I’ll be traveling for part of tomorrow, so blogging will be somewhat delayed. 

Earlier today, I was part of a conversation on NPR about the meaning of conservatism; other guests included John Pitney of Claremont McKenna College and Sal Russo of Tea Party Express, the latter of whom I had the pleasure of meeting a few months back. Rather than focus on what is or isn’t truly conservative, I tried to offer a historical perspective in my remarks on how conservatism has evolved. I also tried to offer an alternative to some of the more familiar narratives about conservatism. That is, I advanced by thesis that the Republican party has actually moved to the technocratic center on the most pressing issues facing the federal government (the future of health entitlements and the tax code) during the Obama years, a view that is not widely embraced on the left (to say the least) or even the right (because it is in tension with the narrative of a Tea Party-inspired return to conservative purity), yet that strikes me as clearly true. Talk of the Nation has helpfully provided a transcript.