True Conservatives Still Waiting

There's an excellent article today in National Review by Jonah Goldberg: True Conservatives Just Want a Turn. Goldberg explains how the standard talking point about how conservatives had their way for 8 years under Bush and it clearly was terrible, is factually wrong. It's a great read.

Either it's a straw dog argument put up by liberals to paint conservatism as bad, or they really don't understand that Bush was no conservative. A lot of reflex conservatives probably don't even realize that George W. bush was no friend to conservatism. He betrayed so many conservative principles that you'd think conservatives would be out there talking about it more, rather than reflexively defending Bush policies they weren't necessarily comfortable with but felt obligated to support. Don't get me wrong, Bush did some things right from the perspective of conservatives, but he also did an awful lot wrong. Goldberg's article doesn't even mention some of the Bush mistakes like trying to get Harriet Miers on the Supreme Court.

True conservatives are still waiting for their chance to lead. Reagan even did not hold fast to every conservative principle, but he came far closer than George W. Bush ever did. When someone tells you conservatism is the root of America's problems the correct response is:

"How would you know? We've been operating continuously under a socially liberal, big government model for the past 70 years."

Why? Because it's the truth.

Oh and while we're on the subject, conservatives are often categorized as fiscal or social conservatives (or national defense conservatives).  Why aren't liberals categorized as big government liberals and social policy liberals?  The overlap in those two groups might be just as muddied as on the right side of the political spectrum.