“No offense, but I think I will stick with Thomas Sowell’s characterization.”
Your choice, but he’s not saying anything new. Radicalism and conservatism have existed forever and they will continue to exist because it’s, I believe, a genetic trait and of age. Younger people are naturally more impatient for change.
Whereas older radicals look at all the injustices in the world and are moved to want to blow up the status quo and replace it with their wet dreams. Conservatives look at the same imperfect world and want to keep the rules for living that have proven to work for millennia and fix the ones that haven’t in a more gradual and thoughtful way.
There is a great poem by Kipling that brilliantly captures this reality about human nature - it’s called “The Gods of the Copybook Headings”. If you’re not familiar with it, I highly recommend it.
It should be the anthem of conservatism.
I will disagree with you on your viewpoints on “constrained“ or “unconstrained”, but I will absolutely check out your recommendation on the Rudyard Kipling poem.
Thank you.