I think the hardest thing, for me anyway, is really standing up to these people who are bullying us into silence.

I like the point about not letting anything slide. Like talking to someone with Borderline Personality Disorder, the key is to stick to the facts which can be a challenge because I think one problem is thinking these conservative are "rational" and "like us"-- they aren't!

Thanks,
I'll keep reading.

Quick questions...  Why he gotta player hate on Snoop?  What did Snoop ever do to him?

--sam

... and I liked what it had to say; it helped me to anchor my understanding of "conservatism" in the broadest sense. This is great because with this kind of powerful foundational frame from which to work - conservatism as a means of propogating an aristocracy at enormous cost to the rest of the population - progressives are provided a great method with which we can subvert the rhetorical arguments posed by conservatives. This allows us not only to undercut their initial argument, but at the same time poses a counterargument akin to "you're not fooling me, the emperor has no clothes and you have nothing left in your arsenal that's going to work." ... If that makes sense to anyone else but me.

And lesnussman, I hear where you're coming from, but I have to tell you that I did stand up to one of "those people" outside a convenience store here in Lansing Michigan two nights ago and almost got into a physical altercation, but it felt damn good. When I was leaving the store with a 12 pack, this guy was ranting at a cashier about how horrible the damn liberals are. On my way out I told him that I overheard his conversation and just wanted to tell him that I am a proud liberal. He shot back with more perjorative talk and I just simply called him a "fucking fascist republican fuck" and got in my car hitting the power locks in time to see him pounding on my passenger door demanding I open the car. I gave him the finger and he stomped on my bumper as I drove away. I know it was a silly stupid thing for me to do, but in the spirit of embracing the divide in this country - which I strongly advocate - it felt good and I have no regrets.

We've discussed this at myDD ad infinitum. I think we are quick to label the current right wing as conservative, and that's just not right. It plays the language to their favor. Conservatism is rooted in pragmatism. This radical experimentism of the current state defies pragmatic proof and basically is leading toward a monolithic fascism. It's okay to use the "f" word. It's not a put down, it's an accurate description. Conservatives would ply cautiously toward a goal. Pragmatists would also stress the means over the ends, and today's American fascists stress the ends over the means, not acknowledging that their choice of means defeats their intentions.

I would call Jon Anderson a conservative. Nixon, a domestic one. Eisenhower, etc. Not these guys. This is a fascist takeover going on.

Okay, all that being said, I could end up with egg on my face. Did Agre cover this topic? I've read only Chris' summary above, and not the original! Okay, jeez, I'm going to go read the whole essay now! Thanks all.  

   His approach to the topic was pretty thorough. The description of Republican word association games was the most insightful psrt in my opinion. The domination of the PR battle by republicans has hammered away at our majority. He does make many sweeping generalizations to marginalize the philosophies he doesn't like. Marx, economists, rap, and even Nash equilibrium driven game theory are summarily dismissed.

However, I generally thought this piece greatly clarified what i had been trying to put into a cohesive perspective for a long time now. I would like to offer an addendum about the effectiveness of the word games, couched in political science hypotheses about the realities of democracy:

    The public is generally uninformed. They follow politics with less zeal than the box scores in the morning paper. They hold incorrect ideas about most of the factual information that influences policy-making. Americans consistently fail to know who their Congressional representatives are, the basic seperation of powers in the constitution, and basic knowledge about foreign affairs. Thus, democracy ought to make consistently bad choices, but in reality they don't. People's mistakes are random, and thus the uniformed voters randomly pick candidates for a wide range of different reasons. Through this mess of randomness, a common wisdom emerges as everyone's small piece of knowledge is added to the whole to create an aggregate opinion. This is where the Republican word association game changes things. People who were previously picking donkeys and elephants for a host of silly reasons, are now picking elephants. They are picking elephants, not on the basis of there policies, but because they feel safe with the elephants. They believe the elephants are trustworthy and the donkeys are not. They haven't interacted with any of the politicians and have no basis for the opinion except for the politicians public statements. The Republican are outdoing us publicly, and they are winning the know-nothing vote. Having a sitting president will make it almost impossible to beat them, but we have to start somewhere. Reclaiming our stolen words is an important first step.  

Well, since that seems to have gone out the window, maybe I can post my discussion point at top-level in the thread.

One fault line on the Left is the intellectual disucussion: Should we move to the center or to the left?  Ignoring issues of the inadequacy of this one-dimensional projection of politics for the moment, Agre has this to say: we need our own Pat Robertson.

I think the "move center" versus "move left" argument, until resolved, is an issue that weakens and divides us.  We have to put this one to bed.  Any thoughts?

Maybe we should attack the one-dimensional frame itself, and replace it with a new one (and I don't mean a two- or three-dimensional one --- that doesn't resolve the issue).

