If you were on a scavenger hunt and had to come up with a principled conservative, you might find one at the Cato Institute. They're slightly more intellectually consistent than the rest of the Republican think tankers (remember, in the valley of the blind, the one-eyed man is king), although of course they have their barking mad moments, too - like most conservatives. Now Charles and David Koch have filed suit to take control of the organization, and the Cato people are not very happy. Via the Volokh Conspiracy:

The Kochs deny any such intent, but it seems like they want to buy the Cato credibility and use it as an attack dog in the presidential election:

We seek no ‘takeover,’ and this is not a hostile action.

This is at odds with both the words and deeds of the Koch brothers of late. Last year, they used their shares to place two of their operatives – Kevin Gentry and Nancy Pfotenhauer – on our board against the wishes of every single board member save for David Koch. Last Thursday, they used their shares to force another four new board members on us (the most that their shares would allow at any given meeting); Charles Koch, Ted Olson (hired council for Koch Industries), Preston Marshall (the largest shareholder of Koch Industries save for Charles and David), and Andrew Napolitano (a frequent speaker at Koch-sponsored events). Those four – who had not previously been involved with Cato either financially or organizationally – were likewise opposed by every member of our board save for Gentry, Pfotenhauer, and David Koch.

To make room for these Koch operatives, we were forced to remove four long-time, active board members, two of whom were our biggest donors. At this moment, the Kochs now control seven of our 16 board seats, two short of outright control.

Why are they forcing out Cato board members, all strong, principled libertarians who have been heavily involved with Cato – financially and organizationally – for years? The answer was given in early November of last year when David Koch, Richard Fink (he of many Koch hats), and Kevin Gentry met with Cato board chairman Bob Levy. They told Bob that they intended to use their board majority to remove Ed Crane from Cato and transform our Institute into an intellectual ammo-shop for American for Prosperity and other allied (presumably, Koch-controlled) organizations. That statement of intent is certainly consistent with what we’ve been hearing from both Kevin Gentry and Nancy Pfotenauer. They’ve frequently complained during their short time on our board that Cato wasn’t doing enough to defeat President Obama in November and that we weren’t working closely enough with grass roots activists like those at AFP.

We want to ensure that Cato stays true to its fundamental principles of individual liberty, free markets, and peace into the future, and that it not be subject to the personal preferences of individual officers or directors.

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I figured there were some principled conservatives somewhere -- I just never expected any of them to stand up when it counted. I must say, Ted Olson is impressing me more every time he opens his mouth lately. I imagine he's getting the pariah treatment from his fellow Republicans these days:

Ted Olson, former George W. Bush solicitor general, attorney behind the case against California's gay marriage ban, and husband of a woman who died aboard the plane that crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11, said Wednesday that President Obama was right about his analysis of the "Ground Zero Mosque" as a constitutional right protected by the First Amendment.

Olson's wife, conservative commentator and lawyer Barbara Olson, perished on September 11 aboard American Airlines Flight 77, the plane that was hijacked and flown in the Pentagon.

Asked on MSNBC about his opinion on the plans to construct a 13-story Islamic community center two blocks away from Ground Zero, Olson gave a response that served as a rather high profile departure from what has become the conservative norm on the issue.

"Well it may not make me hap-- popular with some people, but I think, probably, the president was right about this," Olson told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell. "I do believe that people of all religions have a right to build edifices, or structures, or places of religious worship or study where the community allows them to do it under zoning laws and that sort of thing, and that we don't want to turn an act of hate against us by extremists into an act of intolerance for people of religious faith. And I don't think it should be a political issue. It shouldn't be a Republican or Democratic issue, either. I believe Gov. Christie from New Jersey said it well, that this should not be in that political, partisan marketplace."

SAN FRANCISCO -- Lawyers for gay couples, California Gov. Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown filed legal motions Friday telling a federal judge that allowing same-sex marriages to resume immediately in the state was the right thing to do.

The motions came two days after U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker struck down California's voter-approved gay marriage ban as unconstitutional.

