Below are some excerpts taken from an essay entitled, 'Postmodernist History' by the eminent historian of the Victorian era, and neoconservative intellectual Gertrude Himmelfarb. When reading the excerpts it is meaningful to distinguish the congruity between postmodernism and nihilism. Both conceptions are antagonistic to the mechanisms that maintain Western modernity, and function as an antithetical model directed towards the disintegration of such modernity. The dissolution is brought about by the introduction of relativism, which sequentially begets nihilism through the breaking down of all cultural and intellectual standards in modernity until there are no such standards left in existence. In her essay Himmelfarb lambastes the intellectual vacuity of postmodernism, and elucidates the perils it introduces to Western civilization.  

Footnotes excluded (footnotes signified by '*').

(From: On Looking Into the Abyss: Untimely Thoughts on Culture and Society)

- For the historian, as for the philosopher, the quarrel between the Ancients and the Moderns is being superseded by a quarrel between the Moderns and the Postmoderns. If the great subversive principle of modernity is historicism--a form of relativism that locates the meaning of ideas and events so firmly in their historical context that history, rather than philosophy and nature, becomes the arbiter of truth--postmodernism is now confronting us with a far more subversive form of relativism, a relativism so radical, so absolute, as to be antithetical to both history and truth.* For postmodernism denies not only suprahistorical truths but historical truths, truths relative to particular times and places. And that denial involves a repudiation of the historical enterprise as it has been understood and practiced until very recently. - (Page 131-132)

- From Jacques Derrida postmodernism has borrowed the vocabulary and basic concepts of "deconstruction": the "aporia" of discourse, the indeterminacy and contrariness of language, the "fictive" and "duplicitous" nature of signs and symbols, the dissociation of words from any presumed reality. From Michel Foucault it has adopted the idea of power: the "power structure" immanent not only in language--the words and ideas that "privilege" the "hegemonic" groups in society--but in the very nature of knowledge, which is itself an instrument and product of power. The combined effect of these doctrines is to impugn traditional rational discourse as "logocentric," "phallocentric," "totalizing," "authoritarian."* In literature, postmodernism amounts to a denial of the fixity of any "text," of the authority of the author over the interpreter, of any "canon" that privileges great books over lesser ones. In philosophy, it is a denial of the fixity of language, of any correspondence between language and reality--indeed, of any "essential" reality and thus of any proximate truth about reality. In law (in America, at any rate), it is a denial of the fixity of the Constitution, and of the legitimacy of law itself, which is regarded as nothing more than an instrument of power. In history, it is a denial of the fixity of the past, of the reality of the past apart from what the historian chooses to make of it, and thus of any objective truth about the past. - (Page 132-133)

- Here lies the crucial distinction between modernism and postmodernism, between the old relativistic relativism, one might say, and the new absolutistic version. Where modernism, aware of the obstacles in the way of objectivity, regards this as a challenge and makes a strenuous effort to attain as much objectivity and unbiased truth as possible, postmodernism takes the rejection of absolute truth as a deliverance from all truth and from the obligation to maintain any degree of objectivity. - (Page 137)

- This is the twofold agenda of postmodernism: to free history from the shackles of an authoritarian ideology, and to release it from the constraints of a delusive methodology. The ultimate aim is even more ambitious: to liberate us all from the coercive ideas of truth and reality. - (Page 137)

- For all historians, traditional and "new" alike, the hardest case in modern history is surely the Holocaust. It is especially hard for postmodernists, who face the prospect of doing to the Holocaust what they do to all of history--relativizing, problematizing, ultimately aestheticizing or fictionalizing it. - (Page 143)

- The difficulty is compounded by the existence of a school of thought [postmodernism] that relativizes, "deprivileges," "decenters," indeed, deconstructs the Holocaust so thoroughly as to deny its reality. - (Page 144)

- The comic-ironic mode is congenial to the postmodernist because it has the double effect of converting history into metahistory, thus distancing the historian from anything that might resemble truth or reality, and of dehumanizing the subjects of history, thus transforming history from a humanistic discipline into a critique of humanism. - (Page 144-145)

