I thought it was important to post on the matter of Giuliani v Dobson, et al, but I wanted to take a day to reflect because if you’re going to take sides in a family dispute, you better think it through.

To hear Jim Dobson, Richard Viguerie, and Tony Perkins (head of the Family Research Council, not the star of Psycho and Fear Strikes Out) tell it, our movement is heading into the abyss if Republicans dare to nominate Rudy Giuliani, and they’d rather join a third-party than support him. In their minds, there’s no difference between him and Hillary.

Strong stuff. But upon closer reflection, this is more about some of the conservative leaders than it is about Rudy Giuliani.

I think what we have here is a somewhat vain effort at “Interest Group Conservatism” the ugly step-child of the Interest Group Liberalism of the 60s-80s. While a few folks in Washington would, I’m sure, find it perfectly appropriate for them to select the next President of the United States, that’s not quite how it works.

In the case of whether conservatives should support Rudy or back a third-party candidate, Dobson, Viguerie, Weyrich, etc, could not be more wrong.

First of all: Is conservatism so weak, is its hold on the GOP so tenuous, that nominating a social moderate is the end of both the conservative movement and the Republican Party?

Will values voters really decide that their allegiance to the Republican Party is gone because our standard bearer is squishy on social issues?

They will? Really? They will ignore the pro-life credentials of their local elected officials, their members of Congress, their Governors, their Senators, the Party Platform, and years worth of pro-family legislative success?

Only a seriously declining movement would be so threatened by the prospect of nominating Rudy Giuliani. The Republican Party is, and will continue to be, a conservative party. Though, if it doesn’t get its house together in quick order, fiscal and economic conservatives will continue to abandon it at an alarming rate.

Supporting a third-party candidate who will get 3-8 percent of the vote and allowing Hillary Clinton to be elected President is the height of irresponsibility.

As a boy in my formative political years, I adopted Bill Buckley’s dictum on who deserves support in a political contest: The Rightwardmost Viable Candidate.

In my mind, Rudy Giuliani is, at this point, probably the Rightwardmost Viable Candidate. I find issues where I disagree with him fairly strongly. However, the idea that Rudy Giuliani isn’t clearly more conservative on every single issue, including life and marriage, than Hillary Clinton, is just plain at odds with the facts and reality.

Off the top of my head, here’s a quick list of reasons why, if he is nominated, I would support Rudy Giuliani and actively work for him against Hillary Clinton, especially with Democrat majorities in the House and Senate:

• Hillary Clinton appoints 2-3 liberal activists to the Supreme Court and makes hundreds of lower court appointments.
• Hillary signs government run health care.
• Hillary signs expansion of taxpayer financed abortion and a repeal of the partial birth abortion ban.
• Hillary signs massive new taxes and spending.
• Hillary is Commander-and-Chief in a time of war.
• Hillary presides over more government control of education.

Finally, look at any survey of “Most Important Issue” among conservatives. Life and marriage isn’t in the top three. The War, the Economy, and Health Care all prevail, even among the most conservative voters. Even more crystal clear is the phenomenon I noted in an earlier post: many conservative, pro-family voters cast ballots for very socially liberal candidates in the ’06 elections.

Pro-life, pro-marriage conservatives care deeply about winning the war on terror, job creation, health care costs, education, wasteful spending and taxes – issues where Rudy probably has the most stalwart combination of record and issue positions in the Presidential field — in addition to life and marriage.

This episode should remind us all that the Internet Era has changed politics forever. Candidates can communicate directly with voters more cheaply and easily than ever. Candidates don’t need interest group heads to translate for them as if they’re talking to a lost tribe in the rainforest.

If he’s smart, Mayor Giuliani will take his case even more directly to conservative voters, and spell out the big differences between Hillary and him, as well as how big the stakes are for America. If the conservative group heads are smart, they’ll recall that the perfect is too often the enemy of the good.