Author Archives: Ron Lipsman

The High Tide of American Conservatism

Since the dawn of the 20th century, the United States has experienced four presidential elections in which a true liberal squared off against a true conservative. These elections took place in 1900 (McKinley-Bryan), 1920 (Harding-Cox), 1980 (Reagan-Carter) and 1984 (Reagan-Mondale). With one exception, every other presidential election between 1904 and 2008 pitted a liberal Democrat[1] against a Republican who could at best be described as centrist, but more often than not would be more accurately characterized as a big-government, moderate progressive with few real conservative or libertarian inclinations. Of the Republican bunch, T. Roosevelt, Hoover, Nixon and the Bushes were (as I have labeled them elsewhere[2]) faux conservatives who expanded the size and scope of the Federal Government in ways that surely would have appalled Thomas Jefferson.[3] Such an appellation, that is, faux conservative, also suits all of the past century’s unsuccessful Republican candidates – from McCain and Dole back to Dewey and Wilkie. The only legitimately conservative Republican presidential candidates in the last 110 years, beside the successful ones named above, were Coolidge and Goldwater.

The sole exception to all of the above, that is, the only time that two conservative candidates faced off, occurred in 1924 when the incumbent Republican president, Calvin Coolidge, took on the last conservative nominated by the Democratic Party, John W. Davis. The story of that election and the men who contested it is told in a fascinating new book, The High Tide of American Conservatism by Garland S. Tucker, III. As Tucker details conclusively, both men were bedrock conservatives, with deeply held convictions. Tucker briefly describes the post-bellum United States (1865-1900) as one of unbridled conservative philosophy. It heralded the unparalleled blooming of the most prosperous, powerful, dynamic and self-confident nation in modern world history as the US adhered faithfully to the laissez-faire, individual freedom, limited government model laid down by the Founders. Tucker explains how it was the young Republican Party that motivated and steered this development; he points out that in that era, the Democrats elected only one president, Grover Cleveland, and he was as conservative as any Republican of the time.

Matters began to change as the progressive movement – whose basic philosophy has deep European roots in Marxian socialism[4] – began to take hold in the American electorate, and especially in the Democratic Party. Their nomination of William Jennings Bryan three times was rather dramatic testimony to that fact, but the movement gained presidential power for the first time only with the ascension of Teddy Roosevelt to the office upon McKinley’s assassination. It erupted in full bloom with the election of Woodrow Wilson in 1912, an election in which more than 95% of the total vote went to progressive candidates (Wilson, Taft, Roosevelt). However, in a reaction that would be duplicated several times over the coming century, the people were horrified by the excesses of the progressives, and they through them out of power in 1920. Harding and the Republicans returned the nation to its conservative roots. But Harding died in office and Calvin Coolidge ascended to the presidency. Not surprisingly, he secured the Republican nomination in 1924. And then, through a confluence of coincidences, which – as Tucker describes – revolved around Prohibition, the KKK and the League of Nations, the Democrats, at the conclusion of a hopelessly deadlocked convention – nominated a true conservative to oppose Coolidge, John W. Davis. They would never do that again.

Tucker devotes most of his book to the two men – Coolidge and Davis – and the decade (the Roaring Twenties) in which their contest occurred. Eighty seven years later, it makes for fascinating reading. Tucker has a fluid and engaging style. His prose is crisp and enlightening. His research is thorough and as one pours through the pages, one cannot help but be transported back to the Coolidge family farm in Vermont or the Clarksburg, W.VA home of Davis. Both men’s origins were in small town America and their progress through the American landscape to the pinnacles of political power trace somewhat similar paths: Coolidge’s puritanical, agrarian youth, then a stint at Amherst College, followed by a Massachusetts law practice and eventually local and national politics; Davis’ large and loving family, his formative years at Washington and Lee College, followed by a varied law practice in Clarksburg and then also into politics. Furthermore, the men’s personas were also remarkably similar in many ways: humble, gracious, unfailingly polite, solicitous of others, men of great integrity and above all, of a Jeffersonian liberal persuasion – meant in the classic 18-19th century sense of the term. Tucker writes of them with affection and the reader is hard pressed not to admire both men. The book provides an unusual glimpse into the America of four score and seven years ago and is well worth the read.

