Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Something I need to expand on
It strikes me that some of the differences between today's political Right and Left are tellingly evidenced by their response to victimization:
The Right, when attacked, typically seeks means to fight back. On the issues. This is an OPTIMISTIC stance, "nobler in the mind ... to take arms against a sea of troubles, and, by opposing, end them".
The Left, to my mind, tends to seek compensation. To divert resources from the undamaged to the damaged. This is a PESSIMISTIC stance. "If it moves, tax it, if it stops moving, subsidize it."
On terrorism:
Right ..................... Left
----- ..................... ----
direct .................... indirect
active .................... passive
offensive ................. defensive
long-term ................. short-term
pragmatic solutions ....... despair over 'root causes'
good vs. evil ............. moral equivalence
oppose .................... appease
reform the sources ........ respect other cultures
name the enemy ............ join the victim
profile them .............. say 'Tim McVeigh' over and over
start now ................. wait for threat to be imminent
On poverty or race:
reward success ............. ameliorate failure
benefit from progress ...... foster perpetual client status
celebrate 'best practices' . solidarity with those worst off
attract the ambitious ...... retain the hopeless
educate .................... raise awareness
work ....................... nurse grievances
Obviously I could keep that up for quite a while, on many issues, but I'm not going to reach a thorough synthesis today. I started thinking along the lines of optimism vs pessimism, fixing problems vs perpetuating compensation while thinking of the current arguments over distribution of federal Homeland Security money to state and local governments. Of course the per-capita approach seems silly when one equates the terrorist threat to Idaho with that to New York city... But neither should we give preferential treatment to places with potential problems, lest we reward dysfunction. The reductio ad absurdum here would be: should Hollywood get extra money based on demonstrable terrorist sympathies in its population? How many pro-terrorist fatwahs could Detroit's mayor get the imams of his city to issue, if it would mean federal subsidies pour in?
There is no 'conservative' approach to this problem: if the federal money flow becomes a permanent program, more needs will always crop up and the squeakiest wheels will get the grease. The Republican answer should be: stay on offense, solve the problem over there, don't keep paying for ever-more-perfect defenses here.
It is strange how the ossification of Democratic Party policies continues to make the label 'conservative' continue to stretch out and include new ideas. Are we Republicans now not just the 'big-tent' but 'expanding-tent' party? How did we get the Log Cabin (that is, gay) Republicans? Just because the Democrats' identity politics model won't admit anyone who dissents from other parts of their platform. Rudy Giuliani is a Republican despite being 'pro-choice' because we are not a one-issue party; but it is an article of faith (yes, faith) for the Democrats that Republican rule will usher in a theocracy. 'Conservative' is a label increasingly seen as a positive one even among young people, 'conservative activist' is not seen as an oxymoron any more... If only for didactic purposes we may have to start calling our movement 'Traditional American' instead of 'conservative', before we get too far from the dictionary definition. And then what do we get to call our opponents, 'Utopian Europeans'? Maybe 'Post-dialectic Marxists', I'd like that.
The Right, when attacked, typically seeks means to fight back. On the issues. This is an OPTIMISTIC stance, "nobler in the mind ... to take arms against a sea of troubles, and, by opposing, end them".
The Left, to my mind, tends to seek compensation. To divert resources from the undamaged to the damaged. This is a PESSIMISTIC stance. "If it moves, tax it, if it stops moving, subsidize it."
On terrorism:
Right ..................... Left
----- ..................... ----
direct .................... indirect
active .................... passive
offensive ................. defensive
long-term ................. short-term
pragmatic solutions ....... despair over 'root causes'
good vs. evil ............. moral equivalence
oppose .................... appease
reform the sources ........ respect other cultures
name the enemy ............ join the victim
profile them .............. say 'Tim McVeigh' over and over
start now ................. wait for threat to be imminent
On poverty or race:
reward success ............. ameliorate failure
benefit from progress ...... foster perpetual client status
celebrate 'best practices' . solidarity with those worst off
attract the ambitious ...... retain the hopeless
educate .................... raise awareness
work ....................... nurse grievances
Obviously I could keep that up for quite a while, on many issues, but I'm not going to reach a thorough synthesis today. I started thinking along the lines of optimism vs pessimism, fixing problems vs perpetuating compensation while thinking of the current arguments over distribution of federal Homeland Security money to state and local governments. Of course the per-capita approach seems silly when one equates the terrorist threat to Idaho with that to New York city... But neither should we give preferential treatment to places with potential problems, lest we reward dysfunction. The reductio ad absurdum here would be: should Hollywood get extra money based on demonstrable terrorist sympathies in its population? How many pro-terrorist fatwahs could Detroit's mayor get the imams of his city to issue, if it would mean federal subsidies pour in?
There is no 'conservative' approach to this problem: if the federal money flow becomes a permanent program, more needs will always crop up and the squeakiest wheels will get the grease. The Republican answer should be: stay on offense, solve the problem over there, don't keep paying for ever-more-perfect defenses here.
It is strange how the ossification of Democratic Party policies continues to make the label 'conservative' continue to stretch out and include new ideas. Are we Republicans now not just the 'big-tent' but 'expanding-tent' party? How did we get the Log Cabin (that is, gay) Republicans? Just because the Democrats' identity politics model won't admit anyone who dissents from other parts of their platform. Rudy Giuliani is a Republican despite being 'pro-choice' because we are not a one-issue party; but it is an article of faith (yes, faith) for the Democrats that Republican rule will usher in a theocracy. 'Conservative' is a label increasingly seen as a positive one even among young people, 'conservative activist' is not seen as an oxymoron any more... If only for didactic purposes we may have to start calling our movement 'Traditional American' instead of 'conservative', before we get too far from the dictionary definition. And then what do we get to call our opponents, 'Utopian Europeans'? Maybe 'Post-dialectic Marxists', I'd like that.
