That’s the provocative title of an op-ed published in today’s Washington Post by Steve Hayward, who’ll be speaking Monday at the Shaftesbury Society lunch here at JLF.
Hayward sees a lot of positive ferment on the populist right, from talk-show hosts to best-selling authors of red-meat books by the likes of Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter, but wonders, where are the intellectuals? Who’s developing the ideas that can move America past its often-furious reaction against the Obama agenda toward policies that enhance freedom and limited government — and more important, who’s transmitting that message in popular venues like talk radio?
Of course, it’s hard to say whether conservative intellectuals are simply out of interesting ideas, or if the reading public simply finds their ideas boring. Both possibilities (and they are not mutually exclusive) should prompt some self-criticism on the right. Conservatism has prospered most when its attacks on liberalism have combined serious alternative ideas with populist enthusiasm. When the ideas are absent, the movement has nothing to offer — except opposition. That doesn’t work for long in American politics.
Hayward offers recommendations, but it does offer some genuine challenges to those who think that channeling the outrage expressed at tea parties and town halls is sufficient to restore conservative self-government.
Read the whole thing.
(Update: The op-ed is dated Sunday, so it’s online now but won’t be available in print for a couple of days.)
