The GOP and Revitalizing the ‘Voluntary Community’
Conservatives are getting plenty of advice from both friend and foe alike on how to navigate the new electoral waters that have arisen as a result of Barack Obama’s back-to-back election victories. It’s demographics, say some. Others think that embracing issues prized by Hispanics, women, and youth will make the right more politically competitive.
But if the key to conservatives becoming relevant again is to be found in changing their positions or tweaking their message when it comes to immigration, abortion, or gay marriage, few on the right would accept such advice. And indeed, they shouldn’t. Embracing amnesty will not make Hispanics more Republican any more than taking the anti-abortion plank out of the party platform will cause more women to vote for the GOP.
The reason is that these “fixes” are superficial — rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The real problem conservatives have goes to the very heart of what America is and must continue to be if our most precious principles and values are to be saved.
At its most basic, America is about community. But the conservative definition of community no longer resonates with the growing numbers of Americans who traditionally were banned from joining and participating in that community. Indeed, minorities, many women, gays, and young people had little use for the kind of community described by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan in their speeches. That’s because the modern state has twisted the very nature of what community should be, substituting an entirely new — and alien — definition for the traditional notion that community should be “governed by love and charity, not by compulsion,” as Russell Kirk put it.
In fact, as William Schambra points out in an article in National Affairs, like everything else in modern American society, that state has appropriated the notion of community for its own ends:
The age of Obama has been an age of revival for the Progressive ideal of a “national community.” It is a vision rooted in two core beliefs: that direct, local associations and channels of action are too often overwhelmed by the differences among communities and the fractious character of American public life; and that rather than strengthening the sources of these differences, modern government should seek to overcome them in the service of a coherent national ambition. By distributing the same benefits, protections, and services to all Americans, fellow feeling and neighborliness can be fostered among the public; combined with the power of the national government and professional expertise, this communal sentiment can then become a valuable weapon for attacking America’s most pressing social problems.
Contrast this “community by compulsion” with Russell Kirk’s “voluntary community”:
In a genuine community, the decisions most directly affecting the lives of citizens are made locally and voluntarily. Some of these functions are carried out by local political bodies, others by private associations: so long as they are kept local, and are marked by the general agreement of those affected, they constitute healthy community. But when these functions pass by default or usurpation to centralized authority, then community is in serious danger. Whatever is beneficent and prudent in modern democracy is made possible through cooperative volition. If, then, in the name of an abstract Democracy, the functions of community are transferred to distant political direction—why, real government by the consent of the governed gives way to a standardizing process hostile to freedom and human dignity.
Conservatives believe that by shrinking government, by taming the Leviathan, the voluntary community can reassert itself and sweep away the collectivist nature of modern society — that we can return to an idyllic past where local communities governed themselves, individual rights rarely conflicted with the needs of the community, and the need for a big government in Washington was lessened considerably.
But for blacks, Hispanics, gays, and other minorities (who gave more than 70% of their vote to Barack Obama), this is a nightmare scenario. It was just these kinds of “voluntary communities” that denied their basic freedoms and caused Washington to step in and guarantee their constitutional rights. It didn’t take much hinting from the Obama campaign that this, in fact, was the goal of Republicans: disenfranchise blacks and Hispanics, put gays back in the closet, force women back in the kitchen, and deny worthy young people a chance to go to college. Having been nurtured in the “national community,” those who suffered as a result of a disproportionate emphasis on protecting individual rights naturally look upon the conservative definition of “community” with a jaundiced eye.
But there is a price to pay for membership in the new national community: one must deliver up his soul in order to belong. The communitarian impulse in a national community subsumes individualism and individual rights, as the needs of society outweigh the rights of its members. But the yearning for community, even in totalitarian societies, will cause individuals to give up a lot in order to belong. Robert Nisbet wrote, “The extraordinary accomplishments of totalitarianism in the twentieth century would be inexplicable were it not for the immense, burning appeal it exerts upon masses of individuals who have lost, or had taken away, their accustomed roots of membership and belief.”
Nisbet’s 1953 classic The Quest for Community anticipated and described the “national community” beloved of the left while tracing the history of community through the ages. On the occasion of a new, critical edition of Nisbet’s book published by ISI, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat wrote in the introduction:
Worse still, since Obama’s elevation to the presidency, America seems once more divided between “the party of the state” and “the party of the individual.” Conservatives are cracking open Atlas Shrugged and shouting about socialism, but they seem to have lost the appetite for thinking through the problem of community in an individualistic age—which is, of course, precisely the problem that make socialism so appealing in the first place.
The state as “protector” and guarantor of minority rights in a national community is what attracts Hispanics, blacks, gays, and those who believe their right to contraception, abortion, and a college education would come under attack if Republicans gained power. We can critique this worldview by trying to dismiss these concerns as unwarranted or even specious, but that only alienates the Obama supporters further.
It’s every group for themselves. Time to realize that and work to create bonds of community in White European America with Identity Political organization.
Time to come to grips that America has changed and there will be no restoration.
White Europeans need to create their own institutions outside of the institutions that they used to control, but no longer. Otherwise they have nobody siting at the negotiating table for their interests and defending their rights not to be discriminated against, in the new balkanized multicultural America.
You are correct in your analysis of the need for white Europeans to create a National Association of Former Majority People, but you seem oblivious to the countervailing forces. Whites are not being simply displaced, they are being demonized.
What began a generation ago in universities as disdain for “dead white European males” became, when the grads went into media, a more general attack on “old white men,” which today has metastasized into constant public headlines about people, such as Republicans, who are “too white.”
The only racial laws in America today are aimed at white men. The federal courts will not turn back “affirmative action,” which enshrines this naked racism. So, clearly, white Europeans are going to be increasingly the go-to scapegoats for every future disaster. We are not going to be forgiven.
