I am coming to believe that Pragmatism is seen some sort of enhancement that one can simply add to Conservatism; that it adds a necessary power that is lacking.
Pragmatism works without the need for moral absolutes. They are irrelevant.
It is a good reminder to check to see if we are still anchored to our principles.
What you are saying is that pragmatism is not pragmatic and you are right. In a Jesuit philosophy class, the teacher taught us about the pragmatists and their methodology and I needed a barf bag. Ubntil then, I had imagined myself a pragmatist. That Jesuit (so long ago that he was still Catholic) disabused me of the notion that pragmatism was desirable.