You’ve all read about how many conservatives are inching — and in some cases running — to the lifeboat as the Titanic Bush administration seemingly begins to sink.
But conservatives are hardly giving up and don’t consider the administration’s polls going down faster than my laptop as signifying the conservative movement’s actual end. To some conservatives, the Bush administration a)is not really conservative, b)has given conservatism a bad name and c)must not be allowed to destroy the movement nurtered by William F. Buckley, Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan.
So they’re looking to encourage and cultivate a new generation of leaders. The Washington Times:
Conservatives are looking to revitalize their movement by trying to heal divisions in their coalition and finding younger leaders as the 2008 elections approach.
“We want to rebuild a conservative movement independent of the Republican Party and of George W. Bush — and to emphasize that it is a third force, not a third party,” said Phyllis Schlafly, 82, founder of the conservative Eagle Forum.
“The Democrats own the liberals, and the Republicans own the conservatives,” said Paul M. Weyrich, 64, president of the Free Congress Foundation and a longtime social conservative leader. He organized a recent “third-force” conservative summit attended by Mrs. Schlafly and about 180 other activists on the right.
“The modern conservative movement has always been a fusion of economic, national defense and religious conservatives who have banded together to fight for common interests,” said David A. Keene, 62, chairman of the American Conservative Union. “But today, the tension among those groups is greater than it has been in the past because of their disappointment with this generation of political leaders who they believe have let them down. We have achieved power but lost our unity in the process.”
And that is the crux of traditional conservatives’ complaints: the days of “He’d Rather Be Right Than Be President” have been replaced by “They’d Rather He Be President No Matter What It Takes Or No Matter What Positions Have To Be Tossed Overboard To Cling To Power.”
Former Reagan White House adviser Gary Bauer, 61, says conservatives must stick together because “those who believe in lower taxes, smaller government, a strong national defense, the sanctity of life and family values are still a governing majority in America.”
Several summit attendees suggested that Mr. Bauer is unduly optimistic. They say the 2006 elections and the competition for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination underscore significant divisions in the conservative movement, which have become especially apparent since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Religious conservatives, fuming at the support of many economic and defense conservatives for former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani’s presidential candidacy, say his nomination would be a “deal breaker” because of his liberal social views on abortion and other family issues. Some social conservatives say they hope former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee will emerge as the Reaganesque nominee who keeps the coalition together. But contentious disputes over foreign policy and immigration continue to tear at movement unity.
It won’t be easy for the conservatives.
They need to look at the internal wars among Democrats and liberals in the Vietnam and post-Vietnam era (an internal war that could break out again but is kept from exploding because the Democrats also now sniff a strong odor of potential power at the ballot box).
Attracting younger candidates by echoing the demonization kings Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh won’t do . It will be hard to get The Next Generation enthused if the pitch is simply “We are the non-Democrats and non-liberals.” The Rovian “hot button” politics may not be enough. Conservatism has to clearly stand for something — versus stand for preventing something.
A big task? It has been done (successfully) before.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.