No doubt, you have the picture, all the more reason to organize. The alternative is hanging separately, picked off one at a time.
We are gonna have to fight for survival, since we pissed away our birthright and inheritance, because we were cowards and spoiled dreamers. Nature will not be ignored.
Important post, Rick. I keep up with things in my hometown via talks with family and reading the local paper online. I read about hunters giving some of their venison to the food bank, church groups raising money for families who lost their home in a fire, local businesses initiating events to raise money for the library, schoolkids organizing to help a sick classmate, and scout groups cleaning up parks after the winter. The fact that I read about them means that the community recognizes the value of such efforts and wants to honor those who are important parts of the community. I’m pretty sure the reporters don’t earn as much as those who describe Kim Kardashian’s newest outfit, but they are doing far more important work.
I disagree with #1 that America has changed so completely. Perhaps Republicans (not as Republicans, but as citizens) could start some community newsletters that young people could distribute door to door to inform residents of the unsung heroes in their midst and of event in which they could participate. Identify those who volunteer to distribute Meals on Wheels and choral groups that perform in nursing homes. Our Community Disorganizer in Chief never experienced American communities. He may not value them, but we can show him that we do.
Here’s how the country has changed.
The 2012 general election was stolen, and the infrastructure is in place to steal every future election at will.
Until and unless we get back to paper ballots, purple fingers, and picture IDs, there is no Republic.
Really? What white european america are you talking about? Do you want to live amongst the white european amerikans who voted for Obama? Do you want to embrace the racist white european american hate groups? There are pockets, often significant size ones of every race, ethnic, religious background who need to unite on conservative priniciples. Leave the who is white, black, blue, green to the demoncraps. What do real conservatives care about skin color, etc? I want governors like Niki Haley or Bobby Jindal, neighbors and tv commentators like Charles Payne (now there is someone who should be president), religious leaders like Rabbi Kanane (RIP), American military heroes of every race, color, creed, on and on, etc., not the skin head white european I used to live next to, not the RINO’s like Bush, McCain et al that have sold us (out) into slavery to Amerika, not the nutjob demoncrap white european amerikans like Reid, Pelosi, etc.
also tried to link in response to number one escape velocity comments
That happens sometimes. These comment thread processors get the hiccups sometimes.
If you dont form an interest group and lobby for your rights and interests, then government will ignore them and pander to those who do, and freely infringe upon your rights and make policy counter to your interests.
It’s a simple as that.
Furthermore, legal protection, and organized cultural promotion, are part of the package. Yes organized promotion of European Christian culture, ie society organized in a way in which you wish to promote and sustain.
But alas…you are too terrified of being called a racist for promoting European Christian cultural dominion, and assimilation to that norm, that you have lost the game before you started playing. Talking in vaguaries so as to defend yourselves from charges of ethnocentrism or worse racism.
At some point you are going to have to realize that not everybody wants to embrace European Christian culture. That the Zeitgeist is that imposing or forcing those values and principles on Others and immigrants is racist, xenophobic, and supremacist.
Youve lost control of the culture and the government/law/courts. All youve got left is organization in the private sector.
It will take some longer to realize this, and they will continue to shuffle along in self delusion.
It appears as if you’re ignoring the notion that there are many aspects of white European culture that other races would (and do) find appealing. I think the focus on skin color must be softened a lot with emphasis on what things people of all skin colors want out of life & what values we all share. IOW, what do we all have in common versus what divides us. A lot of the problem lies in the trouble people have in understanding one another. We all should be working on being open minded while we shun those who simply want to overpower us & run our lives as they see fit. Race has little to do with that.
You keep trying to solve the problem, as you see it, which is the problem. As you see it, we need to broaden the base, blur the lines, make us all one. If like were like we wanted it to be, you’d be right.
But it’s not.
The Demoncrats have moneyballed this one, alright. They learned just how to fragment us, both targeting people to drop Romney and in targeting people to vote Obama.
They would not be able to do this if you blurred any lines. In fact, they intend to fracture us further, because a shattered America won’t come to the defense of each other. It’s the old divide and conquer strategy. And nobody(read:none of them) whens if you start un-dividing things.
What right-wing hatemongers call voluntary communities are nothing more than the brutalization and enslavement of the working classes under the mericiless jack boots or corporate power. This is all right-wingers mean by voluntary–the right of greedy corporations to impoverish the people.
That is why “local control” is so important to them. Local control is the source of Jim Crow laws and the “Border Control” they adore. This institutionalized bigotry keeps White workers in a state of false consciouness. They fail to recognize their real enemies are not Blacks, Hispanics, and Muslims but the greedy billionaires in the boardrooms “voluntarily” hoarding everything!
Minority Identity Groups are the New Left Proletariat. Cultural Marxism rules.
Until you realize that this is the way of the world, you will continue down the path of folly.
Right down in Spengler’s post about Asian-Americans, several Asian Americans came on there to inform us that Asians dont like Christians. Yet we cluelessly will keep importing them, and then wonder why American Conservatism continues to lose elections. You are colonizing the place with people that are hostile to your ideological and metaphysical precepts, and rejecting imposed assimilation for multiculturalism. They dont want assimilation imposed on them, they merely want to make a buck and carve out their own territory and political space for themselves.
The terminally clueless will continue to aid and abet their own destruction and the empowerment of all “Others,” and then wonder why things arent going their way.
Time to face reality.
If Asians don’t like Christians how do you explain the fast growing numbers of Asian Christians? Or aren’t they real Asians the same way I am not a real woman and African Americans who stray from the liberal plantation aren’t real blacks.
My, what a subtle and nuanced critique.
