The conservative machine

Here’s an example of the cheer-leader behavior that, along with many other things, has so turned me off on mainstream conservatives. Caroline Glick, quoted at Powerline, writes that Gov. Palin’s undelivered speech on Iran, published in yesterday’s New York Sun, was

an extraordinary document…. It was a remarkable speech, prepared by a remarkable woman.

Now I read Palin’s speech, and I happen to agree with its message that Iranian possession of nuclear weapons is totally unacceptable and must not be permitted. For years the Bush team has delivered that same message, and I always agreed with them too (though of course the administration has never acted on the message but has instead engaged in absurd and humiliating negotiations with Iran allowing its supposedly totally unacceptable nuclear program to keep moving forward). Palin’s speech is thus no different from innumerable other warnings that we have heard about Iranian nuclear weapons for the last several years. Yet Glick can’t just say that the speech is good and important; she has to call it “extraordinary” and “remarkable,” and even absurdly tells us that the “remarkable” woman Sarah Palin wrote it herself, as though Palin were some intellectual prodigy.

The hype was particularly noticeable to me because I read it at Powerline, the website that has worshipfully described virtually every speech given by President Bush—no matter how filled with boilerplate it was, and no matter how similar it was to all his previous boilerplate-filled speeches—as a “great” speech.

And it doesn’t occur to these courtiers that, just as warnings endlessly repeated, but grossly contradicted in practice, lose the ability to persuade, extravagant, endlessly repeated compliments to one’s allies and heroes begin to sicken and repel.

The upshot is that mainstream conservatism doesn’t feel to me like an intellectual and political movement—like a collection of thoughtful and committed individuals who care about their country and the world. It feels like an overcharged machine—a vast mutual suck-up operation that never stops, never relents.

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J.J. writes:

I think what’s important to remember is that there is no functional “conservative movement” of any significance in the United States at present, only a Republican movement.

Of the mainstream cultural institutions that supposedly contribute to the modern-day American “conservative movement,” from websites like Powerline and NewsMax, to media outlets like Fox News and the New York Sun, to pundits like Ann Coulter and John Gibson, to much of the Evangelical subculture, all basically exist simply to apologize, defend, and propagandize on behalf of the Republican Party, and not any sort of larger, ideologically coherent agenda. Hence why they all now support McCain-Palin uncritically, and will say or do anything to defend the ticket, no matter how philosophically hypocritical or opportunistic they appear in doing so. Criticism of McCain was only permitted during the primaries—the brief period in which Republicans are officially allowed to openly question each other—and quickly concluded once he became the nominee and full partisan unity was once again required.

This movement really only has two priorities: to defend the Republican Party in order to help it win elections, and to demean and insult the Democratic Party for the same reason. Promoting or protecting the conservative way of life is simply not something that is terribly important. Conservatism is defined as whatever the Party is currently offering.

When you stop thinking of the purported American “conservative movement” as a movement that is even remotely interested in being ideological, and instead start thinking of it as a strictly partisan racket, everything makes a lot more sense.

LA replies:

You may be right. But even if what we’re looking at here is purely Republicanism, rather than conservatism, that wouldn’t explain the particular behaviors described here. After all, there was a time when men believed in the Republican party, or its predecessor the Whig party, as a great cause. Whiggism in particular was not just a party, but a whole way of life.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 23, 2008 11:05 PM | Send