Talk:Conservatism in the United States/Archive 3

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Roosevelt and WWII

I added the word liberal to the sentence about WWII. In the US, Conservatives have generally been opposed to war. If you look at the wars over the past century most of them were started by Democratic presidents. Exceptions are Greneda, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Famously, Bob Dole said in the 1976 debate with Walter Mondale: "I figured it up the other day: If we added up the killed and wounded in Democrat wars in this century, it would be about 1.6 million Americans-enough to fill the city of Detroit." It should also be noted that Kennedy started the Vietnam War, Johnson escalated it, and Nixon ended it. I'm not saying Nixon was a conservative. The guy imposed price controlls and expanded welfare programs in ways much more in keeping with new deal liberals. I only point out that Vietnam was fought by liberal presidents from beginning to end. Other evidence I'd like to offer in support of my insertion of the word liberal is the book Road to Serfdom by the libertarian Icon Friedrich Hayek. In the book, Hayek argues that war is a tool used by those who would strip us of all of the rights Conservatives generally try to conserve.64.9.237.248 08:26, 17 March 2007 (UTC)Matt

Except that this is not exactly correct. While Kennedy began the process of putting the military in Vietnam, it was actually Eisenhower (who was hardly a conservative) who began U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

The tactic of starting a war to consolidate political power at home is at least as old as the Roman Empire and has been used by leaders of all stripes. Rick Norwood 12:20, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, guys, but we had troops in Vietnam since early in our participation in the Pacific Theater of World War II. As a matter of fact, during World War II, Ho Chi Minh was the leader of an anti-Japanese organization in Vietnam, and we were supplying him. The Quid Pro Quo was that we would keep the French out after the war. The Pacific Desk of the OSS was doing the supplying. At the same time, the European Desk of the OSS was supplying the French, and telling them that we would secure all of Indochina for them. After the war, when the OSS was allowed to pass into history, the State Department favored the French in this matter, and Minh realized that he was betrayed. That started the whole mess. We kept Observers and Advisors in all of Indochina, and they remained to become the initial group that got involved after 1954. The rest is history. SSG Cornelius Seon (Retired) (talk) 11:39, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

American Conservatism and U.S. Constitutionalism

I was disappointed to find so little discussion of the adherence of American Conservatism (A.C.) to the Founding Father's writings, which include the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constituion, The Federalist Papers, etc., including pre-U.S. Independence writings.

A.C. is essentially based upon these documents which also make claim to inspiration to English Common Law and the Bible.

The breakdown of A.C. into groupings of Social Conservatives, etc. is fine as long as it is understood that these groupings form the much larger philosophy of A.C.

I think this article would benefit from additional information and sources from the "Paleoconservatism" page.

While A.C. is a simple philosophy to understand, there is a great deal of information that supports the root and the role it has played in politics from the very first U.S. election to current nationwide elections.

And, frankly, the criticism section is ridiculous because it argues non-contexual arguments in a non-contextual fashion, and leaves more questions than it answers. In fact, answers to the critcism's are found within the article. For example, arguing that the problem with A.C. is that it protects its' perspective despite the march of history, is silly because fundamental beliefs do not change despite what historical occurances any issue encountered. It's like saying that Jewish people should change their beliefs because of the Holocaust. Clearly, absurd. That section should be deleted because a criticism section belongs in a discussion page not in an article that explains the tenets of an article. Jtpaladin 19:09, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

American political parties are an amalgum of a small number of people who know what the Federalist Papers are and a large number of people who don't. Most criticism of politics in America is criticism of the methods used by the various parties to get their voters to the polls on election day. For a slightly deeper, more philosophical article, see Conservatism. Rick Norwood 21:17, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Rick, thanks for your comments. The article on American Conservatism is certainly the forum to discuss the philosophy of A.C. because it is a unique philosophy not a political machine. The article on Conservatism is one of the worst written articles in Wikipedia. It's all over the place. It does not define conservatism as a movement in the U.S. but instead has sub-topics regarding non-U.S. groups that have no basic foundation on English and American history and law. This article needs to be clarfied with the appropriate scholars being quoted and the criticism section removed.
Wikipedia is not a discussion forum, and your complaint that Conservatism does not focus on the US is actually its strength. Rick Norwood 00:18, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Move to Conservatism in the United States

There is currently a discussion at Talk:American liberalism to move the page to Liberalism in the United States. Since the change would also apply to this article, please join in the discussion. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 19:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)


Russell Kirk needs improved cites

The cites in Russell Kirk are looking rather anemic. Anybody care to try to improve them? -- 201.51.211.130 15:20, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

and so it begins

And now we have an article titled American Conservatism with a talk page titled Conservatism in the United States, and links and redirects going God knows where. I'll check back with you all about a year, and see how its going. Rick Norwood 19:54, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I've fixed that. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 21:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

WARNING: one editor is trying to move page without discussion because of his POV hostility to "American"

Many editors have worked on this page now one wants to change the title because he dislikes "American" as an adjective. This is vandalism and violates Wiiki policy. Be Aware! Rjensen 21:27, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

You misunderstand. The move (which I opposed) has nothing to do with "hostility" toward "American" but rather to the ambiguity of "American" (country, continent, the New World). Rick Norwood 22:36, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
As Rick said, I moved the page because the term "American" can be unclear, not because I dislike the term. I hail from the United States myself and describe myself as American...it has nothing to disdain for the word. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 02:10, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Who says "American Conservatism" is unclear?? Note there are 402,000 google hits on the term, compared to merely 14,500 on "conservatism in the United States." Users are thirty times more likely to search on "American conservatism" which is by far the termm used in books, articles, encyclopedias and newspapers. Rjensen 02:16, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
First, there was 70% consensus reached at Talk:American liberalism to move the article to Liberalism in the United States, as you fully know, and I posted on this talk page informing editors that the change would also affect this article. So that's who says "American conservatism" is unclear. As for your second comment, see Wikipedia:Google#Urban_legend_bias. A google test is not valid in this instance. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 02:41, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Is this crazy or not--the talk page of ANOTHER article determines what we do here? The root cause is anti-americanism to submit to people who hate the word "American" and pretend falsely that it will confuse users in Peru or somewhere. I am sure that Cielomobile is innocent of this motivation, but it is not tolerated by conservatives. Rjensen 03:01, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Crazy or not, this is the policy as dictated by WP:RM. I gave ample warning on the talk page, see Talk:Conservatism_in_the_United_States#Move_to_Conservatism_in_the_United_States. Look it up yourself.
The cause for the move was not "anti-Americanism;" it is simply much more vague than "of the United States." -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:18, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

While Rjensen misunderstands Cielomobile's motive, his point about ease of search is a good one. More people call this country America than call it the United States. Rick Norwood 14:10, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Apart from that, there has been no consensus, not even a gesture towards one, on the talk page of 'American Conservatism', that there is consensus on some other US - political oriented page is spurious. I would like to see the page renamed to its former self (conditio state quo ante) and THEN debate this like grown ups on the RIGHT talk page. --Isolani 17:25, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
Now granted I am a bit late in this debate, but I find it almost ironic that even the "conservatism" page title on Wikipedia seems to have suffered from the actions of liberal wikipedians. Any way I look at it, replacing the word "America" with the word "United States" seems to be rather secular. Obviously a vote on a discussion page of "Liberals in the United States" is going to turn out the way it did. That should come as no surprise. It's an obvious sampling error due to the bias. I can't help but compare it to running an abortion poll at an anti abortion rally. Say what you will about the poll being advertised on THIS page before it was closed, there's a reason that during real political elections they don't use one party's campaign headquarters as a polling place. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.244.98.148 (talk) 19:22, 3 March 2007 (UTC).
I opposed the move, but I also oppose the move back. Assume good will. There is nothing "liberal" about the use of the phrase "United States". The whole discussion reminds me of people who go through Wikipedia changing BC to BCE and the other people who go through Wikipedia changing BCE back to BC. Similarly, there are people who change 10 July to July 10 and others who change back again, apparently unaware that if a date is in squarebrackets you can configure your system to display all dates either way. "America" = "United States". What earthly difference does it make? Rick Norwood 19:43, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
as this is an, apparently, controversial move WP:RM has not been followed. --Isolani 17:26, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
and a '70% consensus' (in fact a 7-3 vote) is not a 'consensus', it is a majority and in no way can it be used to force through a move of page 'american conservatism'. It looks like User: Cielomobile now has 2 edit wars on his hands --Isolani 17:33, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
I followed the procedure at WP:RM pretty closely, see here and here. The only mistake I made was not posting the template on the talk pages of American conservatism and the other pages that would be affected by the move, but I did post on their talk pages. If you had them on your watchlist, it'd be pretty hard to miss. As for consensus, this vote was 8:3 (not actually 7:3), which is definitely a clear consensus. KISS (band) was recently moved to Kiss (band) with only a 9:7 consensus.
I can't believe you're calling this vandalism. The move was made in complete good faith; "American" is much more ambiguous than "of the United States," and there are plenty of other articles on Wikipedia with similar titles, i.e. Liberalism in France. Conservatism and liberalism are both political ideologies and the articles regarding national variants of them should thus be named similarly.
Thus, I'm going to move the article back to Conservatism of the United States. Instead of having an edit war over this, I ask you that we please have have it mediated, if you still disagree with my actions. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 18:05, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Since this move is no longer possible for someone without admin status, I'm going to go through the whole WP:RM process for this article again. Whoever incorrectly moved the page split the page histories; you actually have to move the page, not just put up redirects. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 18:12, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok Isolani, here is what you have done. You have set up redirects on the pages, and that is NOT the correct way to do this. It messes up the page histories; I did this for Liberalism in the United States and an admin told me that was not the correct way to do this. If you want to move the article back to American Conservatism, you have to have an admin do it, which means going through WP:RM and having a discussion here. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 18:18, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

