Conservatives Jumping Ship: Updating the List

by David Safier

• CC Goldwater, Barry Goldwater's granddaughter. "Myself, along with my siblings and a few cousins, will not be supporting the Republican presidential candidates this year.. . . We reject the constant intrusion into our personal lives, along with other crucial policy issues of the McCain/Palin ticket."
• Scott McClellan,Bush's former Press Secretary. "From the very beginning I have said I am going to support the candidate that has the best chance for changing the way Washington works and getting things done and I will be voting for Barack Obama and clapping."
• Charles Fried, solicitor general under President Reagan. He's referred to in The New Republic as "a professor at Harvard Law School, has long been one of the most important conservative thinkers in the United States." In a letter, he cites McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as one reason for his decision.
• Arne Carlson, former Republican governor of Minnesota. "Regardless of our party, regardless of our partisan inclinations, there is no interest more compelling than the interest in the well-being of the United States," Carlson said at a gathering of Obama supporters at the state Capitol.
• William Weld,Former Republican Governor of Massachusetts. He called the choice “close to a no-brainer,” writing, “It’s not often you get a guy with his combination of qualities, chief among which I would say is the deep sense of calm he displays, and I think that’s a product of his equally deep intelligence."

If I've left anyone out, I beg their forgiveness, since it seems that everyone with a bit of sense and integrity in the Republican camp wants the rest of us to know they haven't sold their souls completely.