VirulentNeoCon
... and yet, it moves.
Good question. I don't know how familiar you are with American political history, but such a transition is not at all unusual.
About half the founding editors of National Review -- American flagship conservative journal -- had been Marxists, of one flavor
or another. And I'm in touch with, or have known, half a dozen former Spartacists who made the same trip.
Here's what I'll say: I have exactly the same values now that I had sixty years ago, basically, as raw emotion, I'm on the side of the
underdog, and as a settled intellectual outlook, I am in favor of human progress... an extension of the Enlightenment, essentially.
I agree with what Marx and Engels wrote in The Communist Manifesto, about the amazing wonders in the growtih of the productive
forces that the bourgeoisie has unlocked ... ... they were right, and you can see it documented at HumanProgress -- have a look,
you may be surprised!
I believe conservatism and liberalism, or 'leftism' and 'rightism', what you will, should be seen basically as dispositions, not ideologies.
Certainly there is no conservative ideology, although many conservatives would like to have one -- it makes thinking easier -- so they
borrow libertarian ideology, at least in theory.
As for the Left ... it has changed beyond all recognition. A lot of people on the Right talking about 'Commies' etc but in reality we have
a post-Marxist Left. And, ironically, an inversion of several positions classically held by both sides. So, sixty years ago, the Left was generally
in favor of free speech, and the Right ... not so much. Now it's flipped. Astonishing!
In my youth, and earlier, the serious Left -- Socialists on out -- knew perfectly well that the white American working class held many backward
ideas, on race, sex, etc. But they believed these would be burned away in the fires of the class struggle, with a little help from the more advanced
workers. And they made great sacrfices to reach and organize these people, backward as they were : they built the great industrial unions which
improved life so much for their members.
Now the Left -- not the ones in the Marxist groups, but the vast majority -- despises their own working class, whom they see as their social inferiors.
It's a tragedy, in a way. Traditionally the American Right were reflexive patriots and nationalists: if the President announced we were going to war with
Absurdistan, they would back him instantly and without question. [A coule of exceptions: American Conservative, Pat Buchanan's journal; and the Libertarians
of various sorts, who are 'conservatism with a human face'. But they were just a thin layer of intelligentsia. The auto mechanic and the waitress were reflexive
'support our troops' "Bomb 'em back to the Stone Age" patriots.
Twenty years of education in the school of hard knocks and IED's have changed all that ... "Experience keeps a dear school ..." etc. In other words, with
respect to foreign policy, they have come around to the reflexive position of the Left! Invade? Start another war? Nein, danke.
But ... this opportunity for a united front on the most important issue facing the country is being missed! We may get dragged into a stupid war because
the Russians don't want missiles on their border, just like we didn't want them 90 miles from our border 60 years ago.
There are other ways in which the mainstream, rank and file, American Right has changed from what it was several decades ago. You won't want to believe this,
because it's psychologically comforting to demonize one's enemy, but on questions of race and sexual orientation, I would say the majority of American conservatives --
at least, as I have observed them via the internet, and I've been doing this intensively for about three years now -- are essentially liberals, albeit 1960's liberals.
And I'm including the hard core, like those in the miliita movement, which I have a pretty good knoweldge of. Yes, you can find exceptions, but they are just that, exceptions.
There are a few people on the Left who understand this ... Tulsi Gabbard is an example ... but not many. A shame.
Okay, enough. You (and others) can make some clever sarky comments, or we can have a serious discussion. I prefer the latter, but it's still a free country.
Added: one other thing -- I remained a socialist for years after I left the SL, probably best described as a 'Deutscherite' if you're familiar with Isaac Deutscher, ie I didn't
think socialism was imminent in the West, but I hoped to see a peaceful evolution towards democracy in the Soviet Union, where I lived for a few months in 1985, accompanying
my then-wife who was a Fulbright Exchange Scholar in Kharkov. Well, that was a bust.
But at some point I read about the "Socialist Calculation Question" (sometimes called the "Economic Exchange Question"), and it seemed to me to be clear, irrefutable
evidence that a really Socialist economy -- central planning etc -- would be massively inefficient. I looked for refutations -- I'm a Popperian with respect to trying to find
disconfirming evidence for one's beliefs - but never found any. I think most Socialists are emotional socialists ... they don't think about how the system could actually work .
(I mean full, red-blooded, all-in socialism.) I certainly was.
I've also been influenced by Charles Murray's study of the actual results of welfare programs, as in Losing Ground, although I am in favor of a 'conservative welfare state', sort
of like they have in friendly old Singapore. My general politics are those of the American Compass group, if you are familiar with them.
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Like his mate Thatcher it was obvious they were unwell when in power
all those communist espousing films they make.
