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Conservatism and Skepticism

HarryKeogh

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to the people who are both on this board (and there seem to be quite a few)...How do they fit with each other? It seems there are some key points which are in direct conflict with each other. Don't you find the way this administration views stem-cell research completely lacking in reason? How about their pro-life stance and strong views on organized religion (personally it burns me up when I hear Rush or Hannity refer to people like myself as ''those atheists" like we're second class citizens)

What draws you to conservatism? Plus don't you find some of the key points of conservatism, namely smaller government and leaving more power to the individual states, not to be a priority of this administration? (FCC regulations, record spending, proposal of gay marriage ban amendment to the constitution)

Which policies of this administration do you most agree with?

I'm very interested in hearing your opinions. Thanks.
 
I'm not a conservative myself, but are these issues really 'key points' for conservatives? Surely it's possible to be right-of-centre but still disagree with the current administration's religion-inspired take on certain aspects of policy.
 
I would imagine that many conservatives on this board consider themselves "classic liberals". They want minimal government intrusiveness into everything- morally and economically. I fall into this area. I believe there are certain necessary functions which government does best, but in most areas the free market should prevail.

George Will (that uptight little weenie) actually had a column just this morning about the possible re-ascendency of such conservatism.
 
An outsider's view is that the current neo-con presidential executive is as NON-conservative as they come. The adjectives "reactionary", "totalitarian" and "apocalyptic" seem to spring to mind far easier. I suspect they do not embody the "minimalist government" stance that classical conservatives eschew.

But that's just by 2c worth...
 
<SNIP>
...How about their pro-life stance and strong views on organized religion (personally it burns me up when I hear Rush or Hannity refer to people like myself as ''those atheists" like we're second class citizens)...

...proposal of gay marriage ban amendment to the constitution)

How many of those issues are 'key points' to all conservatives, and how many of them are just hot button issues based primarily on agit-prop?
 
crimresearch said:
<SNIP>
...How about their pro-life stance and strong views on organized religion (personally it burns me up when I hear Rush or Hannity refer to people like myself as ''those atheists" like we're second class citizens)...

...proposal of gay marriage ban amendment to the constitution)

How many of those issues are 'key points' to all conservatives, and how many of them are just hot button issues based primarily on agit-prop?
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hey, stop cherry-picking points from my original post!

ok, let's make "key points" into just "points" (though I still think they are key points with this admin at least, they talk about them all the time)
 
I agree that politicians, particularly the administration are pushing those hot buttons just as hard as they can...it is what passes for leadership these days.
 
"A Conservative is a Liberal who's been mugged."

-Ed Koch, democrat New York City mayor, GW Bush supporter in '04
 
This is just a personal observation (and may very well be completely wrong), but it seems to me that one hot-button issue for many of the hardline Republicans on this forum is the 2nd amendment/gun control.
 
Oh I dunno, it seems that the key issues that many republican conservatives are voting are Gay Marriage, Abortion and the War on Terror. I really don't understand how a skeptic can jump on board with the religious right on these issues. A vote for Bush is a vote against anything that is not "christian".
 
thaiboxerken said:
Oh I dunno, it seems that the key issues that many republican conservatives are voting are Gay Marriage, Abortion and the War on Terror.
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The first two are my voting issues, and have been since the 80's.

Economics, anti-protectionism, less buraucracy... those are important to me, but aren't my voting issues.

The War on Terror would be a toss-up. And that's where the Republicans could have gotten my vote, I think.
 
America has, by and large, a 2 party system. Sadly 2 parties don't really meet the needs of the vast majority of people. Many conservatives and republicans and moderate Republicans don't completely agree with the current administration for many different and many of the same reasons.

The question should be, given the state of the Republican party as it is now should those who currently associate themselves with the party but have some opposing views abandon it and move to the other party?

It seems there are some key points which are in direct conflict with each other.
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If I moved to another party I would just be replacing some "key points" of disagreement with other "key points" of disagreement.

The question then becomes, what is the point?
 
The Conservative Andrew Sullivan has something interesting on the subject in his blog today:


I CANNOT SUPPORT HIM IN NOVEMBER: I will add one thing more. And that is the personal sadness I feel that this president who praises freedom wishes to take it away from a whole group of Americans who might otherwise support many parts of his agenda. To see the second family tableau with one family member missing because of her sexual orientation pains me to the core. And the president made it clear that discriminating against gay people, keeping them from full civic dignity and equality, is now a core value for him and his party. The opposite is a core value for me. Some things you can trade away. Some things you can compromise on. Some things you can give any politician a pass on. But there are other values - of basic human dignity and equality - that cannot be sacrificed without losing your integrity itself. That's why, despite my deep admiration for some of what this president has done to defeat terror, and my affection for him as a human being, I cannot support his candidacy. Not only would I be abandoning the small government conservatism I hold dear, and the hope of freedom at home as well as abroad, I would be betraying the people I love. And that I won't do.
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http://www.andrewsullivan.com/



That, in a nutshell, is why I became a democrat. And why I now view everything the republican party says with distrust.


Call my family sinful and evil, boo the concept of gay rights openly on the convention floor, that I will not stand for.
 
How do they fit with each other?
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If you think about it, skeptical thought and conservative thought have some similarities. Both defend an existing status quo. In skepticism it is conventional scientific thought and in conservatism it is the traditional way of dealing with politics. Skeptics are not very progressive when it comes to accepting revolutionary scientific ideas, which means that they rarely turn out to be completely wrong about things when it the revolutionary idea is found to be just a silly fad. Conservatives are often try to keep things as they are - hence their name - instead of jumping on some bandwagon of change. Some of them may be 'progressive' when it comes to going to war, but that can also be seen as the traditional way to solve perceived problems: through violence.

