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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   15914 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 2, 2025

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Resurfacing another old comment from @functor about Conservatism as anti-ideology. I think it's interesting to reflect back on now that we're in Trump 2.0:

Keith woods says it better than me

Conservatism as Anti-Ideology

There was much debate online recently over the political beliefs of country music singer Oliver Anthony. Anthony captured the hearts of conservatives with his “Rich Men North of Richmond”, which took aim at out of touch fatcat Yankees who have abandoned people like him. At first there was no question to conservatives, Anthony was definitely one of them. After all, he railed against welfare queens, taxes, and complained about elites not relating to regular folk. Anthony did alienate some of his newfound following when an interview of him appeared where he affirmed the “diversity is our strength” mantra. Then the first question at the first of this years Republican Party primary debates was the hosts asking the field for their interpretation of Athony’s masterpiece, to which an indignant Mr. Anthony then responded with derision for the entire field, reminding Republican partisans that these politicians were actually part of the elite he was singing about.

Still, most conservatives are not in any doubt that Oliver Anthony is one of them, and I think they’re correct. The fact that he is almost indistinguishable in his rhetoric from a Berniebro Democrat is a feature, not a bug. Neither is it a problem that the message in his song seemed inconsistent - targeting rich capitalists as the source of his problems in the same song that he complained about taxation and welfare spending. Conservatism in recent years has lost any positive content, it is now best understood as an anti-ideology, a vague, paranoid and inconsistent critique of a nebulous “elite”, the only point of which is to spread a general mistrust in whoever happens to be in power. ... Modern conservatism in the English speaking world developed out of the cadre of conservatives who formed the National Review in 1955, led by William F. Buckley. Buckley believed he had found a program to unite the two camps who dominated the right, but had been up to that point adversarial: the Burkean conservatives, led by figureheads like Russell Kirk, and the increasingly expanding camp of libertarians, who had been influenced by works like Friedrich Hayeks The Road to Serfdom. The program that would unite them was the “fusionism” of Frank Meyer, a German-Jewish immigrant to the United States who himself abandoned communism after reading Hayek’s work while serving in the US Army. Frank S. Meyer: The Fusionist as Libertarian | Mises Institute .... Since at least the 2000s, the conservatism of Reagan and Thatcher has been in retreat, while it found a resurgence with the Tea Party program during the Obama administration, this trend was swept aside by the muscular populism of Donald Trump. Since then, conservatism has lost any vestiges of whatever positive content it had remaining. Free market economics are still central to the establishment GOP politicians, but many conservatives now sound like economic populists, seeing rich capitalists as part of the same elite class as liberal politicians. While many conservatives still stand firm on abortion, there is little else in the way of the social conservatism that used to define the right: Trump was the most pro-gay US President in history, and modern conservatives are all too happy to embrace their own, based versions of “trans women” like Blair White if they affirm them back. Alex Jones asks Blaire White if "the chemicals" made her trans | Media Matters for America -... So what’s left? Well, there’s definitely a strong belief that the elites are evil - ridiculously, cartoonishly evil, to the point that they poison the water and the skies, intentionally derail trains, and start wars just to make common people suffer. There is also a strong cynicism about politics and idealism generally, not only is the conservative anti-ideological, but they are convinced everyone else is too, and that people that profess to believe in leftist ideals like egalitarianism are just cynics who don’t really believe it. As saimleuch, conservatives will often critique leftists for being inconsistent anti-racists or say things like their affirmation of trans rights is rooted in a hatred of women. Oliver Anthony engaged in some of this on his recent appearance on Joe Rogan. Rogan pointed out that Democrats in the early 90s “sounded like Nazis”, Oliver Anthony recognised the argument and immediately pointed out that Democrats like Hillary and Obama didn’t even support gay marriage in the 2000s! .. It is of course an eternal source of frustration to people on the radical right that conservatives attack the left by holding them to the moral standard the left itself has established, thus enforcing the leftist moral framework on the whole political spectrum. This seems obviously counter-productive, until you realise there is no alternative program the conservatives are advancing anyway - all that matters is getting people to share the same sense of cynicism and mistrust of power, so an accusation of racism or homophobia works as well as anything else.

https://keithwoodspub.substack.com/p/conservatism-as-anti-ideology

Conservatism lacks ideology, vision and a moral compass. At this point it is just angry ranting against cartoon vilians who are satanically evil. There is little systemic analysis instead there is an over emphasis of conspiracies. If the populist conservatives took power, they would be incapable of wielding it since their policies lack depth beyond SJWs bad but trans people with MAGA hats good. Conservatives are too negative, their entire focus is on what they dislike. Rich people bad, welfare queens bad, Klaus Schwab bad but what is good?

