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06/30/2003 Entry: "dubya and the right"

DUBYA AND THE RIGHT: There's an interesting article in the New York Times about the strong support President Bush enjoys from conservatives, which I found via Ramesh Ponnuru in The Corner.

Let me start by saying that Bush has been more conservative than his father and has definitely done some good things. Overall, I think he's been better than I expected when I was beating up on him in the pages of ESR during the 2000 presidential campaign.

But there are a couple of things that concern me about this article. One is that it highlights the divisions between conservatives and libertarians I have been writing about recently: The movement conseratives seem to think everything is going just fine with this administration while movement libertarians are up in arms about it. My second concern is that it doesn't seem to take a whole lot more than access, influence and proximity to power to impress a lot of Beltway conservatives. For example, they are implying that he might be better than Reagan when his record does not yet support any such contention. Wayne LaPierre is praising Bush in the context of the Second Amendment while he plans to renew the assault weapons ban. There is no mention of the need to even slow the growth of government, which probably explains why there isn't any criticism of things this administration has done to make government bigger and no concern expressed about the Medicare prescription drug benefits.

I'm not saying that conservatives should be looking for a Pat Buchanan (or a more free-market conservative) to run against Bush in the primaries or that the president isn't worth supporting in 2004. I just think that conservative activists and intellectuals need to set their goals a little higher and actually use their influence to point the administration in the right direction, rather than simply rubber-stamping all its policies. I know that some of this happens, particularly behind the scenes, but I get the sense that this doesn't happen enough. Articles like these reinforce that sense.