AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

Thank you, Foxfyre for reviewing what you think is modern conservatism. I think that is exactly what modern conservatism ought to be. I wish that what you and I think is modern conservatism were actually what a majority of those calling themselves conservatives today also think it is. However, too often too many seem to me to be alleging it's something else (e.g., go-along-to-get-along conservatism, compassionate conservatism, buy-votes conservatism, etc.).

Or......to put it more succinctly, what some try to pass for conservatism is in fact mostly modern liberalism.

Or......to put it more succinctly, what some try to pass for conservatism is in fact mostly modern liberalism.

Now, I would very much appreciate the focus to be turned to WHAT is modern conservatism and the merits or lack thereof of that <snip>

Of course that assumes that liberals are capable of considering a subject without throwing their hate and loathing of anything or anybody non-liberal into it?

With the prospect of defeat for John McCain growing more likely every day, the GOP destined to see its numbers reduced in both the House and Senate, and the Republican brand debased to the point of bankruptcy, the conservative intelligentsia is factionalized and feuding, criminating and recriminating, in a way that few of its members can recall in their political lifetimes. Populists attack Establishmentarians. Neocons assail theocons. And virtually everyone has something harsh to say about the party’s standard-bearer.

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When the weapons of choice shift from pistols to Uzis after November 4, <snip> for Republicans it will be a necessary passage toward either the revival or reinvention of conservatism. Nobody serious on the right doubts that the overhaul is at once required and bound to be arduous"but it may take longer and prove even bloodier than anyone now imagines.

Not surprisingly, Sarracuda’s foes on the right dismiss the counter-backlash more or less out of hand. When I ask Frum about the apparent class overtones of the anti-anti-Palin argument, he deems it a mere “rhetorical trope.” What he hears instead is the sound of defeatism. “The people who defend her have already given up any serious thought of Republicans’ wielding governmental power anytime soon,” Frum says. “They have already moved to a position of pure cultural symbolic opposition to a new majority. The people who criticize her do so because we have some hope that we could be in contention in 2012, and there’s some risk that she could be the party’s nominee, and she’d probably lose"and even if by some miracle she won, she’d be a terrible president.”

There are, in fact, any number of post-Reagan visions floating around among the eggheads of the GOP. Newt Gingrich has been contending for some time that the party needs to abandon its posture as resolutely anti-government; that it needs to adopt a “pro"good government” stance of managerial competence. Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam, in their recent book Grand New Party, made a case for a blend of social conservatism and populist economics to appeal to what they call “Sam’s Club voters.” And Brooks cites British Tory party leader David Cameron’s focus on civil society, twinned with an acceptance of a larger state so long as it is fully paid for, as offering a promising example.

Frum is not alone is fearing that Palin"who, for all her obvious defects, must be the Republican at this moment with the largest, most ardent fan base in the party"will emerge as one of the front-runners the next time around. The former Reagan economic adviser Bruce Bartlett predicts, indeed, that the Republican primaries will turn into a Palin/Gingrich steel-cage death match.

Foxfyer wrote:

Or......to put it more succinctly, what some try to pass for conservatism is in fact mostly modern liberalism.

I would say much of today's modern conservatism is now mostly a status quo kind of socialsim masquerading as conservatism. But drop the status quo part and we have what is mostly modern liberalism.

But for this one, please repeat after me:
Modern American Conservatism is not synonymous with George W. Bush.
Modern American Conservatism is not synonymous with John S. McCain
Modern American Conservatism is not synonymous with the Republican Party.

If the Republican Party has lost ground with American voters it may not be because we've "abandoned" important conservative principles. It is just as likely that the Party has lost public appeal by been too far Right. Those who urge and rant about ideological purity are a turnoff, and present fat targets for the opposition. As Republicans, we need to ask ourselves if Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, and Ron Paul truly represent conservative principles traditional to our Party. Ron Paul's candidacy was based entirely on ideological purity, and frankly many of his conclusions about what policies those principles called for were wide of both Republican and the relatively unaffiliated moderate voter's acceptance.