“nothing more than the brutalization and enslavement of the working classes under the mericiless jack boots or corporate power”
did you get this from the hipster prof at the community college?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS_1bzaj2fw&feature=related
Troll much?
This isnt a Christian nation anymore, and according to the new zeitgeist, never was.
Just look at the calls for the GOP to jettison Christianity and it’s Christian positions to attract voters. Democrats have already removed references to God from their party platform, and win.
Facing hard reality is difficult, but necessary.
Christtans and Christian organizations/Churches are demonized in Academia and Popular Culture. Just look at Tim Tebow, in what Christian country is Tim Tebow a controversial figure? The Catholic Church is portrayed as a pedophile ring who wants to oppress women.
You are the counter culture, the Left is the Establishment. It’s time to start acting like it…or continue shuffling down the road of self denial and continued decline, instead of rebirth outside the institutions.
Read Article VI of the US Constitution. If the US was a Christian nation, I’d think that one would have to be a Christian to hold office. Instead, the Constitution says there is no religious test.
There you have it folks.
Just as a FYI, the Establishment Clause and the no religious tests, were Federalist restrictions on the Federal Government. What we had was a Confederation of Christian States.
What we have now is Tyranny.
So…is that a Catholic christian state, a Baptist christian state, a Calvinist christian state…or a Luthern christian state? Mebbe a Pentacostal christian state? Greek Orthodox, perhaps? Presbyterian?
‘Cause the last time we tried that sort of thing, on a continental scale,, we got the thirty years war…which pretty much lasted for over a hundred years, all told. Millions of dead people, everywhere.
Freedom of religion. Which kinda includes the idea that you don’t need to belong to one in order to be an American citizen. Freedom to excercise your own conscious. (Free will. It’s a biblical thing. You wouldn’t understand.)
One requirement for holding office in this United States…christian…christian…lemme see… Nope. It ain’t there. Ya see, technically, if America were a christian nation, we’d have a priest or a bishop of a minister of some sort holding all of the political and bureaucratic offices in America.
America is a secular nation, with freedom of religion. If you get that part wrong, nothing else will ever add up.
I know this is hard for you to comprehend, but the US government was a severely limited in scope affair, and the states were the primary sovereigns.
The States reserved to themselves the purview of addressing those questions, and prevented a tyrannical Centralized Monstrousity from dictating to the states what they could and could not do with regards to religion.
Only Virginia followed the Jeffersonian preference. All other states were Christian, explicitly.
Read the historical State Constitutions which preceded the US Constitution. Or continue being an ignorant arsehole. The choice is yours. One thing is for certain, there is a correlation between the decline of Christianity in this country and the decline of the country. But Im sure you couldnt even fathom why. Youve got the government and country you deserve and you are clueless as to why. You are a fool of Marxists…and you dont even know it, an educated yet clueless rube.
Don’t worry Wareen Bonehead, you won’t have to worry about anyone asking you to be a good samaritan or to find forgiveness in your heart. We are all free from those pesky guilt trips. Obama won and we are all Chicagoan’s now. Free from guilt trips. F&&K the Christians and all of their talk about forgiveness and charity. They are all intolerant hypocrites. Every single one of them. They deserve to be thrown to the lions due to their intolerant views.
California, Greece, Chicago. We are there baby!! We have arrived! Medicaid for everyone. Tax the rich to feed the poor until there are no rich no more!! WooHOO!! Go Obama. We have arrived.
BTW, this denial of Christians of their history and heritage is Anti-Christian (think Anti-Semitic). But haters gonna hate.
One thing is for certain, there is a correlation between the decline of Christianity in this country and the decline of the country.
Let’s see. The US is the planet’s sole superpower and has a military that can pretty much wipe out suncontinents if it chooses to do so, and it can do this with minimal casualties. US based medicine and research has whipped most of the common communicable diseases that plagued man in prior centuries; we even have a handle on many cancers and there are cures — and preventive measures — for these. The US is the home of most of the world’s significant patents in almost every subject you can name. Today the US is home to multiple private companies that are starting to conquer space, something thought impossible 100 years ago and thought to be the sole purview of national (government effort) as little as 25 years ago. I could go on but bright readers will get the idea. (You and Becky might be perplexed though.)
Back in the day before man flirted with blasphemies like evolution the average lifespan was about 55. Today it’s about 80.
Meanwhile church attendance is falling and the christian influence is declining. Yup. The US is going to the dogs all right. You got me. There’s a direct correlation between the decline in christian influence and the overall betterment of the human condition.
Yeah the US is in sure in decline.
Of course Chrstians developed science to it’s heights in Christian societies.
Moral and cultural relativism leads to tha accceptence and subsidizing of behaviors that lead to failure. When you subidize something you get more of it.
But haters are gonna hate.
Instead of the Anti-Semitic “It’s the Jews fault.” It’s now “It’s the Christians fault.” Demonization of Christians is cool and Politically Correct.
Instead of the Anti-Semitic “It’s the Jews fault.” It’s now “It’s the Christians fault.” Demonization of Christians is cool and Politically Correct.
I responded negatively to the allegation that the US is in decline, and this is what you took from it.
Seriously?
Show me the demonisation. Don’t claim it. Show it.
Hey Warren Bonehead, life is hard, but it is harder when you make up stupid stuff in an effort to appear smart. Your grasp of history is so lame as to be comical. Go read a history book.