In his 136-page decision, Walker said gay marriages should begin immediately. But later Wednesday, he agreed to suspend weddings until he could consider the legal arguments he ordered to be filed by Friday.

Opponents of same-sex marriage said they want Proposition 8 to stay in effect until their appeal of Walker's ruling is decided by higher courts.

They argued in court papers filed earlier this week that resuming gay marriage now would cause legal chaos if the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals or U.S. Supreme Court eventually reverse Walker's ruling.

The 9th Circuit received their appeal of Walker's decision on Wednesday, hours after the judge ruled that Proposition 8 violates the civil rights of gay Californians.

On Friday, Schwarzenegger and Brown were the first to urge an immediate resumption of gay marriage, which was legal in the state for more than four months before voters amended the California Constitution to outlaw it in November 2008.

The legal team of David Boies and Ted Olson, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of two gay couples that led to Walker's ruling, also submitted a motion in conjunction with the city of San Francisco, another plaintiff.

Either this will turn out to be a bold, brilliant move - or a disaster that will set the cause back for a long time. Here's hoping they pull it off:

Eight and a half years after their epic partisan battle over the fate of the 2000 presidential election, the lawyers David Boies and Theodore B. Olson appeared on the same team on Wednesday as co-counsel in a federal lawsuit that has nothing to do with hanging chads, butterfly ballots or Electoral College votes.

Their mutual goal: overturning Proposition 8, California’s freshly affirmed ban on same-sex marriage. It is a fight that jolted many gay rights advocates — and irritated more than a few — but that Mr. Boies and Mr. Olson said was important enough to, temporarily at least, set aside their political differences.

“Ted and I, as everybody knows, have been on different sides in court on a couple of issues,” said Mr. Boies, who represented Al Gore in Bush v. Gore, the contested 2000 vote count in Florida in which Mr. Olson prevailed for George W. Bush. “But this is not something that is a partisan issue. This is something that is a civil rights issue.”

The duo’s complaint, filed last week in Federal District Court in San Francisco on behalf of two gay couples and formally announced Wednesday at a news conference in Los Angeles, argues against Proposition 8 on the basis of federal constitutional guarantees of equal protection and due process.

In the end, the two lawyers suggested, the case might take them, again, to the United States Supreme Court. While neither man claimed any special connection to the gay community — they are working “partially pro-bono,” Mr. Olson said — both said they had been touched by the stories of the same-sex couples unable to marry in California.

“If you look into the eyes and hearts of people who are gay and talk to them about this issue, that reinforces in the most powerful way possible the fact that these individuals deserve to be treated equally,” Mr. Olson said at the news conference.

“I couldn’t have said it better,” said Mr. Boies, patting Mr. Olson on the back.

Not everyone in the gay rights movement, however, was thrilled by the sudden intervention of the two limelight-grabbing but otherwise untested players in the bruising battle over Proposition 8. Some expressed confusion at the men’s motives and outright annoyance at the possibility that a loss before the Supreme Court could spoil the chances of future lawsuits on behalf of same-sex marriage.

“It’s not something that didn’t occur to us,” Matt Coles, the director of the LGBT project at the American Civil Liberties Union, said of filing a federal lawsuit. “Federal court? Wow. Never thought of that.”

But Mr. Olson said that their lawsuit — which also seeks an injunction blocking the marriage ban until the matter can be resolved — fell squarely in the tradition of landmark cases like Brown v. Board of Education.

“Creating a second class of citizens is discrimination, plain and simple,” said Mr. Olson, who served as solicitor general under Mr. Bush. “The Constitution of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Abraham Lincoln does not permit it.”

Lean Left: Oh, that liberal media

Faithful Progressive: Four September 11 stories your press corps ignores

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Scoobie Davis Online: Isn't it ironic?

Daily Howler: The price of journalistic group-think: Petraeus was a "straight shooter"--even though he was talking pure bunk

The Next Hurrah: If Ted Olson is Chimpy's AG nominee, Harry Reid says he'll do everything he can to prevent confirmation. There's many reasons why Olson is a lousy choice, but here's a big one.