I came across one of the better pieces I've seen in some time, over at HotAir today.
Republican politicians often forget that conservatism is an argument, while liberalism is a promise. The conservative argument will never be over, because any free-market system will always include a certain population who fare poorly. No matter how small that population is, or how much the overall wealth of society eases the burden of their poverty, they will always be extremely receptive to the seduction of collective politics...The conservative champions both the moral and practical superiority of liberty and individualism. The liberal promises tangible rewards in exchange for votes.
Ronald Reagan said as much in his presidential farewell address when he said, "Freedom is special and rare. It's
fragile; it needs protection." As such, the job of a conservative never ends. We must always be diligent and ready to defend freedom.
Liberal socialism is the ongoing critique of capitalism’s imperfections. To the casual center-left voter, the world seems overwhelming, confusing, and unfair. This was never more obvious than in the financial crisis that erupted last fall, when a large number of citizens became very angry and frightened about a crisis they couldn’t begin to understand. They just knew something terrible was happening, and they demanded action.
And this is why freedom is fragile. As a people, we have given as much spending power to the federal government in the last 100+ days as why have in the whole of our nation's history, because people demanded action and elected a man who promised he would give them all the government action they could ever hope for.
The Democrats stepped in with a ready-made narrative, which the Republicans suicidally left unchallenged, and offered the exact same solutions they have offered to every problem since the days of FDR: massive government spending and control. Conservatives found this dismaying and horrifying – who in their right minds would solve the problem Barney Frank created by giving Barney Frank more money and power? But Democrat voters were willing to accept this diagnosis and solution, as they always seem ready to accept liberal solutions, despite a century-long track record of absolute failure… because they need to believe that someone out there knows what they’re doing, and has the answers to the overwhelming problems produced by a complex economy, and packaged by a sensationalist media in love with Big Solutions to Big Problems.
As for the graphic above, I place myself about where the "Original Liberal" star. That would be what our founding documents would have been called at the time. With words changing meaning, the word liberal came to mean someone who believes in big government. Many of today's conservatives (like me, for whom social issues are not a high priority) are conservative in that they wish to conserve and retake the freedom and protections guaranteed in the Constitution.
It's a never-ending battle.
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