Why Be A Conservative?

I absolutely love this opinion piece by Christopher S. Brownwell at American Thinker:

Setbacks in recent elections have left some self-proclaimed conservatives announcing the era of Reagan is over.  David Frum thinks conservatives need to be less aggressive and move to the center to win.  David Brooks suggests that Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal's conservatism is stale.  Possibly, the Kathleen Parkers, Peggy Noonans, Christopher Buckleys of "conservatism" are just embarrassed by the NASCAR watching, Wal-Mart shopping, Jesus-loving conservative base.

In a survival of the fittest, these political pundits have tried to spontaneously generate an evolving definition of conservatism.  They then try to put conservatives like Rush Limbaugh, Bobby Jindal, and Sarah Palin in a closet of political extinction.  However, these and many other conservative Neanderthals refuse to go quietly into the political closet despite the ridicule.

Let me follow these conservative examples and come out of the closet by announcing my political orientation.  I am a conservative and I am proud of it.  Furthermore, I was born this way.  Some might say "No, you weren't.  You were indoctrinated to be conservative by heartless, authoritarian parents.  You chose to be conservative because you are mean-spirited." 

Why would I choose to be a conservative?  Why would I choose the persecution?  I am constantly ridiculed for my beliefs.  I have been compared to Nazis.  Liberals call me a sexist, racist, bigoted homophobe.  My intentions are mischaracterized, and then I am judged by those mischaracterized intentions.  For example, because I favor policies to help get everyone off of welfare to succeed on their own, my intentions are characterized as trying to keep blacks and minorities poor.  These liberals then brand me a racist because they perceive my intentions are to keep blacks poor. 

You would think I would choose to be a liberal.  Liberals worldwide are hailed as compassionate for merely "raising awareness" of the plight of the poor.  Forget that the poor don't see a dime from the "awareness" raised.  Despite poverty winning the war we waged on it, liberals get judged by their intentions rather than the results of their policies.

I was born a conservative.  I was born with the yearning to be free.  My love of liberty has been an inherent part of me as much as my blond hair and blue eyes.  God gave me a conscience to know what is right and wrong.  He gave me the desire to follow my conscience rather than the dictates of politically correct tolerance.  But, even if I weren't born this way, I'd still choose to be a conservative despite the name calling and lies about me.

Conservatives believe that right principles drive right policy choices.  Policy choices must yield to the proper principles.  As a conservative I will not change my conservative principles to mirror popular or progressive policies.  These conservative principles stand in antithesis to principles held by modern liberals.  Here is a sampling of conservative foundational principles:

• 1. Our liberties come from our Creator, not from our government. As a self-evident truth, we owe our allegiance to God for making us free and equal, not to our government. Our inherent, God-given rights include life, liberty and private property. No government has the authority to take our lives, liberty or property unless we forfeit those rights.

• 2. The authority to govern comes from God through the people. Our charter document, our legal authority to exist as a nation is our Declaration of Independence, not our Constitution. In our Declaration we told a candid world the source of our authority to govern ourselves. The Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitled us to "assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station...."

To secure the blessings of our God-given liberty, we, the people, established our Constitution.  We chose a representative republic to best secure our liberties from anarchy and tyranny.  Government must obey the people even as we obligate ourselves to obey the laws of our government.  

Conservatives actually believe that the words of our founding documents have meaning today.  Our humble allegiance is to a higher authority than ourselves.  In relying on the protection of Divine Providence, as our Founders did, we can pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

• 3. Human nature tends toward evil and not toward good. James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 51 "But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary." John Adams stated "[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion.... Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

The problem today is that the predominant philosophy in America, secular humanism, does not allow for an inner moral restraint.  People without moral restraint need an external force to restrain them.  Benjamin Franklin said "[O]nly a virtuous people are capable of freedom.  As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." Conservatives believe an inner restraint on human nature is preferable to an external one.

• 4. Government, being obligated to restrain human nature, must be obliged to restrain itself. "In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." Federalist No. 51. Our Constitution is a document of enumerated powers. This document gives our federal government only such powers necessary to protect our liberty from an unruly mob. To control itself, government must be small and government authority must be separated and restrained by checks and balances. The bigger our government grows and the more centralized government authority gets the more we lose our liberty.

Reagan conservatism is not dead and does not need to evolve with the times.  Conservative principles are as true today as they were at the time of our founding.  After reading americanthinker.com and other conservative websites, clearly intelligent, thinking, politically-oriented conservatives are far from extinction.  We simply need politicians to articulate and postulate today what our Founders believed.

When it comes to foundational principles, I prefer to align myself with the conservative political orientation of the Founders.  They were infinitely smarter than Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi and Barrack Obama.  Although I was born this way, anyone can choose this conservative political orientation.

I particularly like how Brownwell goes into some detail on how the Founders were quite clear that the Constitution was only going to be effective with moral people.  The abject moral bankruptcy of many politicians today -- on both sides, but particularly the Left -- is proof positive, as they disregard and ignore the Constitution all the time (half of the federal government, in fact, is unconstitutional, if you want to get technical about it).  Nevertheless, I think that the Founders knew what they were talking about, and we should strive to return this nation's character to that of the people who built America to the greatest pinnacle of human civilization over the years, and the way to do that is through conservatism.

Like Brownwell, I think I was born conservative, too.  I was certainly raised that way, but even beyond that I have embraced it willingly and fully to an extent that I think surprises even my family at times.  Why?  Because, as I began working in the real world and raising a family, I realized that this political stuff -- however distasteful it may be -- had a drastic effect on my life and the life of my wife and kids.  As such, I wanted to be as prepared as possible to minimize negative effects and maximize positive effects, and that meant I had to understand what was going on.  As I began to pay attention to the real world around me and the politics that influenced the country, I noticed that there were certain things and behaviors that were consistently true, and certain actions that could be accurately predicted with a proper understanding of motivations.  Thus, the more I observe the world around me, the more convinced I have become that conservatism is the way to go based on the values I prize most highly.

Someone once defined wisdom as 'intelligence guided by experience', and I think that's a great definition.  It's not possible to know everything nor experience everything, but when you combine the two, you've got a pretty good shot at making good choices.  When you live based on unchanging principles, you can handle any situation that life throws at you because you always have that foundation upon which to draw and evaluate the situation.  The principle doesn't change, so it provides an anchor point, if you will, that is consistent throughout your life, and that gives you a much better grounding to make sound and correct decisions at any given time.  Using your intelligence, you can examine the new situation based on the principle(s) that apply, and make a good decision with confidence that you're doing the right thing.

The ever-shifting whims of liberalism provide no such foundation.  There is nothing consistent about liberalism, except perhaps to always attack, ridicule, and erode conservatism.  When political expediency reigns as the primary decision-making factor, nothing is more important than simply being able to persuade people to support your viewpoint, whether by genuine persuasiveness, extortion, or blind desperation.  There is no set value system involved other than the mood at the moment, and thus, liberalism is a bankrupt philosophy with no core principles.

Why be a conservative?  Because it's the best way to preserve the core principles that founded this great nation, the core principles I believe in: a Creator from whom all rights are established, individual responsibility, smaller government, peace through strength, compassion, and so on.  Quite simply, it's the right way to live.

There's my two cents.