But I have one major quibble with Tucker. He highlights the fact that the 1924 election did not at all spell the death knell of American progressivism. In particular, he describes at some length the third party candidacy of Robert La Follette who ran on the Progressive Party ticket. Tucker acknowledges that, although La Follette did poorly in the vote total, he commanded a passionate following. Tucker goes further and asserts that one of the prime consequences of the campaign was the acceptance by the Democrats of the progressive program and its ultimate rejection by the Republicans. He claims that in the years following the 1924 election, the Democrats became the party of liberals (or progressives) and the Republicans became the party of conservatives.

While La Follette’s 1924 run for the presidency fell short, it was a transformational event in American political history. The major party realignment marked by the 1924 election was significantly influenced by the La Follette candidacy. Progressive Republicans were shaken loose from their historical party moorings of more than a generation and ultimately found a home in the Democratic Party, which turned away from its Jeffersonian roots in the years following 1924. As the victorious Republicans held steady on a conservative course, the Bryan Democrats determined to guide their party leftward to claim the progressive banner.

That quote is as close as Tucker comes to explicitly claiming it, but it is clear from many other portions of the book that he believes that the election of 1924 solidified the role of the two parties in the American political future:

Since 1924, the Republican Party has generally been the conservative party while the Democratic Party has not even seriously considered nominating a conservative candidate…By 1924, progressivism was still a nonpartisan issue, with both of the major parties having sizeable progressive wings…After 1924, the Republicans remained on a rightward course, while the Democrats steered leftward; and there has been no major realignment since. The philosophy of La Follette and the Progressives was essentially that of Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, and now Obama, and the twenty-first century Democratic Party, while the philosophy of Davis and Coolidge was essentially that of Reagan and the twenty first century Republican Party. [And finally, as Fred Barnes sums up in the Introduction:] The 1924 race also foreshadowed the political struggle between an increasingly conservative Republican Party and an unflinchingly liberal Democratic party that has endured ever since

In short, it is Tucker’s thesis that after 1924 – and as a consequence of what transpired in that election, the Democratic Party became and remains the party exclusively of the left or liberal philosophy and the Republican Party became and remains the party exclusively of the right and conservative philosophy. In this he is, alas, only half right. While the Democratic Party certainly, increasingly became – and today almost exclusively remains – the party of the Left, the Republican Party has hardly followed the contrapositive path. The litany of Republican presidential candidates that I recited in the opening paragraph should serve as proof of that observation.

In some sense, American politics in the eighty years from 1928 until 2008 has not been a fair fight. Not only did the progressive movement come to completely dominate the Democratic Party, but as has been amply documented, it also dominates the media, the educational establishment, the legal profession, government bureaucracy, unions and the major foundations. Conservatism in America was, if not dead, then totally dormant for a generation following Coolidge until it was revived by Bill Buckley (and a few others) in the 1950s. Since then it has made agonizingly slow and fitful progress in trying to achieve equal status with the liberal, progressive movement. True, it has won a few presidential (1980, 1984) and congressional (1994, 2010) elections. But it is absolutely false to assert that the conservative movement took control of the Republican Party in any way similar to how the progressive movement captured the Democratic Party. There are some recent signs that this might be happening at last. Time will tell. But Tucker’s assertion that the election of 1924 cemented the Republican Party as the party of conservatism in America is unfortunately and patently untrue.

That quibble aside, the book could serve as an excellent introduction to the vast majority of Americans who, if they were taught anything about the era, have learned that Harding was a crook, Coolidge was an obscure, insignificant lightweight and the conservative policies of the Harding-Coolidge administration caused the Great Depression – from which the progressive movement in the person of FDR rescued the country. Three quarters of a century later we are slowly uncovering the truth – all of this narrative is a pack of lies that has abetted the hijacking of the Founders’ country by the progressive movement. Tucker’s book is one of many (e.g., that of Amity Shlaes, The Forgotten Man) that is helping to set the record straight.