You mean having the kind of discussion which you didn`t feel necessary on this page? Have fun sorting it out, I`m not wasting my time on this nonsense. --Isolani 18:04, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
WP:RM mandates that for multiple page moves, you have the discussion at one talk page. I posted on this talk page (scroll up, it's right here) informing users that I wanted to move this and other related pages, and that the discussion would be happening at Talk:American liberalism. This is what WP:RM dictates; if you did not catch my message, that is your own fault. Anyhow, if you want to move it back, feel free to voice your thoughts in the discussion below. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:15, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

VOTE: Move back to "American Conservatism"

The following is a closed discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was no consesus, defaults to keep for now. Please continue the discussion in another thread, though. Teke (talk) 05:14, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I propose we move back to "American Conservatism" for these reasons:

  1. "American conservatism" is by far better known term, by a ratio of 30-1 according to Google. The AC term is much less likely to confuse anyone.
  2. The idea is that it is part of the American thought system, not a branch of world conservatism that happens to take place in the US
  3. The move was a fraud--it was not discussed here and no poll was taken. The "vote" (7-4) was taken on a different article (on Liberalism) about a different subject, dealing with different ideas and intellectuals and politicians, and edited by different editors. Rjensen 01:45, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
You did not post at WP:RM. If you are going to accuse me of not following Wikipedia regulations, perhaps you should follow them yourself. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 07:09, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
thanks for the suggestions, which I followed. It's a fraud to say that two articles that deal with entirely different ideas, people, events and movements are "closely related. Rjensen 09:29, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Support

  1. Support. we had a good thing going here before an outsider with scant interest in the topic jumped in. Rjensen 03:28, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    In other words, I like it. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:34, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
  2. Support. "conservatism in the united states" (with the quotation marks so helpfully ignored by user:Cielomobile) has 15.700 google hits, whereas "american conservatism" has 410,000 . This is a ratio of 26-1 in favour of american conservatism. Furthermore I cite the procedural irregularities in moving the page from 'american conservatism in the first place. Under cielomobile's own rules we can luckily move if we have a 2-vote majority, or as he calls it in Pravda-speak "a 70% consensus" --Isolani 10:09, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    also: the "american conservatism" site:.edu search has 12,100 results whereas "conservatism in the united states" site:.edu has 145. This makes for a ratio of 83-1 in academic circles. But I suppose that they too will ofcourse be running dogs of the bourgeoisie and do not therefore 'count'. --Isolani 10:15, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    I've already explained why the Google search does not work, see my long-winded explanation below. I find it funny that you imply that a search with ".edu" determines the consensus within academic circles. But please, continue to compare me with communists; it is rather amusing. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:49, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
    As I said, running dogs of the bourgeoisie. OK. in 'higher education circles' then. It is obviously the accepted term. If you can show me a single instance of 'american conservatism' being used to describe conservatism in Surinam, I`ll drink more coffee than is good for me. --Isolani 09:22, 19 January 2007 (UTC)+
    Searching .edu websites does not support your claim that it is the proper term. Search recent scholarly articles (using something like JSTOR), and come back to me. Also, I have no idea why you are comparing me to the bourgeoisie...what is that supposed to mean? -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 04:12, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
    Never mind, I ran a quick search on Ebscohost-Soc.Science Index and the ratio is 63 to 25 (American Con vs. Con. in the US); also .ac.uk (UK universities) sites google check is 110 - 23 in favour of Am.Cons.--Isolani 10:00, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
    Just because a term appears more frequently on a search engine does not validate its use. If you're concerned about people performing Google searches, the redirect page will still show up in the top results. Anyway, the Ebscohost results aren't really that conclusive; "conservatism in the United States" is a much longer term and is thus less likely to appear. However, the article concerning Native Americans is titled "Native Americans in the United States," not "American Indians" or "Native Americans," because they are either politically insensitive or ambiguous. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 04:55, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  3. SUPPORT. Please keep American. People will simply NOT find this article if we change American to the United States. Most Americans refer to our country as America, not the United States. I find when I travel that non-Americans are the ones that refer to us as the United States. PLEASE keep American. Don't allow POV to dominate this entry. Jozil 18:22, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
    This is obviously a sock puppet. He has only five previous edits, and this is his most recent in two months. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 04:12, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
  4. SUPPORT. American is the best term. Let's move it back to what we have had for a long time. I am a college student and lots of my friends use wikipedia and we want to make it useful for them. Changing the title makes the article hard to find. Obow2003 20:55, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
    Also an obvious sock puppet; this user only has two edits. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 04:12, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
    False Allegation: I am NOT Jozil or Obow2003. As for contributions, Cielomobile had ZERO contributions to this article before he proposed moving it earlier this month. No interest at all in our subject matter--yet suddenly he tries to take control where many other editors have been working patiently for many months. (for that matter he was scarcely involved in the Liberalism article before he decided to move it too). That's disruption in an area where he has no experience or expertise. Rjensen 11:42, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
    Regardless of whether or not they are your sock puppets, they are in fact sock puppets. See Wikipedia:Suspected_sock_puppets/Rjensen for the discussion. As for your personal attack on me, while I may have not edited this article before (though I probably have some edits here), I have edited Liberalism in the United States quite a few times in the past, if I remember correctly. I've had it on my watchlist for ages, and I saw that someone had tagged the article to move it to Liberalism in the United States, but he had not posted at WP:RM and had not posted the notice on the talk page, so I followed up with a proper request. Nothing wrong with that. However, creating accounts for the sole purpose of voting in discussions is a violation of Wikipedia policy (as you so frequently like to accuse me of doing), and even if you yourself did not operate these accounts (unlikely, I'm almost sure you did), you certainly asked someone else to do so. Enough about the sock puppetry though; please redirect all comments about it to the entry at Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 05:17, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
  5. Support "American conservatism" is short and sweet. It's the term most people would use in ordinary speech or writing. The fact that the switch to "X in country Y" form is driven by a vote that took place on a liberal page is an additional reason for us to do it the other way. It would let us say that American conservatives put America first. In contrast, liberals in the United States are liberals who, due to an unfortunate accident of birth, happen to live in the land of the great fascist satan. Kauffner 14:21, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
    Liberal-bashing is always a good way to win an argument. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 19:12, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
  6. Support though my support could be stronger. An appropriate Google test favors "American Conservatism". I would also argue against Cielomobile's argument against the Google test based upon a codicil of the search engine criteria. Cielomobile should provide evidence that the former title suffers from an urban legend bias. There is also no danger of confusion of language or speakers here (as with French Conservatism). Rkevins82 15:20, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
    • According to Wikipedia:Search engine test#Google bias, "...the Google test checks popular usage, not correctness. For example, a search for the incorrect Charles Windsor gives 10 times more results than the correct Charles Mountbatten-Windsor." Such is the case here. Honestly, I'm not immensely worried about people confusing "American conservatism" with conservatism in the Americas, just as I wouldn't be worried about people confusing Prince Charles with Prince Charles of Belgium. However, we can and should use the correct term. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:27, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
      • The Charles Windsor example is an interesting one. If you use Google and search for "Charles Windsor" (including the quotation marks) the first link is to the correct page. The Wikipedia article also fails to carry the correct title (Charles, Prince of Wales). Never mind that. You have yet to show that American Conservatism is incorrect, so you have failed to fill the middle of the argument. Rkevins82 04:47, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
        • What do you mean, I have yet to show that American conservatism is incorrect? The use of the word "American" to solely refer to citizens of the United States is seen by many Latin Americans as insensitive and ignorant, as they use the word to refer to people from all of the Americas. See here. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 06:12, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Opposition

