In an odd way Conservative Republicans may be looking at Democrats with something like envy. Because Democrats have so many viable candidates for President. The Moderates have Evan Bayh and John Edwards. The Liberals have Hillary, John Kerry, Al Gore and John Edwards (who’s trying to appeal to everyone). But what about conservative Republicans?

Right now, the leading Republican candidates are Rudy Giuliani and John McCain. Conservatives have reservations about both. Giuliani showed great leadership on 9-11, but he is pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-gun control and pro-affirmative action. Senator McCain is a legitimate war hero, but along with Ted Kennedy he co-sponsored the Senate bill to give amnesty to illegal immigrants. That leaves Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Senator Sam Brownback.

But Brownback’s stand on immigration is similar to McCain’s, and in a 1994 TV debate against Ted Kennedy, Romney changed his pro-life stand, saying after “a dear, close family relative…passed away from an illegal abortion…Since that time, I have been committed to the belief that…we will not force our [pro-life] beliefs on others. You will not see me wavering on that.” (Dick Morris Reports at Vote.com)

Governor Mike Huckabee is more in step with mainstream conservatives on these issues, but, right now, to say the least he’s a long shot.

How did the movement which has dominated Republican Presidential primaries since the 1970’s suddenly find itself unable to even muster the strength to put forward a strong candidate for President?

A few conservatives are now writing books about the Bush Presidency. Bruce Bartlett published a withering criticism of Bush’s record on government spending. In another book a former White House aide describes how the Bush White House has publicly courted the ‘The Christian Right,’ while privately mocking its leaders and agenda. But those are recent exceptions. For years, since Bush was elected, poll after poll has showed him more popular with conservatives than virtually any political figure ever, including Ronald Reagan. After his election in 2000 election George Bush in effect became the conservative movement. Since then, except for isolated voices, no conservative leader (if he was elected) dared to criticize Bush’s spending or his conduct of the war. Conservative leaders went along or remained silent and, somewhere, during the Bush presidency the conservative movement lost its moorings.

In a way it has floated back downstream to the era before Reagan ran, when conservatives were members of a party dominated by leaders who did not share their values. Back then the crisis of the Cold War (after our defeat in Vietnam) created the political windchange that swept Reagan into power.

Today it appears we are on the verge of losing another war. No one has used the phrase ‘peace with honor’ to describe our retreat out of Iraq, as they did our retreat in Vietnam, but the parallels and rhetoric today have an eerie familiarity.

But The Cold War didn’t go away after we lost Vietnam; it got worse. And the War on Terrorism isn’t going away. President Bush’s policy of ‘staying the course’ has hit the equivalent of political bankruptcy and in the short term it’s also taken any hope of doing more to win the war in Iraq with it. But the next few years may show ‘retreat’ is equally impractical when dealing with terrorists. But, unfortunately, no conservative leader – at least in a Presidential campaign – has evoked that theme.

To comment, send us an email to comment@talkingaboutpolitics.com.