Fuck (But Charles Fried Makes Me A Little Happier)
Only an Obama victory combined with a total thrashing of Minnesota next week will make me feel better.
Oh, and by the way, I’m actually pretty that Charles Fried endorsed Obama. Sure, he’sstill quite the conservative and was the Solicitor General for Reagan, but as evidenced by his bloggingheads appearence with Joshua Cohen and hi high reputation in the academic community, the man is a serious scholar and intellectual before being a political hack. It certainly means something that he’s coming out for Obama. I would like to think that the “flight to quality” of ones side inteligentsia would mean something to a movement, but with Sarah Palin “going rogue” and laying the groundwork for a 2012 run, I think we can be sure that the conservative movement’s divisive populism, fear of policy subtance, and total nihilism when it comes to governance will continue. And although I think it’s a strategy that will lead to them losing more in the short term, it’s hardly good for American politics to have one side whose base and party leadership just doesn’t care about quality or governing ability. Politics are cyclical, and the Palinauts will have some sort of power soon, and it won’t be pretty.
Also, when will we see the mainstream media pointing to the defections from McCain by moderate Republicans as a sign of the party’s fading relevance and hijacking by radicals. This, of course, is the popular narrative for explaining the Democratic decline from the early 70s through the 80s. Because the Democrats were too socially liberal and hated our veterans (or something like that), all these white union workers abandoned the party that they had always been tied to. So, shouldn’t we be hearing about white collar workers whose capital gains taxes are going to shoot up and support free trade not voting GOP (and the flight of the moderate leadership) as a sign that the GOP has been taken over by socially conservative, fiscally insolvent, hawkish radicals? I know that this a common refrain of, say, Andrew Sullivan, but when will it congeal to the standard narrative? I feel like the Bush administration’s obvious incompetence is the culprit. For the past eight years, it was too easy to just say “oh, well, Bush is an idiot, so no wonder the GOP is so screwed up.” But when they realize that non-idiots (Steve Schmidt, Bill Kristol) are behind a systemic degradation of the party, hopefully the narrative will change accordingly.
Another note on conservative intellectuals endorsing Obama. In a perfect world, Gary Becker would be next, but he seems to be pretty far in the tank.
