Good morning.
- Well I saved this because I wanted to read it. I still do. Now you can look too … but since I haven’t read it … I actually don’t know whether it’s hokum or not, but it’s about the 2nd Amendment.
- More on Xenophon.
- Conservatism as cult.
- And … a similar vein here but for the other side.
- Divorce and health.
- Of guns and defense.
- Equal vs precious … an important observation.
- I’m sorry, but yes you certainly can.
- And one reason is, the center of the text (doesn’t have anything to do with creationism vs evolution).
- Riiiiight.
- And here I thought is was just ontology (and some theology) recapitulated and reinforcced by praxis all along.
- Getting the gospel wrong.
- Zaaap.
- So, ‘splain why there are clauses on gender in a climate treaty?
- Spot on protest.
- NYTimes has no clue about job creation.
NYTimes has no clue about job creation.
WTF? Just because the NYT agrees with Keynes instead of the Chicago school doesn’t mean they have “no clue.” I’d argue that the people who think they can use “common sense” to extrapolate from what goes on in small business owners’ heads to create macroeconomic policy are the ones with no clue.
And … a similar vein here but for the other side.
Mr. Gelman does a pretty good job taking apart NPod’s idiocy regarding the Jews (although to be fair, it’s like fish in a barrel) but I think he didn’t really capture the emotional core of Jewish liberalism. Yes, non-fundamentalist Jews believe that Dems are better for the economy and for Israel and for social issues, contrary to what NPod thinks they should believe, but it goes beyond that. Or, rather, deeper than that.
Jews have a long historical memory of being the underdog, of being the minority, of being the oppressed and the unwanted. And at the same time we have a (slightly less) long historical experience of being cosmopolitan — valuing education and intellectualism, being non-provincial, and comfortable with diversity and migration.
America (the government) has always been good to the Jews, but we (non-fundamentalists, who are less tribalistic) empathized with African-Americans during the civil rights struggle and empathize with gays during their civil rights struggle and empathize with the millions of “illegals” and legal immigrants who are now in the position that so many of our own ancestors have been in. We even empathize with accused Islamic terrorists who are being whisked off to secret prisons to be tortured as so many of our ancestors and relatives were.
And we also instinctively fear the jingoism on the right, having been the target of so much jingoism in the past. And we instinctively fear the fundamentalist Christianity on the right, having been the victims of that so often in the past. And we are repelled by the insularity and tribalism of the anti-immigration crowd and the passion of the anti-illegal-immigration crowd and the American exceptionalists and those who use Europe or the French or Canada as a punchline. (Yes, the echoes of anti-Jewish sentiments are quite clear to us in today’s anti-European sentiments on the right.)
So our liberalism is rational and a product of our education and intellectuality, yes, but it’s also a gut-level response to the things that have made Jews safe and prosperous and against those things which endangered and led to slaughter of Jews in the past. Diversity, immigration, pacificism, tolerance, intellectualism, education, universalism… all of those have always been good for the Jews. Hawkishness, jingoism, restrictions on immigration, tribalism, economic stratification… all been bad.
It also happens to be the case that historically what’s good for the Jews has been good for everyone, and that’s been as true in America as anywhere, so it’s not like there have been negative results from these instinctive reactions. The right (and the protectionist faction of the left) think that they’re acting in self-defense, but they’re even wrong about that. It just so happens that reality is not a zero-sum game. Under Republican presidents, income growth is much stronger for the top strata then for everybody else… but under Democrats, it’s strong for everybody else AND the top strata.
Excellent post JA.
Thanks!
Not being judgemental but is this perhaps the deepest split between left and right? The right feels good about being the majority, the left feels uncomfortable about it? Or perhaps the right is more inclined to think “Am I being treated fairly” while the left is more inclined to ask “Am I treating others fairly?”
This would seem to conform to stereotypes of both the left and right. The left is seen as weak and unsure of itself. The right as head strong and confident. The left is willing to ‘read another book’ before making a call. The right knows what it thinks and wants the book to reflect that. Yin and Yang here, not a judgement. Both styles IMO have their pros and cons and as part of the human condition both aspects need to be present. What are everyone else’s thoughts?
And of course I agree with you on number 8. Anyone who follows the link will discover that
Jim
Re: cannot be a christian and believe in evolution.
I suppose you can be a Christian and believe in any number of things, but can you believe in Providence (with a capital P) and also in undirected evolution?
Every Christian believes in creation and a Creator, but not every Christian is a Creationist.
Jim,
I knew you didn’t agree, I was concurring with your view. I’m sorry I didn’t make that clearer.
In part it was an attempt to “lure” people to find out what I was talking about.
Boonton,
I’m going to have to disagree, at least in part. Especially about the confidence part. The left is unsure about itself because it wants to set out on the windy bridge leading civilization to new lands. Conservative is even more unsure and is wants to read more books and consider things from every angle before making the plunge. So, I’d see that as mistaken.
On the other, I do agree that both have pros and cons. It’s just that I see more cons with unfettered progressive confidence than the latter.
JA,
Oddly enough I was reading (a few chapters) tonight on the plane from a ex-pat Russian Jew … who might differ with you on some points. That is on the national/exceptional tribal identity as being an essential guard of liberty and freedom.
