AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

Locke would have been appalled that the government would presume to take property from Citizen A without Citizen A's consent and give that property to Citizen B for Citizen B's exclusive use. In this case Citizens A and B can be individuals or can be symbolic for groups of people.

The government taxes citizen A and gives money to soldier Citizen B's for their exclusive use.
The government taxes citizen A and gives money to Citizen B that lost their home in a natural disaster.
The government taxes citizen A and gives money to Citizen B who's spouse died and she has minor children
The government taxes citizen A and gives money to Citizen B who is collecting social security.
The government taxes citizen A and gives money to Citizen B that grew up poor and is getting loans or grants to go to college.

Your argument is that Locke would say none of these uses is good for society. I say what Locke clearly seems to say, the majority decides. As long as the taking of property is not arbitrary but is subject to all equally there is no fault in the redistribution under Locke.

Quote:

. Their [the legislature's] power, in the utmost bounds of it, is limited to the public good of the society. It is a power, that hath no other end but preservation, and therefore can never* have a right to destroy, enslave, or designedly to impoverish the subjects. The obligations of the law of nature cease not in society, but only in many cases are drawn closer, and have by human laws known penalties annexed to them, to inforce their observation. Thus the law of nature stands as an eternal rule to all men, legislators as well as others. The rules that they make for other men's actions, must, as well as their own and other men's actions, be conformable to the law of nature, i.e. to the will of God, of which that is a declaration, and the fundamental law of nature being the preservation of mankind, no human sanction can be good, or valid against it.

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Now, here we go...some good conservatives take a stand against bigotry. Well done.

http://americannewsproject.com/node/158

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@parados,

Look at the clip you posted, Parados. Locke said of the legislature: "It is a power, that hath no other end but preservation, and therefore can never* have a right to destroy, enslave, or designedly to impoverish the subjects."

What is slavery but forcing one person to involuntarily work for another?

Anyone who has read Locke knows that he was a devoutly religious man, and as such he approved much of concern for the poor, needy, distressed, etc. As all conservatives, he believed a moral society cares for the helpless among us. But you won't find anything among his writings that suggests that it is the government's role to do that other than as a matter of policy for the benefit of the whole.

Therefore he would not have condoned the government using the peoples money for the benefit of any individual or group for any reason.

He would certainly have approved of private charity accepting voluntary private contributions for the purpose of helping others in need.

It was on that principle that no president prior to FDR used the public treasury for relief of any individual or group for any reason except on the most limited basis. All before FDR thought there was no Consititutional principle by which that could be done. It was left to the churches and private charities to help the poor, take in orphans, assist unwed mothers, etc. In the 1930's, because some orphanages were pretty bad places, the government did provide a very small stipend to foster homes who would take in orphaned children and also provided a meager widow's pension so that women who had lost their husbands would be able to keep their kids at home. The lion's share of charity work still fell to the churches and private charities, however.

Why is it best for charity to be handled in the private sector instead of by the government?

1. The private sector has proved again and again that it is usually the better steward and manager of resources and produces the better results.

2. The private sector is far more likely to know the people serviced and can tailor services to accommodate individual needs instead of a far more wasteful practice of one-size-fits-all relief.

3. There is no justification to confiscate property from Citizen A who built his house upon the rock and give it to Citizen B who built his house upon the sand where it washed away. (Metaphorically speaking of course.) The government can certainly assess the need and get the word out to private relief agencies and the public who has never failed to respond generously and adequately to the individual burned out family or large scale disasters. And the government can help coordinate and manage relief services whenever this is something that the private sector cannot do.

4. And finally there is no temptation for elected leaders to expand necessary aid to the less than necessary in order to curry favor with their constituents and thereby become corrupt and self serving. There is no temptation to grow government larger than it must be when the government serves each citizen equally and is best appreciated for keeping the costs to the citizens as small as possible.

Conservatives are every bit as compassionate and caring as are liberals. The difference is that liberals want to take Citizen A's money and give it to Citizen B. Conservatives want everyone to search his/her own heart and give willingly and voluntarily each according to his/her means and the dictates of his/her own conscience because any other policy corrupts the system.

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@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

Anyone who has read Locke knows that he was a devoutly religious man, and as such he approved much of concern for the poor, needy, distressed, etc. As all conservatives, he believed a moral society cares for the helpless among us.

Locke surely was deeply interested in matters of faith and religion, like all.
But to call him a devoutly religious (there weren't many outside religion in those days - if at all] man is as surprising as calling him conservative (Whigs > Liberals > Labour Party).