- If in the hard case of the Holocaust postmodernism finds it difficult to sustain the "difference between fiction and history," it has less reason to try to do so in the case of less sensitive subjects. Committed to the "fictive" nature of history, liberated from "fact fetishism," uninhibited and unapologetic in the exercise of the "imaginative creation" that is presumed to be of the essence of the "historical imagination," postmodernist history may well take the form of fictional history. - (Page 146)

- Formerly, when historians invoked the idea of imagination, they meant the exercise of imagination required to transcend the present and immerse oneself in the past. This is the genius attributed to the great nineteenth-century historians: "empathy, imagination, the attempt to place oneself in an historic situation and into an historic character without prejudgment." For the postmodernist it means exactly the opposite: the imagination to create a past in the image of the present and in accord with the prejudgment of the present-minded historian. - (Page 147)

- Postmodernism, even more overtly than Marxism, makes of history--the writing of history as much as the "praxis" of history--an instrument in the struggle for power. - (Page 153)

- Multiculturalism has the obvious effect of politicizing history. But its more pernicious effect is to demean and dehumanize the people who are the subjects of history. To pluralize and particularize history to the point where people have no history in common is to deny the common humanity of all people, whatever their sex, race, class, religion. It is also to trivialize history by so fragmenting it that it lacks all coherence and focus, all sense of continuity--indeed, all meaning. From a postmodernist perspective, this is all to the good, for it destroys the "totalizing," "universalizing," "logocentric," "phallocentric" history that is said to be the great evil of modernity. Postmodernist history, like postmodernist literary theory, celebrates "aporia"--difference, discontinuity, disparity, contradiction, discord, ambiguity, irony, paradox, perversity, opacity, obscurity, anarchy, chaos. - (Page 154-155)

- The modernist accuses the postmodernist of bringing mankind to the abyss of nihilism. The postmodernist proudly, happily accepts that charge. - (Page 155)

- Postmodernism entices us with the sire call of liberation and creativity, but it may be an invitation to intellectual and moral suicide. - (Page 160)


Other key books by Gertrude Himmelfarb -

Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution


On Liberty and Liberalism: The Case of John Stuart Mill


The Moral Imagination: From Edmund Burke to Lionel Trilling


Poverty and Compassion: The Moral Imagination of the Late Victorians


The De-moralization Of Society: From Victorian Virtues to Modern Values


The Roads to Modernity: The British, French, and American Enlightenments

  
Victorian Minds: A Study of Intellectuals in Crisis and Ideologies in Transition


One Nation, Two Cultures: A Searching Examination of American Society in the Aftermath of Our Cultural Revolution

- Written Commentary By Adam W. Rounds

In the video below Peter Robinson of the Hoover Institution (Stanford University) interviews conservative commentator Andrew Breitbart on the ideological metamorphosis of Hollywood from a predominant Edmund Burke style schema of conservatism into the present-era foremost disposition consisting of an ideological amalgam of social paternalism and moral individualism (or collectivist liberalism). This collectivist liberal ideological fusion is intrinsically derived out of the American counter-culture movement of the late 1960's, and the constitutive ingredients of this breed of ideological dogma are pervasively affirmed out of a construct of whimsical neoclassical directional nihilism.   



The short video below (a Hollywood production from the 1950's) makes more vivid the monolithic political cultural disjunction between early Hollywood and that of present-era Hollywood (as delineated by Breitbart in the interview above).
 



Andrew Breitbart websites -

Big Hollywood

Breitbart.com

BigGovernment.com

Hoover Institution official site, and YouTube channel -

Hoover.org

Hoover Institution on YouTube

- Written Commentary By Adam W. Rounds

Once described by a critic as 'humanitarianism by force' neoconservatism is perhaps the most misunderstood ideology in American political-cultural history. Conservative intellectual David Brooks in the past has noted, "If you ever read a sentence that starts with 'Neocons believe,' there is a 99.44 percent chance everything else in that sentence will be untrue." The intrinsic nature of neoconservatism is foundationally straightforward, but the known distinctions in the ideology are far more esoteric especially in regard to the mainstream media.

