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Learning to Love the Political Wilderness (or, Who Doesn’t Like Camping?)
I have deep respect for Ramesh Ponnuru, one of the sharpest and most knowledgeable of conservative commentators. Nevertheless, I disagreed almost totally with this recent column at Bloomberg View, in which he suggests that anti-Trump Republicans have rendered themselves futile and irrelevant through their inability to get on the same page. I can summarize the column most efficiently by quoting the final paragraph first:
The major point of agreement among Trump’s conservative critics is an important one: They think that he doesn’t have the character to lead the country well. But that agreement is not a substitute for having a clear and unified sense of where they want the Republican Party, and the country, to go. They don’t have that, and they don’t even seem to see how quixotic it makes their dream of wresting the party back from the man who is their common enemy.
Everything before that, as you might expect, is a sketch of the wildly diverse views of anti-Trump commentators, who disagree about gun control, immigration, tax reform, and even how to refer to themselves.
Obviously, Ramesh is right that Trump-opposed conservatives have a wide range of views on other issues (and even on the question of why Trump rose in the first place). But I don’t see why this should be regarded either as a failure or as a problem.
Anti-Trump Republicans cannot wrest the party back from Trump. His consolidation of the base is, at the moment, much too strong. I think that’s very unfortunate, not only because he’s corrupt, unfit for office, and an embarrassment to the nation, but also because he’s really not that popular. Trump can’t easily be ditched because a substantial portion of the base adores him, and those are unpromising conditions for a revolution, especially when the majority of its politicians and pundits have already invested in his slimy brand. But he’s distasteful enough to the rest of America that he could easily be the millstone that drags the GOP down. Bummer.
Before we despair though, we should note that populist politics is volatile. Trump himself is very volatile. Also, the man is old. This moment will pass. In the meanwhile, I’ve always found the wilderness to be rather a good place for hashing out important arguments and developing ideas. Parties in power are forced to focus most energies on the practicalities of the present moment. If you aren’t (for the present moment) empowered to do much anyway, the pressure to perform is lifted, and you can afford to think in wider circles. That’s why to me it seems like potentially a good thing that the “wilderness-dwellers” of the present moment are in disagreement on several topics that could really use a good hashing-out.
So, for instance, Ramesh points out that anti-Trump conservatives are in disagreement over gun control. Bret Stephens, Max Boot, and Charlie Sykes are pressing for more sweeping gun control measures, while David French and Erick Erickson are totally opposed to that. To me, this division seems rather intriguing. I myself think an intra-conservative gun control discussion could be rather fascinating. There are some very deep moral questions at the heart of it. On the one hand, our Second Amendment guarantees the right to bear arms, and personal self-defense holds a significant place in our rugged-individualist, anti-nanny-state American tradition. Also, the practical difficulties of confiscating hundreds of thousands of firearms are daunting, to put it mildly. On the other hand, I think it’s hard to deny that Americans are considerably more likely to die violently in comparison to citizens of other equally-developed countries, mainly because we own so many guns. In light of that, it’s not strange that many Americans would really prefer at this point to step back from that element of our tradition. Setting all of that on the table could be beneficial, even if there aren’t any ready-to-hand solutions at the present time.
Then there is immigration. In mainstream Republican circles, the immigration hawks are strongly ascendant, but anti-Trump conservatives are more divided. Again, I see this as potential fodder for a fascinating and (maybe?) fruitful debate. I myself think the amnesty-plus-enforcement track pretty clearly the right way to go in general, but of course, that doesn’t really clear up all the deeper questions. I sometimes think that the arguments of Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam (who we might call moderate immigration hawks) make pretty good sense. But I also think their presentation tends to exaggerate the objective significance of this issue while underplaying the extent to which immigration hawkishness is really driven by nativist angst far more than any objective appreciation of the impact immigrants have on American life. I understand why that offends writers like Stephens and Jennifer Rubin, who are repulsed by the ugliness of some of those currents. Nativism is not one of our prouder American traditions. Underneath all of this is still a further question: how do we balance our nation’s “melting pot” history against the realities of a world in which travel and communication are much easier than they used to be (making border control far more necessary)? It seems to me like the stage is set for some great discussions.
