What’s Wrong with the World

If David Frum's message to us all as conservatives is how careful we need to be...

Frum's concerns would concern this conservative if I thought he were one.

This is the kind of thing I try to do with my students, to help them think through whether the evidence given is relevant and sufficient to effectively support an argument. It's always affirming to see really smart people doing something I do; maybe I'm on the right track! It's also another example I may send them to in next semester's course. You want to come teach for us? :)

Yes, I should say "very good post." I'd like to argue with you but...

Ouch, Bill (for Frum, that is), but I'm really inclined to your opinion on that.

The only thing about this piece of writing, Beth, is that it's very informal, very bloggish. Perhaps not a good writing model. :-)

Oh, but that's good for the topic. It's written very like someone simply taking you through the process of analysis to show how to do it, and that's what they need -- clear and conversational. One of our goals is getting them to understand how *context* drives things like level of formality, so we use material from a variety of sources.

You can't get out of being a good thinker and clear expositor! :)

David Frum has entered minute 14.5

I agree with Bill: just who is it who is quite happy calling Frum a conservative? And if he is one in some weird fashion, maybe other conservatives should take care to distance themselves from someone who makes such poor arguments "on behalf" of conservatives.

You guys just won't let me be nice, will you? In fact, Frum is the sort of pundit who drives me pretty much nuts, especially with all of that "give up on gay marriage, downplay abortion" stuff. Not my idea of a conservative. But _he_ thinks of himself as one, and he presumes to lecture conservatives on what they are and should be as from within, and since Horowitz took him on so well, I figured I'd finish the job by knocking the Sunstein thing out of the ballpark too.

I'm on David Frum's side. Not necessarily about Sunstein - I'm not really interested in him - but about conservatives' need to talk to moderate independents, rather than just to rile up the people that are already on your side. This involves moderating one's tone when speaking publicly.

It's not a question of being a "true conservative" or being a sellout. I'm more right-wing than both Frum and Horowitz. The question is whether to express your "rage" by "speaking the truth", or to try to bring in those who aren't yet on your side and get something accomplished. To get results you need to persuade moderate independents. I don't agree with all of Frum's recommendations, but he's right that you don't persuade moderates by getting on radio or TV and raving like a lunatic.

Anyone else notice that it's only conservative who fret about stupid crap like "who's good for conservatism?" The left doesn't care about ACORN, the Black Panthers, PETA, etc. until they make them look bad. Then they do a hail mary and move on. Meanwhile, conservatives are desperately trying to appeal to people who believe that being a conservative is ipso facto irrefutable evidence of kookishness.

Pathetic. If anyone is bad for conservatism, it's people like David Frum who would sacrifice entire percentages of the base to appease people who hate conservatives and libertarians.

To get results you need to persuade moderate independents. I don't agree with all of Frum's recommendations, but he's right that you don't persuade moderates by getting on radio or TV and raving like a lunatic.

If Frum seriously believes that most people watch shows like Beck, Limbaugh, The View or Keith Olbermann for reasons other than to have their prejudices confirmed, then he needs to upgrade his understanding of democracy and human nature beyond 8th grade social studies.

I actually think there's a lot to be said for rallying the base. Part of the problem with the whole approach of trying to moderate the message to speak to the moderates is that one never gets back again to where one started. For example, if you cut out abortion from your topics to talk about, when are you allowed to introduce it again? And are you really likely to get people involved in being conservatives just by _not talking_ about abortion? And what kind of "conservatives" are they, and how useful are they going to be? For someone like me, for whom the controversial issues are the most important, I can't imagine cutting those issues to gain members. It would be a kind of betrayal, and I'd end up in a group I never wanted to create and that I couldn't call "conservative." Part of the question is, what do we want to persuade the moderates _of_? I absolutely don't agree that what we want to persuade them of is just to join our club while still being "moderates," where "moderates" means something like "supporting legal abortion, gay marriage, etc." Why would we want a club like that? If we're trying to persuade them to change their views, then we have to talk about those issues.

**Anyone else notice that it's only conservative who fret about stupid crap like "who's good for conservatism?" The left doesn't care about ACORN, the Black Panthers, PETA, etc. until they make them look bad. Then they do a hail mary and move on.**

This is true, but it's not necessarily a liability. Conservatives are supposed to have principles which transcend their political agenda; "what's good for conservatism" must, in our minds, equate with "what's good for the country." But the Left cares far more about its agenda than it does about the nation.

I'm not a Frum fan, but he does have a point. It is one thing to rile up the base, quite another to attract moderates, right-leaning populists, and the like. If conservatism doesn't manage to do the latter we're liable to end up back where we were under Bush II: a faux-conservative Congress after the 2010 elections, and a faux-conservative president in 2012.