Idealism, and realism nourished with an essential belief in the same natural rights that were so profoundly self-evident to the Founding Fathers of America, neoconservatism elucidated by this reasoning is an unambiguous moral obligation to humanity. It refuses the chains of servitude that so often shadow that which is intellectually fashionable by cultivating a clear acknowledgment of what is right. In philosophical contrast with traditional conservatism, neoconservatism is not consumed with the nostalgia of the past but rather presents a compelling vision for the future. A vision absorbed in moral clarity that demonstrates the apex of all humanistic ideals (natural right), coupled with geo-political realism, as well as an unflinching antagonism toward despotic tyrannies wherever they may exist, neoconservatism is without anguish in its unconditional aspiration concerning the eradication of such tyrannies, and the expansion of human liberty. 

In the commentary below acclaimed historian of Lord Alfred Douglas, as well as a neoconservative intellectual and author Douglas Murray discusses the commonly distorted ideology.







Douglas Murray is the author of -

Neoconservatism: Why We Need It


Key books dealing with neoconservative ideas -

The Crisis in Economic Theory -

By Irving Kristol and Daniel Bell (Editors)

On Looking Into the Abyss: Untimely Thoughts on Culture and Society -
 
By Gertrude Himmelfarb

The Norman Podhoretz Reader: A Selection of His Writings from the 1950s through the 1990s -

By Norman Podhoretz (Author), Thomas L. Jeffers (Editor), and Paul Johnson (Author of Introduction)

The Neocon Reader -

By Irwin Stelzer (Editor, and Author of Introduction)

Natural Right and History -

By Leo Strauss

Documentary featuring Irving Kristol and Daniel Bell -

Arguing the World -

Directed by Joseph Dorman 

"To pluralize and particularize history to the point where people have no history in common is to deny the common humanity of all people, whatever their sex, race, class, religion. It is also to trivialize history by so fragmenting it that it lacks all coherence and focus, all sense of continuity--indeed, all meaning."

- Gertrude Himmelfarb

In the commentary below by neoconservative intellectual Douglas Murray the cultural inefficiencies of the multicultural social model are discussed and then contrasted with a pluralist alternative cultural model as elucidated by Murray. Under the pluralistic model that Murray briefly mentions the implications would be that radical cultural factionalization as well as increased aversion from cultural concurrence would be greatly diminished, conversely, distinct cultural heritage would also have the opportunity to flourish.







Douglas Murray is the author of -

Neoconservatism: Why We Need It

The commentary below is an address by President Vaclav Klaus of the Czech Republic expounding on the problematic dilemma of the growing predominant political and economic predilection of Western Europe in relation to collectivist ideology. He also explains the inherent antithetical premises of collectivism in respect to economic freedom, individual liberty, and the foundational conceptualizations of classical liberal thought.

The address took place in Aix-en Provence (France).

(From: BrusselsJournal.com)

Thank you for the invitation to come to Aix, for giving me a chance to address this reputable audience where I see many friends and, above all, thank you for continuing to organize the Summer University. I only don't understand why you call it Summer University of the New Economics. Which one is the old one? We have only one, good, old economic theory and it is our adversaries who use the term "new economics" as an attack on our views.

This year's main topic of your gathering is "Markets and Morality." I only hope that by choosing this title you wanted to say that there is no morality, at least in the public arena, without markets. It is an important and, again, a very old message. In our early post-communist years, I was being often patronized that what we needed then was morality, whereas I stubbornly repeated that what we needed were markets. My critics argued that a strong, ex-ante infusion of morality is necessary with the implicit expectation that it would be them, who'd be supplying it. It was the substance of my disputes with my predecessor in office, President Vaclav Havel. I hope the speakers at the Summer University will be on my side.

