Interesting thoughts from a "true" conservative

Llewellyn H.(Lew) Rockwell, Jr. is a libertarian and true conservative. In his most recent post he has some rather profound observations on Shills, Paid and Unpaid, Republican "intellectuals". He begins by talking about the pay for shill cases of Maggie Gallagher and Armstrong Williams and then moves on to the unpaid shills of BushCo.

.......... more profound than why Gallagher and Williams did what they did: what excuse do the rest of the Republican intellectuals have for their behavior? Day after day, they crank out the most absurd articles and treatises in defense of the indefensible so long as it is being pushed by the Bush administration. They wallow in their hatred of what they consider leftism even as they work to build a state with the size and power that hardly any leftist in the country would call for or even welcome. Those of us who were embarrassed by the slavish tendencies of the left in the 1990s to defend Clinton were unprepared to see the same behavior on the right, but with far more intensity.

Without reviewing the egregious history of this regime, and all the destruction, death, and debt it has wrought, we can only marvel at how the propagandists view every bit of bad news as a signal to work harder to portray the Bush administration as infallibly glorious. The Clintonites must have been squeamish about their defenses of his shady deals and peccadilloes. But how can that compare to the Bushites and their celebration of war crimes and fiscal wreckage?

Strong words, I don't think he has much use for the Bush administration or the current republican party. Go back and read those two paragraphs again, he says it all so there is no need for me to elaborate. Next he gives some examples of the cultish adoration of Bush in The National Review.

There is no real point in demonstrating the extent of their slavishness. In just a few clicks just now, from only one source, I found this: "Future generations will praise his idealism, courage, and audacity. They will appreciate that he embarked on one of the most breath-taking adventures in human history" and this: "George W. Bush is a man of deep religious faith and unwavering loyalty to his wife, family, and country. His own political story is remarkable" and this: "Americans should be congratulated for rejecting the slippery slope of moral relativism and endorsing Bush's steadfast leadership…" and this: "President Bush's goal to support the growth of democratic movements is not far-fetched. The United States should continue to be democracy's midwife and help countries though the difficult periods of democratic transition" and this: "What conservatives understood then and what President Bush understands now is that America itself is a radical nation, founded on the revolutionary principle that self-government is simultaneously the best form of government and the most moral. And that lovers of liberty in all parties should seek to conserve that legacy. The circumstances we face today are new, but the principles are eternal. So yes, George W. Bush is a revolutionary, but he is merely the latest in a long line of American revolutionaries."

There are a lot of words to describe the above (salaaming, etc.) but clear-headed is not among them. The cult of personality was fully revealed after Bush's inaugural address, which the conservatives are struggling to immortalize, as if history is made by the largest possible number of craven fulminations on blogs and websites. Bush stands up and says, in effect, "I will bring liberty to the world!" and the slaves of the GOP all stand to give a rousing cheer that lasts and lasts, and none dares be the first to stop clapping.

The cult worship of those in power was to have ended in 1776.

Intellectually, the tendency toward power worship was torn asunder by the great liberal revolution that began in the middle ages and culminated in 1776, with the generation that proclaimed that political rulers were worthy of distrust, in need of being restrained, and ultimately dispensable. This attitude toward politics came about not because the liberals hated the people with power, but because they saw power itself as destructive of the order that liberty itself creates. They came to realize that the good society is not created by great leaders but by the coordinated actions of all individuals in society in their private and commercial lives. It was this revelation that pulled back the curtain and showed the whole world what power has always conspired to hide: the people at the top are pretentious fools, and a source of disorder.

It takes a conservative to say what the Liberal and Progessive Intellectuals should be saying. Read the above, and in fact read the entire article. Then go to LewRockwell.com and read some more. We may not agree with much of what they believe but they certainly understand the nature of our common enemy.