This review also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

[1] Except that some considered the Democratic nominee in 1904, Alton B. Parker, to be conservative.

[2] See e.g., my book Liberal Hearts and Conservative Brains, http://home.comcast.net/~ronlipsman/index.html

[3] Eisenhower was a centrist who made absolutely no effort to roll back FDR’s New Deal.

[4] It also borrowed heavily from Italian Fascism, as is explained in Jonah Goldberg’s book Liberal Fascism.

Three Cheers for Barak

Ehud Barak, former Prime Minister, current Defense Minister and head of the Israeli Labor Party quit his own party on Monday (1/17/11). He formed a new “centrist” party (called Independence) and left the already decaying Labor Party in complete disarray. In a sentiment that is reverberating throughout Israel, the Wall Street Journal reported:

Labor dominated Israeli politics for the country’s first three decades, producing a string of prime ministers that included Israel’s founding father, David Ben-Gurion, and the slain prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin. Mr. Barak briefly served as prime minister in 1999 and 2000.

But in recent years, Labor has been reduced to a midsize party, with just 13 seats in the current parliament. Many party members hold Mr. Barak responsible for the party’s demise, and accuse him of abandoning its socialist and dovish ideals to remain in power.

Yohanan Plesner, an [Israeli] lawmaker, said it was a sad day for Israel. ‘This is the day the Labor Party was buried for good,’ he said.

Not at all! It is a great day for Israel and for the West. It represents another nail in the coffin of the statist, leftist, progressive movement that brought so much damage to Western Civilization in the 20th century.

For several generations, the socialists who founded and ran the Labor Party completely dominated Israeli politics. They managed to take a country with arguably the greatest concentration of brain power, creativity and potential entrepreneurship and mire it in a collectivist funk. It is only in the last generation, during which the Israeli economy, having at last been freed from the shackles imposed largely by the Labor Party, has soared in a frenzy of free market activity.

Ehud Barak is the author of several efforts at blatant appeasement of Israel’s Arab enemies, and for that he is no hero in my book. But if the action he just took results in the further marginalization, demoralization and delegitimization of the Left in Israel, then he may yet be recorded as a hero of the Jewish people.
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This post also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

A Warning to America from a British Lover of Freedom

Imagine that your grandfather was one of the greatest tycoons of his day. Through a combination of ingenuity, courage, competitiveness and devotion to principle, he created a new product, which revolutionized an entire industry. Then he proceeded to lead that industry to world-wide prominence. The wealth, prosperity and employment that he created were the envy of the world. His example was emulated and others were able to approximate his success – although never to the degree that characterized your grandfather’s achievements.

But your grandfather’s magnificent success was also the source of bitterness, resentment and contempt among those who believed that the fruits of his endeavors were unevenly distributed among the people in his industry. These malcontents hatched plans to bring down your grandfather’s empire – either overtly by a frontal assault or, if that failed, then covertly by undermining the people’s faith in the soundness of your grandfather’s ideas and methods.

Eventually, your father inherited a thriving business; but he did not inherit the wisdom, tenacity, fidelity and courage of his father. Slowly but surely, the plotters undercut the beliefs – not so much of the rank and file – but rather of the leadership who ran the business, so that by the time your father passed the company to you, it was a mere shadow of what your grandfather had created.

However, your grandfather had another son who left the company to start one of his own. And that son was blessed with all of your grandfather’s salutary traits – perhaps even more so. He founded a company whose success eclipsed even that of your grandfather’s. But alas, eventually, he and his company began to fall prey to the same forces that afflicted your company. Now, as your uncle hands his business off to his son, it is your task to educate your cousin as to what happened to your company, and what is in store for his. It might be too late to rescue your business, but you suspect that there is still time for your cousin – if he will recognize the forces arrayed against him and change course appropriately.