I'm not a Frum fan, but he does have a point. It is one thing to rile up the base, quite another to attract moderates, right-leaning populists, and the like. If conservatism doesn't manage to do the latter we're liable to end up back where we were under Bush II: a faux-conservative Congress after the 2010 elections, and a faux-conservative president in 2012.

Frum DOES NOT have a point here because he has advocated openly abandoning many conservative goals. If you listen to him and those like him, your scenario is a foregone conclusion since they want to drum out everyone from the birthers, to Ron Paul supporters, to social conservatives who won't budge on social issues. By the time they're done cleaning house, it'll be ready for the left to move in and start unpacking.

Anyone else notice that it's only conservative who fret about stupid crap like "who's good for conservatism?"

You obviously don't get out much. Have you heard of the DLC for starters? That's problem with so much of conservatism. They live in there own self-delusional shell. I just wish Maximos would post more. It's nice to hear a real conservative here every once in a while.

Have you heard of the DLC for starters?

Yes, and I'm still waiting for you to show that the sentiment of the DLC is mainstream among the left when it comes to repudiating and banishing the kooks of the left.

"Frum DOES NOT have a point here because he has advocated openly abandoning many conservative goals"

The fact that Frum's vision of conservatism is a far cry from mine doesn't negate his basic point, which is a variation on the idea that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. Frum seems to want to attract more Arlen Specters and Olympia Snowes; I'd prefer to reach out to those vaguely "populist" slightly right-of-center types that the 'blue dog' Democrats represent, or that Reagan appealed to (not that we need another Reagan, necessarily; I think we can do without the sabre-rattling and the corporate cheerleading).

Badger, your wish is my command.

The fact that Frum's vision of conservatism is a far cry from mine doesn't negate his basic point, which is a variation on the idea that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Lydia sez:

Part of the problem with the whole approach of trying to moderate the message to speak to the moderates is that one never gets back again to where one started. For example, if you cut out abortion from your topics to talk about, when are you allowed to introduce it again?

That's easy. You don't remove abortion from the topics you talk about; at least, David Frum doesn't want to do that. As I recall, he wants to remove the right-to-life amendment from the plank of the Republican Party, while staying anti-abortion.

Let's say you're categorically anti-abortion, which would make you an "extremist" on that issue. If your goal is to significantly reduce the number of abortions, then the way you do that is by getting the moderates on your side, most of whom don't put abortion at the top of their list of issues. You welcome them into your coalition and join with them to help ban the most egregious cases, like late-term abortions. You never deny that you're categorically anti-abortion, and you never shy away from explaining why, if it's in the right situation with the right audience. But mostly, you concentrate on what's politically possible, because that's the way you save unborn lives.

I'm way more extreme than David Frum. I'm out there with those he'd denounce as "racists" and "unpatriotic conservatives". But one thing I like about him is that he's one of the few conservatives out there who's not tone-deaf. He speaks to others, not just to himself. He knows that conservatives can't just use the same rhetoric as liberals, mutatis mutandis, because the discourse is asymmetric: the liberals control the public sphere to a large extent, so in that sense a conservative is talking to a hostile audience. You quoted that comment about Al Franken, about Frum not responding to his name-calling in kind. Exactly! That's how you talk when you're addressing a hostile audience. Right-wingers need to learn to talk to people other than themselves.

If you listen to him and those like him, your scenario is a foregone conclusion since they want to drum out everyone from the birthers, to Ron Paul supporters, to social conservatives who won't budge on social issues. By the time they're done cleaning house, it'll be ready for the left to move in and start unpacking.

Mike T, absolutely right. If you take a look at what a "moderate" Republican supposedly stands for today, and what a staunch liberal of the Eisenhower era stood for, you would find virtually no difference. The whole dang playing field has shifted far, far over to the left. Why? Because we keep on allowing liberals to set the terms of the debate, thereby allowing them to determine who is considered "too kooky rightwards" to be allowed on the stage with our main attraction. People like Ron Paul are thus forced into the wilderness instead of helping formulate the central conservative framework (please note, by the way, I don't even agree with Paul on a number of things).

If "attracting" middle-of-the-roaders means giving up on the basics of what it means to be right, then who wants it? We don't want them muddles to vote conservative this election while remaining muddled middles , that would just ensure more see-saws in the near future.

What true conservatives should instead be saying is not "ditch abortion and Glen Beck to attract the middle-of-the-roaders", it should be more like "show the truth about Obama and some of those middle-of-the-roaders may recognize the truth, get off the fence and join the fight - they won't BE middle-of-the-roaders any more." That said, there is nothing about speaking truth that requires it to be done offensively. If it can be done with honey, then that's going to be a lot more effective than doing it with vinegar.

From what little I have heard of him, every now and then Beck is offensive, but not primarily by attacking public figures with unfair characterizations; mainly by stating his personal opinions (or worse, his tastes) as if they were objectively and universally right. But that's not a feature reserved for conservatives, nor does he do that as conservative. So big deal. That's not a basis for ejecting him from the field.

