How About that Wing?

This morning Liane Hansen, noting Huckabee's successes in Saturday's voting, commented that "once again it showed that McCain faces a significant hurdle - the conservative wing of his own party." Conservative wing! What other wing of the Republican party is there? And is there anyone in their right mind who thinks John McCain is not conservative?

I know there are a few (very few) Republicans out there who consider themselves moderate Republicans, but what sway do they have in the G.O.P.? As Harold Meyerson pointed out in the WaPo in September of 2006, the idea of moderate Republicans is a sad joke - they don't have any (zero, zilch, nada) influence in stopping the reactionary, extremist Republican policies from steamrolling ahead.

NPR is not alone in this misrepresentation. Listen to any mainstream news and you'll hear the word conservative being used to describe not only the traditional pro-business, anti-union, big-Pentagon conservatives but also the more radical core of politicians and activists who are bigoted, theocratic, homophobic, fetus-focused, authoritarian, pro-torture, pro-war, corporatist, etc.