Imagine me sighing in relief 🙂

Your’e singing to the choir Macedona74. Of course I’ve read Hayek and company. I’ve read Burke too.

And you don’t find uncritical acceptance of Republican policies here. “Conservativism” is used to draw a distinction between Classical Liberal ideas and the policies of the Republican Party. For the same reason the term “capitalism” is avoided for the most part. First of all the term originated with Marx; secondly it obscures the moral dimension of a market economy. I, and many commentators here, prefer “free markets” instead.

Again, “conservative” does not mean Republican. Note too we publish Srdja Trifkovic here on occasion, probably one of the fiercest critics of American expansionist policy writing today.

For the record, your critique of neo-conservatives is on the mark. Buchanan’s dismissal is largely correct: they are misplaced former Troskyites.

Father Hans – If we want a true view of Captialism then we need to read the likes of F.A. Hayek, Von Mises, and Bastiat. All of these men laugh at the concept of conservatives being capitalists. They equate both the liberal and the coservative to statist/socialists.

Please tell me you’ve read “The Road to Serfdom” ?? Of all the books on these websites, if there’s none from “the Austrians” we HAVE NOT done the right thing and we need to step back before we comment further on Capitalism and Morality in Capitalism.

Father Hans: The Patriot Act, Pre-emptive military intervention without the approval of US Congress (executive orders), Hoover’s New Deal, the Bailout, the biggest expantion of medicare in US History, – these are all socialist policies and all were undertaken by so-called conservtive Republicans. Grant it, socialism/statism’s grand master was Woodrow Wilson with the 16th Amendment and the Federal Reserve or even now Obama with his views – but Conservative Republicans haven’t been immune.

If ancient patterns teach anything, it is that there were essentially only three modes of community existence:

1. Those that lived off the land in a specific geographical area, whose size varied along with populaton, and defended its borders.

2. Those who lived by raiding the foregoing in a military or other threat-of-force coercive way.

3. Those migrant who followed prey animals around seasonally, attacking and defending minimally as opportunity or defense need arose.

Our problem is that those who lead the strategically named ‘progressive’ efforts posess the sentiment of the second group, while those who think like ‘the good samaritan’ in the Gospel support ‘Progressive’ talk owing to a trusting nature, the ‘good sounding’ name ‘Progressive’ and a bit of an uncritical look at who they allow to lead.

Current ‘Conservatives’ would do well to examine whether that name is an accurate characterization of the sentiments that motivate them. I don’t have the answer but I’m liking words generally closer to ‘Sustainable’. Some may correctly note that that word arises from the ‘Progressive’ community but in fact it is quite the ‘trojan horse’ for the rapacious leadership among them, as ‘Sustainability’ presupposes ‘lack of collapse’, presupposes ‘not living beyond means’, presupposes ‘not using someone else’s effort to look after what you can look after yourself’, presupposes honesty, fair dealing, etc. etc.

No, I am saying I am having a hard time seeing how a conservative can be a socialist. Do you have any examples?

State control of economic activity whether in concert with large businesses or not has many problems from a Christian perspective. The aim of the Chrisitan life is union with Christ yet he compels nothing. Repentance is required of us if we are to enter the Kingdom, but he does not compel it.

Rapacious greed is also a problem. Unfortunately, the statist answer to greed is state appropriation–just another form of greed in my book.

Government will always be involved as long as it has the power to tax and the guns to back up collecting the tax. The question is how much and what type of involement.

The ability to own property and trade freely is a cornerstone of economic growth and stability. Since Christianity is about freedom (from death, from oppression and from our own sins), then it seems to make sense that translating that freedom into an economic approach would also require freedom, freedom to own property, to trade the work of one’s hands freely, etc. The larger the scale, the more difficult it becomes to maintain such freedom.

We are still dealing with the structural changes wrought by the industrial revolution while at the same time attempting to come to terms with the reach that our communications technology and transportation technology affords us.

We have a mixed economy (some government, some free market). We will always have a mixed economy. The difficulty and the tension arises in determining what mix is best over all and what mix is best specifically. Local management on a human scale is usually the best, but when one has a boss far away whose livelyhood is dependent upon the performance of the local management, it is hard to trust enough to allow for local control. The drive to centralize becomes almost overwhelming whether the centralization is ecclesial, economic or political. With centralization comes loss of freedom. History has shown that the more central control there is the less successful the operation and the less freedom. We can also see from history that a leveling approach does not work well. When freedom becomes license, economically or socially, chaos ensues. A true free market approach allows for correction to both extremes in an organic manner that does not rewards those who are not acting in an extreme manner.

Bureucrats don’t think well. A big for instance: the EPA is attempting to force dairy farmers to abide by the same safety regulations as those who drill and transport oil. They are doing this because milk apparently has oil in it so the EPA has the power to regulate it (oil is oil after all). Hence, the truckers who transport milk (and nothing else) are required to have a hazzardous materials certification and put hazmat stickers on their trucks (raising their vehicle taxes and insurance costs). The milk holding tanks on dairy farms and at processing plants must have the same containment protections as oil holding tanks (cost). Also the farmers and daries must file an emergency response plan with the EPA that details the procedures to be followed when there is a spill (cost). ALSO, the farmers and the dairies must train first responders to deal with the health and environmental risks associated with a milk spill (big cost). Not only do the farmers, transporters and processors incur significant extra costs (in a small margin business) even without the cost, the regulations are an oppressive use of governement power. Expect the price of milk to sky rocket because of the extra cost to produce and the smaller supply.

There is a great deal of evidence that the ability to produce and transport milk for wide scale consumption has been integral to building civilzations because of the food value that milk has. Poor people will be most adversely effected by the greater cost and more limited supply. Is that Christian?

The insanity of the EPA is what results from a state controled economy. It is not Christian to put such economic and social burdens on people, but that is what the state always does without strict limitations.

The real problem is allowing an ideological perspective take hold of our minds.

A Chrisitan approach will always encourage the development of personal abilities and the desire to put those God-given abililties to use for others. Within the broad spectrum of ecomomic philosophies and approaches called ‘capitalism’ the freedom of the person to maximize what God has given is far more prevalent than in any socialist approach.

I am not going to judge whether one has to be a capitialist to be a Christian, but I will say, it seems to be a bit easier. A life of repentance, almsgiving, prayer, fasting and worship is what it takes to be a Christian. Every socialist system ever put into practice puts legal limits or outlaws most of those activities.

Are you saying that to be ‘conservative’ one must be a capitalist?

Is the director the same ‘Curtis Bowers’ who wrote this little ditty? Seems kind of out there.