I am here already for the third time in this decade. It demonstrates at least I wish it does my respect for what you're doing. I was here in August 2002 when we, at the beginning of the second post-communist decade, started to reassess our journey from communism to a free society. The title of my speech then was "Post-Communist Era: Atmosphere of Victory or of Lost Illusions?" We had a mixed feeling at the time. We had quite rapidly liquidated the formal structures and mechanisms of the communist society and successfully established parliamentary democracy and market economy. The question was whether we were building free society based on classical liberal principles or whether we instead had fallen into another blind alley of regulated society, of unproductive welfare state, of brave new world of European socialdemocratism and of empty and artificial Europeanism. My answer to that question was that the winner of the transition decade was democracy, not freedom or classical liberalism. Our original slogan: "deregulate, liberalize, privatize" was gradually transformed into a different one: "regulate, adjust to all kinds of standards of the most developed and richest countries, listen to the partial interests of the NGOs and follow them, get rid of your sovereignty and put it into the hands of international institutions and organizations."

This year we celebrate already the 20th anniversary of the fall of communism and we are again in a reassessment mood. The situation has not changed for the better.

My second visit here was in August 2006. The title of my presentation was...

- To continue reading click here 

In the video below President Vaclav Klaus discusses global climate change before the United Nations.

It should be noted that when Stiglitz uses a phrase like 'societal well-being' as an economic indicator he is premising an imposition of his own subjective perceptions of social justice upon the society as a whole, and is in no way discussing objective economic efficiency (sound economic theory is based upon objective not subjective economic efficiency). Additionally, it should be noted that although Joseph Stiglitz is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences that distinct award is in no way associated with the Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel, and is awarded based on no objective criteria as well as may be awarded to individuals with no expertise or background in economics.

The problematic premises in this economic policy commentary by Joseph Stiglitz:

Premise One - Increasing GDP does not increase overall prosperity therefore economic growth in regard to GDP should not be a primary concern in respect to economic policy.

The Inefficiency of Premise One - The fundamental difficulty in this particular analysis is that in most cases economic growth does increase prosperity (even for the poor), and because GDP measures the size of the economy and its output economic growth measured against GDP provides the most efficient model to measure increases in overall prosperity.

In Real World Terms - Stiglitz is actually premising that for example a nation like China has in fact not increased prosperity significantly as a result of economic growth, and that although the GDP of China has increased dramatically over the last decade China has in reality not increased in prosperity as much as their GDP would demonstrate. According to this premise, China is not booming with economic growth, and that booming economic growth that is not happening has in no way improved the lives of most Chinese. The reality is we are not delusional, and neither are the Chinese. China has been booming with economic growth over the last decade and the lives of most Chinese have improved exponentially in the process.

Premise Two - GDP does not tell what happens to the typical citizen, because the GDP of a nation can increase but the inequality of that nation may increase making people worse off in respect to median income.

The Inefficiency of Premise Two - The most problematic component of this commentary is the false assumption that income inequality is an economic indicator in respect to general prosperity. Keynesian economics is predominately rooted in subjective preceptions of social justice (not objective economic efficiency), which is why Keynesian economists believe income inequality is an economic indicator even though it indicates very little because of the substantial intervening variables that are left out of such an indicator. For instance increases in total wealth of a nation through economic growth will often modify definitions of poverty thereby eliminating the contrasting element of any income inequality with nations identifying differing standards for poverty (looking strictly at raw numbers this intervening variable will not be shown). As a subset of the previously mentioned variable there may be significant inequality of income within in a nation, but the poor and middle-class still may be better off than in a nation where there is less, because the general prosperity of the nation may be significantly less in the nation that has less income inequality (a model in which everyone lives equally poorly can hardly be regarded as more properous if the vast majority of people are worse off as a direct result of such a model). Usually increases in economic growth resulting in greater GDP result in much improved prosperity, living conditions for the vast majority, and as previously noted changes in societal definitions of what criteria is necessary in order to be identified as in poverty (increased standards are often directly congruent to economic growth).

