Woohoo! I did one awhile back for PK-Watch, but it wasn't nearly as good as yours (though it did have Walter Wink and Leonardo Boff). And since my blogging software is broken, I never posted it... what do you consider pseudoconservatives to be?
The 'pseudoconservatives' came after reading my friends' reflections on the election. I'm not sure how clearly I can define it, and they might well take issue with anything I type. I'd include in a definition of conservativism, though, support for free markets and noninterventionist international policies as the appropriate ways for the federal government to be involved in social governance. So really, my definition of conservatism looks a lot like libertarianism, which I think is why there are so many libertarians who keep voting Republican because 1) the Libertarian party is a consistent mess and 2)um, they enjoy being back-stabbed, or something.
So, psuedoconservatives would be the folks who call themselves conservative but support intrusive 'values based' social legislation, interventionist wars, restriction of free trade to benefit their friends, and so forth. It's conservative sloganeering, rather than conservative thinking.
I might disagree throughly with a conservative on some issues. Pat Buchanan makes a great example- he's crazy, but honestly so. I may not like his ideas, but I can at least read American Conservative and understand how he's thinking. Pasting 'I (heart) conservative values' on the side of your campaign van just makes you a pseudoconservative, though, a conservative wannabe... which in many ways is just dumb squared.
Rogers said it better than this, once in 2004 and again more recently.
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Woohoo! I did one awhile back for PK-Watch, but it wasn't nearly as good as yours (though it did have Walter Wink and Leonardo Boff). And since my blogging software is broken, I never posted it... what do you consider pseudoconservatives to be?
"Seminary in general"--woohoo indeed.
The 'pseudoconservatives' came after reading my friends' reflections on the election. I'm not sure how clearly I can define it, and they might well take issue with anything I type. I'd include in a definition of conservativism, though, support for free markets and noninterventionist international policies as the appropriate ways for the federal government to be involved in social governance. So really, my definition of conservatism looks a lot like libertarianism, which I think is why there are so many libertarians who keep voting Republican because 1) the Libertarian party is a consistent mess and 2)um, they enjoy being back-stabbed, or something.
So, psuedoconservatives would be the folks who call themselves conservative but support intrusive 'values based' social legislation, interventionist wars, restriction of free trade to benefit their friends, and so forth. It's conservative sloganeering, rather than conservative thinking.
I might disagree throughly with a conservative on some issues. Pat Buchanan makes a great example- he's crazy, but honestly so. I may not like his ideas, but I can at least read American Conservative and understand how he's thinking. Pasting 'I (heart) conservative values' on the side of your campaign van just makes you a pseudoconservative, though, a conservative wannabe... which in many ways is just dumb squared.
Rogers said it better than this, once in 2004 and again more recently.
I am officially awarding you 20 points for this post.
Don't spend them all in one place.
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