...final word (for now) on libertarians vs. conservatives

Really Strange Bedfellows II
A final word (for now) on libertarians vs. conservatives
by Nick Gilespie

It's been a long, long while since I've been accused of impairing the morals of a minor (really). In fact, the last time I can remember such a claim being leveled against me was back in high school when I coaxed some classmates at good old Mater Dei High School into seeing Monty Python's Life of Brian rather than a less theologically charged movie. Some of my friends' mothers--and a buttinsky parish priest--saw my actions as proof positive of heretical tendencies (this, even in a very post-Vatican II atmosphere).

So the recent charges by National Review Online Editor Jonah Goldberg that what he calls my brand of "cultural libertarianism" is partly to blame both for 20-year-old John Walker's defection to the Taliban and for "campuses today [being] infested with so many silly radicals" really make me feel young again. For that early Christmas present, I thank him. He's recently signaled that he's putting this particular hobbyhorse back in the closet for a while and I fully intend to follow suit after these few more words on the matter.

Beyond its particulars, this exchange--prompted by Jonah's taking exception to my editor's note in the January Reason--helps clarify important ideological differences not only between our respective publications but between libertarians and conservatives more generally. These differences are worth underscoring, if only because they are not going away anytime soon. Indeed, especially with the hardcore Marxian left becoming increasingly irrelevant and centrist liberals essentially acknowledging the efficiency of markets and grappling more and more with libertarian arguments for free expression and lifestyle choice, the debate between libertarians and conservatives is likely to assume greater and greater significance as the 21st century unfolds. These two positions--roughly representing forces of choice vs. forces of control--are where the action is, and will be, for a long time to come.

In his original formulation, Jonah claimed that libertarians espouse a form of "arrogant nihilism" and that John Walker's participation in a retrograde fundamentalist regime was "a logical consequence" of such a misguided "political agenda." He wrote, "According to cultural libertarianism, we should all start believing in absolutely nothing, until we find whichever creed or ideology fits us best. We can pick from across the vast menu of human diversity — from all religions and cultures, real and imagined — until we find one that fits our own personal preferences."

He is not, I think, particularly mistaken in emphasizing libertarianism's interest in what he derisively terms "Chinese-menu culture" and "designer cultures." I'd argue, in fact, that all cultures are precisely admixtures put together by individuals to serve their particular needs and ends. No one questions that "cultures"--an imprecise term at best--change over time and in response to the demands of the people comprising them. Consider Roman Catholicism, which I alluded to at the start of this piece: Despite official claims to a consistent, unbroken, and self-evident tradition dating back to the first century A.D., the plain fact is that a Catholic from 1901 would barely recognize today's church as his own. Things change, and in response to specific and ongoing, if not always articulate, demands.

One of the defining characteristics of contemporary America and the modern world writ large is that more individuals have the means and motivation to insist on a "culture" that reflects their particular needs and sensibilities. Jonah ridicules this as underwriting such apparently clear absurdities as "Buddhists for Jesus" (as if Christianity itself had no precursor forms that violated existing categories). Dictating the limits of culture used to be the province of small, typically aristocratic elites, who could enforce their vision on the masses. Nowadays, that ability is effectively becoming decentralized, the result being a proliferation of standards, not a flight from them. This trend, which I've written about at length in terms of creative expression, frustrates and frightens conservatives and other gatekeepers who prize stability and hierarchy, for they mistake it as an end to standards.

Where Jonah is absolutely wrong, however, is to assert that an appreciation for this dynamic is tantamount to nihilism. To suggest that is to argue that tolerance is nihilism. It isn't: Tolerance, particularly in a libertarian framework, is grounded in respect for individuals as equal and autonomous agents, as long as they recognize others' similar standing--the right to swing one's fist ends at my nose and all that. Tolerance is a universal principle that underwrites all sorts of local differences. To believe in tolerance is manifestly not to believe in nothing.

Which is precisely why F.A. Hayek, in his widely read essay "Why I Am Not a Conservative," placed tolerance at the heart of a truly liberal--or, properly, libertarian--order. In his column titled "The Libertarian Lie," Jonah makes great hay over the fact that Hayek explicitly rejected the term "libertarian," calling it "singularly unattractive." There's no question Hayek dissed the particular word, claiming that "it carries too much the flavor of the manufactured term and of a substitute." Yet he unreservedly embraced the substance of it, too, talking repeatedly about "the party of life, the party that favors free growth and spontaneous evolution." "The liberal," wrote Hayek, "is aware that it is of the essence of human achievement that it produces something new; and he is prepared to come to terms with new knowledge, whether he likes its immediate effects or not." This seems to me much more a description of "cultural libertarianism" than of National Review conservatism, which seems to groan at every change in women's status, say, or every new development in genetic engineering.

