Conservatives used to care about community. What happened?

[Remodeling Maidiac]

How much do you give to charity lohkota? It's really none of my business but since your saying I don't do enough let's see what YOU DO for your community

 

[tigerbob]

By E.J. Dionne Jr.

To secure his standing as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney has disowned every sliver of moderation in his record. He’s moved to the right on tax cuts and twisted himself into a pretzel over the health-care plan he championed in Massachusetts — because conservatives are no longer allowed to acknowledge that government can improve citizens’ lives.

Romney is simply following the lead of Republicans in Congress who have abandoned American conservatism’s most attractive features: prudence, caution and a sense that change should be gradual. But most important, conservatism used to care passionately about fostering community, and it no longer does. This commitment now lies buried beneath slogans that lift up the heroic and disconnected individual — or the “job creator” — with little concern for the rest.

Today’s conservatism is about low taxes, fewer regulations, less government — and little else. Anyone who dares to define it differently faces political extinction. Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana was considered a solid conservative, until conservatives decided that anyone who seeks bipartisan consensus on anything is a sellout. Even Orrin Hatch of Utah, one of the longest-serving Republican senators, is facing a primary challenge. His flaw? He occasionally collaborated with the late Democratic senator Edward M. Kennedy on providing health insurance coverage for children and encouraging young Americans to join national service programs. In the eyes of Hatch’s onetime allies, these commitments make him an ultra-leftist.

I have long admired the conservative tradition and for years have written about it with great respect. But the new conservatism, for all its claims of representing the values that inspired our founders, breaks with the country’s deepest traditions. The United States rose to power and wealth on the basis of a balance between the public and the private spheres, between government and the marketplace, and between our love of individualism and our quest for community.

Conservatism today places individualism on a pedestal, but it originally arose in revolt against that idea. As the conservative thinker Robert A. Nisbet noted in 1968, conservatism represented a “reaction to the individualistic Enlightenment.” It “stressed the small social groups of society” and regarded such clusters of humanity — not individuals — as society’s “irreducible unit.”

True, conservatives continue to preach the importance of the family as a communal unit. But for Nisbet and many other conservatives of his era, the movement was about something larger. It “insisted upon the primacy of society to the individual — historically, logically and ethically.”

Because of the depth of our commitment to individual liberty, Americans never fully adopted this all-encompassing view of community. But we never fully rejected it, either. And therein lies the genius of the American tradition: We were born with a divided political heart. From the beginning, we have been torn by a deep but healthy tension between individualism and community. We are communitarian individualists or individualistic communitarians, but we have rarely been comfortable with being all one or all the other.

Much More: Conservatives used to care about community. What happened? - The Washington Post

That's one of the most thought provoking OPs I've read in a while. And I have to say that largely I agree. There are some issues where I think that the points are a bit of a leap, but it is fair to say that a lot more moderate traditional conservative positions have been abandoned as being too close to the left.

And this is largely a reflection of the changes in society that we have seen over the last 10 years, by which I refer most specifically to the emergence of social media, blogging and places like this - political message boards.

Debates about middle ground issues now seldom go on for more than a handful of minutes, or posts, before they are shouted down by those whose political ax rests firmly in either the left or right hand. Acknowledgement of the potential validity of more moderate policies is abhorrent to activists, who seem to believe that in order for their side of the aisle to prosper a wedge has to be driven between socialist and conservative ideology and for the two to be polarized as much as possible.

Once a loud and extreme voice is raised, the entire debate begins an inevitable downward spiral to to point where at length nothing of value can be discussed in a reasonable manner because there is so much that is unreasonable to be rebutted first.

At no time since the end of WWII has society demonstrated such a clear and seemingly unbridgeable ideological split. I find this not only terribly depressing, but also extremely concerning. When people base their positions on being diametrically opposed to others it's a recipe for disaster, and a breeding ground for extremism.

 

[peach174]

They will until there is no Fire Department to put out their house or a cop to respond to their call or a teacher to teach their children.

Fire, Cop's and Teacher's are State Government. Not Federal Government.