  1. Oppose - To begin, the "google search" notability test is not a valid argument, see Wikipedia:Google#Urban_legend_bias. Second, your numbers are completely off. A search for conservatism in the united states yields 1,310,000 results, while a test for American conservatism yeilds 1,390,000 results. Hardly a 30:1 ratio. In regards to the validity of google searches, type in "failure" and your first result will be George W. Bush's official website. What does that tell you?
    As for your second comment, that distinction you're making is completely artificial. Let's not kid ourselves, "Conservatism in the United States" is the exact same thing as "American conservatism;" the difference is only linguistic. One uses the adjective form, and the other uses the "in the noun" form.
    This move was not a fraud. I posted the move for moving American liberalism to Liberalism in the United States at WP:RM, and I posted on this talk page (see Talk:Conservatism_in_the_United_States#Move_to_Conservatism_in_the_United_States) notifying users that a discussion to move this and other related articles would be taking place. You yourself participated in the discussion, Rjensen. By the way, consensus was established, and it was 8:3, not 7:4, see Talk:American_liberalism#Page_move. If anything is fraudulent, it is your statement. RfAs (which are much more serious decisions than page moves) generally succeed with more than 75% support, and this move had 73% support. I fail to see how the consensus did not exist.
    My reasoning for moving the articles in the first place was quite simple. "American conservatism" and similar terms can be somewhat ambiguous as to what it refers, the brand of conservatism found in the American continents, or the brand of conservatism found withing the United States. While it is clear to us, citizens of the United States, that it refers to conservatism within the USA, this is not quite so obvious to people living in Central and South America. To them, "America" refers to the whole of what we could call the "Americas." This idea of mine was sparked by an encounters with a Venezuelan woman, who spoke English at a native level I might add, who said that she actually finds it a bit offensive that people from the US consider "American" to describe themselves only. While anyone would quite quickly understand to what the title actually refers, the title "American conservatism" would propagate the US-centric, politically incorrect notion that "America" means the USA and nowhere else. Wikipedia strives to maintain NPOV, and this is simply not in line with that. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:09, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    Cielomobile does not know how to do Google searches. If you search on the exact term "conservatism in the United States" with quotes you get 15,800 hits today. If you search for "American conservatism" (using quotes) you get 408,000 hits. (capital letters do not matter). It is FALSE to say this article is closely related to "Liberalism" -- more like the opposite most people would say, as it covers very different people indeed. We need to avoid the fake theory that unknown silent people in other countries want this change. No one in the world will be fooled into thinking that "American conservatism" deals with Peru. Only Cielmobile seems to believe that. Rjensen 03:28, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    Fair enough, but the Google search is not valid anyway, for reasons I already stated. However, the article is related to liberalism—they are both political ideologies; thus, they are related. They may be considered opposing ideologies, but they are nonetheless both ideologies. As for no one else agreeing with me, who were those other seven editors that supported the move? Why then did only three oppose? Obviously there is some debate on the subject. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:33, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    Wikipedia rules say that only closely related pages can be moved (If you are proposing that multiple closely related pages should all be moved for the same reason (see Multiple page moves), it may be advisable to create this discussion on only a single talk page and provide links from the other talk pages to this centralized discussion.) Liberalism and conservatism are not closely related. They are more like opposites! ("Football in 1950s" is closely related to "Football in 1960s") Rjensen 03:54, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    These two articles are very closely related: they are both political ideologies. It's that simple. They may be at odds with each other, but it is the exact same issue here for moving the two articles. Their being completely different from one another changes absolutely nothing, as I moved the articles for the same reasons, which you have yet to address. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 07:20, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    Nonsense--the two articles talk about different people, different ideas, use different sources, written by different editors, with different time emphasis. To say that all political ideologies are essentially alike is an extreme position that surely Cielomobile does not believe himself. The fact they are quite distinct means the move of "American Conservatism" was a fraud that violated Wiki rules and did not represent the consent of the people (a value which both liberals and conservatives support). Rjensen 04:30, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
    You don't grasp what I'm saying. Of course the ideologies aren't alike—duh. That's not why I moved the articles. I've explained this countless times; they are both ideologies and fall under the same naming conventions. It's extraordinarily simple. You haven't responded to anything I've written about the process of WP:RM or why "in the United States" is less vague than "American." -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 07:07, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
    The issue is too important to confuse readers by displaying such a misleading title as 'Conservatism in America'. There are too many opportunities for misinterpretation. 'American Conservatism' will direct readers more quickly and effectively to the topic, and seems consistent with other works dealing with the topic.63.170.88.2 19:19, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
    No, it is not misleading. On the contrary, the current title is much more precise. Read my explanation above. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:51, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
  2. Oppose I opposed the move here, I oppose the move back, I oppose anything that causes needless confusion and redirects. As long as the title is reasonable, and a search on any one title leads to all the others, change for the sake of change is pointless. Rick Norwood 21:56, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
  3. Strong Oppose - per us trying to use form X in country Y rather than Yish X. There are plenty of reasons for this, such as the amibiguity of words like American, British, French (language? location? people who speak the language?), etc. It's best to use this form. What's made it a strong oppose is that American Conservatism is already moved to Conservatism in the United States, and we really ought to be consistent. Patstuarttalk|edits 09:47, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  4. Oppose per all the above arguments.UberCryxic 05:30, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
  5. Strong Oppose First per the above argument of an ambiguous "American", which actually has a dab page: are we talking about the United States, North and South America, or American Airlines conservatism (conserving fuel, maybe, as opposed to ideaology)?See also here. Second, this article with the title of "American conservatism" would then be out of sync with the other articles such as Conservatism in Canada, Conservatism in Germany, Conservatism in Colombia, and Liberalism and conservatism in Latin America. Also agree with UberCryxic, Cielomobile, et al. --MPD T / C 05:45, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

American as proper term for the culture (USA = geography)

This article is about American culture and political movements like American Civil Rights Movement. the USA designation is merely geography, not culture. The article must be inclusive of the millions of Americans who lived outside the USA -- James Baldwin, WEB DuBois and Richard Wright come to mind, for example. Conversely it does NOT cover European and Latin Amerian writers who lived for years in the US, such as José Martí or Bertolt Brecht. Rjensen 06:00, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

This controversy just points out the reason not to use American, which can mean a person (a patriotic American), or can be an adjective meaning in or of the United States, (American productivity), or can mean a government (the American policy in the Middle East). Rick Norwood 13:24, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Second Rick.
Rjensen, unless there is consensus to move the article back to American conservatism, this change won't be made. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 05:22, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
The page wasn't moved here by consensus, so it shouldn't require a consensus to move it back. A simple majority should decide the issue, IMO. Kauffner 14:38, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Go to WP:RM. It reads, "If you are proposing that multiple closely related pages should all be moved for the same reason (see Multiple page moves), it may be advisable to create this discussion on only a single talk page and provide links from the other talk pages to this centralized discussion." I did just this. The discussion was held at Talk:Liberalism in the United States, and I posted on this talk page informing editors that the discussion would be taking place. Scroll up. By the way, the move for this article doesn't even have a simple majority; it's 3 - 3 (remember, two of the support votes are sock puppets, see Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Rjensen. Furthermore, if Rjensen is found to be guilty of sock puppeteering, his vote would have to be discounted. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 19:45, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
I appreciate that the move was made in good faith, but liberialism and conservatism are not in fact similar, at least not with respect to this issue. The name change is motivated by sensitivity toward possible Latin American objections to the word "American". This type of PC concern is obviously more appropriate for a liberalism article than for a conservatism article. AFAIK, no actual Latin has objected. I was poking around and found that Wikipedia has a Hispanic American history catagory, full of articles about Peruvian Americans, Mexican Americans, and Spanish Americans. Someone needs to tell them that they are Hispanics in the United States! Kauffner 04:28, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
The article's topic does not exempt it from having to be politically correct. As for your last comment, it is unfortunate that the term for Mexicans, Peruvians, etc. in the United States is "Mexican American" and the like, but it is quite established that "blank American" refers to people from countries outside the United States who have settled in the United States. It is a bit unavoidable. However, it is completely avoidable for the name of this article; "Conservatism in the United States" is really no more awkward than "American conservatism." Sure, "American conservatism" is shorter, but so is "Native Americans" when referring to "Native Americans in the United States." It too is vague, though. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 05:03, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
The name Conservatism in the US is no more awkward, but it may be less accurate, as it implies that the qualifier simply refers to the location, or simply to the local nomenclature, whereas in fact Conservatism in the United States is largely its own tradition as distinct from other conservative movements abroad. Imagine for instance if the article on American English refered to its subject "English in the United States." That nomenclature would give the wrong impression about American English's history, development and relation to other dialects of English. The article need not be moved, because American Conservatism is clearly the dominant strand of conservatism in the United States, but the article should probably be allowed to refer to its subject using the most accurate and most common terminology. --Isra1337 08:26, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
I understand your argument, but the status of "American" as ambiguous as to whether it refers to the Americas or the United States trumps this distinction you're creating between American conservatism and conservatism in the US. I honestly believe this distinction does not exist. The strongest argument in favor of moving it back to American conservatism has been that American conservatism is shorter and more likely to be searched upon. However, clarity supercedes shorter article names, as seen if you search "Native Americans." -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 15:05, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
Nowhere did I argue for moving the article. For reasons that need not be rehashed, I think the page is fine here. I note, however, that you have reverted usage of the term "American Conservatism" within the article itself, and I think this is inappropriate. Ambiguity is less of an issue within the article (though frankly I think it is a non-issue anyway) and the article itself would seem to disagree with your assertion that there is no distiction as it clearly discusses figures who have overwhelming influence on the American tradition, but who are (rightfully) found nowhere in the discussion of Conservatism in general. Take a look at the move discussion at Talk:Liberalism in the United States and you will see that the lack of such a divergence with reguards to Liberalism is cited as a reason for the move of that page. Getting rambling to let me recap: keep the page name, but do not try to alter the broadly accepted terminology by preventing its use in the article. --Isra1337 02:43, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Point taken. I don't feel all that strongly towards which term to use in the article itself; I think "C. in the US" should be used when possible, but sometimes "Am. C." is simply less awkward. Note that my reverts were only partial; I left it as Am. C. in some instances, when it was less awkward. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 03:08, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Name change caused redundancy in first sentence of lead