The contested role of Hayek in this is worth lingering over, less because Hayek is some sort of high priest with divine insight and more because the appeals made in his name demonstrate core beliefs of his petitioners. At the heart of the Hayekian project, as I quoted in my earlier rejoinder to Jonah, is a belief that "to live and work successfully with others requires more than faithfulness to one's concrete aims. It requires an intellectual commitment to a type of order in which, even on issues which to one are fundamental, others are allowed to pursue different ends." For Hayek, such tolerance had a strong instrumental component: He argued for a maximally defined private, "protected sphere," one free of all sorts of coercion, because it allows for decentralized experiments in living through which individuals and groups gain meaningful knowledge and social institutions evolve. Elsewhere, he defined a free society as one in which individuals "could at least attempt to shape their own li[ves], where [they] gained the opportunity of knowing and choosing different forms of life." To limit choices, for Hayek, was to risk impoverishing a robust "extended order."

Hayek's insistence on the necessary limits of human knowledge similarly distances him from contemporary conservatives, who typically sound a very different tone in their proclamations. "The liberal is very much aware that we do not know all the answers and that he is not sure that the answers he has are certainly the right ones or even that we can find all the answers," wrote Hayek. At another point, Hayek, true to his Humean roots, notes that "in some respects the liberal fundamentally a skeptic." Compare these positively postmodern emphases on the limits of knowledge to Jonah's exasperation that "to the cultural libertarian, all authoritative cultural norms should be scrutinized again and again" (emphasis in the original).

Jonah is right to note that the "conservatives" specifically alluded to in Hayek's title are "conservatives in the European tradition (de Maistre, Coleridge, et al)," yet he merely ignores the question of whether that brand of conservatism is a part of his own. Hayek may well have noted, as Jonah writes, "that United States was the one place in the world where you could call yourself a 'conservative' and be a lover of liberty" because of America's peculiar past as a liberal nation. Yet that doesn't mean that all aspects of U.S. conservatism are classically liberal. Hayek notes that conservatives have a reflexive "distrust of the new and strange," essentially a fear of change.

This calls to mind Jonah's argument against another "cultural libertarian," Andrew Sullivan, who supports gay marriage. Titled, "Patience, Andrew, Patience: The Case for Temperamental Conservatism," the column seems an illustration of Hayek's idea that conservatism, "by its very nature cannot offer an alternative to the direction in which we are moving. It may succeed by its resistance to current tendencies in slowing down undesirable developments, but...it cannot prevent their continuance." Jonah essentially grants that gay marriage will come one day--a concession that no conservative would have made 30 years ago--but that we should just hold off on it for the time being. (Click here to read the explicitly Hayekian case for gay marriage I made in Reason some five years ago.)

Regardless of where or whether Hayek fits into all this, there can be little question that libertarians and conservatives break sharply over issues of choice vs. control, with libs opting for more of the former in all areas of human activity and conservatives emphasizing the latter, whether the topic is gay marriage, biotech, or drug use. There can be little question that we are facing increasing choice--not simply in economic but cultural and social terms, too, where the "Chinese menu" has exploded into a wide-ranging buffet. Anthropologist Grant McCracken has observed what he terms "plenitude," or the "quickening speciation" of social groups, gender types and lifestyles. "Where once there was simplicity and limitation ... there is now social difference, and that difference proliferates into ever more diversity, variety, heterogeneity," writes McCracken in 1997's "Plenitude."

For conservatives, such thoroughgoing choice is problematic, whether we're talking politics or culture, because it allows for unregulated experimentation ("Buddhists for Jesus"). Jonah notes that "personal liberty is vitally important. But it isn't everything. If you emphasize personal liberty over all else, you undermine the development of character and citizenship" and all forms of "established authority."

Maybe, maybe not. This much is certain, though: Such an understanding misses the key point that individual liberty is the starting point of "established authority," whether political, social, or cultural. Reeling off a list of "the ingredients for Western civilization," Jonah counts, "Christianity and religion in general, sexual norms, individualism, patriotism, the Canon, community of standards, democracy, the rule of law, fairness, modesty, self-denial, and the patriarchy." All of these things are under construction, reconstruction, and deconstruction on a daily basis, as different individuals opt in or out. But they all require buy-in from individuals too, even if the choice, as it often is, is to bind oneself to particular rules and conventions.

