The Unmaking of Conservatism

April 24, 2003 Conservatism — or at least something calling itself conservatism — is now fashionable, and those who claim the label are triumphant today. Their government has just won a war, and they can afford to gloat not only over liberals, but over an older breed of conservatives who are suspicious of big government even when (or especially when) it’s winning.

When I began to consider myself a conservative, back in 1965, conservatism didn’t seem to have much of a future. Lyndon Johnson had just crushed Barry Goldwater in what looked like a final showdown between the philosophies of limitless and limited government. I was clearly enlisting in a losing cause.

But that, in a way, was what attracted me to conservatism. It was a philosophy of reflective losers, men whose principles and memories gave them resistance to the conquering fad and its propaganda. Such men hoped for victory, naturally, but they were fighting heavy odds, fierce passions, and powerful interests. They were ready for defeat, but they weren’t going to adjust their principles in order to win. They knew that if you win power by giving up your principles, you’ve already lost.

I was a college student, and my reading in English literature had already predisposed me to conservatism. The great writers I admired — Shakespeare, Jonathan Swift, Samuel Johnson, Edmund Burke, John Henry Newman, G.K. Chesterton, C.S. Lewis, George Orwell, Michael Oakeshott — were all notable for opposing the fads and enthusiasms of their times. They took being in the minority for granted. They even treasured solitude and meditation. Their minds and hearts were closed to statist propaganda and the passions it sought to incite, and they were prepared to endure abuse and libel for refusing to join the herd — especially what has been wittily called “the herd of independent minds.”

It soon turned out that the Goldwater campaign marked only the beginning, not the end, of a powerful new conservative movement, which astonished itself by managing to get one of its own, Ronald Reagan, elected president in 1980. Few had imagined this possible in 1965.

But by winning power, the conservative movement began to loose its grip on conservative principles. It had hoped to reverse the gains of liberalism — not only Johnson’s Great Society, but Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, both of which had violated America’s constitutional tradition of strictly limited and federal government. Now it quietly dropped its original goals.

As a powerful movement, conservatism also attracted new members who were more interested in power than in principle. Some of these were called “neoconservatives” — admirers of Roosevelt and recent supporters of Lyndon Johnson who cared nothing for limited government and the U.S. Constitution. Few of them, if any, had voted for Goldwater.

The chief common ground between the conservatives and the neocons was an anti-Communist foreign policy. All talk of deeper principles — and of repealing the welfare state — was discreetly dropped for the sake of harmony within the movement and political victory.

The conservatives wanted to keep the neocons within the movement. In this they succeeded only too well. Today the neocons have not only stayed; they have taken over the movement and pushed the principled conservatives out — or cowed them into silence, which comes to the same thing.

The older conservatives were wary of foreign entanglements and opposed on principle to foreign aid. But these are the very things the neocons favor most ardently; in fact, they are the very things that define neoconservatism and separate it from genuine conservatism.

As the neocon Max Boot recently wrote, “Support for Israel [is] a key tenet of neoconservatism.” He failed to name any other “key” tenets, because there aren’t any. War against Arab and Muslim regimes — enemies of Israel — is what it’s all about. Reagan’s all-out support for Israel, when Jimmy Carter was toying with Palestinian rights, is what won him neocon support in 1980.

A Rip Van Winkle conservative who had dozed off in 1965 would wake up in 2003 to find a movement that has almost nothing to do with the creed he professed when he last closed his eyes. It also has nothing to do with the conservative temper we find in the great writers of the past. It has everything to do with a shallow jingoism and war propaganda. It has become the sort of hot fad wise conservatives used to avoid, back when wise conservatives still defined conservatism.

"I think it's neither -- I think it's a recognition that social egineering in one form or another is with us now, always, and this is an attemnpt to force it into a benign a form as possible, given existing circumstances...The debate for the last 60 years has not been "How can we make government smaller?" -- it's been over what we want Big Government to be doing."

I don't necessarily disagree with what you say. But unless we can reframe the debate to FREEDOM, then the United States is not worth saving and the sooner we can bring about secession the better. What made the United States different and maybe even sacred was FREEDOM. Without FREEDOM there is nothing sacred about the United States and nothing worth saving. Instead of dividing conservatives by bickering over Israel, drugs, religion, abortion or any other pet issue of the right, I want to focus on getting FREEDOM back. FreeRepublic was formed for two primary reasons. We succeeded in Impeaching Bill Clinton, but have gotten way off the track of restoring the Constitution.

Jim Rob has not been wrong in making the goal of defeating Democrats the number one way to restore the Constitution. But he and others who would see FREEDOM restored have failed to see enemies of FREEDOM and the Constitution in the Republican camp. Settleing for the lesser of two evils is still losing. Many who seek FREEDOM have reached the point where recovering our lost FREEDOM is approaching a lost cause as long as the United States exists in its present form. Many have reached the conclusion that the status quo is no longer acceptable. And many have reached the conclusion that the status sought by many Republicans or other members of the right are not acceptable because their vision does not include cutting the government down to a size where recovering FREEDOM is possible. If FREEDOM is not the goal, why fight to preserve the United States? If our government has become the source of the abuse of FREEDOM, why not fight to change the powers that be or divide the United States itself. The lessor of two evils is not an acceptable choice to me. I am fighting to recover FREEDOM and nothing else will be acceptable.

I think the debate should be framed by experiments. I still believe we can recover FREEDOM and save the United States as its home. But I don't believe in the sanctity of the Republican Party nor am I afraid to let the Democrats back into power. Indeed, I think a strong argument can be made to Republicans that those of us who seek FREEDOM have enough votes to deprive the Republicans of power unless they join our fight. And if the Republicans remain unconvinced, then I think we need to let the Democrats back in to prove the point. Once we have made our point, we will have the full attention of the Republicans. I think the frequenters of this site who are genuinely interested in FREEDOM made a serious mistake in the 2002 off-year election by bowing to Jim Rob and others who felt like electing Republicans regardless of the consequences was the route of lesser evils. We squandered the opportunity to prove the point I am making and delayed having this debate in a meaningful way. And if there are not enough of us who seek FREEDOM, then changing the Republican Party to suit us is not in the cards. And if that is true, then I think the secession camp should become the major focus of discussion. Defeating Democrats without recovering FREEDOM is like drinking non-alcoholic beer, sex with a condum, or eating lean steak and trimming away any fat that remains. Life without liberty is better than no life at all, but only because the possibility for a struggle for FREEDOM still exists. Surrendering to the serfdom of government as it exists now in the United States is severing your last link to sanity.

I am stating in no uncertain terms, we take our FREEDOM back or form a new country within the United States through secession. This is the discussion that I want to see on these boards. Are there any who will join me?

Japan embraced American consumerism, maintained their old order of hierarchy and close connection between extra-governmental institutions, (the Japanese equivalent of the Mafia) and now they have a corrupt, bloated state, an aging population, a declining birth rate, and lots of porn, drugs and abortion.

They are like any Western state these days: declining.

I am submitting that this not automatically, de facto, a 'great thing,' a triumph, nor am I saying its a bad thing. It's clearly a matter of perspective.

(I passed over reviewing Japanese late 19th early 20th Century history for the sake of making a broader point, but I think their history proves that Japan as a culture, was really inclined to Western ideas where as the nomadic, tribal existence of multiple wives, fatherless children and blood ties more so defines the experience of the Middle East.)

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