[beckett]

Dreher has earned the ire of several of his former colleagues at National Review for what some call his high self-regard and the undeserved disdain he exhibits for broad swaths of principled free market conservatives.

For myself I can only say that, as a conservative, I've never thought of the market as a god, never worshipped capitalism, and always understood the trade-offs any economic system presents to those who participate in it. The market is simply a tool, the best tool ever devised for creating wealth. It's not the 'be and end all' of life, and if Dreher maintains that principled conservatives, with the exception of certain Randian types, have said otherwise in the modern era, he's simply mistaken.

[Colonel Batguano]

"I've never thought of the market as a god, never worshipped capitalism, and always understood the trade-offs any economic system presents to those who participate in it."

You are absolutely correct; too many in our movement have a Walter Williams-like reglious belief in unrestrained capitalism, that the market is ALWAYS right, and that the "law" of supply and demand was handed down along with the 10 Commandments!

[little jeremiah]

Here's a thought: On many threads about raunch - whether porn, seriously nasty computer games, and the like - people will say things like "let the market decide", if people don't like it they won't buy it, it's legal, and so on.

This proves that letting the market decide in all matters is to slide off into the abyss. I've said more than once that capitalism without being informed by morality winds up little better than communism. DIfferent, but little better. Inevitably conflict arises between the rights of corporations to make money how they choose, and the rights of people to not have to live in a sewer.

[GOP_1900AD]

I think the real issue is that the typical corporate leader is a social liberal and an economic libertarian extremist. Those who aren't are out and out liberals. I know enough such people to feel pretty secure in that conclusion. As a result, since there is little left in terms of traditional non corporate leadership (e.g. church, family, state), these de facto leaders promote the corporatist version of bread and circuses. Most truly honest free market conservatives are far too plain spoken, direct and bullshyte intolerant to make it as execs of major corporations.