"Conservatism is like an anchor"

I strongly recommend this article on conservatism, appropriately entitled "The Anchor." Here are a few excerpts, but definitely read the entire thing!

...From its foundations in 18th century Europe through the violent sex fantasies of Ayn Rand, the position of conservatism has been the same: stop liberalism. Rather than attempt to smooth out the inequities of society, conservatism seeks to maintain these chasms, and where possible to open them wider. The whole basis of conservatism is that this structure -- a wealthy elite holding the reins -- is the natural, desirable state.

And that's why conservatism always holds the advantage. Always...

Just as an example of the edge held by conservatism, the Sierra Club has an annual budget in the neighborhood of $100 million in 2008 (we can argue about whether the Sierra Club is actually liberal, but I don't think any would argue that's a pretty good neighborhood). As the largest and oldest environmental organization in the country, the Club carries a, um, big stick. On the other hand, Exxon Mobil made that much by the end of the first week in January -- that much in straight profit, not revenue. Which one do you think is more capable of spreading it's message to the public? More capable of using the media to its advantage?

[...]

Why do many people still have doubts about something as straightforward as climate change? Because tens of millions are spent each year to see that they stay confused -- more by far than is spent trying to get across the truth.

[...]

Conservatism is like an anchor. It doesn't propel either society or the economy. Its whole reason for being is to slow change of all sorts and keep the current situation in place for as long as possible for those who benefit most from the current system. It's not "I've got mine, and you can do the same" it's "I've got mine, and hands off while I get some more."

In contrast to the "I've got mine so @#$@##$ you" people (aka, "conservatives"), progressives believe that government at its best can be a force for the common good, for the expansion of individual rights, for reform, for elimination of waste and corruption, for efficient and responsive government, for economic fairness and social justice, for rationality and empiricism, for environmental conservation, for progress in all areas. That, of course, is the exact antithesis of conservatism, which believes in using fear, ignorance and anger to keep society mired in the past while ensuring that wealthy and power elites remain in charge.

Why would any non-wealthy, non-elites vote for this, given that it's 180 degrees opposed to their own interest to do so? For possible answers to that question, I'd recommend that you read the article referenced above, as well as books like "What's the Matter With Kansas", "The Wrecking Crew", "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life", and "The Progressive Revolution". Then, I'd strongly encourage you to tell everyone you know what you've learned and to ask them to help you "weigh anchor."

P.S. I'd add that in order to convince the 99% of Americans who are NOT wealthy elites to vote against their own self interest, an entire mythology has been created. For instance, the idea that "you too can be a wealthy elite some day" is a useful one (albeit almost certainly untrue for the vast majority of people), as is the nefarious concept that if you're rich you "deserve" to be (or even that you are "blessed by god") and that if you're poor you also "deserve" it. So, if you deserve what you get and, anyway, you too can be rich some day, why oppose the system that facilitates this. Very clever.

A Great Conservative, Free Market Idea: Cap and Trade!

It's not often that I praise conservatives or conservatism, but every so often even a blind squirrel finds an acorn. Now, courtesy of Smithsonian Magazine's August 2009 edition, here's a great example of exactly what I'm talking about - "The Political History of Cap and Trade: How an unlikely mix of environmentalists and free-market conservatives hammered out the strategy known as cap-and-trade"

The basic premise of cap-and-trade is that government doesn't tell polluters how to clean up their act. Instead, it simply imposes a cap on emissions. Each company starts the year with a certain number of tons allowed—a so-called right to pollute. The company decides how to use its allowance; it might restrict output, or switch to a cleaner fuel, or buy a scrubber to cut emissions. If it doesn't use up its allowance, it might then sell what it no longer needs. Then again, it might have to buy extra allowances on the open market. Each year, the cap ratchets down, and the shrinking pool of allowances gets costlier. As in a game of musical chairs, polluters must scramble to match allowances to emissions.

Getting all this to work in the real world required a leap of faith. The opportunity came with the 1988 election of George H.W. Bush. EDF president Fred Krupp phoned Bush's new White House counsel—Boyden Gray—and suggested that the best way for Bush to make good on his pledge to become the "environmental president" was to fix the acid rain problem, and the best way to do that was by using the new tool of emissions trading. Gray liked the marketplace approach, and even before the Reagan administration expired, he put EDF staffers to work drafting legislation to make it happen. The immediate aim was to break the impasse over acid rain. But global warming had also registered as front-page news for the first time that sweltering summer of 1988; according to Krupp, EDF and the Bush White House both felt from the start that emissions trading would ultimately be the best way to address this much larger challenge.

That's right, the Reagan Administration and first Bush White House both were fans of what today's extremist, flat-earth Republicans denigrate as "cap and tax." In so denigrating, of course, these Republicans demonstrate that they're completely clueless about economics, history, and the fact that this is a fundamentally Republican, free market, conservative idea. Heck, it even appears that George W. Bush was a fan of "cap and trade". But of course, now that Democrats are in charge, Republicans like Eric Cantor and John Boehner just have to oppose everything they propose from a hard-line, knee-jerk ideological perspective -- even if it originally came out of their own party.

But perhaps, you say, the evidence on "cap and trade" for acid rain indicates that it didn't work out very well, so perhaps we shouldn't apply it to CO2? Well...perhaps you might just want to reconsider that assumption. As it turns out...

Almost 20 years since the signing of the Clean Air Act of 1990, the cap-and-trade system continues to let polluters figure out the least expensive way to reduce their acid rain emissions. As a result, the law costs utilities just $3 billion annually, not $25 billion, according to a recent study in the Journal of Environmental Management; by cutting acid rain in half, it also generates an estimated $122 billion a year in benefits from avoided death and illness, healthier lakes and forests, and improved visibility on the Eastern Seaboard. (Better relations with Canada? Priceless.)

That's right, we ended up getting $122 billion in benefits from "cap and trade" for acid rain at a cost of just $3 billion, or a 40:1 rate of return. Seems like this - a huge bang for the buck from an idea rooted in Reagan Administration free market conservative principles - would be something even the Eric Cantors of the world might be able to understand. But no...