Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 9, 1994 TAG: 9410140023
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: B2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Today, "liberal" seems little more than a taunt. Its collapse as a term to describe any coherent set of political principles is a raw reflection of America's traditional devotion to the politics of pragmatic interest over political ideology.
But "conservatism" seems far from a spent force; indeed, appears on the verge of making dramatic gains in the November elections. The problem is: How much is really "conservative" about it?
Surely genuine "conservatism" involves a healthy respect for the traditional institutions of government and for the orderly conduct of society's affairs, as well as a distrust of radical rabble-rousing.
Yet the putatively "conservative" candidate for a U.S. Senate seat from Virginia is a mercurial character whose fame arose as a midlevel military officer in rebellion against the constitutional authority of Congress, not to mention the stated policies of his commander in chief.
Moreover, much of what these days claims the banner of "conservative" commentary - the radio chatter of a Rush Limbaugh, for example - is remarkable for its disorderly incivility. "Facts" are asserted without the pretense of verification; ad hominem attacks proliferate; ideas are not so much examined as howls of complaint and contempt are vented.
Surely, too, genuine "conservatism" is concerned with maintaining robust communities and the mediating institutions that grow out of them.
Yet a significant portion of contemporary "conservatism," the religious right, would weaken one of the most enduring of such nongovernmental institutions - organized religion - by allying it with the coercive powers of the state. A look at history (another habit of true "conservatism") suggests the folly: In the America of First Amendment freedoms, organized religion has fared much better than in the Europe of established churches.
What happened to the libertarian impulse in "conservatism," according to which the state should meddle less in the affairs of individuals and families? Governments' dictating when women should carry their pregnancies to term, when children should pray, and which books should be available in libraries does not, in this light, appear very "conservative."
And surely genuine "conservatism" reflects an impulse to work with the world as it is, rather than to dream idly about - or try to violently force-fit reality to - a neverworld as we might like it to be. It means to favor incremental change, empirically grounded, over the less practical and more hazardous grand designs and utopias of revolutionaries; to accept the fact of human flaws and, in so doing, avoid making the perfect an enemy of the good.
Yet today's abstracted theorizers fill the camps of "conservatism." Once upon a time, it was "liberals" who seemed to think you could pass legislation outlawing poverty. They were the fiscally irresponsible ones. Now it is "conservatives," including the more than 300 Republican congressional candidates campaigning on a "Contract with America," who seem to think you can cut taxes, touch nobody's Social Security or Medicare benefits, raise defense spending - and then, simply by fiat, order a balanced federal budget. It's as if Congress should pass a law declaring that two plus two equals five.
The issue of who's "conservative" and who's not is more than a semantic quibble, more than a question of who gets elected and who doesn't. Americans are angry. All institutions, not just those of government, are mistrusted, even despised. In an age of instant gratification, fiscal demagoguery wins votes. And any sign of incremental improvement is indignantly dismissed as too little, too late.
Truly conservative counsel - of patience, of attention to detail, of fidelity to fact, of the wisdom of careful over volatile change, of the value of sound stewardship - is sorely needed. Its absence is sorely missed.
by CNB