Peach, if this is so, then why doesn't Missouri spend the $500,000,000 they have in their disaster fund for helping the people in Joplin? Instead, they are depending on the federal government because the spending of that fund would institute an automatic state tax increase. So they depend on us in the blue states to fund their disaster.

Same with Texas. The US Government spent many millions of dollars helping them fight their fires, only to have Texans scream about how they don't want federal people doing anything in their state.

Right now, when it comes to fiscal issues, the conservatives and 'Conservatives' all seem to be rather hypocritical.

Fire, Cops and teacher's salaries are paid by each state from their taxes.
Federal disaster funds are there to help the states. It has nothing to do with State workers salaries.
There is a difference between State Government workers, and Federal Government worker's.

 

[Two Thumbs]

We are a nation in decline. As prosperity fades, people tend to think more about self-preservation than they do about the common good.

They will until there is no Fire Department to put out their house or a cop to respond to their call or a teacher to teach their children.

You need more fiber in your diet.

cuz you're full of shit.

 

[Two Thumbs]

By E.J. Dionne Jr.

To secure his standing as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney has disowned every sliver of moderation in his record. He’s moved to the right on tax cuts and twisted himself into a pretzel over the health-care plan he championed in Massachusetts — because conservatives are no longer allowed to acknowledge that government can improve citizens’ lives.

Romney is simply following the lead of Republicans in Congress who have abandoned American conservatism’s most attractive features: prudence, caution and a sense that change should be gradual. But most important, conservatism used to care passionately about fostering community, and it no longer does. This commitment now lies buried beneath slogans that lift up the heroic and disconnected individual — or the “job creator” — with little concern for the rest.

Today’s conservatism is about low taxes, fewer regulations, less government — and little else. Anyone who dares to define it differently faces political extinction. Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana was considered a solid conservative, until conservatives decided that anyone who seeks bipartisan consensus on anything is a sellout. Even Orrin Hatch of Utah, one of the longest-serving Republican senators, is facing a primary challenge. His flaw? He occasionally collaborated with the late Democratic senator Edward M. Kennedy on providing health insurance coverage for children and encouraging young Americans to join national service programs. In the eyes of Hatch’s onetime allies, these commitments make him an ultra-leftist.

I have long admired the conservative tradition and for years have written about it with great respect. But the new conservatism, for all its claims of representing the values that inspired our founders, breaks with the country’s deepest traditions. The United States rose to power and wealth on the basis of a balance between the public and the private spheres, between government and the marketplace, and between our love of individualism and our quest for community.

Conservatism today places individualism on a pedestal, but it originally arose in revolt against that idea. As the conservative thinker Robert A. Nisbet noted in 1968, conservatism represented a “reaction to the individualistic Enlightenment.” It “stressed the small social groups of society” and regarded such clusters of humanity — not individuals — as society’s “irreducible unit.”

True, conservatives continue to preach the importance of the family as a communal unit. But for Nisbet and many other conservatives of his era, the movement was about something larger. It “insisted upon the primacy of society to the individual — historically, logically and ethically.”

Because of the depth of our commitment to individual liberty, Americans never fully adopted this all-encompassing view of community. But we never fully rejected it, either. And therein lies the genius of the American tradition: We were born with a divided political heart. From the beginning, we have been torn by a deep but healthy tension between individualism and community. We are communitarian individualists or individualistic communitarians, but we have rarely been comfortable with being all one or all the other.

Much More: Conservatives used to care about community. What happened? - The Washington Post

Liberals care about Community than do Comservatives?? That depends on the community. Take unions for example. They are a community that take precedent over non-union communities like small businesses or non union workers. How about the Poor? I see conservatives push programs such as school vouchers and tax payer funded scholarships so that poor, and in many cases, black or other minorities are not subject to unsafe, underperforming schools. Instead, this redirection of taxes enables students to go to schools with the 1 percent. Liberals would rather that money go to unions, bureaucrats, and political cronies. I did not see too much Liberal concern or care for the Gulf States comunities in the wake of the BP Oil spill. The "care" was focused on punishing and squeezing BP by shutting down drilling and refining in the region. How many communities' livelihoods were ruined? Do Liberals care about communities impacted by waves of illegal immigrants who come in and take government services from the taxpayers who pay into them? Check the number of hospitals shut down in the Southwest because of this and tell us how much liberals care.

