The Great Debate – Redux
So, true to form, there were problems hooking the discussion up via Blog Talk Radio, but Dan, Conor, and I gave Skype another whirl and managed not just to get through over an hour of conversation, but also had a really great and spirited dialogue.
Dan and Conor were really great about rolling with the technological punches and really engaged one another on a variety of topics. It’s an hour well spent. My favourite moment? Dan’s explanation about the God box. If that teaser isn’t reason to sit and listen to the whole thing I don’t know what is.
My apologies for not communicating that the discussion wasn’t going to be live, such are the perils of part-time unpaid blogging. Again, if you would like to post follow up questions, feel free to do so here and Conor and Dan can answer if/when they the time to do so.
Update: argh, problems with the file embedding, have tried a new format.
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28 comments
Doesn’t work for me. The link I mean.
Fixed.
Thanks Scott.
Dan’s first principle seems to be “let the people decide.” Who can argue with that? The people have spoken since the inception of this country, and I am taking a very long and broad view here. The people have voted for government growth. Any reading of American history shows it. So the conservatism Dan wishes has always existed – if his position is “let the people decide.” Clearly, Dan is unhappy with some of the policies the people have chosen. That’s politics, but that’s conservatism as defined by Dan.
Bob,
Sorry but you’re answer strikes me as incredibly naive. The “people” don’t vote on policy, they vote for an individual during a process durng which specific policies are often hard to discern, or subject to change. Obama was going to end the war, he talked tax cuts, not hikes – and if he had campaigned promising to increase the future debt as is has done and continues to grow even more – he wouldn’t have won. Perhaps you might want to give your position some thought,particularly as it makes no sense. In CA people voted against gay marriage, they vote against taxes, yet judges often get the final say. You are visiting from America, I assume.
Bob
June 16th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Dan,
Nothing to be sorry about. Election after election voters send representatives to governments, governments at all levels, and the trend is for more government, not less. Is this trend disturbed on occasion? Sure. But over time the trend is absolutely there. Can you point to a period in U.S. history where government did not become bigger? Less intrusive?
But did I misunderstand your position? That is, “let the people decide” So is your argument that the governments since the Constitution was established have been unrepresented, in some sense illegitimate?
“You are visiting from America, I assume.” Okay buddy you forced my hand, you’re not to bright.
“you’re not to bright”
Oh, thank you, Bob. Bright or not, there is certainly much more depth of thought behind what I’m stating, as opposed to your silly talking point. As government grows, obviously it needs to increase revenues – it most often does that by increasing taxes and fees. How many people do you know that can’t wait to run and out vote for that?
Have you any idea what proportion of the pop. is even taxed anymore, and what percent effectively isn’t at the Federal level.
And what percent of the population even votes at all, or has any genuine appreciation for what the full details of this or that policy are?
Do you understand the consequences of that? Do you have any concept for a solution? It seems to me that you just can’t, or don’t care to think that hard. Are you really just happy to cruise along to whatever place certain politicans take this great nation, while you mouth silly platitudes, that, “the people voted,” after all.
I doubt it, as you tried to turn a rather substantive discussion of ideology that ultimately informs policy into a most superficial political argument.
FYI – Sorry if I don’t make it back, but do carry on, chief.
Bob
June 16th, 2009 at 6:13 pm
When I was doing my student teaching my cooperating teacher spoke to me of an “intolerable combination.”
For him it was stupidity and bad manners. I see this intolerable combination in you. Bye-Bye.
I think it’s somewhat intellectually dishonest to claim
“The people have voted for government growth.”
Government growth is merely an unfortunate byproduct of political expediency. Dan is right in noting the indirect nature of “voting on policy” and the ignorance (non-perjorative) and engagement level of voters.
For example, polticians, campaigning on equal rights for women, were voted into office so they could introduce legislation such as that which allows protected maternity leave in our labor laws. This, of course, has been statistically proven for women to be LESS likely to be hired due to employer concerns of productivity and liability.
What people voted for was equality, or more accurately, freedom from discrimination… it would be intellectually dishonest to claim people “voted for less freedom” just because this was the result.
The same is true for government growth: people vote for those who would cut government growth, and those politicians attempt to meet these ends by creating new oversight bodies and watchdog bureaucracies which exacerbate the very problem they were created to combat.
This is a fundamental tenet of conservative understanding: attempting to legislate liberty results in, at best, egalitarianism, and at worst tyranny, BOTH of which are contrary to freedom.
Bob
June 16th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
If you wish to jettison representative government for direct democracy that is a legitimate position to advocate. But to assert that our national government does not represent voters is unhistorical. Please provide some examples. If your main point is that voters sometimes make flawed decisions, I agree.
Jaybird
June 16th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
“But to assert that our national government does not represent voters is unhistorical.”
How about medicinal marijuana? Despite the States making it legal (without exception, whenever it’s been put up for a vote, I believe), the Feds still prosecute.
Bob
June 16th, 2009 at 8:53 pm
The Feds are enforcing drug laws passed by a lawfully elected representatives and signed by lawfully elected presidents. Or perhaps federal agencies are interpreting laws that they see as prohibiting medical marijuana. In any case laws exist that courts see as making such prohibitions legal.
Now the question is one of Federalism. Historically courts tend to favor federal statutes over state statutes. If federal drug laws are constitutional then they trump state regulations. Voters and political parties are free to work for change. But as things now stand laws passed under the Constitution are favored over state law.
I certainly think that states should be allowed to pass such laws but federal law need to be changed first.
Captain Obvious
June 17th, 2009 at 4:07 am
“But to assert that our national government does not represent voters is unhistorical”
This is wrong. If you were to ask whether or not the national government historically represented voters, the answer would be “mu”. No such boolean answer exists. I did not make that assertion, nor did I posit direct democracy. Public desire to protect animals is reflected in technically unconstitutional but generally accepted federal animal cruelty laws… public desire to deport illegal aliens is not reflected in passed bills granting benefits and amnesties.
In the previous post, I just provided two examples. Voters voted, and thereby instructed legislators to represent them by decreasing discrimination against women in the workplace… and the result was an increase in discrimination. Voters voted, and thereby instructed legislators to contain bureaucratic expansion… and the result was an increase in bureaucracy. The ONLY point I am making is that you should not confuse actual results as identically correlative to voter intention. But to belabor the obvious, they are not reliably inversely related either.
BTW, from what I can tell the Feds are ignoring this issue by-and-large.
Dan is terrific.
Conor needs to cut the valley girl “up talk”. Drives me nuts.
Arggghhh! I listened but it cut off 16 minutes in.
Scott H. Payne
June 17th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Strange, it seems to be working fine for me.
Probably some stupid work firewall. I thought I could listen to it while i was finishing a very long, tedious and brainless report. i’ll have to try again at home.
I really enjoyed the middle section with Dan defending Bush’s most important policy–the Iraq War–as politically necessary even though in conflict with conservative principles. And all of this in the context of demanding some kind of consistency in those who call themselves conservative.
It was especially delicious to hear his glee at having hit upon what he believes is an awesome argument in favor of the Iraq invasion: what else were we supposed to do?
Too bad Conor didn’t point out the obvious answer: continue to contain Saddam as we have mostly always done with what are considered to be dangerous dictators. 9/11 shouldn’t have given us the license to act like reactionary engorged morons.