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Forest, Meet Trees

Submitted by thinkgra on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 17:13
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Forest, Meet Trees

“Over the past two hundred years, industrial civilization has been relentlessly undermining the Earth's chemistry, water cycles, atmosphere, soils, oceans and thermal balance. Plainly said, we have been shutting down the major life systems of our planet. Compounding the ecological crisis are decaying economies, ethnic and class conflict, and worldwide warfare.”

--Bill Plotkin, The Wild Human,” Shift Magazine, July-August 2008
 

Navel-gazing over which flavor of Republican is the authentic one, the correct one, or even the one most likely to win elections will not help the Republican cause, much less the nation or the world. I've read through a number of blog posts here and have yet to see one that addresses the actual challenges we face, both as a nation and a species. If Conservatism is to survive as a philosophy, the real question is how to apply basic Conservative principles to the multiple crises facing us, which are, at their root, environmental. Social, economic, and political structures can only exist in environments that support them. Any philosophy that cannot be applied to the business of living becomes a historical artifact.
 

Let's pick a random example: The approaching collapse of global fisheries. You may remember the collapse of the California salmon fishery a few months back. (Here in the Pacific Northwest, at least, it made headlines.) I mentioned it to a conservative of my acquaintance, and he blamed sea lions. Well, sea lions have been eating salmon for hundreds of thousands of years without destroying them, so let's take a look at the human side of the problem, the part documented by studies of the actual fisheries: ag and industrial runoff, dams, and overfishing. The standard Republican solution? Individual freedom and a free market, with plenty of competition. In other words, more of the same that created this crisis. Personal responsibility apparently applies only to individuals' sex lives, not their economic lives.
 

What would an principled conservative alternative to government regulation of fisheries, look like? Could it possibly have something to do with the conservative principle of self-restraint? After all, salmon fishermen would seem to have a vested interest in the preservation of salmon. Would a group composed of members of that industry be able to maintain and enforce limits? In such a group, would the interests of small fishermen be represented, or would it, like most industry groups, eventually become dominated by the biggest and best-connected?
 

This might be a useful topic of debate on this site, and could be applied to the issues of climate change, pollution, energy generation, anything. So far, the Republican response to environmental issues seems to vacillate between, “What problem?” and “It wouldn't be a problem if it was legal. Damn liberals.”
 

A major reason that the public is turning away from the Republican Party is the perception that Republicans will always vote for short-term profits for corporate stakeholders with the risks outsourced to the general public. Then, for example, when cancer rates rise due to toxic waste from industry, conservatives demonize liberals for wanting to broaden access to health care. The current public perception of Republicans, particularly Bush-style Republicans, is that they will not vote for anything that would genuinely benefit all or most people, but only what benefits themselves and those who fill their campaign coffers. Increasing numbers of people are driven away by this “heads I win, tails you lose” approach to governance, as well they should. Could the concept of personal responsibility be applied to corporations? How would that work without the force of law behind it, particularly when dealing with corporations that are economically larger than small nations?

Or consider this postulate to the Conservative belief in the sanctity of life and the right to private property: Damage to the environment is, at its root, a public health issue, and a theft from individuals in the form of reduced earnings and increased expenses due to ill health and premature death.
 

Paul Hawkin, Amory Lovins, and Hunter Lovins, in their book Natural Capitalism, point out that natural systems (carbon/oxygen cycle, hydrologic cycle, etc.) operate free of charge. Damage to these systems is not factored into the cost of goods, meaning that normal accounting procedures ignore them while we all pay the price in diminished resource base, a degraded environment, and consequent ill health. This book-cooking is the basis of classical economics and makes the Enron scandal look like cheating on a third grade math test.

If Conservatism could remember it has a common root with Conservation, acknowledge that environmental problems do exist, and contribute something to the debate other than foot dragging and obfuscation, it just might survive.

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Comments

Hello, thinkgra. I might

Submitted by Lisa on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 19:34.

Hello, thinkgra. I might caution you that you may not find much support here. This is a rather skeptical lot when it comes to the matters you address above. Perhaps you already realize that, though.

thinkgra - a Conservative who brings us fresh air, not hot air

Submitted by GOP_Rebel on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 20:28.