 

[Remodeling Maidiac]

What a bunch of depressing defeatist bullshit these libs spew.

 

[Sallow]

What a bunch of depressing defeatist bullshit these libs spew.

It's not.

It's observation.

Conservatives are social darwinists. You know. Like conservative heroine Jan Brewer. Who, to the cheers and applauds of conservatives nationwide, let 2 people die due to lack of funding.

Let em die, boys!

Good job!

 

[Stephanie]

What a bunch of depressing defeatist bullshit these libs spew.

It's not.

It's observation.

Conservatives are social darwinists. You know. Like conservative heroine Jan Brewer. Who, to the cheers and applauds of conservatives nationwide, let 2 people die due to lack of funding.

Let em die, boys!

Good job!

omg.
just what I was talking about...

 

[Remodeling Maidiac]

What a bunch of depressing defeatist bullshit these libs spew.

It's not.

It's observation.

Conservatives are social darwinists. You know. Like conservative heroine Jan Brewer. Who, to the cheers and applauds of conservatives nationwide, let 2 people die due to lack of funding.

Let em die, boys!

Good job!

Conservatives just don't publicly jump up and down bragging about the charity work they do like you libs do. And honestly its none of your fucking business. Judge all you like. I give regularly, do you?

 

[NYcarbineer]

you have to love that...the common good..

We as a nation are fine..it's you whining liberals who never see good in anything or anybody is the problem..

If you all didn't have your panties in a bunch all the time you aren't happy..

What's gotten better in the last 30 years in this country, economically?

 

[teapartysamurai]

By E.J. Dionne Jr.

To secure his standing as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney has disowned every sliver of moderation in his record. He’s moved to the right on tax cuts and twisted himself into a pretzel over the health-care plan he championed in Massachusetts — because conservatives are no longer allowed to acknowledge that government can improve citizens’ lives.

Romney is simply following the lead of Republicans in Congress who have abandoned American conservatism’s most attractive features: prudence, caution and a sense that change should be gradual. But most important, conservatism used to care passionately about fostering community, and it no longer does. This commitment now lies buried beneath slogans that lift up the heroic and disconnected individual — or the “job creator” — with little concern for the rest.

Today’s conservatism is about low taxes, fewer regulations, less government — and little else. Anyone who dares to define it differently faces political extinction. Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana was considered a solid conservative, until conservatives decided that anyone who seeks bipartisan consensus on anything is a sellout. Even Orrin Hatch of Utah, one of the longest-serving Republican senators, is facing a primary challenge. His flaw? He occasionally collaborated with the late Democratic senator Edward M. Kennedy on providing health insurance coverage for children and encouraging young Americans to join national service programs. In the eyes of Hatch’s onetime allies, these commitments make him an ultra-leftist.

I have long admired the conservative tradition and for years have written about it with great respect. But the new conservatism, for all its claims of representing the values that inspired our founders, breaks with the country’s deepest traditions. The United States rose to power and wealth on the basis of a balance between the public and the private spheres, between government and the marketplace, and between our love of individualism and our quest for community.

Conservatism today places individualism on a pedestal, but it originally arose in revolt against that idea. As the conservative thinker Robert A. Nisbet noted in 1968, conservatism represented a “reaction to the individualistic Enlightenment.” It “stressed the small social groups of society” and regarded such clusters of humanity — not individuals — as society’s “irreducible unit.”

True, conservatives continue to preach the importance of the family as a communal unit. But for Nisbet and many other conservatives of his era, the movement was about something larger. It “insisted upon the primacy of society to the individual — historically, logically and ethically.”