My question is how did a prosperous and stable democratic society be lulled into buying this conservative message. We know  who was selling, but why did anyone buy? Was it just repetition?  And is that our strategy to win it back for liberalism? Just keep repeating the mantra for 20-30 years.

There must be an underlying dynamic. What is that? Could it be that by nature of the reasonable, rational beast that is liberalism we would become amoral? Does the exercise   of science and reason lead to some very non-godlike explanations for the things we say and do? That would be very threatening for people of faith. And I believe people of faith have been assailed from all sides, but  primarily from liberal/ libertarian ethos and heavy commercial exploitation of this self centered life as well as a dramatic increase of  vulgarity in the public sphere.

We know what the elite's motives are. They are self serving self aggrandizers and are extremely unaltruistic. Conservative elites express this in materialism; liberal elites expressed this in hierarchical socialism, (that is someone has to be in charge). Perhaps the liberal elite were a little more inclined to human welfare. But not by much.

I think we have to find new descriptions of what we are and wish our society to be.
We need to create a narrative of what our nation shall be and unshackle our selves from the narrativee of what we were.

What Is Conservatism and What Is Wrong with It?

Philip Agre's essay  "What Is Conservatism and What Is Wrong with It?" has simple answers to the title's two questions, which in turn lead into a well-structured discussion of why these simple answers are so little recognized or known.  Yet, despite the tight structure there is so much raw insight that it is frankly impossible to fully digest. Indeed, in my view it is not intended for digestion. It is intended for prolonged chewing on, in tandem with more focused and productive activism, which it seeks to motivate, inspire and partially direct.  In that spirit, this review will touch on some key points, and will then focus on a single example, which I feel exemplifies the value of Agre's insight for enriching our capacity to do engage in meaning and effective activism.

The first question and answer can be gotten from any of the classic conservative texts or writers--the modern prototypes being Edmund Burke in the Anglo-American world and Joseph de Maistre in Continental Europe. Agre summarizes thus:

There is nothing controversial in this purely descriptive answer, except for those bamboozled by the past 30+ years of anti-liberal propaganda, that much of the rest of the essay deals with.  This simple fact highlights one of Agre's underlying points--to combat conservatism, we must understand it much better than we already do.  We must know its history--ancient, modern and contemporary--and we must know its latest tricks and inner logic.

The second question and answer is more controversial, simply because it is analytical, rather than purely descriptive. However, the analysis in the answer is then fully supported in the essay that follows.  

Agre writes:

Numerous aspects of Agre's essay support this claim, but it is most directly buttressed in section 2, "How Conservatism Works," which he breaks down into subsections, "The Destruction of Conscience," "The Destruction of Reason," "The Destruction of Language."  

Agre's focus on the destructiveness of conservatism strikes me as one of the most fruitful contributions, one which liberals can and should study in detail  and fully internalize, so that they can talk about it easily, naturally and knowledgeably. This focus is matched/countered by Agre's focus on entreprenurialism as the opposite characteristic that liberalism embodies, but does not always recognize as such.

(Agre fleshes out his notion of issue entreprenurialism in another essay written earlier this year, The Practical Republic: Social Skills and the Progress of Citizenship, which is, in a sense, a sibling essay--each makes even more sense when read in the light of the other.  A key passage from that essay:

)  

There is much talk--and even some fledgling effort in the Dkosopedia--about the tracking and countering rightwing memes.  Agre's observations should serve to focus attention on the need to think this project through in a far more thorough way before proceeding with it.  While the general notion of memes is that they are natural mental phenomena, Agre highlights the fact that rightwing memes are actually carefully crafted, and cannot be understood apart from the larger historical project which give life to them.

Consider, for example, this paragraph:

Clearly, "liberals hate X" is a generic meme, which in turn spins off any number of specific variants. Cataloging memes into families is certainly a useful approach, but Agre reminds us of something more--that it's important to identify where these memes originated, and what they were designed to do.  His discussion of the message "Gore's lies" is also relevant here. As he indicates, a major meme is supported by an entire entourage of subsidiary memes which are part of a coherent system, which must be understood as such:

We cannot really do a good job of analyzing and countering rightwing memes if we do not first explore the larger context in which they are created.  The aformentioned model of "issue entreprenurialism" requires a degree of focus and integration of related material that will be richly rewarded the more we put it into practice. A study of memes in the manner suggested above is just one of the many directions that would-be issue entreprenuers can take from this articulate and richly suggestive essay.

p.s. I've corresponded irregularly with Agre over the past few years. When I wrote to him about this discussion, he replied, in part:

Agre not only gives us an historical look at conservatism and its objectives, but also why liberalism has a hard time fighting such an ancient system. Agre is also good at giving us ideas on how to fight conservatism. Unfortunately, it's not an easy task.

