“While I agree that it’s fairly pointless, as a tactical matter, for dissidents to attack the talk radio giants, this comes, I think, out of a deep frustration that people with little more than slogans and attitude have bigfooted discussion among conservatives, and have helped turn the GOP and the movement into something that’s extremely hostile to change (as distinct from skepticism of it, as all real conservatives should be), and almost fanatically opposed to dissent from within. A fairly conservative friend of mine and I were talking the other day about something Glenn Beck had said, and my friend looked disgusted, saying, “I’m sick of being associated with conservatives.” The impulse to take on the Becks and the Limbaughs comes from a sense that these guys are hurting us bad, and preventing the kind of clear thinking that we need to get back in the political game. I’d love to know how Mark and the League propose for dissident conservatives to “engage” the base when the kind of people the base trusts and takes its cues from demonize dissidents as RINOs, closet liberals, squishes, wets, suck-ups, and so forth. I’m asking seriously. I don’t know how to go about this in the current climate.” ~ Rod Dreher

There’s no easy answer to this question, of course.  Dreher and other critics of Beckian talk-show conservatism are right: the talking heads do hurt the  cause.  Think of William F. Buckley back in the days leading up to the launch of National Review.  Imagine if he’d had to compete with Fox News for the heart and soul of conservatism.  It wouldn’t have been easy.  Indeed, on the field of battle, Buckley with his more reasoned and polite approach to political discussion (which isn’t to say he always threw soft punches, the man could be rather straightforward after all) may very well have lost to the populists now manning the airwaves in defense of “true conservatism.”  Buckley would be painted like every other East Coast Elite.

But I doubt very much that Buckley would have taken to that particular field.  He was too canny to become embroiled in a fight he couldn’t win, and too immersed in ideas to need to resort to those measures – at least until he was sure of victory.  What’s the point in taking on the Goliaths of the conservative movement anyways?  They have a higher bully pulpit, a wider audience, a louder megaphone.  And they’re okay fighting dirty, and dragging you down to whatever level they need to drag you in order to win.  Wait until they’re marginal players.  Wait until they’ve outworn their welcome.

Conservative dissidents these days have nowhere near enough patience.  Impulsively, they attack the easiest and biggest targets they can find: the talking heads.  As Dreher points out, the impulse for this fight is two-fold.  On the one hand it’s the impulse to remove Rush and co. from the conversation, because they’re “preventing the kind of clear thinking we need to get back in the political game.”  But much, much more importantly, I think, is the desire to simply not be associated with that particular brand of conservatism.  Guilt by association.  We’re not with them, we say.  And to prove it, here’s post after post on just why this is so, on why we hate Limbaugh even more than you do.

And it works.  Nobody who knows Conor or Rod would ever couple them with Limbaugh or Levin – right?  Only, it has unintended consequences.  Sure, you’ve blacklisted the pundits, but you’ve also been blacklisted, by a pretty significant portion of the conservative base.

Isn’t there a better way?

I think there is.  Let’s call it the Trojan Horse strategy. [Read more →]

Reading Andrew’s take down of the inimitable Michael Goldfarb today (apparently Fridays are Michael Goldfarb Day for me), I was struck with an insight about why I find myself so much more drawn to closely analyzing the goings on of American conservatism than American liberalism.

Andrew writes,

When you are a propagandist, these caveats – and the whole idea of thinking out loud in order to understand a foreign culture better – are anathema. And that’s why you end up shutling between “journalism” and being a spokesman for party campaigns.

There is a complete and utter lack of fear present in Andrew’s analysis about calling out the hypocrisies that he perceives as active within a movement and a party in which he was once fairly heavily invested.  I believe completely that such such ruthlessness, so long as it is carried out with an spirit of constructivism, is badly needed in America’s current political discourse.

Of course, Andrew isn’t the only one engaging this mission by any stretch of the imagination, and while he remains one of my favourite bloggers and thinkers, he isn’t even necessarily the most effective at it, either. What Andrew and other dissident conservatives are, though — at least to my mind — are honest brokers in the process who stand to unleash a certain kind of fire power on a sinking ship that by many accounts refuses to acknowledge the rising water line of its situation (that ship, I should add, is as much the conservative movement as it is the GOP, if not more so). [Read more →]

Reflecting on the brouhaha over the future of American conservatism of late, I am reminded that while it seems evident to me and others on this site that a sizable chunk of conservatives’ problem is that the movement as a whole seems to be doubling down on ideas that have been dealt irreparable blows, there remains a sturdy and increasingly pervasive perception problem as well.

The now infamous Gallup poll that demonstrates GOP losses along pretty much every demographic also happens to show that some of the steepest drop offs have occurred amongst younger voters. And while I think I’ve made it pretty clear that what I happen to think conservatives need to do to rectify these problems is focused on the generation of new ideas, I don’t conversely want to completely ignore the problem of perception, particularly as it pertains to younger voters.

The fact of the matter is that for most people, it just ain’t cool to be conservative anymore. [Read more →]

“What leaves me with a queasy feeling, though, is the growing sense that Obama is willing to denigrate America in order to boost his own personal popularity in other countries. As President, Obama has a responsibility to explain and interpret America to the rest of the world — in a way that is truthful and corresponds to reality for sure, but in a way that explains his country and its history and actions. So it would have been nice for him to point out just once that (as Charles Krauthammer has reminded us) during the last two decades Americans have shed their blood and spent their treasure in order to defend innocent Muslims in Kuwait, Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Iraq.” ~Peter Wehner

Right, Peter.  That’s exactly what Obama’s doing – denigrating America in order to boost his popularity in other countries.  And you’re right, he should have reminded the Turks and Europeans about all those American-instigated wars; I’m sure they’ve forgotten all about them by now.  Certainly the President should have spent more time pointing out just how successful the “liberating” Americans have been in Iraq.  That always goes over well in countries totally opposed to the Iraq war and fundamentally opposed to American arrogance and imperialism.

You see, Wehner is having trouble with what many neocons and movement conservative types are suffering from: a total break with reality.  This makes it very, very difficult to understand the importance of reinvigorating our diplomatic efforts with, yes, even the French. I might go so far as to say that in fact our diplomatic efforts are a good deal more important than our massive cuts to the defense budget.

[Read more →]