Are Conservatives Realists or Idealists?

[Morality Games]

Are conservatives realists who have come to terms with the fact that people with money have power, and therefore are merely trying to leverage their talents, resources and abilities to make the most of this situation for themselves? Or are conservatives deluded idealists, whose blind faith in the free market have led them to enact policies such as deregulation of financial markets that led to the financial crisis of 2008?

What do you think, are conservatives realists or idealists?

... conservatism attracts personalities who tend to be spirited and passionate and love competition and conflict to the extent that when it isn't around they have imagine it into existence. Realists almost never are like that. At least at the mass numbers grassroots level, conservatives are idealists to a T.

The realists among conservatives -- mostly among the leadership -- aren't really conservative, they're manipulative opportunity-seeking pragmatists.

 

[X Factor]

That is real scary. Not only that, it's about to get worse. I hear there is a bill that will give the banks government backed insurance on mortgages!! Dang!!!! What kind of sense does that make?????????

Totally amazing!!!

BTW, that was a pretty good response. Thanks.

Agreed. It was a much better response than your OP warranted.

 

[Cephus]

Governor Sarah Palin (she qualifies as a conservative, right)

Is she fiscally responsible? Is she for small government? Is she for personal responsibility and keeping the government out of the lives of the people? No? Then she's not a conservative. Neither are any of these other neo-con idiots who keep calling themselves something that they certainly are not.

 

[RiverDad]

Is she fiscally responsible?

No damn debate on this question.

Governor Murkowski's last budget was FY 2007, and he proposed a budget of $8.5704 billion. Governor Palin’s first budget, FY2008 was for $7.5886 billion. That's a spending reduction. To sweeten the deal, she also presided over a 20% reduction in Federal revenue transfers. In that budget she also boosted state funding for topping up the neglected teacher retirement fund by increasing state contributions by 35% over the previous year. Maybe you've heard of a public sector "pension bomb" that is ticking in other states, well one way to defuse that bomb is to, now sit down for this, to have the fiscal discipline to fund those retirement obligations instead of spending that money on flashy projects. A 35% increase in that budget category while actually reducing government spending and reducing Federal transfers is pretty damn amazing. In her 2009 budget she dealt with a revenue surplus from FY2008 because in budgeting exercises it's always wiser to underproject tax revenues and find yourself with a surplus than to overproject revenues and find yourself with a deficit. She had projected FY2008 revenue of $8.2316 Billion down from Murkowski's FY2007 realized revenue of $9,9216 Billion and at final accounting the FY2008 revenue amounted to $11.1346 billion. This is when she instituted 2-year budgeting for education spending in order to smooth out year to year bumps in terms of operating and capital spending. Her budget for FY2009 was $8.3457 billion which still put her below Murkowski's last budget, even with her now paying more into retirement funds.

And to the issue of Federal Transfers. Here is a list of Murkowski's requests to Congress - $349.5 million in support of 63 projects. Governor Palin cut the list in 2008 down to $256 million in support of 52 projects. In 2009 she cut the requests even more, it takes time to wean government bureaucrats from the idea of requesting money - now we're looking at $195.1 million requested in support of 31 projects.

She's earned her right to call herself a fiscal conservative. She was a terrific manager of the public's finances. She hasn't abandoned her fiscally conservative views - just a few days ago she had this to say about Rep. Paul Ryan's proposed budget:

“Holy Moly! Are you kidding?” Mrs. Palin wrote. “The latest Ryan (R, Wisconsin) Budget is not an April Fool’s joke. But it really IS a joke because it is STILL not seeing the problem; it STILL is not proposing reining in wasteful government overspending.”​

She cut pork barrel requests from Washington every damn year during her administration, she reduced state spending, she budgeted conservatively and dealt with greater than budgeted revenues, she began repairing the neglected retirement funding system, she overhauled education budgeting. She's not asking Ryan to do anything that she hasn't ALREADY DONE.

There was a reason that McCain chose Palin. She was the most popular Governor in the nation. She took on the crooks in her own party and sent the head of the Alaska Republican Party to prison. She ran against Murkowski, the Republican Governor, beat him in a primary, then went up against a popular ex-Governor that the Democrats put up and cleaned his clock. Once in office, she played hardball with the oil companies by threatening to take away leases that they'd been granted but had not developed for over 30 years and got them to begin development, an accomplishment which no previous governor had been able to achieve.

