A reinvigorated conservatism ought to step up its public rhetoric, recognizing our many grave problems under the general theme that nothing less than Western Civilization itself is at stake.

Anyone who studies fusion energy will know that the physics of fusion are easy to describe, but practical fusion engineering is exceedingly difficult. That's one reason the standing joke in the energy world is that fusion power has been 10 years away for the last 50 years.

The same could be said of "fusionism," and the modern conservative movement: theoretical treatments of the fusion of individual liberty (and free markets) with traditional or Burkean conservatism are abundant, but engineering this fusion sustainably in practical politics has always been difficult. The hot plasma of fractious intellectual sects is breaking out of the containment field. Conservative "fusionism" is forever thought to be a promising and necessary endeavor, but always seems to be out of reach and abandoned. Nowadays, fusionism is regarded as a musty relic of a bygone era. But maybe it could have its day again?

The question is newly salient in the wake of Ross Douthat's New York Times speculations on how a "post-Trump new right" might be constituted. Douthat's premise is that the second Trump presidency marks the definitive end of previous iterations of conservatism. Douthat assumes that there is no going back to a recognizable version of pre-Trump conservatism but suggests that one of several current and conflicting vectors may emerge as the dominant factor in the post-Trump era. Among them are Silicon Valley technologism, heartland Protestant or integralist Catholic Christianity, ethno-nationalism, outright "Caesarism," foreign policy realism, a paternalistic industrial policy, and pro-natalist ideology. "Trump's unique status as a personalist vessel for incompatible ideas has postponed some of these questions," Douthat thinks.

Like any forecasting exercise, Douthat's is indeterminate, aside from his own preferences for a watery soupçon of the best face of some of his various threads, so much so that you can almost audibly hear the air coming out of the balloon by the end of the article. Largely missing from his inventory of possibilities are some hitherto core principles of conservatism over the last several generations, especially a dynamic economy driven by open markets (and trade!), and above all, individual liberty. These latter two principles are under direct attack from different vocal factions on the right today.

A new "new right" comes along roughly every other decade, so the exercise is neither frivolous nor untimely. While Douthat is correct that much is up for grabs at the moment, some aspects of the emanations and penumbras of Trumpist conservatism resemble a version of a long-ago "new right," and as such, we have come full circle. The remedy for the confused, uncertain conservatism of the immediate postwar years turned out to be fusionism, and perhaps it is worth recalling the full cycle for clues about how conservatism matches permanent principles to changing circumstances.

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