Make room at the table

I have always resented the liberal presumption of intolerance among conservatives – the notion that we huddle around campfires in endangered forests and seethe in our abhorrence of gays, ethnic minorities, illegal immigrants and France.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not proposing we amend the Constitution and smuggle in an undocumented lesbian from Honduras to run for president. But I would at least hear her out. Assuming she could cook.

This presumption among many liberals is as unbecoming—if not more so than—the presumption among many conservatives that all liberals deplore God, guns, uninherited wealth and the South.

These are extremes, of course. At the end of the day, most of us can come together and break bread. Italian, not French.

Having said that, it was more than a little disheartening to read of the GOP’s proposed resolution a few months back. It was basically a conservative purity test; 10 principles, at least eight of which a GOP candidate seeking national support and party funding would have to meet.

They included stalwart conservative bailiwicks like support for the Defense of Marriage Act, opposition to amnesty for illegal immigrants and, Principle No. 6: Victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges.

Is that all victory in Iraq and Afghanistan requires?

Party elders flatly, and fortunately, rejected the resolution weeks ago.

The terse checklist was offensive not only in its narrow-minded simplicity, but in its preclusion of otherwise qualified candidates from carrying the dimming Republican torch. These are complex issues; issues that require—at the very least—some complexity of thought and circumstantial consideration.