I like learning about the tactics liberals can use and what conservatives are using. It helps me be a more informed citizen, which is something the conservatives don't want too much of in our country - informed citizens.

Seeing conservatism as a continuing force in all societies makes it seem less threatening, but more difficult to fight. We're just fighting an age-old tug-of-war between power and the people. Oh my. "Power to the People!" is such a cliched hippy slogan, but isn't that what democracy is all about? Though if conservatives have their way, that slogan would refer to those people who only agree with them.

I very much liked Agre's description of conservatism as the preservation of an hierarchical elite.  This is a real frame that we have to use. Conservatives like to convince people that they are fighting for a return to the values of small town America.  Rather, they are fighting for a return to the 19th century factory system, with its owners, bosses, foremen and "means of production".

However, Agre misses one of main points about conservatism, that it had an appropriate historical time and place. The hierarchical society was necessary in order to bring civilization out of chaos.  The power of a few was necessary to impose the order necessary to advance us out of the dark ages.  It was also necessary to enable the type of educations - for a few  -- that led to the renaissance.  The trouble is that its time has passed.  

But to miss this historical point is to miss the gut-level appeal that conservatism has to people who feel that our civilization is crashing down around us.  We need to be especially forceful in arguing that 1) at this point in the world's history, reason and progress are the best ways forward, and 2) that our civilization is not really going to hell - lesbianism is not rampant in Oklahoma high schools, Muslims do not all behead people, etc.  

I did not care for his rant  about how those "evil" conservatives have appropriated all of the good words, make their arguments too forcefully , etc.  As if we wouldn't do that if we could!  In fact, for a while we did.  But they are just beating us at the game of rhetoric, and - whether you believe it is fair or not - we had better fight back.  

Finally, I agree 100% that entrepreneurs are a natural constituency of the progressive movement.  They are to economics what activists are to politics.  And conservative policies seek to pull up the ladder behind them, not extend a hand up.  Conservatives often co-opt a successful entrepreneur, who suddenly "remembers" that he did it all himself, with no help from anyone.  We have to continually remind people that governmental institutions enable and encourage entrepreneurship, they do not hinder it. Small business people and entrepreneurs should be our natural constituency, and will be one of the keys to a majority party.

His phrase "mockery of conscience" seemed to me to sum up the last 10 years of politics.

Democracy as a concept has been all but crushed under the weight of republican radicals and what mascarades as the "Christian" movement which is in fact nothing more than a political lobby.  The dishes of fear and prejudice the above entities serve up to the public along with an avalanche of news and data, the factual content of which is highly questionable, forces the public into a refusal to think.  After all, to think may force them to face some things such as global gluttony, out of control materialism, the real death toll in Iraq to name a few and that makes them too uncomfortable.  No, it's much safer to think about abortion and gay marriage since rarely do either of those issues directly impact their lives.

I'm heartened to find that so many are willing to fight for the Democratic party because our reluctance in the past to fight; in fact to choose the lesser evil instead has landed us where we are today.  Agre has laid out some valid strategies for battle.

In his essay, Agre goes over how conservatives have made language their tool and seeks to fire his own salvo by identifying conservatives with "aristocracy" and "destruction" while identifying liberals with "reason" and "democracy."

Agre is correct in identifying an aristocratic bent to conservatism, and his advice to assess the '60s shows an awareness of what modern American conservatives abhor.  (Still, we should not fail to recognize that the '60s included some negative aspects like free love and drug use, just as Agre notes we should acknowledge that there is both good and bad rap.)

But I feel that in a rush to (perhaps rightly) demonize conservatism as anti-reason and anti-democracy, Agre has glossed over the existence of traumatic current events as a trigger for waves of conservatism.  In a desire to paint conservatives as self-interested aristocrats, he fails to show how some conservatives come by their views honestly before going about their business by any means necessary.

The modern conservatism founded by Burke was essential a reaction against the French Revolution and while it is proper to be horrified by some of the excesses of the Revolution that does not mean one should re-establish the old monarchy.

Modern American conservatism practiced today is fundamentally a reaction against the 1960s and while it is proper to be horrified by some of the exceses of the '60s that does not mean one should re-establish the 1950s.

In general, conservatism is a reaction against the excesses of the masses.  This reaffirms the Hobbesian instinct that the masses cannot and do not deserve to rule.  (For a similar example of this, look at the hand-wringing of some on the left who decry what they see as the stupidity of a nation for re-electing George W. Bush.)  What is missing in Agre's list of solutions is how to grapple with the most recent traumatic event affecting conservatives, September 11.

