Posts Tagged with Conserv

Better Libertarianism

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This is a bit of my episode with Iowancap in which we discuss how Libertarianism might be served by considering how various schools of ethics relate. Hear the whole episode below. Enjoy. -P

Penjammin: I was just reading For a New Liberty by Rothbard, and his last chapter is a strategy for liberty . . . He makes one caveat in there that I thought was really fascinating and perhaps a little controversial, which is really what you're saying. The idea that– well, a conservative in Congress might prefer some sort of a policy compromise or a trade where they get a little bit of this, a little bit for that. Whereas a libertarian who might want agree with the conservative on the boon, you know, that's to be had (maybe lower taxes or something), but they won't also say, “okay, but for this, what we're going to do is we're going to introduce a new act of aggression by Washington, DC against the people.” I'm not going to positively support that. I'm going to hold principle. The goal is always not to be incrementalist or gradualist, but to have the whole thing now. But with that hope, you know, firmly in place, there's you accept gains as they come. You're not going to tell them no. But he always had that caveat. It's like, “but I'm not going to vote positively against my principles. I will accept gradual movement towards them, but I will not vote against them.” . . .

Iowancap: Yet, I think there there is also an idea where, sometimes you do go for less bad. Sometimes that is the move. I think. In fact, I suddenly realized, Pen, that this all worked out perfectly because I realized that it was that phrase that I told you that I really loved, that you said, that actually launched all this thinking for me.

Penjammin: Okay.

Iowancap: And that is when I saw it, it was in a in a group chat, I saw that you made the statement: The means must be worthy of the ends.

Penjammin: Yeah.

Iowancap: And I think that is really what I'm talking about. Yes, we should keep in mind the ends. We need to keep the goals in mind. And, we shouldn't live purely principally and say, “but let's not look at what works. Let's not look at strategy, let's not look at tactics. Let's not look at reality.” At the same time, we have to always keep our principles in mind because if the means are not worthy of the ends, then you could start asking the question: “Are we really going where we think we're going?”

Penjammin: Yeah.

Iowancap: Especially as a Christian, I think that's very important because obedience to the law of God, obedience to the gospel and to Christ's commands, that is ultimately a winning strategy, even if short term it is not.

Penjammin: Right. I mean, we've already won.

Iowancap: And so I think that's really where this whole tension of principles and strategy is so important. Yeah, let's look for strategic ways to get the gospel to go out. Let's look for strategic ways to accomplish and to carve out the freedom to do the work that the church needs to do. And yet, if we at any point find ourselves going against the law of God with a sort of ends justify the means sort of mentality, then– if the means are not worthy of the ends, then we should question whether or not the means are actually going to get us to the ends that we think we're going toward.

Penjammin: Yes, because that's how you trapped. I think when you play the game, you get played by the game. It doesn't work in the long run. And, that's how I think about third-party voting as well. But I'll leave that for another time.

Penjammin grew up in a labyrinthine cavern. Later he ran with the wolves and lived every moment marinated in the sweet scent of his game, until pirates landed and… (see “About”). Get his eletter at penjams.com/subscribe.

Better Conservatism

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This is a bit of my episode with Iowancap in which we discuss Trump and conservatism. Hear the whole episode below. Enjoy. -P

Iowancap: At the Flyover Libertarian, which is the parent podcast, I guess you could say of The Anarchist Bible Study. On that show, we did an episode 23, Trump is a bad conservative is the title of it, but we kind of generally talked about conservatism broadly. And Penjammin, when we talked about getting him on the live stream tonight, he said he wanted to talk a little bit about what I said on that. I think that's what you were saying, right?

Penjammin: Yeah because I'm, you know, just such a bad fan that I haven't got to watch it yet. So now, if I have you here personally, I can get the scoop straight from the horse's mouth or whatever. It's an interesting subject to me in general, so I'd love to hear what your thoughts were.

