The cocks will crow, and that is to be expected; so let them go ahead and do so, as they will, full-throat- edly, in the months and years ahead, about what a disaster Barry Goldwater was to his cause, his party, his country, the world, the United Nations, and the Milky Way. It is, as I say, to be expected that the Democrats, and the Republicans who denied him their support, should behave as they now behave towards Goldwater, swilling in I-told-you-so’s, anxious to make the point for all posterity that the Republican Party has only again to breach good common sense and nominate another conservative, in order to invite another catastrophe. Tant pis, as they say in gay Paree.
But something else is happening, here and there in conservative circles, which strains justice to the breaking point. Last week a Washington newspaper carried the report of an anonymous individual highly placed, or so the story reported, in the new, and thus far mostly confidential American Conservative Union, as follows: “In the 1964 elections, the source said, the electorate had a choice not between conservative and liberal thought, ‘but between Cornpone and ineptness.’ He made it clear that he was referring to President Johnson and Senator Goldwater, respectively. The source, who would not permit use of his name, voiced confidence that his personal assessments correspond closely with those of many ACU directors and backers.”
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