Michael Gerson raves about 'Reform Conservatism,' the fresh, anti-Obama-inspired ideological school to which belongs Paul Ryan, whose "agenda ... has weaknesses," concedes Gerson, though "It is best on the fiscal crisis"--which it explains on the basis of First Premises:
[I]t asserts that America’s massive fiscal crisis is a result of public-sector inefficiency.
Like all First Premises, Reform Conservatism's and Ryan's (and by extension Gerson's) is unproved and unprovable, hence all that flows from it is logically tainted. Indeed, in Reform Conservatism's case, its First Premise is almost laughably disprovable: America's massive fiscal crisis is--and believe it or not, this has been in the news lately--a result two extraordinarily expensive, unfinanced wars and two extraordinarily expensive, unfinanced tax cuts.
Reform Conservatism simply hopes that either no one notices; or that everyone has forgetten or will forget; or that most everybody is so easily bamboozled they'll swallow Reform Conservatism with a No-Questions-Asked chaser.
And who knows. Given the deplorable state of low-information democracy, Reform Conservatism might be onto something. We'll know in about six months.
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