The roots of conservatism.

I agree with Alexander Brunk's main point over on the main site (unfortunately my screen-reading software doesn't cope well with HTML so I can't post the link and make it look pretty). II intended to post this comment in response, but I decided it was long enough to merit a post of it's own.

There is an increasing tendency to hyphenate our conservatism, which I think  is dangerous. In general, I'd describe conservatives as people who, whensome grand new form of social engineering is proposed, stand athwart the train yelling, at the very least, "hold on a minute. Let's think this over shall we?" This is the tendency which unites opponents of redefining marriage with opponents of redefining the role of government; a basic sense that our institutions and liberties have served us well and shouldn't be overturned lightly. Incidentally, I'd argue that defense cons are opposing a redefining of our national interests and defense policy from the common framework we've accepted throughout history. The US has almost never embraced the isolation of the Paulites or the internationalism of the progressive left, and for those who think neoconservatism is some radical form of new foreign policy, I'd recommend a more careful reading of the history of the nineteenth century. Now, this isn't to say that conservatives are lock-step opposed to "change", but we tend to, I think, look for reforming rather than revolutionary change. As Rudi Giuliani brilliantly pointed out in the primary, we should be talking about the kind of change we want, rather than simply talking about change.

This does not mean that every conservative is going to agree about everything all the time. Mike Huckabee and Rudi Giuliani have, policy-wise, fairly little in common. There are also some conservatives who believe that their caution should extend to both fiscal and social issues, but who tend to emphasize one or the other more. However, if we all share this basic caution and skepticism about the social engineering which has fascinated progressives from eugenics to the "new new deal", then we are all conservatives.

I think progressives have a different, more eschatological philosophy. For a progressive (which is a more accurate term than liberal I think), there is always (A) some catastrophic calamity facing society which (B) we have brought on ourselves and which (C) only a radical re-engineering of society can ultimately solve. Eugenicists railed against the polution of "good genes" by hordes of Eastern European immigrants and the handicapped. Their solution was a new, almost unheard of regime of national entry quotas for immigration and the sterilization of those they demed mentally and physically incapable. The recession of 1929, under the progressive presidencies of Herbert Hoover (read Modern Times by Johnson if you disbelieve Hoover was a progressive) and FDR gave birth to the single greatest expansion of the role and scope of government in American history to that point. LBJ fought a war on poverty with yet another such expansion. The calamity of US foreign policy causing all manner of domestic and international ills (the Progressive read not mine) must be met with unilateral nuclear disarmament and a policy of "getting along better" with other nations. Racism could, for progressives, be socialy engineered away by successive government programs from bussing to affirmative action. Finally, in modern times, global warming must be met with another radical reconstruction of our society. Of course, some of these problems (racism) were and are real and others (the fears of eugenicists) were products of progressives' fevered imaginations. Whether real or imagined however, the problems spotted by progressives are almost never solved by them. We need progressives in society, spotting areas which need reform, but we probably ought never actually let them run things.

One more thought. I think that, among some fiscal conservatives, there is a fear that "so-cons" are really social engineers in Christian clothing. This may be true in a few cases, but in general I think you've got nothing to worry about. For the most part, so-cons want to be left alone to live and worship in the way they choose, and they feel that the hostility of culture and government makes this problematic. In many cases, so-cons want to change culture, but through persuasion and the open marketplace of ideas by preference. Unfortunately, much of the media and cultural attention lavished on so-cons portrays them as social engineers. Don't believe the hype.