A Voice in the Wilderness In Defense of "Mere Conservatism"

A View of the Right, From the Left

E.J. Dionne is a Washington Post columnist, a loyal liberal, and ardent critic of conservatives everywhere.  I consider it very important to "know thy enemy" and to read what the other side has to say about the same exact issues I read and hear about.

This time out, in a piece entitled "Tory Lessons For Republicans", Mr. Dionne goes after the "radical" nature of the current Republican Party.

WASHINGTON -- "There's something else you need to know about me," declared the earnest young politician, "which is I believe the test of a good and strong society is how we look after the most vulnerable, the most frail and the poorest."

This lovely bleeding-heart liberal sentiment was part of the closing statement offered by David Cameron, the leader of Britain's Conservative Party at last week's final debate before this Thursday's election. And after a rocky campaign start, Cameron now leads in the polls and may well become the next prime minister.

Contrast Cameron's deliberate effort to reach out to voters who, as he has put it, have "idealism and progressive ideals hardwired into their DNA" with what's happening in the Republican Party.

Let me take one thing at a time:

First, David Cameron's comments are not "bleeding heart liberal"; they are the sentiments of the overwhelming majority of civilized, Western people.  I know very few people who advocate against taking care of those in need.  The ENTIRE debate centers around the ideology involved.  The question is not "Should we help the poor?", but "Who should help the poor?" and "Who is better suited to help the poor?"

Conservatives believe that the individual, and by extension, the local communities, groups, and organizations he or she is affiliated with, ought to be the main and primary source of care for the "least among us."  Liberals, like E.J. Dionne, believe that not only is the government better suited to help the poor...it is more moral to have the government help the poor.

The disagreement here is worldview, not petty politics.

In today's GOP, someone like Cameron would be condemned as a big-government sellout and buried under a mountain of tea bags. For even as the news in Britain focused on Cameron's comeback courtesy of his effort to detoxify the Conservative Party brand, the political news here was Florida Gov. Charlie Crist's decision to abandon the Republicans and run for the U.S. Senate as an independent.

Again, no one would condemn Cameron (were he an American conservative Republican running for office) for the quote Mr. Dionne attributed to him.  Just as no one forced Charlie Crist out of the Republican Party.  Unless you consider "more people liking your opponent than you" a "force out."

We have these things called "elections" every two, four, and six years, and leading up to those "elections" we have these other things called "primaries" where each Party can decide who their candidates will be in the general elections.  Charlie Crist ran as a Republican, was unpopular with Republican primary voters in Florida, and decided to bolt the party to keep his shot at gaining power as a U.S. Senator in tact.

To blame Republicans for not liking someone who, we now know, is comfortable switching sides of the aisle as soon as it becomes politically expedient, would be like blaming Democrats for being upset with Joe Lieberman (D-CT) and his staunch support of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and of John McCain's 2008 presidential bid.  Both are understandable.  Democrats jettisoned Lieberman because, on the whole, they are anti-war.  Republicans jettisoned Crist, in part, because he was a supporter of the Stimulus spending bill and other various forms of fiscal irresponsibility.

There's also this: The angry, incendiary and sometimes racist tone that is being projected at party rallies -- and by legislation such as Arizona's Don't-Risk-Looking-Hispanic "immigration" law -- is starting to give Democrats real hope that they might avoid electoral catastrophe this fall.

The majority of people who go to Tea Parties are, in fact, white.  Almost 100% of black people voted for Barack Obama.  Does this mean black people are racist towards white politicians and those of us who hold conservative values and promote conservative policies?  Of course not.  What are the chances that E.J. Dionne has attended a Tea Party?  I'm not saying his opinions are legitimate; I'm saying they are wrong and close-minded.

Oh, and you can hope all you want for the results of the elections in November to be anything but disastrous for Democrats...but it will be just that: hope.

Republicans, from my conversations, are starting to worry that a purely negative approach to this fall's elections will be insufficient to put the party over the top. That helps explain why House Republican Leader John Boehner took to National Public Radio (and not Glenn Beck's show) to promise that the GOP would be about more than a large number of exclamation points after the word "no."

"We have a project under way that people will see soon," Boehner said, "that will engage the American people in helping us develop our agenda that we would enact if we're fortunate enough to win the majority in November." Of course there was negative even in the positive, since he acknowledged that part of this approach will be repealing and replacing this year's health care bill.

Opposing pieces of legislation (i.e. health care, cap-and-trade, etc.) that the nation cannot afford and stand intellectually and ideologically opposed to everything you hold dear is "negative" only when it involves Center-Right Americans and politicians opposing liberal Democrats and their policies.  When George W. Bush was rabidly maligned for 8 years, we were told by the media (and men like E.J. Dionne) that dissent was "patriotic"; that it was the duty of the minority party to counter-balance the rule of the stronger one.  Now, we on the Right are nothing more than a bunch of negative, nay-saying "haters" that love to say "no" to every fun, exciting idea liberals in Washington D.C. have.

And about the whole NPR vs. Glenn Beck comment...Isn't it showing that Republicans are NOT close-minded and simply preaching to their base if they are actively pursuing the type of liberal audience NPR boasts?

It tells you something when politicians are forced by pressures inside their party to embrace what they must know is wrong. And as a political matter, Republicans have just given Democrats a huge boost by reminding Latinos why it's important to vote this fall.

In Britain, Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labor Party is trying to hang on by insisting that Cameron's changes to the Conservative Party are merely cosmetic. Democrats don't have that burden. Here, moderate Republicans are being forced to plaster themselves with right-wing makeup just to survive. Or, like Charlie Christ, they're deciding to go natural, and leave.

I would be shocked to learn of any politician in the past year or so (since The One took office) voting for, or publicly lending his/her support to, a piece of legislation that they did not fully believe in.  I'd hate to learn that the White House or Party leaders had applied explicit or even implicit pressure on Democrats who were not "totally cool" with things like cap-and-trade, the health care bill, or current senate financial regulation bill.  That would be a shame, if it were to come to light that such things took place under anyone but a mean, old Republican's watch.  (Think: Dick Cheney)

The logic (or lack thereof) employed by liberal commentators to explain away the rise in traditional, conservative, fiscally-responsible Americans becoming involved in the political process is dizzying.  Independents and moderates have turned on Barack Obama, and we're supposed to believe that the reason they have is because Republicans have "gone to the far-Right"?  It is inconceivable to someone like Mr. Dionne that Americans are sick of BOTH parties primarily because both have spent money they don't have, regulated things that should be less-regulated, and under-regulated things that should be closely-regulated.

Democrats (and spend-happy Republicans like Charlie Crist) are taking it on the chin right now because they have been unwilling to move to the Center (which requires them to go Right), not because conservatives (always depicted as white, angry males) are watching Glenn Beck or don't mind Sarah Palin's accent.  Democrats are passing massive pieces of society-altering legislation with no bi-partisan support, and dis-favorable poll numbers among the American electorate. The Left has all the power right now, and they are using it accordingly.  I don't blame them for that.

But don't then turn around and tell me that I am wrong or mean or inappropriate in my vocal opposition to the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda.  Don't tell me that the only thing getting people out to Tea Parties and out to voting booths for primary elections is hatred of the poor and racism.

What matters most to me is not which Party is in power, but whether or not the Party in power is doing the right, moral, and Constitutional thing.  I don't believe the liberal Democrats currently in power are passing any of those three tests.  That's my opinion, and I plan on doing everything I can to see many of them removed in November.