One of my favorite political commentators is David Brooks. He is a thoughtful, incisive, and well-modulated conservative beholden, seemingly, to no one.

I received his latest article via gmail from stalwart Bosque Boys reader and contributor, Tocqueville, with a succinct two-word introduction and endorsement: "he's right."

I agree with Tocqueville. This essay is a significant admission from Brooks, who (like me) has supported and exhorted the Bush attempt to remake the Middle East.

For those reasons, and in recognition of the New York Times and their recent decision to suspend their annoying and ill-considered pay-per-view regime, I am featuring this latest offering from Brooks via the NYT:

The Republican Collapse

"Modern conservatism begins with Edmund Burke. What Burke articulated was not an ideology or a creed, but a disposition, a reverence for tradition, a suspicion of radical change.

"When conservatism came to America, it became creedal. Free market conservatives built a creed around freedom and capitalism. Religious conservatives built a creed around their conception of a transcendent order. Neoconservatives and others built a creed around the words of Lincoln and the founders.

"Over the years, the voice of Burke has been submerged beneath the clamoring creeds. In fact, over the past few decades the conservative ideologies have been magnified, while the temperamental conservatism of Burke has been abandoned."

Brooks goes on to sketch out the fissures in the modern American conservative movement.

I encourage you to read the full article here (free subscription still required).

And this conclusion from Brooks:

"American conservatism will never be just dispositional conservatism. America is a creedal nation. But American conservatism is only successful when it’s in tension — when the ambition of its creeds is restrained by the caution of its Burkean roots."