Comments on: Different Viewpoints on the TAC Blog http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog @TAC Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:23:04 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Willie Buck Merle http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1630 Willie Buck Merle Thu, 30 Oct 2008 15:38:30 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1630 @Francis Great post, very lucid @Francis

Great post, very lucid

]]> By: Mike C. http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1622 Mike C. Thu, 30 Oct 2008 06:01:12 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1622 I have to say that I agree with some of what Mr. Boyd had to say in his original missive. While it would certainly be boring to read repeated pronouncements of "paleo" orthodoxy, I sometimes think that some of those who post on this blog are too zealous in their attacks on the neocons, to the exclusion of all else. The neoconservative corporatist, statist, and internationalist world view is an abomination which needs a stake through the heart. But we should not be happy about the general public replacing them with a corporatist, statist, internationalist, SOCIALIST cabal...which is what we will be getting soon. The fact that some of us are cheering this as a repudiation of the neoconservatives is very gross. I will go into the voting booth and cast my vote for Chuck Baldwin, but I cannot celebrate the election of Barack Obama. I have to say that I agree with some of what Mr. Boyd had to say in his original missive. While it would certainly be boring to read repeated pronouncements of “paleo” orthodoxy, I sometimes think that some of those who post on this blog are too zealous in their attacks on the neocons, to the exclusion of all else.

The neoconservative corporatist, statist, and internationalist world view is an abomination which needs a stake through the heart. But we should not be happy about the general public replacing them with a corporatist, statist, internationalist, SOCIALIST cabal…which is what we will be getting soon.

The fact that some of us are cheering this as a repudiation of the neoconservatives is very gross. I will go into the voting booth and cast my vote for Chuck Baldwin, but I cannot celebrate the election of Barack Obama.

]]> By: David Boyd http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1619 David Boyd Thu, 30 Oct 2008 02:51:07 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1619 I am "Mr. Giraldi’s correspondent" and was graciously responded to by Kara Hopkins. I really just wanted an answer to my question. I struggle as much as the respondent might with Kirk's dialog (since I'd rather watch baseball or a good college football game or be coaching one of my kids in baseball or football or drinking a good Irish whiskie, as I am now ). So now my implied distinction between liberals and neocons is being called "rather specious"? Actually, my concern is that we've "progressed" as a society to the point that the economics and imperialism expressed by the major parties are so close together that the life issues, with the consequent Supreme Court appointments at stake, have become for me the defining issue of presidential elections. We need to quit picking fights with other countries, we need to quit killing our children, we need to quit believing that the national government is our solution for everything, we need to quit believing that our faith in God doesn't matter, we need to recover the constitutional principles on which our country was founded...these are some of the things that occupy my thoughts. Therefore, I was just asking.... I am “Mr. Giraldi’s correspondent” and was graciously responded to by Kara Hopkins. I really just wanted an answer to my question. I struggle as much as the respondent might with Kirk’s dialog (since I’d rather watch baseball or a good college football game or be coaching one of my kids in baseball or football or drinking a good Irish whiskie, as I am now ). So now my implied distinction between liberals and neocons is being called “rather specious”? Actually, my concern is that we’ve “progressed” as a society to the point that the economics and imperialism expressed by the major parties are so close together that the life issues, with the consequent Supreme Court appointments at stake, have become for me the defining issue of presidential elections. We need to quit picking fights with other countries, we need to quit killing our children, we need to quit believing that the national government is our solution for everything, we need to quit believing that our faith in God doesn’t matter, we need to recover the constitutional principles on which our country was founded…these are some of the things that occupy my thoughts. Therefore, I was just asking….

]]> By: Francis http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1613 Francis Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:38:44 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1613 <i>sanctity of life, small government, ... , limited government intrusion in one’s privacy</i> This is probably not the time or place to start a debate about abortion, but since this site and Culture11 are the only readable righties I can find, I'll try anyway. Looking at the quoted material, one of those things is not like the other two. After 15 years of practicing law, including a small amount of lobbying, I've learned that the more intrusive a law, the greater popular support it must have. Unpopular laws kept in place by a determined minority can be profoundly corrosive. Witness the Abolition era. We know that women have practiced family planning and abortions since time immemorial. We know that abortions have been legal in the US since the early 1970s. We know that flat bans of abortions are unpopular. We know that IVF, including techniques that create multiple viable lives, is popular. We know that it's very difficult to impossible to tell the difference between an unfertilized and fertilized egg. Few people appear to want to talk openly about a post-Roe world. Would family planning buses recapitulate the Freedom Riders? What would be the political consequences of rich women being able to travel to California (or Montreal, assuming a federal ban), while poor women would be forced to carry an unwanted fetus? (On the federal issue, note that the US is now prosecuting people for engaging in acts overseas that are lawful in those countries. Extraterritoriality is apparently no bar to the reach of Uncle Sam.) Could DAs get injunctions against pregnant women preventing them from travelling? What would be the penalty for an illegal abortion? Prison? For the doctor only or the mother too? If a fetus is declared to be a life, wouldn't the commonly accepted rape/incest exception have to fall? None of these issues appear to be consonant with the ideas of "small government" or "limited government intrusion in one’s privacy". Cheers. sanctity of life, small government, … , limited government intrusion in one’s privacy

This is probably not the time or place to start a debate about abortion, but since this site and Culture11 are the only readable righties I can find, I’ll try anyway.

