A Conservative Sellout? Quelle Surprise

"David Keene is no conservative."

That is what I predict Mr. Keene's brethren on the right will soon be saying about the longtime chairman of the American Conservative Union (ACU).

Last week, Mr. Keene's ACU became embroiled in another of Washington's pay-to-play scandals, seeming to offer its services to an outside company for a cash consideration. And virtually the only way conservatives have of dealing with such an embarrassment is to declare the miscreant an "impostor," to find that the city changed him rather than the other way around, and to excommunicate him from the movement.

But before that happens, I want to suggest that Mr. Keene, the head of an organization that has for decades judged the conservatism of everyone else on the scene, might just be the one who is truest to the cause.

The story begins with one of those classic D.C. battles between big K Street spenders -- in this instance, FedEx and United Parcel Service -- that are thought to be matters of first principle to Beltwayers but that are completely uninteresting to almost everyone else. Employees of UPS are covered by one labor law -- the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) -- while employees of FedEx are governed by a different one, a law that makes it much harder for them to organize a union. Lots of UPS's employees are organized; few of FedEx's are.

The House has passed a bill putting both companies under the NLRA and the Senate is considering similar legislation now. UPS reportedly approves of the measure, while Fedex is boiling mad. Last spring spokesmen for the latter company even threatened to cancel an order for 30 Boeing jets if Congress dared to give its employees more of a chance to have a say about work conditions.

Toward the end of June, it seems that an officer of the ACU named Dennis Whitfield wrote a letter to an officer of FedEx proposing that the ACU organize grassroots opposition to the hated legislation. Mr. Whitfield outlined the steps that would be taken: The ACU would mobilize the troops by contacting voters, "participating in Hill meetings including key members of the Senate," and "producing op-eds and articles written by ACU's Chairman David Keene," who is also a columnist for The Hill newspaper.

Then Mr. Whitfield quoted a price: All of this activity would commence in exchange for $2 million and up, depending on how far FedEx wanted to go.

About two weeks later, with FedEx having evidently decided against the campaign, a group of conservatives wrote a letter to the CEO of the company taking UPS's side in the controversy and berating FedEx for -- yes -- using unfair tactics in the battle. One of the signers of the letter: David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union.

Last week, the letters were published and the story exposed by Politico under the headline, "Conservative Group Offers Support for $2M."

In response, Mr. Whitfield issued a furious statement declaring, "ACU's positions on important policy issues have never been for sale."

Public outrage has so far fallen mainly on Mr. Keene. But it's Mr. Whitfield's attitude -- "never been for sale" -- that should give pause to conservatives. What does he have against market-based exchange? Does he think that ACU talking points enjoy some lofty status above the free enterprise system?

His organization, he might do well to recall, is supposed to be one of the nation's chief evangelists for the free-market gospel. In fact, he said it himself in his original letter to FedEx: "For more than four decades we have worked in support of lower taxes, free markets, limited government," and so on.

And the last time I checked, sales were a basic element of free markets. Individuals don't determine the merit of things by dint of superior judgment; buyers do, by bidding the prices up and down. When applied to politics, the logic is the same: Ideas and legislation should live or die depending on how they satisfy the market's needs.

Most conservatives in D.C. seem to know this; that's why their movement is fashioned along business lines, bringing prosperity as well as political success to the activist entrepreneur. The basic strategy is to apply market forces to the state: More money in politics, not less, is what will get the goods.

Liberalism, on the other hand, is thought to be an inherently corrupt enterprise because it is driven less by good, honest market forces and more by the myopic whims of the millions. So when Democrats were threatening to pass the "card check" bill -- which would make it easier for workers to form unions -- back in March, Mr. Keene railed in The Hill against the obvious quid pro quo, as Democrats paid "the price for organized labor's support."

"In politics," he concluded with a world-weary sigh, "it all depends on what one gets for selling out someone else's rights."

What one gets for this kind of cynicism, on the other hand, are the very wages of righteousness.

Read other articles at the Opinion Journal:

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Comments

[Rugger]

Any system that allows business to take stupid risks and hand the resulting losses to the public is not free enterprise. Only the most stupid or the most criminal can say it is with any degree of assurance. My most cherished wish is that these belly-crawling snakes will ultimately drown in a pool of their own bile.

[knowBuddhaU]

