“Most politicians … are pretty adept at sensing when to stop riding an issue … When it stops paying dividends, when on straight pleasure-pain principles it ceases to yield a sufficient return in praise, all but the most exceptional politicians will quietly drop it. McCarthy wouldn’t … [It] was a strange and ultimately fatal innocence.”
Source: If Not Us, Who? William Rusher, National Review, and the Conservative Movement
Keywords: campaigns,biography,identity
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William A. Rusher (1923–2011), publisher of National Review (1957–1988), was a leading conservative spokesman, columnist, and author. He helped draft Barry Goldwater for the 1964 GOP nomination, shaping the party’s future. A Princeton and Harvard Law graduate, he served in WWII, worked in law, and advised the U.S. Senate. In 1989, he became a Distinguished Fellow at the Claremont Institute and remained active in conservative circles until his passing in 2011.
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