"Choosing determines all human action," wrote a different Austrian economist (and Hayek's mentor), Ludwig von Mises. "In making his choice, man chooses not only between various materials and services. All human values are offered for option. All ends and all means, both material and ideal issues, the sublime and the base, the noble and the ignoble, are ranged in a single row and subjected to a decision which picks out one thing and sets aside another."

To understand that basic reality is not, pace Jonah, to "encourage the dismantling of the soapboxes [libertarians] stand on." Rather, it is the best and perhaps only way to maintain a flourishing culture.

I don't have to be a Libertrian, in order to know just exactly WHAT the LP platform states, and what FR's Libertarians claim to believe in. Unlike YOU, I am NOT blinded by assumed, " feel superior ", propaganda, of a fringe subset, that will NEVER have an elected president, Denator, nor Congressman, in your lifetime. NO, Rom Paul does NOT count ! He can't get elected , as a Libertarian, as dog catcher; let alone anything else . He's a RINO, who has NO effect, whatsoever.

Okay, let's see ... dope, prostitution, gambling,open borders, and abortion, are ALL things that the LP nd the GREENS, and the DEMS agree about. The GOP disagrees with the afroementioned, on every point.

The Consitution Party, is even an SMALLER group, fringe of the fringe of the FRINGE, than the LP is. Combined, they don't even come lose to 1/2 of a percent.

The privatization of ALL roads and publicly held land, , espoused by the LP, is SO far off the edge, that it is abjured by everyone else.

The LP free market / isolationist , diametrically opposed positions, is insane, unworkable, and silly.

To continually claim that the DEMs and the GOPs are the same, or only minimally different, is the cry of the political naif; one who lives in fantasy. Libertarians, here, claim to waht what they want it, when they want it; which is immediately. WE did NOT get here , all in one fell swoop, and incrimentalism, is the ONLY way to extricate / reverse those Socialist / BIG GOVERNMENT things, which have s---l---o---w---l---y been imposed on this country, over the past 80 + years.

Don't lecture those of us who are actually politically aware, CONSERVATIVE, and have been working on turning the tide, for more decades, than you have been alive. When Libertarans finally admit that actions have consequences, and that most of the tme, those consequence are NOT the ones they imagie that they might be, I'll start taking them seriously. Until then, I and the majority of the rest of the nation, will know the for what they are.

LIBERTARIANS SEE A 1/2 FULL / EMPTY GLASS, AS EMPTY !

"Okay, let's see ... dope, prostitution, gambling,open borders, and abortion, are ALL things that the LP nd the GREENS, and the DEMS agree about."

This shows how completely blind you are. If the Democrats didn't ALSO share the Republicans' desire to completely ignore the Constitution by continuing the federal War on Some Drugs, we wouldn't HAVE any federal drug laws! The Democrats are with Republicans on drugs. Damn the Constitution, full speed ahead in the war on drugs. (Which shows how completely bogus Republicans' pretending to care about The Law really is. They ROUTINELY completely shred the Supreme Law of the Land.)

I also defy you to show me ANYTHING in the Democratic or Green party platforms that indicates that indicate that the Democratic or Green parties support legalized prostitution or gambling (unless the gambling is run by the government, of course!). You won't find anything.

Like I wrote before, there's really one fundamental difference between the Libertarian Party and the Green, Replican and Democratic parties...the LP supports Small Government, and Republicans, Democrats, and Greens support Big Government.

"The privatization of ALL roads and publicly held land, , espoused by the LP, is SO far off the edge, that it is abjured by everyone else."

The Constitution is absolutely crystal clear on this issue: the federal government absolutely can NOT own land outside of the District of Columbia and military bases ("forts"). Of course, Republicans completely ignore the Constitution in this regard, as they have THROUGHOUT THEIR ENTIRE HISTORY.

What you're saying is that Libertarians think the federal government should follow the Constitution, and no one else does. Tell me something I don't already know. :-/

"The LP free market / isolationist..."

Not "isolationist." "Non-interventionist." Big difference. Libertarians are, in fact, less isolationist than Republicans, Democrats, and Greens. Libertarians support eliminating immigration limits. Republicans, Democrats, and Greens don't support that.

"To continually claim that the DEMs and the GOPs are the same, or only minimally different, is the cry of..."