"Conservatism in the United States comprises a constellation of political ideologies within the United States under the blanket heading of conservative."

I parse this as conservatism in the United States means conservatism in the United States. This formulation is apparently residue from when the title was 'American Conservatism' and someone felt a need to disambiguate the term 'American.' I couldn't fix this rhetorical tautology by simply removing the redundant term because that would have utterly destroyed the sentence. Hence the change. Baon 07:44, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

I also changed the adjectival forms refering to groups to noun forms refering to doctrines (i.e., conservatives to conservatism) to better reflect the form of the title. Baon 08:12, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Your rewrite looks good to me. Rick Norwood 13:53, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Bill O'Reilly

This article states that O'Reilly states he is either "conservative or libertarian", yet the source that it cites states that O'Reilly claims himself as an "independent", not a "conservative" nor a "libertarian". In fact, a political organization in opposation to him calls him conservative. This statement in the article is inaccurate, and possibly even opinionated by including the organization's opinion as fact. --66.227.194.89 01:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Electoral Map

Can someone please post a county by county election map? 70.108.101.57 11:11, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure you could find one in an article such as 2004 United States Presidential Election. -- Cielomobile talk / contribs 04:40, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Republican Midwest

Republican Midwest? Why was it that in 2004 only Ohio, Indiana, and Iowa were won out of all the Midwest? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.5.170.110 (talk) 05:54, 21 April 2007 (UTC).

Historically, it was GOP, note "midwest" can include Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota which lean Dem today, others include Plains states like Kansas, Nebraska and the Dakotas which are still heavily GOP... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.72.215.225 (talk) 17:02, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Criticism section

The Criticism section seems to me particularly lame. This article and the Liberalism articles both used to have criticism sections, as did many other articles on controversial subjects. It was suggested that instead of placing criticism in a separate section, it should be incorporated in each section where there was more than one generally held belief. Is there any objection to doing that here? Rick Norwood 12:48, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

With EnglishEfternmann's edit, the criticism section has become even more of a debate rather than straight reporting. I really think it has to go. I notice that nobody has defended it here. Rick Norwood 13:40, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
There is no "Criticism" section in the article on [Liberalism_in_the_United_States]. There should not be a "criticism" section here either - the article should be about Conservatism, and what the movement does, what Conservatives think/believe etc. It seems that the Wikipedia userbase is by far very Liberal, and therefore only says good things about the Liberals and feels the need to post-script any information on Conservative beliefs with "These guys are so wrong because..." statements. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.42.253.50 (talk) 19:07, 15 May 2007 (UTC).
Someone tried to remove the section today on the grounds that it violates NPOV. Since it's sourced, I'm sure it can at least be incorporated into the rest of the article rather than deleted wholesale, so I placed the criticism-section template on it. I don't think it needs its own section though.--Cúchullain t/c 06:01, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Inconsistency in "Fiscal conservatism" and "Economic liberalism" sections

In the section titled "Fiscal conservatism"...

"This economic liberalism borrows from two schools of thought: the classical liberals' pragmatism and the libertarian's notion of "rights." The classical liberal maintains that free markets work best, while the libertarian contends that free markets are the only ethical markets."

Then, in "Economic liberalism"...

"Classical liberals AND [emphasis added] libertarians support free markets on moral, ideological grounds: principles of individual liberty morally dictate support for free markets."

Further, the article notes that conservatives passively reject rights theory as a motive for support for free markets, after stating that they inhert their position from both camps (whether or not it is true that such disparity between them exists)...

"Modern conservatives, on the other hand, derive support for free markets from practical grounds. Free markets, they argue, are the most productive markets."

So there are two contradictions in all. First, that classical liberal and libertarian perspectives on the market are different AND the same. (For the record, I'm NOT saying that they aren't different positions, OR that they're the same. It's just that the article should come down on this one way or the other.) Second, that conservatives hold a position taken from a single source (after stating otherwise). King of Corsairs 02:40, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Conservatism and Change

A writer noted under this topic heading:

"The race-blind meritocracy now embraced by many U.S. conservatives as an alternative to affirmative action would have seemed quite radical to most U.S. conservatives in the 1950s."


Really? Both National Review and The Freeman editorialized against Brown vs. Board of Education when the opinion was handed down in 1954, as being an unconstitutional attempt to recognize race as a political category. Specifically what conservatives of the time would have regarded a color-blind polity as "radical"?

Well, National Review and The Freeman, for example. In opposing Brown, they were supporting the right of schools to inquire into the race of students and refuse admission to students who were of the "wrong" race. At that time, the idea that a school should not even inquire into the race of students was certainly "radical" -- they would have probably called it "communist". Rick Norwood 14:00, 30 August 2007 (UTC)


No, this is not correct. I suggest you go to the library and actually read the editorial in the first issue of National Review. They simply editorialized against what they perceived as an usurpation of power on the part of the federal government. There is a difference between this position and that of "supporting the right of the schools to inquire into the race of students". The primary issue was the federal government's role and the fact that it did not even have the legitimate power to make the ruling (in the opinion of NR). Most conservatives of the time did not care what states like Massachusetts and Rhode Island had done to desegregate schools. NR even said so in the editorial. Lazytory 15:02, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

TV/MEDIA PERSONALITIES

I think Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity should be removed, because they are neoconservatives? If there are no comments on this in 24 hours I'll go ahead and move them.Reinoe (talk) 19:20, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Gop-plank.JPG

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Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 23:24, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Clark reference

A recent edit quoted Barry Clark as saying that in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, conservatism was a mixture of economic liberalism and social conservatism. Here is what Clark actually says on the subject: "During the Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries, American Conservatism was found almost exclusively in the South, where the Plantation System and slavery were ideally suited for an ideology that emphasized the importance of a hierarchal community." Rick Norwood (talk) 15:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Jonamo's edit

Most of Jonamo's recent edit seems fine to me, with two exceptions. First, conservative Christians are strongly divided on environmental issues, some favoring "stewardship", others opposing any government attempt to protect the environment. I agree that the movement is currently in the direction of steweardship, but do not see any evidence that believers in stewardship are yet in the majority.

On the question of schools, the issue is more clear cut. There is a strong movement among conservative Christians in the United States in favor of teacher-led Christian prayer in state schools. The right to choose between public and private schools has never been in question.

Rick Norwood (talk) 14:18, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

McCain a conservative?

