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I’ve read over this thread again and it seems to me that you and we are speaking at cross purposes. I don’t think you have gone deep enough in order for us to reach some common places. I’m not sure how many times in your posts here, rogerv, you have suggested that *we* need to figure out how to change society – how to better society – how to “arrange” society – how to “piece-meal” social-engineer society etc.

What I don’t think you understand is that conservatives generally think that we have an excellent society already. Do you see how your introduced topic speaks at cross purposes with those you are trying to to start a conversation? Most conservatives believe that the governmental “system” set up by the Founders is already good enough – in fact – it’s the best around.

Conservatives, as a rule, in working toward a better society and a better world, want to more closely adhere to the Constitution while leftists and socislists want to increase the size and scope of government. They are two diametrically opposed world views. You, rogerv, based on your writings here – line up with the leftists and socialists. Perhaps you are not telling yourself the truth about that.

Conservatives, as a rule, believe in human nature, in mankind, in *individuals*. We don’t think that we need to persuade people to care about others or rise to a higher level of caring or anything like that. We believe that people will naturally “care” about others when they have met their own needs. And the proof that that is true is in the generosity of the American people. We give more than any other people on the planet. Leftists and socialists, as a rule, believe in government, in “engineering”, in creating a society that “takes care” of individuals. Conservatives believe that when you have the kind of governmental system that encourages and expects “individuals” to be all that they can be – you will have a great society. Conservatives are more willing to “allow” society to evolve and grow organically. Leftists and socialists want to “engineer” it – to “control” it.

There were so many good posts written to you on this thread. I do hope you will go back and re-read them – several times. Billybudd, marron, mr.maine-iac, TKDietz, Peter Finn, KC for freedom, Jonestown etc – all of them are worth studying – if you want to learn from conservatives.

I think it is hard to understand, when one takes an honest look at the world we live in – how you can not realize that America is a fabulous society. And I think it is hard to understand why you don’t seem to realize that the reason that third world “individuals” are not doing well is because they are not free to do well. They do not have good governmental systems. Democracy in the Middle East is going to revolutionalize the lives of individuals there. And once individuals begin to have hope and to dream their own dreams and go after them, living in a country with a good governmental system and then begin to grow and change as individuals, with personal character and responsibility – their societies will radically improve.

There is evidence to support what conservatives believe. When you look at the history of the world – people in free countries with good governmental systems – do much, much better than those in dictatorships or other oppressive systems. Socialists and leftists have failed over and over – and they are failing again in Europe and Canada. There is no “rational” reason to waste time on leftist and socialist attempts to “engineer” society – whether in toto or piece-meal. Voters let politicians know if they like or don’t like the way that society is going. We already have a way to make policy and evaluate policy.

As I said before – freedom is messy. But the results are far superior to “engineered” societies. This kind of gets at the heart of where leftists like you are coming from:

He makes a strong case that liberals are seeking illegitmately to discredit and disqualify policy arguments that rest in whole or in part on religious beliefs. For example, Peter Beinart, editor of the New Republic, has argued that it is wrong for religious conservatives to base their views and arguments about public policy on theological premises because, in doing so, they appeal to reasons that are not "accessible to people of different religions, or no religion at all."

Ponnuru has more time for this argument than I do, but he does state the essential point -- when liberals make this plea for "open debate," they are really trying to rule things out of the debate, to shut down the discussion. Once again, it's about attempting to marginalize Christianity for political gain. And the attempt is made under the false pretense that religiously based arguments are insufficently accessible.

secularism and its discontents

[[[I did come across a good explanation in David Horowitz's new book Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left. Horowitz's theory is "the utopian future that embodies the idea of 'social justice'" connects radical Islam and its sympathizers with yesterday's Marxists: "It is this utopian vision that provides radicals with the standard of judgment that condemns the actually existing world, no matter how decent it may be." So therefore America and its friends, like Iraq the Model, are automatically suspect. – National Review]]]

Your post number 75 is excellent.

The belief that there can be such a thing as a perfect society, inevitably leads us to hold in contempt a society that may be imperfect but fundamentally decent. Imperfect, but fundamentally functional.

I believe that society is "perfectible" in the sense that it can grow and be made better over time. But there is nothing more destructive to human nature than the belief that such perfection is the responsibility of government.

Let me repeat that: there is nothing more destructive than the belief that the perfection of society is the duty of the government.

