Hi, everyone.
I've made some small changes on my links over yonder, breaking down the group in to Earth, Wind and Fire, then also, Friends Seeking Common Ground. You can interpret the headings as you like.
I realize that we might all fit in to any of these groupings so, if you'd prefer to be linked under another category, please let me know and I'll submit your request to the CBA (Committee of Blogging Affairs) for a Reconsideration and Re-Categorization Process and we'll get back with you soon.
Another ongoing change has to do with the nature of labels. After reviewing Classic Conservative tenets a few months ago and reading Thomas Sowell's book, A Conflict of Visions, in which he proposed a rationale behind the differences between the Left and the Right, I've had to come to realize that I'm not very opposed to what we might call Conservative doctrine.
Don't have a heart attack, anyone. I haven't changed my positions. I'm just saying that very few (neither "liberal" nor "conservative") are in favor of endlessly spending tax dollars for the fun of it, nor for a Big, Invasive gov't. And no one is opposed to personal responsibility and we all recognize that people do make bad choices.
In other words, I'm not opposed to most of the tenets behind Classic Conservatism - I'm just opposed (strongly so, often) to the policy and actions of some people who self-identify as Conservatives.
And so, I've been trying - and will continue to strive - to quit writing as if it's Conservatism itself that I'm opposed to, or even those who call themselves conservatives. Rather, it's specific policies that I'm opposed to (or in favor of) and I'll try to speak to the specifics of those policies, appealing to both Conservative and Liberal ideals in the process.
For what it's worth. Feel free to hold me accountable.
Along those lines, my promised question has to do with the nature of those who self-identify as Conservatives and is simply this:
Why would those who don't trust the gov't to spend $20 billion to try to lift the poor out of poverty (because the gov't is so inept and can't be trusted with money or power), why would they trust the gov't to spend nearly one trillion dollars on guns, bombs, WMD, nukes and a generally bloated military machine and use these to invade other sovereign nations?
35 comments:
You are in very good company.
"Do I contractdict myself? Very well, then, I contract myself. I am large, I contain multitudes."
- Walt Whitman
"Denounce the Government and embrace the Flag/How to live in that free republic for which it stands."
Previous unattributed quote by Wendell Berry.
The new categories are appropriate.
You're open-mindedness is welcome. I also will attempt to allow my liberal trends (there are many and varied) to show.
As to the last question--it's not ANY government that I trust with the military task. This particular administration--I do trust. More than I could trust any alternative that has been offered thus far.
The parts of government that are depended on by those who feel it is the government's responsibility to make every man finacially equal are not ones that have been elected.
they are beaurocracy--beaurocracy that has proven itself to be untrustworthy. Beaurocracy that leaks classified information and such. Beaurocracy that is laden with holdovers from administrations with which I didn't trust.
And the Military Machine is not heavy-laden with bureaucracy? Wouldn't the level of bureaucracy be proportional to the size and age of a dept? And, with the military being our largest and oldest dept, wouldn't you expect it to be the most bureaucratic and, by your definition, the most inefficient and untrustworthy?
Good points, then, Daddio. I'd concur.
Thanks for visiting GMT, love the quotes.
"This particular administration--I do trust."
This is a theme that keeps coming up . . . people who acknowledge that skepticism of government in general is a good thing, but say "this administration we trust."
No doubt that Gee-Dub is a very charismatic fellow, and in times of crisis there's a tendency to rally behind strong personalities in leadership positions, but once you look past the individual in the Big Chair, isn't this particular administration essentially the same as the Nixon, Reagan, and Bush I administrations? Those driving the policies and setting the agenda are, after all, longtime members of the Reep establishment (notably Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rove), the same folks who thought building up the Afghani mujahideen, arming Iran, and backing Saddam was great strategy.
It's a faction that was merely active within the foreign policy structures of past administrations but which, in the wake of 9/11, appears to have taken over this administration outright.
I just don't see how we can trust them now, absent any evidence they've changed their ways.
