Andrew Sullivan redefines conservatism to something that makes some sense to me

I find myself in agreement with David Brooks' column this morning on how - unwittingly - the Obama administration was forced into the kind of big government action required to cope with several huge crises, after years of negligence and drift. I can see how easy it was for the FNC-RNC to wheel out their exhausted tropes of anti-government rhetoric and for Paul Krugman, say, to wheel out his own pro-government radicalism. None of these elements were cheerful about a "Goodbye To All That" presidency, and they've done their best to extinguish it. I happen to think that Krugman has much more of a case right now, because the circumstances almost require the drastic measures he favors. But, yes, the comfort zone of all these advocates is well within the abstract and kabuki world of "freedom or tyranny", more government or less. And that has affected the perception of the new administration among independents especially.

But they're all wrong. This administration's actions are defensible for the large part from the perspective of the actual circumstances we face: a collapse of the extreme free market capitalism of the last twenty years and the implosion of a neo-imperial post-Cold War foreign policy in the mountains of Afghanistan and the deserts of Mesopotamia. To recognize this, and to defend it from ideological attacks, is, in my view, the real conservative position today.

What should matter to conservatives is the empirical data, the specific circumstances, and the least worst practical way of grappling with social and economic and political problems. That's why I see the work of, say, Yuval Levin, Ross Douthat, David Brooks, Jim Manzi, Conor Friedersdorf, Fareed Zakaria, Bruce Bartlett, Jon Rauch, and on a good day, Ramesh Ponnuru (among others) as admirable and well within the contours of conservative discourse - and why I find Andy McCarthy, Powerline, Instapundit, Glenn Beck, Stephen Moore, Bill Kristol, Karl Rove, Sean Hannity and all the toujours l'audace reality-free fanatics to be the antithesis of conservatism as I have long understood it. (The deeper argument here is in The Conservative Soul.)

But I disagree with David's world-weary resignation over this, and his reluctance to support the Obama administration as it represents the pragmatic center in this day and age. The truth is: Obama has not caved to the left's understanding of the role of government. In reality, the healthcare reform was a moderate enterprise, made radical in the public consciousness by a cynical bid to propagandize the whole debate by the FNC-RNC axis. Same with the handling of the banks, the financial regulation bill, the stimulus, and the recalibration of US foreign policy after the failed belligerence of the Bush-Cheney years. If David doubts the moderation of Obama, he might ask his colleague, Paul Krugman, or read more Glenn Greenwald.

Even yesterday, Obama did not batter Wall Street. He asked them to "join" him in rescuing capitalism from itself and restoring the confidence of ordinary folks with retirement accounts in Wall Street. His September 2009 speech to Congress on healthcare reform was just as balanced and sane and moving. I feel absolutely no remorse - and considerable pride - in supporting him as a pragmatic end to the red/blue, pro-government/anti-government debate that has dominated for so long to so little practical effect.

It seems to me that if, as David notes, it is history that has allowed the perception of Obama's "big liberalism" to take hold, then it is the duty of moderate conservatives to resist this narrative, not cave into it. And that means the uncomfortable task for real conservatives of stoutly defending this president as the best option we now have. The epistemic closure on the right is how other conservatives still manage to blind themselves to the pragmatic virtues of this president's remarkable 15 month record at home and abroad. Our job is to insist that the debate continue and that criticism of Obama be based on empirical reality, not ideological fantasy. If we do, we have a president open-minded enough to listen. But if we give up, the old divides win.

So buck up, David. And get back to defending Obama when it is appropriate (which, so far, has almost always been the case). You'll lose friends; enrage colleagues; alienate long-time allies. And in the end, you'll enjoy it.

This is a great time for conservative thought - because it can be clearly disengaged from conservative power and the conservative movement. No fucking surrender.

--Andrew Sullivan from the Atlantic.com

"Big Bambú" now playing on the roof of the Met

First-hand experience

There is an old Zen saying that you can try to explain to someone how an orange tastes, but how can you describe it, really? Until you’ve tasted an orange, you have no way of truly knowing. And once you’ve tasted one, what is there to say?