Because of the depth of our commitment to individual liberty, Americans never fully adopted this all-encompassing view of community. But we never fully rejected it, either. And therein lies the genius of the American tradition: We were born with a divided political heart. From the beginning, we have been torn by a deep but healthy tension between individualism and community. We are communitarian individualists or individualistic communitarians, but we have rarely been comfortable with being all one or all the other.

Much More: Conservatives used to care about community. What happened? - The Washington Post

This is the biggest load of laughable crap, I've seen in a long time.

It was written by a liberal (that's OBVIOUS) and AS USUAL, the liberal now tells what what HE THINKS conservatism used to be and SHOULD BE NOW.

But notice what he thinks it so "terrible." INDIVIDUALITY! Can't have that. It should be a "balance" between the collective!

Now Rush talks about this all the time. How liberals see compromise. They never see it as liberals compromising THEIR beliefs with conservatism. Oh no!

No, conservatives MUST compromise THEIR BELIEFS.

This is just more of the same, and as usual, with the paid, er I mean volunteer op, it's just another cut and paste opinion piece that has no facts and no value.

Yawn! Move on people. Nothing to see here. HO HUM!

 

[NYcarbineer]

you have to love that...the common good..

We as a nation are fine..it's you whining liberals who never see good in anything or anybody is the problem..

If you all didn't have your panties in a bunch all the time you aren't happy..

This daft cow's implication that conservatives never complain about how things are in this country might be the dumbest post of the year.

 

[Seawytch]

They never cared about community.

Conservativism is the philosophy of "me, mine, and myself".

Maybe that has been your experience, but not mine. I'm 65, and I don't ever remember Conservatives being so hateful, radical and selfish as they are today. That's why I truly identify with the OP.

Hmm I still say this is the result of the end of the fairness doctrine and the corresponding rise of Rush Limbugh types and talk radio.
Hours of daily fear and hatred programming programmed them.

All brought to you by...

Bain Capital

 

[Remodeling Maidiac]

Liberals seem to think paying taxes and having the govt spend their money is charity for the community. I see it differently. I see that as a scam and what I do personally as more charitable to the community.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Conservatives never really embraced 'community'.

Conservatives want the poor poorer and the rich richer. Every policy that effects that situation that they advocate advances that cause.

 

[Seawytch]

you have to love that...the common good..

We as a nation are fine..it's you whining liberals who never see good in anything or anybody is the problem..

If you all didn't have your panties in a bunch all the time you aren't happy..

What's gotten better in the last 30 years in this country, economically?

CEO pay, the 1%'s control of the nations wealth and multi-national corporation profits.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Liberals seem to think paying taxes and having the govt spend their money is charity for the community. I see it differently. I see that as a scam and what I do personally as more charitable to the community.

If charity worked the people would have never voted to involve the government.

 

[Remodeling Maidiac]

Conservatives never really embraced 'community'.

Conservatives want the poor poorer and the rich richer. Every policy that effects that situation that they advocate advances that cause.

Sometimes you can be a real douchebag. This, is one of those times.

Do tell us WHAT HAVE YOU DONE PERSONALLY TO BETTER YOUR COMMUNITY?

 

[NYcarbineer]

you have to love that...the common good..

We as a nation are fine..it's you whining liberals who never see good in anything or anybody is the problem..

If you all didn't have your panties in a bunch all the time you aren't happy..

What's gotten better in the last 30 years in this country, economically?

CEO pay, the 1%'s control of the nations wealth and multi-national corporation profits.

Yes, because money is power and money and power combined beget more money and power for those who had it.

And yet, conservatives now, in a time of necessary sacrifice, happily exempt the rich from ANY share of that sacrifice.

 

[Two Thumbs]

I live in a neighborhood full of people that rely on the liberal idea of community.

It's so bad here, I don't let my teens play outside.

Can't wait to leave this "community".

Oh, and grats to the liberals for turning Bethlehem PA, ya know, the source of American steel, into little more than a ghetto.

A generation ago, people moved here for the schools, jobs and art, now a local administrator confessed to us; "I just work here, I would never have my kids attend."