Editor’s Note: This post originally appeared on Jen Kuznicki’s blog. Kuznikci identifies as a constitutional conservative and belongs to the Michigan Republican party.
Michael Gerson at the Washington Post, Peter Wehner at Commentary, Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post, and Karl Rove at the Wall Street Journal, and many more are the voice of the moderate mush, the mediocrity brigade of the Republican Party.
And so it has begun, the push to attack Reagan by Commentary’s Peter Wehner and Henry Olsen. Trying to put a fine point on what Reagan stood for, the two described Reagan as standing more for human dignity, rather than human freedom, as if the two can be separated. The rather long and tedious piece is answered by Western Journalism’s Donald Devine, who shows the weasel-like co-opting of Reagan’s philosophy by the re-write of history.
The small-mindedness of believing Reagan conservatism is outdated, and the accusation that Reagan didn’t get the job done, are things Wehner regularly accuses that great man of. But he does so by overlooking the fact that Reagan was opposed by the mush of the time, people like him who want compromise with the left, but not with right, and couldn’t, “get the job done” because of them, his philosophical comrades. Wehner is mighty bold when the man isn’t around to defend himself. The idiotic attempt to paint Reagan as someone who would reject tea party sentiment is pathetic. Reagan understood he was battling people who hated the idea of limited government when he ran for the party nomination, in fact, he contributed to George W. Bush’s opponent when he was running for office in Texas. Yes, Reagan was well aware of who was conservative, and who was not.
In the Wall Street Journal, Wehner takes the aggravating tone of a higher understanding of Reagan, by insisting Reaganites don’t understand who they understand. And he rewrites history by saying his favored Bush, “challenged” Reagan in 1980.
Can I lay a harsh reality on everyone? George H.W. Bush never ran for President; he was a perpetual Vice President hopeful. When it came down to Bush and Reagan in 1984, Reagan made unity in the Republican Party a priority, and decided to pick Bush, and unfortunately, there began the Bushie rise in the Republican Party.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.