This is picking up on a comment that Al made here. Al argues that “Conservatives like short sharp shocks, prison and capital punishment” and “Trusting properly is of course a huge ask. You might end up getting nailed to a tree. But I think it’s clear that that is what the Gospels ask us to do. And politically they ask us to tend away from punishing and towards liberalism.”

My trouble with your perspective, Al, is that you have defined the terms to suit your argument. A conservative is, by your definition, someone who does not trust; they are therefore deficient in some way (not quite fully enlightened); and their position needs more psychoanalytic treatment than reasoned argument. (You’re describing what I would call a reactionary.)

There is no reason on earth why a conservative shouldn’t embrace carrots as much as sticks – whatever works is good, that’s a very pragmatic (=conservative) approach.

It’s a bit like a race that everyone’s invited to, but then the rules are revealed saying that only those who can place their feet on the ground one after another can win, so all those in some way handicapped (as just defined by those rules) get excluded from participation. There aren’t enough steps between there and the gulag for me to feel comfortable.

As for trust, I think the issue isn’t about whether one side or the other is trusting or not, it’s about where the emphasis of trust is placed. Conservatives place their trust in local and customary relationships, emphasising the face to face and the personal virtues. Progressives (at least if I can also indulge in something of a caricature) trust the representatives of a well-meaning state ideology to ‘do good’ on behalf of other people. What conservatives actively distrust is that those latter people are all too willing to use force to achieve their point, and that their well-intentioned interventions often accomplish more harm than good.

Is Bush a conservative? Of course not. When all the evidence is in, I think historians will agree with Princeton’s Sean Wilentz, who wrote a carefully argued article judging Bush to have been the worst president in American history. The problem is that he is generally called a conservative, perhaps because he obviously is not a liberal. It may be that Bush, in the magnitude of his failure, defies conventional categories. But the word “conservative” deserves to be rescued.

So says Jeffrey Hart. I agree, especially with the last sentence above.

The distinguishing and original characteristics of the deep ecology movement were its recognition of the inherent value of all living beings and the use of this view in shaping environmental policies. Those who work for social changes based on this recognition are motivated by love of nature as well as for humans. They recognize that we cannot go on with industrialism’s “business as usual.” Without changes in basic values and practices, we will destroy the diversity and beauty of the world, and its ability to support diverse human cultures….The platform can be endorsed by people from a diversity of religious and philosophical backgrounds as well as differing political affiliations. “Supporters of the deep ecology movement” (rather than being referred to as “deep ecologists”) are united by a long-range vision of what is necessary to protect the integrity of the Earth’s ecological communities and ecocentric values.

Davidov asked in a comment: “Please please tell me 3 things the Republicans have actually done that make you “Republican on most things”? I am truly intrigued.”

Well, I don’t really want to get into ‘what the Republicans have actually done’ (tho’ the abolition of slavery is not to be sneezed at 😉 but I thought it might be of interest to describe the background to what Davidov is commenting on, ie my comment that I would be classed as a ‘Republican on most things’. This really has two aspects – one to do with the Republican party, one to do with being a Conservative.

The former is quite superficial, and I was actually thinking of these sorts of books, especially the political analysis that suggested that if you were white, college educated and attended church regularly, you were massively more likely to vote Republican. Being that sort of person, I think I would be classed as ‘Republican’. However, that’s all a bit beside the point. The more fundamental issue, for me at least, is why I would identify myself as a Conservative (and see the Republicans as the Conservative party in the US).

I see the fundamental political division as between those who take a ‘tragic’ view of the human condition – meaning one which expects sin to be a significant factor in human affairs – and those who take an ‘Enlightened’ view of the human condition, and who therefore believe human affairs to be perfectible, with human sin able to be removed if the governing circumstances are changed.

I take this understanding of Conservatism as deriving largely from Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the French Revolution. British society was profoundly shocked by that regicide and terror, undertaken in the name of some good ideas (Liberty, Equality and Fraternity), and Conservatism is conditioned by that experience. I would argue that this represents ‘mainstream’ Conservatism in the UK.

Flowing from this, the Conservative perspective tends to scepticism towards “good ideas”, and prefers the tried and tested institutions. More fundamentally, it means a significant distrust of the state – almost a loathing – and a great deal of admiration for Burke’s ‘little platoons’, ie the local institutions and voluntary societies which provide the humus within which a full humanity can grow. The besetting fear for a Conservative is of an over-mighty state, in the hands of a man with a good idea, who causes well-meaning havoc. This is why the US Constitution is a profoundly Conservative document, as the separation of powers, and all associated with it, was designed around the assumption that the leaders elected would be prone to sin – and therefore needed to be kept in check by other bodies (also prone to sin). It was in the balance of competing interests that human freedom and welfare would find their best means of preservation. I am a great fan of the US constitution.

