A core Republican value?

One clear sign of the utter moral bankruptcy of the political Right these days is a comment made by the batty Kathryn Jean Lopez. Normally one would ignore this woman but she writes for William F. Buckley’s web site. Buckley always prided himself as being the Holy Inquisition for conservatism and regularly published encyclicals reading out of the conservative movement people with who he disagreed. And there is no question that the Buckley brigade have had a major influence shaping modern conservatism -- and not for the good I should note.

Lopez says that McCain can’t win as a Republican because “on a whole host of issues” “he’s not one of us”. Fair enough. But what are these defining issues. She lists some as “water boarding, tax cuts and the freedom of speech.” Apparently the use of torture methods are now one of the Republican parties core values -- one that is so important that it is used to write a leading Republican out of the race -- at least in the eyes of Lopez. Is this woman entirely loopy? I suspect she isn’t more loopy that what passes as conservative these days.

The conservative movement has never really been pro liberty. They have always been pro-past. Whatever the past was they intended to keep it. Lopez, however, doesn’t want merely to embrace the recent past. Apparently she thinks that conservative values means embracing the Holy Inquisition and torture. Disgusting.