My life sucks, boo out group isn't really lyrics that inspire or offer novel insights. It isn't surprising that the anglosphere right has greater problems attracting young people than the right in the rest of the west. AfD, Sweden democrats and national rally do fairly well among young voters. The rather aimless right in the anglosphere fails at attracting young people and successful people. A young highly educated person is simply going to find the aesthetics and the values of mainstream conservatism boring and unappealing. It isn't a uniting message, it is a message with no vision that is anti PMC. I simply struggle to see a well travelled, highly educated person fitting in to the conservative movement at all. The right is making itself culturally toxic defenders of boomer rights.

I'll say from my perspective, this view actually seems validated after what we've seen from Trump so far. With the exception of tariffs, which are already being struck down, there's much more of an emphasis on destroying than actually building anything.

That being said, I'm generally conservative myself and weakly pro-Trump, so I'm not trying to just take cheap potshots. I genuinely think this is a huge problem the right needs to face in order to create a more compelling and useful platform for the future.

The rather aimless right in the anglosphere fails at attracting young people and successful people. A young highly educated person is simply going to find the aesthetics and the values of mainstream conservatism boring and unappealing.

True, consider the Tories in the UK and Liberals in Australia. Both are ostensibly conservative parties, both are fully committed to mass migration, the energy transition and so on. If there's one thing the Tories are 'for', it's Universal Boomer Income, the triple-lock on pensions subsidizing senescence. They promised to take control of migration, won an election victory and then raised it significantly. And they let the NGO-deep state blob run the rest of society. Hopefully the Tories dissolve entirely, nothing of value would be lost.

I think the problem with Trump is that he needs to be destructive in order to break the power of the NGO-deep state blob, in this case the judges. I was at lunch with an American law professor some time ago who was wistfully imagining a world where the Democrats decided to run on a platform so popular they'd just dare the judges to block them and if so... expand the court! Break them! He told us that he often asked his students about the consequences of their marvellous plans to use state power to achieve some goal, what if the other side got in power and used the power to their ends? Students used to realise this and come out with a renewed perspective on compromise. About a decade ago they started coming to a different conclusion: 'it'll be tough but we'll fight back and win eventually'. Restraint is for suckers. Even the professor seemed to have changed his mind on this.

The same logic applies for Trump. Deporting illegal immigrants is his big thing, he did win the election, he should probably have devoted his efforts to that rather than schizo tariff wars. Break the will of the courts on the most advantageous battlefield you can find, don't fight on unfavourable battlefields.

But as usual with Trump, his destructive energies are not tightly focused on the right targets in order of priority.

You absolutely can have a positive vision of 'safe streets', 'cheap energy' 'nation-state not economic zone' 'peace through strength' and that would be pretty popular. But without the confidence to pursue it, they're just words.

Conservatism lacks ideology, vision and a moral compass. At this point it is just angry ranting against cartoon vilians who are satanically evil.

Im sorry, but i dont see how anyone could reasonably engage with the work of current conservative thought leaders like Victor Davis Hansen or Thomas Sowell, past leaders like Limbaugh, Brietbart, and Buckley, or old lions like CS Lewis, GK Chesterton, Rudyard Kipling, Douglas, Burke, Smith, Et Al. and come away with the impression they lack "ideology, vision and a moral compass"

Thier vision may be unreasonable in your eyes, or totally at odds with core liberal beliefs, but that's not the same thing as not having one.

Ditto for current conservative-coded posters like @FCfromSSC and @Dean or past posters from the reddit/SSC/lesswrong days like Hlinka, Diesach, BarnabyCajones, Jason, or LetsStayCivilized.

Say what you will about them, but what they were not lacking in is/was ideology.

Say what you will about them, but what they were not lacking in is/was ideology.