It is too easy to define "conservatism" negatively by accepting the false premise that  right-wing Republicans are "conservatives". But they are not. "Conserve" means to preserve. "Conservative" is meaningless in a vacuum, instead gaining meaning with respect to the existing institutions or norms that are the subject of intended preservation.
It would be "conservative" to preserve the values embodied for centuries in our Bill of Rights (for example, free speech, separation of church and state); that is not what Bush and his minions have in mind at all, hence they are not "conservative", but instead are promoting a radical fundamentalist agenda, restricting free speech, extending right-wing media control over the terms of debate and expression, and integrating Christianity as the de facto state-sponsored religion.
Nor is it "conservative", in the economic sense, to deplete surpluses and spend money one does not have.
Nor is it "conservative" to promote dirty air, dirty water, destruction of forests-- "conservation"  and "conservative" are consistent in derivation and meaning, so those who oppose conservation are not conservative.

Lakoff's views on framing of issues are important here, as elsewhere.  As progressives, our goal is to recast the terms of the debate, which includes showing that the professed conservatives are in fact radical fundamentalists whose intolerance is contrary to traditional American values.

Until I read Agre's article Conservatism was just a jumble of disconnected irrational parts. Agre's article also gave me a deeper understanding of Lakoff's framing principles. Because my frame of understanding was antithetical to conservative ideas their "facts" and arguments bounced off my frame and I perceived them as an irrational jumble. I could never understand how anyone could find them persuasive.

The "Bush haters" attack is a perfect example. It seemed so obviously pretentious to attack anyone who disagreed with or criticized Bush as a "hater" that I completely disregarded it as unworthy of response. Then I saw it over and over and over again. I had the same reaction to Rush Limbaugh saying the Democrats hate the military or Dobson saying Leahy was a "hater of God's people". This is clearly a well thought out and developed PR campaign to demonize liberals. Repeated in enough different contexts it will become an established frame in portions of the electorate. Once the "liberal hater" frame is established any rational argument will bounce off.

Likewise Sowell and Will's irrational charge that criticism of the wealthy is simple envy. I don't know how many times I've seen this recycled nonsense. For those who eventually accept this frame the wealthy are above criticism unless you are a billionaire like Warren Buffet or George Soros. Everybody else is just envious, so their opinion doesn't count.

One thing Agre is right about is that we can't continue to let them get away with it. Media Matters has the right idea. We need to counter attack 365/24/7. Every idea that is not aggressively challenged slowly becomes part of the conventional wisdom.

Agre is also right about conservative think tanks. They are grooming and finishing schools for next generation conservative leaders. They also pump out editorials to rural newspapers across the country and talking points to conservative commentors. Conservatives have an extensive network that provides income and employment to conservatives. We have nothing on the left to match.

I think that this has enormous potential to not only bring to light ideas that may not find their way to the mainstream (such as this piece), but to illuminate the myriad of views that we as liberals (or progressives, or populists, or whatever) bring to the table.

On to the subject at hand:

On the whole, I thought Agre did a very good job illuminating some of the problems that we as liberals face when confronted with conservatism (especially the nefarious brand the current administration brings with it). His arguments are clear and concise, if at times a bit stilted, i.e. the jab at Snoop Dog, or oversimplified in the case of Agre's description of conservatism in the 1800's.

Agre devotes the majority of the section on How Conservatism Works to the "Destruction of Language," with the next largest section being the "Destruction of Reason." I think Agre missed a huge opportunity here to address what I feel goes back to the root of the problem, and that is the lack of critical thinking that is rampant in this country. He addresses the problem in his conclusions on How To Defeat Conservatism, "Teach Logic," but his summary is far too brief.

Unless a person can think critically and objectively, any discussion of logic simply goes in one ear and out the other. A person may think that their reactions, responses, or opinions are logical, but without the crucial element of critical thinking, their thinking has no basis in reality. For these people, their knowledge filter has become warped or fogged. A person's knowledge filter works by comparing new images we see in the world with old images in memory. When a person's knowledge filter fails, fantasy and reality merge (think tin-foil hats). But if the knowledge filter engages, and the images seen contradict images in memory, without critcal thinking to "correct the course" so to speak, cognitive dissonance occurs. Cognitive dissonance, along with disingenuousness is, I feel, at the core of almost every person who votes against their own best interests by aligning themselves with Conservatives.

How do we counter this? Straight logic will not work, because cognitive dissonance will kick and effectively shunt any logical arguments away from their mark. We must analyze what is the primary motivation for why these people belive what they do. Is it a moral reason? Is it simplicity? Or is it comforting? In most, it is probably a combination of these, and other reasons. Therefore, to counter and shatter these belief systems, liberals must construct a meaningful and satisfying system of morality and meaning to replace the poisoned rhetoric of the Conservatives. And this is where Agre's point of Building the Democratic Party comes in to play.

I hope that I have not strayed too far off of the mark, or made most of you shake your heads wondering, "Where in the world is he going?" I simply wanted to highlight what I think is the primary problem encountered when confronting conservatives and Conservatism, and that is the lack of critical thinking embodied in the very core of conservatism. Getting a person to think critically, as well as logically, is the key to defeating the pestilence of Conservatism in the US.

