First Post

Because of encouragement by a couple friends I've decided to try to keep a blog. Hopefully I'll be adding to it daily, but we'll see. My main purpose will be to look at news stories and use my brain to formulate a type-written response, available for your tube-driven internet perusal. Here's my first effort, starting with something from the New York Times week in review.

NYT

The article concerns the claims which are apparently being made about the conservative movement being in its death throes. Right away this gives me pause, because I don't know who's talking about that. Apparently, "many" are behind this line of thought. I wonder how "many". I don't really know anybody who has said that the conservative movement is finished, maybe because all the liberals I know are too pessimistic--or realistic. Or maybe the "many" don't actually exist, and are merely a straw man fallacy, created and held up so that it can be knocked down. Unidentified multitudes say that the conservative movement is over, thus giving us a perfect opportunity to talk about how wrong they are.

The gist of the article is, of course, correct. The conservative movement isn't finished. It's actually very hard, maybe impossible, to kill an ideology. The Nazis were complete and utter failures whose efforts accomplished nothing but the utter ruination of their homeland and stained German history forever, yet there are still swastika-toting goons to be found in any country one cares to look at.

The problem with the article is it's uncritical placement of Wolfowitz and Falwell in the same category. Since both supported the Republican party, the reasoning goes, they're similar enough to talk about them as one. But if you look at what the two actually supported you find they have almost nothing in common. For Falwell social issues (homosexuals, fetuses, condoms, and indecent television) were paramount; Wolfowitz didn't care about anything but invading Iraq. There are multiple movements within the Republican party which scarcely bear resemblance to one another and are allied for political convenience--to whit, Falwell's fundamentalists with their foam-at-the-mouth social agenda, Wolfowitz's neo-conservatives with their military adventurism, and the Eisenhower school exemplified by Arlen Specter or John McCain circa the 2000 campaign (these days he's just another goon). America being a two-party system, these elements overlook their wildly divergent goals and focus on their similarities.

The reason for Reagan's success and his saintly image in the Republican party today was his capacity to make all the different parts of the GOP feel loved by him (he was an actor, after all). Still, making reference to a conservative movement exemplified by both Wolfowitz and Falwell is a little odd--shouldn't a "movement" tend to move in one direction? Maybe Tanenhaus was thinking more about the similarities in rhetorical strategy, with both F and W having plenty of contempt for truth, logic, and the rule of law.

Finally, a last nitpick

"The unpopularity of the Iraq war is nearing Vietnam proportions, and President Bush’s plummeting poll numbers resemble those of Mr. McNamara’s boss, Lyndon B. Johnson."

With margin of error, and depending on what poll you trust, Bush's approval ratings are actually right around Lyndon Johnson's deepest valley of 35%, and have at times dipped even lower. Newsweek polls reported a 28% percent approval rating at the beginning of the month.

Polling Report

Another prominent difference would be that Bush's abysmal poll rating has held steady for quite a long time, whereas Lyndon Johnson's numbers dipped severely after the Tet Offensive and then climbed back to just under 50% by the time he left office. The jury is still out on whether Bush will recover to lofty 40% territory or not, but it doesn't look too good.