At some point, you have to come out of the clouds (or wilderness) if you hope to have a real impact on national policy. But considering the dramatic and shocking nature of the Trumpian take-over, I think it’s a little much to expect anti-Trump conservatives to have drawn up a counter-platform already. For the present, there’s something to be said just for articulating Trump’s defects from a conservative perspective. These last few weeks, as the Democrats have been working through their regrets from the Clinton years, I find myself wondering: Would it have mattered if there had been a more significant contingent of anti-Clinton Democrats who refused to sanction the corruption and turpitude of the Clinton White House?
Perhaps not. Maybe our major parties have such tremendous momentum at this point that dissenters will inevitably be assimilated, or else marginalized into insignificance. On the other hand, maybe it would have been helpful to have a stubborn contingent of NeverClintons on the left. Maybe such a group could have salvaged a bit of the honor of the Democratic Party, explored some new ideas, or groomed a few interesting candidates for further down the road. Maybe if liberals had been planting more seeds back then, the left wouldn’t have found itself rolling into 2016 with the baggage-laden, tone-deaf, geriatric Hillary at the helm. We all knew she was a dreadful candidate, but still, they ran her, because the Democrats had long since given up fighting Clintonian corruption, and frankly, they didn’t have anyone else.
As Ramesh correctly points out, “no to Trump” is not a substitute for a full political platform. An interesting starting point, though? It could be.
Published in General
The actually supportive Trump base, which can be called populist and who call themselves conservative, is, among other things, nostalgic for another time in the country. They are also pragmatic, in that they believed a third Obama administration in the person of Hilary Clinton would be an unfathomable disaster. Reluctant Trump voters share that pragmatism. Every time he does something that raises my eyebrow or makes me cringe, I remind myself that this was the price we had to pay to avoid The Hydra.
But that nostalgia and pragmatism aren’t principle. That isn’t Trump’s wheelhouse. Principle is going to have to come from somewhere else, in the next wave. And there always a next wave. Republicans recovered from Nixon and Democrats recovered from LBJ. The parties will be remade again and I do hope that ours is remade from something more robust and timeless than our current lot.
I agree but — for the moment — I don’t think much would come of it. What does an intra-anti-Trump debate have to offer that can’t come from a debate among conservatives in general?
The major problem on the right is that we’re unable to have a ideological or philosophical discussion that doesn’t devolve into a screaming match about the president — or our wounds from 2016 — within five minutes. I’m sure there are some innocent parties in this, but it seems that this applies broadly among both those who generally support the president and those who generally criticize him.
Until we figure out how to have those conversations again, I think we’re stuck with this.
There are several veins of rather pretentious, dishonest and mushy thought here indicative of the Ivory Tower “Conservative Thinkers” that are rightly losing influence.
You cite Douthat and Salam as though this will all be resolved at an AEI or CATO seminar and not ultimately by voters, you know, the ones that clearly outnumber you.
What descriptor do you seem to purposely omit when referring to “immigration” (hint: not lawful or legal but….illegal!). Those nativists aren’t afraid of drones & robots forming and finishing concrete, framing houses, painting or countless other jobs currently done by your fellow ‘citizens’ – they resent being undercut by workers illegally here, undercutting their wages, placing strains on educational & social service resources – all without being invited. That obvious omission discounts what you write to make it nearly meaningless.
Your premise drips of elitism and condescension – that’s coming from a fervent Ted Cruz supporter/Trump skeptic. We’ll all climb aboard the Marco, Kaisich or is it now the Sasse Express Train back to ‘Principled Conservatism of the electoral minority kind’
Perhaps you Burkean Hot-House Flowers win some actual Presidential elections for a change, actually roll back the “State” for change. Was never a big Trump fan at all but he’s positively Reganeqse compared to you ankle-bitters of the “Intellectual Right”.
For crying out loud, Rachel was positing an intra-conservative debate on the Second Amendment as a debate that she would find interesting and worthwhile to have.
She was not announcing herself as a gun-grabber.
EDIT: I confused Judithann’s comment with another; my mistake, as described below.
There are ways to have such discussions and you often see them on ricochet. Starting out conversations like the one in the OP is utterly pointless and designed to divide rather than solve anything.
Where did I accuse her of being a gun grabber?
Is someone keeping score on the cringes versus positive conservative achievements or at least moves in the right direction? Even though I was no fan of Trump prior to the election and do shake my head from time to time at certain tweets, he embarrasses me much less than his predecessor and has proven for the most part to be competent on many issues.
