Sounds uncomfortable

Rich, those conservatives who are using Reagan as a model to attack where Bush has gone wrong are focusing, it seems to me, on pretty broad (and thus vague) principles, rather than on specific issues like immigration; as Ross himself frequently notes, the actual Reagan was signficantly different than the image of him which exists in popular conservative thinking. Which is not to say that said image is worthless insofar as figuring out what’s happening in the conservative camp; Reagan became the promised fulfillment of Buckley’s grand fusion of conservative moralism and free-market libertarianism, and so every way in which successors fail to live up to his popular image becomes another bit of evidence showing how much larger the tensions in that fusion have become, and how much more unlikely it is that it–and thus the Republican party platform in its current form–will survive.

As far as immigration is concerned, the way it plays out in this debate seems to turn not on the “big government/liberatian” continuum, but rather on the question of whether immigration reform, with its promise of at least some form of amnesty, isn’t “compassionate conservatism” run amok.

Actually, I find the whole argument between Goldberg, Douthat, Dreher, Larison and others to be fascinating. As the Bush years wind down, expect these sorts of arguments to become even more fierce.

“Actually, I find the whole argument between Goldberg, Douthat, Dreher, Larison and others to be fascinating. As the Bush years wind down, expect these sorts of arguments to become even more fierce.”

It’s rather reminiscent of the arguments between far-left groups over the failings of the Soviet Union.

If we can get the conservatives tearing themselves apart over whether the Bush administration was a “deformed liberatarian-conservative state” or “state neosocialism* “, we’ll in the clover.

We’ll know we’ve won when Heritage Center fellows are reduced to selling newspapers called “Bourgeois Capitalism” on the street corners.

* Liberatarian blogger Vox Day is calling Bush a neosocialist. I shit you not.

RAF wrote:

As far as immigration is concerned, the way it plays out in this debate seems to turn not on the “big government/liberatian” continuum,

Sentence 2 of the first linked post directly links immigration to big-government conservatism, and I find it hard to read the debate coherently without assuming that it is in the forefront. The sentence is:

“After all, he argues, the ideological touchstone of this Administration has been a critique of libertarianism and small-government conservatism, and if we don’t like what Bush has wrought – with immigration “reform” being the latest example – than don’t we need to admit that the critique was a mistake, and join Jonah in becoming “more libertarian in response to the Bush years”?”

It seems to me that the argument — based just on the linked posts — is all about immigration on that continuum. Other examples given — the perscription drug plan, NCLB, faith based initiatives — are all years old. If they are NOT talking about immigration reform, and they are not talking about the Iraq war (and I see no indication that they are) then I’m not sure why they are talking at all. THOSE are the issues that are currently driving wedges through the Republican party.