It's amazing that her pubic record is unknown to people and instead they believe that she can see Russia from her house. The power of propaganda is so great that most people don't even know that they've been propagandized.

 

[Cephus]

No damn debate on this question.

Yet you entirely ignored the rest of my questions. In order to be conservative, you have to be ALL of them.

 

[RiverDad]

Yet you entirely ignored the rest of my questions. In order to be conservative, you have to be ALL of them.

If you don't know the answers, then go and read some of her books. Hint: she's a real conservative.

 

[Cephus]

If you don't know the answers, then go and read some of her books. Hint: she's a real conservative.

No, she's a real religious nutter.

 

[RiverDad]

No, she's a real religious nutter.

I'm an Atheist and that doesn't matter to me. If that's your beef, the personal beliefs of government officials, and you want to ignore their actual performance while on the job and the actual policies that they implement, then fine, but don't pass your position off as anything other than religious bigotry on your part.

 

[Ikari]

Are conservatives realists who have come to terms with the fact that people with money have power, and therefore are merely trying to leverage their talents, resources and abilities to make the most of this situation for themselves? Or are conservatives deluded idealists, whose blind faith in the free market have led them to enact policies such as deregulation of financial markets that led to the financial crisis of 2008?

What do you think, are conservatives realists or idealists?

Modern day conservatism? Fascist corporatists, just like the modern day liberals.

 

[MildSteel]

The question is far to general and one sided to be taken seriously.

One, are you asking what the Republican party stands for, or individual Republicans? It would seem from the singular focus what you seek is affirmation for an already established point of view.

with a straight out, no alternative choice between adjectives "realists" or "deluded idealists" leaves little room for unbiased discussion. And taking that to the next extreme, a speculative, erroneous and inflamatory claim Republicans are solely responsible for "deregulation of financial markets that led to the financial crisis of 2008" kind of evaporates what little credibility such a question may have ever had.

On almost all points your post is flawed.

First of all the question was simply are conservatives realists or idealists. Why is that question not too general? Because if you can apply the rather general labels of conservative or liberal to anyone, then there should be no reason why the labels idealist or realist could be applied as well. If you don't agree with that, then you should also have a problem labeling someone who is a fiscal conservative but liberal on social issues a conservative. If you really wanted to deal with the manner in an exhaustive way, you could come up with a rather long list of possible permutations of conservatism. Usually that's not what we do, and we simply apply the term conservative in a general way to someone whose views appear to fall on the conservative side of the political spectrum. In a similar way, we can apply the same principle to the labels of realist and idealist. So no, you are wrong, the question was not too general to be taken seriously.

Next of all the question is not one sided. There are two positions that are diametrically opposed, realist and idealist, so it's not one-sided.

Furthermore I did not ask what the Republican party stands for. If I had wanted to know that, that is what I would have asked. All conservatives are not Republicans.

What I did do to spur a discussion is give to examples of what I felt where ways in which conservatives could be viewed as realists and idealists. I used the adjective "deluded" to describe idealist. That's a personal point of view to which I am entitled. However, that did not appear in the list of choices, as I understand that not everyone agrees with my point of view. So that's another flaw in your post.

Next of all I did not say that Republicans were solely responsible for the deregulation of financial markets. However, it is a fact that prominent, powerful conservatives such as Alan Greenspan and Hank Paulson spearheaded the effort to repeal Glass Steagall. This combined with the fact that conservatives are known to favor as much deregulation as possible means that it is not erroneous to say that conservatives where led to enact policies that caused the financial crisis of 2008. That does not mean that they were solely responsible, however, because of the very powerful positions that some of them held at the time, the statement is not a distortion.

 

[MildSteel]

... conservatism attracts personalities who tend to be spirited and passionate and love competition and conflict to the extent that when it isn't around they have imagine it into existence. Realists almost never are like that. At least at the mass numbers grassroots level, conservatives are idealists to a T.

The realists among conservatives -- mostly among the leadership -- aren't really conservative, they're manipulative opportunity-seeking pragmatists.

What do you mean by conservatives are idealists to a T at the grassroots level?

 

[MildSteel]

Agreed. It was a much better response than your OP warranted.

Although we agree on that point, I think it's a pity that your response had so little to add to the discussion. I would be interested to know your thoughts on the matter.

That said, if you feel better having gotten that off your chest then that's good.

