The Death of Conservatism

Tanenhaus' capsule history of American conservatism begins with a nostalgic review of the movement's intellectual forefathers-Edmund Burke to William F. Buckley-and culminates in an analysis of its run off the rails during the George W. Bush administration, when the ideas-driven conservatism of the postwar era was obliterated by a generation of ideological lockstep and inept governance. Alan Sklar's capable and smooth reading gets the material across but is marked by the occasional jarring misnomer (it is William F., not William E., Buckley). Nevertheless, he ably renders dry political battles of the past as high intellectual drama. A Random hardcover (Reviews, Jul. 6).