By the way, Dan, if you're looking for a conservative opinion source which is not partisan in the slightest, the libertarian newsletter from LewRockwell.com is essential. This piece is a good place to start.
Excellent points, Cat. And thanks for the links.
"This administration I do trust..."
Hmmmm...Okay. Why? On what basis?
This is where I find a brick wall, getting answers like, "He's a
Christian." or "He means what he says." What it comes down to is a hunch. Some are trusting some leaders based upon a hunch, their best guess.
And that's troubling.
I asked the former pastor I used to worked with why he supported Bush and he said because the man never wavers. I said, yeah, but what if the direction Bush is taking you is straight over a cliff to your demise? He said "yes even then". Whew!
As the saying goes: "A wise man changes his mind, a fool never."
I suppose it is a question of what you feel is the natural role of government. I think many, including myself, at times, trust our military too much, and think it is incapable of much wrong, that it is always asking in our best interests. Nevertheless, I do believe the military itself is necessary, although it is far from perfect. That's why I disagreed with, for instance, Michael Moore insinuating in Bowling for Columbine that manufacturing missiles is equivalent to the Columbine murders. Yes, we may disagree with how the missiles are used, but we still need them.
And yes, the military is a huge bureaucracy itself. The more I see, the more I am opposed to socialized health care. Why? Because there is no free market alternative to the military (unless you an anarchist, perhaps), whereas I believe a free market health care system works better.
I hope that helps. In short, someone like myself believes a military is necessary (not that you are saying the opposite), but I see alternatives to the governmetn in other areas of spending.
castrophile, the article looks good, but the $43 million given to the Taliban has been discredited by multiple sources. The overall article looks good though.
I am glad to see you moving toward understanding and commonality rather than moving toward further division and misunderstanding like I have seen so often lately.
Now, as for this administration, I don't trust it. I never have. But, I had to pick one, so I chose Bush over Gore and Bush over Kerry. It's not like there was much of a choice, you know. But, I feel that I have to support the administration to some extent. Otherwise, NOTHING gets done. That's what happens in Congress so often. Two different ways of acheiving the same goal end up causing nothing to be done. The immigration debate is just one example. So is the Social Security debate.
To some extent both economic policies will work some, but neither will solve all the problems we face. We have to pick one, and thus, I pick conservativism because it rewards hard work and provides motivation for laziness. In regards to military spending, we don't have much choice as long as crazies like Kim Jong-Il are shooting off missiles into the Sea of Japan.
Thanks for the comments, all. A couple of thoughts.
Chance said:
"Because there is no free market alternative to the military"
Well, sure there is. Nations have often hired mercenaries, right? We apparently are, currently.
We have our own military (as overly large as I think it is) for the same reason that socialized medicine might (MIGHT - maybe not - I don't have a firm position) make sense.
Some problems/issues are so large and of such a corporate nature that dealing with it corporately begins to make some sense. Same reason why we do some roads on a federal level.
Now, myself, I always prefer a local answer where possible but sometimes, it may just be wiser to use a larger response. It seems to me.
DR said:
"We have to pick one, and thus, I pick conservativism because it rewards hard work and provides motivation for laziness."
This is suggesting a more liberal answer doesn't reward hard work and encourages laziness. This would get to one of the points of my post: I don't suppose that conservatives or liberals want to encourage laziness (big lazy corporate bosses making money off hard workers, for instance).
We all value and honor hard work. Social workers strive to help people who've fallen on hard times find motivation and needed tools to work hard and get out of their dire straits. Don't suggest that one side values hard work and the other doesn't, please, because it isn't true.
And back to my question: IF "conservatives" are opposed to Big Gov't, why wouldn't they vote for the party that is producing smaller gov't? Why would they trust a leader that they don't trust to a trillion dollars, a massive military and thousands of nukes? That just sounds insane to me.
Dan,
The question at the end of your post smacks of being rhetorical, but an answer would be that it is the function of the federal government to defend the country with bombs and missles but it is not a function of the federal government to lift anyone from poverty: (source of this would be the Constitution).
