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Why a New Conservative Magazine?
Our editorial policy
 Six
months ago, I wrote a memo lamenting the fact there was no longer
a conservative journal of opinion to provide a vision for the future
of the limited government movement. National Review, the journal
created by Bill Buckley to fulfill that mission, had opted to turn
from ideology to emulate the British Economist as a right-of-center
neutral evaluator of the passing scene rather than as the voice
of the conservative philosophical movement.
The
memo created a firestorm and resulted in the highest number of "hits"
ever to the American Conservative Union's Web site. We were inundated
with requests to start our own magazine. In response to popular
demand, here it is. Its editorial policy is based upon the presumption,
as our hero Ronald Reagan put it, that a successful conservative
philosophy of limited government must express itself in bold colors,
not in pale pastels, if it is to inspire a movement for American
revival.
It
follows that conservatism cannot be a satrapy of the Republican
Party. Conservatism has always been an independent movement of ideas
that sought to fill the GOP and all other parties with its moral
and programmatic ideas. A political party merely wants to win at
all costs. On its part, the leaders of the present Republican Party
have made it clear for all who will listen that they do not want
limited government as a defining aspect of their program anyway.
In
his first visit to presidentially pivotal New Hampshire, the new
GOP party chairman told its leading newspaper "in no uncertain
terms that the days of Reaganesque Republican railings against the
expansion of government were over." The Union Leader's conclusion: "The party's unofficial but clear message to conservatives
is: where else are you going to go"?
Even
the single case where someone in the White House even tried to make
a limited government case for the Bush Administration, it criticized
Ronald Reagan for withdrawing from Lebanon after the 1983 bombing
of the Marine barracks as a sign of his weakness against terrorism
compared to George Bush after 9/11. Did I miss the domestic terrorism
under Reagan? And if President Bush delays too long in Iraq he may
come to appreciate his predecessor's prudence for not being sucked
into a quagmire.
 This
case argues that Reagan actually spent a higher share of national
wealth on government than Bush. Reagan's, of course, was primarily
the result of his defense build-up-and he did win the Cold War by
doing so. It claims that spending under Bush increased at a decreasing
rate if one looks at non-defense, nonhomeland security spending
only, and uses, as does the president's budget, the 2004 estimates.
Yet, estimates do not count. If Bush held to his originally budgeted
2 percent increase, conservatives would be shouting joy from the
highest rooftops. But this never happened.
The
cave-in on the notoriously expensive and re-regulatory agricultural
bill, the expensive national controls enacted in the education bill,
the steel tariff, the instant retreat on the necessity of basic
reform on the Medicare drug bill, the tepid brief on the Michigan
affirmative action case, the fitful leadership on the judges battles,
the unnecessary limits on civil liberties occasioned by the war
on terrorism, and refusing to narrow Title IX quotas for men and
women college sports—these all show the actual record.
In
fact, the true results on spending for president Bush and the GOP
Congress are horrific and present a worse record than under Bill
Clinton. If one starts with FY 2000 under Clinton as a base, nondefense
outlays increased 4.7 percent in 2001, 6.2 percent in 2002 and 6.99
percent in 2003. On discretionary non-defense spending, it increased
10.9 percent in 2002 and 11.2 percent in 2003, and homeland security
is too small to affect the overall rates very much. Discretionary
spending increased last year under Bush by the highest amount of
any president in modern times. Reagan cut non-defense discretionary
spending 10 percent his first year and the average of the Clinton
years was only a 6 percent increase. Overall, the Gipper reduced
non-defense spending from 17.9 to 16.4 percent of GDP during his
tenure.
Today,
entitlement spending is nearing crisis. Social Security is $7 trillion
in the red compared to only $3.5 trillion on the official books.
But Medicare is $36 trillion (not billion) in negative balance.
What was the response of the president and GOP Congressional leaders?
They forced through a new Medicare drug entitlement that will increase
unfunded liability by $7 trillion-in effecting adding a whole new
Social Security-sized obligation. Social Security, Medicare and
Medicaid will grow from 8 to 14 percent of national wealth by 2030,
which will require a 36 percent increase in all federal taxes or
a 91 percent increase in the payroll tax or an 81 percent increase
in the income tax, any of which would destroy the economy.
The
new Medicare drug entitlement creates a Rubicon for the conservative
movement. It either responds to this clear message from the GOP
that limited government conservatism can be taken for granted or
the movement dies. As a new Pew Research Center analysis makes clear,
those believing in smaller government represent one of the essential
cores of Republican Party self identification. Yet, the Republican
president and party in Congress clearly have no interest in reducing
the stifling burden of national government bureaucracy in peoples'
daily lives. Someone must represent them.
The
fact that conservative journals of opinion fought this incredible
increase in the welfare state so laconically or even simply acceded
to it demands a new voice for limited government conservatism. If
anyone is to revive that ideal-or even see it survive over the next
four years-someone will have to face this unpleasant reality. If
other journals of opinion on the right are willing to accommodate
to this divorce of politics and principle, so be it. For us, we
will face the reality squarely, with no animus to Mr. Bush or other
GOP leaders, but only with our own passionate commitment to the
founding principles of our movement. The limited government ideas
of the founders simply must survive into the 21st century if American
is to remain free and good.
We
at Conservative Battleline Online relish the responsibility to speak
for those ideals. Our voice will be our own, not even the official
voice of the American Conservative Union Foundation, our institutional
home. We will be independent and unafraid of Washington pressure
to play along. We invite you to join us for this exciting ride to
enliven the principles that made America great.
Donald
Devine
Editor
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