Whose Fault Line Is It, Anyway?

The nexus that has formed between Paleoconservatism and Libertarianism – starting, if memory serves, with George W. Bush attacking Afghanistan and Iraq... and, by implication, Islam in general, AKA “everybody who doesn't like Israel” -- has reached a new level of intensity and camaraderie under Obama. Suddenly a bunch of – to vastly oversimplify – atheists and anarchists has found common cause with believers in traditional American values, including religion and (if properly limited) government. And this common cause, rather than being confined to speculations in limited-circulation “journals of opinion”, has been all over the news recently.

But first, a tidbit of history. The Paleocons broke through the media wall when the Neocons stepped on their collective shvantz over Iraq... and the Libertarians broke through when their political party actually started showing up on both local and national ballots. And since then, they have found even more common cause in jointly rejecting Bush/Obama style socialism, which is kind of like fascism except for the fancy uniforms. Not only that, but the most prominent fault line within the Republican Party, and within the ranks of conservatives, seems to revolve around the Neocon vs. Paleocon + Libertarian split. Which is to say, it's not about religion vs. atheism (or agnosticism at least), and it's not even about social issues like “abortion rights” vs. the right to life. No – it's about the answer to two questions.

The first is, should the government be involved in every imaginable aspect of the lives of its citizens, and should it drive them into poverty in order to support (and justify) that program? Another way of putting this is, should the U.S. government be as totalitarian as possible consistent with traditional American values as embodied in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution? (That last sentence was a joke; I hope you caught it.) And contrary to the traditional duality and the propaganda pushed by the MSM, this question does not, in any meaningful sense, divide mainstream Republicans, i.e. Necons, from Democrats, i.e. liberals or “progressives” (as the Democrats have subtly renamed their political stance). Both of these believe in big government – in overwhelmingly big government, in fact; the differences are at the margins, i.e. in what areas of life does government most need to assert its bigness? This is on what is called the “domestic” side.

The other question is, should the U.S. government – and, by implication, Americans in general, including the military – take it upon itself to force “democracy” down the throats of any and all other countries, including the most benighted and hopeless? And should it do this in willful ignorance of the social customs, traditions, values, beliefs, economies, etc. of those countries? And especially, should it do this in the face of outright hostility, or at least disinterest, in the “democratic process” and all of its trappings, shown by the country in question? And even more especially, should it do this when the entire effort is a transparent scam, whose real purpose is empire expansion – trade, oil, etc. -- or some other equally-obvious political, economic, or military agenda?

The answers to these two questions will, in nearly all cases, divide the populace neatly into two camps, albeit of grossly unequal size. You will have anti-war conservatives answering “no” and “no”... Neocons and liberals answering “yes” (if they're honest) and “yes”... and I can't offhand imagine too many people opting for the other two possibilities. Totalitarianism on the home front combined with “isolationism”? When's the last time we saw that? (Some thought it was possible during the New Deal, but it turns out it wasn't.) Or, limited government combined with empire-building? Ah, but that's what the mainstream conservatives say they want – pare government down to the bone, but retain the largest military in human history to go along with a “muscular” foreign policy (that means, if other countries don't do as we suggest, we attack and occupy them). But the mistake they make is that it is simply impossible to have this empire-building, democracy-spreading attitude along with limited government; it simply can't be done. Now, some might say that we were doing plenty of international huffing and puffing under Teddy Roosevelt, but the government was quite limited back then, compared to now. And we didn't actually occupy, or have military bases in, that many places. Or even when Wilson plunged us headlong into World War I, the government was relatively limited (in scope, even if more totalitarian, in some ways, than today). And my answer is, sure, it's possible in the short run, but in the long run the military-industrial complex will make demands on the economy, and the citizenry, that require ever-increasing control of both. Start with taxes, and then add “national security”... and you've already made great strides toward social control. And admittedly, after World War I we did have a brief period of relative isolationism combined with relative economic freedom – but all of that came to an abrupt end with the Great Depression (on the economic side) and World War II (on the military/foreign policy side)... and guess what, most of those “emergency” measures taken to salvage the economy during the 1930s are still in place, and all of the military structures built up in order to fight World War II are still in place. So it might be said that we have a perpetual depression/perpetual war economy and system of government – no surprise to the Paleocons or the Libertarians, and just starting to dawn on groups like the “tea partiers” (who are, basically, conservatives of neither the “neo” or “paleo” stripe – it's just that current events have finally gotten their attention). (Call them "populists" if you like -- but of the conservative rather than the secular humanist variety.)