Regarding the growth of Christianity, a quick google search could have saved you the embarassment of exposing just how lame your claims are:
“In 2010, there were 2.30 billion Christians in the world, an increase of 300 million from two billion in 2005. The increase in the Christian population was at a slightly higher rate than that of the world population, 1.3 percent per year, when the total world population increased by 1.2 percent per year. The Christian population in Asia and Africa had the highest growth with 2.6 percent and 2.4 percent, respectively, but the Christian population is declining in Europe. Although the numbers of Muslims and Hindus (1.6 billion Muslims and 870 million Hindus)[when?] are fewer than the number of Christians, the Muslim population has grown at a rate of 1.9 percent per year and the Hindu population has grown at a rate of 1.5 percent per year, however charismatic Christianity and independent churches are growing at the fastest rate, at 2.4 percent per year.[1]”
But as Escape Velocity said, the haters gotta hate. So have at it. Join the ranks of third world inhabitants who for millenia have blamed the jews instead of holding their own governments to account. You can hate the Christians now too. Two groups to blame will make your world two times better!
oh,I’m sorry, I should have addressed that to you, Randumbengineer. eh… you seem like one in the same.
Sorry bud, the last 50 years of Christian decline in the US have produced the failure that will be plain to see when the economy collapses. Out of wedlock births have risen, easy divorce rate, broken families, we killed off our offspring via abortion on demand. Our declining quality of life is on you bud.
The Christian order left you a world superpower mid 20th century. You fully support the Marxist attack on the Christian order.
Enjoy.
Becky
So… using world factbook data, you’re showing that the christian religion is growing in places that have yet to master the intricacies of indoor plumbing, and declining in places that figured it out. That’s very interesting. Is there a point you’re wanting to make, or was that it?
You have no justification for your smug attitude. You are not a Victor David Hansen. You are not even someone interested in an honest, intelligent discussion as to how we got here and how we can best move forward.
For you to say that “I can, I will, and I just did” …strip Christianity out of the equation…. in your one silly, incoherent sentence shows you to be a simpleton.
Let me give you some insight into just blinkered and ridiculous you sound: ” I can I will and I just did, in one sentence, strip Islam out of the equation of the role it played in the the Middle East, Asia and Indonesia.
ROFL.
Well, forgive him Becky…for he knows not what he does.
He is simply mouthing what the Marxist professors have taught him, and he accepted unquestionably. It sounded plausable after all.
so true
“When conservatives talk of community, they tend to call upon revered intellectual figures:Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, Russell Kirk, or Robert Nisbet”
Interesting selection. While those indeed are revered intellectual figures, there is another revered figure who had a far greater impact on Western Civilization. Hmmm…. let me think who that might be…..???
Come on, let’s all think reeeealll hard….who WAS figure who inspired inspired the true diversity of the brotherhood of man. Who was that revered figure who inspired the abolition movement because all men have worth in the eyes of God? Who was the one who inspired ideals of faith, hope and charity? Who was that revered figure???
That enough people don’t know the answer to that question, or the ideals that the revered figured inspired us to achieve, that is the sole reason that the masses believe that it is The Government, from whom all blessings flow.
Indeed Becky.
Very well said and important, Rick.
I spent enough time on the Left to know one essential difference between Left and Right: they talk good game about serving people and community, but they will do nothing if they can’t get grant money for it. I live in a small town now, and the various service clubs for men and women raise enormous amounts of money with dinners and donations and food drives. They support themselves and others. The liberal groups sit around writing grants and complaining if the government does’t pay for their hobbyhorses.
But there is a problem with this distinction: the churches have altered in character because they deliver state social services. This is no small thing. They support big government and government dependence because they are now dependent on the government, especially the Catholics, and I speak as one.
It’s definitely _not_ a matter of simply embracing liberal policies in order to woo voters who traditionally vote Democrat. It can be a matter of how we frame our policies and speak to those we hope to vote for us. The media has done an awesomely awful job of portraying the Republicans as thinking that every Hispanic is probably an illegal. We need to yank the frame back to welcoming with open arms those who enter our country through legal channels, maybe even focusing on that positive instead of always highlighting the negative. Likewise, with African-Americans, we need to show how our policies will help them, again focusing on the positive aspects. I’d suggest school choice as one policy that could easily be portrayed as helping struggling (African-American and other) families get their children quality education and a step-up on the future.
The over-all key is not so much targeting our policies, but targeting their portrayal to highlight the positive effects on various demographics. We already know that a good policy should be good for almost everyone. We have to show that to people who’ve bought the “tax cuts for the rich” nonsense.
Sorry, the Leftwing MSM will frame these issues, no matter how much perfect messeging is attempted by Conservatives.
You still dont get it. You lost the culture and the institutions of culture.
You arent going to reach people except by taking them back. Which will take a long concerted effort that is anathema to Conservative principles. It isnt going to happen.
Parrallel institutions is the way to go. And White Europeans need to organize outside the institutions for their own protection and promotion of their well being and interests given the reality of America, today.
Assimilation is no longer policy, but rather integration. Which means changing the majority traditional culture and institutions to suit all “Others.” This is why minorities vote Democrat-Left. They dont want to become you, they want what you have, it’s colonization, not immigraton.
“Parrallel institutions is the way to go. And White Europeans need to organize outside the institutions for their own protection and promotion of their well being and interests given the reality of America, today.”
How exactly can such a thing be implemented & should people of other races be excluded even if they are interested in joining such a thing?
That is the discussion that needs to be had.
Check out View from the Right blog, Taki Magazine, and Gates of Vienna blog for starters.
Here is a PJ Media conotributor Bill Whittle’s first attempt at the discussion.
Building Parallel Structures
http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/2012/11/building-parallel-structures.html
Fascinating approaches discussed; I appreciate the post. Highly recommended to everyone who sees the above link to watch. It would be something to behold if these principles could be applied to public education, starting with K-12. This would be a great way to, at the very least, garner some “equal time” with the proverbial narrative. Same thing should be considered for the media outlets.