"You want the moderates to be changed, Frum wants conservative principles to change."

True, in a sense, but Aaron's comment makes my point better than I did. My "agreement" with Frum has to do with how one talks, not with the purpose of the speech. Ranting and raving like an idjit will attract no moderates -- neither those that Frum likes, nor the ones that I'd court.

As a perfect illustration of the discursive dynamics in play here, imagine the reaction of many moderates - people the GOP, and the conservative movement, need to attract to remain viable - to the denunciations of health care reform, with or without end-of-life counseling, as a socialist plot. These moderates, to a man, understand that health care policy must be reformed, even if they haven't any ideas as to how this might be effected; and when they hear the rhetoric of the socialist plot, they are apt to conclude that the speakers are off their meds - because they're not going to think, "Hey, Obama wants to ensure that insurance companies can't deny coverage to sick people - that must be a socialist plot!" Rather, they're going to think that such a policy objective is a good one, and wonder about the judgment of those who oppose it as socialism.

I have no patience for Frum's project of downplaying social conservatism, probably even embracing gay "marriage" as an inevitability. But I am an advocate of greater civility and precision in public discourse.

The fact that Frum's vision of conservatism is a far cry from mine doesn't negate his basic point, which is a variation on the idea that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. Frum seems to want to attract more Arlen Specters and Olympia Snowes; I'd prefer to reach out to those vaguely "populist" slightly right-of-center types that the 'blue dog' Democrats represent, or that Reagan appealed to (not that we need another Reagan, necessarily; I think we can do without the sabre-rattling and the corporate cheerleading).

That's just it, though, Rob... he's not advocating anything like catching more flies with honey. Frum has made it quite clear on numerous occasions that the solution to election issues is to change or drop principles and publicly banish large segments of the right.

Ranting and raving like an idjit will attract no moderates -- neither those that Frum likes, nor the ones that I'd court.

That assumes that the moderates are even paying attention to people like Beck. The left has its own people like Beck such as Keith Olbermann who is the most in-your-face, obnoxious, self-righteous blowhard this side of the love child of Bill O'Reilly and a televangelist. You didn't see them driving the moderates away from Obama...

Aaron, if you don't think that Frum wants us to say less about abortion, you do not, I repeat do not, understand Frum. And by the way, it isn't particularly "politically possible" to ban late-term abortions either, because Roe v. Wade has to be overturned first, and "moderates" don't want to overturn Roe v. Wade. Play-to-the-moderates politics are fantasyland politics, and they are also a recipe for conservative suicide.

And I like Tony's last comments, too.

What can be funnier, than a Canadian polemicist, who questioned the patriotism of those Americans who correctly foresaw the folly he was promoting, co-authored the “Axis of Evil” speech and incessantly waves pom-poms for a “global democratic revolution”, to counsel others on moderation?

Neo-conservatives always believed in big government and never suffered from the internal contradiction that bedevils those who implausibly advocate both limited government and the world’s largest military in service to a “benevolent empire.” Knowing his priorities, it should be no surprise how Frum wants to resolve the obvious contradiction between being both pro-life and an unabashed militarist.

Pro-lifers should divorce themselves from not only his agenda, but all the World Wrestling Federation theatrics that infect our culture and politics. Unless, of course you think, a preference to stand with martyrs like Jim Poulion, rather than 50 year old face-painters with sandwich-boards full of pejoratives, a form of moral snobbery.

David Frum has responded to Horowitz's latest with a thoughtful post:

http://www.newmajority.com/scorched-earth-conservatives

I commend Lydia for examining the substance of Sunstein's arguments. She made me think twice about my judgement of Beck (and by implication David Frum's defense of Sunstein). I still think, granting everything Lydia says about Sunstein, David's argument remains that Professor Sunstein is probably the best conservatives could hope for in his position at OMB in the Obama administration and so does it really make strategic sense to go after him when there are other rich targets out there in the administration?

I grant that Obama's picks are a target-rich environment. Speaking for myself, even w.r.t. Sunstein himself I would be more interested in researching Sunstein's views on the use of "quality of life years" (done in the UK) for rationing healthcare. I have read that he supports this but have not researched it. And I would like to find out more about how those views might be relevant to his position in the Obama administration and how Obama's pick of him with those views is relevant to Obamacare. Those issues are nearer to my heart, but I researched this one because it was the one where Frum went ballistic at Beck and implied that Beck was out on a limb all by his lonesome when in fact this was not the case.

And I would like to find out more about how those views might be relevant to his position in the Obama administration and how Obama's pick of him with those views is relevant to Obamacare.

I'd like to know more about this, myself.

