The AEI hasn't been taking my phone calls either.
Do you suppose the WH is pissed at me, too?

Sorry... "It's all George W. Bush's fault" doesn't wash.

You and the Republican leadership need to realize that constantly repeating “but the other guy would have been worse” is a poor and ultimately losing way to run a political party.

Clearly, you're upset Bush is not more of a flaming right-winger, rather a Reagan on Steriods. And candidly, I wouldn't mind that, myself. But what that is is idealism, and completely ignores the reality of what, exactly, constitutes the political center of the country.

I tell you; Reagan himself couldn't get elected in today's environment. Consider the state an an electorate where Bush the younger a moderate leftist if there ever was one, can be labeled 'Hitler', and where such labels find traction. Think conservatism is going to sell in such an environment?

I don't. Not in the near term, anyway.

There are ways.... long-term ways... to push us towards that goal. But bitching about the small steps we take in that direction isn't one of them.

The only area I think you could reasonably say conservatives support increased spending would be on the military.

Actually my point is that regardless of how money is spent the modern conservative simply does not care. And the reason he does not care is because in the minds of conservatives there is no longer any relationship between spending and taxation. Hence they believe they can and spend money, cut taxes, and spend even more money and cut even more taxes, and all is well in the world.

Once it was common understanding, on a gut level, by both conservatives and liberals alike that there had to be some relationship between spending and taxation. Reagan changed all that for conservatives but not for liberals. Hence we have the phenomonon, unique to a the modern American conservative, of people believing, contrary to fact, that they can borrow and spend money without ever having to pay it back.

What I do know is, All Americans can sure thank God that Gore was not president when 9/11 happened, and that Kerry was not there to follow Gore up and give the country to the Frenchys.

Aint that the truth! If it wasn't for GW Bush, we all would be speaking Arabic right now. He saved us from Saadam's invading army through his brave and heroic leadership.

Even though he missed the boat on 9/11, it doesn't matter since Hillary and Bill Clinton basically created Bin Laden and the crazy al Quaedas through their funding of the mujahadeen in Afghanistan during the 1980s.

It's indeed strange to see Ken, a hardshell liberal, socialist democrat lecturing James on what conservatives are all about. It sure gives me "The laugh of the day".

What I do know is, All Americans can sure thank God that Gore was not president when 9/11 happened, and that Kerry was not there to follow Gore up and give the country to the Frenchys.

The only area I think you could reasonably say conservatives support increased spending would be on the military.

The fiscal conservatives were opposed to the medicare prescription drug coverage and Bush had to do some impressive over the top arm twisting to get enough Republicans to vote for it to allow passage.

You and the Republican leadership need to realize that constantly repeating "but the other guy would have been worse" is a poor and ultimately losing way to run a political party.

There are far too many people who are Bush supporters first and conservatives last. These are the people who as one person described them "would praise Bush for creating constuction jobs if he burned the White House down"

The modern conservative does not care about deficits so is perfectly willing to cut taxes and increase spending. Since deficits do not matter there is no such thing as the "bad" variety you naively call bridges to nowhere. Reagan proved, in the words of Dick Cheney that 'deficits do not matter'. How much clearer do you have to have it spelled out.

Even the idealized fiscal conservative you may be imagining is nothing but a shallower version of the modern conservative. Oh, they may 'gnash' their teeth over deficit spending, but then blithely vote for and contribute money to only those people who studiously ignore the mounting deficit problem.

Like I said before James, our problem is that we may soon be actually unable to repay the debt you care nothing about paying off anyway. When our ability to pay it off meets your lack of desire to do so we will have an economic apocalypse the likes of which the world has never seen.

You said

"the conservative base doesn't need to be kept particularly happy if they're fired up to keep Hillary Clinton and Howard Dean out of power."

As far as I can see Bush has given mostly platitudes to both the social and fiscal conservatives.

If the conservative base is not happy that may be enough to allow Hilary to win. So discontent in the base needs to be taken seriously if Republican leadership wants to keep winning elections.

If I recall correctly I believe simply freezing spending (no baseline budget increases) would do much to reduce the deficit.

Borrowing isn't inherently a bad thing. Certainly, we can afford the modest-compared-to-GDP payoffs.

The questioning is What is the borrowing FOR? Borrowing to build, to use the current popular example, bridges to nowhere, is a bad thing. It's like going into debt to pay for a vacation or a more luxurious automobile than you can afford. On the other hand, borrowing to invest in the nation's infrastructure may well be worth it and there's every reason future generations should help pay for it.

Similarly, spending on the national security or to recover from a natural disaster is worth borrowing for, although wasteful spending can take place in both instances and should be criticized.

I disagree with much of the spending of the current Republican administration and Congress. A not insignificant chunk of it is of the "bad" variety. Implicitly, the post acknowledges that. Bush isn't a fiscal conservative, except on the issues of taxation and regulation. To the extent he isn't, that's largely a bad thing in my view.

It remains the case however that 1) Bush is a "conservative" in the social sense of the term and that 2) recent past and likely near future Democratic nominees are not "conservatives" in any meaningful sense.