Thanks for that link. Good stuff.
I understand the concern but when the entire point of the current federal ed reforms in K-12 and higher ed, in the US and globally, is to eliminate the concept of individuality and get the individual to defer to the group and recognize that the group comes first, this is a dangerous time for this message.
Our message needs to be that the only thing that has ever brought mass prosperity stemmed from recognizing the legitimacy of the individual to make their own decisions, not adhere to an imposed shared vision reached by consensus. That’s the mandate of the communitarianism that is a key component of what constitutes College and Career Ready or the desired beliefs that will be part of being granted a degree under the Lumina College Degree Qualifications Profile.
http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/does-common-core-target-hearts-and-minds-to-sway-future-voters/ is one of many posts I have written on the implications of this unappreciated state-enforced and data regulated new values imposed via education Communitarianism. This is not a by-product. It’s the whole point of these reforms.
We thus introduce a Republican vision of community at great peril without first appreciating the level of indoctrination and forced compliance to be going on in schools and universities on this issue. Especially since we are talking about making a rational argument to students and voters who are being primed to respond from the heart emotionally, instead of rational mind first.
I think a failure to appreciate the effects of what the Clintons unleashed in the 90s as Outcomes Based Education and the affective orientations already being mandated in higher ed is part of some of the bad analysis the RR campaign got on how to reach voters. We have almost a generation of voters who have been taught to think with their hearts not their minds and their perceptions of reality are being filtered by worldviews consciously created by ed “reforms” that were for an unappreciated political purpose. To drive this very impulse for collectivism.
Until Conservatives better understand this reality and the true definitions of these Orwellian terms, we will continue to get played at the federal level. I still do not think a majority wants to get rid of the Axemaker Mind and mass prosperity and enter a post-GDP world. But we have to understand the reality of the game being played right now.
Looks like some revitalization has been taking place among computer programmers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=u2LwnmbdiTg&NR=1
Wow, that was a stem winder- I fell asleep twice. You need to get together with Karl Rove and charge somebody 20 or 30 million to invent your new plan- it sounds like a dandy. How about instead of creating some new “community”, which in reality already exists, we stick to conservative principles and try and educate the voters as to what those principles consist of. That would mean nominating a real conservative for every position in government. No more Akins, witches, morons, or fat rino governors, just real conservatives- there are plenty out there. Then, perhaps we could start running ads on a regular basis that explain what the right is trying to bring to the table- values, jobs and security. If you can’t educate people about your tried and true principles; if 75% of Obama voters are on food stamps; if your voters won’t come out and vote for you, then it’s probably too late anyway. But for the first time in the last twenty some years how about trying to run a conservative and see how he or she would do up against the doom machine.
If you can’t educate people about your tried and true principles; if 75% of Obama voters are on food stamps; [snip]
Obama probably won certain demographics in part because the image republicans seem to get across loud and clear is yours: the sneering smug condescension of Obama voters being welfare collecting bums, the takers looking to steal from you. Other posters here natter on about how America isn’t “white christian” any longer. Taken as an aggregate the commentary herein is clearly anything but uplifting and welcoming.
All that “sneering smug condescension” you just accused me of in a typical fit of liberal name calling was based on something that makes all of your kind especially nervous- facts. If you total 75% of Obama’s votes it will equal the number of people on food stamps. As I pointed out, if they all voted for Obama, which I suspect a large majority did, then we are probably lost anyway. I’m sorry you don’t feel uplifted and welcomed, I guarantee you would if you went to the Huffington or Daily Beast web sites.
…in a typical fit of liberal name calling…
Clearly, any republican commenter not drinking at the same “conservative” trough as you is obviously a liberal, “other,” not of the body, and so on. Thanks for underscoring my original point. Do you have even a slight grasp of the meaning of “image?”
When you portray Obama voters as food stamp bums, you’re bypassing the civil discourse that supposed “conservatives” ought to have the class to engage in. i.e. you *could* say that Obama voters are fellow Americans with an opinion that is not yours, you think they’re arriving at an incorrect conclusion based on faulty data, or maybe they see exactly what you see but disagree on the solution. But class just ain’t your thing, is it, sparky? No, you just go right for the welfare bum image and call it a day.
And by the way, “sneering smug condescension” is a descriptor of how you come across, not name calling. If I did the name calling thing I’d be referring to you as an authoritarian douchebag. Of course, I don’t need to do that — the image speaks for itself.
The outworn multi-culti/PC fetish has nothing to do with it. Conservatism did not end on election day. We are still a closely divided nation between responsible adults and self-centered children. Conservative “relativity” will emerge quite spontaneously (and without the least bit of tinkering from talking heads) once public fear and actual-pain levels take off into the stratosphere. And from what I’ve read in the “news” this week, that shouldn’t take long.
We are still a closely divided nation between responsible adults and self-centered children.
As long as you are viewing voters who don’t vote your way as “self-centered children,” you’re never going to get republicans elected. Listen to yourself. The democrat voters are your fellow americans, people who disagree with your politics. If anyone here is self-centered and acting like “the enemy” who is seeking divisiveness, it would be you.
http://www.ericgarland.co/2012/11/09/letter-to-a-future-republican-strategist-regarding-white-people/
“Conservative “relativity” will emerge quite spontaneously (and without the least bit of tinkering from talking heads) once public fear and actual-pain levels take off into the stratosphere.” Uhh, no Doctor. Not the way YOU see it.
http://www.ericgarland.co/2012/11/09/letter-to-a-future-republican-strategist-regarding-white-people/
The problem with all this talk of voluntary communities is that there is no way to create them. If they are to exist, they must be largely spontaneous. The most we can do is try to figure out how not to get in the way.
