Ramesh Ponnuru: Right On Schedule

Longtime readers may remember that back in November of 2011 I noted that the "smirky little weasel who wrote 'The Party of Death: The Democrats, the Media, the Courts, and the Disregard for Human Life'" was showing clear signs of trying to tippy-toe away from the Great Big Sack of Horribles Movement he helped to create and from which he has drawn every nickel he has ever earned and every erg of professional recognition he has ever received

You may also remember that I handed out a handy 10-point checklist so that you could play along at home as we watched another wingnut welfare moocher contort himself to the point of vanishing up his own urethra trying to remarket himself as a Very Reasonable Person while still keeping one paw firmly planted in CPAC-country (as that list stood in November, 2011):

UPDATE 11/18/11: As predicted... 

Step One: Under construction. 

Step Two: Under construction.

So how does that list stand today?

Step 3:  "He will Frum along for awhile, fence-straddling nicely by precisely balanced out potshots at the increasingly drooling, unhinged Right with vague criticisms of the imaginary sins of fictional Liberal."

Check.

Step 2:  "He will be welcomed with open arms and tangible perks into the Wingnut Expatriate community."

Check.

Ponnuru Channels The Dish
FEB 18 2013 @ 11:02AM
I could have written this post myself – and have done quite regularly for several years. Funny it appeared in the NYT and not Bloomberg or NRO.  

Step 9:   "Once David Brooks moves on to become David Broder 2.0 on a full-time basis

Chunky Bobo will be elevated to the top Reasonable Conservative spot at the New York Times, after which Ponnuru will be brought in as second chair."

Well, not quite "Check" but getting close (From the New York Times):

Reaganism After Reagan
By RAMESH PONNURU
Published: February 17, 2013

TODAY’S Republicans are very good at tending the fire of Ronald Reagan’s memory but not nearly as good at learning from his successes. They slavishly adhere to the economic program that Reagan developed to meet the challenges of the late 1970s and early 1980s, ignoring the fact that he largely overcame those challenges, and now we have new ones. It’s because Republicans have not moved on from that time that Senators Marco Rubio and Rand Paul, in their responses to the State of the Union address last week, offered so few new ideas.

...

Conservatives should retain their skepticism about government intervention, the preference for letting markets direct economic resources and the zeal for ending government-created barriers to economic growth that they inherited from Reagan. In his first Inaugural Address, Reagan famously said that “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” The less famous yet crucial beginning of that sentence was “in our present crisis.” The question is whether conservatism revives by attending to today’s conditions, or becomes something withered and dead.

And, of course, Step 10 remains perpetually in effect:

... 

Finally, at no point during this latest reshuffling of America's Conservative media courtiers will anyone be gauche enough to mention that the Filthy Liberals were, once again, absolutely right all along.

Still, over here in the cultural ghetto of Liberal Central Command, we will all laugh and drink our chardonnay and laugh some more.

Then we will go back to being right.

all along.