Robert W. Merry, who wrote a good book on the Alsops some years ago, urges us in the American Spectator to embrace Andrew Jackson as the GOP/Tea Party model. Merry also encourages rejection of the doctrines of Theodore Roosevelt, the very embodiment of the progressive, Big Government, war-mongering figure whom, he argues, Republicans should disown, disavow, disparage, and never let into their party again.

Roosevelt increased the government presence in commerce and government, Jackson reduced it. Jackson warned against “unnecessary wars unrelated to vital American interests,” while Roosevelt was an “imperialist” who longed for world dominance. (This isn’t quite true: He wanted the U.S. to keep order, which is not the same thing.)