As for the 2016 Democrat alternative…well, I understand she’s president on Earth 2, so not sure why she’s not happy and her followers keeping screaming into the sky (maybe because they’re stuck on Earth 1). I don’t know that Trump’s administration is corrupt. Perhaps Rachel knows something we all don’t or that James Comey has been emailing her some inside information. Pretty darn sure Ms. Clinton was as corrupt as Sec’y of State, senator, First Lady and governor’s wife. That is pretty well documented.
Both Bush presidents often had me cringing, for what it’s worth. Personally, I’m not getting behind a Flake or Corker for President effort in 2020.
And I’m not sure where the so-called conservative urge for gun confiscation is coming from. Is that a new thing?
I agree Rachel’s post is not a good way to begin such discussions, but that’s all I’m going to agree to.
Apologies. I confused your comment’s with @Annefy‘s. I’ll add a note to my previous comment.
Don’t get upset, Tom. Here is Rachel’s troublesome quote (emphasis mine):
Annefy raised an appropriate question in response. Essentially – why would one want to?
Rachel is the one who stated in incredibly vague terms that she would find a debate about guns interesting. So far, she has given no specifics about what her ideas are. Is it wrong of us to ask for specifics?
By means of border control, limiting chain immigration (including reforming the rules so that “family reunification” is much harder to game; right now gaming the system is the system) and ending birthright citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants. Some or all of which are opposed by the “conservatives” you mention.
By that argument you cede the rhetorical ground to the Left and preemptively surrender. There is a countervailing argument: legally owned firearms are on balance a social good. As has been said elsewhere, the problem of the Las Vegas type shootings is problem in how we handle the mentally ill. The vast majority of the non-Muslim, non-gang related multiple homicide events are perpetrated by people who back in the day would have been committed. The single measure of making civil commitment less onerous is likely to reduce the murder rate by 1/3.
Contrast Anne’s comment with Judithann’s (as I should have).
I see nothing wrong with what Judithann has said in any of her comments.
And I still contend that Rachel’s comment is troublesome coming from a conservative. Perhaps she will explain what she meant or step back from inferring that guns should be confiscated but it’s just too difficult to do so.
Is it wrong of me to use the OP author’s own words to do so ?
There was absolutely nothing wrong with Anne’s comment. Rachel has spent a great deal of time on Ricochet, and writing for conservative outlets. Considering this, and considering how unbelievably smart she is, I am surprised by her comment about there being no good way to confiscate guns. Anyone who has spent five seconds around us gun nuts should know that kind of comment will not be well received. Anne asked a fair question.
Because there are violent members of protected groups against whom some (Brett Stephens, I’m talking about you) consider it forbidden to defend oneself effectively.
Another question: Advocates for unrestricted or barely restricted abortion are no longer welcome in the conservative movement, tell me again why we should welcome opponents of effective self defense?
We have a right to our guns. Full stop. Any “discussion” is giving away the point. ;)
The people of the GOP have spoken. It is not they who are divided, but the conservatariat. The People are pretty united in support of the GOP president. Would that the GOPe was as supportive. Or that Congress would pass something.
I know that some pooh pooh the “he fights” argument, but it is the case. At the end of the day, people, even those opposed to Trump, don’t really vote on facts or reason, no matter what we tell ourselves. We vote on gut and passion.
The conservatariat needs to understand that facts have no traction against passion. The people who voted for Trump are tired of a GOP that does nothing but lose in the culture wars. Trump promised to fight them, and he is doing so. The only place in the culture wars where we are winning is on guns, and Ms. Lu is ready to give the other side ammo (heh) to roll that back.
But, I don’t worry much, because the movement that Ricochet won’t let me name has been able to do nada in slowing Trump.
And the guy I voted for has had a more conservative administration than Romney or McCain, or any of the “chosen ones” of the establishment have put forward since Reagan. Think about that: Trump has the most conservative admininstration since Reagan.
Like you — and unlike Rachel — I see little worthwhile to come out of such a debate.
I maintain that Judithann’s way of asking the better way to go about it.
There’s enough bad blood in this thread as it is.
Like most Ricochet contributors, I doubt we will see her say anything much at all in the comments.
@rachellu is in the comments on this very thread.
Three times on page one, on what is sure to have been a controversial thread. I take it all back.
I would like some clarity on what was wrong with my question.
I used the author’s own words from a comment and asked a simple follow-up question. An obvious question.
These intellectual giants of which you speak had 7 years to formulate a conservative intellectual response to Obamacare and proved in more ways than one that all they really had was empty promises and unicorn spit. At this rate their anti-Trump counter-platform should be ready for the 2038 midterms.