Kevin,

Neo-conservatives always believed in big government and never suffered from the internal contradiction that bedevils those who implausibly advocate both limited government and the world’s largest military in service to a “benevolent empire.” Knowing his priorities, it should be no surprise how Frum wants to resolve the obvious contradiction between being both pro-life and an unabashed militarist.

Neo-conservatives have never advocated for limited government. In fact, they have frequently mocked advocates of limited government claiming that big government is no problem at all so long as it is well-run.

The mistake is to accept the left's (ie Frum's) terminology to start with. Given the demographic decline of the Republican and conservative base, the choices are appeal to moderates or have no power. But what's a moderate in the sense here relevant?

Frum/the left casually assume that "moderate" is a functional synonym for "people Matt Yglesias hates less." Who, exactly, is going to start voting for Republicans if they drop abortion? Bill Maher? The set of people who would vote for Republicans but for Republicans' abortion stance is miniscule. In truth, "moderate" in the sense here relevant is a functional synonym for "people Matt Yglesias hates more."

The ripe pickings for Republicans are downscale whites who currently vote Democrat. There are lots of people like this. Appealing to them does require moderation --- it requires moving right on a number of issues where Republicans are currently far left of center (immigration, affirmative action) and left on a few issues where Republicans are currently right of center (trade liberalization, minimum wage, healthcare, top marginal tax rates, etc). Who would this movement lose the Republicans? Wall Streeters and other corporate elite types whom they are steadily losing now anyway. And this demo is tiny.

Moving left on abortion or gay marriage or related issues would rob Republicans of their volunteer base and much of their contributor base and many of their voters. What will it gain them? David Brooks and Secular Right move on to polishign their halos by despising conservatives for some other deviation from leftism.

Here is a riddle. Why are not the Teamsters, the Mine Workers, the Auto Workers, and the Steel Workers reliable Republican constituencies? Which party wants to kill their industries dead? Which party is more in line with the values of their members? The Republicans' problem with these guys is that they are seen as reflexively, mindlessly pro-Capital and this is enough to overwhelm the other obvious commonalities of interest.

Neo-conservatives have never advocated for limited government.

Mike T, I know that, they are anti-communist liberals out of the Hubert Humphrey,Scoop Jackson and Pat Moynihan tradition. Hence, their postion on Levithan, both at home and abroad is perfectly consistent.

Not so for conservatives who attempt to square the circle of constitutional republic and global empire.

Who, exactly, is going to start voting for Republicans if they drop abortion?

Bill, good question. Time to ask though, whether blind allegiance to the GOP advances or retards the Gospel of Life.

The ripe pickings for Republicans are downscale whites who currently vote Democrat.

Bingo.

The tragedy of the Republican party is that, out of a sense of loyalty and obligation to those who have decimated the party, the corporatists and the proponents of aggressive war, its would-be reformers are prepared to jettison the only people who still vote for it in any numbers.

Why are not the Teamsters, the Mine Workers, the Auto Workers, and the Steel Workers reliable Republican constituencies? Which party wants to kill their industries dead? Which party is more in line with the values of their members?

Despite the economic disadvantages of voting Republican, I have read reliable poll numbers that show about thirty percent do so anyway.

Time to ask though, whether blind allegiance to the GOP advances or retards the Gospel of Life.

Only the morally-retarded is foolish enough to continue believing that the Democratic Party is The Way, especially given the wickedly ambitious Pro-Abort Crusade of the current administration (which, if I might remind certain folks, was precisely predicted in previous years).

"But what's a moderate in the sense here relevant?"

Yes. This is the question I was implying above.

"The ripe pickings for Republicans are downscale whites who currently vote Democrat."

Right, what Sam Francis used to call the Middle American Radicals. One might also include those socially conservative but fiscally more "liberal" blacks who aren't stuck on the white liberal plantation (I admit this is a small number of folks, but it's something).

Despite the economic disadvantages of voting Republican

The working class has always been the bedrock base for political and cultural conservatives. The one-way nature of the relationship is catching up to a Right run by the Managerial class, or to borrow Chesterton's phrase, the Business Government.

Only the morally-retarded is foolish enough to continue believing that the Democratic Party is The Way

Indeed. Who said they were? I'm afraid you posit a false choice designed to keep us herded in the enclosure.

Not so for conservatives who attempt to square the circle of constitutional republic and global empire.

Which raises the question of what conservatives you're talking about, then? I can think of a few positions on our military that can be found in reasonable representation on the right:

-Global empire
-Semi-interventionist (the sort who didn't want conflict, but were willing to intervene military to contain Soviet allies, for example)
-Non-interventionist
-Isolationist

None of them are inherently incompatible with a constitutional republic, only with the ideals that we have connected to one. Global empire and its lesser evil sibling, the interventionist, are problematic because they leave us in a perpetual state of war which empowers scoundrels, ruins America's reputation, wastes lives and bankrupts our treasury. For all of those reasons they should be avoided.

