For those of us tempted to say “I told you so” it’s at best a bittersweet comment. I can remember standing in a clinic the afternoon of Sept. 11th talking to a lady watching the news and commenting that I hoped Bush was up to the task of marshalling the goodwill we had at that point of most of the world in leading the country through that trama. It’s a real shame that he pissed away all that goodwill, and then some. Talk about opportunity lost! Phil

I live near Dallas, read the Dallas Morning News and Dreher’s blog. I must say he seems well-read and can put a coherent sentence together. However, please look again at what he writes. He laments the fact that Republicans, indeed most conservatives of any or no party affiliation, himself included, were complicit in going along with the failed policies of this president and the administration. Why does he lament? It’s because the Republican Party and the conservative movement in general will suffer in the next election. Does he care that over 3400 good men and women in our military have died, and that thousands more have been wounded? Does he care that hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians – men, women, children – have also needlessly died? Does he care that millions have been displaced from their homes? He doesn’t give that impression. Instead he takes another crack at the Medicare prescription drug benefit, among other things. His contrition over backing the war appears sincere yet self-serving. From his other writings, I don’t believe he’s learned any lessons.

If we’re talking about Noonan’s piece in the Wall Street Journal, I had this problem with it: The immigration bill is not the final kiss-off the base, it’s the first thing Bush promised to and might yet do. The anti-immigration people are not fiscal conservatives, they aren’t limited government conservatives, they are not acting as a religious voice and they are not advocating better national security. When Noonan describes the immigration reform proposal as a final kiss-off of the Reagan Republican coalition by the administration, I think she’s picked the wrong issue over which to announce the fall. Absolutely, though, the immolation of the conservative movement belongs to the movement as a whole and while I never once voted for Bush (I wrote in McCain in 2000) I include myself.

Peggy Noonan has the running, somewhat curious and selfcentered, conceit that somehow the Reagan era was a unique and highest fulfillment of the conservative movement. She has also apparently forgotten about the immigration policies and bills of 1980s- the fallout of the Mariano boatlift, and the 1986 bill which resembles the current one. As for the whole of the present, i.e. Nixon Era-formed ‘conservative’ movement…their game, as far as I can tell, was to take and stall the country in the distinctly un-Modern social and political conditions prior to 1968 or 1969. It succeeded, but it has required ever more absurd, vehement, reality-denying, and extreme measures and crises revisiting the pre-1968 past. Of course, that has necessarily limited its core appeal to generations who lived in that social condition. I think history will say that in 2005 the rising tide of Modernity quietly overtopped the conservative political levee. We saw the meltdown of the politically pragmatic Republican leaners in the second half of 2005. Then meltdown of the partisan moderate Republicans in the first half of 2006. And meltdown of the classical Right Republicans in the second half of 2006. Now it’s the exposed Republican bedrock, the reactionaries, struggling to cling to denial and fend off refutation by realities.

Jillian, I respectfully disagree about what the conservative movement was about. For a lot of us to whom it appealed, the issue was whether government and law could control behavior to the extent the left thought it could. I would never defend racism, sexism, homophobia, exploitation, ignorance, lack of health care, a sole model for families or any form of intolerance but I objected and still do to the extent that government involves itself in affairs in which it is not a party. Just because the Republican party since 2000 is every ounce as intrusive as the Democrats are doesn’t mean conservatives are trying to freeze society. The Republican party left the conservative movement by the year 2000.

Oops, sorry that was me.

Absolutely right on. Mrs. Noonan referred to this president throwing away his inheritance more than once in her article. Maybe she does not realize that perhaps his GREATER inheritance is already secured in Him. It is good to see this president looking like a globalist again.

What a great, great discussion. It is very cool to be a part of it with you guys. David

Anonymous, Both parties have long had elements that promote highly intrusive policies. It didn’t simply flip over for Republicans in 2000. I have to admit that the scariest times are the periods when the House, Senate and Presidency are controlled by a single party — Times of few checks and balances, and of towing the party line regardless. Case in point, why did it take the Democrats getting a majority in the Senate and House to get Republican politicians to speak out? As others have mused, why did it take immigration to push Noonan over the edge? Yes, it’s a lousy bill but at least it is subject to *active* debate. That is something we haven’t seen often in much of Bush’s post-9/11 presidency.

George Bush leads us into a disastrous war in which he squanders 3400+ American lives and God only knows how many Iraqis, throws a third of a trillion dollars down a rathole, and turns Iraq in the very terrorist incubator he claimed to be trying to prevent and what finally disaffacts Noonan and so many other true-believers in this catastrophic presidency is Mexcians.

This immigration issue is a hand grenade with the pin pulled being hurled back and forward between the parties. Look at it in that context and you can understand the issues. We are not going to deport 12-15 million people. I almost wish we could/would but we are NOT going to do that. If the president WERE to DO THAT, the GOP would be left with 10% of Hispanics like it now gets of blacks, not withstanding the supposed opposition to anmensty by American Hispanics. The media knows how to whip up emotions.

Unsympathetic Reader, “Anonymous” was me by mistake. You are right, of course, but I guess I was trying to point out the “conservative” and “Republican” are no more synonymous than “Republican” and “Christian.” 2000 is when I, as someone who is conservative and tends to vote Republican, had to ask myself if the two hadn’t diverged entirely.

It was too bad that many others hadn’t noticed then. Since before the founding of the US many leaders worried about the usurpation of religion for political gain. No party has a lock on religious sanctity. My rule of thumb is that anyone who wraps themselves the flag or a Bible deserves extra scrutiny. The trouble these days is they every candidate feels they have to go through the motions of religious obsequiousness. Frankly, I think the country should elect at least one unabashed agnostic or atheist for President and get over the immature, populist craving for religious piety in our government officials. There is simply no reliable correlation between professed religious belief and good governance. FWIW – “Catholic” and “Democrat” diverged too.

Right Unsympathetic reader. Dogs drool when they smell meat and politicians praise.

I am a moderate with some conservative tendencies; however, I spent a number of years politically left-of-center.The Bush Administration has never changed its modus operandi since first coming into office, and its not just the conservative movement that has been betrayed — it is the nation itself.The Bush Administration has been doing to the nation what Enron did to its shareholders and employees (and the state of California) etc. and with some of the same players involved. It started, insofar as I can see, when a man who was not qualified for the job of President decided he was entitled to that position by virtue of his parentage and class.I am anything but anti-business, but Bush brought a bunch with him who are incapable of seeing a difference between the business interests they advocate for and the public interest.

The notion that Rod thinks American Conservative is the future of conservatism in any way is just laughable. It’s unfortunate that his disillusion with the Bush administration has pushed him to a corner of conservatism that was rightly isolated and push aside long ago.