Such a vision of human society depends to a very great extent on the ability of civil society to regulate human conduct, ie the development of social virtues, and for this it looks to support a) the family, and b) the church – for these are where the social regulation of human behaviour is established.

This is the sense in which I’m a Conservative. I believe in human sinfulness (tho’ I see it as redeemable and subject to grace, hence this is a Christian tragic vision, not a Greek tragic vision), and therefore I have a hearty loathing for the state, especially the welfare state and all that has come in its train through the twentieth century.

Paradoxically it also means that whilst I am in principle in favour of “free trade”, I do not equate that with ‘globalisation’ (which destroys the local community) nor with ‘capitalism’ (which destroys the social virtues). Moreover I am thoroughly persuaded that the language of economists is 99.9% idolatrous, that ‘the free market’ (and especially ‘growth’) are the contemporary equivalents of the golden calf, and that such idolatry – as with all idolatry – ends up destroying human life.

All this makes me opposed to the libertarian position (human freedom as the idol, capitulation to the forces of international finance) and also to state socialism (which in practice is indistinguishable from fascism, which is often misdescribed as a Conservative form of government). This might seem strange, but the political position that comes closest to my own (other than Conservatism) is anarcho-socialism, built around communes.

All this ties in very closely and intimately with my theological views, and how I see the church functioning – but that’s another post!

(BTW I could also class my political views as ‘deep green‘ – but that’s a different axis of assessment, I believe, to the one on which ‘Conservative’ stands.)

Lomborg on the Stern Report here.

I have been a great fan of The Sceptical Environmentalist. It was understanding Peak Oil which shifted my position – not least because in 1999 Lomborg argued that the oil supply was so healthy, there would be no peak, and therefore the price of oil would remain below $20 until 2020.

Ho ho.

However, I do think he makes one very good point, which is good irrespective of his arguments about global warming: “Spending just a fraction of this figure–$75 billion–the U.N. estimates that we could solve all the world’s major basic problems. We could give everyone clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education right now.” And we don’t do that because, frankly, our system is profoundly wicked and about to suffer God’s just judgement (see my talks for further details 😉

The real trouble is that trying to capture the problem of global warming (which is itself only one symptom of the more fundamental problem of exponential growth in a finite system) through using economics is like trying to ward off demons by invoking satan. It’s just not going to bat on your side.

Mexico’s problems are going to get really severe – and are massively influenced by Peak Oil, in that their main oilfield (the largest in the Western Hemisphere) has peaked, and is depleting at the rate of 10.6% in the first six months of this year.

Have a look at this site for an examination of some of the firewood.

My Learning Church talk – “The accumulating crises of our time” – is now available for your listening pleasure.

If your blood isn’t running colder by the end of it then I will have failed in my intentions….

(And for the reason why I don’t ultimately accept the doomer perspective, go here)

Can be found here.

How exciting.

A letter published in ‘The Courier’, the Mersea Island paper, 29 September 2006.

“Why have we forgotten coal?”

I have given some thought to the ceased power station at Bradwell and of others around the country. I live in sight of Bradwell and there is now talk of it being renewed. I am thinking of coal…
Any smoke would be carried away with the prevailing winds, towards the channel…
I personally say that coal is the only answer to getting electricity from Bradwell or anywhere else avoiding nuclear rods.

~~~~~~~~~~

Of course, if we use coal, Bradwell will be under several metres of water, rendering the whole debate null and void. Am I disordered for finding this letter intensely depressing?

Since Israel was created, some 10 million muslims have been killed or murdered by violent state action. The numbers break down like this:

“Israel is responsible for about 60,000 Muslim deaths (all its wars and the occupation included).
The USA is responsible for about 70,000.
France is responsible for about half a million (in the 1950s alone, by the most conservative estimate).
Russia (along with the former Soviet Union) over one million.
About 8.5 million Muslims were murdered by Muslim regimes, internal Arab civil wars, and Arab tribal ethnic cleansing.”

Of course, this is all the fault of the evil Zionist regime.

/irony off

As my four year old son reminded his mother the other day, two wrongs don’t make a right. Israel is guilty of all sorts of wrong doing. But the total loss of perspective evidenced in Western media is mind boggling.

(HT Normblog)