The DoD in its current size and configuration is in no way incompatible with our ideals or a constitutional republic in principle. It can be maintained for a sum that is equal to not even 17% of the federal budget, and I am referring to the pre-bailout budget. 1.4M men at arms is also a healthy number of professional warriors for a country of **300M** to maintain.

So the conservative support for a large, credible military (large by global standards, not relative to our population, budget or GDP) is not the issue, but rather our use of it. Even if we bound ourselves constitutionally a la Japan to using it as a self-defense force only, the DoD would probably not look that much different than it does today except the Navy would be the largest branch, followed by the Air Force with the remainder in a smaller set of ground forces.

I'm baffled by your comments.Is your point purely theoretical; republics can maintain a small state apparatus, while constructing and overseeing an empire, but that in reality you can't think of any, least of all ours? Likewise, are you contending that the conservatives one is asked to vote for, read, listen to and otherwise support the past couple of decades aren't really conservative?

You may have a point on that one.

Sorry for going back to an earlier comment, but I wanted to address this statement:

The left doesn't care about ACORN, the Black Panthers, PETA, etc. until they make them look bad.

Actually, the overreaction to the ACORN scandal has opened up major possibilities for the left. Congress wrote the law so broadly that nearly the entire military-industrial complex can be defunded for its corruption and fraud.

Don't tease me, Step2.

Kevin,
http://pogoblog.typepad.com/pogo/2009/09/if-congress-attacks-the-mighty-oak-of-contractor-misconduct-it-shouldnt-just-settle-for-an-acorn.html

I said: Why are not the Teamsters, the Mine Workers, the Auto Workers, and the Steel Workers reliable Republican constituencies? Which party wants to kill their industries dead? Which party is more in line with the values of their members?

step2 replied:
Despite the economic disadvantages of voting Republican, I have read reliable poll numbers that show about thirty percent do so anyway.

Agree with your numbers, more or less. From this paper :

Exit polls show, however, that union voters disproportionately support Democrats in national elections. In the Presidential election of 2000 union members voted 62% for Gore while non-members voted 52% for Bush

This mushes together conservative unions like the carpenters with liberal unions like the service workers, so it's a little hard to tell exactly what the right number is.

On your other point though, I think it is objectively true that the economic and social interests of the unions (or at least the members) I mentioned above (UAW, UMW, USW teamsters) are better served by voting Republican at this point. Dems really do want to kill their industries. I think they don't because they see Republicans as soft, doughy, foppish guys in expensive suits --- ie they look like the boss. And Rs confirm this by being "economically conservative."

Rob G:

Yes, I guess I stole your thunder some. Sorry about that. One thing you said that I disagree with is this "Ranting and raving like an idjit will attract no moderates." Watch union leaders talk to their membership. Watch the pastors of downscale white churches talk to their congregations. I'm guessing that you would call what they do ranting and raving like an ijit (maybe you meant something else). If you want to launch a populist appeal, you gotta use populist language, no? Sarah Palin in style if not in substance. Once you see that "moderates" means snake handlers not Episcopalians, lots of things look different.

Kevin says:

Bill, good question. Time to ask though, whether blind allegiance to the GOP advances or retards the Gospel of Life.

Well, right now it looks to me on balance that voting R is more likely to advance life issues than is voting D. Let, say, Bob Casey, the "pro-life" D Senator from PA actually act pro-life and let him be replicated a bunch of times, and I'd be willing to look again.

I'm baffled by your comments.Is your point purely theoretical; republics can maintain a small state apparatus, while constructing and overseeing an empire, but that in reality you can't think of any, least of all ours? Likewise, are you contending that the conservatives one is asked to vote for, read, listen to and otherwise support the past couple of decades aren't really conservative?

A few points:

1) I am saying that there are at least four distinct views on the right on the use of our military.

2) That maintaining a real empire, ie occupying land and annexing it in perpetuity, is inherently destructive of a republic's wealth, vitality, reputation, etc.

3) The US is not an empire in the traditional sense, but rather brutally imperialistic in its relationship with other countries.

4) The size of the US military now is not comparable to a traditional empire. Rome's imperial army, for example, was (adjusted for population) several times larger at any given time. For example, around I believe 100-200AD, they had about 300,000 men in their army and at their peak it was about 600k is my understanding.

5) Most people don't realize that the US military is essentially a constitutional republican force ordered to carry out imperial tasks abroad.

6) Most people don't realize how cheap the US military is to maintain.

7) Even if we abandoned our aggressive, imperialistic foreign policy and made our military behave like a purely self-defense force, it would not be very different in size and cost to what we have today.

3) The US is not an empire in the traditional sense, but rather brutally imperialistic in its relationship with other countries.

