Limbaugh and Levin find CPAC wanting

Via the Right Scoop, please listen to Mark Levin. He rejects "Mitch Daniels and all the rest who embrace such a sterile, disconnected, unmoored approach to conservatism and governing." He's talking about Daniels' "truce" on those pesky social issues that mean so much to us bitter clingers.

Here's Rush on the ditto-cam and a partial transcript here:

What was missing I thought from the CPAC convention just as a theme is what has been occurring the last few years, this ascendancy of traditional conservatism, the ascendancy of Reagan conservatism. There's no doubt it is happening all across the fruited plain. You didn't get -- at least I didn't get any sense of it, watching CPAC. And don't misunderstand, nobody's looking here, certainly not I, for some magical appearance of a Ronald Reagan, just looking for a conservative that actually embraces conservatism. Not parts of it; not tries to redefine it. I mean clearly there's some people from the era of Reagan is over crowd. Did you ever hear Reagan say, "We got social conservatives here, we got to make sure, yeah, we'll listen to 'em but then we're not gonna pay much attention to 'em." There wasn't this kind of division within the ranks.

What is a conservative candidate? A candidate who supports the Constitution; who supports national security; who supports traditional family values, the basic stuff. And that stuff seemed controversial for parts of CPAC. When a would-be candidate says put aside the social issues, what does this mean? Is the left putting aside the social issues? The left right now, they are in federal court demanding that judges impose an agenda on the nation that was voted down at the ballot box. What do we do in response to that, ignore it? We have a health care bill here that's unconstitutional, could have been a huge rallying point. Instead, we got the latest ruling-class drumbeat that we put aside the social issues, more important things on the agenda than the social issues right now.

Dan Riehl asks: Has CPAC Sold-Out The Movement For DC-Style Checkbook Conservatism? A few choice bits:

I'm not saying [Trump] shouldn't have a seat at the GOP table. But if that's what CPAC has become, then it's time to change the name. I'm tired of "conservative" being co-opted by everyone and everything Republican because they want to capitalize on the cache while playing whatever political game it is they have in mind. Republican and conservative are and have always been two different things. By allowing the confusion, when it's so glaring, all conservatives succeed in doing is weakening their own brand.

Unfortunately, it seems if you show up at CPAC with a bit of celebrity and a thick wallet, thanks to an invite from GoProud co-founder Chris Barron, who cares? You're more than welcome to take to a stage built on the legacy of Ronald Reagan to tell the rubes what a conservative you are. Heck, there may even be a check in it for the ACU one day. So, what's the harm? [. . .]

When you have folks like Rumsfeld and Cheney being booed, or called war criminals at what's billed as a conservative event, you have a problem. If Sarah Palin's Alaskan travelogue is supposedly not presidential, yet a rich clown with a bad comb-over and television show is allowed to take the stage at CPAC as a potential conservative 2012 presidential contender, CPAC, you have a problem. In some ways, CPAC is starting to look more like a Republican circus, than a serious, if often fun, conservative movement event.

Yes,CPAC is a great opportunity for many fine people to get together. But when the net effect is to undermine, or marginalize traditional conservatism, then it's time for a re-think, or to at least re-define it as something other than the crown jewel of conservative events.

Read the rest. That re-think is happening.

Along those lines, see also my dismay at Roger Simon's statement that talk of abortion and social issues was "vaguely discordant or anachronistic" and his giddy hope that "Pretty soon it may be cool to be a Republican and square to be a Democrat."

Also see two posts from Politicaljunkie Mom: No thanks, Mr. Daniels and In the wake of Kermit Gosnell, we get this from CPAC: “Liberal in bed, Conservative in the head.”


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