In Real World Terms - According to Stiglitz based upon his analysis a nation like Japan for instance over the last decade should be considered an economic tiger because they maintain one of the most modest income inequality disparities in the entire world, and a nation like China should be in the toilet economically in contrast with Japan, because there is a much more significant income inequality disparity in China than in Japan. Unfortunately for this analysis reality sets in, and Japan has endured a miserable economy in respect to economic growth over the last decade resulting in a decrease in general prosperity making most worst off in Japan even though they maintain a modest income inequality disparity (one of the smallest in the world) whereas in contrast China has experienced an exceptional boom in economic growth over the last decade resulting in much improved living conditions for most as well as an enormous increase in general prosperity.

Premise Three - A Green GDP as he presents it would demonstrate economic sustainability, and function as a more efficient economic indicator than the current GDP model.

The Inefficiency of Premise Three - In his conceptualization of a Green GDP Stiglitz regards economic sustainability based upon natural resources as a foundational premise to genuine economic growth. This conceptualization is exceptionally problematic for obvious reasons to most with a less than limited thought process as Stiglitz frequently demonstrates. The most problematic element of such a proposal is the absence of a major intervening variable known as technology. Technological innovation alters conceptions of sustainability in respect to natural resources, and may eliminate the conception of scarcity in this regard toward some natural resources totally. Additionally, it is problematic to estimate total quantities of many varying resources making calculations of such a GDP virtually impossible to achieve accurately (outside of the technological variable being applied) in any respect. It should also be noted that Stiglitz deduces this premise out of aberrational phenomena, primarily Argentina which had substantial intervening variables that played an artificial role in their inflated GDP that Stiglitz conveniently fails to mention only drawing upon the raw GDP number as the foundation of his analysis.

In Real World Terms - A Green GDP sounds nice, but it is utterly superficial, and juvenile in nearly every respect. According to such a GDP a nation like France would be an economic tiger, and nations like China as well as India would be in the toilet in regard to economic growth. This delusion of reality would present many exceptionally problematic scenarios in respect to real economic growth versus fantasy economic growth in regard to increasing total prosperity within a nation. It is clear that life in France has not been improving at the same rate it has in China and India over the last decade, even though a nation like France would demonstrate more Green GDP growth in contrast to China or India based on the criteria Stiglitz has presented. It is always an exceptional irony to hear a Keynesian economist discuss economic sustainability as a primary concern, because Lord Keynes the father of that school of economics intrinsically admitted himself that his economic model was unsustainable long term by commenting "all I know about the long run is that we are all dead" (Source: God & Man at Yale p. 68).

In the video below French economist Veronique de Rugy discusses some of the variables that have made France the antithetical model to follow in respect to economic policy that is conducive to producing increased prosperity at the most efficient rate.

(From: Reason TV, and the Center for Freedom and Prosperity Foundation)



Premise Four - Foreign investment does not increase economic growth in a substantial enough way to represent an efficient economic indicator (Stiglitz uses a mine as an example).

The Inefficiency of Premise Four - Foreign investment usually helps all parties involved (not always equally), but because all parties are helped by it usually all parties are better off for it. The example Stiglitz uses (the mine) is exceptionally problematic from the start, because it premises that income from a mine could be generated without any use of labor (this is an impossibility with current technology). Since labor would be required the mine would be creating jobs thereby creating job growth as a part of the foreign investment, and that job growth would result in increased sustained spending in the economy by the workers thereby increasing economic growth. Again, Stiglitz demonstrates his limited thought process by using this example as an efficient model to support his argument even though it clearly demonstrates the antithesis in actuality.