(His liberal ideas/liberal positions can be found summed up e.g. in "The Two Treatises of Government".)

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@Walter Hinteler,

He emulated, preached, and taught many of the tenets of modern American Conservatism; therefore, to me he was conservative. I don't care anything about political ideology in this context. Nor is any particular religious group important in this context. Just about all the language related to God given unalienable rights that made it into the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution had its roots in the writings of John Locke.

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@Foxfyre,

Prove it Fox. Examples please.

Show me public programs that went private that are better stewards and managers of resources and produced better results.

Well, I guess private armies like Blackwater produce results... Except we pay them more than American soldiers and they seem to create more problems.

Before schools were public were we able to get a better education?
Before we has public Fire Departments, were we better tailored to handle dangerous fires?

Fox, you're wrong. again.

T
K
O

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@Foxfyre,

Sorry, Foxfyre, but isn't that just a very simplistic view, which neither does cope with Locke's reputation nor with the period he lived in?

You really can't look at someone and his/her merits without looking at the circumstances, conditions.

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@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

He emulated, preached, and taught many of the tenets of modern American Conservatism; therefore, to me he was conservative. I don't care anything about political ideology in this context. Nor is any particular religious group important in this context. Just about all the language related to God given unalienable rights that made it into the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution had its roots in the writings of John Locke.

This thread is about "American Conservatism". Isn't that a political term?

If Locke was a conservative, how do you call the opponents of his ideas? (Those in his time, that is!)

And I didn't refer to 'religious groups' in my above post nor did I write such: I was referring to "religion".

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@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

Look at the clip you posted, Parados. Locke said of the legislature: "It is a power, that hath no other end but preservation, and therefore can never* have a right to destroy, enslave, or designedly to impoverish the subjects."

What is slavery but forcing one person to involuntarily work for another?

When does A work for B? A is taxed by government. He doesn't have to do what B tells him. He doesn't have to live where B tells him. B does not own all of A's property. To claim giving money to someone else makes them your slave is not rational. If you give money to a poor person are you their slave or are you providing charity? There is no logical or rational basis to call B a slave under this scenario.

Quote:

Anyone who has read Locke knows that he was a devoutly religious man, and as such he approved much of concern for the poor, needy, distressed, etc. As all conservatives, he believed a moral society cares for the helpless among us.

And he never once said helping the poor turned the person helping into a slave of the poor. Your statement above was nonsense.

Quote:

But you won't find anything among his writings that suggests that it is the government's role to do that other than as a matter of policy for the benefit of the whole.

I never said as much. You however DID say that his writings prohibited taking from A to give to B. You have still not shown where it exists. Please provide a quote where a reasonable reading would even come close to making your argument. Slavery is NOT a reasonable argument.

Quote:

Therefore he would not have condoned the government using the peoples money for the benefit of any individual or group for any reason.

Just because he doesn't advocate it means he was against it? That is completely illogical. Does that mean Locke would be against the use of cars, airplanes and trains?

Quote:

He would certainly have approved of private charity accepting voluntary private contributions for the purpose of helping others in need.

His approval of private charity doesn't mean anything other than that. I approve of private charity and I also approve of the government helping those in need. Being for one doesn't mean he is against the other.

Quote:

It was on that principle that no president prior to FDR used the public treasury for relief of any individual or group for any reason except on the most limited basis. All before FDR thought there was no Consititutional principle by which that could be done.

Just because it was not done doesn't mean there was no constitutional principle. Helping the poor is certainly under the general welfare clause unless you are going to argue that it doesn't promote the general welfare to help them.

Quote:

It was left to the churches and private charities to help the poor, take in orphans, assist unwed mothers, etc. ....

None of the rest of your statement does anything to show what Locke said about the matter so I will ignore most of it.

Quote:

3. There is no justification to confiscate property from Citizen A who built his house upon the rock and give it to Citizen B who built his house upon the sand where it washed away. (Metaphorically speaking of course.)

There is nothing you have provided from Locke that prevents it. Nothing, not a single quote, only a poorly thought out argument that paying tax that goes to B is somehow forced servitude.

In fact Locke pretty much gives the legislature the power to do anything as long as that legislature is elected and subject to the rules and laws they write.

Locke wrote:

the first and fundamental natural law, which is to govern even the legislative itself, is the preservation of the society, and (as far as will consist with the public good) of every person in it.