Iowancap: Yeah. Just to give a brief kind of overview of that (and I recommend any anyone who wants to hear more to go over to The Flyover Libertarian podcast on — well, pretty much any app that you find, the anarchist Bible study, so whatever you're listening to this on or watching this on, go find the flyover libertarian on that same platform and watch episode 23 or listen to episode 23) — kind of the overview is we started by talking about how Trump had put up a page with his achievements, and we looked at that page and asked, so how many of these things are really things that . . . classical conservatism would really be excited about? And we said there's not a lot. But really, it got into some of my concerns, I guess, with conservatism in general . . . and ways in which I think libertarianism can help conservatism to be better.

Penjammin: Yeah ok.

Iowancap: And so one of the things that I said…

Penjammin grew up in a labyrinthine cavern. Later he ran with the wolves and lived every moment marinated in the sweet scent of his game, until pirates landed and… (see “About”). Get his eletter at penjams.com/subscribe.

Super Conservatism

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Often, I see my takes as not only conservative, but super conservative. Other conservatives may disagree from time to time, but that seems due to their accepting the compromise of yester year. Let me explain.

There's this article I read long ago: Why True Conservatism Means Anarchy by Alexander William Salter. The article ended with this line: “[T]he state is constitutionally hostile to conservatism. For the sake of preserving ordered liberty and protecting inherited faith and folkways, conservatives should reject the state’s legitimacy. Failure to do so is fighting a war on the enemy’s terms.”

Salter sees conservativeness as more of a preservation-orientation than a creed. This frees him up to sort inherited wheat from chaff. He makes two points regarding the modern state: (1) that it is a relatively new institution and (2) that conservatives, in defending the state, make a concession to the left of yore- something that they should draw from rather than concede. He explains: “The polylegal system of the High Middle Ages, in which the authority of kings, local nobility, trade guilds, free cities, and the Roman Catholic Church competed and often checked the abuses of each other, is an important example and one that should be of obvious interest to conservatives.” How many present-day institutions revered by conservatives (but not by anarchists) are compromises to leftists of long ago?

Well, to Salter, governing institutions need not include the pretended monopoly of legitimate force of the state. He also argues that such a monopoly makes the state particularly useful to anti-conservatives because those of a small exogenous culture might find forced influence of the common folk from on top to be easier than persuasion. And, well, there's more in the article: Why True Conservatism Means Anarchy over at theamericanconservative.com.

Penjammin grew up in a labyrinthine cavern. Later he ran with the wolves and lived every moment marinated in the sweet scent of his game, until pirates landed and… (see “About”). Get his eletter at penjams.com/subscribe.

Some light reading…

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Hello from the budding green yonder. How are things? I hope things are well. If twitter is any indication though…. well, thankfully twitter is not real life, right?

Actually, I did notice two good things on twitter recently. One is my happy place list. But also the Caped Persuader dropped word of his new post. I read it, and I enjoyed it. It comes with the fun superhero parallels one expects from CP, and it asks some good questions like:

Which [kind of conservative] is the true heir to the American spirit?

What does it even mean to be conservative or liberal?

Which am I?

I should add that I’m not endorsing everything there, especially one part at the end. (You’ll know it when you see it.) : ) Nevertheless, there is plenty to appreciate. Maybe check it out.

Incidentally, all that definition talk reminds me of my reading (that Terran book Human Freedom). I recently came across a section discussing the intended meaning behind a phrase in Aquinas that is translated free-will. Definitions are fascinating little buggers ain’t they? I’ve dropped some thoughts on them myself (here, here, here, here, here, and to a lesser extent but still worth mentioning: here).

Around my neck of realms, the work has really lightened up. The mad rush I mentioned before is now more of a light hustle. That change put the fun back in the work. For example, today, I did a bunch of cleaning up and also a few odd jobs for money. Oh! I am so close to getting my horse that I can smell it! (I mean. I can smell the getting of the horse, not the horse itself. Well, no I suppose I could smell that too if- never mind.)

Well, I better get back to them beautification efforts.

– Pen