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Entry: McCain is even worse than you thought Link: http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/mccain_is_even_worse_than_you_thought#31994 Post contents: (This appeared out of order above - please disregard first appearance of this comment, read now.) To continue my comment above: So Bush cannot easily be classified as either Right or Left, at least superficially; that is, if one accords equal weight of importance to all of the various policy strands classified as ‘Right’. But to do so would constitute a philosophical as well as pragmatic error. To understand why, we must develop some idea of the essence of Left and Right. Perhaps there is no core, but merely an ever-shifting set of political and economic interests, and attendant policy recommendations. But I don’t think so. I believe there is a core to conservatism, though its practical expression varies with historical circumstances. Conservatism may be defined (OK, roughly) as “the disposition to defend, or increase the power or influence of, the existential particularities of one’s communally formed identity; that is, one’s people, nation, culture, psyche, way of life; within the bounds of universal, immutable moral law.” In other words, the conservative “takes his own side”, unless his side is behaving in an unequivocally evil manner. The liberal, on the other hand, betrays his own communal identity, people, nation, etc., in the interest of his vision of an undifferentiated, globalized, ideologically abstract humanity. Many rightist commentators, from James Burnham and Revilo Oliver, to Anne Coulter and Michael Savage, have considered the essence of liberalism to be treason. Indeed, it is. If my definition of the core of conservatism is correct, then obviously certain issues loom as far more consequential than others, and so a hierarchy of concerns must be acknowledged. Clearly, the mass immigration of persons who cannot, for deep biological reasons, assimilate to the communal identity sought to be preserved, in our case, Traditional America, is a far greater threat than, say, gay marriage, a practice demanded by relatively few people, who can mostly be avoided by the mainstream population (unlike the ubiquitous, ever-growing numbers of immigrants) . Therefore, while proper (American) conservatives would oppose both nonwhite immigration and same-sex unions, as both policies are inimical to the preservation of the historic America, they would devote far more effort and political capital to fighting the former than the latter. (That they, in fact, do not should tell you a few things: eg, about Christian conservatives, who are mostly politicized Christians, as opposed to political conservatives who happen also to be religiously Christian.) What is that core American identity, the preservation of which is the political ‘sumum bonum’ of the true conservative? Putting the matter as pithily as possible, the real, historic America was “free, white, and Christian”. We conservatives therefore wish to keep America as racially white (demographically as well as culturally), as Christian (morally, culturally, and yes, legally), and as free (that is, we believe in limited, Constitutional government; delegated and enumerated, never implied, powers; states’ rights; individual liberties; private property, commodity money, free enterprise; private gun ownership; and an impartial rule of law) as possible. Sent at: 2008 12 01