Living in the Real World

EVER since the end of the Cold War, torrents of analysis have predicted that the conservative movement was about to come unglued. Our defining rationale-anti-Communism-had vanished, and without that stanchion securely planted in terra firma the various members of the coalition would fly off in different directions, libertarians decamping for their never land, evangelicals for theirs. But the truth is that such predictions predate the end of the Cold War by a long shot. Robert Nisbet and others argued (often in these pages) that the Reagan coalition was intellectually untenable and could never last.

This perennial observation has, of late, dovetailed nicely with more conventional political punditry. Bush is a lame duck and, more important, he is very unpopular—and so Congress is running away from him on everything from port security to the budget. Free-market conservatives are feeling their oats these days, symbolized by Bruce Bartlett’s broadside against Bush as an “impostor” in his book of that name. Matthew Continetti of The Weekly Standard has an indictment of the GOPas crapulent and corrupt coming out this spring. George Will, who has been quite tart toward Bush for a while, grew downright testy over the Harriet Miers nomination (“for this we need a conservative president?”).

About the Author

Jonah Goldberg

Jonah Goldberg is a National Review contributing editor.

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EVER since the end of the Cold War, torrents of analysis have predicted that the conservative movement was about to come unglued. Our defining rationale-anti-Communism-had vanished, and without that stanchion securely planted in terra firma the various members of the coalition would fly off in different directions, libertarians decamping for their never land, evangelicals for theirs. But the truth is that such predictions predate the end of the Cold War by a long shot. Robert Nisbet and others argued (often in these pages) that the Reagan coalition was intellectually untenable and could never last.

This perennial observation has, of late, dovetailed nicely with more conventional political punditry. Bush is a lame duck and, more important, he is very unpopular—and so Congress is running away from him on everything from port security to the budget. Free-market conservatives are feeling their oats these days, symbolized by Bruce Bartlett’s broadside against Bush as an “impostor” in his book of that name. Matthew Continetti of The Weekly Standard has an indictment of the GOPas crapulent and corrupt coming out this spring. George Will, who has been quite tart toward Bush for a while, grew downright testy over the Harriet Miers nomination (“for this we need a conservative president?”).