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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jlallen who wrote (537586)	2/9/2004 1:00:31 PM
From: Gordon A. Langston	Respond to of 769667

Pretty fair assessment IMO Monday, February 9, 2004 Defining conservatism down Small-government advocates are hard to find on campus in the Bush era By ERICA HARPSTER The U.C. Irvine senior is an associate editor of the Irvine Review. IRVINE - The current climate of big-government Republicanism has caused traditionally conservative commentators to become apologists for George W. Bush. This, coupled with a dishonest academic climate, threatens to create a generation of Republicans without respect for small-government principles, as these younger ideologues emulate the positions of the most influential voices in conservative and Republican politics. Weekly Standard Editor Fred Barnes defends President Bush's policies by arguing his critics do not understand the principles and strategies behind "big-government conservatism." On National Review Online, the dominant conservative media source for college students, writers Jay Nordlinger and David Frum frequently soft-pedal Bush's policies by euphemizing his actions as "staunch" or "real" leadership. The commentators justify Bush's domestic spending, which they disagree with, for the sake of his foreign policy, which they support. If these pundits succeed, then where will today's students, specifically Republicans receptive to the ideas of limited government, find small-government ideology? Not in the classroom. A cursory examination of current political science courses at UC Irvine shows that of the 24 offerings in the department, only one Enlightenment or free-market thinker, John Locke, is assigned as course reading. In that instance, Locke's "Treatise on Two Forms of Government" is one of seven books required for the course. In many of the courses, the only perspectives provided are Marxist or racialist. The university barely acknowledges Republicanism, let alone limited-government ideology. In October, UCI's annual Peltason Lecture on Democracy was given by Ted Kennedy. He was billed as a health care "expert." If not in classrooms or guest lectures, perhaps free-market conservatism can be found in one of UCI's many student groups? Again, it's not the case. Prior to this quarter, of the 11 political organizations on campus, a student interested in small government could turn only to the College Republicans. But the group's members are beholden to the state party; they must support specified candidates, walk precincts and collect signatures on party-endorsed issues, regardless of a candidate's principles or the GOP's policy stands. Unfortunately, these young Republicans might not even be aware of their party's traditional principles. A graduate student who leads political science discussion courses told me he believes most self-identified Republican students have little or no idea what their party actually represents or should represent. In their minds, Republicanism - and by extension, conservatism - is anti-Clinton and pro-life, with, at best, a general mistrust of the welfare system. Consequently, when the recall campaign was at its peak, the argument among young Republicans was not over sound budgeting but whether Arnold Schwarzenegger would embrace gay marriage and expand abortion rights. The misconceptions that young Republicans and conservatives operate under are compounded by the intellectual dishonesty of the campus left. Professors characterize the president and congressional Republicans as hard-liners and extremist conservatives. If Bush's steel tariffs, farm subsidies and Medicare bill are defined as examples of right-wing fanaticism, the effect is to make the issue stands of the far left seem tame and moderate. For most young people, it's no wonder that limited government as a concept is functionally non-existent. College will not expose them to small-government ideology. The Republican Party, as its leader in the White House has often demonstrated, will readily sacrifice principles for politics. Even many conservative pundits have forsworn their doctrine for short-term political advantage. At least we'll know whom to blame if Republicans' embrace of big government becomes the party's standard operating procedure. It's the expedient conservatives who gave up on free markets and embraced state power in the George W. Bush years - all in pursuit of fleeting political gains.