Oh, all right. I’ll attempt a real response—beginning, to be a little circuitous about it, with the article this morning by Victor Davis Hanson, “Wronging Reagan.”

In attempting to claim the mantle of Reagan, Victor argues, Republican candidates have beatified the man, forgetting that he made plenty of mistakes and engaged in a whole lot of political compromises. True enough. What Victor himself overlooks, though, is that Reagan had a way of making clear his principles and his program. In 1982, Reagan cut personal income taxes by some 30 percent. Then, in 1983, he signed TEFRA, taking back part of the tax cut by “raising payroll, income, and gasoline taxes,” just as Victor says. But because of the speeches Reagan gave, because of the quips he made—for that matter, because of his body language during staff meetings, everybody knew that the tax cuts represented part of the Reagan agenda, the tax hikes merely an unhappy set of compromises that circumstances had forced upon him. (In one meeting, Reagan fidgeted while Arthur Burns lectured him on the necessity of raising taxes to curtail the mounting deficits, then turned to the distinguished economist and said, “Arthur, never mention a tax increase in my presence again.” Giving a speech on corporate tax rates a couple of years later—examples come flooding back—Reagan glanced up from the text, which, for what it’s worth, I had written, winked at his audience, and ad-libbed, “Of course, if it were up to me, the corporate tax rate would be zero.”)

Everybody knew just where Reagan stood. And therefore everybody knew, again, when Reagan was advancing his program and when he was merely maneuvering, as best he could, through the politics of the day.

Which brings me to the current candidates.

The reason I find Romney so flawed is precisely that he is so utterly unlike Reagan in this critical regard. First Romney was pro-choice. Now—a scant two years later–he’s pro-life. First Romney was a social conservative. Now he’s some sort of managerial moderate. Until about a week ago, Romney was in favor of limited government. Then he began campaigning in Michigan, where he suddenly discovered that the American automotive industry required the close and intensive supervision of the federal government to recover—and federal handout of some $20 billion to engage in research that Toyota is already conducting. Over and over again, ceaselessly, with his inimitable chirpiness, Romney claims the Reagan mantle. Yet when Teddy Kennedy accused Romney of being a Reagan-Bush Republican during a 1994 debate, Romney appeared shocked. “Look, I was an independent during the time of Reagan-Bush,” Romney replied indignantly. “I’m not trying to return to Reagan-Bush.”

People who know Romney well—people such as Dean Barnett, with whom, as it happens, I just had a cup of coffee—tell me that the true Romney, the inner Romney, really is a Reagan Republican. Maybe. But I’d sure like to be able to do more than take Dean’s word for it. (Not, come to think of it, that his knowledge of the inner Romney has enabled Dean himself to view Romney’s conduct with equanimity. As Dean wrote this very week in the New York Times, Romney has “mounted a campaign that was, at its most basic level, insincere.”)

Fred Thompson? Could any candidate have proven more exasperating? Not until he began his bus tour of Iowa, a scant couple of weeks before the caucuses, did he even really begin to campaign. And not until the debate in Myrtle Beach last weekend, just a week before the South Carolina primary, did he really begin to fight, landing jabs on Huckabee and taking a swing at McCain. But could any candidate have proven more authentic? Thompson has done just what Reagan did. He has stated his principles. He has let voters in on his program. And when Fred Thompson says he intends to secure our borders, defeat the Islamofascists, cut taxes, reduce regulations, control spending, and defend the unborn, he’s not flipping or flopping. He’s demonstrating fundamental consistency with his entire record in public life. If he lacks college liaisons, direct mail experts, and other appurtenances so in evidence on the Romney campaign, so be it. Thompson isn’t relying on some giant, gleaming juggernaut to carry him along. Like the Gipper before him, he’s standing on principle.