I saw this, too. I'd call it commercial-grade propaganda.

~~~~~~~~~~
The conservative group’s remarkable demand — black-and-white proof of the longtime Washington practice known as “pay for play” — was contained in a private letter to FedEx , which was provided to POLITICO.

The letter exposes the practice by some political interest groups of taking stands not for reasons of pure principle, as their members and supporters might assume, but also in part because a sponsor is paying big money.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25072.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That describes our foreign policy, too. It's a perfect definition of a process of managing electorates I've been calling myth-jacking.

This is absolutely crucial: Factual arguments, however well phrased, often fail to move electorates; the power of myth never fails.

'Myth' is not synonymous with 'lie;' a myth is a metaphorical image of the composition and functioning of the cosmos that shapes the world in which we are presently enacting this wholly absurd theater of life.

National myths deliver us as a people into our Promised or Waste Land, exactly as we load them with our intentions: passengers into life boats, or kittens into burlap sacks? Our myths, our shared narratives, are as indispensable as a mother's womb.

Benign or malign, either way we're getting taken for a ride. How do you jack electorates? Not by boring them with facts, but by grabbing them by their myths.

http://www.examiner.com/x-8313-Seattle-Buddhism-Examiner

[LeftRight]

I'm sorry, but I focused on something that no one else seemed to catch..... FedEx said that they would cancel an order for 30 Boeing jets if they were placed under the NLRA, thus making it somewhat easier for the FedEx employees to unionize.....

Isn't Boeing unionized? Couldn't THEY have struck if FedEx chose to continue with the order????

[mamacat]

"Conservatism," the worst government money can buy.

[unitron]

"ACU's positions on important policy issues have never been for sale."

However we *can* accomodate your needs with a long-term lease.

[RobinSeattle]

If this statement from the ACU was honest, it would actually read,

"ACU's positions on important policy issues have never been for sale BEFORE NOW."

[skippypicasso]

"that you know of"

[jsgaetano]

LOL, I love it. "Activist entrepreneur" is a perfect term for what conservative officials are doing.

They don't work for their constituents- they are raised above them by dint of their inherent, God-given superiority. As "The Family" so aptly puts it, they are The Chosen.

Therefore, why WOULDN'T they put their financial interests first? If God didn't want them to collect millions of dollars for allowing the mining industry to poison the water of your constituents, He never would have had you elected to public office.

[PopeRatzo]

Mr. Borsage, I disagree with your assumption that a "free market" approach to things is always best.

When it comes to public policy, it is often the WORST approach.

The concept of "free markets" has been useful to the US as we grew from a colony to superpower, when the country was growing at the frontier, but as we have seen with health care, foreign policy, and the military, a "free market" approach can sometimes do a lot more damage than alternatives.

I understand that it's somewhat heretical to say this in this overheated environment, where any sort of public program is immediately called "socialism" by the Right Wing and all the corporate media nods their heads in agreement, but there it is. When more than 3/4 of Americans want to see a "public option" in the payment of health care costs, maybe it's time to re-examine the hoary old myth that there really is such a thing as a "free" market.

[jsgaetano]

You don't read much satire, do you?

[mimsnpips]

A+ for effort though. It happens.

[waustingray]

haha yikes

[Puller58]

Keene was involved in an interesting dust-up with Grover Norquist following 9/11. Norquist wanted to hustle American Muslims into becoming GOPers feeling that their faith made them ripe for the conservative swindle. Keene objected to Norquist's blanket criticism of the concern over Muslims being potential terrorists. For a short time, the two were trading nasty tirades against one another until the rest of the movement nervously had them cease and desist, lest the party rupture. The conservative movement is more about political convenience than it is about principle.

[jsgaetano]

It's like the Mafia. You sit down with the Conservative Big Daddy, kiss his ring, and listen to Him preach His wisdom from on high.

And, like the Mafia, it's all about handing in that big fat envelope to the RNC at the end of the week.

[prabbit]

The entire Keene family is a spectacularly dysfunctional clan, and is certainly one of the most interesting untold stories of conservative politics in modern times.
"The son of a prominent Washington, D.C. conservative leader is scheduled to attend a hearing in federal court later this month after being arrested and charged with shooting at a driver.

Federal Magistrate Judge T. Rawls Jones, Jr., Friday scheduled a Dec. 17 hearing for David Michael Keene, son of American Conservative Union Chairman David A. Keene.

U.S. Park Police said the 21-year-old Keene was arrested Wednesday evening and is accused of firing a gun at another motorist while driving on a suburban Washington parkway last weekend...."
More at:
http://www.crosswalk.com/1175034/

And this is just the tip of the iceberg...Keene's two (now adult) daughters have a track records that makes Dubya's seem like cloistered nuns, and the above mentioned ex-wife Diana (Keene) Carr cut a wide swath through the DC area music scene as a would be steel guitar player in the 80s-90s, but was known more for her ravenous libido than her onstage talents.

[miles120]

Oh, if only Mark Twain or H.L. Mencken were still around. I feel like I'm living in another Gilded Age. I just hope it doesn't end with a Huey Long.

[DrPaulProteus]

That's why we have Mr. Frank.

[TheBaffler]

Indeed. Gore Vidal and Lewis Lapham, also

[TJCole]

None of the so called "Conservatives", were ever in fact conservative...they are radical ideologues...

[luckynewman13]

"Conservatives" today are some weird, contradictory amalgamation of bible-thumpers and economic Darwinists. So what should their name actually be, I wonder? Mammonists?

[ObamanextPresident]

Mammonists! lol perfect!

[jsgaetano]

George Orwell's 1984 was a perfect description of conservative though. He had a term, Doublethink, which described the ability to hold two contradictory ideas in your head, yet be completely oblivious to the contradiction.

Conservative thought is nothing less than thoughtless, habitual hypocrisy.

[Querent]

None of the so called "Conservatives" were ever in fact conservative? While I admire your diction, I must disagree with your premise. Conservatism is in fact just as venal, corrupt, and intellectually vacuous as it appears. Those who aggressively proclaim themselves conservatives really are conservatives. The fact of their corruption and their obliviousness is not evidence that they are not "real" conservatives, but evidence that they are. Conservatism is based on a set of principles which are not only wrong, but are deliberately designed to be wrong. They reduce to nothing other than the self-interest of conservatives. Conservative "philosophy" can be summed up by the statement, "The hell with good public policy. What about ME?"

[JackWhistle]

Aye to that