The Philadelphia Society turns twenty

National Review, June 1, 1984 by Timothy J. Wheeler

T. Kenneth Cribb Jr., assistant counselor to the President, established his bona fides thus: "My mother is so conservative she's against discussion. [Laughter.] The only time she discusses anything,' he said, "is when Dan Rather is on, and you can hear her all around the house saying, "Jackass!'' Mr. Cribb then manfully undertook to explain why the election of a conservative President had not produced a conservative reformation. He offered in expiation the casualties inflicted by the advocacy press, and lamented our occasional inability to eschew "the art of the possible' in favor of taking the right position, hence making Congress take the heat for defeating right-thinking measures. In the end it is the correct intellectual underpinning, he said, that leads to political reform.

Stan Evans, returning to the podium as the final speaker, drew on rich experience to argue that "conservatives have been operating according to a mistaken model.' Namely: We have supposed the people to be sovereign, hence have supposed them to be misled by ideologues into disastrous voting patterns. It follows that we should educate the people and organize them politically; and this in fact has been done with some success. The trouble is, voters are not sovereign; we are now ruled by a form of government in which the people have little or no say. It is bureaucratic in nature and remains in power no matter who is elected (only three-tenths of 1 per cent of executive-branch positions are filled by appointment). The Supreme Court is the most influential element, by far, but mere time-servers in the bureaucracy, several million strong, are also beyond reach because of autopilot budgeting (the "unmanageable' 75 per cent of the budget that is indexed to the CPI and that increases without congressional appropriations). These elements of unreachable government are served by the numberless ideologues, lobbyists, and special interests in Washington, and protected by the advocacy media--the Post, the Times, network TV, and others addicted to a lotus diet. Americans, in short, are no longer self-governing, but are ruled by an insulated and insatiable Washington system that works solely for its own benefit. Therefore, Mr. Evans said, the real problem is, "How do we put the people back in charge of their government?' The answer is not pragmatism, but restoration of a moral basis for political decisions.

One question in the Q&As following is worth note. "Where,' someone asked, paraphrasing the hamburger ad, "is the veto?'

"Good question,' sighed a panelist, completing the answer by saying no more.