Bush is not a conservative by any recognizable definition of the word. He is a globalist (aka, plunderer). Things are fomenting rather rapidly around the world to clearly demonstrate the folly of globalism.
"He who will trouble his own house shall inherit the wind."
"it is the function of the federal government to defend the country with bombs and missles but it is not a function of the federal government to lift anyone from poverty..."
Says you.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
"Provide for the common defense" could mean many things, including bombs and guns. "Promoting the general welfare," likewise, could mean many things. A lot depends on what one thinks makes a country safe and well, seems to me.
Dan, the word you are overlooking is general.
The government doesn't assess an individual's ability to defend themselves and then use the military to defend some people but not others, hence its role is to provide common defense.
General welfare is the same thing. The government is ordained to promote conditions that allow, encourage, and facilitate people to avoid poverty, all people equally. Singling out an individual and getting him out of poverty by means of individual largesse was not the intent and today is not the role of government. Nor is it a good idea.
Again, says you.
I think that perhaps the single best thing that we can do to promote the common defense is to live within our means. There are more ways than one to defend ourselves.
Likewise, I find it helps promote the general welfare of the US when there are fewer homeless, when folk are better-educated (which I'll gladly concede doesn't alway coincide with "more-schooled").
That's up to We, the People to come together to decide what it means to promote our common defense and general welfare, right?
And still, my question remains valid:
Why, if one does not trust gov't, would one gladly grant it all this destructive power and money? I understand that our constitution says the gov't is to promote our common defense but if you (the generic you, out there) don't trust the gov't like I don't trust the gov't, then why give more money and bombing power than is necessary to JUST defend ourselves against attack?
THAT is how I interpret that common defense. Sure, we could expand that to mean that our gov't will spend trillions and trillions to spy on every possible country and individual to prevent "future crimes" or even the notion of future crimes - and I'd say we're much closer to that than a "common defense" - but then we'd have a truly massive gov't and, I'd suggest, more need for defense than ever. And so we could invest trillions more and...
Our military exploits are being conducted to keep our unsustainable lifestyle going just a little longer. In other words, it's not defence, it's plunder.
We the people have come together to decide what promotes our "defense" and our "welfare". Oh, sure, we have the vote at the polling place, but just take a glance back over your shoulder at the past four or five presidents (and congresses) and see what an efective tool for change that is (not!). Yes indeed, we've come together and decided that we want to consume a record amount of gasoline, borrow record amounts of money, import record amounts of goods, become idle in record numbers. The concensus is nearly unanimous. No amount of head wagging, tongue clicking, and general disapproval will every amount to more than flautulance in a hurricane so long as that concensus holds.
As to education, you might have a point, it would promote the general welfare. But it can't be done through government schools, schools of any type, and so there is no convenient target at which to fling armloads of money. Rather the education that is needed is to dispell such ridiculous notions as "I've got a black thumb, I can't grow any of my own food." "There's a guy who lives under the bridge who doesn't have a place to grow his own food or provide his own fuel, so it's OK if I don't either until we figure out a way for everyone to do it."
We might try educating people that driving across country to attend conferences and protests such as the recent one near here in Carbo, Va, is contradictory because if they, the protestors, didn't have the spare fuel and idle time to protest, the protest probably wouldn't be needed to begin with.
We might try educating people that the bad things that happen in their lives almost always have a lot more to do with stupid decisions than circumstances.
But I do have my suspicions that this is not the curriculum you had in mind.
That would indeed be exactly part of the curriculum I'd advocate, if I were the Educator General. Haven't you heard anything I've said?
This is an obscure reference, but I'll go for it none the less.
In Ingemar Bergman's The Seventh Seal the Knight and his Squire are returning from the Cursades to Sweden. There is a man in a hood sitting against a stump and the Squire dismounts and asks the man where is the inn. When the man doesn't answer, the Squire shakes him and the man falls over revealing that he is a decomposed corpse who has some time back died of the plague.
