Is it the theme of less government? The fiscal conservatives (FC's) would say no, if anything they're the true conservatives. With my heavy abortion blogging a few months ago to my more recent drug tangent it's become apparent we're not all on the same page. Throw in gay marriage and I would hazard a guess too that they don't get all that bent out of shape if a sex shop opens next door to a church and a playground which segues nicely into
economic policy? Well if this is all there is that's kind of thin gruel. Most conservatives favor lower taxes but what about those of us who favor no income tax at all? I almost said "and less spending" but true to form when they get into office even they throw the money around. OK, so the libertarian position of no income taxation to the more mainstream conservative view of lower taxes, well that's a bit of a ravine but we can still wave comfortably to each other from each side of the bridge. So does it all revolve around the dinars? Then there's
military excursions. Surprisingly I would've expected more diversity here, when those phantom WMD's in Iraq failed to materialize I would've expected conservatives to debate more the loss of life there, we're not pacifists by any stretch but remaking the Middle East? OK, Pat Buchanan had a problem with this but he's Pat Buchanan, the rest of us referred to it as Bush-bashing.
$$$$$$ and War.....hmmmmm.....and oh yes, Alec Baldwin is a dick.
Take social issues off the table and what do we have? Are there still common threads? Do we still have A common thread? I don't quite have the answer anymore but I don't think liberals debate what liberalism means to them, if they're not always on the same page at least they're reading the same book.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to stuff a personal political philosophy into a compact sensible box. When we list each and all our values, we probably find we agree or disagree with some facet or other of our chosen political philosophy...I know I do. :)
ReplyDeleteBut to me BB conservatism SHOULD be consistent in its philosophy, and that is that the government do what the Constitution says it should do, and the rest of us make our own decision, HOWEVER, we must take responsibility for our actions (or inactions).
ReplyDeleteNow where social conservatives clash with each other on this philosophy is about the responsibility part of the equation. I say a person who is sexually active take precautions to not get pregnant, after the fact abortions are irresponsible in my opinion. Conservatives who want to legalize drug use saying let me make my own decisions fail to acknowledge that they are in a mind altered state, and so how can you say that what you do in that state-of-mind you can be responsible for?
Z-man is spot on, it's like the hippies have taken over both sides of the aisle and say "do whatever feels good and who cares how it impacts society? It's all about ME."
This is why I say, party politics is dead. There is no perfect package deal. Deal with the issues that are most important to you on that basis and that basis alone.
ReplyDeleteI would say however that for me, the best package deal (to say there was one) would have to be with either the Constitutional Party or the Libertarian Party (however the Libertarian Party I'll admit goes to extremes on certain issues. But then...every party pretty much does.)
Thought: do liberals have these discussions amongst themselves, or is it all about whatever expands government is all good for them?
ReplyDeleteI don't think Beth that liberals disagree with each other as much as we conservatives do. As for the Constitutional Party vs. the Libertarian Party I'll take constitutionalism any day. THAT is at least what should bind us but it doesn't, if it did the FC's would say Roe was a bad decision, not the way to go about it. IMO we don't have that many threads that bind us anymore. Conservatives being "pro-choice" goes way back, I still remember some old Bob Grant shows where he pushed this line but the drugs really surprises me.
ReplyDeleteHonestly Beth I couldn't tell you. But because philosophy is such a necessary essential, I happen to think that scrutinizing my own as often as possible to make certain it is sound does me a great service in life. It makes the equation (that is the means by which I reach conclusions) airtight and gives me comfort in knowing that the resulting answers are ones I can live with.
ReplyDeleteAbout people making decisions while being in mind-altered states, it's an interesting issue. I've worked with people and you would swear on your cat's grave that they're on some kind of substance. I was talking about this recently with a woman and there's different theories. I brought up those bosses for example who say they never get a good night's sleep and yet they're so highly alert to the picayune things you do every day, they seem fixated on what you're doing as opposed to ordering enough supplies or whatever (the Bigger Picture) but she said that's not so much coke or meth as they have a lot of neuroses. I know myself that when you're around a nervous or high-strung boss you absorb their stress, you begin to think there's some emergency even when there isn't 'cause they act like there is. Hard to distinguish between people with nervous problems and those on substances but I think those on the drugs ain't capable of making rational decisions, responsible ones so good point Beth.
ReplyDeleteBut you see, the Constitution has no provision regarding abortion Z (either condoning it or banning it). It is an issue which is to be decided by the states exclusively. And yet, you get social conservatives who are adamant in distorting the doctrine in pursuit of a personal agenda or belief.