As terrible a Crime as Benghazi was by people who will never be formally punished for their Sins, the re-assertion of Voluntary Activity by Self-Generating and Self-Reinforcing Communities is a far more important topic of conversation.
We are coming to a place where people like Random Engineer are running out of other people’s money to spend, to achieve diminishing returns they delude themselves into thinking have not shrunk the same way the major networks imagine the audience they try to win over has not dramatically grown smaller.
The Republican Party will be saved, if it can be saved at all, by Conservatives. Conservative will have to reaffirm their Values (as opposed to the False Religion of people like Random Engineer) before they can take on the Liberals. And Conservatives can only reaffirm their Values by living them.
Work through church groups, in your own community and as far out as you can reach.
As a New Yorker, I care about the people of San Francisco, but am confident there are enough able bodied people of sound mind already living there there to help bring that city out of the Darkness of Progressivism (a 6.5 earthquake is nothing compared to what damage Nancy Pelosi can do), once those people able bodied people of sound mind can rouse themselves enough to be roused.
In fact, given the current gas situation only just starting to lift, the church I have joined has decided it cannot send teams of volunteers to help people on Long Island. Coney Island, yes, but Long Island, no.
BTW, Random Engineer I have just spoken your Pseudonym for the last time. You would be dead to me, if you were ever even alive in the first place.
Well done, Mr. Moran. At least you’re beginning to look at some of your (conservative/right/Republican) premises and assumptions.
It’s a start.
Yes, mechanics, messaging, competency among campagin staffs and all of the rest, really do need to be addressed, but if your underlying premises are wrong, even slightly…
wrt messaging: combined with your incorrect -at best, incomplete- premises and assumptions, there’s a reason why Romney’s comments about the ’47%’ (now, at 49%) resonated so strongly…and so negatively. wrt his response, and that of most conservative attitudes toward the poor in this nation? Let’s just say that you aren’t telling folks how they’ll be included in any re-newed economic activity after your policies are enacted.
You’ve left them out. You don’t even address them as fellow human beings, let alone as fellow citizens, with all of the rights and priveliges thereto. Then, you marginalize them by attacking them. You then dehumanize them. In your own words, they’re welfare addicted, drug addicted, drunken, lazy and irresponsible, which are among the less colorful epithets used by everyone from your leadership to average conservative voters. Then, you wonder why most of that 47% won’t vote for you and your candidates or policies? It’s beyond your comprehension? The beatings will continue until morale improves? What are you thinking? It’s not them. It’s you: Your premise and ‘messaging’ are… counter-productive, unethical and morally suspect, at best.
So…yeah. Your ‘messaging’ needs some work. Tell them how slashing government regulations will help them to get jobs, feed their families, clothe them and educate them. Tell them -exactly and precisely- how your policies will make it easier for them to start a business. Let them know that you, without a doubt, believe that they are capable of doing these things…and show how your policies will make it easier for them to do these things. Currently, it’s all but impossible to start a business in this nation…unless you get a loan from a bank and jump through innumerable cycles of red tape.
Currently, regulations and taxation are at the heart of slashing the number of jobs available in America. That’s why so many companies ‘outsource’ those jobs to overseas locations around the world. Regulations and taxation in America make it too expensive to do busines in America. Tell them how you will slash these regulations and business taxes in order to make it easier for them to start a business or to get and retain a job that will pay enough to keep a roof over their heads, food on their tables and clothes on their backs.
Once you tell them all of this…you’ve got to follow through. Keep your promises. …and treat these people, your fellow human beings on the face of this earth, as if they were your fellow citizens, with all of the rights and privileges you claim for yourselves.
So, to paraphrase you Mr Bonesteel: Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. We are the Borg.
he isn’t implying that at all. What on earth is wrong with policies that make it easier for anyone who wants to start a business to do so? Do you realize that the majority of employees in this country work for a small business?
You can’t have ‘voluntary’ associations until you start treating one another like human beings.
When you treat other people as if they weren cardboard cutouts or as if they were objects for you to use and abuse, you’re nothing but a sociopath.
Not a big fan of Freedom of Association, heh?
^^ Yes, this. ^^
I’m not sure there’s a way out of this mess, but more and more I think it requires the death of the Republican Party. What needs to happen is that people need to think about how the existing system doesn’t deliver on its promises. Despite all the programs and all the money spent…poverty doesn’t get reduced…problems don’t get solved…kids don’t get educated. But the Republicans have ZERO credibility on fixing those problems.
If the GOP dies, just like when the Federalists and the Whigs died, the Democrats will split and the natural faultline will be between big government, status quo types and libertarian, individual freedom types. The new party system could pit libertarian, local control, individual rights people against the Big Business/Big Labor/Big government crony capitalist types.
The key is getting the social issues off the national burner and having a new messenger with some credibility. The GOP can’t do that…but the death of the GOP might create a space where a new second party can carry the message of Freedom.
Such twaddle I have not read here before: What a Maroon!
Had he any understanding of American beyond his Chicago prejudice, he would know that rugged individualism went hand in hand with a willingness to form voluntary associations when necessary to meet ongoing challenges. Wagon masters, for wagon trains were elected, and need not be appointed from above. Voluntarism is the American way, not community organizers.
The broader tradition was that you worked with what you had available. Based on personal experience many groups have chosen to segregate themselves for self-beneficial solidarity.
I am much afraid that Mr. Maroon comes from a tradition, I suspect Roman Church and Chicago bossdom, of top down authority, and cannot imagine any unity that is not coerced.
I promise to read no more of him and suggest that you all do the same.
“Can a community based on love, voluntary association, and real diversity compete with the vision of a compulsory “national community” enunciated by Barack Obama and the rest of the left?