I note you conspicuous avoid attesting to any of us having 'morality' here.

(Wink / nudge / laughing at self in good humor.)

Im sorry, but i dont see how anyone could reasonably engage with the work of current conservative thought leaders like Victor Davis Hansen or Thomas Sowell, past leaders like Limbaugh, Brietbart, and Buckley, or old lions like CS Lewis, GK Chesterton, Rudyard Kipling, Douglas, Burke, Smith, Et Al. and come away with the impression they lack "ideology, vision and a moral compass"

Those people do, certainly, but none of those people seem remotely represented by what currently calls itself the conservative movement in the United States. Limbaugh, maybe.

But if I compare MAGA to, well, Lewis, Chesterton, Kipling, Burke, or even old Adam Smith, I doubt you will find much ideological overlap, if any at all.

If I compare any political movement in it's entirety to it's top thought leaders, I get the same result.

I question to what extent those people even are thought leaders in the context of MAGA or the modern Republican base. It's hard to see Burke or Chesterton approving of the kind of reckless destabilisation that you get with Trump, no matter how far you stretch the analogy.

To my mind they're just totally different ideologies. There are always some differences between the way a movement's elite conceives of its mission and the way the masses do, but I think this is far enough that it's fair to say there is no meaningful resemblance.

Show Burke or Chesterton the system being destabilized, and I'm skeptical their conclusion would go the way you claim.

They did see that, though? I'm not sure what world you live in if you think Chesterton wasn't living through the decline and destabilisation of the systems that he thought were essential for civilised society. He explicitly thinks English society is increasingly run by a cabal of vicious, anti-human elites and is therefore sinking back into barbarism.

So I am pretty confident that he wouldn't end up like MAGA.

He did get desperate a few times - I believe he once visited Italy and said nice things about Mussolini - but on the whole, I don't see the resemblance.

He explicitly thinks English society is increasingly run by a cabal of vicious, anti-human elites and is therefore sinking back into barbarism.

When you write it out like that you make Chesterton sound positivly Trumpian.

That our institutions have been captured by a cabal of anti-human elites actively working to turn the US into a 3rd World country is arguably one of the core premises of the MAGA-right.

So I am pretty confident that he wouldn't end up like MAGA.

Could you elaborate on the specific features of MAGA that that you believe would preclude his approval?

Chesterton was a localist and a distributist - his political views strongly tend towards small government. He criticises both capitalists and socialists for concentrating property in the hands of the few who can then wield arbitrary power over individual citizens. As an ethical matter, I think Chesterton is also conspicuously opposed to bullies. He presents himself as a champion of the ordinary, no-longer-free Englishman who craves a return to ancient liberties.

I would say that MAGA involves a centralisation of power in a single office, or more properly a single man, and that man is grossly intemperate and vengeful. I'd guess that Chesterton would see Trump as akin to one of the more demagogic kings of England, vicious in his lusts, but nonetheless opposed to the suffocating bureaucratic-parliamentary class that the common man sees as a more direct enemy.

In his Short History of England, Chesterton writes that "the case for despotism is democratic". I suspect he would see Trump as a 'democratic despot' along these lines, and Chesterton's observation that "[despotism's] cruelty to the strong is kindness to the weak" might enable him to regard some of Trump's excesses with a measure of sympathy, even if the man himself remains a despot. Thus, still in Short History:

This conviction, as brilliantly expounded by Bolingbroke, had many aspects; perhaps the most practical was the point that one of the virtues of a despot is distance. It is "the little tyrant of the fields" that poisons human life. The thesis involved the truism that a good king is not only a good thing, but perhaps the best thing. But it also involved the paradox that even a bad king is a good king, for his oppression weakens the nobility and relieves the pressure on the populace. If he is a tyrant he chiefly tortures the torturers; and though Nero's murder of his own mother was hardly perhaps a gain to his soul, it was no great loss to his empire.

Naturally I do not think Chesterton would be at all sympathetic to the American left, especially as that left has become increasingly institutionalised and regulatory. I am sure he would see that as a thicket of weeds choking the natural liberty of the people. That is simple an instance of The Servile State.