ReplyDeleteIt is wrong when liberals do it and it is equally unjust for a social conservative to do it.
With drugs as with anything in life, you bear the consequences of your resulting action.
ReplyDeleteTake apart a stereo to try to fix something on your own?? Void the warranty.
Fail to make your car payment?? Have your car repossessed.
Trip out on LSD and kill someone?? Do not pass go. Go Directly to jail.
Morning soapie and I agree with you, it's good to analyze your own philosophy from time to time. Problem being every time I lean heavily towards a certain political philosophy I encounter problems especially with libertarianism as you yourself said. It's like with what I call The Gospel of Moderation, as desireable as political moderation is in so many situations many people make the mistake of applying it across the board and imo too much moderation (for lack of a better word) tends to water down some important principles.
ReplyDeleteRe abortion soapie said: "It is an issue which is to be decided by the states exclusively."
ReplyDeleteI can more than live with this. Federalism, problem being most liberals and fiscal conservatives don't seem to be big fans of it. How often do you hear them say for instance that Roe sucks on so many levels? The Human Life Amendment, as it stands now that's pure fantasy, it's always been before 1973 anyway make your case in the legislature. On this we're on the same page (or give or take a page we're reading the same chapter).
Soapster, when it comes to safety issues, I think the government does have a right to make laws to make us safe. Putting repossed cars on the same moral equivalency of killing someone while on LSD is a bit crazy.
ReplyDeleteMorning to you Z (or should I call you Comrade??) LOL
ReplyDeleteI'd argue that it's impossible to even have principles if they're subject to being watered down.
You're missing the point Beth. We have laws on the books that would prosecute someone who committed murder while on LSD.
ReplyDeleteHowever, whether or not government creates a law banning LSD is irrelevent because people can and do still take it.
That's the point in all of this. Making drugs illegal doesn't prevent their use. And, spending ridiculous dollars to prosecute and then incarcerate an individual simply because he smoked a joint or had a quarter bag of pot in his house or dropped a couple hits of acid is senseless when those resources could be better allocated towards people who actually committ serious crimes.
I should have added that I don't think by legalizing drugs that all of a sudden you're going to see this HUGE uptick in usage or number of users.
ReplyDeleteIt's the same failed argument that liberals make with respect to conceal and carry laws.
"Why we can't allow people to carry firearms!!! Dear God No!!! Can you imagine all the gun violence?? It will be like the Wild West all over again!"
It simply doesn't happen like that.
I understand that making something illegal does not mean it won't happen (abortions or drug use) but I say that legalizing it does give it social acceptance, and if you don't believe me look at the whole "legal but rare" argument for abortion that is so untrue it is not even funny.
ReplyDeleteLaws are made to deter, but hell even the death penalty does not stop people from murder, so that doesn't mean we just let murder be legal.
Actually soapie I agree with you in this sense, it's not a rational drug policy to prosecute and incarcerate users and I never understood this use of law enforcement at all. Go after the dealers only but I have to say about legalizing something it happened with abortion. After Roe came down in 1973 if you notice abortions gradually began to climb every year until they really shot up and I can only surmise that the attraction of something legal made people make use of their new "options" if you will. I agree with you about your gun analogy though. Have to go in at 3 today and work 'til 9 so I'm early today. You'd think after nine years in the place I'd at least get the shift I want, as I keep telling them I'm an early riser so give the late shift to the guys who like to party. I get used to a routine, it kind of throws off your biorhythms (there's a word you don't hear anymore).
ReplyDeleteI'll grant you the comparison between murder and abortion with respect to issue "social acceptance" (i.e., making it illegal).
ReplyDeleteHowever, those two issues Beth are not the same a drug use because drug use (while its consequences may) does not have an effect upon you.
If I shoot heroin or snort coke or whatever, those specific actions do not have an effect upon your person.
Murder and abortion on the other hand do.
I just don't happen to think that government's role is to protect us from ourselves. That's why I stand firm on the issue as I do.
Ah yeah, "safe legal and rare", the old Clinton formula that will never be. Honestly and I made this point before if abortion were truly this, safe legal and rare pro-lifers would still be passionate about it, don't get me wrong but half their work would already be done in having formed a societal consensus against it. Now as Beth recently commented because it's so common it's a bigger problem and so that IMO is where the added passion comes in.
