Conservatives Without Conscience

In 1996 the Washington Times’s magazine Insight examined “Who’s Who in America’s Conservative Revolution,” an article that highlighted the remarkable degree of sectarianism in the right wing, a fact well known to most conservatives. Insight noted that there were thirteen print journals geared toward the various factions of conservative readers.[45] These journals represented “distinct, though overlapping, philosophies,” which the magazine, a well-known conservative publication itself, divided into ten different species of conservatives. Here, in highly compressed, occasionally paraphrased, and updated form, is a glimpse of the modern conservative family tree:[*]

Austriocons: The paleoconservatives (paleocons), so called because they were conservatives back when most of the neoconservatives (neocons) were still Trotskyites, are split over the issue of free trade. Those paleos who are followers of the “Austrian” school of economics, i.e., the free-trade libertarians who honor Ludwig von Mises, were dubbed by Insight as “Austriocons.”

Buchanocons: Paleos who have rebelled against free trade and the unaccountable global bureaucracies that they believe it is producing. Their political leader is Patrick Buchanan. Since 2002, they have had their own journal, The American Conservative.

Neocons: Intellectuals who drifted from the far left to the center to the right, carrying their flagship magazine, Commentary, with them. They are mostly Jewish, and mostly New York based. Neocons tend to be militant internationalists. They publish their own inside-the-Beltway weekly, The Weekly Standard.

Aquinacons: Neocons acquired a Christian wing when the Reverend Richard John Neuhaus founded his monthly magazine, First Things, patterned after Commentary. However, this is an increasingly distinct group, one that can be called “Aquinacons” because its members focus on the work of a rising generation of academic experts on the natural-law theories of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas.

Radiocons: (Just kidding, says Insight.) This group includes talk-radio conservatives like Rush Limbaugh, Gordon Liddy, Mike Reagan, Blanquita Cullum, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, and other popularizers of the political and cultural right, if not their enormous middle America audiences.

Sociocons: Often lumped with the religious right, these social conservatives advance secular arguments for curbing abortion, divorce, illegitimacy, rights of homosexuals, and drugs. Its leading lights are the Family Research Council, the Institute for American Values, and columnist Cal Thomas.

Theocons: Conservatives who actually favor a more or less theocratic application of biblical law. Unlike Aquinacons, they reject natural law. In fact, this faction is far smaller than some in the news media believe, according to Insight.

Republicons: Young people who learned their conservative theory back in college and since have given themselves over to activism, either as Republican campaign strategists or as policy advocates. Newt Gingrich is their hero, and Grover Norquist (of the Americans for Tax Reform) is their leader. They have politically gold-plated résumés and no time for pessimism.

Catocons: Hard-core libertarians who recognize that even if your goal is to dismantle government, you have to play the Washington policy-wonk game to change things. Their leading think tank is the Cato Institute.

Platocons: Allied with, but different from, the Aquinacons, the Platocons are the disciples of the late Leo Strauss, who excited generations of students at the University of Chicago about classical political philosophy. Not all Straussians are conservatives, however. Still, their belief that ideas are intrinsically important, and are not just manifestations of class interest or historical prejudice, puts them at odds with the academic left.[46]