In recent years, writes Ramesh Ponnuru in “The Fights on the Right,” the cover piece for the new issue of NR, “some of us ‘freedom conservatives’ were surprised to learn . . . that we are not the only kind of conservatives in the wild.” The other kind, the “national conservatives,” have expressed “an increasing, if baffling, confidence in the ability of central governments to bring about desired economic outcomes.” In this they have not a little in common with Democrats.

Those of us who retain the skepticism about ambitious government that once seemed to define the right are ceaselessly told that we are obsolete. We do not, the cliché has it, know “what time it is.” It is . . . a time for strongman rule; a time to let go of a Constitution that has served our country reasonably well (exceptionally well when we have actually adhered to it); a time to forget everything we have ever learned about how government plans can go awry.

Those of us who retain the skepticism about ambitious government that once seemed to define the right are ceaselessly told that we are........

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