Dick Cheney and Bill Kristol have more in common than not. Mr. Cheney, the former vice president, and Mr. Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard magazine, served together in the first Bush administration, were staunch supporters of both wars in Iraq, and are admired figures in the conservative movement.  Yet when it comes to the crisis in Egypt, they are striking quite different notes. Mr. Cheney, in remarks in California over the weekend, called Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak "a good man, a good friend and ally to the United States" who has brought stability to the region and who shouldn't be subjected to too much public pressure to leave.  The crisis in Egypt is causing a schism aomong conservatives, with congressional Republicans backing the Obama administration, while conservative commentators are warring over whether to back democracy in the region or Hosni Mubarak. WSJ's Jerry Seib explains.  Mr. Kristol, in a new editorial, strikes a markedly different tone. It's an unhealthy sign, he writes, when "American conservatives are so fearful of a popular awakening that they side with the dictator against the democrats. Rather, it's a sign of fearfulness unworthy of Americans, of short-sightedness uncharacteristic of conservatives, of excuse-making for thuggery unworthy of the American conservative tradition."  While the Obama administration continues to struggle to find the right pitch in its call for "orderly transition" in Egypt, conservatives are engaged in a similar struggle over the correct response. The debate carries echoes of a conservative discussion going back three decades over how to balance stability and the American interest in avoiding radical outcomes against the love of liberty and democracy.  The Egyptian version of this debate is particularly important, because it could well be repeated in other nations in the Middle East in years—perhaps even months—to come.  Conservatives actually are dividing into three camps in the argument over Egypt. In one camp stand congressional Republican leaders, who are sticking by Mr. Obama in fealty to the old rule that partisan politics end at water's edge. House Speaker John Boehner has said the administration is handling Egypt "pretty well," while Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell told Fox News: "I think in an issue like this we ought to speak with one voice."  Outside government, conservatives aren't so constrained, and they are roughly dividing into two groups. The first argues, in essence, that, conservatives should back people seeking liberty and democratic reform wherever they emerge, and that any short-term instability is outweighed in the long run by the prospective emergence of new democratic governments that inevitably will share American ideals.  "Revolutions...can go bad," says Peter Wehner, a former speechwriter and political adviser to President George W. Bush. "That doesn't mean that at this particular moment conservatives can't show solidarity with the aspirations of the Egyptian people as they want to throw off the shackles and engage in liberty. That is, after all, at the core of conservative belief."  Like-minded conservatives—among them Mr. Kristol, former White House Middle East adviser Elliott Abrams and commentator John Podhoretz—share that view, and some of them argue that it's pointless in any case to try to stand in the way of a historic tide moving toward democracy around the globe.  The opposing camp argues that, as alluring as the idea of street protesters giving birth to Egyptian democracy may be, the harsher reality is that the uprising could just as easily pave the way for Islamic extremists to step into a power vacuum created by any hasty exit by the country's current, pro-American leader.  The conservative ideals of liberty and democracy would be seriously undermined in the long run, they argue, if the alternative to an authoritarian Mubarak regime isn't a democratic state but rather a radical Islamic government of the kind Iran's revolution produced. Such voices include, among others, commentators Edward Luttwak and Charles Krauthammer, Michigan Republican Rep. Thaddeus McCotter and former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton.  In short, these conservatives argue, a rash push for change in Egypt has the potential to undermine American interests by undercutting the confidence of other American friends in the Arab world as well as the interests of Israel, the region's most established democracy. They argue that a more methodical approach to change has a better chance of simultaneously protecting American national interests and advancing American ideals.  In many ways, the current conservative debate is rooted in a seminal essay Jeane Kirkpatrick wrote for Commentary magazine in 1979, which became a lodestone for Ronald Reagan's foreign policy. She argued that the U.S. was better off supporting authoritarian regimes friendly to America, even if their leaders were unsavory, than totalitarian Communist governments. The former might evolve toward democracies, she argued, while the latter never would.  Mr. Wehner argues that the choice is no longer a "binary" one between right-wing autocratic regimes and left-wing totalitarian regimes. Democracy instead provides a path between the two. "A lot of conservatives," he says, "have not appreciated what a stirring moment this is."  Write to Gerald F. Seib at jerry.seib@wsj.com
Conservatives are divided about what the proper U.S. policy should be for an orderly transition in Egypt. Some argue for standing by President Mubarak. Others say people seeking liberty and democratic reform should be backed wherever they emerge.