So, if you want to continue this expression of your view of Jew’s and liberal vs conservatism … I’d be interested also in your take on Mr Sharanky’s book, Defending Identity: Its Indispensable Role in Protecting Democracy
.
Another tack to take here is to compare Jewish and Christian experiences and lessons drawn from centuries of oppression. I’m an Orthodox Christian and the Christian East has not been the triumphant dominant religion for most of its history as it was in Western Europe. Armenia, Iran, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, 20th century Eastern Europe … all find the Christian in a tough social situation. I’d note in the few chapters I read of the above book tonight, Sharansky talks about Stalin’s oppression of the Jews … which followed on the footsteps of his attack on the Christian Church.
JA,
Oh, everyone who is hired is hired at the “micro” economical level. Nobody is personally hired at the macro level and nobody makes a hiring decision at that level.
No problem, Mark.
And I should add, as always I am grateful for the link.
The right, though, is not unsure about the past. Again and again we hear people instinctively label ‘conservatives’ or ‘hardliners’ people taking a bold stance without regard to actual policy.
For example, the conservatives of the USSR opposed the breakdown of Communism, idolized Stalin (grins, mental image, imagine Archie Bunker singing about Hoover “we could sure use a man like that again”……see the cultural echo?) for ‘being tough’ etc. Flip to, say, Saudi Arabia or Iran.
I think there is a deeper ‘conservative mindset’ and ‘liberal mindset’ at play. The way it expresses itself is mostly about doubt IMO. Liberals are more comfortable with doubt, Conservatives with certainity. Since the past is known with certainity this often, but not always, takes the form of the conservative mindset viewing itself as building a bridge to the past while the liberal one bridges to the future. The specifics of this expression, though, arise in the context of culture. Hence you can have a conservative in 1919 asserting the solution is to return the world to the pre-WWI gold standard at pre-WWI prices. You can have a conservative in China attacking a ‘tell all’ book about Mao’s sexual habits on the grounds that it dishonors the nation to tar a figure of such national respect. Or you can have a conservative in 1980′s East Berlin writing a memo to the leadership screaming “have you guys lost your minds, tell the troops to shoot those damm hippies dancing ont he wall!”
Not so you think I’m being partisan by picking hypotheticals where we all know the answers being proposed were wrong. But I think its easier to find such mistakes because certainity leads to definitive stances which can be evaluated in the future as either right or wrong. Carter and Reagan were right to support a tight monetary policy to ‘squeeze’ inflation out of the economy at the cost of a massive recession. But the uncertainty and doubt inherent in the left wing mindset (not policies mind you, my schema makes it possible for a conservative to hawk left wing policies and vice versa) makes spotting glaring errors hard. Examples, I think, would be incrementalism…. The steady buildup in Vietnam, for example, happened not through a bold stance in either direction but a “let’s try one division and see what happens” type of uncertainity.
Evolution and Christianity
This touched a nerve:
I became a regular on Joe Carter’s old EvangelicalOutpost blog because of something stupid I saw him write on evolution. I agrued evolution (and other things there) for years. I ended up learning a lot about science I didn’t know because I needed to be on my toes to argue with those who were taking a stance against evolution.
After a while, though, it became clear to me that while I was learning stuff, many of the people I was arguing with were not. They cared about evolution being wrong so as long as they could keep lots of arguments spinning they were happy because, if nothing else, that provided the ‘reasonable doubt’ regarding evolution they felt they needed. It becomes tiring to hear the same arguments that you refuted in painful detail months ago simply trotted out again as if they were new off the assembly line. Even more frustrating is that the same people who you argued into a corner so long ago will trot those agruments out again without even acknowledging all the holes and gaps in them that I (and others) spent so much time articulating.
It was good practice constantly trying to take a complicated idea and present it in a way that was more clear, more compact and ensuring it was stronger and less vulnerable to attack than before. But one can only argue with someone who is arguing ‘in bad faith’ so long. I understand fully why many who support evolution have decided to simply shut out the critics as not being worthy of acknowledgement. I still will tweak the creationist nut here and there but I think I’ve reached a point of realization. Some people are going to be hopelessly irrational about some subjects and no amount of rational discourse will change their minds. Joe, who is a pretty smart guy, is one of them.
Sorry, I haven’t read Sharansky’s book. However, I would (and do) distinguish between tribalism for minority “tribes” and tribalism for the majority in the most powerful nation on Earth. Black pride, Jewish pride, Mormon pride, Catholic pride — these, while (and this is where I probably disagree with Sharansky) still falling short of the ideal of universalism, can be useful for societies which contain them. It’s when the primary group of a powerful society shows too much tribalism that it becomes dangerous. But, again, I think universalism is ultimately best.
JA,
Do you know anything of Natan Sharansky outside of his book(s)? That is to say, being in the Jewish community do you have anything to add to expand on the Wiki page?
Boonton,
Yet it was the liberals of the old USSR that started Communism in the first place.
