CONSERVATIVES & LIBERALS

Conservatives don't like change, except possibly when it is to their advantage.  As change happens, conservatives regret it and want to "turn back the clock."  Liberals love change and are likely to plunge into changes where the unintended consequences are not thought through.  Liberals are not content with the status quo.

Certain ideals of conservatives are certainly admirable such as taking responsibility for your actions.  This is a basic tenant of the Twelve Step Programs, for example.  They also want strict sexual social strictures, especially for others.  In practice, obeying these turns out to be very hard to do for many conservatives.  Liberals do not have sexual strictures.  There is an old joke that conservatives pull their shades and draw the curtains at night but probably don't need to, whereas liberals don't pull their shades or draw their curtains at night  but probably ought to.  But liberals do have strictures and can have a hard time obeying them.  Liberals want low-cost health care for all, but they refuse to reform torts that drive up the cost of medicine.

Liberals want to allow a "reasonable" amount of  personable irresponsibility so that a person's life is not damaged permanently by some small indiscretion.  A problem is when does "reasonable" turn out to be "unreasonable?"  The boundary is ill defined.  Liberals tend to be social libertarians  whereas conservatives tend to be unfettered business libertarians.

A true conservative does not believe in debt, either in their personal lives or for government.  Many will not borrow money under any conditions: not to buy a car or even a home.  Though they might say otherwise, many liberals dote on debt, both in their personal lives and especially for government.  Thus conservatives are wary of big government and liberals feel that big government is needed to handle big problems and is a social good.

All this led me to develop a phrase many years ago that "Liberals may want to get into our wallets but conservatives want to get into our bedrooms."  Liberals gravitate to the Democratic Party, conservatives gravitate to the Republican Party.  One has only to look at the present election to see this phrase in action.

As an aside, what about libertarians?  They are torn between the Democratic Party where the social libertarian strictures are and the Republican Party where the unfettered business oriented libertarians are. There is a Libertarian Party, of course, that is not very influential.  It turns out, therefore, that libertarians congregate in the Republican Party where the anti-government, unfettered business faction is.

More recently, I have discovered another definition that has a lot of merit: liberals emphasize groups (Blacks, women, Hispanics, unions, lawyers) and community whereas conservatives emphasize individualism,  family, and community.  You can see this when Hillary Clinton wrote a book "It Takes A Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us."  On the other hand, Bob Dole in his acceptance speech for Republican candidate for President said "... it does not take a village to raise a child. It takes a family to raise a child."  There is much to be said about what I call the Kansas conservative, a rugged individualist, but when someone's barn burns down, the community rises to rebuild it.  As one farmer said, "We were doing all right before 'gimmie' politics."  If a community is destroyed by something like a natural disaster, liberals have government step in to help restore the community.  It is the difference between the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake where the Federal government did not get involved  and the 2005New Orleans Hurricane Katrina where the Federal government got heavily involved in the recovery.

You can see it again in President Obama's statement when he said "If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business -- you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet." **  This created a firestorm among many "self-made" business people who worked very hard to create their business, and thus feel they did it all by themselves.  Creating a successful business IS HARD, and I doubt that President Obama would dispute that.  Only 51% of new businesses last more than five years***  So I wish President Obama hadn't used a phrase like "you didn't do that" and "somebody else made that happen." He could have made the point less insulting, I believe (e.g "We stand on the shoulders of giants," for example). But without the community, we wouldn't be nearly the advanced nation we are now.  The internet was developed by the USAID.****  Another modern marvel is GPS that was developed by the DoD.  But once again see the difference between a group/community centered approach (liberalism) and individualism/community (conservative).

What about wanting a strong military?  This issue is complex.  When the Solid South was in the Democratic party, they were the war party: WW-I, WW-II, Korea, and the big buildup in Viet Nam.  The Republican Party tended to be isolationist; however, when the Solid South became the Southern Strategy of the Republican Party, the Republican Party became the war party but the isolationist wing is still there too.  I think maybe that conservatives feel that you cannot be too safe and therefore approve of a strong military far beyond what is needed.

Note added August 31,2012:  The conservative (center right) columnist David Brooks has written an op=ed piece for the NY Times that seems to be in agreement with much of the above: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/31/opinion/party-of-strivers.html?ref=davidbrooks

For a further commentary on liberalism, see "In The End Liberalism Wins" (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2009/12/in-end-liberalism-wins.html)


* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Takes_a_Village
** http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2012/07/17/foxification_rescuing_romney.html
*** http://www.businessknowhow.com/startup/business-failure.htm
**** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Internet