Dear RockinRight,
"Where do you think he has failed on social issues?"
It's less that he's failed than that he really hasn't seemed to give much priority to them, and at times, has seemed as if he'd rather bring the crazy aunt down from the attic than deal with them.
I just don't think that he is a social conservative first and foremost. I think that he viewed himself initially as a supply-sider first. After September 11, I think he's come to see himself as a war president first and foremost, and that might actually be the closest to the truth.
"Conservatism is like a bird with two wings, one fiscal one social. You can't fly if one wing is missing."
Well, I can identify at least four wings: social conservatism; fiscal conservatism (deficit hawkism); economic conservatism (supply siderism); and limited government conservatism (which intersects to a degree with each of the three previous).
sitetest
OK...your analysis also works. Good way to look at it.
Where do tax cuts fall? The economic/supply-side end?
And does ANY possible '08 candidate actually posess 4 functional wings using that model?
I'd say Gingrich does, and maybe Hunter, but Hunter has a little tendency towards big-governmentism.