As for doubt, I guess you’d expect me to be a die hard liberal then. I’m perfectly at peace with doubt. For example, in the decades since my fall away from Christianity in college I had no intimations of what my fate after death, I was perfectly at peace with 100% doubt and lack of knowledge of my fate. As a Christian now it is still one of the things I struggle with … the song goes:
is I believe true … but I don’t feel it in my bones. I could go on. This is just one example. Climate is another. I’ve said this time and time again (and I think JA doesn’t believe my protestation) but my preferred way of putting my stance on climate is that I doubt. I doubt that there is anthropogenic sources of global warming. I also doubt that there are not. I think it is undecided … and I’m not troubled by that.
The book I was reading last night, Beneton, traces progressive/liberalism not from a standpoint of doubt but tracing a logical system from the French revolution through to today. A logical progression of belief. I have made a emphatic rational choice to reject that … and today that labels me a conservative … but as you’ve likely noticed my political ideas are far from mainstream. So what am I? Fish or fowl?
Yet it was the liberals of the old USSR that started Communism in the first place.
Yes ironic but where did the past come from? Someone’s past was somebody else’s future. You mentioned the French Revolution. You do realize the Founders, the Revolutionaries were the radical leftists of their day. Conservatives defended Royality and priviledge from the new ideas of people like Adam Smith which favored a meritocracy. Go try to find monarchists among conservative thinkers today. Where did they go?
As for doubt, I guess you’d expect me to be a die hard liberal then. I’m perfectly at peace with doubt. For example, in the decades since my fall away from Christianity in college I had no intimations of what my fate after death, I was perfectly at peace with 100% doubt and lack of knowledge of my fate. As a Christian now it is still one of the things I struggle with … the song goes:
You have a liberal mindset, or at least part of your mindset is liberal. As I pointed out I’m trying to pick at something that transcends our present day culture. That means ignoring the present day policy disputes that take up so much bluster. 30 years from now don’t be surprised if they seem quaint and trivial. Like I said, I think this is a yin and yang type of divide which would predate even the French Revolution.
but as you’ve likely noticed my political ideas are far from mainstream. So what am I? Fish or fowl?
Don’t fancy yourself as too unique and special. Your political ideas are well within the mainstream my friend.
Boonton,
Or your defining characteristic of living with doubt as a liberal tag is wrong.
Hmm, so you’ve read a lot of people on the right touting localization of political power. JA always objects to it because he thinks abortion and SSM will be illegal everywhere, not
realizing, err, seeming to notice that what it really means that it will be legal and illegal in various places.You do realize that for every one the progressives get right, there are five that are blocked and a few that turn out disastrously (although not many are as bad as that Lenin thing).
JA always objects to it because he thinks abortion and SSM will be illegal everywhere,
PLEASE stop putting words in my mouth. I object to it because I think localities will violate people’s rights if given the opportunity, and I don’t think that being able to move somewhere else — perhaps somewhere far away from the only home you’ve ever known, the only friends and family you’ve ever had, and the source of your income — makes that okay.
JA,
Sorry, I think that JA objects to …
“Far away?” More likely a few blocks or miles at most (there’s this thing we’ve invented … called a “car”). I think that people are more conscious of others rights than you do, that even if your town or precinct passes a law that you can’t live with and you have no interest in fighting to change it that it is very likely that the same laws are not passed in a nearby village or precinct.
And yes, I agree it’s a pain in the but for everyone to start having to deal with democratic issues … but since I think the alternative is that you’ll have to move a lot further to escape tyranny, i.e., out of the country, I think the price is worth it.
Hmm, so you’ve read a lot of people on the right touting localization of political power. JA always objects to it because he thinks abortion and SSM will be illegal everywhere, not realizing, err, seeming to notice that what it really means that it will be legal and illegal in various places.
No but I don’t think you’ve really thought that idea out very well. Anyway it’s quite common for the ‘common man’ to have wacky ideas. My father-in-law thinks there’s a good case alien UFO’s are featured in the Bible and had a hand in building ancient monuments. I have an aunt-in-law whose convinced she has been reincarnated multiple times, might have had an affair with Jesus, and is awaiting a magical man to ‘step forward’…at which time she will be able to leave her apartment for trips that are not of trivial lengths. Likewise a not trivial portion of the population is willing to consider ideas like the cure for cancer is being kept secret because big corporations make so much money on cancer, HIV was a gov’t experiment gone wrong, 9/11 was partially or wholly staged, and if you think that’s consigned only to the left there’s the older varient of FDR supposedly knew about Pearl Harbor.
Like Klinger on MASH, you’re going to have to do something better to convince us your crazy than just wearing a dress.
You do realize that for every one the progressives get right, there are five that are blocked and a few that turn out disastrously (although not many are as bad as that Lenin thing).
One what? This is a mindset here not an ideology or set of policies.
Boonton,
One change or policy shift.
Boonton,
Villages and precincts do actually have some power and control. Do you find them particularly wacko, in a way that is dangerous to your liberty?
they have some, that much is not wacko IMO
BTW, I sent you an email regarding your previous post on doubts…I used the stonescryout address ’cause that’s the only address Google had. If you didn’t get it let me know and I’ll send it to an alternative one…
Boonton,
That address works. polymath at the pseudopolymath.com also works.