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Entry: From Richard to Rowan Link: http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/from_richard_to_rowan#33006 Post contents: Dunnyveg, good points. Allow me to share some thoughts about conservatism and liberalism. Burke himself explained the need for change, so long as the change was carried out in a gradual, organic and responsible manner, conformed to the moral law, cohered with other customs and traditions, and maintained basic continuity with the past. This is basically refined common sense. So, perhaps the difference between liberalism and conservatism has to do with loosening or ignoring these constraints on change. Also, another way to think about so-called liberalism, at least in practice and over the last 100 years or so, is that it’s basically communism in slow motion and without the overt violence. Everything the CPUSA used to push for and advocate is either the conventional wisdom, official policy or a campaign promise. Indeed, a reasonable interpretation of the last several decades is that the entire communist manifesto has been all but implemented and right under our noses – albeit, in a sophisticated, subtle, rhetorically brilliant, gradual and uniquely American way. Heck a bunch of Trotskyites, who long to fight wars and empower government in the name of abstract ideology, now represent “conservatism” in the public mind. Maybe conservatives have misidentified the enemy ideology and that’s our problem; maybe we know what the enemy ideology is and refuse to talk frankly about it and that’s our problem; then again, maybe I’m way off base; just a few thoughts. Sent at: 2008 12 02