No contest.”
You are correct; there is no contest; collectivism wins. All historical, societal, and institutional forces are driving toward that. The re-emergency of voluntary association and real diversity are predicted on a devolution of power to the state and local level, however, such a devolution (assertion of constitutional enumerated powers really) due to the legacy of slavery. Since the term “states rights” was used since Jackson’s time to justify a weak central government to perpetuate slavery in North America, the concept of limited central government is forever tainted with the legacy of slavery (now used by the left-wing to demonize opponents of a collectivization, because it perpetuates the underclass by race).
At the societal level, in election politics, doing something, however misguided or ineffectual, is preferable than arguing for doing nothing. The days of Silent Cal, President Calvin Coolidge, are long gone. People have an expectation of a strong nanny state. They look to the state to maintain their middle class status in the face of declining wages in the private sector as technological changes and free trade continue the slow erosion of manufacturing in the US that had supported a large middle class until the 1970s. (Even though it was a historical accident–a consequence of the Bretton Woods agreement and the utter destruction of industry in Europe during WWII.) Now government employment soaks up that labor that is no longer needed in manufacturing.
At the institutional level, bureaucracies perpetuate themselves and continue to arrogate power to themselves. Look at the EPA as a classic example. The EPA exists to correct for a market failure and to address externalities. An externality is a negative effect of an economic exchange. Take acid rain. The cost of the pollution from the use of coal that creates acid rain is not borne by the power generator nor the customer of the electric utility, but is borne by the public 1,000s of miles down-wind of the power plant, thus, regulating emissions of sulfur from coal fired power plants was a necessary corrective. Today, however, the EPA regulates, not to correct market failure, but chooses ever-smaller or illusory externalities to address, since the function of the agency is to make rules and arrogate power to themselves to the point of picking winners and losers in the marketplace. They in a sense are beholden to rent-seeking firms and environmentalist Luddites.
For these historical, societal, and institutional reasons, such a society envisioned by Kirk can never be a reality in the US. In 2012, the public had spoken, and they want the blue-state model of government, regardless of the counter examples of California and Illinois.
I’m one dejected conservative. My side, has lost the country. Progressivism has reached its apotheosis in Barack Obama. The Republican Party has lost its reason for being (first defeating slavery, then confronting communism) and is destined to go the way of the Federalists and American Whigs of the past. The only hope is that a generation of economic stagnation and societal disintegration under a blue-state governance model may force a counter-revolution, but given the woeful state of public education and mass media, it is unlikely in the extreme. My children’s generation as a whole will not have any spirit of America left.
No, there is hope. It lies in the revitalization of European Nationalism, which is being revitalized by the challenge of Muslim immigration to Europe. The Left of course is aiding and abetting Muslim colonization.
After much nastiness, this will lead to a rebirth of European nations, strongly devoted to their own survival and well being, like Jews in Israel.
This will help support White European nationalism in the Agnlo Nations.
All is not lost. But we must embrace this return to nature and reality, rejoin the fight for survival on this planet. Tribes survive, individuals are picked off one by one.
Look at the nations based on tribal communities. Then ask yourself – which of these )(*(*&holes do I wish to live in? American wasn’t based on tribal ties. Western Europe wasn’t made great on tribal ties. No great society in history was based on tribal community ties.
Yeah, the entire nation of Britain didn’t eventually arrive at the Magna Carta in 1215 due primarily to centuries of interaction of the various Saxon tribes whereupon English Law was derived and adopted from common Saxon law.
Oh wait. It did.
Let me guess. You’re a tea party intellectual, right?
okay. But you can’t strip the influence of Christianity out of the equation. Look at the Jews. Twelve tribes. What is it that made them different than all of the other tribes. Even today, what makes them the only functioning democracy – with all of the values of Western civilization on full display – in the entire middle east?
okay. But you can’t strip the influence of Christianity out of the equation.
The greeks had democracy and massive public works while the jews/hebrews/canaanites/etc were busy bitching at each other about golden idols and wondering why palm frond roofs didn’t last.
Centuries later the entire continent of Europe — after a millenium of oppression by the christian church — rediscovered the greeks, and not without a lot of bitching about it from the power(s) that be, thus birthing the enlightenment. The US is the crown jewel of the enlightenment.
In other words: I can, I will, and I just did.
“When conservatives talk of community, they tend to call upon revered intellectual figures:Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, Russell Kirk, or Robert Nisbet”
Interesting selection. While those indeed are revered intellectual figures, there is another revered figure who had a far greater impact on Western Civilization. Hmmm…. let me think who that might be…..???
Come on, let’s all think real hard…who WAS the figure who inspired the true diversity of the brotherhood of man? Who was that revered figure who inspired the abolition movement because all men have worth in the eyes of God? Who was the one who inspired ideals of faith, hope and charity? Who was that revered figure???
That enough people don’t know the answer to that question, or the ideals that he inspired us to achieve, is the sole reason that the masses believe that it is The Government, from whom all blessings flow.
So…what many conservatives are saying is that nearly one hundred and fifty million Americans are worthless, shiftless, lazy, drug addicts who want your stuff.
The idea that you can even think that way is…unacceptable. It’s not only immoral, it’s completely amoral. …especially for those of you who claim to be christian SoCons.
That’s the way sociopaths think, people. One hundred and fifty million Americans aren’t real to you, are they? They just aren’t human, to you. ‘Cause that’s what you keep saying. Your words reveal your hearts for all to see, and you wonder why they don’t like you? Why they won’t vote for you? No. It’s because you’re acting like sociopaths.
No, the left, often enough, is far worse. However, *you* keep claiming that you’re better than they are… more civilized and mature… more thoughtful and considerate of others… more caring… more…er..spiritual and loving.