Until you are willing to argue that it is for the public good to have people starving in the streets, the legislature is entitled to take food from the rich and give to the poor in instances where the rich are not feeding the poor. Are you willing to argue that Fox? Let's assume that private charity is not occurring at the rate to feed all the citizens. At that point can the legislature take food from the rich to feed the starving or not?

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@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

He emulated, preached, and taught many of the tenets of modern American Conservatism;

Please provide the quotes to support this statement.

Damn it Fox. You have not provided ONE quote. At this point I am thinking you incapable of reasoned discussion. Yet you claimed being rational was one of the core parts of being conservative. Are you arguing that rational beings don't have to provide support for their arguments? We are being led to believe that conservatives, of which you claim to be one, do nothing more than change meanings of words in the dictionary and works of others to claim they mean what you want them to.

Quote:

ra·tion·al (rsh-nl)
adj.
1. Having or exercising the ability to reason.
2. Of sound mind; sane.
3. Consistent with or based on reason; logical:

Quote:

rea·son (rzn)
n.
...
4. The capacity for logical, rational, and analytic thought; intelligence.

Provide support for your tortured reading of Locke using his words and the standard dictionary definitions of those words.
Providing charity, even forced charity, to someone else is NOT slavery. No one but someone arguing from an emotional and selfish standpoint would make that argument. No rational person should expect that argument to appear reasoned to others. It is NOT reasoned.

If you can't provide any support using Locke's words than we can only assume that conservatism as you practice it is bereft of any rationality.

I fully expect you to not support your statements about Locke. Instead you will probably accuse me of attacking you personally and refuse to talk to me like you have done in the past.

1 Reply

@parados,

Parados you apparently didn't read the quotes of Locke that I did post, and I frankly don't give a damn whether you agree with my opinion about what Locke was about or not. The man wrote a very great deal and had a great deal to say and I'm not going to post everything he wrote in this thread. Except for specific pertinent illustrations, the broad concepts of Lockean thought cannot be proof texted effectively. If you are so damn sure I don't know what I'm talking about, present your own take on what you think Locke meant or was all about. If you don't want to do that, fine. Nobody's making you, but I will not get into an anal examination of every word and phrase with you and I don't intend to play the 'gotcha' game with you.

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@Foxfyre,

won't give an anal examination of every word and every phrase? LEt's not talk about Locke?

Okay. Fine.

Then the first word that we can stop being anal about is "redistribution," and we can leave Locke out of the dialog entirely.

T
K
O

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Of course, the conversation (what future conservatism ought to look like) could switch over to the ways in which Obama is just like Adolph Hitler...

Quote:

Last update - 15:09 25/10/2008

Report: Pennsylvania Republicans email likens voting for Obama to rise of Hitler

By Haaretz Service

Tags: John McCain, U.S. elections

The New York Times reported Friday that a "new e-mail making the rounds among Jewish voters" in Pennsylvania, "equates a vote for Senator Barack Obama with the 'tragic mistake' of their Jewish ancestors, who 'ignored the warning signs in the 1930's and 1940's.'" The email, says the report on the Times political blog, was signed by top John McCain backers in the state. The email appears to refer to the rise of Adolf Hitler in Germany. (Click here for the full report)

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1031235.html

1 Reply

@Foxfyre,

Quote:

Parados you apparently didn't read the quotes of Locke that I did post,

Your interpretation of Locke is NOT a quote from Locke. I see one sentence of his you quoted in all your posts and then you used it to try to argue that taxation was slavery which is complete nonsense. Yes, Locke was against slavery but Locke never said taxation was slavery and never said anything about taxing A to give to B being slavery.

Since you used the word "quotes" meaning more than one quote from Locke, could you please point out where you quoted Locke in the last 3 days? I only see one instance.

Quote:

I'm not going to post everything he wrote in this thread.

Everything? Maybe you could post one paragraph as he wrote it. You posted one sentence. It's now Saturday. On Wed you said this

Quote:

I will be back to decimate your argument shortly Paradox. (I did a college thesis on Locke. I'm pretty sure that I'm on solid ground in the principles that he furthered.)

http://able2know.org/topic/113196-92#post-3447032 What does "shortly" mean to you? Since you made that post you haven't even disputed anything in my post you said you were going to decimate.

You now accuse me of a "anal examination" of every word? Present my take? I have disputed everything you have said about Locke using Locke's own words to undermine what you said he said. Your argument is not with me. It is with Locke.

Quote:

the broad concepts of Lockean thought cannot be proof texted effectively

The broad concepts of Locke as he wrote them or as you want them to be? What Locke wrote can be seen in his writings. It is standard rational argument that if you are going to argue someone said something that you can then back up what you claim with the words of the person you claim said it.