This fault line was brought out in sharp relief at the recent CPAC convention, where there was a chorus of boos, presumably from the Neocon side, in response to the news that Ron Paul had won the straw poll for the presidential election of 2012. Are you going to see that much excitement in a meeting of liberals/progressives/Democrats? Not bloody likely – they're all walking around with rings in their noses. So in this sense there is far more life in conservative than in liberal ranks – but I believe we have always known this. Liberals are, basically, dead souls who have adopted a completely mistaken view of human nature – in all its psychological, sociological, and biological complexity. And most of their behavior – public and private – is predicated on the rage they feel when their world view repeatedly clashes with reality. So they make up for this failing by proposing ever more outrageous “programs” that are an affront to all that makes us truly human. They are, in other words, trying to turn us into their ideal – namely that of blind, unthinking animals who need perpetual shepherding in order to survive. Conservatives, on the other hand, are more likely to be willing to accept the fallen condition of the human race and of the world in general, and willing to work with humanity as it is, “warts and all”, and not as it “should” be.

But in any case, we know that our work is not yet done when a very large roomful of “conservatives” erupts in boos and catcalls at the mention of Ron Paul. Those few who realize that he represents what they have long since sold for a mess of pottage should slink off and hide their heads in shame. Instead, they wave flags more furiously and bellow out buzz words like “Islamofascism” -- which makes about as much sense as “Buddhocommunism” or “Judeovegetarianism”. The real question, however, is not about conservatives in general or the Republicans – it's about whether the fragile coalition between Paleocons and Libertarians can hold together and continue to form what is basically the conscience of conservatism – ignored tho' it may be (and despite the likelihood that the last thing a typical Libertarian wants is to be placed in that role). One problem is that the Libertarians also share many articles of faith with liberals – but, once again, not with the mainstream but with the more radical, i.e. principled, left, who are not always wrong about everything (there, I said it!). Things like legalization of drugs, for example, which causes most conservatives of any stripe to shy away. Libertarians also tend to be dead-set against any form of nationalism – but this is not to say they are globalists or “one-worlders” either. It would be more accurate to say they share many values with the distributists, who were followers of Catholic social teaching – that social teaching that came about in response to the challenges posed by the Industrial Revolution, socialism, and communism. But then how many Libertarians are comfortable breaking bread with the Catholic Church? They have much more in common than either party wants to admit, and yet there is an awkwardness. For one thing, Libertarians also tend to gravitate toward capitalism – the pure form advocated by Ayn Rand and which is perfectly consistent with everything the Founding Fathers ever wrote or thought. The Catholic Church, on the other hand, and consistent with its social teaching, tends of favor a “third way” based not on collectivism or capitalism, AKA free enterprise, but on distributism, as mentioned above, and most of all on charity – of the voluntary kind, of course, rather than the forced kind we are so familiar with.

One can hope that unity in the face of adversity will be sufficient – kind of like in the old sci-fi movies where every nation on earth joins forces to fight off the alien invaders. This could work indefinitely, in fact, until (in the unlikely event) the Paleocon/Libertarian partnership acquires some real political power – and then let the fun begin. The falling-out would, most likely, be around questions on the role of religion... “legislating morality”... abortion... nationalism... free trade vs. tariffs... in short, anything that would set the ideal Paleocon world apart from the ideal Libertarian world. And don't forget, even within the Libertarian community there is a wide scale of belief in limited government vs. no government... and don't expect the Paleocons to take the side of the anarchists very soon (even though, at this moment in time, they can agree on many things having to do with our current state of government). Heck, as far as that goes, there are Paleocons out there who are nostalgic for monarchy -- despite the ongoing bad example set by the British "royals".

So the ultimate question would be, could everyone in this uneasy partnership fully enjoy their freedoms – according to their definition thereof – in a context set by any, or even one, of the various subgroups? In other words, could the Paleocons find contentment in a Libertarian world... or vice versa? Can the anarchists find contentment in... well, in any world but their own? And as I've said, these are questions that are unlikely to come up in our lifetime, if ever... and yet they are worth considering if one is concerned with the here-and-now health of “real” conservatism, and of the motley crew that supported Ron Paul. He is only one man, and yet he seemed to attract them all. But again, it only gets tougher when you win.