I respectfully disagree that thinkgra might not find much support here.  This is exactly the breath of fresh air that the Republican Party desperately needs.  We have got to start focusing on the economic benefits of conservation and good stewardship of the environment. We also need people who can translate economic imperatives into everyday language to drive home points so that everyone can understand them.

I disagree completely with Mark Bauerlein when he refers to the Millenials as "The Dumbest Generation" in his book "The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30)". 

If you were to ask me who the dumbest generation is, I would tell you that it's my generation.  We put the "BABY" in Baby Boomers because we're the most narcissistic, victim-focused, self-absorbed, entitlement-obsessed, culture of personality-driven do-nothing generation that I'm personally aware of.  Perhaps my historian colleagues can enlighten me as to any other generation that has sat around doing absolutely nothing for the past thirty years knowing that we were looking at an apocalypse of scarce energy resources and dependence on foreign oil while taking no action to remedy the situation.  Aside from creating absolutely no new energy sources such as hydrogen, blocking nuclear power, preventing controlled forest burns that have led to catastrophic fire destruction and pollution, overfishing to the point of decimation, allowing other countries to pollute without imposing any restrictions or sanctions on them and generally fiddling while Rome burns, we haven't exactly rocked the house. 

I thank my lucky stars that we have two upcoming generations who are smarter, more engaged, more active, more committed and more intelligent than mine.  If I were a litigious person, I'd sue my generation for complete negligence and incompetence.  But since I support tort reform, that would not be appropriate.  Ahem. 

Welcome, thinkgra.  Your fresh ideas are exactly what I want to read. 

Rebel, I mentioned this only

Submitted by Lisa on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 20:50.

Rebel, I mentioned this only because her blog was rated one star, which I thought was awfully rude of our fellow members considering this is her first post. I didn't want her to take that personally. (I'm using the pronoun her for consistency, I don't know if thinkgra is a her.)

Perhaps it's been different for you, Rebel, but I have found that even the most reserved of my pro- environmental or pro- conservation remarks have been met with only scorn and derision in these circles.

Ah, but the times they are a-changin'

Submitted by GOP_Rebel on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 21:51.

Lisa, you go girl (I'm assuming you are a her).  Your fresh ideas are exactly what we need also, and I would take scorn and derision on these topics to be a sincere compliment.  I'll bet you at least a buck that the scorn-mongers were born between 1946 and 1964.  I'll bet you another buck that you were either born later or you're not a Kool-Aid drinker (hopefully both).   

I read this recently in a WaPo article, but Victor Davis Hansen wrote about it recently as well.  William Straus and Neil Howe outline a cyclical trend of generational values and behavior in their book "Generations".   Because idealist generations (Baby Boomers) are unwilling to compromise on moral issues, they've always failed to solve the major social and economic problems of their eras. 

Civic generations (Millenials) react against the idealist generations' efforts to use politics to advance their own moral causes and focus instead on reenergizing social, political and government institutions to solve pressing national issues. 

Nomadic generations (Gen X) tend to be more isolated, less politically active, less involved.  Nomads can be ruthlessly realistic.  I bet another buck that this is the cohort most fed up with the trickery, pandering, chicanery, lack of ethics and general inanity of our current political and economic systems who would be very attracted to a realist and strict Constitutionalist such as Ron Paul. 

Obviously these cohorts are simplistic, but I think that the theory does have some value.  The bottom line is that the idealists have got to get out of the way so that those who are willing to act can actually get something done.  Boomers are undoubtedly going to go kicking and screaming.  Personally I always liked the the Pixies and the Sex Pistols better than Neil Young and the Beatles, in many ways I relate more to the Nomads than to Boomers. 

I look at the Millenials and I'm just awed by their willingness to serve, by their sense of community and networking, their easygoing friendly attitudes, and I see real hope and change on the horizon.  I think that's what Barack Obama started to tap into, and there's a gold mine of opportunity for whomever can actually extract all of its great potential.  I think that Barack's got too much baggage to finish the job, but that doesn't mean we can't continue to mine the vein that he tapped into.  In fact, I believe we really must. 

I'm not sure the detractors

Submitted by Lisa on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 22:11.