In Real World Terms - In respect to his example foreign investment not only created infrastructure (the mine), but in reality would also have created sustainable jobs in the process thereby benefiting the foreign investor or investors, the workers, and the nation that has been invested in (essentially all parties involved would gain, whereas in contrast if there were no investment at all none would gain). Additionally, the increased income from the mine for the foreigner may be spent in positive ways on goods produced by the nation in which the mine is located (directly, or indirectly); economically this would be demonstrated in the form of increased consumption of goods produced by the nation in question thereby generating even more economic growth for that nation.

Premise Five - Any measure of societal well-being says it's not good to have so many people in prison, and it is a symptom of something dysfunctional.

The Inefficiency of Premise Five - This premise imposes a subjective not objective perception of social justice upon a society in contrast to objective economic efficiency, and it does not identify the root causes of such inefficiency which in actuality may be derived out of economic policies that Stiglitz himself advocates (Keynesian policies).

In Real World Terms - Stiglitz claims this indicator is dysfunctional, and inefficient, even though he does not identify what economic policies have contributed to making it inefficient, or why it is inefficient thereby making his commentary without foundational merit in this respect.

Premise Six - America spends more on health care than any other country as a percentage of GDP, and America's health outcomes are much lower than in other advanced industrial nations, and actually lower than many developing countries.

The Inefficiency of Premise Six - The most inefficient element of this analysis is that it relies upon false indicators of health care systems, which inherently have too many intervening variables that may have very little or nothing to do with the health care system itself thereby producing a false analysis of the health care system in question. For instance life expectancy is not an efficient indicator of the efficiency of a health care system because of the significant intervening variables that may alter it most substantially the general health of the populace. Usually individuals in poor health, most significantly obese individuals are going to require much more health care over their life-time than healthy individuals will, which means they will need to spend more of their income on health care in order to maintain their health. Additionally, another significant variable conveniently left out by Stiglitz is the expense needed for the development and production of health care technology innovation, which the U.S. leads the world in (U.S. Leads in Medical Innovation, David Brennan, The Washington Post), and is a variable that increases the total health care expenditure, but usually produces the most cutting edge health care technology. The health care liability burden is yet another substantial component that increases the total health care expenditure not mentioned in the commentary by Stiglitz, but is a variable that significantly intervenes in the health care expenditure total.

In Real World Terms - Stiglitz is relying upon false indicators of health care system efficiency (resultant to the significant intervening variables that may influence substantially the indicators he is applying) thereby drawing false conclusions on health care system efficiency in relation to total expenditure.

Figure 1: Total Expenditure on Health Care as a Percentage of GDP -



(Figure 1 Source: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, "OECD Health Statistics and Indicators for 30 Countries," (Paris: OECD, July 2007); 2004 data.)

The figure below demonstrates the overwhelming disparity in MRI Units, and CT Scanners (per million people) the U.S. maintains over the rest of the world, especially nations like France as well as the U.K. MRI Units, and CT Scanners are exceptionally distinctive medical equipment in determining various serious medical conditions, and the quantity supplied should more than exceed demand in respect to utilization for this reason (an actuality the U.S. demonstrates but most other nations do not, notably France and the U.K.)

Figure 2: Number of MRI Units and CT Scanners per Million People -



(Figure 2 Source: Organisation for Co-operation and Development, "OECD Health Data, 2007 Statistics and Indicates for 30 Countries" Paris: OECD, July 2007. Note U.S. data from 2003.)

In the video below John Stossel of ABC News reports on national health care programs around the world.

"Some in Congress say they're moving closer to a plan that will make health care cheaper, and better; sounds great, but when government takes charge it can also mean innovation stops."

(From: ABC News 20/20)



ONE OUT OF THREE AMERICANS WILL GET CANCER BEFORE THEY DIE. (Source: CBS News, Oncologist Dr. David Nanus)

Five-Year Survival Rates for Men and Women (All Malignancies) -

Women:
63% (U.S.)
56% (Europe Avg.)

Men:
66% (U.S.)
47% (Europe Avg.)

(Source: Arduino Verdecchia et al. "Recent cancer survival in Europe: a 2000-02 period analysis of EUROCARE-4 data," Lancet Oncology, 2007, No. 8, pages 784-796.)

