I noted over the weekend that foreign policy seems to be a uniquely important issue for the GOP establishment. Longtime readers of this magazine know better than most the cost that has too often been imposed on conservatives who dare to deviate from mindless hawkishness. We saw this at the undercard debate on Wednesday night, when Vivek Ramaswamy became the target of unhinged attacks from former Boeing board member and neocon hack, Nikki Haley, for his sensible position on Ukraine.

This week also saw an even greater freakout from Official Conservatism over the “betrayal” of one of its own: the Heritage Foundation. As John Daniel Davidson writes in the Federalist:

The background here is that under the leadership of President Kevin Roberts, Heritage has been saved from irrelevance by focusing less on what establishment neocon Beltway elites think is important and more on what ordinary Americans actually want. And one of the things they want is for Congress to stop pouring taxpayer dollars into Ukraine.

Last week, Roberts penned an op-ed in the Hill against pairing disaster relief money with yet more aid to Ukraine:

Instead of exploiting their dire need to force through even more aid to Ukraine, lawmakers should stop and consider whether that money might not be better spent on the hardworking Americans they represent.    

This week, Heritage took it a step further, launching an ad campaign against any further Ukraine aid:

Readers need only spend a few minutes clicking around establishment publications like National Review to get a sense of the panic among Conservatism Inc. over this “heresy” from Heritage. I’ll take the opportunity to highlight one such panic piece in NR, though, due to its unintended hilarity. In attempting to rebut Heritage’s concern about U.S. tax dollars going to Ukraine, Dominic Pino writes:

In addition, not all the money goes to Ukrainians. Much of it goes to U.S. defense contractors, which employ Americans and contribute to U.S. economic output.

Yes, the rich men north of Richmond need more of your tax dollars! Lockheed’s shareholders demand you do your part for their bank accounts the GDP graph!

Just incredible. Good on Heritage for irritating all the right people. With friends like these on the Right...