There’s a civil war on the Right again, and one of the insurgent groups just got a profile in the Atlantic. The Bulwark, the editorial platoon run by veteran conservative radio host Charlie Sykes, reportedly is gearing up for a very peculiar battle.
If the Atlantic profile is accurate, the Bulwark’s next target is not so much President Trump, nor even Trump’s fiercest, vilest, and most intolerant defenders. The target appears to be conservatives who find themselves defending Trump despite knowing his flaws.
“[I]n the coming months,” McKay Coppins at the Atlantic reports, “The Bulwark will home in on a specific class of ‘grifters and trolls’—those opportunistic Trump enablers who still get invited on Meet the Press and write for prestigious newspapers.” Then the Atlantic names names, including Henry Olsen and Marc Thiessen.
While a fatwa against political scientist Henry Olsen reflects odd priorities, the personal ferocity of the Bulwark’s plans seem even more out of place. This isn’t about persuading anyone or defeating anyone in debate, it seems. The Bulwark reportedly “wants to shame and stigmatize the ‘bad actors’ in the conservative elite.”
This tactic in intra-conservative battles is nothing new. I’ve only been in Washington for 20 years, but I’ve witnessed plenty of internecine struggles filled with unnecessary attacks on the motives and character of those on the other side.
In 2002 and 2003, things got ugly. Along with my boss Bob Novak, a few friends, and a small group of other conservatives, I opposed the Iraq War. I knew I would be in the minority on the Right, but what caught some of us young bucks off guard was that folks in the majority, including some neoconservatives and other hawks, tried to exile and personally smash the dissidents.
Wide-eyed and believing in robust debate, I organized a panel in 2002 debating the wisdom of the war. My co-organizer, ideologically warm to wars for regime change and democratizing the Muslim world, would condescend to allow an anti-war libertarian on stage, but drew the line at “the paleocons,” traditional conservatives opposed to the war, because “they have been discredited.”
Major conservative magazines ran articles smearing war opponents as “unpatriotic” and worse. Friendships were ruined. Careers were stalled. Many of the Iraq War’s loudest proponents made it clear that opposing their war wasn’t mere disagreement. It was an excommunicable sin.
Why the vitriol and intolerance? Perhaps they thought invading Iraq was an issue of first principles and a pure test of character, like opposing slavery. Or perhaps they were just ruthlessly using the tools at their disposal to whip the undecided into agreement and cow their opponents into silence.
Politics is a big-boy game, and tough tactics are part of it. But I had assumed those tactics were the stuff of parties and campaigns. I thought they didn’t happen in journalism and policy circles. Boy, was I wrong.
That bitter taste was still in my mouth a couple of years later, when the intra-Right fight was a different, smaller one. It was about Arlen Specter, the liberal-leaning Republican in line to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee. When Specter told a reporter that the Roe v. Wade decision striking all state laws against abortion was sacrosanct and hinted that he’d block any anti-Roe nominees, a firestorm ensued on the Right. The party establishment resisted efforts to take the gavel away from Specter, but activists were up in arms. I was furiously writing on this hubbub in those weeks.
In those days I got a call from an old Catholic pro-life conservative, with a long record of fighting the good fight. He told me that many of his fellow gray-haired pro-lifers believed Specter had been properly chastened by the uproar, and that allowing him to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee was prudent.
“Now, I’m not expecting to convince you this is the right course of action,” I recall this man telling me. “Keep fighting your fight if you like. But please know that the pro-lifers who have come to terms with Specter have done so because they think this is the best way to get a good judge on the high court. Argue against this view, but please don’t impugn motives or ostracize anyone.”
I was not necessarily persuaded about Specter, and between his work on confirming two conservative Supreme Court justices and his later defection to the Democrats, it’s still debatable which one of us was right in that disagreement. But this man’s phone call struck me as the decent, honorable method for waging a friendly fight against people on one’s own side.
Today’s fight is over how to treat and react to Trump. On the Right, there’s a spectrum, ranging from lapdogs who dance to Trump’s tune no matter what, to those who adopt the opposite of whatever position Trump takes, no matter what.
In between the extremes are Charlie Sykes, Henry Olsen, Marc Thiessen, and I think most conservative commentators.
Some of us try to agree with Trump when he’s right, criticize him when he’s wrong, and never lose sight of how profoundly unfit he is for the job. I have also tried to learn from the 2016 election and understand what drove voters to nominate Trump, rather than to chastise or dismiss Trump’s core base as deplorables.
But no, that’s not good enough, according to some still-Never Trumpers. Because Trump is unfit, we must declare his unfitness without ceasing. Sure, he’s been president for more than two years, but we must not risk “normalizing” him — whatever that can mean at this point — by praising his good moves, such as the nomination of Neil Gorsuch, the withdrawal from the Paris climate accords, and his pro-life executive actions.
There’s a tactical and even moral debate to be had here. It could be a debate over the limits of compromise and the best means for advancing conservatism. But we can have that debate only if all the camps see it as a debate and not a holy war.
