I feel like I am going off the deep end every time I write about the presidential election.
The reason is clear – my small government principles are not embodied by the front runners in either major party.
I have been all over the map from wanting a new party to form, to not voting in the presidential race, to sucking it up and voting for McCain.
While in many ways, I was just sort of thinking out loud, I don’t want to muddy the focus of this blog with that level of inconsistency.
I started She’s Right to educate people about small government conservatism.
To get bogged down in the politics of a party that, as a whole, does not represent small government conservatism, and in many cases is antithetical to those principles, only takes away from the goal that I am trying to accomplish.
The internet does not need another Republican party hack.
I was thinking about this before I got out of bed this morning and I decided that I need to declare a moratorium on discussion of the presidential race for at least the next 30 days, so I can return my focus to (1) the fundamentals of small government conservatism and (2) state and local politics.
Our elections in Burlington are only a month away and I have not been updating my Burlington Politics page.
After I made this decision, I read a post at one of my favorite blogs, Principled Discovery, that really drove this point home for me.
Dana has a wonderful post in which she talks about the despair felt by conservatives, that the Republican party has moved away from small government, and that as conservatives, we need to be more focused on local government.
If we as conservatives truly believed that the best government is the one that is “closest to the people,” we would show remarkably more interest in local politics. Instead, we focus on the presidency and when it looks like that may be lost, we decide to stay home.
I had already decided that I needed to take a break from talking about the presidential election and return to the intended areas of focus of this blog.
Then to read a thoughtful and respected blogger friend of mine echo the same thoughts was a fine thing, indeed.
February 8th, 2008 at 12:10 pm
When has there ever been widespread popular support for small government conservatism? (I say that not as a ‘you’re a distinct minority, so why bother?’, moreso to see if you have a realistic grasp on the popularity of your position). And, no, I’m not saying you make that claim explicitly, but since day one you’ve always sort of inferred that in your general writing style, as if you were talking about a majority belief.
Don’t say 1994, because Newt and the boys got in there with only 28% of the electorate voting. Even if you take more than half of it, it’s barely 20%. More than likely, it was more due to them tapping into the anger, both of the privileged classes increasing loss of privilege, as well as them being able to successfully convince those less fortunate that their problems were the fault of those gawdam liberals, instead of the trickle-down economics and such brought on by the cons in the first place. Many liberals and moderates were so disillusioned after dealing with Reagan and Bush I that they stayed home in droves.
See, the thing is, Charity, “small government conservatism” is like anarchism, in the sense that it’s really just another theory. It never really existed, kinda like Adam and Eve.. And those cons in the millionaire class that campaigned on it forgot to tell you that they were primarily concerned about doing everything they could to press policies to accumulate more wealth for them, not you, because even with all this “small government’ nonsense, they never seemed to have a problem with all the corporate welfare (which costs the gov’t much more than welfare for living, breathing humans). So recognize that you’re philosophy is in the theoretical realm (like many other popular political philosophies). If you acknowledge to yourself that it never existed or was never popular to begin with, you’ll find a peace of mind that you never had before as you slowly start to accept the truth. It’s a lot easier to get into deep political thinking when you know you’re dealing with theoreticals, instead of the political realities. That holds true no matter what end of the political spectrum you’re on.
February 8th, 2008 at 12:11 pm
And I have to say that your soul-searching lately is a rather refreshing change, and thoroughly unexpected in its honesty.
February 8th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
“When has there ever been widespread popular support for small government conservatism?”
I wasn’t aware that widespread popular support = right.
There was widespread popular support for going into Iraq.
There is widespread popular support for teaching “theories” other than evolution.
There was widespread popular support for segregation.
There has been widespread public support against gay marriage.
Instead of a having a Congress, why don’t we just make our laws by running opinion polls?
I am not here to debate the history of the popularity of conservatism, but, as I said, to educate people about what conservatism is and why I am conservative.
February 8th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
“Instead of a having a Congress, why don’t we just make our laws by running opinion polls?”
Because the Founding Fathers were smarter than that I think.
February 8th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
Ha! It just so happens that you were wrong, JD.
“Queried about their views on the role of government, 54 percent of the 1,013 adults polled said they thought it was trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses.”
Date: October 2006
February 9th, 2008 at 10:56 am
Yeah,my entire premise, supported by tons of evidence, brought down by one poll, interesting after you just pointed out how those things shouldn’t matter.
February 9th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
JD Ryan
Yeah,my entire premise, supported by tons of evidence,
You always say stuff like that but fail to produce.
I can take it. Hit me with you tons of evidence.
February 9th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
Secretly, I’m really a conservative, so I just make shit up… but I did go into this here a bit.