Five-Year Survival Rates for Some Common Cancers -

Prostate:
99% (U.S.)
78% (Europe Avg.)

Bladder:
81% (U.S.)
66% (Europe Avg.)

Breast:
90% (U.S.)
79% (Europe Avg.)

Uterine:
82% (U.S.)
78 (Europe Avg.)

(Source: Arduino Verdecchia et al., "Recent cancer survival in Europe: a 2000-02 period analysis of EUROCARE-4 data," Lancet Oncology, 2007, No. 8, pages 784-796. U.S. bladder cancer data from "Cancer Facts & Figures 2007," American Cancer Society.)

Five-Year Prostate Cancer Survival Rates -

100% 5-year relative survival rate (U.S.)
95% 5-year relative survival rate (Canada)
77% 5-year relative survival rate (U.K.)

(Source: American Cancer Society, Canadian Cancer Society.)

U.K. Health Care Wait Times -

Cataract Surgery - 8 months
Hip Replacement - 11 months
Knee Replacement - 12 months
Slipped Disc - 5 months
Hernia Repair - 5 months

(Source: British Waiting Times, 2004. BBC May 27, 2009.)

In the video below famed economist Thomas Sowell briefly discusses the problematic central premise of the Obama health care proposal (a proposal that is congruent with the implications of the previously mentioned commentary by Joseph Stiglitz in respect to health care) with Peter Robinson of the Hoover Institution.

(From: Hoover Institution Presents: Uncommon Knowledge, Fora TV, and Liberty Pen)



Cato Institute Research Study -

The Grass Is Not Always Greener: A Look at National Health Care Systems Around the World

Cato.org

Interested in Practical Methods for Health Care Reform? Please Visit the Link Below -

The Center for Health Transformation (a public policy think tank dedicated to efficient health care reform)

Present Era Liberalism: The Antithesis of a Genuine Intellectual Movement

- Written Commentary By Adam W. Rounds

In this commentary by Evan Sayet at the Heritage Foundation (a conservative public policy think tank), the problematic nature of relativism (in respect to it being a central theme in policy making), and specifically moral relativism is discussed in relation to its role in present era liberalism. He also identifies the distinctive differences between the classical liberalism of the founding fathers, and present era liberalism, thereby demonstrating that the two ideologies have virtually no historical or ideological relationship to one another despite a common name. Additionally, Sayet details the intellectual excellence of conservatism in respect to its foundations in the classical liberal values of the founding fathers, and then contrasts it to the absence of such foundations in present era liberalism, attributable to many factors, but specifically to the relativist premise from which all other aspects are derived from within the ideology.

For the YouTube link to this video click here

- By Adam W. Rounds

The central theme upon which all the principles of the Republican Party have been derived from are intrinsically demonstrated through the concepts of economic freedom, as well as political freedom, and have been so since the very foundation of the party. This is a brief historical summary of conservatism within the Republican Party, and its transformational evolution throughout American history.

All dates are only approximate time frames.

1854 to 1893 - Classical Liberalism/Social Conservatism:

Classical liberalism was the predominant ideology of the founding fathers, and remained the dominant ideology of all of the major American political parties during the 19th century resulting in a great amount of political parody between the major parties ideologically, thereby allowing for distinctions to be made over differing interpretations of classical liberal thought in regard to policy. This ideology was coupled with social conservatism, which was the other dominant ideology of all the major American political parties during the 19th century, primarily for cultural reasons, but also for political. When Thomas Jefferson deliberately linked the inalienable rights of man to God, a connective mechanism was then established between religiosity in America and liberty thereby creating a cultural bond between two factions that may not have naturally existed otherwise.