Even if I grant this is true, it is not primarily true on account of how we use out military as a threat, is it? In my thinking, our "hegemony" is formed mostly of economic forces (not, by the way, that this means they are benign - I am certainly not suggesting that). But we don't go around threatening France and Australia and Nigeria with military reprisals if they don't sell us their whatever. If this is true, then Mike's overall point is even more true: the military as such - currently constituted - is not a fundamental denial of our constitutional republicanism.

Step 2,
I read your link and all I can sadly say is; don't get your hopes up.

Maybe we should be grateful, that these steroid-jacked, drug-addled, heavily armed slave-traders aren't unleashing their psycho-sexual energies on American streets, but I still think we should have declined to renew the 190 million dollar contract given their employer for this form of ambassadorship.
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/09/10/afghanistan.embassy.whistleblower/

Why let some human trafficking get in the way of DynCorp's 8 billion contract to provide "security" in Afghanistan?
http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2002/08/06/dyncorp/index.html

Look, don't read reports from the Commission on War Time Contracting without access to the vomitorium and a sense of resignation, because apparently, no one cares! http://www.wartimecontracting.gov/

Step 2,
I read your link and all I can sadly say is; don't get your hopes up.

Maybe we should be grateful, that these steroid-jacked, drug-addled, heavily armed slave-traders aren't unleashing their psycho-sexual energies on American streets, but I still think we should have declined to renew the 190 million dollar contract given their employer for this form of ambassadorship.
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/09/10/afghanistan.embassy.whistleblower/

Why let some human trafficking get in the way of DynCorp's 8 billion contract to provide "security" in Afghanistan?
http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2002/08/06/dyncorp/index.html

Look, don't read reports from the Commission on War Time Contracting without access to the vomitorium and a sense of resignation, because apparently, no one cares!

Link to the Commission;
http://www.wartimecontracting.gov/

That maintaining a real empire, ie occupying land and annexing it in perpetuity, is inherently destructive of a republic's wealth, vitality, reputation, etc...Even if we abandoned our aggressive, imperialistic foreign policy and made our military behave like a purely self-defense force, it would not be very different in size and cost to what we have today.

Are you saying the price for a benevolent empire, benign hegemony, or a well-intentioned imperium - I don't care what we call it - remains at a static, cheaply fixed cost no matter how modest, or grand our national ambitions may be?

How does a military tasked with maintaining 700 bases around the world, engaged in the kind of social engineering abroad that conservatives used to dread at home, and straining under the burden of two wars, not drain our Treasury faster than one with smaller, scaled-back missions? Is there a determinism that works in favor of the Defense budget that is absent from the rest of our federal expenditures?

As for the allegedly wide variety of foreign policy theories on the Right, it matters little when only one prevails in terms of real-world application.

Lydia, of the two issues you raised - whether I accurately summarized Frum's approach and whether my approach is good strategy - I'm more interested in the latter. My point was that many moderates, those in the center and center-right, would like to put more restrictive conditions on abortion than exist today, or at least would support a policy bundle that includes such restrictions. Further restrictions on abortion are possible, juridically and politically, without overturning Roe v. Wade.

And a couple points on Roe v. Wade itself, since you brought it up. The only way to overturn it is to elect Republicans to the Presidency and to the Senate. (That's necessary but not sufficient; however you don't need a hard-line President to appoint good Supreme Court justices.) The only way to elect a Republican President and Senators - today, not in 1980 - is to run candidates who appeal to moderates. Second, if Roe v. Wade is ever overturned, that will be the start of fifty intensive battles over abortion. In most states you won't be able to categorically ban it. You'll be in exactly the situation I described before: a broad, continuous spectrum both of policy choices and of public opinion.

Are you saying the price for a benevolent empire, benign hegemony, or a well-intentioned imperium - I don't care what we call it - remains at a static, cheaply fixed cost no matter how modest, or grand our national ambitions may be?

How does a military tasked with maintaining 700 bases around the world, engaged in the kind of social engineering abroad that conservatives used to dread at home, and straining under the burden of two wars, not drain our Treasury faster than one with smaller, scaled-back missions? Is there a determinism that works in favor of the Defense budget that is absent from the rest of our federal expenditures?

No, I am saying that the size and cost of our military would not fundamentally change if we adopted a Ron Paulesque non-interventionist foreign policy as opposed to our imperial-bully foreign policy. That is quite different from saying that we can operate an empire or an imperial, bullyish relationship with other states on the cheap.

It costs about $500B to maintain our military's strength and ability to rapidly respond to an attack. It has cost us $1T to occupy Iraq because of all of the social engineering we're doing there ranging from rebuilding their infrastructure, to rebuilding their military with new weapons, to paying the cost of bringing out private contractors to build all of that stuff with hazardous duty pay.