Agre continually references this person in his essay, but alas, I have no idea who is he talking about.  Perhaps it is my relatively neophyte status in politics or my tendency to shun conservative literature, nonetheless, I have no idea who Burke is and what he has written.

All in all, I thought the essay was well thought out and thought-provoking though it tended to drag at some points and go on and on in others.  Some of it seemed to rehash topics others have delved into at length (i.e. the trashing of Gore/right wing media ala Alterman and Brock, and the reframing of language ala Lakoff), but it did present a few original ideas that were interesting.  

A few comments on language:  In his section discussing the destruction of language he referenes Al Franken and his unwitting comment supporting the Republican idea of the media elite, it occurred to me that we all do this to a certain extent when referencing abortion stances.  This is obvious and has been discussed before, but the phrase pro-life is their phrase yet we have bought into it.  Every time we use that phrase we are buying into their narrative.  Liberals in general should start using the term anti-choice to describe them.  That is, after all, what they are.  Why give them their pro-life phrase when it sounds so positive and life-affirming.  By calling it anti-choice we are both calling it what it is and framing in a negative way.  Also why not refer to the conservative judges that Bush attempts to appoint as "DESTRUCTIONISTS" instead of the term they like, constructionists.  It is much more descriptive and also negative in connotation.

And as a sidenote, why don't the liberals in Hollywood really help out and fund think tanks?  Someone needs to lobby these guys, particularly strong activists like Tim Robbins, Susan Sarandon, and Sean Penn to funnel money into a liberal infrastructure.  There aren't many Soros and Buffets so we need all the millionaires we can get.

Anyway, all in all a good essay, but I'm looking forward to the books much more.

Agre's heart is in the right (I mean left) place, obviously, but I was disappointed by the paper.
It annoys me to see the argument blunted by such flagrant card-stacking and so many sweeping generalizations disguised as evidence. Like the opening questions, the answers Agre offers are indeed simple, too simple. What has long been recognized as conservatism became an articulated political doctrine in reaction to the French Revolution; what it sought to conserve was a complex web of English customs and institutions, with the governing role of an aristocracy as one part of all that. It does us no good to portray conservatives then or now as fixated only on maintaining an aristocracy by means of linguistic tricks, nor to engage in bickering about what conservatism really means. That would hardly count as seizing the rhetorical initiative. Picture yourself trying to make this work with a hard-bitten red-state evangelical. Or an inner-city single mother. Now picture yourself hearing Lincoln quoted against you: "What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?" (Speech, 27 Feb. 1860). We would do well to consider why Lincoln might have said that.
My strongest objection, though, is against Agre's implicit notion that a language - our language or any other - can be `destroyed' by the kinds of manipulation he describes. I've spent my adult life studying the details of structure and use in several languages. There are patterns, of course. Everywhere in a language, wherever you look. Lots and lots of somewhat similar competing patterns. What we think of as `the language' is a desperate abstraction from these, a pious hope that broader and broader generalizations will bring the complexity under control by distracting us all from the overwhelming mass of details. Then it becomes more convenient to deal with the abstractions, instead of the data. In much the same way, astronomy seems like an orderly affair in which the motions of planets and their moons can be described by neat equations. But the lunar equation, the one that is expected to tell us just what position the moon will be in at a certain moment in the future, goes on for many, many pages, as less and less significant variables are added in order to improve its accuracy: every body in the solar system has a role, no matter how tiny, in moving the moon. But I personally don't seem to be able to affect it, no matter how hard I try. And no matter how hard they try, the Undead can't move English very far, and neither can we.
In the end, I feel, keeping the focus on words and their proper meanings is not going to win any verbal battles for our side: it's a waste of time. One theme we will encounter again and again in these discussions is the comforting but ultimately useless notion that there is a universally correct and true or at least neutral vocabulary for political discourse, and that one side or the other is deviating from it on purpose, for unwholesome reasons: I argue rationally; they play dirty tricks. The facts are much shaggier than that: rhetoric, what Agre's and all the other rhetors use, is nothing less than a body of techniques, codified in various ways since ancient Greece, for using vocabulary and patterns or figures of argument strategically in persuasive discourse. Among the best places to look for some useful tools is in the old literature of propaganda analysis from the late 30s onward (see for instance the material indexed on www.propagandacritic.com). Framing, as a technique and a conscious strategy, is nothing new either. We should accept, I think, that rhetoric is a tool anyone can pick up and use. Rather than try to educate bystanders about evil propaganda techniques, we can simply use the same techniques ourselves. I really don't see any effective alternative. The trick is to do it with more wit and persuasive effect than our enemies. That shouldn't be so hard.