1894 to 1932 - Paleoconservatism (also known as the 'Old Right' or Traditionalist Conservatism)/Social Conservatism:

Paleoconservatism is rooted in classical liberalism and is aligned to the laissez faire economic policies associated with economic liberalism (also known as free-market conservatism), but is distinctive in that it advocates geo-political isolationist policies with an opposition to major foreign intervention engagements, as well as promoting a small professional military. Paleoconservatism was the dominant ideology of the Republican Party leading up to the Great Depression of the 1930's. The popularity of Franklin Roosevelt, and American victory in the Second World War essentially made this ideology extinct in mainstream America in the post war era.

1933 to 1964 - Collectivist Liberal Conservatism (also known as 'New Deal Conservatism')/Paleoconservatism/Social Conservatism:

The popularity of Franklin Roosevelt created a scenario in which the only type of Republicans who were electable during the Great Depression, and the post WWII era, were collectivist liberal conservatives. These were Republicans who still believed in the concept of political freedom and were socially conservative, but advocated far less economic freedom than the paleoconservatives, or the classical liberals of past Republican eras. Collectivist liberal conservatives could be characterized as 'New Deal Republicans,' because they were not opposed to government intervention in the economy, and would sometimes advocate big government programs. For these reasons this era of American politics had a great amount of political parody among the two major parties with few distinctions separating the two.

1965 to 1979 - Collectivist Liberal Conservatism/Social Conservatism:

The defeat of Barry Goldwater in the 1964 Presidential election marked the final extinction of paleoconservatism in mainstream American politics, which at this point was really just the remnants of the ideology that had dominated American politics in the pre-Great Depression era. Although Goldwater was not a pure paleoconservative in every respect (he advocated a proactive foreign policy, which included foreign intervention if necessary; this was a hallmark of the GOP in the Cold War era), he was certainly more closely aligned to it than he was to collectivist liberal conservatism, which makes him the last real mainstream paleoconservative leader. The next Republican Presidential nominee would be from the collectivist liberal conservative faction (Richard Nixon).

1980 to Present - Conservatism/Social Conservatism:

Conservatism would make a comeback, but in a much different form than the paleoconservatism which had dominated the pre-Great Depression era of American politics, and its foremost architect would be William F. Buckley Jr. He made conservatism relevant again in the post FDR world by reintroducing the values of the American Revolution to the American people through conservatism. Buckley rooted the ideology upon the same values of economic liberalism (also known as free-market conservatism), and classical liberalism that the founding fathers had cherished. These values were naturally aligned with the historic heritage of political freedom that the Republican Party had always stood for coupled with the hallmarks of the Republican Party during the Cold War era of a strong military as well as a proactive foreign policy this new form of conservatism would come to dominate the party. This ideological formula can be evident by many of the speeches delivered by Ronald Reagan, which elucidate this form of conservatism, and consistently remind Americans of the importance of maintaining the values of the American Revolution, values rooted in economic freedom, political freedom, as well as individual liberty. These attributes combined with the inalienable rights of man as described by Thomas Jefferson comprise a universal morality to conservatives, and represent the Buckley conservative mechanism.

The Buckley conservative mechanism can be demonstrated in the video below. The video is part of the historic speech by Ronald Reagan entitled: 'A Time for Choosing,' in which the ideals of the American Revolution are discussed in relevant context with the political background of the era.



In the video below William F. Buckley Jr. delivers an inspiring, and decisive speech in which he uses his own mechanism in order to authenticate his argumentation. The speech was delivered on behalf of the Panamanian people, and embodies the oratory excellence that one might contemplate Cicero would have projected in the final days of the Roman republic.

  

Important note:

Neoconservatism is not mentioned, because it has only ever represented a minor faction within the GOP, and only major factions are discussed in this limited historical summary. Many will argue that neoconservatives have played a significant role in Republican policy making especially in regard to foreign policy, and that is accurate, conversely, neoconservatives still have never been a major faction within the Republican Party even in the present era.

Brigitte Gabriel discusses modernity in the Middle-East and radical Islam in this speech at the Heritage Foundation (a conservative public policy think tank).






 
To watch the remainder of this speech click the link below:
 
Brigitte Gabriel at the Heritage Foundation