In this allegorical story, you, gentle reader, are Daniel Hannan, a British journalist and writer who achieved notoriety by excoriating his own Prime Minister on the floor of the European Parliament. Your grandfather is 19th century England and your father is 20th century England. The talented son (your uncle) is 20th century America and your cousin is the America of today. Hannan took up the cause of warning his cousin in his recent book The New Road to Serfdom: A Letter of Warning to America. In it he explains the nature of the virus that felled Great Britain, and more generally, Western Europe. He wistfully points out the manifestations of the same virus that are present now in the United States and explains carefully how the virus, if left unchecked, will kill us exactly as it has killed the host across the Atlantic Ocean.

The last chapter of Hannan’s book is entitled Where British Liberties Thrive. By that Hannan is of course referring to America. It is barely taught in school any longer, but there is no question that the American Republic derives virtually all of its founding ideas from the concepts of liberty developed by British and Scottish lovers of freedom in the eighteenth century (and earlier). The idea of a society structured to maximize individual liberty and the rule of law, ensured by a limited government that derives its powers from the consent of the governed was born and nurtured in the British Isles and transported to America with the colonists in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are the fullest expression of the seminal idea of British liberty. The implementation in Britain of those original concepts made that country the freest, most prosperous and civilized nation in the world for 300 years. But about a century ago, the Brits began to lose faith in their own ideals. In many ways they held on for another 40-50 years, but the blatantly socialist experiment upon which they embarked following World War II heralded the death of British liberty and glory. America picked up the torch 235 years ago and has been the leading exponent of British liberty for at least a century. But now, alas, we are threatened with the same malady that brought low our British cousins. Hannan sees this clearly and takes up his pen in order to alert us to what has happened to his beloved country and what is in store for us if we follow the same path.

Hannan follows in a line of eminent British historians and politicians who have sung the praises of British liberty, applauded America’s achievement in bringing said liberty to an even higher level and who have encouraged us to stay the course. I am thinking of Andrew Roberts, Paul Johnson, Margaret Thatcher and of course Winston Churchill. Hannan’s book, whose title channels that of the Austrian philosopher/economist, Friedrich Hayek, is short, powerfully argued and specific in its predictions. The analysis is sharp, incisive and to my thinking absolutely on target. We ignore him at our peril. To illustrate, here are a few quotes from his Introduction:

American self-belief is like a force of nature, awesome and inexorable. It turned a dream of liberty into a functioning nation, and placed that nation’s flag on the moon. It drew settlers across the seas in the tens of millions, and liberated hundreds of millions more from the evils of fascism and communism. If it has occasionally led the United States into errors, they have tended to be errors of exuberance. On the whole, the world has reason to be thankful for it.

      Every visitor is struck, sooner or later, by the confidence that infuses America. It is written in people’s faces. Even the poorest immigrants rarely have the pinched look that dispossessed people wear on other continents. Instead they seem buoyant, energetic, convinced that, when they finish their night classes, they will be sitting where you sit in your suit.

…

The air of the new world can work even on the casual visitor. When I write about my own country’s politics, I am as cynical as the next world-weary Brit. But, whenever I go to Washington, I give in to the guileless enthusiasm that foreigners so often dismiss as naïveté. Like James Stewart’s character in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, I goggle reverently at the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” swelling in my mind.

At least I used to. On my most recent visit, as I stood before the statue of your third president, I fancied I heard a clanking noise. Doubtless, it was Jefferson’s shade rattling his chains in protest at what is being done to his country. The ideals for which he had fought, and which he had incorporated into the founding texts of the republic – freedom, self-reliance, limited government, the dispersal of power – are being forgotten. The characteristics that once set America apart are being eliminated. The United States is becoming just another country.

      To put it another way, the self-belief is waning. Americans, or at least their leaders, no longer seem especially proud of their national particularisms. The qualities that make America unique – from federalism to unrestricted capitalism, from jealousy about sovereignty to willingness to maintain a global military presence – now appear to make America’s spokesmen embarrassed.

      One by one, the differences are being ironed out. The United States is Europeanizing its health system its tax take, its day care, its welfare rules, its approach to global warming, its foreign policy, its federal structure, its employment rate.

