on the J.R. Dunn
. Note that they immediately zero in on Peggy Noonan as the main Northeastern Corridor conservative villain:
Reply 2—Posted by: ZurichMike, 9/18/2008 1:43:41 AM
Aren’t what the author refers to as the Northeast Corridor conservatives Rockefeller conservatives? You know, the other half of the vicious conservative stereotype? (the two sides being rich, monocled, captains of industry in gentry homes versus gun-toting rednecks)
Reply 5—Posted by: PageTurner, 9/18/2008 2:29:18 AM
I wouldn’t call them rockefeller republicans, I think they are neocons, the real ones. Noonan is the worst, but there’s Frum, Brooks, Will, Kristol (initially—though I think he wised up) and even (pain!) Krauthammer (though I think he’s come back to the fold).
I think these eastern elites just don’t understand the West and they don’t understand middle classness. However, I do find Palin having tons of recognition and understanding among the Reagan crowd of SoCal where I am. Michael Reagan immediately recognized her as one of us. I too am a western conservative and I really like her.
Reply 6—Posted by: suedotsue, 9/18/2008 3:19:22 AM
Sarah is the only one who can save this country. Figuring out if she’s up, down, right, left, center, or half way to Poughkypsee doesn’t matter at all to me. If Sarah doesn’t get in, these guys won’t be writing too many more articles anyway. I’m well aware that party labels and identities have changed, that’s just conversation. [LA replies: Palin is the only one who can save the country! A nominee for vice president. If this comment doesn’t show the irrational enthusiasm involved in the Palin phenomenon, nothing does.]
Reply 7—Posted by: Triangulum, 9/18/2008 4:07:51 AM
I’ve already written off the NY-DC axis pundits who call themselves Republicans. They are oh-so nuanced and refined, and it smacks of elitism. I live in fly-over country and my conservatism is almost instinctive, based on a love of my country and its institutions. I don’t want to see this beautiful land slide more toward socialism. I would like to take back some of the ground that has been lost.
Reply 8—Posted by: LadyHen, 9/18/2008 4:27:59 AM
FTA: Conservatism as it exists today is a heartland phenomenon, with all the virtues and strengths—and yes, weaknesses and errors—of the American heartland. Today it’s the Northeast Corridor conservatives who are the outliers. [LA replies: does this commenter think that American Thinker is from the American heartland?]
~~~
When we elected who they told us to elect, they had no problem with us peasants. Now we are not listening to them and there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth. While they think they need a “new base”, I think this base needs some new leaders. Our leaders need to be people that represent who we are, not simply fiscally conservative versions of the snobbish elitist liberals that deride us as slack jawed, hayseed sucking hicks from “Jesusland.” Might I say to our erstwhile leaders, evolve or die. We are the future and if you don’t like that, please don’t let the door hit you in the patoot on the way out.
Reply 10—Posted by: FALbert, 9/18/2008 5:33:36 AM
I live in the northeast, though not in the urban areas, and I can’t stand these people. Te contempt they show for the average guy is sickening.
Reply 12—Posted by: A Balrog of Morgoth, 9/18/2008 6:28:14 AM
I am certainly looking forward to commenting on the next Peggy Noonan article that gets posted here.
Reply 14—Posted by: greggojo, 9/18/2008 7:06:21 AM
Somehow, with all of the leftists running our schools, our courts, the media, somehow, many millions of us survived with our Americanism intact. Thank you God.
McCain/Palin in ‘08
Reply 15—Posted by: M2, 9/18/2008 7:06:49 AM
This is excellent! (With apologies for the long quote…):
In the same way that liberals view the U.S. racist, militarist monolith, the Northeast Corridor coterie view it as a cultural wasteland populated by backwoodsmen, halfwits who need to be guided by an enlightened but aloof elite.
That’s what they saw when Sarah Palin stepped before the public. Not a superb example of the 21st-century American woman, knowledgeable, capable, and admirable, but a hick with a roughneck husband and a load of kids. Quite the opposite of what the rest of the country saw, and accepted, and will likely send to Washington this November.
Precisely. Well done.
….and then there’s this:
The Northeastern urban conservatives must find some way to connect with the rest of the country. If not, they’ll end up much like the “conservatism” expressed by Andrew Sullivan (whose main outlet, it should be noted, is a European paper)—obsessive, strange, and isolated, existing in dream world with no connection or influence to anything else.
This is at the very heart of our Republican Party as we knew it.
Reply 18—Posted by: DocH, 9/18/2008 7:27:01 AM
George Will’s another one, and David Frum, and there are others (but by no means all) on the National Review Online staff who meet this description. The neph’s a good ‘un, though.
Reply 19—Posted by: Arby, 9/18/2008 7:38:04 AM
Good article. The problem, I think, is NYC and D.C. They’re both bubbles. NYC occupants have totally distorted views of reality and consider every place else “different” in the sense of flawed, weird, and backward. D.C. residents are mostly developmentally disabled. The perception is that there is really only one good job in town, so everyone else gossips, backbites, plots and dreams about it. D.C. has no manufacturing and, really, no banking. Culturally it is still what NYC would consider a backwater. This exacerbates the problem.
