sadly, it will never happen. we're all statists now--the default, reflexive solution to a problem always seems to be a federal government solution.

Doug Hoffman approves.

No. Please. You've done quite enough helping already.

Let everyone else work at good governance instead of small governance. It's win-win.

We all get an improved government, and you get to complain that "if only we ever elected candidates who claimed to be conservative, all of these things would be fixed".

The opposite is we get worse governance and your ideas fail in practice.

I'm going to need a definition of conservative for today. Are we talking money conservatives or standing in my bedroom making judgments conservatives?

YES! move rightward, GOP! listen to the teabaggers! the preciousssss!!!

So, divorce, alcohol, abortion, tobacco, and fun are all illegal now?

and segregation and cruxifiction is back in?

splendid

The problem wasn't that Bush was too conservative, but that he wasn't conservative capable enough

Ideology is secondary.

It's like the swimmer who finishes second in the race convinces himself that tying cinder blocks to his feet will speed up his time, and, after slowing down even more, thinks "Dammit! Need more cinder blocks if I'm going to win this thing."

Go for it Jonah, I'll bet you "conservatives" can dominate a lot of Appalachian city halls.

FlashHarry: YES! move rightward, GOP! listen to the teabaggers! the preciousssss!!!

SRSLY. We on the left will be here watching, popcorn at the ready.

Is there a portal to Goldberg's universe? I'd like to check it out. Seems it will be the only way I can put his blatherings in context and understand them.

Goldberg gets Bush's domestic legacy (which was nowhere near conservative) exactly right:

He advocated government activism, and he put our money where his mouth was. He federalized education with No Child Left Behind - co-sponsored by Teddy Kennedy - and oversaw the biggest increase in education spending in history (58 percent faster than inflation), according to the Heritage Foundation, while doing next to nothing to advance the conservative idea known as school choice.
With the prescription-drug benefit, he created the biggest new entitlement since the Great Society (Obama is poised to topple that record). Bush increased spending on the National Institutes of Health by 36 percent and international aid by 74 percent, according to Heritage. He oversaw the largest, most porktacular farm bills ever. He signed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, a massive new regulation of Wall Street. His administration defended affirmative action before the Supreme Court.

He pushed amnesty for immigrants, imposed steel tariffs, supported Title IX, and signed the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance-reform legislation.

Oh, and he, not Obama, initiated the first bailouts and TARP.

What he doesn't address is why Republicans stood around and cheered while Bush was doing all of this stuff.

Mr. Coffee Nerves: It's like the swimmer who finishes second in the race convinces himself that tying cinder blocks Sarah Palins to his feet will speed up his time, and, after slowing down even more, thinks "Dammit! Need more cinder blocks Sarah Palins if I'm going to win this thing."

FTFY

Bush?

Conservative?

FlashHarry: YES! move rightward, GOP! listen to the teabaggers! the preciousssss!!!

Hey, it worked in New York!

...right?

Dancin_In_Anson: Bush?

Conservative?

Revisionism at its finest. How was Bush any less conservative than Reagan?

Bellicose foreign policy, check.
Big spender and tax cutter, check.
Social conservative, check.

A Democrat just won a seat in a district that has been Republican controlled for over 160 years because his opponent was so far to the right.

By all means. Keep going right.

So this applies to Marx also, right?

Yup - who needs legislation when we've got rope, pitchforks & torches?

elchip: Bellicose foreign policy, check.

not only bellicose - his foreign policy consisted of spreading american-style democracy via the point of a sword. that's militant liberalism, a.k.a. neoconservatism.

what many people forget is, the neocon "vulcans" who thought up the whole regime change thing were almost all disillusioned trotskyites or "scoop jackson" democrats led by their great elitist hero leo strauss. the bush doctrine is really a militant liberal doctrine. but then it's nothing new for republicans to lash out at what they really are deep inside. look at larry craig and mark foley!

DamnYankees: So this applies to Marx also, right?

The Nazis hated Marx, too.

elchip: How was Bush any less conservative than Reagan?

'Compassion'

Dancin_In_Anson: 'Compassion'

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the only "compassionate conservative" thing Bush ever implemented was the Medicare prescription drug program. But other than the cost (and Reagan was a big spender too), I don't think most people have a problem with that.

Oh, and faith-based initiatives, but that's a social conservative bit. Social conservatives love the idea of churches and such providing welfare to people.

No. The problem with the Bush years, and to some extent Obama's first few months is inconsistency with conservative or progressive policies.

You can't be conservative on one thing and all gung ho, spend money on other things and then try to claim you are the spend thrift party.

The neocon philosophy seeks to do both: be conservative and liberal depending on the issue, while also pushing a vast new world order. It might succeed on 2 of those 3, like the conservative and liberals ideas seem to, but when you add all 3 together, it gets convuluted at best and dangerously corrupt and compromised at worst.

ITT: Conservative Buyer's Remorse.