well if bush didn't take the conservative and drag it thru the liberal mud spending trillions, increasing the power and scope of the federal government all under the name of conservative there would be no need to qualify it. The GOP base and allowed and still allow bush to get away with be called a conservative. Bush was a liberal just happened to have an R after his name.
Now he wasn't a Marxist like Obama but he was still a liberal.
I agree with that to a point, but Bush’s conservatism was a qualified (”compassionate”) conservatism. That was the problem. The answer isn’t another brand of qualified conservatism. It’s just conservatism. The common sense is inherent.