Prediction: Coastal Cons are a Dead End

Coastal Cons include: Ross Douthat, lots of people at The American Scene, David Frum, Michael Gerson. They do not include Will Wilkinson--although he shares many of their behaviors--because he would never claim to be conservative. They do not include Andrew Sullivan, because his conservatism was always a pose to help him stand out from the TNR crowd. They do not include David Brooks but many of them are his love children.

Coastal Cons want to redefine conservatism in a way that can be acceptable to their smart and sensible liberal friends. To do that they must define out old-school conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin (whoever Mark Levin is). But there can be no successful conservative party without the people who like Rush Limbaugh.

Rush Limbaugh is a genius and a comedian. He enjoys himself and he is not jealous or particularly petty. He is theatrical and often says things in a way that shows he knows he is overstating for dramatic effect. Coastal Cons are guilty of opining about him without having listened to his shows regularly. They listen and read only those bits that have been targeted by their liberal friends.

Coastal Cons attack Rush Limbaugh and others for behavior that is no more right-partisan or polarizing than the behavior of prominent left-partisans in the national media. Those left-partisans include Bill Maher, Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, Michael Moore, and used to include Al Franken.

Coastal Cons do not really begrudge these left-partisans their often-vicious attacks on non-Coastal Cons, because many of the targets are people with whom Coastal Cons do not identify. Sarah Palin and George W Bush are examples of politicians. Ms. California and Joe the Plumber are examples of non-politicians who accidentally exposed themselves to the left-partisans.

The liberal friends of Coastal Cons do not target left-partisan media the way that Coastal Cons target Rush Limbaugh. They accept that those left-partisans are filling a need for left-partisan voters.

Liberal friends of Coastal Cons are allowed to accuse non-Coastal Cons of racism, fake pregnancies, and other horrible things. Coastal Cons will not stop being friends with these liberals and will continue to include them in discussions as reasonable people. A very recent example is Matt Yglesias saying that Ramesh Ponnuru thinks the new Supreme Court nominee's schools do not matter because she is not a "white dude". Ramesh Ponnuru is good friends with Coastal Cons and supports them despite what I think are significant differences of opinion. None of those Coastal Cons will say 'that's it, Matt is crazy here, and he needs to apologize to Ramesh." Andrew Sullivan's accusations that Sarah Palin faked her entire pregnancy with her Downs Syndrome son were so hysterical and groundless, and went on for so long, that no leading right-partisan could have carried on a similarly bizarre attack without being disowned by the right and the left.

Coastal Cons will not recreate a conservative party by ostracizing Rush Limbaugh supporters. They will get some more book deals. They may still propose some Third Way-type social programs (I am looking at Douthat and Salaam), at least until they realize that their dinghies have been swamped by Obama's tankers. They will rise in DC and NY media as conservatives who write for liberals. But they are a dead-end.

Conservatives may get to 50%+1 in 3 1/2 years. But it will not be done by people who think of Rush Limbaugh supporters the way Pauline Kael thought of Nixon supporters.

A Note: This post is too long. I am writing it because I want to be on record and prove my rightness in 5 years