John Seiler's article, "National Review's Weird Endorsement of Mitt Romney," is worth reading for the brief history lesson it provides, especially so for the editors of National Review, on National Review. Seiler quotes the magazine's endorsement of Mitt Romney: "Our guiding principle has always been to select the most conservative viable candidate." The former Orange County Register editor responds, "But this is flatly wrong."

Seiler points to NR's ethusiastic endorsement of John Ashbrook, the conservative Ohio congressman who primaried President Richard Nixon, in 1972, and NR's tepid endorsement of Pat Buchanan, the onetime Nixon aide who primaried George H.W. Bush, in 1992. It was apparent to everyone, even diehards working those campaigns, that neither man would win. Put another way, NR routinely discarded viability as a criterion for support when the candidate sported impressive conservative credentials. Did NR's "viability" test occur to William F. Buckley when he decided to run for mayor of New York City in 1965?

Magazines change. The New Republic, a milquetoast liberal magazine, for instance, was once published by a man who had just served as a Soviet agent. National Review is now 52 years old. Just like any man that age, the magazine has understandably gone through changes. The wildly successful shift in emphasis from print to online is one such transformation. As the tenor of the magazine has diverted from intellectual conservatism toward political journalism over the last decade, no one regularly perusing the magazine or surfing over to The Corner could be caught by surprise by the endorsement of Massachusetts Mitt. But for any conservative who stopped reading NR in the days--not so long ago--when, say, Joe Sobran, Russell Kirk, and Florence King appeared in the magazine, the endorsement of Romney would come as a shock.

The question is: Did the person who wrote the words, "Our guiding principle has always been to select the most conservative viable candidate," grow up reading the magazine when such writers graced the biweekly's pages and NR could be counted on as the scourge of liberal Republicans?

"In my "Left and Right: The Prospects for Liberty", I pointed out that the conservative, here and in Europe, is always a long run pessimist. The conservative believes that the inevitable march of history is against him:

Hence, the inevitable trend runs toward left-wing statism at home and communism abroad. It is this long run despair that accounts for the Conservative’s rather bi-zarre short run optimism; for since the long run is given up as hopeless, the Conservative feels that his only hope of success rests in the current moment. In foreign affairs, this point of view leads the Conservative to call for desperate showdowns with communism, for he feels that the longer he waits the worse things will inelectably become at home, it leads him to total concentration on the very next election, where he is always hoping for victory and never achieving it. The quintessence of the Practical Man, and beset by long run despair, the Conservative refuses to think or plan beyond the election of the day." - Murray N. Rothbard

Posted this the last time it came up. Goes a long way towards explaining that lamentable phenomenon, I believe. Most of the people still defending old right principles, such as Joe Sobran and Ron Paul, long ago moved into the radical libertarian front. Sobran is in fact, like my self, a full blown market anarchist these days.

Why? Is there a big difference between Romney and Buchanan??

HarHar.

Too bad this country is into duplicitous candidates full of slick bull$hit and wouldn't embrace a guy like Pat.

Intelligent, unwavering straight shooter with vision.

Wouldn't want a guy like him.