Yesterday on Hardball, Tweety schooled GOP Strategist Karen Hanretty on why there's no longer a 'left-right' debate on Iraq. Matthews explains that it really comes down to whether or not one subscribes to the neoconservative vision which Presidents Ford & Reagan -- among other real conservatives -- clearly did not. Even Bush 41 knew better than to occupy Baghdad.

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Glenn Greenwald wrote a superb post back in August about Holy Joe and the real issues that now determine one's political orientation:

Throughout the 1990s, one's political orientation was determined by a finite set of primarily domestic issues -- social spending, affirmative action, government regulation, gun control, welfare reform, abortion, gay rights. One's position on those issues determined whether one was conservative, liberal, moderate, etc. But those issues have become entirely secondary, at most, in our political debates. They are barely discussed any longer. Instead, what has dominated our political conflicts over the last five years are terrorism-related issues -- Iraq, U.S. treatment of detainees, domestic surveillance, attacks on press freedoms, executive power abuses, Iran, the equating of dissent with treason.

It is one's positions on those issues -- and, more specifically, whether one agrees with the neoconservative approach which has dominated the Bush administration's approach to those issues -- which now determines one's political orientation.