“So…what many conservatives are saying is that nearly one hundred and fifty million Americans are worthless, shiftless, lazy, drug addicts who want your stuff.”
No, they didn’t say that. You said that. Because making up sh&& like that to demonize others makes you feel important. Like you are better than they are and more civilized and more mature… more thoughtful and considerate of others…more caring.
I was just gonna let the cognitively dissonant irony of his post stand as it’s own refutation, Becky.
Well, I didn’t make it up. Read posts, comments, articles and commentary at almost any conservative or Republican blog or website about poverty stricken and poor Americans. Compare the words and epithets they use to describe those who are ‘dependent’ on government ‘handouts.’ You can find such descriptive terms in any article about the issue here at PJM, for that matter.
A common number used is that such people comprise 47% of the citizens of America. That number corresponds to nearly one hundred and fifty million Americans.
You, as individuals and as a group, attack them, demean them, and dehumanize them…w/o telling them exactly how your policies and ideologies will help them to escape poverty.
…but you, apparently, are unable to see what you are doing or the harm that you are doing to your own cause.
It apparently doesn’t make sense that people don’t vote for you after you’ve insulted them.
Is that the best you could do to make your point? “those who are ‘dependent’ on government ‘handouts.”
It is now an epithet to discuss the problem?
So I guess your solution is not to propose real change to roots of their poverty, but to promise them an Iphone, condoms and a pony so they will like us better than the democrats.
Here is what you can’t see because you are afraid if you open your eyes and see it, you will lose your membership card in the cool kids club.
You can’t drag people out of poverty by giving them handouts. That’s just a fact. You can look to Rome and Greece and any society you want, and you will NEVER find a society that ended slavery, gave women equal rights and did not have masses of people who were hungry – except in those that were based on Judeo Christian principles.
So rant on all you want. You can’t name one. Europe is in decline. We are in decline because the laws and values that made us great have been ridiculed and mocked and replaced with the exact opposite values. Look up the 10 commandments and let me know which ones you think still hold sway in this country. Don’t murder? Okay, let’s pass on the abortion debate. Name another? Don’t covet ? That’s what class warfare is based on.
Christians keep on ticking, improving the world on person, one family, one community, one nation at a time. That you can’t see the good in the hospitals, the food banks, the rescue missions, the schools, is just because you are willfully blind. You don’t want to see because you would have to challenge the assumptions that make you think that you are better than, smarter than and more caring than hundreds of billions of others.
He is a Freerider on the dwindling Christian populations morality and principles. The more that we abandon them the crappier the nation and society become….from economics to general behavior.
But alas…
Warren —
Actually the ‘discussion’ you’re having with the god squad there is sort of funny. The largest group of ‘dependent on handouts’ (entitlements) is retirees. All of the morons here yammering as they do seemingly have no ability to look up the federal budget and grasp that about a third of it is medicare and social security (entitlements.) The obamaphone / EBT / welfare crowd that they *think* they’re putting down? Doesn’t even show up in a pie chart; you have to break it out longhand. Comes up to less than 2 cents a day for we taxpayers.
Obamacare, look at it closely. Relatively few people under 40 really need spendy health care other than the occasional appendix procedure and of course giving birth. So where’s the money really going? Old farts. Obamacare is simply the easiest way to get everyone chipping in while a fraction of their “tithe” is ever spent on themselves (until they get old.) The alternative is Logan’s Run.
All of these people screeching at 11 — with the thinly veiled racism in some cases and an air of utter moral superiority in others — seem to have no real idea of whom they screech about; they seem to have their own bogeymen they wish to slay. I wish I’d paid more attention in my psych classes.
As an outsider with a passing familiarity with the Mormon welfare system, I can tell you that there’s nothing else like it in American life, and I’d bet that very few people, who weren’t raised in that system, or marry into it, would voluntarily go into it. From the outside, it looks like an all or nothing deal. Besides the 10% tithe, you follow all the strictures and “advice” from the bishops and the elders, no question. Please correct me if I’m wrong. I’m sure it turns out very lovely citizens.
I think this whole piece tries too hard to think big. I see a different lesson from this election that focuses on both the message and the messenger.
Never underestimate the power of fear. It is especially pervasive in poor communities where there is often a great deal of social isolation. This creates an ideal environment for demagoguery and race baiting. These voters know Obama hasn’t performed as promised but better the devil you know. In hard times fear also effects the middle class. These voters understand the current system is unsustainable but they need a lot of reassurances that what is being proposed will, in fact, be better. Because they often have both financial problems and social isolation single mothers can be especially fear based voters. Romney never really connected with these people in a personal way. They looked at him and saw a more personable version of the crony capitalists who helped get us in this mess in the first place. That is why he could not sell his solutions to enough voters in a low turnout election even with people saying the nation is on the wrong track.
Do all future politicians have to come from dysfunctional childhoods such as Clinton and Obama experienced? No. But they do have to have some experience outside of extremely affluent white suburbs and Ivy League schools to help them to connect in what is becoming a very tribal America. There is an article in the NY Times today about the reaction of New Yorkers to relief efforts that speaks of the feeling many Sandy victims get that the affluent citizens coming to help them tend to act like they are zoo specimens. That attitude helped cost Al Gore and John Kerry the elections against another Ivy Leaguer, albeit one raised in Midland Texas who spent his post Harvard MBA pursuits in small town Texas courthouses researching mineral rights. Looking at the results it is clear those experiences served George W. Bush better at connecting with working class whites, Main Street small business owners and Hispanics than Romney’s years working at Boston Consulting and Bain all the while living in the very community Charles Murray used as is paradigm of an out of touch elite in Coming Apart – Belmont, Massachusetts.