Professor Bainbridge...on law, politics, religion, culture & food
The Meme of the Day: How Has the Iraq War Changed Your Views?
Rod Dreher started the meme with five lessons learned, including:
I no longer implicitly trust governmental institutions, including the military -- neither in their honesty nor their competence.
How could anyone who calls himself a conservative have ever trusted governmental institutions "implicitly"? Did Dreher never hear Ronald Reagan say that the 9 scariest words in the English language were: "I’m from the government and I’m here to help"?
Daniel Larison continues the meme with six of his own. (HT: Sullivan) The first makes precisely the point I just made:
First among these was my assumption that most Americans who called themselves conservatives distrusted government and feared the expansion of government power. That was the conservatism I had been raised with, and it seemed to be the one that had a visceral appeal to a large number of conservatives during the ’90s. Obviously, this conservatism is held by only a fairly small number of conservatives, and, as wiser people than I have known all along, the popularity of a “roll back the state” message is extremely superficial.
It's scary how many so-called conservatives allowed 9/11 to blind them to Ben Franklin's aphorism that "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security." Or, as Edmund Burke put it, "the true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts." Instead, we handed Bush a blank check to massively expand government and chip away at civil liberties.
Larison continues:
"Here I think he errs on two points. First, conservatism is more than just visceral dislike.”
Professor, I think Larison is right on the mark on this point. Remember, Larison knows that these “conservatives” with whom he is taking issue are not really conservatives, but rather opportunists and a collection of whack-jobs that Rove and Co. have brought into the fold for political advantage instead of for the purpose of advocating conservative principles. I think American conservatives were thrilled with the powerful machine that Delay, Gingrich, Rove, and talk radio built, but I think that they turned a blind eye to who they were accumulating as supporters. I think both liberals and conservatives in America have adherents that they should not be proud of, but I think there is a recent difference between the two in the way that the GOP appealed to and mobilized their less savory, populist-types. I think the true conservatives are now watching their party destroyed by these people who were recruited for their brand-loyalty instead of their principles. Looking at it from the other side, I could not be more pleased as a liberal that Air America has failed to take off, and that Moveon.org has also seemed to plateau in its growth.
Professor,
Could you please justify the statements regarding our “loss of civil liberties?” I too am a conservative disgusted with Bush but the idea that his administration has presided over some great loss of civil liberties has always struck me as quite silly and weakens what are usually otherwise cogent criticisms,
Professor:
“Not that I would have voted for Gore or Kerry, of course”
Why not? In 20/20 hindsight, do you honestly believe that Gore or Kerry (particularly with a Republican-controlled Congress) would have put us in an overall worse position than Bush? Please expound on this.
PB REPLIES: Abortion. Taxes. Regulation. Their smug paternalism. And so on.
Next entry: Eliot Spitzer is a Thug
Previous entry: Spitzer = Nixon?
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I voted for Bush in 2000 as a mediocre alternative to Al Gore.
By 2004 I voted for “none of the above.”
I did not think we could ever repeat anything close to the Viet Nam mess. Guess I was wrong.
Bush (and his administration) are incompetent and seem to have forgotten anything they ever knew about ethics.
And if they are going to play “hardball” politics they should at least do it competently.