In response to the recent addition of John McCain's name to the list of conservatives, I must point out that his voting record is pretty much the same as Hillary Clinton's. Speaking for myself, I was a big McCain fan when he ran against Bush in 2000, but changed my view when joined the gang of 14 to block Bush's judical appointments. McCain yearns for the moment in 2000 when he had the adoration of the media; the nomination is a cross he bears. Kauffner (talk) 11:01, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't McCain vote along the Republican Party line over 90% of the time? How can his voting record be "pretty much the same as Hillary Clinton's"? — Red XIV (talk) 19:44, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
While the Republican Party is traditionally the conservative party in the US, it's positions don't make or break American conservatism. I'm with Kauffner here. John McCain isn't a conservative leader. And based upon what other Conservative leaders have said, I don't think they consider him conservative either. 04:11, 9 July 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.86.219.240 (talk)

Conservative thinkers and leaders in the United States

I think this list is too long, and I don't think minor figures like Sean Hannity or Neal Boortz should be on this list. Would anybody mind if I cut the list down to a few fundamentals:

John Adams, John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, Robert A. Taft,
Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, Russell Kirk, Robert Bork, William F. Buckley, Jr.,
Grover Cleveland, Irving Kristol, Alan Greenspan, Antonin Scalia

Does that look acceptable? -- LightSpectra (talk) 06:28, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Taft, Bork, and Scalia -- that's heavy on Supreme Court people. How about Milton Friedman? Then there is also John Calhoun, who was the first U.S. politician to call himself a conservative. Tagging the founding fathers is a complex issue. I think if you list Hamilton, you should list Jefferson as well. To list only Hamilton would suggest that Jefferson -- icon of the Confederacy, president who fought the jihadis in North Africa -- was a liberal. Kauffner (talk) 12:16, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree that Hannity and Boortz can go, and that the list is too long. It would probably be best to leave Founding Fathers off the list, because the political divide in those days was not between liberal and conservative -- all the Founding Fathers were both -- but between Whig and Tory. Both Milton Friedman and John Calhoun certainly belong on the list. Rick Norwood (talk) 12:59, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm edgy about leaving any Founding Fathers off the list, since John Adams is considered to be the father of conservatism. (By the same train of thought, since Jefferson was essentially his polar opposite, they cannot both be seen as conservatives.) Also, while Milton Friedman has been a strong influence on fiscal conservatism in the U.S., he is almost universally considered to be a libertarian. -- LightSpectra (talk) 07:38, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
To have three founding fathers on the list, all Federalists, tends to identify conservatism with Federalism. The Federalists feared that war with Britain would harm trade. The Jeffersonians were land-hungry farmers eager to drive the British out of the Midwest. Both groups would be pretty conservative by modern standards.
I'm happy with John Adams on the list, but he wasn't the founder of any movement. The Federalists were reduced to the status of a regional party after he left office. Adams himself was basically forgotten -- the minor president between Washington and Jefferson. Russell Kirk rescued him from obscurity and made him a conservative icon in the 1950s.
As for Friedman, he can be both a libertarian and a conservative. Kauffner (talk) 13:34, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

All of the Founding Fathers were liberals -- they overthrew a king! All of the Founding Fathers were conservative -- they believed in the traditions of western civilization.

The same is true today. The practical difference between your average liberal and your average conservative is about as great as the difference between the Red Party and the Green Party in ancient Constantinople, and they divided up into parties based on which race horse they backed!

People tend to divide up into parties. Might as well call them the Us party and the Them party. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:48, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I noticed you added Ann Coulter, Pat Buchanan and Rush Limbaugh. I don't think any of these people have had a serious impact on conservatism. One of them is a shock author with no ideas of her own, another's claim to fame is that people accidentally voted for him (and his appearance on talk shows), and the third is just a shock author. I would say that if they didn't exist, conservatism would be roughly exactly the same as it is today. This isn't true for people like Greenspan and Buckley. -- LightSpectra (talk) 20:57, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

The names are widely recognized and newsworthy, and without the support of their followers the intellectual conservatives could not win an election. I voted in the local Republican primary yesterday, and the main issues in contention were not the issues of Greenspan and Buckley but the display of the Ten Commandments in court houses, establishing English as the only American language, and overturning Roe vs. Wade. This, too, is American conservatism. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:35, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they're influential in the sense that people listen to them, but they have contributed nothing to conservative theory. We decided to cut the list down to a few fundamentals, and I can think of a lot of people much more important than those three. -- LightSpectra (talk) 22:59, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

The article is on Conservatism in the United States, not on conservative theory. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:04, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Again, I can think of dozens of people more influential. We decided to cut the list down to a few fundamentals. Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh are certainly not fundamental to conservatism. -- LightSpectra (talk) 22:15, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I think dismissing Coulter and Limbaugh is wishful thinking. They are scorned by intellectuals, yes. But intellecutals only make up about five percent of the population. Many American conservatives are strongly anti-intellectual -- consider the the frequent accusation that their enemies are "elitist", live in an "ivory tower", and eat brie and drink white wine. If you ask the average American to name a living conservative, I think Limbaugh's name would lead the list, followed by Bill O'Reiley (who says he isn't one). Rick Norwood (talk) 13:16, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

But the list is not "influential conservatives," it is "conservative thinkers and leaders." Since Coulter and Limbaugh have no ideas of their own (they merely justify and defend the Republican Party), I don't see how they can be considered either. -- LightSpectra (talk) 14:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

They are leaders because they have many followers. Rick Norwood (talk) 12:59, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't buy that logic. George Orwell is not a leader because many people read his books or like his ideas. The only people we consider to be leaders, in the political sense, are politicians and military officers. -- LightSpectra (talk) 23:17, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Coulter doesn't really have "followers," but Limbaugh is a political player as well as a commentator. He led a successful effort against McCain's immigration amnesty bill last year. Kauffner (talk) 02:32, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

The psychological section

I have a number of issues with the psychology section in article: to begin with it is quite dissonant in tone and - so to say - puts rather a bit of pressure on the NPOV. Furthermore, if there is a psychological component to conservatism, it cannot possibly be specific to specifically American conservatism. I suggest the psychological section is split off from this article and moved to an article on 'the psychology of political ideology' or some such. --Scarpe (talk) 13:36, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Terminology

Could someone please explain how the terms liberal and conservative came to be used in the US. I have never come across the use of these terms in their modern sense in writings before the post-war era. The Four Deuces (talk) 23:04, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Funny you should ask that, as it came up in a yahoogroup I'm part of the other day and as i recall one of my colleagues there came up with an article or book on exactly that subject; I'll dig back through posts and find hte information. Essentially it's an outgrowth of the re-tooling of normal English words that came out of the McCarthy era and it was part of a deliberate effort to rejig the language for political purposes (see newspeak). It's all very recent and, to a Canadian, has always sounded strange to hear it used as a pejorative almost-as-bad-as "pinko commie faggot" (and used interchangeably for same). Oddly enough, in the mid-1800s "a more liberal policy" was a reference to unfettered free enterprise and other what-are-now-conservative meanings of "liberty" (notably where I'm from, in British Columbia, it also meant abolishing the rights of the indigenous poeple as they "stood in the way of progress"), which not incidentally shares the same Latin root. I'll be back with the link or article, whatever it it was, once I find it....Skookum1 (talk) 14:41, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
Because the level of education in the United States is so low -- roughly equal to the level of education in Bulgaria, far below the level of education in any other developed country -- words in American politics have no meaning, but are chosen to provoke an emotional response. The emotion provoked by "liberal" is fear -- fear of Willie Horton (a Black rapist used in a political ad), fear of rising taxes, fear of people who don't "look like Americans" moving into your neighborhood. The world "liberal" is almost always used by conservatives, liberals no longer use the word at all. The emotion provoked by "conservative" is strength -- the strength to kill people who speak with a funny accent and hate America, the strength that comes from keeping a loaded handgun under your pillow, the strength that comes from living in a community where everybody dresses alike and has the same color skin and the same beliefs that you have. Before the post-war era, America had not yet committed (in the words of one government report) unilateral intellectual disarmament, and words were still used to communicate ideas as well as emotions.
I recommend a new American novel, "Anathem" by Neal Stephenson, which, though set on another planet, has a lot to say about America and the world. The book introduces a useful vocabulary, such as the word "sline". A sline is a person with no intelligence, talent, skills, or any desire to acquire them. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:55, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Nineteenth century Britain had a Conservative Party and a Liberal Party, which is where the words come from. The issues in U.S. politics were always quite different than those in Britain and therefore the meanings of the words different. Calhoun introduced the word "conservative" into American politics in the 1830s, but he was talking about racial issues and slavery. Conservative in the modern sense of "pro-business" comes from the McKinley/Bryan campaign in 1896. McKinley was conservative while Bryan was "populist," later "progressive." In the 1930s, Franklin Roosevelt called his supporters "liberal" and the word stuck, although by European standards he would be "labor" or "socialist". Kauffner (talk) 15:52, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
Please disregard Norwood's dribble. "Liberal" originally meant one who thought the sole purpose of government was to protect your rights (these people are now called classical liberals), as opposed to nowadays, where a liberal is one who believes that the government also has a role in relieving poverty (these people are now called social liberals). This is confusing, because the philosophy of civil rights and limited government comes from John Locke, who developed "liberalism" yet cannot really be pidgeon holed into either of these two categories. The term "liberal" did not really have any single usage in politics until Franklin Delano Roosevelt; a liberal was one who supported his New Deal, whereas the Conservative Coalition lead by Robert A. Taft opposed it.
On the other hand, "conservatism" can have two meanings. The first is that it's just one who resists or desires very slow change in society. However, this has nothing to do with its political usage, which is one who supported limited government, specific morals enforced by the government, free enterprise and support charity over government welfare. The word "conservative", when used in this sense, is shorthand for "liberal conservative". This tradition began with Edmund Burke, a British MP who supported the American Revolution but opposed the French, though obviously, the issues of the 18th century are a lot different than that of the 20th and 21st centuries. What we know as modern conservative began with, as above, Robert A. Taft and the anti-New Deal coalition. -- LightSpectra (talk) 17:39, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