...someone who actually knows what the Constitution says, and thinks the federal government ought to FOLLOW it!

"WE did NOT get here , all in one fell swoop, and incrimentalism, is the ONLY way to extricate / reverse those Socialist / BIG GOVERNMENT things..."

You're a fool if you think the Republican Party will EVER attempt to restore Small Government (i.e., a federal government that follows the Constitution). Republicans have held either the Congress or the Presidency (or both!) for all the time that the federal government has been expanding. Do Republicans actually support eliminating the Department of Education? No, they support EXPANDING the Department of Education! Do they support eliminating the Department of the Interior, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Energy, the Department of Health and Human services? Of course not!

If you think Republicans are at all interested in Small Government, you need to grow up, and read up. And if YOU'RE interested in Small Government, you certainly don't show it if you vote for Republicans. (With the exception of Ron Paul.)

"Don't lecture those of us who are actually politically aware, CONSERVATIVE, and have been working on turning the tide,..."

Bullshit. Conservatives, by and large, aren't interested in Small Government. They haven't been since the New Deal.

If you knew even 1/1,000 th., of what you imagine that you do, your replies MIGHT make some sense. As it is, you have now brought DOPE into the mix, and reinforced the concept that legalizing dope, is the true, SOLE , iny interest of Libertarians. LOL

Okay, though I am utterly bored by you people, who don't know historical facts, ignore consequences / can't imagine what they woud be, based on previous history and human nature, and live in your own, tiny, imagined world , I'll repect just a very few incontrovertible FACTS ; just for YOU. : - )

No matter what Libertarians seem to think, NO EMPIRE, NO NATION, NO STATE, NO COMMUNITY, NO TRIBE, NO FAMILY has EVER functioned WITHOUT moral / vice laws. NONE ! A live and let live policy, results in chaos and problems for everyone. Mankind doesn't change, only technology changes.

If you just take European colonies, in America, prior to there even being a unified set of colonies, those in charge, had moral / vice laws, ruled with an iron fist, and did things that would make you shudder. Facts have a nasty way of destroying assumed positions.

All acts have connsequences. One person's actios, DO really have a ripple effect upon many others, whether they like it or not. The Constitution provides for both House to make the laws of the land. The president can veto any Act or Bill. Vetos CAN be overturned, but I hope that you knw all this stuff , as well as what it takes for the Supreme Court to do what they have been granted the power to do . Since .Article 4, Section 2, Clause 1 states that : " The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states ." , the legalization of dope, in one state, would make it legal ( or at the least , throw all into a quandry ! ) in ALL of the others. This is the crux of the matter, regarding same sex marriage being made " legal " in one state. So, there goes the " STATES RIGHTS " issue .

Prior to the PURE FOOD AND DRUG ACTS , the free market did less than NOTHING, to protect the populace from tainted meat, adulterated butter, or watered down milk. Neither did it protect them from the effects fro patent medicine, or the abuse of certain narcotics, opiates, and alcohol. The PREAMBLE, to the CONSTITUTION contains the following : " promote the general welfare." These few words, gave the government the power, to that which would benefit / protect EVERYONE ; even IF that meant that some people's personal " pursuit of happiness " ( doing dope ) , is curtailed / infringed upon.

People have the " RIGHT " to try to either ammend the Constiution or try to repeal what is in it. Until EITHER of those things happen, the law is the law, the government has the right and duty to enforce the law, and complaining about one thng, or another, on an internet site, does absolutely NOTHING at all, to change anything.

Prior to the CIVIL WAR, the Abolutionists, said that America's alcoholism was a far LARGER problem than slavery was. American, from colonial times was known as THE worst country, when it came to public drunkeness, and abuse of alcohol. That only grew worse. Recreational dope usage was NOT common then, nor even possible ; opium was unknown here, heroin didn't exist, crack, crank, SPEED, PCP, EXTASY ( or however dopers spell it ) , and a whole host of other things were NOT available . When they did become available, and the cultural changes occurred ( by omission of knowledge, as in the FIRST wave of addicts , or by comission, in the 1960's ) the government had an OBLIGATION , given it by the CONSTITUTION, to " promote the general welfare ", and THAT is exactly what it HAS tried to do.

Prohibition , no matter WHAT spurious things you care to CCP or quote , DID cut the alcohol consuption, of the populace of the USA, way down. The PURE FOOD & DRUGS ACTS, did indeed stop the cause of indirect / unintentioal alcoholism / dope addiction from patent medicines, such as Lydia Pinkham's . This benefitted the entire nation.

