The Buckley Calculus

The pertinent question before every political movement is how to best utilize the political process to effect the litany of policies it favors. William F. Buckley had a simple yet effective calculus towards this: the best way to enact conservative policies generally is to nominate and support the most conservative candidate electable in each specific race.

In the recent Republican primary for the U.S. Senate in Delaware the Republican/Tea Party movement failed to do this. The trend from this cycle to oust incumbents who have been amenable to the establishment ethos of Washington on behalf of novices who are inimical to it has been salutary.

Yet denying the nomination to Congressman Castle (undeniably someone amenable to the establishment) and awarding it to Mrs. O'Donnell (someone vociferously inimical to it) was a tactical mistake that threatens to make the Conservative/Tea Party agenda less attainable.

By any objective standard Mike Castle is no conservative; at best he will agree with conservatives half the time -- at best. This is Delaware however, one of the bluest states in the bluest of regions. Mike Castle is the best you can hope to get; he is the most conservative person that the voters of Delaware can be expected to elect to the U.S. Senate -- he is, in other words, the most conservative candidate electable.

The primary objective of conservatives at this time is to repeal the odious health-care bill that Americans cannot stand and that was passed through a series of corrupt bargains. Everything about that "reform" legislation stinks.

Whatever his disparities with conservatives are (and they are certainly many), Mike Castle was and is on record favoring the repeal of that law. For that repeal to be possible it will require at least 60 votes in the U.S. Senate, among other things. If elected as a Republican from Delaware (a Republican from Delaware!) he would have constituted one more vote towards that magic number.

In awarding the nomination to Mrs. O'Donnell though -- someone whose comparative conservatism to Congressman Castle is surpassed only by her comparative un-electability -- Conservative/Tea Party activists in Delaware have put themselves one vote farther away from achieving their foremost objective.

The savvy, if not completely obvious thing to do for the Conservative/Tea Party movement would have been to have nominated the candidate who disagrees with it half the time. In failing to do so they are now highly likely to be stuck with a senator who disagrees with them 99% percent of the time.

An over-developed demand for purity can be counterproductive to the cause -- sometimes the disciples of a cause cannot get out of their own way. Replacing incumbents like Sens. Bennett and Murkowski were not examples of this. Denying the nomination to Congressman Castle was.

Somewhere William F. Buckley is shaking his head.