But when did these terms become used in the United States with their modern meaning? Is there any reference that McKinley called himself a conservative? The first Republican I could find who used the term was Barry Goldwater. Even then, it seems that Roosevelt's use of the term was much broader, and Goldwater's narrower, than current usage. The Four Deuces (talk) 18:07, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Again, the FDR's New Deal. Those who supported FDR were liberals, and they were opposed by the Conservative Coalition. -- LightSpectra (talk) 18:09, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

LightSpectra, The Four Deuces specifically asked about the use post-WWII. Your information about the use pre-WWII is very interesting, but does not answer The Four Deuces's question. Since you didn't like my first answer, which I am willing to defend if we are talking about political discourse at the level it is conducted on television, I'll try again. Among Americans who do not turn to television for their "news", the words have gone through many meanings in my lifetime. John F. Kennedy was proud to call himself a "liberal", by which he meant something similar to what FDR meant. William F. Buckley wrote an influential book, "The Conscience of a Conservative", and founded a magazine, National Review, that defined intellectual conservatism for several decades. Barry Goldwater was of this school. Buckley was strongly anti-Communism, and so for a time "conservative" meant "anti-communist". Liberals were anti-communist, too, but because liberals and communists both supported integration, women's rights, and trade unions, the liberals had a hard time convincing anybody of their anti-communist credentials. So, the liberals embraced integration as the most important liberal cause. This caused the "solid south" to change from solid Democrat to solid Republican overnight, but the Democrats were still strong enough to stay in power. So, for a while "liberal" meant "civil rights". The next players on the scene were rich businessmen, who chafed at a very high tax rate -- as high as 95% in the top tax bracket. They were looking for a personable, likable candidate who would lower their taxes, and found him in actor Ronald Reagan. Reagan was a strong conservative in the anti-communist sense, and this is when the racists, the anti-communists, and the tax-cut conservatives joined forces. Reagan was allowed to pursue his sincere anti-communist agenda while his Handlers saw to it that he pushed for low taxes and deregulation of business. Then everything changed in ways that almost nobody could have guessed. First, thanks to Blacks on television, the younger generation no longer feared Black people the way the older generation did, and the low-tax conservatives lost many of their racist allies. Then Reagan, against all expectations, won the struggle against the Soviet Union, and the low-tax conservatives lost most of their anti-communist allies. They had, by this time, lowered the top tax rate from 95% to 35%, but they thought they could get it even lower, if they could find another cause that would join them. That cause came their way when the Supreme Court passed Roe vs. Wade. So, now "conservative" means "low taxes" and "no abortions". Liberals, too, had largely won their struggle. So, if liberal doesn't mean "civil rights", what does it mean? Mostly, now, it seems to mean pro-choice and gay rights. But listen to the presidential debates. The conservative and the liberal agree about almost everything, and are reduced to talking about William Ayres and Joe the Plumber -- non-issues if there ever were any. So, the history of the meaning of "liberal" and "conservative" has, in a practical sense, little relationship to their original meaning. Yes, liberals favor freedom, such as freedom of choice and freedom for gays. Yes, conservatives favor traditions, such as the upper class and the Christian religion. But when words change their meaning from election to election, they tend to lose their meaning entirely. Rick Norwood (talk) 19:43, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

You're describing some mutant version of neoconservatism and white nationalism. Neither of these movements have anything to do with actual conservatism. Your fearmongering is fairly annoying, especially since you're trying to implant this garbage on an encyclopedia as opposed to some crazy blog. -- LightSpectra (talk) 20:33, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Contemporary writers may refer to supporters of the New Deal as liberals and their opponents as conservatives, but can anyone find a reference that these terms were used at the time? I can only find people calling themselves (in the modern sense) liberals in the late forties and conservatives with Richard Nixon. Was the Conservative Coalition even known by that name? The Four Deuces (talk) 23:00, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

No problem. There was a book published in 1936 entitled Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the great liberal by Archibald Campbell Knowles. The word "conservative" was certainly in common use before FDR. In the 1912 presidential race, Taft's supporters hailed him as the "authentic conservative" while Roosevelt and Wilson were progressives. Progressive vs. conservative was the common terminology in the 1920s, as you can see from Coolidge's 1929 autobiography.[1] Kauffner (talk) 03:38, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

You have to say what Knowles meant by the term liberal. Did he for example describe Hoover and Coolidge as liberals too? As for 1912, the Republican platform does not use the term liberal but accuses its opponents of supporting Democracy, which they saw as a step to Socialism. Is there an example before the 1950s when any Republican called himself a conservative, or an example before the 1960s when a mainstream Republican called himself a conservative and his opponents liberals?

In the citation, Coolidge did not call himself a conservative, but merely used the term. It's like a democrat saying he is conservative with salt but uses liberal amounts of ketchup. The Four Deuces (talk) 06:43, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Coolidge described a political platform he wrote as conservative, which is not at all like being conservative with salt. North Carolina Democrat Josiah Bailey released a "Conservative Manifesto" in December 1937. This was the founding document of the Conservative Coalition which controlled Congress for many years. FDR used both "conservative" and "liberal" with their modern meanings in a joke he made during a 1939 radio address.[2] Kauffner (talk) 08:46, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

LightSpectra: I'm not trying to "implant" anything, just trying to answer The Four Deuces question. Nor am I "fearmongering". I'm generally optimistic. But I lived in the American South during the civil rights movement, and while first hand reports have no place in articles, here in the talk section I can report what I saw. The South changed from solid Democrat to solid Republican. What's your explanation? Why did William F. Buckley fight so hard to keep Black students out of Skull and Bones? Modern conservatives would like to deny that they ever allied with racists, but history says otherwise. (For a modern example, see the verbal attacks on a Black cameraman at a recent McCain rally.)

The Four Deuces: Before the anti-communist movement in America, Republicans and Democrats alike described themselves as liberal. The modern use of "conservative" began with William F. Buckley's book, as cited above. Conservatives then began to use the word "liberal" in a negative sense. There is a good discussion of that in Modern liberalism in the United States in the section "Negative uses of the term 'liberal'", with plenty of examples. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:21, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Goldwater wrote The Conscience of a Conservative (1960). Buckley wrote God and Man at Yale. (1951). Actually, I think the book that you have in mind, the one responsible for making the word "conservative" respectable again, is neither of these, but rather The Conservative Mind (1953) by Russell Kirk. As for the South, it has never been solid Republican. Republican organizations in the South were founded by people who moved in from other parts of the country. With air conditioning and increased mobility, the South became more like the rest of the U.S. If you were in the South during the civil rights movement, you know that in 1968 the South voted for the Democratic governor of Alabama. Kauffner (talk) 14:31, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Apparently the "Conservative Manifesto" was not known by that name when it was written and its author identified himself as a liberal who opposed the New Deal. The Four Deuces (talk) 08:17, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Kauffner: Thank you for correcting my defective memory, which paired the author of one book with the title of another. My bad. On the other hand, I am not mistaken by the number of racists who shifted from Democrat to Republican because of Lyndon Johnson. Yes, sometimes southern states vote for a democratic governer. My own state, Tennessee, has a democratic governer. But according to the polls, Tennessee will go strong for McCain. I hope I'm wrong about that. Rick Norwood (talk) 15:03, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

By "Alabama governor" I meant George Wallace (for president), although Texas actually voted for Humphrey. Kauffner (talk) 00:39, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

George Wallace went back to the days when the Democratic party proudly called itself "The Party of the White Man". Actually, Wallace started out as a liberal, but found he couldn't advance politically in the South without being a racist, so he remade himself as a racist's racist. After he was shot, and retired from politics, his true liberal nature came to the fore again. He was an interesting character. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:20, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

This article implies that conservatism existed as an ideology in the US from Revolutionary times, when in fact it is a modern reaction to New Deal/Great Society liberalism with no agreement on ideology. Some conservatives trace their beliefs to British Toryism, while others look to the US constitution or European liberalism. While historic figures like Adams and Jay are claimed by modern conservatives, there is no universal agreement on this. Also, most of the sources for this article are from modern conservatives, not academic studies.

Conservatives historically supported monarchy and the established church, and were opposed to equality, private property and capitalism. The lack of a conservative tradition in the US is seen by most historians as leading to greater enterprise but also lack of social cohesion.