ReplyDeleteAt its most positive though soapie being around people on drugs is annoying. They may not be a danger to your person but they're hell to work with. Ever work with a wired up person all day? Everyone comes in at 6:30 in the morning quietly doing their work and still waking up and they're bouncing off the walls. So maybe the solution here is not coming down on their heads with the full weight of the LAW but some kind of social ostracism, the kind I proposed a while back for dealing with all those bad-mooders out there.
ReplyDelete"Cut it out dick!"
Well I'm gonna run folks, go for my walk and get ready. It's a slambang discussion imo.
ReplyDeleteI agree I don't think we need the government to protect us from ourselves, but if drug use is legalized, then people will be able to say drive a car and smoke pot, wouldn't they? They'd be in their own cars, right? Well, I don't want to be on the road with people as they smoke pot or crack or shoot-up whatever.
ReplyDeleteGotta agree with Beth...heck if we can keep cellphones out of cars, cannibis should stay outside too. :)
ReplyDeleteGood analogy BB, because cell phones are a legal thing to own and operate, but laws are popping up to deal with idiots who talk on them and even freaking TEXT MESSAGE with them while driving, because they have been known to get in accidents and kill people when engaging in these activities.
ReplyDeleteWe already have laws on driving under the influence, of alcohol AND drugs. I think any behavior that produces no victim other than the person doing it should not be illegal. Examples include wearing a seatbelt, wearing a helmet on bikes or motorcycles, getting drunk, smoking a joint, even suicide. Government has NO business protecting us against ourselves. PERIOD.
ReplyDeleteIn considering social vs fiscal conservatism, one wonders about
ReplyDeleteagreement/disagreement in these cases:
1. A single mother with six children (three of whom receive social security payments for the disabled, gets herself embyronic
implants and births octoplets. Since she has no job, taxpayers foot the bill.
2. A single business woman is a lesbian. She pays $25,000 in income taxes.
It appears (to me, anyhoo)that some sort of conflict between
fiscal responsibility and moral/ethical views might occur..or do these reconcile nicely and resonate perfectly with the entire range of conservatism?
My reaction to your scenarios BB:
ReplyDelete1.) Hmmm, sounds like a familiar story...
I say, do not reward bad behavior (same goes to the failed banks).
2.) Are you suggesting that only lesbians pay taxes??
Beth,
ReplyDelete1) Yes, very familiar
2) No, just that like any other societal sector, some do & don't.
..I thought I saw conflict between
the morality and the fiscal responsibility of the two situations..and was just pondering whether fiscal and social conservatives would see it identically or what....
I agree with your point Joe in theory but a lot of these things don't take place in vacuums. I've known people who like to drive and toke at the same time and as for suicide, well since we're on the topic of drugs lately someone giving someone else LSD without them knowing it let's say and then that person doing something radical like killing themselves or if a person's severely depressed and you say "here take these pills", that's illegal. All I'm saying is it's not a vacuum-packed world, I tend towards libertarianism in theory but it doesn't really work in the practical world.
ReplyDeleteBB O'Reilly's already written a column blasting the Octomom. One pro-lifer I know said "well at least she didn't kill any of them" but that misses the point completely IMO. I said in a blog a few weeks ago about lifestyle choices once you reach the threshold of your lifestyle choice impinging on me somehow, Octomom getting my tax dollars then Houston we have a problem.
ReplyDelete"in theory but it doesn't really work in the practical world."
ReplyDeleteI hear this alot [this notion that something is good in "theory" but not in practice].
If something is illogical in practice, then however can it be good theory? If by implementing it and putting it in practice, you have reservations or you think their would be too many issues or problems then wouldn't it be fair to say the "theory" is a bit (shall we say...) flawed?
Which is why the whole theory of libertarianism if you will is so flawed. People DO smoke pot and drive at the same time. People DO give other people dangerous drugs without their knowledge often with ill motives. In one of her books crime writer Ann Rule writes of a case where a woman with the help of her friend dosed large quantities of her husband's meal with LSD to do him in, it didn't work though but it's like the people with the ill motives know the truer nature of these drugs than the apologists here do. Again the world is not a vacuum.
ReplyDeleteTake the Moral issues out of the party and all that's left is money, money, money and Me, Me, Me. I've said other things on this subject before, but I'll have to look them up again.
ReplyDeleteThis is why and thank you for commenting that I consider this thread in particular to be one of the most important I've ever posted, this constant tension between the social cons and the fiscal cons and why when you take the social issues off the table as the fc's want that's what you're left with, the big ole dollar sign which is why maybe Rand is so popular in the first place. Good and insightful comment.