Republicans have ALWAYS wanted " smaller government ", lower taxation, and ALL of the " good " stuff , which the LP purloined from the GOP ; now irrationally claim as the LP's sole provenance . If ANYONE is " blind " ; it is the LP, and Libertarians !

One may have a full plate of wishes ; getting those wishes into the realm of reality , takes patience, understanding, and fighting against the tide of propaganda, apathy , and the DEMs ! Political naivete, delusions, and abject lack of historical / political knowledge will only frustrate the fulfillment of those desires. WE LIVE IN A REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC ! Libertarian rule will ONLY become maifest, at the point of a gun / revolution / coup , which will NEVER happen !

I am disappointed that you resort to the term "statist" given your past civility in defending your libertarian philosophy. Be that as it may, I am glad that the debate has been settled as to the myth that libertarians are just conservatives in all but name. The fact is that libertarians and liberals share a family tree not libertarians and conservatives.

Not so fast Tex

An intuitive procedure for defining conservatism is to begin by listing the institutions which conservatives have sought to conserve. That will not get us very far Conservatives have, at one time and place or another, defended royal power, constitutional monarchy, aristocratic prerogative, representative democracy, and presidential dictatorship; high tariffs and free trade; internationalism; centralism and federalism; a society of inherited estates, a capitalist, market society, and one or another version of the welfare state. They have defended religion in general, established churches, and the need for government to defend itself against the claims of religious enthusiasts. There are, no doubt, self described conservatives today who cannot imagine that conservatives could defend institutions and practices other than those they hold dear. Yet they might find, to their surprise, that conservatives in their own national past have defended institutions which contemporary conservatives abhor. And were they to look beyond their own national borders, they might find that some of the institutions and practices they seek to conserve are regarded as implausible or risible by their conservative counterparts in other nations.

In one of the most perceptive scholarly analyses of the subject, Samuel Huntington argued that conservatism is best understood not as inherent theory in defense of particular institutions, but as a positional ideology. "When the foundations of society are threatened, the conservative ideology reminds men of the necessity of some institutions and the desirability of the existing ones,"Huntington suggested. Rather than representing the self-satisfied and complacent acceptance of the institutional status quo, ideological conservatism arises from the anxiety that valuable institutions are endangered by contemporary developments or by proposed reforms. The awareness that the legitimacy of existing institutions is under attack leads conservative theorists to attempt to provide an articulate defense of the usefulness of those institutions. Huntington claimed that because the articulation of conservatism is a response to a specific social situation. . . . The manifestation of Conservatism at any one time and place has little connection with its manifestation at any other time and place." However, this exaggerates the lack of continuity of conservative social and political thought.

For if the specific institutions which conservative thinkers have sought to conserve have varied over time and space, a set of conservative assumptions, themes, and images has endured.

And this observation from Jerry Muller:

Another recurrent dilemma for conservatives is how to legitimate change which marks a break with the past. One solutions as we have seen, is to recast or reinterpret institutional past to made it appear continuous with contemporary practice; or, alternatively, to formulate innovation in a way that appears continuous with past pncticel as in Legal fictions. Yet another solution to the legitimization of new or radically recast institutions is the resort to historicist explanations: the institutional rules must change, it is argued because historical circumstances have changed. This Historicist conception has become a ubiquitous component of modern intellectual life, and in one form or another has been central in conservative thought as well. Yet the permeation of historicist assumptions may have the unwitting effect of undermining belief in the truth of existing institutions, or indeed in the idea of truth as such.

The need for conservatives to react to cultural social economic and political change gives rise to recurrent strategies each of which has potential pitfalls. The strategy of pragmatic flexibility runs the risk of trading away the fundamental substance of existing institutions in order to avoid unpleasant conflict. The strategy of holding fast to existing institutional arrangements in their totality risks descent into political irrelevance. When the fundamental institutions valued by conservatives appear to be in imminent danger, a strategy of radical action may seem necessary, despite the conservative's sensitivity to the hazards posed by the negative unanticipated consequences of action.

Our late experience has taught us that many of those fundamental principles formerly believed infallible, are either not of the irnportance they were imagined to be; or that we have not at all adverted [referred] to some other far more important, and far more powerful principles, which entirely over-rule those we have considered as omnipotent.