I'm not sure the detractors are old, but I think they're all boys. Boys just like to argue a lot and rarely concede points.

That's an interesting generational theory. I slipped between the cracks of the generations...too young to be a disaffected GenX, but too old to be a myspace millennialist. My sense of displacement carries over to my politics, where the Democrats are just nuts (the committee circus yesterday a case in point) and my own party lost its way sometime around the time I was born.

That's a long aside. Your final point is what I believe the core issue is. We have to make inroads with the youngest generation of voters. The ones who refuse to be defined by labels. The ones who are still hopeful about our future. The ones who have the time, the freedom, the motivation, and the desire to be involved and change America for the better. I posted a graphic the other day about how badly we're hemorrhaging support among this set. We have find a tourniquet and then do some reconstructive surgery. And we need to do it soon.

Gen-Xer here

Submitted by Walt Gilbert on Sun, 06/01/2008 - 23:06.

As a Gen-Xer, I'd have to say that "nomadic" is a pretty apt description of my politics with regard to conservatism.  I haven't fully subscribed to any one of the various strains as laid out in the chart so helpfully created by GOP_Rebel, as I've moved in and out of the various camps at different stages of my life.  Hence, "nomadic".  The best description for my politics, and I suspect the politics of many conservatives of my generation is simply "anti-leftist".  And, when I see folks label themselves as "principled conservatives" as has become so fashionable of late, I can't help coming to the conclusion that there's more than a little self-congratulation at hand, as well as a good measure of the political version of moral code enforcement that goes on in the Middle East.  After all, if someone is a "principled conservative" and I happen to disagree with them on something -- well, what does that make me?  Clearly, I must be a filthy whore.

And I see a lot of that within the conservative movement today -- particularly as it relates to John McCain.  That's in large part responsible for the admittedly pugnacious approach I sometimes take in debating issues within the context of conservatism.  Having long considered myself a conservative, and holding down-the-line mainstream conservative beliefs, it is rather tiresome to see myself portrayed as somehow not a conservative by the very virtue of the fact that I support McCain.  You see it throughout the blogosphere and on every right-leaning bulletin board on the web:  it's not certain strains of conservative, or conservatives who tend to focus on specific issues who are resisting McCain's candidacy.  Wherever there's an accounting of any difficulties McCain may be having in gathering support on the right, it's almost without fail "conservatives" -- no qualifiers or descriptors -- just flat out "conservatives" that he's having trouble with.

So, the only conclusion that I can come to as a McCain supporter is that somehow, over the past few years, I've ceased to be a conservative.  This isn't unique to supporting McCain, either.  It happens whenever anyone strays from the orthodoxy as dictated by the bigwigs of talk radio and mainstream conservative media outlets.  And, I think it's that sort of doctrinaire mindset that has created much of the division within the conservative movement -- at least that part which wasn't created by the Republican Party's lack of coherence and effectiveness.

The topic of this thread (yes, I finally got around to it) is an excellent example where straying from the pack in even the most delicate way leads to the adventurous conservative being howled down and branded a heretic for even deigning to recognize the reality of public opinion on the matter.  I would say I'm a borderline skeptic-agnostic when it comes to the phenomenon of global warming/climate change.  But, I do recognize the public opinion currently holds it to be a reality, and that it needs to be addressed.  While I'm not ready to put the brakes on the use of fossil fuels, I'm also not willing to die on a hill that I can retreat from and live to fight another day, when the forces of skepticism are more prepared to wage battle.

But, in suggesting that it might be a good idea to at least make some concession -- particularly that it's a good idea to strive to keep pollutants at as low a level as is feasible without causing undue economic harm -- I quickly found myself branded as an apostate, for all intents and purposes.  I had "gone over to the dark side" as Newt Gingrich has been accused.

I think this tendency among the conservative intelligentsia of discouraging heterodoxy through intellectual thuggery and intimidation is very much responsible for the situation in which we find ourselves to day.  It has grown uglier and uglier over the past few years, so much so that anyone who dares to step outside the constraints of approved conservative thought is branded a RINO, at best.

As I said, I remain skeptical with regard to the subject matter of this piece, but it is refreshing to see it discussed among intelligent thinkers without a shower of brickbats raining down on the person who had the temerity to post it.