Hugh Hewitt?

Hugh Hewitt wasn't on my radar screen until I reengaged with politics earlier this year. I certainly didn't know of his abominable record on pushing conservatives around with his own view of what makes up conservatism, most spectacularly on the blundered Harriet Miers nomination, which he defended with considerable vitriol. (Professor Bainbridge particularly turned me on to Hugh's seemingly wilful blindness) Now, as everyone but me knew, he's in the tank for Mitt Romney, of which this post is indicative. His theory, apparently, is that Romney is the only plausible choice for a good conservative, and that Mccain is some sort of liberal trojan horse.

I'll go into this a little more deeply over the next couple of weeks, I guess, but it really needs to be said - a moderate governor from Massachusetts who created government health care is a more authentic conservative than John McCain, who has fought the good fight for decades? How is this meme passing the smell test? And no, a willingness to defend waterboarding isn't the litmus test of conservatism.

It seems clear to me that Republicans, and especially the Republican money men, needs to start coalescing around Mccain. Bizarre stories about a conservative icon being liberal aren't going to get us there.