My point is that you are conflating issues. The 1.4M men at arms and base cost of $500B would barely change if we folded up all 700 bases, moved the troops back home and gave the world the middle finger at the UN when they ask for intervention. Imperial expenditures like the occupation in Iraq are the issue and what is killing us in terms of military spending. If we dropped all of that tomorrow, the military would be only a few percentage points of our GDP to maintain as a self-defense force capable of scaring the hell out of anyone who thinks about going to war with us.

It is also important to remember that not all defense contractors are the same. Most of the profiting from the invasion of Iraq was not done by munition suppliers who already have regular, low-cost contracts to steadily supply the military with equipment and IT work. Those guys already make good money keeping the military equipment ready to go and there wasn't nearly as much scrambling there because they'd been steadily keeping things going and ready. The real profiteering was done by contractors from KBR which is not a traditional defense contractor, and of course Blackwater which is a separate issue altogether and mainly due to problems with military pay and dissatisfaction among elite troops.

With regard to Blackwater, I think the key is to make the military able to give extremely generous salaries to its more elite troops. Enlisted rangers or airbase defense should be able to make at least $40k, and the base salary for a SEAL or Green Beret should be at least $80k, with a ceiling of say $120k-$130k. I have no problem giving guys like Delta a salary of about $200k/year.

That's how you make groups like Blackwater obsolete.

"...a new American Right must recognize that its natural allies are...in the increasingly alienated and threatened strata of Middle America. The strategy of the Right should be to enhance the polarization of Middle Americans from the incumbent regime, not to build coalitions with the regime's defenders and beneficiaries...The salient concerns of postbourgeois Middle Americans that a new Right can express are those of crime, educational collapse, the erosion of their economic status, and the calculated subversion of their social, cultural, and national identity by forces that serve the interests of the elite above them and the underclass below them, but at the expense of the middle class. A new Right, positioning itself in opposition to the elite and the elite's underclass ally, can assert its leadership of alienated Middle Americans and mobilize them in radical opposition to the regime.