…

      A hundred years ago, my country was where yours is now: a superpower, admired and resented – sometimes, in a complex way, by the same people. We understand better than most that popularity is not bought through mimicry, but through confidence. You are respected, not when you copy your detractors, but when you outperform them

      Until very recently, the United States did this very well. While it may have drawn sneers from European intellectuals, denunciation from Latin American demagogues, violence from Middle Eastern radicals, the population of all these parts of the world continued to try to migrate to the United States, and to import aspects of American culture to their own villages.

      Now, though, American self-belief is on the wane. No longer are the political structures designed by the heroes of Philadelphia automatically regarded as guarantors of liberty. America is becoming less American, by which I mean less independent, less prosperous, and less free.

      The character of the United States, more than of any country on earth, is bound up with its institutions. The U.S. Constitution was both a product and a protector of American optimism. When one is disregarded, the other dwindles.

      This book is addressed to the people of the United States on behalf of all those in other lands who, convinced patriots as they may be, nonetheless recognize that America stands for something. Your country actualizes an ideal. If you give up on that ideal, all of us will be left poorer.

The logo on the cover of Hannan’s book depicts the Statue of Liberty encased in chains. This is a metaphor for the future that he predicts for us if we are foolhardy enough to continue down the road to Euro-statism. Hannan makes a persuasive case that the Euro model of a social welfare state grounded in egalitarian utopianism, characterized by the appeasement of aggressors, massive central government, multiculturalism and anti-religious, anti-family fervor is leading Europe to ruin; and that if we continue to emulate them, our destination will be the same. This is a cousin whose advice America would be wise to take very seriously.
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This post also appeared in The Land of the Free at

http://www.thelandofthefree.net/conservativeopinion/2011/01/19/a-warning-to-america-from-a-british-lover-of-freedom/

21st Century University Students

In an article in The American Thinker in fall 2009, I described the difficulties that a professor with conservative views encounters on American campuses. For example, during eleven years in a senior administrative position, I trod the ever-present minefield of liberal dogma that thoroughly permeates the campus. Since that time, I stepped down from my administrative post and formally retired, but I am continuing to teach mathematics courses – largely to engineering and science majors. This fall, in my first teaching assignment in twelve years, I delivered a post-calculus course to approximately 200 sophomores and juniors. My goal here is to describe the nature of today’s students – at least as represented by the two hundred with whom I interacted, point out some differences from students in the 1990s and earlier, reflect on how the differences mirror societal changes, and finally to speculate on the implications these differences portend for the nation.

Here are the salient characteristics that I see in today’s university students, together with an indication of how their attitude/behavior differs from those of previous generations.

