How Hard Right Will McCain Go...

[Sam Spade]

FWIW, I don't think McCain could win with Jesus Christ himself as his running mate.

There's going to be a McCain/Obama ticket in the fall?

[JSojourner]

I hope he doesn't. I hope he picks a decent conservative like Pawlenty or Huckabee, but this "Tom Coburn" or "Mark Sanford" talk seems too far right to appeal.

Mark Sanford is far right?

I wondered the same, Erc.  I think of him as a mainstream conservative.  Certainly not a moderate.  But in the same basic conservative mold as a Dick Lugar, a Pat Roberts or a Thad Cochrane.  I would regard Jim DeMint, Tom Coburn or John Thune as hard right.  But not Sanford.

[JSojourner]

FWIW, I don't think McCain could win with Jesus Christ himself as his running mate.

That would be a popular tiket though. Jesus would shore up the evangelical vote and make some headway into the Catholic vote. Also, the Sermon on the Mount beats even the yes we can speech.

Evangelicals are a lot more enamored with James Dobson or Pat Robertson than that leftist liberal, Jesus of Nazareth.  Hasn't always been that way, but since Reagan it has.

[Stranger in a strange land]

I hope he doesn't. I hope he picks a decent conservative like Pawlenty or Huckabee, but this "Tom Coburn" or "Mark Sanford" talk seems too far right to appeal.

Mark Sanford is far right?

I wondered the same, Erc.  I think of him as a mainstream conservative.  Certainly not a moderate.  But in the same basic conservative mold as a Dick Lugar, a Pat Roberts or a Thad Cochrane.  I would regard Jim DeMint, Tom Coburn or John Thune as hard right.  But not Sanford.

In that case, he probably won't cut it in the eyes of the religious right.

[Mr. Morden]

I'm amused by the perpetual conflation of "the religious right" with "movement conservatives".

[Stranger in a strange land]

I'm amused by the perpetual conflation of "the religious right" with "movement conservatives".

they're not the same, but there's considerable overlap between the two. Movement conservatives can't win elections without the RR.

[AltWorlder]

Are movement conservatives the grassroots types who frequent Free Republic and the right-wing blogosphere?  I thought they claimed to represent the Reagan coalition as a whole, not any of its constituent parts.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Are movement conservatives the grassroots types who frequent Free Republic and the right-wing blogosphere?  I thought they claimed to represent the Reagan coalition as a whole, not any of its constituent parts.

FR represents the right fringe of the Conservative Movement. Not all Freepers all Freepers are Relgious Right, but many are, and the site itself isn't relgious right or dominionist in the sense that doesn't focus on how to turn the United States into a theocracy.

[AltWorlder]

Then just what is a "movement conservative"?  I thought that meant a true-believer in the Reagan coalition, that is representing socialcons, defense-hawkcons, and fiscal-lowtax-littlegovcons.  Not to mention super-strong borders and all that jazz.  I thought that's what FR was mostly composed of- they were big supporters of Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson, after all.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Then just what is a "movement conservative"?  I thought that meant a true-believer in the Reagan coalition, that is representing socialcons, defense-hawkcons, and fiscal-lowtax-littlegovcons.  Not to mention super-strong borders and all that jazz.  I thought that's what FR was mostly composed of- they were big supporters of Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson, after all.

yeah that's pretty much it, but Reagan wasn't as big on closing the borders as the current movement conservatives are.

I say that FR represents the right fringe of the conservative movement because many of its members advocate things like mining the border and nuking Mecca.

Which raises an interesting question: why didn't movement conservatives rally around Fred Thompson to a greater extent than they did? (other than his laziness and lackluster campaign)

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Which raises an interesting question: why didn't movement conservatives rally around Fred Thompson to a greater extent than they did? (other than his laziness and lackluster campaign)

You answered your own question. They didn't because he was a lazy joke who went nowhere.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Which raises an interesting question: why didn't movement conservatives rally around Fred Thompson to a greater extent than they did? (other than his laziness and lackluster campaign)

You answered your own question. They didn't because he was a lazy joke who went nowhere.

that never stopped them from supporting dubya

[Mr. Morden]

Then just what is a "movement conservative"?  I thought that meant a true-believer in the Reagan coalition, that is representing socialcons, defense-hawkcons, and fiscal-lowtax-littlegovcons.  Not to mention super-strong borders and all that jazz.  I thought that's what FR was mostly composed of- they were big supporters of Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson, after all.

No, you basically have it right.  I haven't spent much time at FR, but my sense is that most freepers are movement conservatives, albeit more extreme than the average movement conservative.  Movement conservatives range from Rush Limbaugh to most of the National Review crowd.  They're conservative on pretty much every issue, but not necessarily on the fringe on every issue.  They tend to care more about things like tax cuts, immigration, and foreign policy than they do about, say, abortion or gay marriage, even though they're likely to have conservative positions on abortion and gay marriage.

Which means that "conservative evangelicals" and "movement conservatives" are not the same thing.  Rush Limbaugh, for example, was largely supportive of Steve Forbes back in 1996 even though, at the time, Forbes was pro-choice.  And while Huckabee gets virtually 100% of his support from evangelicals, movement conservatives largely can't stand him.

Anyway, my original point was that McCain's problems with "conservative evangelicals" and "movement conservatives" are different, with the latter probably having a bigger problem with him.  That's why "McCain has to pick a VP who appeases the religious right" misses the mark a bit.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Club For Growth is a good summary of "movement conservatives".

[Reaganfan]

Pawlenty

[Frodo]

Will conservatives be content if McCain were to pick Governor Mark Sanford as his running-mate, pledge to make judicial picks vetted by the Federalist Society, and overhaul entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare (as well as the tax code) according to conservative principles?  He has already moved right with regard to illegal immigration.

Seriously, if he does all this, what more could they ask for? 

[Gustaf]

Which raises an interesting question: why didn't movement conservatives rally around Fred Thompson to a greater extent than they did? (other than his laziness and lackluster campaign)

You answered your own question. They didn't because he was a lazy joke who went nowhere.

that never stopped them from supporting dubya

Bush had many faults but I don't consider him that lazy.