Whatever happens today at the polls, American conservatives will have to do some soul searching if the term "conservative" is ever to have relevance on the national stage again in our lifetime.

I suggest that a distinctly Hamiltonian formulation offers a unique opportunity in the times ahead, around which we may get our bearings for the good not just of our party, the GOP, but also and more importantly for the good of the country.

Hamilton, to be sure, is a controversial figure for many conservatives. But this conservative has taken a lot of time to study Hamilton's unique contributions to the founding of our nation, and overall I conclude that they far outweigh any of his negatives, and indeed may have been of particular consequence with respect to our nation's rapid rise from agrarian colonial nation to an industrial superpower. Like many true conservatives, his record has been badly maligned and the truth about what he did has been distorted to promote a Jeffersonian brand of conservatism -- still in vogue today -- that has gotten us where we are right now, electorally speaking.

In future posts I will spell this out more systematically, but among the "beefs" I have with modern conservatives include their blind ideological conviction in "free trade," which is probably the best-known but least understood principles of so-called neo-conservatism. It is behind all of modern conservatism's views on economics and foreign policy, and had as much to do with why we invaded Iraq as the stated reasons. Mind you, I am aware that McCain's only real conviction on matters of economics is his conviction in free trade and nevertheless I wholeheartedly support him over Obama, despite Obama's so-called "protectionism." The issue of "free trade" has indeed been oversimplified to the point of being a ridiculous parody of a debate. And the matter of character is far more important to a Hamiltonian than policy positions--just ask Aaron Burr.

Suffice to say: If Hamilton were alive today I'm confident he would advocate, as he did before, for an ad valorum tariff revenue system instead of either the national sales tax or an income tax of any kind, flat or progressive. The key words are "revenue system" and the distinction between it and the national sales tax is that it would tax only a subset of those goods sold, namely, those that are made abroad for sale here.

The consequences of such a system would indeed be radical if applied today, but we used to have such a system--after all, ask yourself, on what did the federal government subsist prior to the income tax in 1917? The tariff revenue system, our founders argued, was the least oppressive, most advantageous revenue system conceivable for a nation founded on liberty and freedom. Which is why it was the first law on the books of the first Congress way back in 1789.

Imagine a system in which there was no income tax on Americans at all, not on workers, not on investors, nor on goods and services, so long as theses goods and services where made here in the USA. Imagine a small but significant tariff of, say, only 10% and only on non-essential goods made abroad. Imagine if government couldn't just print money but had to live on a strong economy attracting foreign trade--indeed, if the only way its revenues grew is if more Americans bought foreign products!

We had such a system and it was a great success. Where I perceive we began to deviate dangerously from our founding principles of liberty and justice was during the Wilson administration. Next was FDR, then Lyndon Johnson, Carter, Clinton--and more recently, yes, George W. Bush.

Don't get me wrong. I like, and voted twice, for President Bush. But it is time for conservatives to face reality with respect to his administration. He has presided over the largest expansion of federal power ever in our history, and 9/11 did not justify the level of expansion that Bush undertook. What, for instance, did 9/11 have to do with federalizing public education, or creating a new prescription drug entitlement? I understand that Bush's administration will look like a golden period of relative fiscal sanity and libertine utopia compared to an Obama administration, I don't dispute that; but I want to make this point very clearly. George W. Bush was no conservative, not even in the Jeffersonian sense. The apparatus of government he is leaving to the next President --which God willing will be John McCain -- is primed for kind of tyranny, the likes of which has not yet been seen on this earth.

Imagine a Stalin or a Hitler with the U.S. military and all the technology we have today. We may not have to use our imaginations anymore if today's election goes the way the polls are indicating (and let's throw in one last, heart-felt prayer that they are wrong!).

So we should take this time not just to look back over the last 8 years, but all the way back to our founders, with a particularly keen eye for what Hamilton and the old Federalist party, of which many of our greatest presidents were members, and of course also Abraham Lincoln, would make of today's problems.

This, in a nutshell, is the purpose of my new blog. I hope you don't hate it too much, and maybe even come to like it a bit. :)