"Because they're weenies?"

Via Kevin Drum, there’s a well-done piece in the Washington Monthly entitled “Why Conservatives Can’t Govern” (I took my shot at answering this in the post’s title). It makes imminently clear that the last few years of crapulent governance were not a fluke but a predictable result of conservatism:

. . . like all politicians, conservatives, once in office, find themselves under constant pressure from constituents to use government to improve their lives. This puts conservatives in the awkward position of managing government agencies whose missions—indeed, whose very existence—they believe to be illegitimate. Contemporary conservatism is a walking contradiction. Unable to shrink government but unwilling to improve it, conservatives attempt to split the difference, expanding government for political gain, but always in ways that validate their disregard for the very thing they are expanding. The end result is not just bigger government, but more incompetent government.

This isn’t the first time someone’s pointed this out, but this guy does the best job yet of explaining it and supporting it with evidence.

But don’t toss my “weenies” theory out the window just yet. More evidence rolls in everyday for that baby.