I wish that I could be a conservative.
I would love to find a group of people who are sober, careful, risk-averse, who do not rush into things, who believe in a well-ordered, well-run society.
People who truly, truly believe that tax revenue is a sacred trust, that the nature of the necessary evil of involuntary taxation means that we have to treat every one of those golden dollars as precious and be sure not to spend a penny needlessly.
People that realize that the practical and the compassionate are not only not antagonistic, they are one and the same. We are practical because we are compassionate, and want to enact our compassion in the most effective and efficient way possible. We owe each other nothing less.
People who realize that society is not merely a playground for the pursuit of pleasure, wealth, and material gain, but an interlocking series of obligations, duties, and rewards, and you cannot have the benefits without paying the necessary price and making the sacrifices. The fact that modern society demands so little of us in terms of labour and effort should not cause us to think everything in life should be free of charge as well. The fact that all the wonders of the modern age come to us without our having to do a thing besides pay our taxes should not cause us to think, naively, that only we could get rid of those taxes, why, everything would be perfect. You have duties as well as rights.
People who take governance seriously. People who realize that society needs rules and these rules need to be enforced, for the betterment of all, and this does not end when you enter the world of high finance, corporations, billions of dollars, and the lives and jobs of millions of people, and the products they use. If anything, this realm needs more regulation than the rest of society, not less, as the stakes are so much higher and the rewards for malfeasance so much larger.
People who realize that corruption is an eternal, enduring, and implacable threat, and that because the crooks and con artists never stop trying to figure out a way to just break open the piggy bank and take what they want, we have to be just as inventive in thinking of ways to stop them. And that the most dangerous crooks wear suits and fly around in private jets and do everything in their power to look like pillars of society while they rifle through the treasury and make off with anything that isn’t nailed down hard enough.
People who realize that a free society is always perched precariously between the forces of fascism and anarchy and that neither side can be allowed to run rampant. Moderation, sober second thought, and careful consideration are not merely good ideas, they’re vital.
People who realize that the smart solution is often not the one with the most sex appeal or excitement. It’s often a compromise, and therefore does not make anyone entirely happy.
People who realize that when it comes to government, it’s quality, not quantity that matters. There’s no idea size. There’s just good government, or bad.
Anyone know where I can find conservatives like this?
Because from what I can tell. they don’t exist.
