Grab For Those Pearls David!

Something just occurred to me.

It's pretty much conventional wisdom in politics that the GOP has consistently, and continually, used the religious right for it's purposes. Each election cycle, conservatives trot out an entire litany of fundamentalists issues to mobilize these voters in support. Then when the GOP governs, they ignore the religious right. You know, it's the old "bait n' switch".

The beltway punditry class has understood this as politics, comforting themselves that the fundamentalist don't really represent any kind of real threat because no sane politician would ever, like, really implement any of the nutbar policies.

The Roberts nomination and the Miers nomination reinforced this commonly held opinion despite any number of other policies that have shown that Bush would indeed cave to much of the religious right's agenda. But hey, not in anything that really matters.....right?

Au Contrar.

One of the biggest pearl clutchers (as Digby describes them) is shocked, SHOCKED to learn that Bush might actually ..... like..... be conservative!!!!. David Broder:

But after Bush acquiesced in the conservative movement’s uproar denying Miers her chance for an up-or-down Senate vote, or even a hearing in that committee, there is no plausible way the White House can insist that every major judicial nominee deserves such a vote. [wanna bet]

...

The conservative screamers who shot down Miers can argue that they were fighting only for a “qualified” nominee, though it is plain that many of them wanted more—a guarantee that Miers would do their bidding and overrule Roe v. Wade . But whatever the rationale, the fact is that they short-circuited the confirmation process by raising hell with Bush. Certainly there can be no greater sin in a sizable bloc of sitting senators using long-standing Senate rules to stymie a nomination than a cabal of outsiders—a lynching squad of right-wing journalists, self-sanctified religious and moral organizations, and other frustrated power-brokers—rolling over the president they all ostensibly support.

You mean they really really do have influence over our Lord Bush?

How's that coffee smell David?