Re: The greatest Mystery to me is Republicans

Suzy said:

>>>Hmm. Interesting; let me recast it a little:

Yes, let's.

>>>Is it a Nature red in tooth and claw
and the weak go to the wall and good riddance since only the
"strong" should survive?<<<

A Republican/conservative/libertarian would say: absolutely
not. You don't want the weak to go to the wall. You want them to
succeed. That's why you need to cut back government.

This is a "progressive" caricature of the conservative position
usually handed out by people who have NOT read all (or even any) of
that stuff I suggested.

<<<Or is it an interlocking set of communities
and individuals who face challenges so enormous that creative,
cooperative remedies must be the backbone of survival?
>>>

A Republican/conservative/libertarian would say: absolutely
yes. You need creative, cooperative remedies--you need lots of them,
and they should be flexible. That's why you need to cut back on
government, since government arranges itself in bureaucracies that are
rigid and stifling to that very creativity. Bureaucracies are also
actively hostile to communities.

This is yet another "progressive" caricature of the conservative
position usually handed out by people who have NOT read all (or even
any) of that stuff I suggested.

>>>Where do we draw the line between A's fist and B's nose (that
is, the smoker's right to kill himself, and the non-smoker's right
not to be dragged along in the process by inescapable second-
hand smoke)?

A Republican would say: at private property. I get to do
what I want on my property. You get to do what you want on yours. In
publicly owned spaces, the will of the majority prevails.

<<<I should add here that I find no contradiction
between, say, banning smoking from enclosed public spaces, and
letting people ride motorbikes without helmets if they want to;
one behavior endangers others, the other endangers only the guy
who wants to feel the wind blow through his hair.>>>

Of course, lots of "progressives" would say they should get to
impose helmet laws because "society" is going to have to pay for at
least some of the medical care the guy gets if he crashes. If society
pays for it, society should have a say--that's a fairly common
sentiment heard on the "left."

But--hey. What about the universal health care thing? If there's
universal health care, and society gets to tell me how to live if it
has to pay for me when I get sick, then doesn't it follow that in a
universal health care system society would get to tell me what to eat?
how much exercise I have to get? Etc?

And now you know why libertarians are opposed to universal health
care programs.

<<<Should it be shaped according
to local ideas of Biblical morals and ideas in order to teach obedience

to "God's Law" above all else, however "God's Law" is interpreted in
that place ?" Or should it be shaped by an understanding of how
things work, in an age of relentless competition with workforces who
learn actual science instead of Creationist theory, and history with
with facts in it instead of self-serving myths (see, "remember the
Alamo" for a pretty good example of the second)?

Who gets to decide what's a "myth"? Who gets to decide what's
"self-serving"? Who gets to decide how the US should be portrayed
when US history is taught to schoolchildren?

Who decides?

What about "God's law"? Is teaching children that there are some
moral values--cheating is wrong, violence is wrong--really teaching
"God's law"?

Is there really a straightforward distinction between "God's law"
and moral relativism? I don't believe in God--but I'm nothing at all
like a moral relativist. I think morality is objectively based and
universally applicable.

Who gets to decide what moral values my children get taught in
school? They will get taught some--"everybody has their own idea of
what morality is and they're all equally valid" is a moral value--who
should decide which ones will prevail?

Republicans would say: parents, not experts, ought to decide.

You sound as if you're singing the same old refrain: if they
don't choose your way, they should get your way forced down their
throats. But if you're willing to force your way, I don't see that I
should castigate as evil those social conservatives who only want to
let the majority prevail in their own communities.

<<<Are we a successful melting pot in which
everybody really is middle-class (as a huge majority always claims
they are when queried) or can become so by some hard work and
self-discipline?

Conservatives and Republicans would say: we are, but the
process has become disrupted by identity politics, where we teach
schoolchildren that their allegiance should be to their own ethnic
group and not to America.

<<<Or has the vastly increased disparity between
poverty and obscene accumulation of wealth rigged the game so badly
that we our culture is failing over all to deliver on its promises?

Okay, I've put the answer to this one in a separate post,
because I started ranting.

<<<Not, by the way, that I think the way to making things better
necessarily lies through the Federal Government nowadays; could be
that the pendulum has swung on this, and improvement will have
to come State by State, which is rocky and inefficient but can be a
workable alternative -- unless, of course, the reactionaries have
obtained a death grip on the Supreme Court . . . but that could
never happen, right?

What's a "reactionary"? Who gets to decide? Why shouldn't I
consider you the reactionary, since it's obvious from the above that
you DON'T want to let people make their own choices (about, for
instance, what their children learn), but that you want to force your
idea of what's a "myth" on other people's children, and that you're
more than happy to disparage other people's ideas as "God's law"
without bothering to actually find out if God has anything to do with
it?

Jane Haddam
http://www.janehaddam.com

.

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