ReplyDeleteI'll have to read the other 32 comments and see what others have said and then I have some of my own Posts that I would like to leave links to that relate to the subject.
ReplyDeleteI don't know why it is taking me so long to give you links to some of my pages. I guess it feels repetitious to me, yet it's also quite important.
ReplyDeleteIn the Post that I did earlier this month, "Never Negotiate from a Position of Weakness", the comments took off in a direction relating to this. My favorite, though, is the Post I did relating to something that Mitt Romney and Ronald Reagan said; "Quotes from Mitt Romney and Ronald Reagan". Ok, now I'll read the above comments.
Beth & Z,
ReplyDeleteThe way to take responsibility for what you do when influenced by mind-altering drugs is to not take them so that what you do will not be influenced by them.
Soapbox,
The Constitution leans more towards the idea of letting the states decide a lot of things, such as Abortion. The Roe vs. Wade decision went against state sovereignty and imposed the conclusion to a highly controversial idea on all of the states.
Also the Constitution speaks of the rights of all persons, so the Constitutional issue hinges solely on whether or not the unborn child is considered a person or not. There was an interesting discussion on this on my blog at "Abortion/Fetal Development".
Soap & Z,
I can live with the the states deciding the issue of Abortion as well. I don't think a lot of people understand that that is what the Constitution says, or at least implies in relation to this issue, or even that State Sovereignty was a key issue in the Roe vs. Wade case. I did a post on this as well; "Abortion/Fetal Development".
I love your blog because you tackle so many non-political subjects too. As BB has said the non-political is so much more interesting but you make the political interesting by tying in spirituality too. Maybe that's why politics is so dry for me, we're always reading from the same conservative or liberal playbook. I'll be sure to check those links out.
ReplyDeleteThanks Z,
ReplyDeleteOophs, I did the second of these links wrong. It was supposed to be "Abortion & State Sovereignty".
In relation to tying in the Spiritual, the scriptures say "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7:14, KJV).
It doesn't say "if we scream our point of view at the top of our lungs, hoping that someone will actually listen." Somehow, this just doesn't seem to work too well.
I've read the first 11 comments and now I've got to go. More later.
ReplyDeleteNow many people agree with the fc's, to just take the social stuff off the table since the rest of the Republican platform is so sensible but here's where it's wrong. MOST people have some social conservatism in them. It might be they don't like a sex shop opening up next to a church, they don't want drugs legalized, they may be pro-choice but agree with parental notification and no tax money for abortion and the list goes on. MOST people being normal and human care about all or some of these things. What gets me is you never hear the fc's in our own party express any concern that our abortion policy is too extreme, too radical, this facet or that one is over the line because they prefer to not discuss it at all. It's why the fc's are making their voices heard but why they won't prevail in the long run, so-cons are more traditional and so have broader appeal.
ReplyDeleteWell, I had to go do something, but I'm back now, so I'll start again with my comment reading at comment #12, 2/11/2009 - 9:26 AM - Beth, which is a comment I agree with.
ReplyDeleteSoap,
You are wrong when you say that "Whether or not government creates a law banning LSD is irrelevant", when things are legalized, they generally become more common, as we have seen with Abortion.
Since making murder illegal doesn't prevent murder, perhaps we should legalize murder. I don't think that your little "equation" works with everything, Soap, and drug addicts do commit "serious crimes".
Beth,
We're on the same page again in relation to Abortion and keeping drugs illegal on the streets, just as you had such good things to say on some of my Abortion pages.
Z,
Yes, let's go after the dealers and we need to offer more rehabilitation programs for the users.
Soap & the rest,
Drug users do harm to others, not just to themselves, especially those on the hard stuff.
The reason why things sometimes sound good "in theory" is because they would work in a more perfect world, yet there are too many imperfections that get in the way and prevent the "theory" from actually working in real life.
Z,
My thoughts relating to the actual subject of this Post are best summed up in my "Quotes from Mitt Romney and Ronald Reagan", as I left a link to above.
"When things are legalized they generally become more common as we have seen with abortion."
ReplyDeleteIt's simple psychology, when something is legalized people figure it can't be THAT bad. Abortion can't be the taking of an innocent human life, the government would never allow THAT. To say there's no correlation between legalizing something and its commonness, it's just not borne out.
Although at least soapie agrees with the federalist or state by state approach to abortion, most fc'ers don't even question Roe. So if more of the fc'ers or the libertarians (Patrick M actually distinguishes them) got on the anti-Roe bandwagon we'd at least have more of a commonality instead of the money issues.
ReplyDelete