The Unbearable Lightness (And Deep, Deep Dishonesty) of Sarah Palin

I hate a world in which smart conservatives are consigned to the periphery. There are two great intellectual/political traditions in contemporary American history. They are liberalism and conservatism. I'm a liberal. I find much of conservatism to be wrong. But conservatism is not immoral or un-American, no matter what the continuing prattling of Dick Cheney teaches us. Nor are the variations of these traditions somehow prima facie flawed.

I am also worried about a world in which Sarah Palin is the spokesperson for modern conservatism. But today the ruthlessly dishonest Sarah Palin represents the most vocal world of conservatism, yet we know that she is deeply and profoundly mendacious. And she is unwilling to be challenged.

Based on sheer politics a huge part of me hopes that Palin becomes the GOP brand. But the problem with that would be that Republicans would then be compelled to support her. I knew Ronald Reagan. I loathed Ronald Reagan. And yet Sarah Palin is no Ronald Reagan. I hope that America's right knows the difference. I fear that they don't.

Ted Kennedy, Rest in Peace

Given the volume of commentary and commemoration I probably do not have much to add to the encomiums flying Ted Kennedy's way. One of the greatest Senators in American history died early today, and I make that statement with no reservations.

Kennedy's biography and legacy will always be shadowed by that terrible event on Chappaquiddick Island, of course, which has more than anything become the zinger line for conservatives who use Kennedy and that event as shorthand for all of the things they consider wrong with liberalism. And Chappaquiddick almost certainly cost Kennedy any hope at the Presidency. Kennedy was a possible contender in 1972, 1976, and did challenge Carter in 1980 and absent the mysteries surrounding the death of Mary Jo Kopechne it is difficult to imagine that Kennedy would not have received the Democratic nomination at some point.

But Chappaquiddick did happen and so Kennedy had to be content with forging one of the most remarkable careers in the history of the Senate. His liberalism came to embody him for critics and supporters alike (is there any honor greater than having one's very name become shorthand for liberalism?), but there is no question that he was formidable as a foe and towering as an ally. Kennedy was profoundly popular and respected among his peers and while he began his career with a reputation for being a lightweight he became one of the most substantial policy-oriented politicians in the Senate's long history even as he played the game of politics as well as any.

I grew up in New Hampshire, so Kennedy was never literally my Senator, but for all intents and purposes he was the Senator who represented me, a liberal, in a state that was during the 1980s as solidly Republican as ever there was. I was stunned when I read about his death even when it was obvious for months that this moment was coming. I had to compose myself for a second, before diving in to read and remember why Ted Kennedy was such a vital figure in American political life for four decades.

Sleeper on Brooks

Over at TPM Cafe Jim Sleeper, hardly a doctrinaire liberal, eviscerates a recent David Brooks column, accusing the New York Times columnist of "intellectual usury." This summation of Brooks' ouevre capture pretty well what I feel about the man and his output:

His pseudo-scholarly ruminations flatter some readers and make others deferential, but they are always suspiciously easy to follow. They're the intellectual equivalent of "cash back" on an easy loan of false knowledge that leaves you feeling "had," empty-handed,and politically paralyzed. That is how Brooks makes his living: He charms you up the garden path toward a politics that is nowhere.

That about seems to capture it.

Obama and the "Far Left"

Here is Andrew Sullivan's take on what will certainly be the key argument that the Republicans make this fall (because it is the key argument that Republicans make every election year):

That's the exhausted meme that Bill Bennett tries to aim at Obama. It is the meme the old right need to force this election back into the red-blue post-Vietnam boomer rubric which is all Bennett understands. But let's be clear. "Far left" means to the right of Clinton in healthcare, right? "Far left" means tax rates broadly within the post-Reagan parameters and certainly far to the right of, say, Richard Nixon. "Far left" means retaining the right to bomb Pakistan if al Qaeda is deemed a threat there. "Far left" means a policy of withdrawal from Iraq that, as Bill Kristol observes, is increasingly close to McCain's. "Far left" means a man that Joe Lieberman was thrilled to get to support his last Senate campaign. "Far left" means a "cap-and-trade" position on climate change very close to John McCain's. "Far left" means well to the racial right of Jesse Jackson. "Far left" means opposition to same-sex marriage and to a federal constitutional amendment (very close to John McCain). "Far left" means a policy on torture embraced by the Republican nominee and endorsed by every American president apart from George W. Bush.

This "far left" meme is meaningless. It says everything about the intellectual bankruptcy of the talk radio right and nothing about the substantive polices and challenges of a president Obama.

Of course it is meaningless, indeed stupid, to call Obama, or really any other Democrat in the primary campaigns who had even a theoretical shot of being successful, an extremist. That will be the accusation, and it may or may not persuade those people too dumb to know the difference not to vote for him. the good thing is that most of the people who believe Obama to be too conservative are, almost by ontological definition, not in line to be persuaded.

John McCain can take comfort in the fact that the equally empty accusations that he is an extreme conservative will not work in any meaningful way. Do I think McCain is too conservative? He is for me. But more importantly, I think he is wrong. More importantly, I think he is more wrong than he was in 2000, because he has shifted rightward on a whole lot of policies. So not only is he more wrong, he is also less principled. Which is a bit of a tough pill to swallow in light of the fact that his principles are what made him most appealing across the aisle.