I don't know Fox, but you seem to be trying to prove that you as a conservative are out of touch with reality.
1. Please provide us with the posts you quoted Locke in and what the quote was. You said "quotes" and I can only find one.
2. Please tell us what school of thought provides for discussions of meanings of an author but ignores what the author wrote.
3. You have claimed meaning in Locke but provided zero support and then get upset when we ask for support.

I didn't realize that simple rational thought was classified as "anal examination" by conservatives. Oh, that's right. You feel you aren't attacking me by accusing me of "anal examination" but I am attacking you by questioning your thought processes.

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Alternately, conservatism could move even further in the direction of likening a presidential candidate to der fuhrer thusly...

Quote:

In an October 22 syndicated column, Thomas Sowell compared Sen. Barack Obama to Bolshevik revolutionaries, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong, Jim Jones, and "[o]ther despotic regimes in China, Cuba, and Iran," all leaders who Sowell claimed resemble Obama in that they rose to power on a message of "change" or due to "inspiring rhetoric and a confident style" more than "specifics." Sowell also falsely claimed in the column that Obama "was against a law forbidding physicians to kill a baby that was born alive despite an attempt to abort it."

http://mediamatters.org/items/200810220017?f=h_top

Wouldn't that be just swell?

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I think we all better confront an uncomfortable truth that may arise from this election.

If Obama wins the election, then it will axiomatically be the case that America hates America.

h/t to atrios

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MediaMatters, as MediaMatters typically does, has completely misrepresented what Sowell has said by taking it out of context. And Obama DID vote against a law that would have required physicians to treat aborted babies who lived.

Quote:

Obama's 10 reasons for supporting infanticide

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: January 16, 2008
1:00 am Eastern
By Jill Stanek
© 2008
I was intimately involved in the five-year process to pass the Illinois Born Alive Infant Protection Act, testifying before committees twice that then-state Sen. Barack Obama sat on.

Following are 10 excuses Obama has given through the years for voting "present" and "no" on the Illinois Born Alive Infant Protection Act, or BAIPA.

10. Babies who survive abortions are not protected by the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution.

Obama, the sole opponent ever to speak against BAIPA, stated on the Illinois Senate floor on March 30, 2001:

I just want to suggest ... that this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny.
Number one, whenever we define a previable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or the other elements in the Constitution, what we're really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a " child, a 9-month-old " child that was delivered to term. …

I mean, it " it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an anti-abortion statute. For that purpose, I think it would probably be found unconstitutional.

9. A ban to stop aborted babies from being shelved to die would be burdensome to mothers.

Before voting "no" for a second time in the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 5, 2002, Obama stated:

What we are doing here is to create one more burden on women, and I can't support that.

8. Aborting babies alive and letting them die is a doctor's prerogative.

An Obama spokesman told the Chicago Tribune in August 2004 that Obama voted against BAIPA because it included provisions that "would have taken away from doctors their professional judgment when a fetus is viable."

7. Anyway, doctors don't do that.

Obama told the Chicago Sun-Times in October 2004 he opposed BAIPA because "physicians are already required to use life-saving measures when fetuses are born alive during abortions."

6. Obama apparently read medical charts and saw no proof.

Also, during a speech at Benedictine University in October 2004, Obama said "there was no documentation that hospitals were actually doing what was alleged in testimony presented before him in committee," according to the Illinois Leader.

5. Aborting babies alive and letting them die is a religious issue.

During his U.S. Senate contest against Obama, Alan Keyes famously said:

Christ would not stand idly by while an infant child in that situation died. ... Christ would not vote for Barack Obama, because Barack Obama has voted to behave in a way that it is inconceivable for Christ to have behaved.

Obama has always mischaracterized Keyes' condemnation as a blanket statement against Obama's pro-abortion position, which is untrue. Keyes was pointedly discussing infanticide.

Nevertheless, induced labor abortion, the procedure that sometimes results in babies being aborted alive, must be included as one Obama condones. Obama responded first to Keyes as he recounted in a July 10, 2006, USA Today op ed:

... [W]e live in a pluralistic society, and … I can't impose my religious views on another.
4. Aborting babies alive and letting them die violates no universal principle.

In that USA Today piece, Obama said he reflected on that first answer, decided it was a "typically liberal response," and revised it:

But my opponent's accusations nagged at me. ... If I am opposed to abortion for religious reasons but seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all.

