[coffeebreak]

Personally I think politicians will hear conservatives loud and clear during the 2006 elections. They don't seem to have gotten the message of 2004. Homosexuality and illegal immigration have most conservatives livid.

[Darkwolf]

Pat Buchanan can see into the future but can't win an election?

[Petronski]

Buchanan sees war between anti-semites and normal human souls.

[Torie]

Unnamed phonies, he suggests, have infiltrated the movement.

True. And one of the premier phonies, in a master stroke of self projection, is the author of this article.

[jess35]

It's all well and good to be an ideologue but if you can't win an election because you refuse to bend, what good are your ideas?

Domestically, I despise the President BUT I understand that we'be basically reached the point where we have to pay off the leaches of society to keep them from overrunning the rest of us.

[West Coast Conservative]

Mr. Buchanan, a former adviser to Presidents Nixon, Ford and Reagan, says conservatism "is at war with itself over foreign policy...

Once again Buchanan is wrong. Of all the things that divide conservatives, foreign policy isn't one of them.

[CBart95]

Old Pat is wrong.
As usual.
Things are exactly opposite of what he says.
The deliberate conspiracy to perpetuate illegal immigration and the failure to candidly name names of all participants in the worldwide war on terrorism has conservatives infuriated.
Gays are merely a subset of the failure of liberalism. It will also pass like all wretched excesses.

[Andy from Beaverton]

I think Pat has finally gone crazy like his brother did.

[xJones]

"The conservative movement has passed into history," says the one-time White House aide, three-time presidential candidate, commentator and magazine publisher

I guess the conservative movement went in the dumpster when the nation rejected Pat 3 times. The 2000 election was an absolute conservative joy when Pat said that any hanging chad votes in the 3 contested Florida counties probably belonged to Gore. Sour grapes ain't the term for it....

[Oreo Kookey]

Buchanan is the "thing" that is passe'.

[thegreatbeast]

A number of you need a remedial reading course. Your reading comprehension is the s*!

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Pat Buchanan is like a kidney stone. He's a pain in the back and you're oh so glad when he goes away.

[KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle]

Pat Buchanan passing gas on the topic of What Is and Isn't "True Conservatism" is a lot like listening to Dan Rather nattering on journalistic ethics, or Michael Moore dispensing diet and grooming tips.

The gut, instinctive reaction, on the part of any sober, rational human being over the intellectual age of two, is an immediate and emphatic: "Lick Me."

[CyberAnt]

movement is now broken up, crumbled, dismantled

[ThirstyMan]

All I know is Pat Buchannon doesn't speak for me. I have hope that the conservatives will continue to expand their influence and widen their majority.
I just wish Pat was helping us, instead of offering his untimely slight to the present leadership.

[k2blader]

Buchanan is right. A lot of self-styled conservatives are phonies.

[x]

Pat likes to use military metaphors, often where they're not appropriate. I doubt there's a war, but there is confusion, uncertainty and something of a malaise. Conservatives won the Cold War, brought back prosperity, and changed the way the world thinks. After that, there's a feeling of "what next?" or "where do we go from here?"

Most Americans aren't going to support an overwhelming rollback of the size of government, though they might be for more limited cuts. And while they accept free markets, they'd be embarassed to celebrate global market forces too much. After a certain point, markets are like the weather -- something you learn to deal with, but not something to get enthusiastic about, because like the weather, what they bring is unpredictable and neither all good or all bad. When US politics gets stuck, the tendency is to turn overseas and try to accomplish something there -- and that's where we are now.

Buchanan's comments are curious because it looks like things have almost come around full circle from Nixon to Bush. In the Reagan years the perception was that conservatives had the White House, clear goals, and unity behind a free market program. Before, with Nixon, and today, goals and their relation to basic philosophy aren't so clear. There is a lot more unity than Pat lets on, but it's unity in support of a war-time leader, not for a program or philosophy.

[Bonaparte]

"Conservatism, by most accounts, has dominated the Republican Party since 1964, when it nominated Barry Goldwater."

After Nixon was nominated/elected in 1968 and again in 1972, he governed like a liberal, especially in domestic policy. He was followed by Ford, a liberal. Finally, they nominated a true conservative, Ronald Reagan. But he was followed by another RINO, GHW Bush.

I think Pat must be losing it.

[Bonaparte]

Oops, better correct that -- "Pat must losing it" should read, "the writer must be losing it." There, that's better.

[Republican Wildcat]

He does? That's nice.

[pending]

huge deficits
bigger government
centralizing power for law enforcement
from Patriot act to National ID
Huge drug benefits for seniors
no move on illegal immigration
no FCC action on cable monopolies
nation building/babysitting
Civil unions a fact of life
Abortion fact of life

Patrick goes over the edge here and there, but he will hit a nerve with this book because the facts are the facts.
We will see him everywhere, opening up this important discussion, hopefully having the effect of refocusing efforts.

God I miss Newt.