The GOP may well be dead. And maybe it deserves the death that awaits. These “great discussions” only cement the image of the establishment Republicans being nothing more than Democrat-Lite. Boy, can’t we all just salivate at the prospect of surrendering on both the Second Amendment and amnesty?! Won’t that be fun?!?
First, let’s legalize the 11 to 13 million illegals so that they can vote to flip the entire southwest, including Texas, to a nice shade of Progressive Blue. Unlike previous influxes of immigrants who wished to run away from their home country’s political dysfunctions, this generation seeks to bring it with them and inflict it on America.
As for guns, lay a map of gun deaths by county over the last electoral map. The deadliest counties in America are also the most urban and the most “progressive.”
Furthermore, let’s acknowledge something that Gary Robbins is correct about in his many anti-Trump posts. The President is a plurality victor, both in the primaries and in the general. For the sake of argument let’s place his ceiling at 35%. By constantly using terms to define this President such as “slimy” and “unfit” you also say something about those that support him. And while Ms. Lu has not gone all Bill Kristol here (he prefers “simple-minded” and uses such politically charged terms as “fellow travelers” and “collaborators”), what exactly does one think one gains by using such pejoratives? If you you think you can’t win any more national elections with Trump, try doing it without his supporters.
What the intellectual elites really need to do is say to themselves is “How did we contribute to this mess?” But the last year has shown that they’re not particularly interested in the answer to that question. And they won’t get the chance to implement their grand policy dreams and schemes until they do.
What the heck is the matter with everyone who hates Trump? He is doing more conservative things than anyone since Reagan. This is far more than Jeb! would have done, or Rubio. It is more than Romney or McCain. We can be 100% sure on McCain because he helped block things in the senate.
Nope. Have to keep hating on Trump. The whole “I’ll call strikes and balls” is nonsense. The anti-Trump crowd (am I still allowed to use that term?) is eager for every flaw and ready to pounce. Where is the joy in having a GOP POTUS? Nowhere, because too many people are unhappy with the man, regardless of what his administration gets done.
You see it everyday in the pop media. MnM, Snoopydog, Kathy Griffin (yes beheading someone in effigy is a death threat) … A few democrats use violent rhetoric against Trump – some quite regularly.
Also, How is losing Virginia a ‘crushing defeat’? Its not a crushing defeat if its the normal political pattern. Its a democrat state, and voted for a democrat, shocking nobody. I thought the democrat candidate deserved to loose on his sanctuary city flip-flop, and that horrible truck ad. Nothing to do with any other candidate in the election, I just thought he was terrible.
I dont think there will be much to loose in 2018, because democrats are defending a disproportionate number of senate seats – many in states that Trump won quite convincingly. and secondly if the democrats keep pushing impeachment process before any evidence of any crime comes to the public – it’ll be the end END of American democracy. Thats not melodramatic or anything – If Impeachment becomes a tool to overturn election results you dont like – rather than a tool to protect against corruption. That’s the ball game – the fat lady has sung.
Hopefully the Trump faithful react to this Impeachment non-sense in 2018, turn out and keep the house and senate onside.
Since Rachel’s gun control comment is something that seems troublesome, I would hope that when she has an opportunity, she simply clarifies her remarks or defends them. I don’t think that’s asking much.
There are also other questionable remarks that Rachel may wish to clarify and defend. The assertion that Trump, or perhaps she meant to say the Trump administration, is corrupt. As others have pointed out, some of the fighting words occurred in the OP, so perhaps that’s where the “bad blood” started.
Was the OP reviewed by an editor before it was posted to the Main Feed? Would a member of non-Contributor status have been challenged on some of this OP’s terminology before their post was considered for promotion? If a member included a paragraph as volatile as the OP’s paragraph 5, would that have resulted in the editor’s/editors’ decision to keep it from appearing on the Main Feed?
The comment:
The first comment is fine on its own; in combination with the latter, it’s clearly lining up Rachel with the gun-grabbers.
Contrast this with comments such as:
Moderator Note:
CoC.Of course not! And those of us who support Trump are horrible people.
Remember, some of the members the movement that cannot be named on Ricochet, not only worked to stop Trump getting elected, it then wanted to undo the election.
I am tired of be lectured by [redacted]. And the movement that cannot be named on Ricochet, even though it is self named, and still working to prevent Trump from getting the nomination in 2020, lost.
Right. So, if my wife say she wants to “talk” about divorce, I should not be alarmed. Once the talking starts, it is over.