In order to be NPOV, the article should rely on peer-reviewed studies of conservatism in America. While it is proper to cite modern conservatives for information about themselves, including their view of history, their view of history should not be presented as fact. I notice that the article on American liberalism is more clear in its explanation of its origins. The Four Deuces (talk) 19:35, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Well said, The Four Deuces. I concur completely. Rick Norwood (talk) 00:06, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

We're all Libertarians now!

Valois bourbon continues his work to definite conservatism as Libertarianism, citing the eminent scholar Ronald Reagan as evidence. He is also working hard in the articles on Liberalism to define liberalism as Libertarianism. In his world view, the world is divided into two groups, one group including both liberals and conservatives, who are all really Libertarians, the other group including socialists and communists, which includes everyone who is not a Libertarian. Since he edits every day, I'm getting tired of trying to restore mainstream definitions to the many articles he edits, and would appreciate any help I can get. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:43, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I have posted my comments at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard. --The Four Deuces (talk) 20:34, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Bobisbob2, Skylab, and I have all expressed the same concerns you have. I think that, together, we can get this under control without needing to bring in administrators (many of whom are Libertarians, by the way). Would you we willing to pick three articles and write a short, serious, scholarly lede? If so, I'll defend your ledes by reverting any attempt to change them without first discussing the changes in talk. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:30, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

Let me write one for this article and see what you think. Both Lee Edwards and Sara Diamond have written extensively about American conservatism, its origins, beliefs and practices, from different perspectives, and I suggest they would be good sources for this article, both for factual information, and for informed commentary. The Four Deuces (talk) 18:50, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

To share with Bobisbob2 and Skylab what I said to you on your Talk page, I agree with what you wrote, but think it is too controversial to survive as the lede. Parts of it would work well further down in the article, but we need something in the lede that is accurate but not too controversial. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:22, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Lead Section (Introduction)

I would like to suggest updating the lead section of this article. Numerous edits have left it lacking in clarity. Specifically, the first paragraph does not clearly define the subject. The second paragraph describes conservatism, rather than American conservatism. The third paragraph lists examples but does not state their significance.

The lead should define the subject and outline the issues, with details left to the main body of the article. It should also be a brief summary of the subject, outlining the issues that the article will discuss. I have written a draft for a possible lead. The information is taken from the Heritage Foundation, which is the leading US conservative think tank, but it conforms to mainstream views. There is controversy over who are true conservatives in the US, and about the conservative credentials of historic figures. These disputes are best left to the body of the article.

I believe that it is possible to have an article that is not controversial, even though it is about a controversial subject. That is best achieved by including the various viewpoints in the article, rather than writing the article from a viewpoint.

I welcome your comments.

Suggested lead:

Conservatism in the United States is a political alliance between two different groups, one in favor of small government and free enterprise, the other in favor of laws that reflect their values and religious beliefs, especially laws against abortion, illegal immigration and same-sex marriage.
Although there has always been a conservative tradition in America, in the sense of a strong belief in God and country, the modern American conservative movement was first popularized when Russell Kirk, in 1953, wrote The Conservative Mind. In 1955, William F. Buckley formed the National Review, a publication for conservative writers, which included traditionalists, such as Kirk, libertarians, and anti-communists. This bringing together of separate ideologies under a conservative umbrella was known as "fusionism".
Modern conservatism saw its first political success with the 1964 nomination of Barry Goldwater, author of The Conscience of a Conservative (1960), as the Republican candidate for president. In 1980, the conservative movement was able to attract disaffected Southern Democrats, cold-war liberal democrats, and evangelical Christians to nominate and elect the Republican candidate Ronald Reagan as president. Subsequent victories included gaining a Republican congressional majority in 1994 and the election of George W. Bush in 2000.
The opponents of conservatism are often referred to as "liberals", and the two movements are often referred to as right-wing and left-wing, respectively. Outside the United States, the term conservative usually refers to supporters of the establishment, including monarchy, aristocracy, and church, while liberals support private enterprise, small government, and individual freedom.

The Four Deuces (talk) 00:06, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Kirk's book is a history of conservatism in the U.S., so it doesn't make any sense to claim that he founded the movement. How can you give a thumbnail sketch of U.S. conservatism without mentioning Calhoun? The modern political landscape, with a pro-business Republican Party facing a populist Democratic Party, goes back to the McKinley/Bryan contest of 1896. Presidents Taft, Harding, and Coolidge were all self-described conservatives, their opponents "progressive." A "Conservative Coalition" dominated congress from 1937 to 1961. The last paragraph is just wrong. Certainly Canada and Britain adopted the U.S. meanings of "conservative" and "liberal" long ago. Kauffner (talk) 03:07, 21 November 2008 (UTC)
I am not saying that Kirk "founded" the convervative movement, merely that he popularized the term, and traced conservatism throughout US history. I would be interested in any reference you can find before Kirk of the use of the term "conservative" in its modern sense. I could not find one. You can read Lee Edwards' article about American conservatism http://www.heritage.org/Research/PoliticalPhilosophy/HL811.cfm
If you have a better source, please tell me what it is.
The last paragraph contains the word "usually" which allows for exceptions. Even then, these countries do not use liberal and conservative in the same sense as in the US. For example the Labour Party is never referred to as liberal. The BC Liberal Party has more in common with US conservatives than liberals.
How do you think the lead should be written? The Four Deuces (talk) 16:35, 21 November 2008 (UTC)
In the 1890s, there was a weekly journal called The Conservative edited by Julius Sterling Morton. Morton was the creator of Arbor Day and was agriculture secretary for Cleveland, a conservative Democrat. I think we can see here how the word "conservative" acquired its modern meaning: It allowed Morton to oppose populism and Bryan and to vote for McKinley, yet at the same time he could identify as a "conservative Democrat" rather than as a Republican.
House Speaker Joe Cannon (1903-11) is identified as "conservative" in a book written by his private secretary and published in 1927.[3] The book counterpoises "conservative" and "progressive," so this clearly conservative in the modern sense.
I have also noticed another problem with this proposal. If you want to make conservatism about "strong belief in God and country," those issues were not controversial until the 1960s. Kauffner (talk) 17:47, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Morton provides a very good example of the use of the word "conservative" with a clearly-defined meaning, and of course is important to the history of the subject. As I wrote there has always been a conservative tradition, but the term conservative was not popularized until Kirk, who traced the tradition, and may have been the first to do so. After Morton there were many people we would today identify as conservatives but were not described as such at the time, e.g., Sen. Robert Taft. There are others, such as WJ Bryan, T Roosevelt and the progressives who do not fit neatly into liberal/conservative categories.

I am happy to remove "strong belief in God and country".

The point of starting with Kirk and the National Review is that it provides a basis for examining the conservative tradition as well as the starting point for modern conservatism. One of the problems with this article is the on-going argument about who should be considered a conservative before the 1950s. Kirk provides a starting-point, although there will always be disagreements, which should be clearly stated in the article.

If you find my writing in the draft lead unclear, I would appreciate suggestions on how it could be re-written. The Four Deuces (talk) 20:29, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I just came across the Wikipedia article Red Tory which shows that conservatism in Canada does not necessarily equate to US conservatism. There is also the Tory Reform Group within the UK party. The Four Deuces (talk) 03:15, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

The word "conservative" was popularized by Calhoun back in the 1830s and appears in the Whig Party platforms, long before Kirk. Kirk himself quotes Lincoln defining the word. Pre-FDR, New Deal type legislation was considered Socialist and radical, whereas post-WWII Social Security, FDIC, and so forth have been treated as untouchable. But what the word means today is pretty much the same as when the Conservative Manifesto was issued in 1937 in reaction to the FDR's proposed (but never enacted) "Second New Deal." Kauffner (talk) 15:51, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
My lead says that Kirk popularized the "modern conservative movement", although I wrote above that he popularized the term "conservative". Maybe I should have said "re-popularized", but I don't think the term conservative was more commonly used than today. But do you have any problems with his definition of the subject or how he traces American conservative thought?
Incidentally the article gives Calhoun and the Whigs one short paragraph together, and then William Bennett's comments on Calhoun and other unrelated groups. First of all more detail is required. But also if the article broke conservatism into its proper threads, then Bennett's comments would be irrelevant, because he is not a traditional conservative.
As far as I know, Lincoln only used the term conservative once in a speech and it was in response to someone who had used the term. Kirk described him as a "conservative democrat", but concludes that the conservative era was over.
The Conservative Manifesto was in the libertarian tradition and was not called conservative until the term began to be used to describe both traditional conservatives and libertarians. Herbert Hoover, Robert Taft, Hayek and Mises all described themselves as liberals, although their ideas have been rejected by modern liberals and found a home in the modern conservative movement. The Four Deuces (talk) 08:21, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

History

I think the history section would be more helpful if the history of American conservatism is broken down into the different strands which have now come together, particularly traditional conservatism and libertarianism. After all, members of these two groups often had significant differences, e.g., federalists and anti-federalists, Northerners and Confederates. The Four Deuces (talk) 06:47, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

