The word “conservative” is not really helpful, because it is used to hide as much as it reveals.
We use the word “conservative” to refer to people who hold clear principles, classic liberal, constitutional, rooted in a clear Judeo-Christian world view. The word doesn’t really accurately apply to these people, but its the word commonly used.
And we use it to refer to people who are vaguely traditionalist. This is who the word more accurately does represent. But these are the people who are dragged along by the culture as it slides off the rails, resisting, complaining, but ultimately relenting because they have no clear principles. They are the tail of the dog, always getting there after the dog, but getting there just the same.
Just as we often make the case that the word “liberal” is a misnomer applied to leftists, the word “conservative” is a misnomer applied to principled people unless it is attached to another word to specify what we are conserving. Conservative Christian, conservative constitutionalist, conserving what?
My take is a scooch different, not on the pernicious, corrupting nature of any form of Marxism but on why Republicans and many “conservatives” are “useless”.
The father of this modern conservativism is Eisenhower.
By this I mean that there is a brand of “conservativism” that values governance as an ongoing concern, that protects and even expands the lawlessness that already exists but may occasionally try to resist new leftward lurches. Mr “no repeal” Eisenhower helped to imprint this deeply into the right.
They are like lazy brakemen on a hill.
This is because they are not actually dedicated to the Constitution as Law, believing in the anti-Origional Right traditionalism of the Court (or the view that, entirely contrary to Marbury, not only was the ratifying of the Constitution merely a pro forma event but also the mere appearance of words on the paper, and not permanent principals they were framed to capture, are important to what the Law is ... leaving the Court free to interpret freestyle as it has done large since FDR and an earlier Justice Roberts abandoned the Republic.
So the are not actual proponents of governance by constitutional means.
Moreover, they are also infected with the very “progressivism” that first advanced this present lawlessness, confusing long established progressivism with the ideals they think the ought to uphold.
The upshot is that they are not dedicated to the Law nor as sold-out to lawlessness as the left is.
They are neither hot nor cold.
Such men, against those who are either actually hot or cold, are inevitably going to seem weak. Towards progressives they are usually unable to genuinely view them as enemies to be politically defeated, neither tolerated or trusted, even as they work their own lawlessness when they’ve no partisan reason not to do so. Towards the Constitution they are simply unable to honor their oath of office, and would be loath to do so little different than sold-out progressives.
Simply: without dedication to the principals hag Marshall wrote of in Marbury their love of the Constitution is really a love for the government and it’s accumulated, long established abuses and excesses.
I wonder if eventually I’ll be booted from my senior center Spanish class for informing them of islamism, a term they had never heard.
It is utterly amazing how insular the left really is.
This is a breathtaking article. I have been struggling to understand how so.many of the conservative intellectual writers and leaders have become indistinguishable from the leftists on most issues. It’s like finding out Darth Vader is your father but kind of knowing it for some time.
Interesting - but I did chuckle a bit at the VERY last line of this long essay, which begins, “In short...” - TOO LATE!
A problem is that most people, including “conservatives”, get their sense of right and wrong from the culture. I should go a step further, even Christians, get their sense of right and wrong from the surrounding society.
As a consequence many people are unable to tell when the culture itself is going off the rails. They may sense it in their gut, but they lack the language or the tools to explain it or resist it.
If you were raised in a church that emphasizes scripture, you have an alternate voice helping to shape your view of the world, and you have some idea of the “gold standard” for right and wrong. You are still heavily influenced by the culture you spring from, but those principles are embedded in you and are at least factored in whether or not they are dominant.
If you were raised in a church that does not emphasize scripture, or if you were raised in no church at all, you haven’t had this alternate voice, your character has been entirely shaped by the culture in which you were born. So whatever your personal philosophy, or your politics, you can’t help but be dragged along by the major currents that surround you.
As an example, I like to say that the “alphabet” networks give you the left-wing view of the left-wing talking points of the day. Fox, on the other hand, gives you the “slightly right of center” view of the left-wing talking points of the day. Either way, though, your news coverage is dominated by the same talking points. Either way, you are talking about what the left wants to talk about.
Our philosophical space is dominated by Hollywood movies, news and opinion media, schools and universities, which are all dominated by the left. If you don’t have clear principles, you can’t help but be swept along by the tide. Even if you do, it is human nature that we amalgamate conflicting information; this is at once a quality and a defect.
The comments on this thread are insightful and thoughtful. The best summary - no enemies to the Right.