Servant Cross, You are correct on the first point, I did in fact do what I argue against, a mistake on my part. My point was that the sterotypes exist and simply wishing them away won’t change them. It takes overt action to change perceptions.
re: MrB’s point about women, that is a good observation on his part, the question, how do you appeal to both.
I go back to my yet un-posted response re: the contract with America. You give them a real choice, something clear, concise and specific. Right now the brutal truth is we lack that message beyond those already highly invested. You don’t convert people speaking to those already converted, you must find a vehicle that makes the message easy to understand to those on the outside looking in.
Again, I think this is an incorrect premise. This is the liberal approach of “how do I spin this to this to a target market?” or “what message do we ‘sell’?” It’s not a focus group. Conservatism is set of principles and values. From Ronald Reagan at CPAC (February 6, 1977 (4th annual)):
When a conservative states that the free market is the best mechanism ever devised by the mind of man to meet material needs, he is merely stating what a careful examination of the real world has told him is the truth.
When a conservative says that totalitarian Communism is an absolute enemy of human freedom he is not theorizing -- he is reporting the ugly reality captured so unforgettably in the writings of Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
When a conservative says it is bad for the government to spend more than it takes in, he is simply showing the same common sense that tells him to come in out of the rain.
When a conservative says that busing does not work, he is not appealing to some theory of education -- he is merely reporting what he has seen down at the local school.
When a conservative quotes Jefferson that government that is closest to the people is best, it is because he knows that Jefferson risked his life, his fortune and his sacred honor to make certain that what he and his fellow patriots learned from experience was not crushed by an ideology of empire.
Conservatism is the antithesis of the kind of ideological fanaticism that has brought so much horror and destruction to the world. The common sense and common decency of ordinary men and women, working out their own lives in their own way -- this is the heart of American conservatism today. Conservative wisdom and principles are derived from willingness to learn, not just from what is going on now, but from what has happened before.
The principles of conservatism are sound because they are based on what men and women have discovered through experience in not just one generation or a dozen, but in all the combined experience of mankind. When we conservatives say that we know something about political affairs, and that we know can be stated as principles, we are saying that the principles we hold dear are those that have been found, through experience, to be ultimately beneficial for individuals, for families, for communities and for nations -- found through the often bitter testing of pain, or sacrifice and sorrow. (snip)
One thing that must be made clear in post-Watergate is this: The American new conservative majority we represent is not based on abstract theorizing of the kind that turns off the American people, but on common sense, intelligence, reason, hard work, faith in God, and the guts to say: "Yes, there are things we do strongly believe in, that we are willing to live for, and yes, if necessary, to die for." That is not "ideological purity." It is simply what built this country and kept it great.