I just checked in at Media Matters and this is one of the stories Brock has posted: linked text

Conservatives have absolutely no shame in how they distort and manipulate emotionally laden phrases. They seem to be on some sort of anti-semitism tirade lately. Here are three more examples of abusing anti-semitism:

The Weekly Standard  linked text

David Brooks in the NY Times  linked text

This last one is a WSJ editorial that I access through a keepmedia subscription. Here's a summary:

This has been referenced by several discussions above. I think this is a distinctly American idiom that can truly find a maximum-size audience. Everyone in America wants to build a better mousetrap!

Years ago, I will now confess, I was an active socialist. However, I failed in persuading any of my colleagues in accepting entrepreneurship as a viable force in fomenting significant social reform. The other socialists all claimed that the desire for the better mousetrap was a degraded form of misanthropic capitalist ethos, sort of a homeless bourgeois sentiment.

Okay, go read the Communist Manifesto if you haven't, because you really should. However, once read, you will find that it is just wrong for our nation.

It is precisely that we want to grow and improve that impells our getting up in the mornings. The monolithic radical right has no affinity for competition. I, however, am an entrepreneur. I believe I can do better than my competition. In fact I was just at a favorite neighborhood bar with my better half, celebrating a minor business victory today. There isn't a better feeling than succeeding on one's own, and knowing the combination of gratification, mixed, in quite generous proportions, with humility; for any success a person has depends on so many efforts and sacrifices from other people. Okay, well, unfortunately, this little victory has once again preventing mois from once again reading the entire Agre essay, which I promise to do now! Thanks for all the excellent insights above. And thanks especially to Chris for the superhuman effort he puts forth every day.

Have the democrats really woken up to this Chris?

One of the radical changes that the British labour party went through after its FOURTH consecutive defeat in 1992 was reformulating its values on this. I was part of that process, and while many on the old left or right simply see New Labour as an opportunistic attempt at 'triangulation', they miss the profound shift in attitudes to the free market. With the fall of the Berlin wall, the rising costs of the welfare and various disastrous attempts at state ownership of industry, we arrived at certain key conclusions.

1. EMPLOYMENT was a much better way of alleviating poverty than handouts and welfare payments.

2. A THRIVING ENTREPRENEURIAL MARKETPLACE was the best way of increasing employment - and most jobs came from small businesses and individual talent - NOT large corporations.

3. Most inequality in the market was caused by BARRIERS TO ENTRY. Lack of accesss education, health, childcare was the main reason people were left behind.

4. Instead of a FREE MARKET, New Labour politicians began to formulate the idea of a FAIR SOCIAL MARKET. The role of the state was to lower the barriers of entry, provide regulation, infrastructure, education and health so that all individuals could have access to the benefits of work.

Since American politics is so different, I'm not sure how this narrative might apply over there. But it seems to me that the Republicans won by creating a coalition between conservatism with classic free market republican values. This is an uneasy alliance, and one of the ways to defeat the Republicans (as it was to defeat the conservatives in 1997) might be to separate the authoritarians from the economic libertarians. You could do this with several wedge issues.

1. HEALTH AND EDUCATION. The classic free market theory of competition requires talent to be able to enter to the market place. But if poor families have little or no access to healthcare or education, how can they compete with the children from privileged backgrounds. 'No Child Left Behind' is a gesture in this direction, but I'm sure every statistic from the last four years, and the next four years ahead, will show a growth in child poverty, a more unequal and class based system developing, in which 'birth right' rather than talent is the key indicator of success.

2. THE ROLE OF CORPORATES. These are often attacked among liberal circles as some kind of Chomskian conspiracy, which seems to ignore the facts that corporations are much more transient and temporary. I forget the precise statistic (I could look it up) but something like half the top 20 corporations didn't exist ten years ago.

Rather than attack corporate excess from a conspiratorial quasi Leninist position, why not point out their role in snuffing out small and medium sized businesses: the way they lobby for government contracts, twist legislation to provide an unfair playing ground. Michael Moore's depiction of the small guy fighting corporate outsourcing and downsizing fails to point out where salvation might lie - it won't be through subsidy or some new deal government created job - it will be through training, innovation, and some smaller more flexible enterprises.

The government doesn't owe them a job - but it has a duty to bust monopolistic trusts, unfair regulation, lack of access to training, childcare and health provision.

3. CLOSED MARKETS versus FAIR AND FREE MARKETS.

Conservatism seems to be a form of aristocracy because it creates a self serving elite, a closed market for its members. It looks for economic and social stability in a class of protected like-minded inward looking groups.

Conservatism serves the interests of only a minority of Americans. So far it has managed to gain majority support by still appealing to older style republicans who believe in the enlightment ideas of secularism and liberty, but still associate the Democrats with big government and state control.