Reply 20—Posted by: justjoe, 9/18/2008 7:43:37 AM
When Peggy Noonan called Sarah Palin “bulls—-” she sealed her own fate: permanently irrelevant. Clueless. Bulls—-.
So it is with all these NE corridor conservatives. They are elitists just like the liberal elites. They have no real connection or understanding of middle class Americans. They read about us, usually from other elites who write about us.
Reply 21—Posted by: triggerberg, 9/18/2008 7:45:09 AM
So, the conservative elites—opinion leaders, spokesmen and pundits (all self-appointed, by the way)—think they need to find a new base. I couldn’t agree more, they ought to cut loose and find a new home. This bunch flatters itself it is conservative, but in truth it has more in common with liberals than conservatives. Maybe the country-club Republicans can take up the place left vacant by the Dems when they made the move to the far left, and we’d have three parties; Republicans (true conservatives), Democrats (former country-club pubbies), and the far left, goofball, nutroot party.
Reply 22—Posted by: gop_guys, 9/18/2008 7:45:14 AM
In my humble opinion, Sarah Palin IS the face of the future in the conservative movement! I put her up there with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Maybe I’ll do a tee shirt.
Reply 23—Posted by: bean, 9/18/2008 8:11:03 AM
Northeast Corridor Conservatives are as sexist as the Dems. I think calling them conservative gives conservatives a bad name.
Reply 24—Posted by: Aggie57, 9/18/2008 8:12:22 AM
I would like to respectfully address some of the previous posters regarding New York City.
Keep in mind gentle Ldotters that there are quite a few on this site that reside in NYC, including Lucianne her own self…please don’t use that really broad brush when addressing problems that include the ‘Northeast corridor’.
There are some really fine folks that live in the City…how do you think Rudy got elected as many times as he did !
Reply 25—Posted by: a man over thirty, 9/18/2008 8:26:43 AM
Perhaps the desire to be liked, to be accepted, to be invited to the openings and the cocktail parties got to these people just as it does to the Hollywood crowd. People are people—even when they have a national byline. Doesn’t make it right and I’m not condoning it. But Peggy wants to be part of the in crowd too.
Reply 33—Posted by: MCRN83, 9/18/2008 9:01:13 AM
Attention northeast corridor conservatives: there is intelligent life beyond the Hudson river valley. In fact, there is an entire continent of intelligent people who hold to American values. They pay taxes, go to work, fight the wars that keep you free to live in your ivory towers.
You may not understand them, but that’s okay. We’re doing just fine out here without you. [LA replies: over and over the L-dotters attack the Northeastern Corridor conservatives, by whom they really mean the neocons. But the neocons have been mostly in favor of Palin.]
Reply 34—Posted by: NorthernDog, 9/18/2008 9:11:40 AM
As someone who grew up in the Northeast but now lives well west of the Mississippi River, I can definitely see the author’s point. However, I think it’s possible for two variations of conservatism to exist and supplement each other.
Reply 35—Posted by: mc squared, 9/18/2008 9:31:35 AM
#34; I think it’s possible for two variations of conservatism to exist and supplement each other.
I too grew up east of the Hudson but I don’t see it that way. The newly named Northeast Conservatives gave us comprehensive immigration reform, McCain-Feingold, out of control spending and McCain himself.
I feel as if I’m the lone member of an insignificant third party.
Reply 36—Posted by: TunnelRat, 9/18/2008 9:43:49 AM
Every time a New Yorker complains about the Midwestern ”accent” I just have to roll my eyes. Most of the country speaks in one way, and New York speaks in another.
Yeah, there are some good ones there, but not all that many. And they have no idea who we are, out here in fly-over country.
Reply 37—Posted by: Barbarian Heretic, 9/18/2008 9:44:49 AM
I don’t think they’re Conservatives at all. They’re Republicans. There is a big difference.
The former is a philosophy; an ideology; a set of principles. The latter is merely a political party; a group of ostensibly like-minded voters. [LA replies: And is the commenter saying that McCain is a true conservative, as distinct from those mere Republicans?]
Reply 38—Posted by: rlwo, 9/18/2008 9:50:37 AM
Sullivan is no conservative of any kind.
Reply 39—Posted by: Reader, 9/18/2008 9:55:40 AM
Good post, #24. My dear late husband, as conservative as they come, was born and raised in Brooklyn. Geography is NOT destiny.
Reply 40—Posted by: Clerk Lady, 9/18/2008 10:21:08 AM
I used to enjoy Peggy Noonan’s writing very much. Can someone here tell me just when, and why, she has gone around the bend?
I read the posts after the American Thinker piece, and one poster spoke about the moment little Piper smoothed Trig’s hair, and when Sarah went to hold Trig when her speech was finished at the convention. Did these two occurances touch anyone elses heart as they did mine?
David B. writes: