Conservatives shaken by the rise of Donald Trump appealed to Republicans today not to support his presidential candidacy, uniting in a full-blown attack from the pages of an influential conservative magazine.
"Against Trump," declared the cover of the National Review, a leading voice of the American right founded by the late commentator William F Buckley.
"Trump is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones," it said in a lead editorial.
The publication followed up with essays by 22 conservative figures who took turns denouncing Trump, the frontrunner in the race for the Republican presidential nomination.
Calling him "astoundingly ignorant," a "charlatan," a "glib egomaniac" and plain "crazy," the conservatives expressed revulsion at the prospect of a President Trump -- and what he might do to the nation and to the Republican brand.
With just over a week to go before the first presidential nominating vote in Iowa, their views also reflected the panic that Trump has set off within a Republican establishment deeply at odds with the celebrity billionaire's angry, populist message.
"This is a crisis for conservatism," said talk show host and author Glenn Beck in one of the essays.
"Trump beguiles us, defies the politically correct media, and bullies anyone who points out that the emperor has no clothes," wrote David McIntosh, president of the Club for Growth.
Edwin Meese, who served in president Ronald Reagan's administration, upbraided Trump for vilifying rivals with personal attacks.
"Our people need positive, unifying leadership, not negative, destructive political rhetoric," he said.
In an introduction, Review editors warned that Trump "wobbled all over the lot" politically, at times embracing abortion rights, gun control and a universal health care system.
Having held views so contrary to the Republican platform shows he cannot be trusted to carry the conservative mantle, they said.
The accusers also drilled into Trump's policy choices, with novelist Mark Helprin offering a comprehensive takedown in a single sentence.