  • Despite a great diversity in race, sex and ethnic origin, there is a remarkable consistency in how students approach problem solving, differentiate what they think is important from what they see as trivial, and also how they interact with each other and with the faculty member. This consistency was highlighted by almost unbelievable similarities that I saw in their exam papers: almost all make the exact same mistakes, concentrate their study on the same right – or wrong – topics, and ask questions that reveal a scarily uniform train of thought. This is of course an exaggeration, but there were times when I wondered whether they were all cloned from a common model. Certainly, the diversity of thought and behavior was far greater among students in previous generations.
  • Related, but not identical, was a lack of creativity and originality that I observed. This was surprising because in terms of academic performance, the students were strong. The university has been working diligently for more than 20 years to upgrade the quality of the student body. And as far as I can tell, it has succeeded. The scores on my exams – the level of which was comparable to those I administered 15 years ago – were higher. But the students achieved the higher scores by careful attention to method, lots of studying, working collaboratively when appropriate, memorization of technique and by dint, perhaps, of a higher level of innate intelligence. What I didn’t see was the unusual student who solved a problem by a clever, innovative method, distinct from the procedures learned from me or the text. Average performance might have been lower a generation ago, but I rarely failed to see a clever solution (by an unexpected method) on at least one student’s paper for each exam. Not today!
  • Also related, but distinct from the previous two points, I saw few (if any) students whose prime objective in the course was to learn well a distinctive branch of mathematics. In the past I always encountered students – not always the best – who seemed to enjoy learning a new mathematical subject and who would approach me for suggestions on what they could do (beyond class) to enhance their knowledge of the subject. I saw none of that this past fall. The prime goal, even for the best students, seemed to be to earn the highest grade possible and their entire approach to the course was in pursuit of that objective. Getting good grades was always important, but for today’s students it seems to be the only objective. In a related vein, one senses that they are at the university primarily to collect a degree – which they see as a ticket to a job or a graduate program – and little attention is paid to the accumulation of knowledge, wisdom or moral values.
  • On the plus side, my students were virtually always well-behaved, respectful, polite and pleasant to interact with in person. This was a welcome change from some of the surly and immature behavior that I too often witnessed (admittedly decreasingly) over the years from the 60s to the 90s.
  • In a somewhat similar, but definitely less encouraging spirit, I found today’s students too deferential. They seem to have too much respect for authority. They never challenged anything I said, questioned my judgment or doubted that I was an oracle dispensing the concrete pieces of information that they required. I sense that they are used to being told what to do by their superiors, that they rarely question the content of the “wisdom” that their elders supply, but rather they are programmed to believe what they are told and to follow orders. I might be overstating this but there was not an iconoclast in the bunch.
  • Finally, twelve years ago, students didn’t send emails to faculty. Now they have no hesitation whatsoever. And they send the most outrageous messages. They whine about missing quizzes because of illness and demand a makeup, plead for advance information on upcoming exams and demand redress for their poor and undeserved fate on exams. They don’t complain about the syllabus, my teaching style, the amount of material to be covered – only about exams and their grade. But as we shall see below, this is completely consistent with what I described above.

The changes in student attitudes and behavior are not accidental. Today’s university students are a product of a government school system, which teaches them that modern society (including its political, economic and even its cultural components) is too complex to be understood by the average citizen and its direction must be entrusted to professionals and experts. They are taught according to an increasingly uniform national curriculum that belittles non-conformity and drums into their heads the primacy of multiculturalism, global climate change, egalitarianism, central planning, secularism and the illegitimacy of any exceptionalism – American or otherwise. Finally, they are imbued with the idea that their highest objective should be to get credentialed and connected so that they can enter the Ruling Class so aptly described by Angelo Cordevilla in the American Spectator last summer. They are also a product of a society that reinforces the baneful lessons they are taught in school; a society in which: lack of feasance to the prevailing wisdom is punished by marginalization and scorn; morals are relative and no value system is more worthy than any other; deference to professional authority is encouraged and individual curiosity, initiative and responsibility is demeaned; and respect is due to those who help one to gain entry to the Ruling Class, while contempt is reserved for those who stand in one’s way.

It does not augur well. While I suspect that many of today’s students will make good managers, bureaucrats and competent engineers and scientists, I wonder how many Mark Zuckerbergs or Sergei Brins we shall produce.

Compared to the unkempt, undisciplined and unruly students that I taught 35 years ago, today’s students are a delight – hard-working, self-disciplined and pleasant. But unfortunately also a bit boring and predictable, except when they are tenaciously arguing for a higher grade. Two hundred more will arrive at my lectern at the end of January. I am trying to decide whether to supply them with the link to this article.
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This article also apperared in The Intellectual Conservative at

Both Sides are Right about the Tax Deal; and What that Portends

Since the passage of the “bipartisan” tax deal to extend the Bush tax cuts, the Republican Party has engaged in an argument with itself over the wisdom of what was enacted. Those on the more conservative side of the ledger argue that while the preservation of the current tax rates was absolutely imperative, the Republicans in Congress paid far too high a price to achieve that objective. They cite:

  • The plethora of liberal goodies that Obama extracted as the price – extension of unemployment benefits, continuation of various targeted tax cuts and credits that do little but enrich the coffers of Democratic supporters, and the seemingly worthwhile but actually temporary and phony stimulus of a reduction in the payroll tax.
  • The fact that the preservation of the Bush rates is again temporary – and at two years, ridiculously short – leaving continued uncertainty in the business community and the public in general about the future of tax policy in the nation.
  • And most seriously, the lack of any corresponding spending reductions that would help to pay for the legislation and more importantly set the government on the path to fiscal responsibility as demanded by the voters on November 2.

