Is conservatism really dead?

9 comments February 26th, 2009

 

 Sam Tanenhaus has a provocative six-page ESSAY in The New Republic in which he pronounces modern American conservatism dead.

 Now, don’t jump to conclusions. This is not some leftish diatribe. On the contrary, it’s a rather arcane argument from the perspective of a guy who’s obviously done a lot of homework on the subject.

 I think it’s worth you’re while, and I’m genuinely eager to read your comments.

Neo-Con Bill Kristol is talking out of school

7 comments February 26th, 2009

 If I’m right about this, there are more than a few Republicans who aren’t very happy about Bill Kristol’s latest column.

 The smarmy Kristol, a leading light in the neo-conservative movement, had his maiden voyage in the Washington Post this morning after having lost similar gigs with Time magazine and The New York Times.

 His INAUGURAL COLUMN in the Post is noteworthy mainly for the frank  — some might say too frank — advice he offers Republican lawmakers on how to deal with President Obama’s legislative initiatives.

 After darkly reminding his pals that Obama’s aim, in the president’s own words, is not merely to “revive this economy, but to build a new foundation for lasting prosperity,” Kristol gets to the gist of his counsel:

Conservatives and Republicans will disapprove of this effort. They will oppose it. Can they do so effectively?

Perhaps — if they can find reasons to obstruct and delay. They should do their best not to permit Obama to rush his agenda through this year. They can’t allow Obama to make of 2009 what Franklin Roosevelt made of 1933 or Johnson of 1965. Slow down the policy train. Insist on a real and lengthy debate. Conservatives can’t win politically right now. But they can raise doubts, they can point out other issues that we can’t ignore (especially in national security and foreign policy), they can pick other fights — and they can try in any way possible to break Obama’s momentum.

 Yeah! Obstruct and delay! We can’t let this guy succeed. It wouldn’t be good for us. To hell with what’s good for the country.

 But now that Kristol’s advice is on the public record, progressives will be sure to mention it every time Republican lawmakers seem to be heeding it.

 Not a smart move, Mr. Kristol. You should have just phoned your buddies or texted them or something.  Going public with stuff like this doesn’t help the cause.

We give them our money — and then they whine!

6 comments February 26th, 2009

 

 I’ve made the point on several occasions here that the blue states — states like Illinois, which tend to vote Democratic — generally pay more in federal taxes than they get back in federal spending, while the red states — the Republican states – generally get more in federal spending than they pay in taxes.

 Gail Collins  touches on that same point in her COLUMN this morning in The New York Times.

 Collins writes: “How is it that the stars of the Republican austerity movement come from the states that suck up the most federal money? Taxpayers in New York send way more to Washington than they get back so more can go to places like Alaska and Louisiana. Which is fine, as long as we don’t have to hear their governors bragging about how the folks who elected them want to keep their tax money to themselves. Of course they do! That’s because they’re living off ours.”

 The nerve of some people!

If I wasn’t who and what I am, I could be president

12 comments February 26th, 2009

 

  It occurred to me this morning that if I wasn’t old and liberal, I might have a chance to become president of the United States.

 This strange thought came to me when I heard Pat Buchanan on MSNBC say something to the effect — I don’t have an exact quote — that now is the perfect time to be young, conservative and politically ambitious in America.

 Buchanan’s point was that the Republican Party finds itself tantalizingly bereft of leadership at this critical juncture in the nation’s history. For example, nobody in the GOP has anything remotely resembling front-runner status for the party’s presidential nomination of three years hence.

 Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindal seem to have flamed out already, having become punch lines to cruel jokes. Mitt Romney? Not likely. He was once too liberal, and he comes off as a slick phony.   Mike Huckabee? Even less likely. Too theocratic.

 So, who’s left? Joe the plumber? Come on, be serious.

 This vacuum of leadership in the GOP will be made manifest when the Conservative Political Action Conference convenes today in Washington.  Oh,  there’ll be lots of red-meat rhetoric from the Limbaughs, Coulters, et al, but there shan’t be much in the way of a conservative ephiphany, no emergence of any hero showing the way to a new brand of responsible governance.

 Ah, if only I were young, conservative and ambitious

 But don’t be fooled. My daydream, if transplanted to the mind of somebody who actually is young, requires recognition of the fact that America neither wants nor needs anything resembling the kind of conservatism that the Republican Party has been selling for the past generation. It’s that kind of stuff that has led the GOP to the political wilderness in which it now finds itself.

 No, the new Republican savior will have to come up with something bold and different, a unique hybrid of conservativism and liberalism that won’t be dismissed as squishy moderation. Maybe we could call it “pragmatism.”

 What a concept!

UPDATE: Speaking of Joe the Plumber, we have exciting news HERE.

How GOP tax cuts burden future generations

12 comments February 26th, 2009

Froma Harrop gets it EXACTLY  RIGHT, making it clear why only 17 percent of Americans are eager for the Republicans to stick to their party’s so-called principles.