Other than being stuck for something novel to write about, I'm not sure what manner of daftness was haunting Richard Cohen of the Washington Post yesterday when he proffered George W. Bush as "more liberal than you might think."
I thought at first it was merely a tongue-in-cheek piece -- "Bush the Neoliberal"; now there's a title suited for sarcasm -- but no, Cohen actually proceeded to make, or tried to make, a serious case. It was a damn slim one, but he gave it a go anyway, and I'll at least give him credit for editorial adventurism.
"Consider this," he wrote. "An overriding principle of conservatism is to limit the role and influence of the federal government.... [Yet] Bush has extended the [education] department's reach in a manner that Democrats could not have envisaged. I am referring, of course, to the 2001 Elementary and Secondary Education Act, better known as No Child Left Behind... It is precisely the sort of law that conservatives predicted Washington would someday seek -- and it did."
OK, maybe it's not what conservatives had in mind, but in what way does NCLB reflect core liberalism? Cohen seems to believe that liberalism, at all times and in every case, means merely more and bigger government for big government's sake. Others -- such as liberals -- believe liberalism stands for better, more responsible and more responsive government. Size doesn't really matter. NCLB, with its megalomaniacal focus on Rumsfeldian metrics, and not on the arts of actual teaching and real learning, hardly fits the bill. I don't care what Ted Kennedy thinks.
Cohen also suggested that Bush's appointments of a female national security adviser and Hispanic attorney general intentionally taunted conservatism's "much-mocked notion of diversity" in high places. Plus, "You only have to listen to Bush talk about the virtues of immigration -- another liberal sentiment -- or his frequent mention of the 'soft bigotry of low expectations' to appreciate that the president is a sentimental softie, what was once dismissively called a 'mushy-headed liberal.'"
Bush may be appreciably soft in the head, and he may extol the virtues of immigration, but are his underlying motivations regarding diversity -- cronyism and the corporate-inspired importation of cheap labor -- "liberal" ones?
Cohen's wildest punch, however, was thrown in "mak[ing] the case that [Bush's 'neoliberalism'] is also true when it comes to Iraq."
Yes, you read that right. Iraq.
Writes Cohen: "One reason for our involvement was an attempt to do some good -- rid the world of a really bad guy and make life better for Iraqis and others in the region. This 'liberal' intent may have left Dick Cheney cold and found Don Rumsfeld indifferent, but it appealed to Bush.
"His war will be cited to smother any liberal impulse in American foreign policy -- to further discredit John F. Kennedy's vow to 'pay any price, bear any burden ... to assure the survival and the success of liberty.'"
There's so much wrong with that, it requires a dissection with heaps more patience than I have, so let's leave it at this: Not only was JFK thoughtfully and ultimately unwilling to pay any price and bear any burden, it was Lyndon Johnson's mutilation of Kennedy's loose manifesto that drove a nail in liberalism's interventionist instincts and, in short order, gave rise to a liberally alienated neoconservatism in reaction.
But Cohen's fundamental misstep was in slaying this humbug, already dead or dying, expressed early in his column: "The conventional wisdom is that Bush is the most conservative of all presidents."
For once, conventional wisdom is on to something, but that ain't it. What is gelling as proper conventional wisdom is that Bush is the most radical of all presidents. From busting the domestic budget to refashioning foreign cultures (trying to, that is), Bush has trashed virtually every tenet of authentic conservatism.
If conservatism survives his swinish presidency, it will be in spite of it, not a legacy of it. And it sure as hell won't be known as "neoliberalism."
On the other hand, if labeling the likes of George W. Bush as some sort of mongrel liberal will help deter conservatives from voting for another George W. Bush, then label away, Mr. Cohen.