BUSH AND BUCHANAN
Republican officialdom, realizing that it cannot sweet-talk Pat Buchanan into staying in the GOP, is now trying to make lemonade (or at least sell it). The emerging line is that Buchanan might help Bush by burnishing his centrist credentials. When Democrats accuse Bush of extremism, he will be able to point to Buchanan's exit as evidence that the "far right" actually can't stand him. Our colleague Jonah Goldberg made this argument yesterday.

But if the Bush campaign adopts this strategy, the chief beneficiary could very well be Buchanan. Conservatives of all stripes are used to being attacked as "divisive," "extremists," on the "far right," etc. Attacking Buchanan with the swear words of the establishment will only make him more attractive to the people who might be debating whether to vote for him. These people will interpret the attacks as signs that Buchanan is with them and Bush is not.

These attacks may also confirm Democratic arguments rather than refute them. If opposition to abortion per se makes Buchanan "extreme"-which it certainly does in the eyes of the media-why doesn't it make Bush "extreme" too? Ditto for Buchanan's positions on racial preferences, gay rights, bilingual education, etc., which if they are not Bush's positions are certainly those of the Republican party as a whole. Buchanan's restrictionist position on immigration, whatever else one thinks of it, is not "extreme"; several polls suggest it is the position of a large majority of the public and even of most immigrants. Buchanan's protectionism is also shared by large segments of the public. It is not so much "extreme" as wrong, destructive — and (arguably) unconservative. That's the case Republicans should be making about Buchanan. And it's not one they can make by calling him a far-right extremist.

JARRING
Have social conservatives found their candidate to challenge George W. Bush? Charles Jarvis thinks so. Today he announced his resignation as Gary Bauer's national campaign chairman and endorsed Steve Forbes for president. In a memo to "conservative leaders" — and gleefully faxed around town by the Forbes camp — Jarvis writes, "I have concluded that Gary Bauer, my friend and colleague for 16 years, cannot win. ... This is now a race between George W. Bush and Steve Forbes. ... Forbes is the only conservative who can win and it is time for all conservatives to rally behind him."