The exclusion of UKIP from the official campaign for withdrawal from the EU, a campaign that is if anything most concerned to depict itself as led by Labour figures and funded by Labour backers, recalls William F. Buckley's exclusion from the emergent American conservative movement, both of the John Birch Society (which had a considerable popular following at the time), and of the disciples of Ayn Rand.
Although, due to the takeover by the neoconservatives, American conservatism is now in very dire straights, in its day it was the most successful popular political movement in the world. It would not have been so if it had included the Birchers or the Objectivists. It has ceased to be so as it has come to include, and more than include, the Tea Party and the fans of Rand.
Think on.
No comments:
Post a Comment