Moreover, say conservative critics of the deal, we could have secured far better legislation if we had waited until the new Congress was seated. In fact, given that Obama had already acceded to the argument that not extending the rates would have brought renewed calamity to the economy, he would have had no choice but to go along with whatever the new Congress proposed, regardless that it would have addressed some or all of the criticisms just enumerated. Conservative, i.e., Tea Party critics of the bipartisan deal complain that it represents a sellout by the Republican Party to the big government mentality that continues to govern the nation and reveals that the GOP has learned little from the fundamental lesson that the voters offered up in the last election.

The “establishment” wing of the Republican Party is having none of this. According to the Mitch McConnells of the GOP, this was a huge victory for Republicans and conservatives. According to their reading of November’s Tea leaves, the prime directive was to forestall any tax increase on any Americans. Therefore, they were determined to ensure that the current rates would be preserved for everyone. They claimed – correctly – that a tax increase on so-called wealthy Americans would impact a large percentage of America’s small business community and consequently inhibit job creation and prolong, if not exacerbate, the unemployment situation in the country. Virtually any price that Obama exacted to secure the continuation of the Bush rates, for however long, was a price worth paying. The liberals’ silly targeted tax credits, extension of unemployment benefits, etc. were small potatoes compared to the critical goal of extending the current tax rates for all.

Both arguments are logical, convincing and easily defended. Moreover, the underlying rationale for either argument emanates from the right side of the political spectrum. Demanding spending cuts and fiscal restraint is as conservative as it gets. But so is the plea for low taxes and job creation, as is the fight against progressive taxation. Thus in some sense, both sides are “right” in their arguments.

So should conservatives be celebrating the deal or ruing the day that it was struck? I believe the answer lies in what conservatives believe to be the current political and economic status of the country, how one measures the degree to which the ongoing progressive onslaught has altered our nation and how radical a course correction one believes is required in order to right the ship of state. Much has been written – from Codevilla’s The Ruling Class to DeMint’s Saving Freedom to Levin’s Liberty and Tyranny – arguing that the political and economic nature of our nation has been radically altered over the last century. According to those arguments, we are no longer a Constitutional republic whose fundamental values are based upon individual liberty, free enterprise, American exceptionalism and Judeo-Christian culture. We are now much closer to a Euro-style, social welfare state in which feasance to the Constitution has been replaced by dependency on big government to satisfy our needs and desires. If one accepts Codevila’s thesis that the Democratic Party is the engine that drives the transformation, abetted by a compliant Republican Party whose leaders aspire to no more than to be admitted to the board rooms of power that administer the social welfare state, then clearly the tax deal represents yet another step down the road to serfdom – even if only a halting and ambiguous baby step. But if one rejects that argument, and instead sees the political landscape comprising a true oscillation between conservative and liberal advances and retreats, not reflecting a persistent, overwhelming advance by progressives, then the tax deal is a small victory for conservatives and should be celebrated.

If the latter are right, we should expect little in the way of fundamental change in the next two plus years. Obama’s natural, hard left inclinations will be held in check to some extent and then who knows what will ensue in 2012? It depends on who is elected president. But the country will continue to bounce back and forth – indulging its equally strong impulses to conserve and liberalize, and while conservatives have the upper hand, they should achieve what they can.

But if Codevilla is right, and we do not initiate a Constitutional revolution in the nation, to wit:

  • drastically, broadly and permanently cut the size and scope of government;
  • overthrow the unholy alliance between the mainstream media, public sector unions, government bureaucrats, crony capitalists and multiculturalists that have and continue to push America to the left;
  • restore a Constitutional republic in which a limited government serves the interests of the people rather than rules them according to elitist ideals;

then we are doomed to complete the progressive trajectory to utopian socialism, second class status as a nation, enforced egalitarian poverty and loss of freedom.

Which side of the argument are you on?
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This article also appeared in The Land of the Free at