Posted on 07/11/2006 10:45:31 PM PDT by NutCrackerBoy
In the 1980s, the historian and social critic Christopher Lasch pronounced dead the conventional political categories of right and left and argued for a revitalization of politics through a redefinition of terms.
"The idea of a 'left' has outlived its historical time and needs to be decently buried, along with the false conservatism that merely clothes an older liberal tradition in conservative rhetoric."
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
What I like about this piece is his analysis and rejection of the totalitarian tendencies of elites.
Instead, it would seek creative ways to open regional markets for regional goods. (errrr, they're already open to regional goods... does he want county-by-county protectionism or what?)...And it would provide incentives to keep cultural capital local. It would encourage people to work, study and raise families close to where they grew up. It would seek ways to promote local culture and would cultivate loyalty to our neighbors and a fierce love for our own places.
Sounds utopian enough, but the devil's always in the details. What if someone doesn't want to live in the place they grew up? Would DC forbid it? Would they punish this horrible traveler through taxation?
This isn't anything new. Like he just figured out socialists and corporatists are using the American populace as a rope for some sort of financio-idealogical tug-of-war? Somebody tell this guy the Japanese have bombed Pearl Harbor!
You are probably correct in the end, but I don't think the author is necessarily guilty, yet, of proposing massive government programs. He is at most daydreaming of what good may come if prairie populism, or crunchy conservatism, grows via grassroots into a full-blown movement.
Until and unless these visionaries fall into a clear liberty-destroying trap, I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt that they are not talking about coercion. It is useful to entertain these thought experiments. Theoretically anyway, it would not take massive numbers of laws to permit and to some degree promote classes of transactions desired already by significant numbers of people.
Nevertheless, as a thought experiment it is very interesting to consider new possibilities.
BTT
Same old socialist tripe with yet another attempt to paste a different face on it.
He has got half of it right. Caleb must be an average guy with half his brain tied behind his back.
You are right of course, it isn't new, neither is his seeming desire to return to a utopia that never existed. Our society and economy is in constant change. I don't see it as a bad or good thing but simply what is, is.
Gee, did it ever occur to some of you geniuses that our Constitution was meant to protect the RIGHTS of the individual against the mob? That the founding fathers knew that mob rule descends into tyranny (ie when the mob rules, it lynches?), that half the population has an IQ at or below 100? That the mob can vote to take your guns away and your right to live your life as you see fit?
Lasch is a has-been. Populism has been a failure as a movement in this country on a national level. Hopefully, the goobers and knuckle-draggers will get a clue.
Remember, that 1. the masses are revolting, they REALLY are and that 2. the tyranny of 200 million men is just as evil as that of one man and 3. we are a REPUBLIC, NOT A MOBOCRACY!
Populism boils down to a desire for local control of the behavior of people you don't like, as opposed to Federal control of the behavior of people you don't like. ;)
The Constitution was also meant to preserve the rights of the states against the Federal govt. A state isn't an individual, but a collective.
All government is about control, but regional control is more responsive than national control. Social engineering is going to be done whether we like it or not. A congresscritter who can't escape to DC and the national elite for months at a time is likely to more solicitous towards his electorate.
The Bill of Rights in both intention and subsequent interpretation is meant to protect the rights of the individual citizen from THE STATE. The 14th Amendment in effect applies all freedoms of the BOR to the (small "s") states.
Hahahaha!
And Pat Buchannen is a self-described populist. And yes, a marquee example for the definition.
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