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I'm not scolding anyone, but if you discuss an article it would be nice to let the author know if they have a public e-mail.

I will deal with two issues that have come up. The relationship of paleos with social conservatives, and Lockean contract theory.

Most paleo leaders (as opposed to the rank-and-file who would be hard to characterize) are religiously orthodox and many are very devout. Many are Catholics but some are Orthodox, Conservative Lutherans, Conservative Calvinists, etc. There are relatively few evangelicals among the leadership. Even the ones who may be skeptics recognize the importance of Christianity to America and the West and accept our Christian tradition as a good, healthy, essential thing. There are probably no crusading atheists among the ranks.

They have always had a distant relationship with the religious right, even though they are all almost by definition social conservatives. There are a few reasons for this. First, they think the religious right has been too beholden to the GOP and too quick to support less than good conservative candidates such as Bush. Because they are for nonintervention, they do not support the War in Iraq. They think many Christian leaders(Falwell, Robertson, etc.) and the rank-and-file evangelicals have too easily supported a War that is hard to square with the Christian Just War tradition. Many see this as partially related to the majority Evangelical belief in dispensational pre-millienialism. Since they are mostly old school Christians, they don't embrace this doctrine, and they feel it is a big reason why many evangelical Christians, esp. the leadership, is overly supportive of Israel in matters of foreign policy. They also do not like the praise music, seeker sensitivity, etc. of much of modern evangelicalism.

In one area where you would think that Christians would have a big stake, halting Muslim immigration into America and Europe, they see the religious right as being completely absent from the fight. (I agree.) A growing number of Christian leaders are making nice on immigration, Brownback and Huckabee for example. They would view this as not necessitated by Scripture and suicidally ignorant. The cultural dissolution that massive immigration is likely to bring about will totally take their issues and the GOP off the table within the next 50 years.

Also, paleos favor regionalism and decentralization, radical decentralization really. They see the RR's focus on the federal government as counterproductive. Instead of trying to get a constitutional amendment to ban abortion, which is very unlikely to happen, they would support State action like SD did. That doesn't mean they are pro-choice. They just see local action as more likely to save more lives.

I am a Baptist and consider myself an evangelical, although I am a very traditional one and despise praise music and the like. But I came to paleoconservatism via the religious right. Therefore I have a more sympathetic view of the RR than do most paleos. I think the hostility is counterproductive.

Whoever said that the RR is a relatively recent phenomenon is exactly right. Issues such as gay marriage and the attacks on Christmas are fairly new issues. There used to be a very broad cultural consensus on such issues. Just 30 years ago the idea of gay marriage would have been unthinkable, for example. So the RR arose in response to cultural drift away from the historic consensus. This is why I believe the RR and paleos should/can work together. Despite the happy talk of some Christian conservatives like Brownback, the RR is not fundamentally a progressive movement. It is a reaction to cultural drift. So is paleoconservatism. The RR has resisted/is resiting a modernist drift to the left on theology and morals, but they have embraced modernism in many other ways. The Paleos can be viewed as resisting modernity in general. So I see both as part of any future counter-revolution against the leftward slide.

But the above illustrates a good point. Paleos are not libertarians on social issues, but they see restoring the cultural consensus that made gay marriage a laughable idea just a few years ago as more important than a law against it. Does that make sense?

Many paloes, esp. the leadership, are very skeptical that any political solution is possible. So they focus on culture and local action. Home schooling is a very paleo activity for example. Also, boycotting the local contractor who is building the abortion clinic is a more important activity than electing a "pro-life" Republican who isn't going to do anything about abortion anyway. Make sense?

This is long so I will post on Locke separately.

"I'm not scolding anyone, but if you discuss an article it would be nice to let the author know if they have a public e-mail."

OK, I checked, you do have one.

~~~rim shot~~~

All kidding aside, I'm glad you're here, I posted your article because I found it to be informative, well-written, and interesting. We post many articles and most authors would rather sue us than take the time to discuss them with us.

I do have some comments on your comments...

"The cultural dissolution that massive immigration is likely to bring about will totally take their issues and the GOP off the table within the next 50 years."

If you're talking about Muslim immigration into Europe, I agree, if you're talking about mass immigration of Muslims into America, I don't see that happenning...today or anytime in the near future.

Before I proceed, I'd like to define a term; immigrant means immigrant (I am one), not illegal alien.

Europe needs to repopulate, and their primary source of available immigrants are Muslim countries, so yes, Europe has a huge problem. America repopulates from Christian countries south of our borders.