"A new, radical Middle American Right need not abandon political efforts, but, consistent with its recognition that it is laying siege to a hostile establishment, it ought to realize that political action in a cultural power vacuum will be largely futile. The main focus of a Middle American Right should be the reclamation of cultural power, the patient elaboration of an alternative culture within but against the regime -- within the belly of the beast but indigestible by it."

~~~Sam Francis, "Beautiful Losers: The Failure of American Conservatism" (Chronicles, May 1991)

Beck et al. have partially caught Francis's vision, but they are only focusing on one flank of the enemy. If the enemy can be described as "corporate statism," the Beck/Hannity/Limbaugh/FOX axis is ignoring the "corporate" aspect and concentrating almost entirely on the statist side of the problem. There are reasons for this, but the fact is that many Middle Americans have not only a strong anti-statist streak, but an anti-corporate one as well. Conservatives, if they want to attract this sort of Middle American, need to stop the pro-big business cheerleading and realize that what we're looking at is corporate statism, not just statism pure and simple.

This will be especially difficult for those who have some stake or other in the GOP. But there is no doubt that there is a large element of truth to the perception that the GOP is the party of big business. It's been that since its inception. The trick is to show the Democrat-leaning Middle Americans that the current Dem party is no longer the party of their immigrant or farmer grandfathers, and in doing so attract them rightward. Of course, this does not necessarily mean we make Republicans out of them. I for one could not care less what happens to the GOP. I'd like to see it become a real conservative party but I don't have much hope for that. I'd much rather see a strengthened and viable American conservatism; if that results in a better GOP, that's great. But I don't think it's necessary.

The 1.4M men at arms and base cost of $500B would barely change if we folded up all 700 bases, moved the troops back home and gave the world the middle finger at the UN when they ask for intervention.

Mike T.,
The recent invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan are largely funded through supplementary spending bills outside the Federal Budget, so they are not included in the military budget figures listed above.[13] In addition, the United States has black budget military spending which is not listed as Federal spending and is not included in published military spending figures. Other military-related items, like maintenance of the nuclear arsenal and the money spent by the Veterans Affairs Department, are not included in the official budget. Thus, the total amount spent by the United States on military spending is higher.
By the end of 2008, the U.S. had spent approximately $900 billion in direct costs on the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. Indirect costs such as interest on the additional debt and incremental costs of caring for the more than 33,000 wounded are additional. Some experts estimate these indirect costs will eventually exceed the direct costs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States

That portion of military spending officially reported in our budget accounts for 21% of the total federal spend. I'm hoping those interested in government transparency and accountability will pursue the "off-balance sheet" items and unreported "black project" accounting. Where are the libertarians when you need them?

After all this back and forth, it sounds like we agree the maintainence of a global empire is incompatible with a constitutional republic,but differ on the appropriate size and scope of a post-empire Department of Defense.

That's how you make groups like Blackwater obsolete

I think conservatives need inspiration more than they need moderation.

but differ on the appropriate size and scope of a post-empire Department of Defense.

If the US is to have a military with a credible ability to defend and decisively defeat an aggressor, it would need to maintain the status quo in the Navy at the very least. As I said, the Army and Marine Corps could be reduced down to easily 200k soldiers and 30k-40k marines if we changed our foreign policy since presumably any invader that could get to our soil would not see much of a difference between fighting 200k soldiers and 600k soldiers over a land mass as large as ours.

Hence why I said that a credible defense force would need a large naval and aerial component. We would want to increase our Navy from about 300 ships to about 500 ships at the very least. Most of them would need to be stationed on the West Coast as a deterrent against Chinese aggression, especially since China is rapidly building up the PLA-Navy to being a modern, blue water navy with a large number of carrier battle groups.

In that scenario, barring the use of nuclear weapons, if China did deliver a Pearl Harbor-style blow to us, unlike Japan, they actually have the man power to launch an invasion of the West Coast.

The Chinese need not cross the treacherous Pacific waters to undertake a massive land invasion of southern California, or trigger a suicidal nuclear confrontation to devastate our country. They can simply stop buying the debt that finances our global pretensions and unsustainable way of life.

They can simply stop buying the debt that finances our global pretensions and unsustainable way of life.

We're also their number one customer. From a business sense, it makes no good sense for them to do that to us. Politicians, however, often don't give a damn about the masses. The only reason the Chinese Politburo might not shaft its own public by deep sixing its relationship with us would be that the Chinese masses, unlike America's, would quickly rise up and slaughter its ruling class in an orgy of bloodshed if their interests were so ruthlessly attacked by the ruling class.

From a business sense, it makes no good sense for them to do that to us.

From a larger geopolitical sense, it is far more probable than your scenario of a land invasion. Besides, if the dollar is supplanted by the yuan or a global currency, parts of America will look like a war was really fought here.

Mike T and Kevin, please rein in the foreign policy discussion on this particular thread. Thanks. A request from your hostess. :-)

Aaron:

Further restrictions on abortion are possible, juridically and politically, without overturning Roe v. Wade.

Name one. Because outlawing late-term abortions, which you mentioned before, seeming to think that it might be one, is not one. Roe v. Wade does not permit outlawing late-term abortions.

Further restrictions on abortion are possible, juridically and politically, without overturning Roe v. Wade.

Unlikely, given the way that the courts have assaulted every limit on abortion. The only thing that might be done would be to either tax abortion to the point that only the rich could get one or to make you attend a week long abortion counseling session that is conducted by the same sort of people who do sexual harassment training for most corporations.

In 2009, approximately 60 pro-life measures[1] were enacted in the states, a marked increase from 2008...Partial-Birth Abortion Bans - At least eight states including Arizona, Arkansas, Hawaii, Kansas, Kentucky, and Michigan considered measures to ban partial-birth abortion. Arizona and Arkansas enacted bans on the procedure, while Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius vetoed a similar measure in April 2009. http://www.aul.org/2009_State_Sessions

Thankfully, prolifers are not pining for the day Roe is overturned. Activity at the local level is still the best way to change hearts and minds, transform the culture and demonstrate faithful discipleship. The "big picture" is the one closest to you.

On Roe v. Wade: are abortion laws identical in all fifty states? If not, then there is room for further restrictions, in some states, under Roe.

I know already that one can't ban all late-term abortions under Roe. I never said you could, or at least I never meant to say that. But there seems to be a lot of room for judicial interpretation of the ruling. That's why I think (but can't prove) that there's room for further restrictions in not just some, but most or maybe even all states under Roe.

This is getting far away from my main point, though, especially since I said that my approach is necessary for overturning Roe v. Wade as well.

Sunstein's duties by appointment has nothing to do with animal rights/law. Disagreeing with the man over cows suing farmers doesn't mean he shouldn't be allowed to do what he does well, watch over the regulatory process.

Aaron, I'm sorry, but you really do not understand the legal situation. Later decisions, especially Casey, have codified and solidified the supposed meaning of Roe. There is very little variation on abortion law from state to state because of the plethora of federal precedents arising from Roe. The only variations concern things like parental consent and various hoops abortionists have to jump through before committing abortions--for example, attesting that an abortion is required for a woman's "health," which must include psychological "health." I don't think you really have studied the legal situation. There are no states in which abortions can be banned at particular stages of development and no states where even actual physical damage to the mother's physical health can be required in practice, because of Doe v. Bolton.

As to what is needed to overturn Roe, Doe, and all their offspring, I don't know if it will ever happen, but the Frum approach will guarantee that it doesn't.

KH, even Frum admits the relevance of Sunstein's position to animal rights, because of his regulatory powers. Frum just thinks he's no radical but rather "careful."