4. ATTACK AND REGROUP

The Republicans currently comprise an uneasy alliance of social authoritarians and economic libertarians. You will never win over the social authoritarians, and everything they believe is contrary to what you value. But the economic libertarians could be persuaded that the market place needs key strategic regulation to make it function properly

But you also have to renew your own base. This means remaining true to your values, but not being wedded to outdated solutions (many of them from the 1930s) to the glaring gaps of social justice.

You have to point out that Democrats believe in social justice and liberty MORE than they believe in big government. You have to show, through a NEW liberalism and that equal rights and equality of opportunity can be pursued through other means as well.

In short, you have to lose the tag of liberal elitism and argue once again that you are the party of the many, and they are the party of the few.

Re: How? Racial & Gender Backlash, That's ( / )

i agree..but not lately....not since the CR movement.
and women rights have been more incremental than revolutionary.

neither of these movements fundametaly challenged conservatism as agre defines it.
in fact these movements simply allowed prospering blacks and women to become conservative.

conservatism as agre defines it a movemnt for the sake of itself.  and we all seem to agree at this site that this purely narcicstic ethos ignores the comnon welfare and as such is immoral and unethical.  

its why in the long run we can't be "republican lite" as is the DLC. that strategy will only   succede in winng the odd election without being able to fuandmentally change the political and economic lanscape, which is seeing an increasing disparity betweeen the haves and have nots.  

remember a few salient facts about us...

clinton gave us NAFTA, a highly conservative treaty enhancing the corporate oligarchs(i.e. handfuls of elites).at least that's how it looks to me.

and the latest crop of dems gave  us iraq. if ever there was a time to differentiate oursleves that was it. but we punted for the sake of votes , for the sake of power , (or fear of losing it), and not over principle.

i even challnge you to show me the last time any dems refered to a "progressive" tax system. that was a value that we held dear.perhaps it made good economic sense too. but first and foremost it was "value" that we held. and it it had great biblical allure. Jesus always valued the poor.

we could have a  fundamental shift in power in 2006 (if iraq plays out as epic tragedy) but what good would it do if we have not defined who we are and what we stand for.

if not slightly repetitive. I think we had already recognized the language twisting from the other side. And we have Bush to thank for that more than anyone....need I say more than "Healthy Forests," "Clear Skies," and "No Child Left Behind."

I had never really thought before about the aristocrital (is that a word) aspects of conservatism before, but it makes sense. What they want to conserve is social order and class systems, not what the average Americans think conservatism means conserving.

I wish he would have provided a few more historical examples, and I'm not so sure we should abandon our passionate friends in Hollywood (or Snoop either).

Also, I could have stood a few more specific examples in the "how to fight them" category rather than just the (very good) three or four broad ideas that he presented.

Overall, it was an enjoyable read. If I may be so bold as to give it a grade, I would say B-, while much better than that in certain areas. I probably actually should have reread before posting this because I'm sure I have left out a lot of stuff I wanted to put in here, and last night my face was buried in the new US News and World Report in the hours after my initial reading.

But this book club was just such a great idea and I really wanted to take part in it. I can't wait for the Kansas book. The library just called a few hours ago to inform me that it's in. Thank god for waiting lists...

This comment is a day late - I wasn't able to read the essay thoroughly until today.  I agree with Mr. Agre's observation of deference to perceived aristocrats.  I am basically a `skills' worker on the lower end of the wage scale at present; however, at the middle of the age-scale.  I have a liberal arts degree - I remember my professors emphasizing over and over the importance of liberal arts degrees and how they were teaching critical thinking.  I maintain I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer - even though I've done some graduate work, I wouldn't consider myself an academic.  To this day I am grateful for my liberal arts degree, and my college's requirements for the subjects of LOGIC and ARGUMENTATION.  Honestly, it would be a stretch for me to put together something as comprehensive as Mr. Agre wrote this past August; however, for someone at my level - it is important that I recognize and understand what is being communicated.  

There were a few things that resonated with me.  I don't have the mental fortitude as many at myDD.com do in analysis and expression of this entire piece; however I am pretty much just going to talk about what resonated with me - so I ask your indulgence.

In the 1900 section..

"The goal of conservatism throughout history has been primarily been to suppress the mob of common people........".  This resonated with me for a particular reason.  It is my own observation that too many Americans spend too much time and energy fooling themselves into thinking they're rich.  I was in a mall along Michigan Avenue in Chicago this week as I often am with my work.  A mall filled with high-end retail stores.  It made me sad to see low-wage earners selling overpriced branded things to people who think they're rich.  The only people winning in this scenario weren't even at the mall - they are the owners and stockholders of the brand-name companies.  They bank on the fact that people will pay four dollars for a paper cup full of coffee.  They bank on the fact American names and American labels of clothing assembled in Sri Lanka mean they will pay more.  These transactions beg a need to have a `context' in order to show off these commodities.  People wear their expensive clothing to the mall to show off.  The point I'm trying to make here is the conservatives don't want people to know they are oppressed by this social context.  People don't want to admit they earn less.  People don't want to admit they are economically poor.  One thing we can do for democracy is to firstly educate people to the fact that they are oppressed and secondly bring-together the integrity and voice of the common people.  How?  I don't know, but it's a thought.

