The idea that our party can't recover from vigorous debate during the primaries is unserious, to wit: Reagan vs. Ford. In the meantime, rumors of the death of mainstream conservatism are greatly exaggerated.

McCain's relative success is not a sign of the end of Reagan conservatism as a dominant political force. It's just temporarily dormant, the victim of a confluence of factors, waiting to be re-ignited.

One factor is that we have had a weak GOP presidential field, though I think some of the candidates ultimately proved themselves to be quite inspiring. McCain has slipped in largely by default, like John Kerry in 2004.

Another factor is that Republicans have been in control of the executive branch for seven years. Though Democrats have recaptured Congress, they still haven't been able to accomplish many of their legislative initiatives, including obstructing funding for the Iraq War. Even their reprehensible character assassination of President Bush has lost steam since the surge began yielding fruit.

Nothing unites conservatives like Democrats in power and working their mischief, or out of power and maliciously but effectively obstructing good government -- excuse the liberal-sounding oxymoron.

And then there's the war, which originally united conservatives but admittedly has led to the ascendancy of the neoconservative influence with its willingness to accept all kinds of economic and social liberalism. I believe that's unnecessary. All three stools -- and more -- of mainstream conservatism can thrive simultaneously. Nevertheless, these factors and others have coalesced to dampen, temporarily, the fires and energy of conservatism.

Sometimes conservatives become more unified out of power. Of course that doesn't mean we should allow Democrats to regain the White House, either because we would unite while out of power or because we are seriously disappointed about the prospect of John McCain as our candidate.

But would the critics of McCain's critics please quit trying to marginalize mainstream conservatives and redefine mainstream conservatism? Just admit your guy is not that conservative and let us hold his feet to the fire, especially since his success to this point will give him all the more temptation to pander to liberals. You're the ones who need to chill out.