Iconoclast, Benedict Arnold served valiantly in the American War of Independence, but once he took the traitorous plunge, any capital he had built up as a patriot disappeared.
Likewise, it makes no difference at all if JPR was a respected conservative writer for fifty years. He has partaken of the moonbat-left Kool-Aid, and from that point his opinion is worthless, as is that of anyone who agrees completely with this rubbish that he wrote.
Likewise, once a "conservative" drinks the "it's okay to intervene in other people's business as long as it serves my purpose," he's no longer a conservative. Seems like Roberts remained a conservative, and the term has been hijacked by some.
The flaw in your Benedict Arnold analogy is that there are several time tested writers that seem to think that GWB's resemblance to a conservative approximates my little Cairn Terriers to a Great Dane.