On the question of where I place myself on the political spectrum, I will have more to say as time goes on. In my own mind, I have the same political philosophy I've always had--basically libertarian but tempered by Burkean small-C conservatism. But I am no longer a member of the Republican Party and no longer consider myself part of the "conservative movement." That's not because I changed, but because I believe that they have. The Republican Party of today is not the party of Jack Kemp and Ronald Reagan that I was once a member of; it stands for nothing except the pursuit of power as an end in itself, with no concern whatsoever for what is right for the country. In a recent interview with The Economist magazine, I characterized the Republicans as the greedy, sociopathic party. I stand by that.
As far as the conservative movement is concerned, I think Russell Kirk and Bill Buckley would be absolutely aghast at the things it stands for today and the people that are acclaimed as its leaders. When clowns like Glenn Beck are its leaders and right-wing bigots pander to ignorant yahoos about a planned mosque in lower Manhattan, I want to be as far away from any such movement as I possibly can. And readers of this blog know what I think of the know-nothing tea party movement, which conservatives have latched onto en masse.
You can read the rest of Bartlett's blog post here, but the two paragraphs above are the best snips.
When you combine this with former Ronald Reagan OMB Director David Stockman's recent comment that the "G.O.P. destroyed the economy" (the rest of that story can be found here), it might appear that the moderate Republicans are trying to take back their party from the know-nothing TeaBaggers. Alas, I think there are not enough moderates left to do much good. And so? Republicans are going to be FLATTENED in this November's elections.
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