Leaving aside the infamous experiments of the twentieth century, the ones that ended in mass death, we often forget the others, the ones that are merely dysfunctional but muddle through. The notion that government is the guiding source for a people leads always to the infantilization of the people. It leads to the politicization of every area of life, and gives you a people that is frustrated, angry, and whose self-righteousness resides in being able to identify yet another perceived injustice that the government hasn't gotten around to fixing, and demanding amid tears and histrionics that someone do something.

I love Latin America, there are certain elements of character among the people that I find appealing. But Latin American governments are famously dysfunctional, and I would say fortunately so. The dominant political culture is one that expects a centralized organizing authority, there is no Republican Party as you know outside the US, no libertarian party, you have left wing and right wing parties who would both fit on the left side of the American political spectrum.

But the fact is, of course, that these governments never work well, and as a consequence people develop parallel ways of surviving; family, church, voluntary organizations, people develop personal contacts, and people develop habits of character.

What they don't realize is that they have found what works. But they believe that its not supposed to work that way, they keep expecting a government that is going to set everything aright, and so you have the endless instability that is characteristic. And you have the corruption that is characteristic. What people don't often realize is that such corruption is to be expected, and it is in fact a necessity.

There are actually two kinds of corruption. There is a corruption driven by greed and opportunity, which centralized government makes possible. Put too much authority in the hands of government functionaries, and someone will take advantage of it.

But put too much power over your life into law and regulations and you will have a system that is clumsy, and blind, and tone-deaf, and as a consequence you will have no choice but to find ways around it. Thats when you find it necessary to have a brother-in-law in the planning commission, an uncle in the party leadership, and you wind up offering a beer to a cop to overlook a law you both know is stupid. That second kind of corruption is the only way such systems work, which is to say, they don't work but we all agree to make it look like they do, while living our lives in reality according to what our real needs are.

Engineered societies never work. If you try to make them work, you run the society into the ground, maybe you wind up having to shoot a lot of people. Or, people on their own find ways to jimmy the system to make it work after a fashion. We call that last option "corruption" but eliminate the corruption and the whole system comes apart.

Alternatively, you let people manage themselves, and have whatever laws are necessary to manage the collisions when they occur. Thats the classic American system. If laws are predictable, people will sort it out themselves and they don't need smart guys to figure it out for them. Most people in the end are decent, and need only a basic framework which allows them to work out their own dreams. All people need is for their governors to protect them from being robbed, and to keep the streets paved, and the rest they can and will do themselves. If government is done properly, at least in peacetime, government should be nothing more than a utility. Boring.

Hi, sunsong,

Thank you for your thoughtful thread. I see no reason a liberal could not agree with you that we have a very fine set of institutions, maybe the best available. But since every institution was created by human beings who like us, have limited sympathies, limited knowledge, limited resources, can make mistakes, there may still be, as jackbob put it, "room for improvement". The reformists among us are not arguing for wholesale replacement (not even gradual replacement) or our institutions. That may of course occur, but it can occur on conservative models as well as liberal ones. After all, what does capitalism as 'creative destruction' mean if not that some institutions may die out and new ones my be created?

I'm less convinced that you that we get to the bottom of things by appeal to our views of human nature. I've become skeptical of the notion myself. The idea that only one set of institutions is consistent with human nature is, I think, untrue. I think whatever biological basis there might be for human behavior is shaped variously by different societies, and that there may be more than one set of institutions in which humans can thrive. At any rate, I think any set of institutions involves trade-offs that are difficult to evaluate. I think John Dewey has said a lot of things in his work "Human Nature and Conduct" that make a lot of sense to me.

I am guardedly optimistic about our prospects as a civilization. There are no guarantees here. Any changes we consciously and deliberately effect can turn out to bring more bad than good. We have to keep our wits about us and monitor the consequences of our actions carefully. But that is simply the human condition: we never know in advance all the consequences of our actions. No institution, not the market, not the government, not even science, can iron out all risk of bad consequences. Uncritical faith in any human institution is irresponsible. Even with the best of institutions, we need to keep our eyes open. This is one reason why I am and always have been a advocate of something like the doctrine of countervailing powers: no institutions should be completely trusted to police itself, and no institution should have unchallengeable power. I think we both agree with the founding fathers on this,and this is common ground between us.