 

[grip]

Conservatives used to be realists, especially more than Liberals. Now days, I find both sides to be equally unrealistic about certain topics, though conservatives are still less idealistic overall.

 

[MildSteel]

I do agree, I just wanted to establish the clear difference between European and American conservatism and its implications in deciding whether conservatives are realists or idealists.

I'll re-affirm my position: (European) conservatives are realists as they're sceptical of social engineering, any attempt to build a system that contradicts man's intrinsic finality and nature, and their valuing of realpolitik in international relations.

What exactly is man's finality and nature?

 

[Cyrylek]

Are conservatives realists who have come to terms with the fact that people with money have power, and therefore are merely trying to leverage their talents, resources and abilities to make the most of this situation for themselves? Or are conservatives deluded idealists, whose blind faith in the free market have led them to enact policies such as deregulation of financial markets that led to the financial crisis of 2008?

What do you think, are conservatives realists or idealists?

Well, whatever they are, they are not as idealistic/deluded as the people on the left who see the mythical "deregulation" as the cause of the financial crisis (because, you know, perverse incentives and market distortions coming from regulations imposed by both parties had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with it; the State is an all-knowing saint), and not as cynically "realistic" as the "liberal" corporate welfare queens, lawyers, politicians et al, et al, who never miss an opportunity to tap into the gravy pipeline....

What do you think, is John "I simply don't know where the money is" Corzine a realist or an idealist?

 

[MildSteel]

Well, whatever they are, they are not as idealistic/deluded as the people on the left who see the mythical "deregulation" as the cause of the financial crisis (because, you know, perverse incentives and market distortions coming from regulations imposed by both parties had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with it; the State is an all-knowing saint), and not as cynically "realistic" as the "liberal" corporate welfare queens, lawyers, politicians et al, et al, who never miss an opportunity to tap into the gravy pipeline....

What do you think, is John "I simply don't know where the money is" Corzine a realist or an idealist?

Wrong. At the core of the financial crises was the problem of financial institutions becoming over leveraged. Allowing commercial banks to underwrite securities with depositors money played a major role in this over leveraging.

 

[Morality Games]

What do you mean by conservatives are idealists to a T at the grassroots level?

The everyday Americans who would describe themselves as conservative are almost 100% idealists, in the sense they agitate for political action that conforms to their ideals -- their inner notions of how the world does and should work -- rather than actions which suit the situation or times (pragmatism).

As opposed to say Chris Christie, Mitt Romney, John McCain, who typify the mostly non-ideological opportunity seeking pragmatism of the Republican Party' leadership.

 

[Cephus]

The everyday Americans who would describe themselves as conservative are almost 100% idealists, in the sense they agitate for political action that conforms to their ideals -- their inner notions of how the world does and should work -- rather than actions which suit the situation or times (pragmatism).

Virtually everyone at the grassroots level, regardless of their political persuasion, is an idealist because most of them have never bothered to think about the ramifications of their positions, nor do they have any means at their disposal to push the national political identity in any particular direction. It is certainly not a bad thing to be idealistic at that base level.

 

[ChunkySalsa]

Conservatives are out-of-touch idealists that think the world is fair, hard work will always pay off and that bad things only happen to bad people.

 

[MildSteel]

The everyday Americans who would describe themselves as conservative are almost 100% idealists, in the sense they agitate for political action that conforms to their ideals -- their inner notions of how the world does and should work -- rather than actions which suit the situation or times (pragmatism).

As opposed to say Chris Christie, Mitt Romney, John McCain, who typify the mostly non-ideological opportunity seeking pragmatism of the Republican Party' leadership.

I understand. Although I would say that it appears to me that John McCain's positions on foreign policy seem to be based on unrealistic ideas on what the actual capabilities of the US are and what our role in the world should be.

 

[MildSteel]

Virtually everyone at the grassroots level, regardless of their political persuasion, is an idealist because most of them have never bothered to think about the ramifications of their positions, nor do they have any means at their disposal to push the national political identity in any particular direction. It is certainly not a bad thing to be idealistic at that base level.

I think it's a problem when those notions start to have too much influence on policy. I think some of our foreign policy in particular is a good example of that.

 

[MildSteel]

Conservatives are out-of-touch idealists that think the world is fair, hard work will always pay off and that bad things only happen to bad people.

That's usually just rhetoric to keep the masses in line. I don't think the conservative intelligentsia actually believes that.