--Ed Brickell, "Genesis Run"

The President argues that proposed legislation requires Wall Street to be "transparent and open" in order avoid another financial crisis

Last night's Madonna episode of Glee is a hit

Soccer boys get excited after winning & kiss!

Read about it here.

Why Andrew Sullivan doesn't support the tea partiers

From The Altantic.com

The last week has seen a lot of analysis of the Tea Party Movement. It's a Republican rump, according to the NYT, and a national majority, according to Pat Caddell. My view is that it's so amorphous that you can slice it any which way. A minority of Americans seem enraged by the Obama administration in ways that are hard to explain. But many Americans also retain a healthy distrust of government and debt (even though they keep voting for lower taxes and more spending). They have a real point. Over the last decade, it is surely evident that big government has come back with a vengeance. And one has to grasp that part of the tea-party anger is pent up from the Bush years. Most of the rational tea-partiers accept that the GOP has been as bad - if not worse - than the Democrats on spending, borrowing and the size and scope of government in recent years. They repressed this anger during the Bush years out of partisan loyalty. Now, they're taking it all out on the newbie. It's both fair and also unfair.

It's fair because Obama is a liberal who believes government can and should help the poor and disadvantaged and has proven it by providing access to insurance for the working poor. But it's unfair because Obama's fiscal and governing record is massively distorted by the impact of the bank meltdown, the steep revenue-killing recession, and the stimulus. Until its last months, the Bush administration could claim no such excuses for its awful debt-management. The big Bush jumps in discretionary spending, the big leap in entitlements under the unfunded Medicare D program, the long nation-building wars put off-budget, and the huge claims for executive power dominant in the first term: all these are far more damning to my mind than Obama's pragmatism in grappling with an economic collapse or even the healthcare reform, which at least formally claims to reduce the deficit and pay for itself (unlike Bush's Medicare-D). Even the protests at the manner in which the health reform was passed are disingenuous. The Medicare-D process - involving holding the vote open for hours and brutal arm-twisting on the floor of the House - was far, far more cynical and brutal.

And this is why, despite my own deep suspicion of big government, I remain unmoved by the tea-partiers. Their partisanship and cultural hostility to Obama are far more intense, it seems to me, than their genuine proposals to reduce spending and taxation. And this is largely because they have no genuine proposals to reduce spending and taxation. They seem very protective of Medicare and Social Security - and their older age bracket underlines this. They also seem primed for maximal neo-imperial reach, backing the nation-building efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq, favoring war against Iran, etc. Only Ron Paul, peace be upon him, extends his big government critique to the military-industrial-ideological complex.

So they are truly not serious in policy terms, and it behooves the small government right to grapple with this honestly. They both support lower taxation and yet bemoan the fact that so many Americans do not pay any income tax. They want to cut spending on trivial matters while enabling the entitlement and defense behemoths to go on gobbling up Americans' wealth. And that lack of seriousness is complemented by a near-fanatical cultural alienation from the modern world.

In my view, this confluence of feelings can work in shifting the public mood, as seems to have happened. When there is no internal pushback against crafted FNC propaganda, and when the Democrats seem unable to craft any coherent political message below the presidential level, you do indeed create a self-perpetuating fantasy that can indeed rally and roil people. But the abstract slogans against government, the childish reduction of necessary trade-offs as an apocalyptic battle between freedom and slavery, and the silly ranting at all things Washington: these are not a political movement. They are cultural vents, wrapped up with some ugly Dixie-like strands.

When they propose cuts in Medicare, means-testing Social Security, a raising of the retirement age and a cut in defense spending, I'll take them seriously and wish them well.

Until then, I'll treat them with the condescending contempt they have thus far deserved.

--Andrew Sullivan

You are invited to my gay brother-in-law's art reception this Thursday in NYC

Republicans block financial reform then "chicken out" as Goldman Sachs scandal blows wide open

The GOP reconsider their ill-fated political strategy to block financial strategy.

Lt. Dan Choi & five other gay American military members courageously put pressure on Obama by chaining themselves to the White House fense

I respect this President but he must be pressured to act as quickly as possible to change this un-Constitutional and un-American law. Read about the brave protest led by Lt. Dan Choi at the White House today.