The pair ride on and presently the Knight asks:
"Did he tell you how to get to the inn?"
"No, my lord."
"Then what did he tell you?"
"Nothing my lord."
"He was a mute?"
"No, my lord, he spoke most eloquently!"
So, Dan, I indeed might not have been listening .... none the less, you have spoken most eloquently.
Again, then, I must ask you to pardon the hell out of me that I don't live up to your standards, Eleutheros.
I wonder, do even you live up to your standards, then? Who's paying for the electricity for your computer? From what source does it come? How about the computer itself, did you build that out of tree bark and moss? I note that you are willing to accept those dollars that you don't believe in for your business.
Gee, a guy can't even agree with you and get along with you...
Dan:"Gee, a guy can't even agree with you and get along with you..."
If you could, of what possible benefit would I be? You have, as do we all, an ample number of people willing to crawl up our backsides and we are whetted not a whit for it.
So to your consternation I say, "Your're welcome."
Now as to standards, you seem to be indulging in absolutes. I must needs use no electricty at all before I can point out the ruinous use by others? My turn to say 'thanks' for having to go that far to find a critique. I knew you were a fan all along.
Here's a more realistic standard: what if everyone lived like you do (or expected to live like you do)? If everyone lived like I do, there'd be plenty to go around for everyone. And of course I'm not just talking about what I consume but also what I produce.
There's no need to fight wars for my two gallons or so of gasoline a week. No one's resources need be plundered for my modest stack of firewood. No one goes hungry half way around the world for my crust of cornbread and bean pottage. Most of the clothes I wear would have just been clogging up a landfill had I not gotten them from the used clothing outfits, so no one stooping their life away to clothe me.
Yes, I suppose I do have a couple of standards, now that you point it out.
1. Before proposing to speak on behalf of some group or the poor in general, first live no more grandly than they do. That is, produce as much goods as they must do and consume no more than they can.
2. Before critiquing the actions of government and business, remove oneself from being part of the cause of those actions.
Of course, I'm perfectly safe from my own standards because I am not trying to save the world or champion some group. I'm also indifferent to what the administration does, it's only our dog doing our consumerist bidding. I don't live a hardscrabble life to save the word, that's just a unintended side effect.
If you and I were visiting a mutual friend in the hospital and he began gasping for breath, and while you were shouting for the nurse, I'd be trying to get your foot from off the fellow's respirator tube.
Now your original question was how could someone advocate withholding a relative pittance for the "poor" while endorsing the great fortune spent on bombs and missles. I have done nothing more than restate your question in light of pulling back the veil to show the underlying causes of both the poverty and the bombs an asked, "How can one lavish their efforts shouting at an impotent windmill (Bush) rather than decrying the unabated parasitic plunder that underlies the problem."
Gee, Dan, a fellow can't even agree with you (in essence) without interrupting your monolog with the windmill ....
chance: "the $43 million given to the Taliban has been discredited"
I'm not sure which $43 million you mean, or how it's been discredited. I'm talking about the deep and enthusiastic support provided for the Islamist guerrilas who would become al-Qaeda back when they were helping us draw the Soviets into a protracted war for Afghanistan. I know all the standard arguments for why we needed to make such shady deals to fight the Soviets . . . my problem is that as long as we accept that sort of reasoning, we'll just keep making those same shady deals and creating new enemies which we'll have to take down in the future. Which is fine, if you're a "defense" consortium looking for perpetual war.
eleutheros: "Bush is not a conservative by any recognizable definition of the word. He is a globalist (aka, plunderer)."
Ding, ding, ding! This is the simple fact that it's taking most conservatives way too long to recognize. Once you get past the rhetoric (and even the administration's rhetoric is more centrist/populist, IMO) and look at the policies, there's nothing conservative about them. They are eagerly expanding the scope and reach of government, as well as spending up a storm.
These folks only resemble conservatives to the extent that they oppose any regulation of the activities of their major campaign donors. The rest of us can rot in jail for all they care -- since the "corrections" industry is one of said major donors.
