The marvelously idiosyncratic Bill Kauffman pens a lengthy TAC essay about how the old New Left had some things in common with conservative localists before the SDS lost its collective mind. He sees the possibility of a new rapprochement and discovery of commonalities:
I recently asked [leftist historian William Appleman] Williams’s biographer Buhle, a Madison SDSer, publisher of the New Left journal Radical America, and editor of the recent Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History, about the prospects for cashing in on the missed chances of 1968. “The spirit at large in the U.S. now reminds me more of the later 1960s New Left/Old Right dialogue or encounter than anything since then,” he says. “Consequently, I find myself more in dialogue with old-fashioned conservatives than I have been, and I suspect that this is widely true.”The Bush wars have brought together anti-imperialists of Left and Right, but their coalescence is being forged not so much overseas as in our backyards. A “wonderful example,” says Buhle, “is conservation, small-town life, and the bird population. All kinds of conservatives and small-town Republicans find themselves fending off new demands for exploitation of public resources (threats to water supplies and such).” Farmers markets are another meeting ground, he notes, as the organic and Eat Local and community-supported agriculture movements introduce folks who look homeward rather than into Baghdad suns. Left? Right? What difference does it make? The model organic farm in my neck of the woods, a truly inspiring extended-family venture, was begun by a former college hockey player and active member of the New York State Conservative Party. I know greens, right-to-lifers, NRA members, and just plain apolitical farmers who are relocalizing life, brightening their little corner of the world in their daily acts.
Add to Del.icio.us
Add to Technorati
Add to Digg
Add to Newsvine
Add to Facebook
Add to StumbleUpon
Subscribe
There are foreign policy decisions that are left or right, like protectionism and free trade and whatnot.
Going to war is not one of them. Going to war should never be a political issue.
And, it's worth pointing, it hasn't been one in the past, and it wasn't one this time. Which is why we had to be lied into it...the people who wanted war wanted it for politics, but the American people flatly (and this is something I've always been proud of) refuse to go to war because they 'want' to. It must be presented as something that is endangering our country, or presented as a desperate humanitarian crisis along the lines of WWII. (It's worth noting that roughly half of these 'presentations' have been lies at this point in history. Remember the Maine!)
However, at this point, it's turned into a political issue. When the lies became obvious, when the fact we had no plan became obvious, all support for the war should have vanished, not just 75% of the support. I'm a little disappointed, but I'm choosing to believe that the remaining supporters are in some sort of clinical denial about it, or think that we can and must solve the humanitarian problem we created, regardless of the original goals. I'm choosing to believe that almost no Americans would choose to enter this war if we had a do-over.
That's a wonderful essay -- startling in its politics, rich in fact, well-written. "The American Conservative" seems to be about the most iconoclastic political journal in the country today.
There are real differences between left and right, but the most creative thinkers manage to transcend the categories. A contemporary example, and one from 1500 years ago:
Wendell Berry confounds this liberal--conservative divide as well. One of his articles said that "Think globally; act locally" was drastically wrong. The only thing that could ever be accomplished by "thinking globally" is a careless concentration of wealth and a kind of disregard for local difference and local health; Coca Cola thinks globally; so do empires. Rather, Berry claims, we should "think locally; act locally." And the people in your post, Rod, seem to agree to some extent.
As far as the social justice ideas in left and right discourse, those on the right who are predisposed to listen to Saint (or Blessed, if you're Orthodox) Augustine should remember that he came up with the idea "If you want peace, seek justice." This idea is in his commentary on Psalm 84, where he presents them as two inseparable women who must accompany each other.
Working for social justice ought to be a defining feature of principled conservative political discourse, though serving money seems to instead be the rule of the day. This has been the bait-and-switch of the Republican party: make noises about certain issues to the social conservatives; then push legistlation to help out the monied and powerful. And seeking justice does not mean expecting a government to accomplish your goals for you; but neither does it mean privatizing everything, especially when large corporations have quasi-governmental powers.
Funny, I read Mr Kauffman's excellent essay and seemed to have missed him calling anything "crunchy". Is everything really self-referential, that you must bring your trite and tiresome book into it?
Thank you, Daniel Nichols. How's your book doing? Oh, wait...
Post a Comment
By submitting these comments, I agree to the beliefnet.com terms of service, rules of conduct and privacy policy (the "agreements"). I understand and agree that any content I post is licensed to beliefnet.com and may be used by beliefnet.com in accordance with the agreements.