3. Introducing legislation to stop live aborted babies from being shelved to die was a political maneuver.

During the Benedictine University speech, Obama said, "The bill was unnecessary in Illinois and was introduced for political reasons," according to the Illinois Leader.

2. Sinking Born Alive was about outmaneuvering that political maneuver.

Obama has this quote on his website:

Pam Sutherland … of … Illinois Planned Parenthood … told ABC News, "We worked with him specifically on his strategy. The Republicans were in control of the Illinois Senate at the time. They loved to hold votes on 'partial birth' and 'born alive.' They put these bills out all the time ... because they wanted to pigeonhole Democrats. ..."
And the No. 1 reason Obama voted against the Born Alive Infant Protection Act was:

1. Introducing Born Alive was a ploy to overturn Roe v. Wade.

During a debate against Keyes in October 2004, Obama stated:

Now, the bill that was put forward was essentially a way of getting around Roe vs. Wade. ... At the federal level, there was a similar bill that passed because it had an amendment saying this does not encroach on Roe vs. Wade. I would have voted for that bill.
This was a lie on two points.

First, there was no such amendment.

Second, both definitions of "born alive" were always identical. The concluding paragraph changed in the federal version. But Obama, as chairman of the committee that vetted Illinois' version in 2003, refused to allow an amendment rendering both concluding paragraphs identical. He also refused to call the bill and killed it.

The federal paragraph (c) actually weakened the pro-abortion position by opening the possibility of giving legal status to preborn children, the opposite of Obama's contention:

Illinois' paragraph (c): A live child born as a result of an abortion shall be fully recognized as a human person and accorded immediate protection under the law.

Federal paragraph (c): Nothing in this section shall be construed to affirm, deny, expand, or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being "born alive" as defined in this section.

At any rate, so what if stopping hospitals and abortion clinics from aborting babies alive and leaving them to die did theoretically "encroach on Roe v. Wade"?

Obama was admitting he supported infanticide if that were true.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=45553

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@Foxfyre,

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@Foxfyre,

Quote:

MediaMatters, as MediaMatters typically does, has completely misrepresented what Sowell has said by taking it out of context. And Obama DID vote against a law that would have required physicians to treat aborted babies who lived.

The complete text of the bill is here
http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/legisnet92/sbgroups/sb/920SB1095LV.html

Quote:

7 Sec. 1.36. Born-alive infant.
8 (a) In determining the meaning of any statute or of any
9 rule, regulation, or interpretation of the various
10 administrative agencies of this State, the words "person",
11 "human being", "child", and "individual" include every infant
12 member of the species homo sapiens who is born alive at any
13 stage of development.
14 (b) As used in this Section, the term "born alive", with
15 respect to a member of the species homo sapiens, means the
16 complete expulsion or extraction from its mother of that
17 member, at any stage of development, who after that expulsion
18 or extraction breathes or has a beating heart, pulsation of
19 the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary
20 muscles, regardless of whether the umbilical cord has been
21 cut and regardless of whether the expulsion or extraction
22 occurs as a result of natural or induced labor, cesarean
23 section, or induced abortion.
24 (c) A live child born as a result of an abortion shall be
25 fully recognized as a human person and accorded immediate
26 protection under the law.

Nothing in the bill about forcing physicians to treat aborted babies born alive. The bill defines person, it doesn't define what a physician is supposed to do. Physicians are not required to treat everyone that has a beating heart or breathes.

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@Diest TKO,

Diest TKO wrote:

won't give an anal examination of every word and every phrase? LEt's not talk about Locke?

Okay. Fine.

Then the first word that we can stop being anal about is "redistribution," and we can leave Locke out of the dialog entirely.

T
K
O

You and/or Cyclop (if you are two different people) and Parados seem rarely interested in discussing a concept. This discussion started out as a concept put forth by Barack Obama of 'spreading the wealth' and how that concept violated the (Conservative) Lockean principles that made their way into the U.S. Constitution. I am not interested in dissecting words or doing an in depth discussion of each phrase, sentence, or comment that John Locke ever made. I have posted sufficient references to illustrate what Locke's views on property were as those views apply to an idea that Citizen B is somehow entitled to any property that Citizen A lawfully and ethically acquired.

Liberal notions of government entitlement related to property were foreign to anything John Locke ever offered and also those Lockean principles incorporated into the US Constitution.

You three seem to want to believe that the government owes you a living if for any reason you do not provide that living for yourself. There is no way that the government can do that without taking property from others and giving it to you.

If you would care to discuss that, it would be good.

3 Replies

AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

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