El said:
"How can one lavish their efforts shouting at an impotent windmill (Bush) rather than decrying the unabated parasitic plunder that underlies the problem."
And that's what I try to do here and in my life. Not there yet, thank you very much, but striving.
And thanks for the response, catastrophile, on the numbers. That's what I thought, too, but hadn't researched it.
It's late and tomorrow I have to update my blog to finish my peace camp reports. So, I'll bypass comment on why ANYONE would trust an administration which has not only been caught repeatedly lying to us, but has bragged that it WILL do so "to protect us" (isn't that the definition of tyranny?). I remember Watergate and it was a college hazing compared to the utter lawlessness of this administration. But I'll let that go.
I like the attempt to seek more common ground by realizing that today the labels "conservative" and "liberal" have almost zero real content in the U.S. (There was a recent poll that showed that over 3/4 of Americans held to mostly "liberal" positions on policies, but, when asked to identify themselves, over half picked the term "conservative.")
The ruling ideology is not conservative but fascist and this is why true conservatives like Bob Barr and George Will have raised serious objections to both the NSA spying and the so-called Patriot Act, while the number of high-ranking retired generals calling for an end to torture and closing of Gitmo is growing.
I long-ago ceased to self-identify as "liberal" because the term has so little real content. But I don't refuse the term because I won't try to dodge or evade. Instead I usually just say that my political philosophy is that of a democratic socialist and if someone calls that "liberal"---well and good.
Your "earth" category makes sense. Does my inclusion in "Wind" make me a windbag, friend?
I was thinking more along the lines of the Rushing Wind of the Spirit, bro.
Michael:"The ruling ideology is not conservative but fascist"
From a purely economic view, this is quite true.
In capitalism individuals own the means to production.
In socialism/communism the state owns the means to production.
In fascism individuals own the means to production but the state regulates it so closely that only the favored few can engage in business.
We clearly have a fascist economic system.
"Your "earth" category makes sense. Does my inclusion in "Wind" make me a windbag"
When the world viewed itself with a more mystical eye rather than a scientific one, everything was seen as being composed of 'esseneces' or 'elements'. Modern physicist point to the medievalists' scheme and deride the ignorance of thinking that everything was composed of only four elements. Modern scientists have no soul and completely misuderstand the role of mysticism in explaining the universe.
Earth deals with physical production and prosperity.
Water deals with the emotions.
Air (or wind) deals with the intellect.
Fire deals with the animation or life force.
These are the four essences and they permeate everything. When Earth has sway, it is autumn, fire in summer, water in spring, wind in winter.
A person's personality is sanquine (bood, fire), phlematic (phlem, water), melancholic (melancholy = Greek for "black bile", air -- intellect, thinks too much) etc.
Mysteriously binding all these four esseneces is the fifth essence (or "quintessence") ether or spirit.
To the world was intended to move along harmoniously with the essences in balance and to the mystic all the ills of the world (such as disease) can be explained because the essences are out of balance.
Thanks for the elements explanation, eleutheros and Dan.
We agree on capitalism (except the way that large corporations work to prevent many individuals from owning any means of production), fascism (Mussolini defined it as state power united with corporate power), and Communism or "state capitalism," most of which has called itself "socialist." But democratic socialism doesn't have the state run most businesses (maybe a few key industries that are vital for the common good). I believes in markets and private enterprise--but with the state setting market groundrules for the common good. It works for "marketplace democracy," in different ways, such as strong labor unions, worker-owned businesses, coops, and getting "the bottom line" to be not just maximizing profits for shareholders but working for the good of all STAKEHOLDERS, including the community and the environment.
Just as the U.S. Constitution sought to create a democratic republic with separation of powers and checks and balances so that no one branch of government got too much power, so social democrats like myself want checks and balances on corporations because without them they become large, unchecked centers of power--and usually act in tyrannical ways that become a cancer on the body politic--or even the world.