In the 1990's section

"....a new generation of highly trained conservative strategists evolved, on the foundation of classical public relations methods, a sophisticated practice of real-time politics that integrated ideology and tactics on a year-to-year, news-cycle-to-news-cycle, and often hour-to-hour basis...."  This resonated with me in that the older I get the less relevant the broadcast news seems.  So much of what is presented as news is not news.  To me, it's all related to the previous idea - "The goal of conservatism throughout history has been primarily been to suppress the mob of common people........".  Real news shows would educated people on taxes and economics.  The reality is that we get entertainment news over and over.  I'm not anti-organized-sports - but sports coverage passes as news.  Sports coverage is not news.  People like sports for the same reason people like weather - they want to know the `outcome' they didn't know the day before.  We want to know the same thing with news, but we substitute that desire with watching Sports and Weather.   News shows today are all public relations spin - to get people to feel good about how rich and fortunate they are and to accept their lot in life - in other words to suppress the mob of common people.  I have a fantasy of having a news analysis show called "NEWS - NOT-NEWS" where panelists call out news shows and punditry showing people how it is not news.  Case-in-point.  Scott Peterson Trial:  NOT NEWS.  Moreover, Americans are isolated by their media - we are fed the Peterson Trial as news, when there is a lot of world news that we are ignorant about.  Additionally, as I learned in college many moons ago - the way news is presented is not to tell you the news.  The way news is presented is so you watch the commercials between the (pretend) news segments.  Remember, this is (more often than not) about advertising dollars.  The behavior of the right-wing bombasts gets people watching.  It is my humble opinion that all this activity and hoopla erodes democracy.  How do we educate on this?

In the "Teach Logic" section

"Many on the left unfortunately abandon reason because the believe that the actual basis of politics is something called "power".  People like this have no notion of what power is..... " This resonated with me and I couldn't agree more.  How often are we - even though we believe we are taking up the mantle of democracy - how often are we guilty of deference to the aristocracy?  I admit I am guilty ; however, I try to stay informed.  It makes me sad that people think the only jurisdiction they live in is The United States.  Just because the nearly 300 million people in the U.S. have the President of the United States in Common, doesn't make that position a position of some sort of penultimate power.  It only makes it the most common.  Conservatives bank on this ignorance.  Senators, Representatives, Governors, Mayors, City Councilmen do things that affect people's lives.  But, everyone's eyes are on the president.  Again keeping everyone's eyes on the President is a way "to suppress the mob of common people".  One thing we can do for democracy is educate people about all the other jurisdictions that affect them, learn about local government systems.  American news agencies are abettors and coconspirators with conservatives in keeping our eyes on The President and away from the economic and institutional systems that oppress us.  

I'm not at all certain that Agre's claims about aristocracy are really defensible:

The defenders of aristocracy represent aristocracy as a natural phenomenon, but in reality it is the most artificial thing on earth.

It's difficult to think of any culture or society, contemporary or historical, that doesn't have some version of an aristocracy, or, indeed, a hierarchy of peoples (or class system) of some kind or another, and something which comes about again and again in widely disconnected cultures has got to be considerd as possibly being a natural outcome of human nature.

Where Agre goes wrong is to fall into the naturalistic fallacy, which is to assume that anything which is "natural" is perforce "good".  The fact that a class system, with an aristocracy at the top, is perhaps a natural outcome of human social psychology does not necessarily mean that it is a good thing, any more than the natural human inclination to covet sweets and fatty foods (a sensible adaptation in circumstances where they are not plentiful, and most be consumed whenever they're found) is useful in our modern situation where these foods are easily available, and overcomsumption leads to widespread obesity, heart disease and other maladies.

In fact, a strong argument can be mounted that the ideas of democracy and political equality are important ones, vital to our continuing success as a species, specfically because they serve to keep in check our tendency towards classes and aristocracy, and provide us with governing mechanisms more able to deal with the complexities of the modern world and to provide the needs of the people.

Now, Agre's argument about conservatism is not necessarily undercut if we break the linkage he suggests to aristocracy as an "unnatural" thing -- in his very next sentence after the one above, he writes:

Although one of the goals of every aristocracy is to make its preferred social order seem permanent and timeless, in reality conservatism must be reinvented in every generation.

-- and this can be a true argument even if the first proposition (the "unnaturalness" of aristocracy, is, as I think it is, untrue).  Still, it does make me wonder what other inappropriate unexpressed preconceptions lurk behind Agre's thinking.