In light of our editorial from the wee hours, we are hearing from multiple credible sources Mike Pence will announce he is running for Minority Leader later today. Likewise, John Shadegg will announce he intends to run for Minority Whip.

Both men are expected to wait for Speaker Hastert to announce he is going to the back bench.

When President Bush pushed through the No Child Left Behind education law in his first year in office, Mike Pence opposed it. Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the current House majority leader, not only supported No Child Left Behind, he became its principal congressional advocate-along with liberal Democratic Sen. Teddy Kennedy of Massachusetts.

In 2003, when Bush pushed through his $8-trillion Medicare prescription drug entitlement, creating a new welfare program for the middle class, Boehner supported Bush again. Pence led a gang of House conservatives who valiantly opposed it. When the leadership brought the drug plan up on the House floor in the wee hours, Hastert and DeLay tried to bully conservatives to switch their votes. Some did. Not Mike Pence.

Boehner voted for the drug entitlement.

Last year, when President Bush, stung by criticism of his response to Hurricane Katrina, started tossing out federal tax dollars like a carnival king tossing out Mardi Gras favors, Pence led the conservatives in the House Republican Study Committee, which he chaired, in demanding spending cuts to offset Bush's proposed spending. Eventually, Pence and Company forced reluctant Republican leaders to accept at least some cuts-even in entitlement spending.

The American people sent us an important message yesterday. They told us that we need to recommit ourselves to our core principles as Republicans, the principles of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan. We are the party of limited government, individual responsibility, and national security. They did not repudiate our principles, but they have rejected some of our recent practices.

I am running for Republican leader, because I believe that we did not just lose our Majority—we lost our way. We are in the wilderness because we walked away from the limited government principles that minted the Republican Congress. But there is a way out. “The way out of the wilderness,” author Mark Helprin wrote, “is the truth; recognizing it, stating it, defending it, living by it.” Here is the truth as I see it.