[Rudey]

Ugh this is annoying because it's making it seem as if conservative view points have no right to change.

As far as conservatives go there is a spectrum but there are the old line conservatives and the neo-conservatives who are able to influence the line of thinking. It is the neo-conservatives who have won virtually every nobel prize in economics and advanced the subject into prominence. Buckley would not agree with the neo-cons.

Edited to add: The Republican party is not beholden to one small section of thought. It is a party. In fact the Republican party was the first party to ever combine issues and platforms to gain political power during its establishment and its merging with the anti-slavery party at the time. Bush is not following Buckley or Wolfowitz...he is leading a party in which Buckley and Wolfowitz are a part of and not clinging to any of their views alone.

Also some of the groups that have joined the Republican party hold very different views from most conservatives. The group that comes to mind is Christian evangelicals. This is a historically Democrat group.

-Rudey