Looking at the quoted material, one of those things is not like the other two. After 15 years of practicing law, including a small amount of lobbying, I’ve learned that the more intrusive a law, the greater popular support it must have. Unpopular laws kept in place by a determined minority can be profoundly corrosive. Witness the Abolition era.

We know that women have practiced family planning and abortions since time immemorial. We know that abortions have been legal in the US since the early 1970s. We know that flat bans of abortions are unpopular. We know that IVF, including techniques that create multiple viable lives, is popular. We know that it’s very difficult to impossible to tell the difference between an unfertilized and fertilized egg.

Few people appear to want to talk openly about a post-Roe world. Would family planning buses recapitulate the Freedom Riders? What would be the political consequences of rich women being able to travel to California (or Montreal, assuming a federal ban), while poor women would be forced to carry an unwanted fetus? (On the federal issue, note that the US is now prosecuting people for engaging in acts overseas that are lawful in those countries. Extraterritoriality is apparently no bar to the reach of Uncle Sam.) Could DAs get injunctions against pregnant women preventing them from travelling? What would be the penalty for an illegal abortion? Prison? For the doctor only or the mother too? If a fetus is declared to be a life, wouldn’t the commonly accepted rape/incest exception have to fall?

None of these issues appear to be consonant with the ideas of “small government” or “limited government intrusion in one’s privacy”.

Cheers.

]]> By: Jayhawker http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1605 Jayhawker Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:17:59 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1605 I find the distinction drawn by Mr. Giraldi's correspondent between "liberals" and "neocons" to be rather specious. Quite a few prominent "neocons" espouse "liberal" positions on social and economic issues, e.g. Frum and Brooks, while quite a few "liberals" espouse "neocon" positions on foreign policy, e.g. Dennis Ross. Even "neocons" like GW Bush and John McCain who are nominal social conservatives have demonstrated time and again that foreign policy trumps social policy in their eyes. Neoconservative, for better or worse, has simply become shorthand in paleocon circles for the aggressively interventionist foreign policy that has become rampant in America's political establishment, regardless of political party. The organs of the "mainstream" right, such as the National Review and Commentary, have mostly been hijacked by apologists for this foreign policy, but in this regard they aren't much different from many journals of the "mainstream" left, such as the New Republic. To the extent that the American Conservative devotes itself to criticizing America's ruinous New Imperialism, and the centralization of power in the hands of the President that has followed therefromt, it is simply providing a much needed balance to a national political discourse that has gone deeply astray. I find the distinction drawn by Mr. Giraldi’s correspondent between “liberals” and “neocons” to be rather specious. Quite a few prominent “neocons” espouse “liberal” positions on social and economic issues, e.g. Frum and Brooks, while quite a few “liberals” espouse “neocon” positions on foreign policy, e.g. Dennis Ross. Even “neocons” like GW Bush and John McCain who are nominal social conservatives have demonstrated time and again that foreign policy trumps social policy in their eyes. Neoconservative, for better or worse, has simply become shorthand in paleocon circles for the aggressively interventionist foreign policy that has become rampant in America’s political establishment, regardless of political party.

The organs of the “mainstream” right, such as the National Review and Commentary, have mostly been hijacked by apologists for this foreign policy, but in this regard they aren’t much different from many journals of the “mainstream” left, such as the New Republic. To the extent that the American Conservative devotes itself to criticizing America’s ruinous New Imperialism, and the centralization of power in the hands of the President that has followed therefromt, it is simply providing a much needed balance to a national political discourse that has gone deeply astray.

]]> By: Polites http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1603 Polites Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:11:02 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1603 I subscribe to two political magazines: <em>The American Conservative</em> and <em>Chronicles</em>. Each, I believe, has strengths, but what I have always appreciated about <em>TAC</em> (I am a charter subscriber) has been its willingness to let contrasting ideas manifest themselves in one place, sometimes generating heat but always shedding light. Keep up the good work. I subscribe to two political magazines: The American Conservative and Chronicles. Each, I believe, has strengths, but what I have always appreciated about TAC (I am a charter subscriber) has been its willingness to let contrasting ideas manifest themselves in one place, sometimes generating heat but always shedding light. Keep up the good work.

]]> By: Willie Buck Merle http://www.theamericanconservative.com/blog/2008/10/29/different-viewpoints-on-the-tac-blog/comment-page-1/#comment-1593 Willie Buck Merle Wed, 29 Oct 2008 18:49:17 +0000 http://www.amconmag.com/blog/?p=1150#comment-1593 Hi, yeah I read your blog and enjoy. IMHO it doesn't really matter "reagan republican" or whatever label. Just have an intelligent POV instead of hardcore fundie idiocy. This country has gone very anti-intellectual and to the fundamentalist right since late '90s. Gay marriage isn't going to destroy this country as much as endless wars, freezing wages and running up our debt. There has been a willful ignorance that has governed to long.... hope it is not too late! oh well, keep up the good writing :) Hi, yeah I read your blog and enjoy. IMHO it doesn’t really matter “reagan republican” or whatever label. Just have an intelligent POV instead of hardcore fundie idiocy.

This country has gone very anti-intellectual and to the fundamentalist right since late ’90s. Gay marriage isn’t going to destroy this country as much as endless wars, freezing wages and running up our debt. There has been a willful ignorance that has governed to long…. hope it is not too late!

oh well, keep up the good writing :)

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