Jonah Goldberg's latest hizzy fit over the
implosion of the Republican Party. Gotta love it!
I've made a disturbing discovery: I am a member of the conservative "establishment." I felt like Michael Douglas at the end of "Falling Down": "I'm the bad guy?"
For the last few years, the rank and file of the GOP and the conservative movement have become deeply disenchanted with what they see as the rubber-spined, foot-dragging quislings drinking from a trough of chablis at some Georgetown party. The term "RINO" (Republican In Name Only) has become an epithet of ideological enforcement, spit out in much the same way Mao cursed "running dog capitalists."
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
The mere fact that there's something one can meaningfully describe as a conservative establishment today is a victory, never mind that it is more conservative than it has ever been. But a conservative establishment is useless if it doesn't bring the nation with it. The frustration on the right stems from the fact that none of the candidates seems up to that task.