[Cathryn Crawford]

You are entitled to your opinion; yet, I think it is a problem. Conservatives are too quick to judge other conservatives, they are slow to defend and quick to ostracize.

You don't call that a problem?

[BADROTOFINGER]

Isn't it true that a lot of the bashing of Bill Bennett is simply due to the fact that conservatives naturally rejoice in the misfortunes of their own? The ability of the conservative movement to abandon their own people when they are even slightly attacked by the liberal/media establishment is absolutely astounding.

Why are conservatives so quick to judge their own? Are we afraid? Are we so afraid of being tainted by a scandal that we will so easily turn away at the first sight of blood?

You bring up two issues here. First of all conservatives do not simply 'naturally rejoince in the misfortunes of their own'. I would ask for a more than a few examples of this being true before I would seriously consider that as fact. The fact that they are conservatives doesnt mean that they should automatically defend them for any reason. That is what the left does, and it is why we are better than them.

To the second issue. You are right on the tendancy of conservatives to not speak up loudly enough when defending conservatives, but then the tendancy of the mainstream media to ignore conservative viewpoints in favor of the more highly invective remarks by libs could also be a consideration here. They seem to prefer a 5:1 soundbite ratio in favor of the left, and usually only have time for 4 of them, so the conservative doesnt get air time in most cases...JFK