IMHO I see modern American conervatism, i.e. classical liberalism, as perfect a concept as humankind is likely to develop. A system in which the government will secure, protect, and defend the rights of the people and then leave them alone to govern themselves and form whatever sort of society they wish to have.
I would tend to agree if one could follow anything classical to perfection. It's the best system in the political cycle (so far) and again imho. This is the reasoning for the creation of the two party system based in the right to climb up the tree AND not have the climber pelted down by those who can not climb and do not wish to eat the apples that fall.
They fail to see that those who climb up the tree (in this system) toss apples down and this too creates a balancing act when seen correctly. The concept of "Trickle Down" is the concept of America and "Trickle Up" is shaking the tree down and will hurt the US imo.
I'm not as interested in why's and wherefores nearly as much as how. How to get the train back on the track?
I'm not so sure of that. When countries are threatened and powerful, they generally get around to doing what their culture has shown they will likely do again.
I agree.
So then, when the government, who must take from the people in order to provide all that, is no longer able to do so, and attempts to pull back, the people, used to their entitlements and having the expectations met, will generally revolt, riot, commit civil disobedience expecting the government to perform the magic that it has previously done. No effort to understand or be realistic or honest is evident. Only that the government is taking away some of their security blanket and binky comfort and they won't allow it.
And it is THAT to which Klavan refers when he says that "leftism makes people awful."
If the Democrats were to win three or more terms I would be far more worried. But then I'm not American.
But I'm not talking Democrat or Republican here as you have leftists and conservatives in both parties. In the society the Founders wanted for us, there is no caste system and no winners or losers. There are only those who choose well and who take advantage of the opportunities they find or make for themselves, and those who do not. And they saw it as the choice of those who chose well to decide whether or how much they will assist those who chose badly. It is not for the government to decide that for them.
In the classical liberal/MAC world the Founders gave us you find the narrow minded, bigoted, and harshly unyielding types like the Puritans with their enforced fundamentalist religion, scarlet letters, stocks, witch hunts, and humorlous/joyless society. They were free to have that which they wanted. Nobody could tell them they were not allowed to set whatever rules they wished.
But they were not free to impose that on anybody else. Nor were they free to forbid anybody from removing themselves from that austere society. And then we watched the phenomenon of people living for the first time under freedom and self governance shake off the prior social shackles. By the end of the 18th Century, none of those little theocracies or the ugliness associated with them still existed. The people themselves saw fit to dissolve them. And the federal government, even if it had been allowed to which it wasn't, didn't have to lift a finger to make that happen.
For the last hundred years or so, we have had more and more authoritarian government that no longer respected a freedom that allowed people to govern themselves. Leftism has become more and more entrenched in government, media, education, and social policy to the point that if we don't turn that around soon, we will lose the intent and protections of the Constitution altogether.
And like the leftist people of Europe we will all probably become AWFUL when the government is no longer able to order the society we think we want and is unable to give us what we come to believe is our right to have.