Michael,
It appears we have identified the same problem and agree on it. What passes for modern capitalism has one great, gaping flaw in it, and this flaw will be its downfall. Rather than the concept of the worker owning the means to his own income (his tools, machines, horses, land, raw materials, etc), it has come to include shareholders and stockholders who are in essence and function just idle parasites on the system.
I know we are conditioned to view the welfare recipient as a useless parasite but the idle stockholder as "creating jobs" or some such prattle. But that's just a view, in function they are the same, using goods and services without doing any of the work for them themselves.
What the present scheme leads to is corporations (and therefore idle shareholders) viewing the worker as just another resource. Human labor becomes part of the capital that the corporation pays for and owns.
But starting from that possible common ground, we go in entirely different directions for the solution. Rather than more and more regulations on business, I'd eliminate them all entirely. All of them. Even for doctors and food processors and such.
Instead I'd place the burden for choosing good and safe products and services on the consumer.
Regulations and unions, says I, have always lead to guilds and a robust guild system is very akin to fascism.
I do think we are close, "e," if not identical, in our diagnosis of the problem. But, you are right, we don't agree at all on the solution--although I do think your emphasis on simplicity and opting out of much of the consumption racket is PART of the answer. I am not a fan of rugged individualism because I, as a Christian, believe we are created to be interdependent: just in a different fashion from top-down, heirarchical, corporate globalism. And, frankly, I believe that complete deregulation will mean the soon end of the earth, friend.
I think that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with collectivism, that we are, in fact, predisposed to "interdependence" -- but it is a sort of collectivism which is voluntary by necessity. Families and friends form de facto collectives at will, and individuals are taken into or kicked out of these groups, again, at will. This is how society came about, and this is how it will continue. Government cannot hope to improve on it -- can, at best, provide a cold shadow of the warmth of a voluntary collective.
Eleutheros' example of the artist trying to barter his work is an example of why the voluntary aspect is an essential part -- because it is simply an extreme demonstration of the fact that value is a wholly subjective concept. The savvy artist and the price gouging storekeep will both tell you that a thing is worth whatever somebody is willing to pay for it. Market prices reflect a broad degree of agreement on the value of a thing, but by no means is it an objective standard, as can be demonstrated by the fluctuation which occurs in every market from day to day.
Similarly, for any individual, the value of helping to sustain another individual is entirely subjective. Want to let a friend crash on your couch, rent-free? It's your call. Want to spend the fruit of several weeks' labor on a piece of colored canvas that will never do anything other than please your eye? Your choice. It's when these decisions start getting made by people with no essential connection to those impacted by them that collectivism falls apart.
One reason why most progressives are not actually socialists - despite claims to the contrary by many on the Right. I've no desire for the gov't to enforce collectivism.
On the other hand, if we can save money by investing assistance, then it only makes fiscal sense to me to do so (as in the case of paying to help convicts in prison to go to school, because educated convicts have lower recidivism, thereby saving us money rather than costing.)
Of course, we are part of a forced collective, to the extent that we are all taxed to fund a military machine which ostensibly exists to protect our collective interests. And it will, necessarily, reach into every part of our lives. As long as that is the case, it's necessary for every individual to use his voice to influence the decisions being made, to try and ensure that things are administered in a just fashion.
Eisenhower knew that the rise of the defense industry had the potential to fundamentally change our existence as Americans. Well, it has. The power of the profiteers who feed at the government trough has grown to the point where countervailing influence is necessary to reverse the redistribution of wealth the war machine has wrought, if we are to have anything like the free market that conservatives talk about.
Excellent points, catastrophile. We have become what we are due to the hypersuccess of capitalism and we'll likely be undone by that very success.
That's a great story. Waiting for more. Starwood 401k csplans Hornet alarm security system Garland tooth whitening Ccab and cisco and canada Fitness center coupons 2006 Electoral college + democracy Send document to fax machine new hampshire payday loans maritime life assurance company debt Assuming a mortgage vs refinancing Skateboarding camera backpacks hawaii payday advance dealers porsche in canada
Post a Comment