So wrote Edmund Burke in a speech of 1775, in support of conciliation with those colonies soon to become known as the United States of America. It is difficult to imagine a more succinct formulation of the funndamental, intrinsic dilemma of conservatism: When does experience demand a change in the order of institutional priorities? That recurrent conservative quandary and the variety of responses to which it gives rise provides a persistent source of tension among conservatives, and an on-going stimulus to the reformulation of conservatism.(See the Drug War Threads)

Conservatism does not mean statism.

"The Constitution provides for both House to make the laws of the land. The president can veto any Act or Bill."

Perhaps you ought to try actually reading the Constitution. The Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land, and Congress is NOT authorized by the Constitution to violate the Supreme Law of the Land (i.e., the Constitution). This is precisely what Congress (and the President) do by passing and enforcing the Controlled Substances Act...to pick only one example from literally hundreds.

"People have the " RIGHT " to try to either ammend the Constiution or try to repeal what is in it. Until EITHER of those things happen, the law is the law,..."

"People" don't change the Constitution, the government (specifically, Congress and State legislatures) changes the Constitution. And the government is NOT authorized to pass laws that violate the Constitution. Those laws that violate the Constitution are illegitimate, because they violate the Supreme Law of the Land (the Constitution). This is true, even though the 9 idiots that make up the Supreme Court can't or won't read and follow the Constitution enough to strike down unconstituional laws.

"...the government had an OBLIGATION , given it by the CONSTITUTION, to " promote the general welfare ", and THAT is exactly what it HAS tried to do."

Try reading Madison's writings on the "general welfare" clause. It's quite clear that the "general welfare" clause was merely an introduction to Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. It most certainly did NOT give the federal government powers beyond those specifically enumerated (listed) in Article I, Section 8. Controlling drugs is NOT one of the authorities given to Congress by Article I, Section 8. Therefore, WITHOUT A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT, ALL federal laws regarding drugs are unconstitutional.

"Prohibition , no matter WHAT spurious things you care to CCP or quote , DID cut the alcohol consuption, of the populace of the USA, way down."

That's irrelevant. Federal Prohibition of alcohol was clearly NOT in the best interests of the United States...otherwise, a Constitutional amendment to repeal Prohibition would NOT have passed.

But even that's irrelevant. The relevant point is that the alcohol prohibitionists at least had the decency to pass a Constitutional amendment, so they didn't violate The Law (the Supreme Law of the Land, the Constitution) when they passed a federal law banning alcohol. The bozos who passed and enforce laws against other drugs haven't had the decency to do that. Instead, they themselves break The Law. (And then bozos like G.W. Bush, John Ashcroft, Robert Bork, Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas have the nerve to actually proclaim that they care about "law and order!" "Order" maybe! "Law"...fageddahboutit!)

"One may have a full plate of wishes..."

On my "plate" is that conservatives will, at some time in the future, actually care about following the Constitution! Now THAT'S a pretty unrealistic wish...considering that conservatives, over the entire 43+ years I've been alive, have given absolutely no indication that they have a general desire to follow the Constitution!

"WE LIVE IN A REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC !"

We're SUPPOSED to live in a Constitutional Republic! It's too bad very few conservatives pay attention to that fact!

You deffinitely show a propensity for NOT seeing what is posted, but that which you desire to see. The ONLY " propaganda " / agenda , that I would dearly love to see put in place, in ALL schools, is a return to teaching patriotism, love of America, and the unvarnished history of this nation. A pro-America agenda, is what schools used to teach, and something which has been banned , for decades. I suppose that that isn't to your liking; but, it IS to mine.

I'm so sorry that you feel compelled to try to discuss a topic, that you neither know anything about, or understand. For some strange reason, you also can't / won't read what I type, unfiltered , by your preconceptions of what you " THINK " I am advocating . THIS IS YOUR PROBLEM ; NOT MINE!

There ARE many problems, with public, as well as within some private, parochial, and home schooling education. No system is perfect; however , there are tried and true methods, which should be gone back to. They could be; even with damned the Unions. The will , is missing, and people, like YOU, are part of the problem; NOT part of the solution.

Nope, I haven't contradicted myself, on this thread. I have a one track mind ( position ) on formal education, which hasn't changed in 40 years. I'm NOT about to change any of it now. : - ) I know, FIRST HAND, that what I say, works. You can NOT say the same, since you haven't taught. : - )

I know, FIRST HAND, the way the teacher unions work ( oxymoron... they don't work ) , what preceeded them, and the education methods , that have been employed, for millenia / from the first written words about it .

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