When were traditional conservatives and libertarians separate and when did they get together? Some conservatives put more emphasis on Christianity and social issues, others on economics. Evangelicals were progressive in Bryan's day. They withdrew from politics in embarrassment after the Scopes trial in 1925, only to return in the 1970s as conservatives because of the abortion issue. As the status quo moves left, groups and people who were once progressive or liberal become conservative, even though their actual political views might stay the same. Kauffner (talk) 01:29, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Traditional conservatives include tories, federalists (and some of their successors) and southern democrats who were separate from revolutionaries, anti-federalists and unionists. As traditional conservatism went into decline, the political debate became between libertarians and populists, progressives and New Deal liberals. Russell Kirk identified and popularized conservatism in America, at the same time that libertarians political philosophers were becoming popular. The fusion of these two strands of belief in the 1950s gave a unifying voice to the modern American conservative movement and provided policies for Goldwater, Reagan, Gingrich and Bush distinct from those of modern liberals. The terms traditional conservative and libertarian are used by the modern conservative movement, and correspond to the European terms conservative and liberal.
Kirk saw the small towns, churchs and farms as the basis for a conservative renewal, and thought that both parties ignored them. The Four Deuces (talk) 06:55, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

I have separated the history section into traditional, libertarian and modern conservatism. The Four Deuces (talk) 08:54, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

This structure seems to suggest that Lincoln, McKinley, Taft, Harding, and Coolidge were libertarians. These presidents all favored the protective tariff. Kauffner (talk) 09:38, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I am using the terminology of modern conservatives, which I have defined in the article, and am not referring to supporters of the modern Libertarian Party. These libertarians support tariffs when they help their businesses and oppose them when they don't. Do you have another word for for pro-business conservatives? The Four Deuces (talk) 05:18, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

This section is confusing anyway, and needs to be re-written. From Lincoln to Hoover, the two parties shared broadly similar ideas, although both were influenced to some degree by populists/progressives. Ideological polarization between the two parties began during the New Deal. The section reads as if a modern conservative had sat down and tried to figure out who he would have voted for. The Four Deuces (talk) 12:24, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

ObjectivityAlways edit

Because this topic is so controversial, ObjectivityAlways, you should discuss changes here first. I notice that Four Deuces is trying to fix some of the problems this edit has introduced, and I don't want my edit to conflict with his, but I'm going to make a few changes in the lede that seem necessary to me, to restore some of the points that were there before today's edits. Rick Norwood (talk) 15:30, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

ObjectivityAlways reverted my edit without discussion. His edit leaves the reader with the idea that there is no conflict between Libertarians and the Religious Right, or between Libertarians and the Republican Party. Sorry, that's not true to fact, that's wishful thinking. I'd be happy to work with you, but until you discuss you ideas here, I'm restoring what I wrote. Rick Norwood (talk) 20:56, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

This introduction should not be a description of a conservative coalition of various single issue movements. Rather, it should define what is American conservatism, which must include a definition of it on a fiscal, national security and social basis. The coalition argument might fit better in the political section. But even there, I think you need to point out that conservatism as a governing and intellectual movement has also been centralized around a few agreeable themes. ObjectivityAlways (talk) 22:59, 2 December 2008 (UTC)
By the way, that coalition argument--labeled fusionism in this article--is well represented in the second paragraph. What was not there (and what I think now is) is an answer to the question: What is American conservatism? ObjectivityAlways (talk) 23:02, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad you decided to talk things over, sorry you decided to revert a second time instead of rewriting. My objections to your paragraph are partly a matter of emphasis and partly a matter of style. As for emphasis: you seem to want "small government" up front, but that has not, until recently, been a conservative principle. It is true that in the 1960s "States Rights" became a conservative by-word, but to those of us living in the South at the time, this was understood as a code word for segregation. The primary conservative position, as a later paragraph affirms, is God, King, and Country. Obviously, in a democracy such as the United States, that has been modified, but the primary conservative values are still religion and patriotism, with "small government" an offshoot that hasn't got much to do with the first two. In fact, the desire for religious laws and for a strong military often come into conflict with the desire for small government. To run these together in one sentence, as if they were similar or even compatible values, is misleading. Also, while it is true that in the past sixty years or so the Republican party has been the conservative party, in the years following the US Civil War the Republican party was the liberal party, and the Democrats were the conservatives. In short, the lede you have written is too narrow a picture of American conservatism.

In the spirit of cooperation, I'll try another rewrite instead of reverting what you've written. I would ask you to also focus on rewriting rather than reverting. Rick Norwood (talk) 00:23, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

The main thing I have done in my rewrite is to take out a lot of material that really belongs further down in the article. Rick Norwood (talk) 01:37, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

ObjectivityAlways You refer to fusionism as an argument. Do have any reason why this is just an argument? The Four Deuces (talk) 05:31, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I meant merely that, while there is a coalition of groups and ideologies that cooperate to form some of the conservative movement, there also are people who are conservatives and subscribe to all of the tenets of conservatism, including its fiscal, social and national security components. I just didn't want to make it seem like there was not such a thing as a conservative, especially since many tens of millions of Americans consider themselves that and subscribe to all basic conservative beliefs. I think we sufficiently convey all of this now, though. ObjectivityAlways (talk) 13:35, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, ObjectivityAlways, for rewriting rather than reverting. I am going to restore "God and country", however, since these are core Conservative beliefs, while "Intelligent Design" is a minor belief of some Conservatives. For example, conservative Roman Catholics do not reject evolution, but do strongly believe in God. If you will leave this, I will leave "most" instead of "some" to describe "small government" conservatives. Rick Norwood (talk) 13:12, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I took it out originally because I am sure there are many Americans who believe in "God and country" who are not conservatives and some who may even be liberals. But thinking about it, that's ok, I think, because it conveys that most conservatives believe in "God and country," which seems true, even if others do too. ObjectivityAlways (talk) 13:35, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree that many non-conservatives also believe in God and country, but the conservatives tend to turn to government to support their beliefs, as with their desire for laws requiring school prayer and laws against burning the flag, while liberals generally want these things to be matters of personal conscience rather than required by law.

As it now stands, we have a lede both of us seem to agree on. Now if The Four Deuces also agrees, we can move on to the body of the article, which still needs some work. Rick Norwood (talk) 14:20, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

The lede seems fine - it outlines the issues and avoids bias. The Four Deuces (talk) 16:15, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I guess we lost the reference to support for a strong defense in those edits. Should a sentence be added at the end of the first paragraph, something like this: In the late 20th century and early 21st century, American conservatives have been the driving force behind vast enhancements and increased expenditures on U.S. national defense, first in an effort to protect the U.S. from a prospective Soviet attack during the Cold War and then a second al-Qaeda or other terrorist attack during the ongoing global war on terror.

Let me know what you think since this seems to be a defining conservative theme. ObjectivityAlways (talk) 23:00, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I am going to add in this sentence above on conservative support for an assertive stance against communism and now al-Qaeda. I would have to think that we all agree that these foreign policy/national security traits have been a centerpiece of contemporary conservatism. ObjectivityAlways (talk) 23:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
I can't agree with defining conservatism as "belief in God and country." Its not really true even today and if you go back further than 30 or 40 years, it makes even less sense. Back in 1920s, it was populist Bryan who argued against evolution and conservative Mencken who ridiculed him. FDR, our most liberal president, give an eight-minute prayer broadcast on radio after Pearl Harbor. Catholics in the 1950s and 1960s were quite religious and all voted for the Democratic Party. It was Carter who introduced the phrase "born again" into mainstream culture. Reagan claimed God for the Republican Party mostly by ending every speech, "God bless the United States of America." But no U.S. politician runs for office as an atheist, even today. I like Lincoln's definition of conservatism much better: "an adherence to the old and tried against the new and untried." This line is quoted favorably by Kirk, so its authority is impeccable.
Defining conservatism as beginning with Buckley and Kirk is in my opinion a bit of self-promotion by National Review. Even if we limit it to its modern sense of "pro-business," the word was well-established by the 1920s. Kauffner (talk) 03:40, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Kauffner, you make some good points, but the conservative tradition is "God, King, and Country". The instances you mention show that America is a very conservative country (as well as being a very liberal country). The two views only became opposed when adopted by political parties to win elections. Also, the Republican and Democratic parties switched places during the civil rights movements. Before that, the Dixiecrats were the conservatives.

I don't think anyone wants to suggest that conservatism began with Kirk, only that the modern American conservative movement began with Kirk.Rick Norwood (talk) 14:57, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

ObjectivityAlways. Sorry, I must have been looking at an earlier edit, and am deleting my comments and your response. The Four Deuces (talk) 13:22, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

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