Matt Welch and Ramesh Ponnuru on John McCain and Bob Barr

Matt Welch | June 10, 2008

A few days ago I strapped a strange contraption onto my head, stared at a camera, and talked on the phone with the National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru about John McCain, Bob Barr, restless libertarians, and the ever-shrinking Reagan Coalition. You can watch it here:

Some supplementary reading material:

* In March 2007, as his magazine was building up to an endorsement of Mitt Romney, Ponnuru made a cover-story Case For McCain, complete with Q&A. By that October, Ponnuru was advocating a one-term pledge for the senator from Arizona.
* In April 2007, I made a cover-story case against, for reason. The long-form version of that analysis is available at Amazon for the low, low price of $18.45.
* In our conversation, I mentioned a couple of perceptive National Review attacks against McCain's National Greatness Conservatism. They are Rich Lowry's February 2000 "TR and His Fan," and Jonah Goldberg's May 2001 "Grading Greatness" (which is best read in tandem with Franklin Foer's fascinating and ultimately premature May 2001 eulogy for National Greatness, "The Great Escape: How Bill Kristol Ditched Conservatism").