If Conservatism is Dead, That Was a Heck of a Funeral!

“Conservatism as we know it is dead. Its last bastion of power, Washington, is being overrun as we speak, in a blitzkrieg operation fueled by popular panic and led by a charismatic field marshal. To the extent conservative ideology survives the onslaught, it will be as a guerilla force, making its presence felt on web sites and radio call-in shows but never in the corridors of real power.”

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So says Jonathan Kay on Full Comment If conservatism perished this week, the nearly nine thousand mourners who showed up at its funeral were oddly upbeat. Attendance at this year’s CPAC exceeded last year by a whopping 40%. The host hotel was overwhelmed. Incomprehensibly, some pundits and bloggers believe that the largest turnout in history at CPAC is indisputable evidence of the death of conservatism. Mr. Kay, the problem is not that conservatism is dead. It is not and never will be. The problem, sir, is that you do not understand conservatism. What has been placed on life support is not conservatism, but the Republican party. And deservedly so. Republicans made a mess of things because they moved away from conservatism and started behaving like Democrats. True conservatives have figured this out. There was plenty of repenting at CPAC. Newt Gingrich even referred to TARP as the “Bush/Obama spending plan”. We get it. That’s why we turned out en masse. It was a huge and wonderful crowd. About half of the attendees were young people and the party would do well to pay attention to that. Not only are they the leadership of the future, they are way smarter about technology. Everywhere you looked there were impeccably groomed handsome men and beautiful well dressed women. One wonders what an LPAC would look like if there was such a thing. Imagine nine thousand liberals gathered in one place without a heavy law enforcement presence. The crowds were so large that at times the doors had to be shut. People dared not give up their seats for fear of not being allowed back in. It’s a little unclear why so many people were willing to risk permanent bladder damage for a dead cause. It was also a grand time for socializing. I enjoyed drinks with an Independent, or Moderate or whatever they call themselves these days. It was a riveting discussion about all of the great Moderates in history and their extraordinary accomplishments. Unfortunately, I was not able to stay for Rush’s speech but I did get to see Ann Coulter . Because this was a bunch of conservatives, the shout outs were entirely lacking in vulgarity and most were “I love you, Ann!” punctuated by a few marriage proposals. Despite the glorious turn out, there are a few criticisms of CPAC this year. The host hotel clearly was not able to handle a crowd this large and that caused more than a little inconvenience. But, the nature of conservatives is such that waiting two hours for an elevator becomes a chance to network rather than whine, and threaten to sue somebody; the standard liberal response to the slightest difficulty. Another glaring error was the failure to give credit where credit is due. None of the speakers I heard properly credited Mr. Obama for this year’s astonishing turn out. To be fair, there was a lot going on so perhaps I missed that. I also really expected Wayne LaPierre to recognize Obama’s extraordinary success in increasing private gun ownership. I have heard, however that an industry organization has already named Obama as Gun Salesman of the Year so that should be sufficient. There has also been some legitimate criticism over the lack of serious discussion about radical Islam and inadequate coverage of Geert Wilders. Just because the current administration is pro terrorism is no excuse for our side to be complacent. On the other hand, it’s safe to assume that conservatives are pretty clear about the threat from radical Islam already. True conservatives are also pretty clear on the concept that conservatism is the solution not the problem. The problem is that Republicans stopped being conservatives. As Mitt Romney put it, there is no need to re-define conservatism. Conservative principles endure. Rick Santorum put it well when he said conservatism did not fail us, we failed conservatism. ©2009