It doesn't surprise me that many skeptics consider themselves conservative (or conservatives as skeptics) as both can be explained as a form of rigid thinking. The main difference between conservatives and skeptics is their attitude towards evidence. Both skeptics and conservatives require a high standard of evidence to change their mind, but skeptics promise they will.
 
Silicon said:
The Conservative Andrew Sullivan has something interesting on the subject in his blog today:

http://www.andrewsullivan.com/

That, in a nutshell, is why I became a democrat. And why I now view everything the republican party says with distrust.

Call my family sinful and evil, boo the concept of gay rights openly on the convention floor, that I will not stand for.
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I just discovered Sullivan's blog this week, and I must admit it is refreshing to read as another fiscal conservative disillusioned with our party.
But conservatism as we have known it is now over. People like me who became conservatives because of the appeal of smaller government and more domestic freedom are now marginalized in a big-government party, bent on using the power of the state to direct people's lives, give them meaning and protect them from all dangers. Just remember all that Bush promised last night ...

... I look forward to someone adding it all up, but it's easily in the trillions. And Bush's astonishing achievement is to make the case for all this new spending, at a time of chronic debt (created in large part by his profligate party), while pegging his opponent as the "tax-and-spend" candidate. The chutzpah is amazing. At this point, however, it isn't just chutzpah. It's deception. To propose all this knowing full well that we cannot even begin to afford it is irresponsible in the deepest degree.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the only difference between Republicans and Democrats now is that the Bush Republicans believe in Big Insolvent Government and the Kerry Democrats believe in Big Solvent Government. By any measure, that makes Kerry - especially as he has endorsed the critical pay-as-you-go rule on domestic spending - easily the choice for fiscal conservatives.
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Silicon said:

<SNIP>
..."To see the second family tableau with one family member missing because of her sexual orientation pains me to the core...."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That, in a nutshell, is why I became a democrat. And why I now view everything the republican party says with distrust.

Call my family sinful and evil, boo the concept of gay rights openly on the convention floor, that I will not stand for.
Click to expand...

Uhhmmm...I don't know which second family *he* saw, but Cheney's daughter was right there, smiling and waving at her Dad, who said his professional opposition to the marriage issue didn't alter his personal support for his daughter...and I didn't watch past that point but when did Cheney's daughter get called sinful, evil, or get booed?

And it certainly wasn't the Republicans who hounded gays out of the military with the pseudo 'Don't ask Don't Tell' policy...Sullivan has picked the wrong example if he wants people to believe that the Democratic party has any less to be ashamed of on the discrimination front than it's counterpart across the aisle.

It is in the nature of politics to step on those underneath, and both parties do a damn fine of of it...everything they spew to the contrary needs to be looked at skeptically, particularly when they are pointing fingers at each other.
 
crimresearch said:
Uhhmmm...I don't know which second family *he* saw, but Cheney's daughter was right there, smiling and waving at her Dad, who said his professional opposition to the marriage issue didn't alter his personal support for his daughter...and I didn't watch past that point but when did Cheney's daughter get called sinful, evil, or get booed?
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By "second family tableau," he is referring to the traditional after-speech-family-joins-politician-on-stage moment. During Cheney's speech, Mary sat in his box with her partner, Heather Poe. However, after the speech she and Poe were not there. Mary's sister Liz was there with her husband Phil Perry and their four children. Mary's mother Lynne was there. But even though Mary was in the building, and runs the vice president's campaign, she did not go on stage.

Now, this could very well have been her choice. But why? Because she thought her father would be embarrassed by having two lesbians on stage with him? I don't know. But she was conspicuously absent from the family display.
 
Ahh...thanks for the clarification...I only saw the moment when the camera cut away from him to her....

I am in total disagreement with the so called 'Defense of Marriage' garbage, but I still think that gays cannot expect either party to be their champions once the election is over.


To oversimplify and paraphrase greatly, it seems as though the Republicans are saying to gays and other minorities:

'We want your vote, but we're promising you right now that you won't get everything you want from us'.

Democrats are saying 'We want your vote, and we promise you will get everything you want'

So far only the Republicans have kept their promise

;)
 
I'm not a conservative, at least not to the extent that it prevents me from being a liberal. Liberals tend to think I'm conservative, and conservatives tend to think I'm liberal. I'm sort of an old-fashioned liberal from the time when it was not necessary to make a distinction between a liberal and a libertarian.

But anyway, I think that when an ideology, whether conservative, liberal, libertarian, or what not begins substantially to affect one's factual judgements (as opposed to value judgements) that it becomes antitheitical toward skepticism.

It is quite one thing to take the stance that the smoking of tobacco and marijuana should be less restricted by law than they are, and I tend to agree. It is quite another, in the service of that ideology, to declare that marijuana smoke and second-hand tobacco smoke pose no health risks at all, or to declare that no people become dependent upon marijuana, when it is clear that some do. On the other ideological side, it is one thing to be strongly opposed to the smoking of tobacco but quite another to say that nicotine is as addictive as heroin, when it is clearly not.

Skepticism is a difficult thing to maintain, and everybody makes factual judgements that are driven by existing value judgements. However, at least it is incumbent upon a skeptic to fight this tendency and try to minimize it.
 
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