war was waging at various points around the internet, I wanted to weigh in on it to defend Conor Friedersdorf from charges by some that he was just some youthful lightweight whose attacks on Levin for suggesting a woman’s husband put a gun to his head for being married to such a dolt were misguided and ignorant of the “context” found on conservative talk radio.

After reading this piece at The American Scene by Mr. Friedersdorf, I’m glad I didn’t.

I have given up trying to understand why conservatives place such importance on what comes out of the mouths of pop righties like Levin whose shtick, while entertaining, is taken far too seriously by way too many. Fine. Color me a old fuddy duddy but it used to be conservatives were perfectly able to find inspiration and guidance from genuine thinkers or even thoughtful politicians. I suppose every mass movement needs its popularizers and celebrities these days (I recall the guff astronomer Carl Sagan endured from his colleagues for trying to make extraordinarily complex concepts accessible to minds less scientifically inclined - like mine). But really now, must we elevate to hero status people whose claim to fame is that they can savage the opposition in more colorful and amusing ways than some other shock jock?

Yes, yes, I know that Rush, Levin, and the rest do more than simply make liberals look like idiots, and even dangerous idiots at times. They also dispense conservative wisdom - or, at least what their adoring fans believe is wisdom. Mark me down as unimpressed with most of these shock jocks forays into the realm of conservative ideas. Listening to Limbaugh sometimes reminds me of my best friend John when I was in high school who didn’t read Moby Dick, or The Red Badge of Courage, or any of the classics assigned in literature class but instead bought the comic book version, usually on the morning of the test. Needless to say, he passed the exam but lost out on the richness of Melville’s prose and Crane’s towering anger at the waste of war.

I like a good verbal slap at liberals as much as the next conservative but why must it degenerate into the kind of crude vulgarities used by Levin et al? In the race for ratings, the more inventive the invective, the more friendly that Arbitron meter becomes, I guess.

At any rate, I agreed with Friedersdorf that Levin stepped over the line and should have been smacked down for it. But when a young man like Friedersdorf comes up with a shockingly ill conceived post like this one on “terror hawks” and how Obama could use the same excuses used by Bush to start going after anti-abortion activists, I am glad my support for his arguments against Levin was never put in a post.

This piece has a double dose of straw men, a generous dollop of reductio ad absurdom argumentation, with a heaping pile of manure for desert.

First, what’s with this?

The attack on Dr. Tiller is widely referred to as “terrorism” in the blogosphere. Agree or not, it is easy to image an ongoing terrorist campaign run by fringe pro-lifers to shut down abortion clinics. Heaven forbid that this recent murder is followed by bombings at a few Planned Parenthood locations, but that scenario isn’t unthinkable — copycat atrocities are a sad fact of modern life.

“Easy to image” an “ongoing terrorist campaign” carried out by fanatical pro lifers in a scenario that “isn’t unthinkable? No, it’s not easy to imagine and barely thinkable (Dismissing the possibility entirely cannot be done but “easy to imagine” it is not.) In fact, one would have to deliberately ignore history to imagine anything of the sort. Such acts of murder by unbalanced fanatics have been blessedly rare and have never come in the kind of terrorist wave attack Friedersdorf posits above. The self evident reason is that abortion providers are on high alert after such a terrorist act as are clinics, making further atrocities nearly impossible.

But someone must have put a burr up Mr. Friedersdorf’s behind for him to go off like this:

Should something like that come to pass, I wonder how “War on Terror hawks” would react. My admittedly flawed term is meant to reference folks who believe the executive branch possesses broad unchecked powers to combat terrorism, including the designation of American citizens as enemy combatants, the indefinite detention of terror suspects, wiretapping phones without warrants, “enhanced interrogation techniques,” and other powers initially claimed by the Bush Administration and its defenders. Would these predominantly conservative officials, commentators and writers be comfortable if President Obama declared two or three extremist pro-lifers as “enemy combatants”? Should Pres. Obama have the prerogative to order the waterboarding of these uncharged, untried detainees? Should he be able to listen in on phone conversations originating from evangelical churches where suspected abortion extremists hang out? The answer is probably that different “War on Terror hawks” — anyone have a better term for this? — would react differently, but as a matter of law, it seems to me that if they’d gotten their way during the Bush Administration, President Obama would have the power to take all those steps and more, a prospect that is terrifying to me, not because I think our Commander in Chief is looking for a pretext to round up innocent pro-lifers, but because it doesn’t take many violent attacks before Americans start clamoring for a strong executive response, a dynamic that tends to erode liberties in previously unthinkable ways and spawn mistakes whereby innocents are made to suffer.

First of all, take a breath, my friend. My eyes are turning red just from reading that last sentence.

I must congratulate Mr. Friedersdorf on setting up such a fine strawman. Obama holding pro-life activists as “enemy combatants” sure is dramatic but really now, the odds of that happening fall somewhere between my becoming starting right fielder for the Chicago Cubs and the moon careening out of orbit and hitting the earth before I finish writing this sentence. Still here? Good.

So the idea that “terror hawk” commentators would be faced with such a question has as much chance of occurring as me being elected Governor of Illinois - especially since I am a nominal Republican and, while I wouldn’t mind a little harmless graft now and again, the crooks and rogues who inhabit the sewer of Illinois politics are major leaguers compared to anyone else.

It is a ridiculous argument to make, this idea that any president would come down on anti-abortion fanatics like that. Ditto waterboarding pro life activists (Why??). And Mr. Friedersdorf is naive indeed if he doesn’t believe the FBI isn’t already listening in on what these activists are up to - even if the connection leads to a church. The Bureau no doubt has a handle on most, if not all of the fanatics and probably have a good idea which ones are a threat and which are mostly talk.

Friedersdorf is also probably off base with his contention that a wave of terrorist attacks on clinics would cause an outcry by Americans for a “strong executive response.” No doubt pro-choice activists would quite understandably be yelping for the civil liberties of activists but would the average American, who would be in little danger from such attacks, make the kind of stink about internal security that our politicians made in the aftermath of 9/11?

Mr. Friedersdorf’s arguments are based on the notion that there is equivalence between a terrorist attack carried out by trained cadres hell bent on killing as many of us as possible and, historically speaking, lone wackos or small groups of untrained fanatics attacking small targets that — again, historically - have resulted in a small loss of life. I don’t see the equivalence or much need to worry that Obama or any president - even if Mr. Friedersorf’s terror wave scenario came true - would carry out the draconian measures that President Bush felt necessary to impose in the aftermath of 9/11.

I would be in agreement with Conor if he had stuck to the notion that another terrorist attack that was equally or more devastating than 9/11 would almost certainly lead to additional curtailments of our liberties. I hate to contemplate the notion of what the aftermath of a WMD attack would entail and what impact it would have on our freedoms. But Friedersdorf is trying to make a point about the danger of right wing religious nuts being equal to that of the jihadists - not only as a threat but that tactics used to fight the jihadists would be used to violate the civil liberties of anti-abortion fanatics That dog don’t hunt.

One point Conor makes I agree with; supporting torture techniques like waterboarding is wrong. As for the rest, I have been troubled by some of the Bush-era policies like FISA violations and and some of the more eyebrow raising strictures in the Patriot Act like removing safeguards on FBI warrants. But I am also not a civil liberties absolutist and recognize that the exigencies of war sometimes calls for a curtailment of some liberty. That has historically been the case and to have denied the president the same powers granted every president since Washington would have been wrong.

If I were Conor Friedersdorf, I would pick another analogy to make his point about “terror hawks” than the fringe fanatics of the anti-abortion movement.

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?