So I can see Chesterton having a kind of, if not affection precisely, at least understanding of Trump, as a kind of poetic expression of the American genius. So perhaps Trump is a Nero figure - someone whose own soul is perhaps contemptible, but whose effect, insofar as it weakens America's de facto 'nobility', is good.

I am not sure how far he'd go with that in practical terms, though, because Chesterton's distributism was very much concerned with the real distribution of property, and as much as Trump has symbolically offended an elite class, he has done very little to remedy the actual concentration of property in America.

I offered via Chesterton a kind of qualified defense of despotism, but I am bound also to mention his description of the same in Heretics:

Next to a genuine republic, the most democratic thing in the world is a hereditary despotism. I mean a despotism in which there is absolutely no trace whatever of any nonsense about intellect or special fitness for the post. Rational despotism—that is, selective despotism—is always a curse to mankind, because with that you have the ordinary man misunderstood and misgoverned by some prig who has no brotherly respect for him at all. But irrational despotism is always democratic, because it is the ordinary man enthroned. The worst form of slavery is that which is called Caesarism, or the choice of some bold or brilliant man as despot because he is suitable. For that means that men choose a representative, not because he represents them, but because he does not. Men trust an ordinary man like George III or William IV. because they are themselves ordinary men and understand him. Men trust an ordinary man because they trust themselves. But men trust a great man because they do not trust themselves. And hence the worship of great men always appears in times of weakness and cowardice; we never hear of great men until the time when all other men are small.

(This leads him on to a defense of 'hereditary despotism', i.e. monarchy.)

If we interpret MAGA as a type of Caesarism, which I think is about as reasonable a comparison as is available to us, I think this gives us a look at some of Chesterton's attitudes towards that. The worship of great men always appears in times of weakness and cowardice.

If you'll pardon a long quote, one of the next passages of Heretics strikes me as particularly apposite:

Everything in our age has, when carefully examined, this fundamentally undemocratic quality. In religion and morals we should admit, in the abstract, that the sins of the educated classes were as great as, or perhaps greater than, the sins of the poor and ignorant. But in practice the great difference between the mediaeval ethics and ours is that ours concentrate attention on the sins which are the sins of the ignorant, and practically deny that the sins which are the sins of the educated are sins at all. We are always talking about the sin of intemperate drinking, because it is quite obvious that the poor have it more than the rich. But we are always denying that there is any such thing as the sin of pride, because it would be quite obvious that the rich have it more than the poor. We are always ready to make a saint or prophet of the educated man who goes into cottages to give a little kindly advice to the uneducated. But the medieval idea of a saint or prophet was something quite different. The mediaeval saint or prophet was an uneducated man who walked into grand houses to give a little kindly advice to the educated. The old tyrants had enough insolence to despoil the poor, but they had not enough insolence to preach to them. It was the gentleman who oppressed the slums; but it was the slums that admonished the gentleman. And just as we are undemocratic in faith and morals, so we are, by the very nature of our attitude in such matters, undemocratic in the tone of our practical politics. It is a sufficient proof that we are not an essentially democratic state that we are always wondering what we shall do with the poor. If we were democrats, we should be wondering what the poor will do with us. With us the governing class is always saying to itself, “What laws shall we make?” In a purely democratic state it would be always saying, “What laws can we obey?” A purely democratic state perhaps there has never been. But even the feudal ages were in practice thus far democratic, that every feudal potentate knew that any laws which he made would in all probability return upon himself. His feathers might be cut off for breaking a sumptuary law. His head might be cut off for high treason. But the modern laws are almost always laws made to affect the governed class, but not the governing. We have public-house licensing laws, but not sumptuary laws. That is to say, we have laws against the festivity and hospitality of the poor, but no laws against the festivity and hospitality of the rich. We have laws against blasphemy—that is, against a kind of coarse and offensive speaking in which nobody but a rough and obscure man would be likely to indulge. But we have no laws against heresy—that is, against the intellectual poisoning of the whole people, in which only a prosperous and prominent man would be likely to be successful. The evil of aristocracy is not that it necessarily leads to the infliction of bad things or the suffering of sad ones; the evil of aristocracy is that it places everything in the hands of a class of people who can always inflict what they can never suffer. Whether what they inflict is, in their intention, good or bad, they become equally frivolous. The case against the governing class of modern England is not in the least that it is selfish; if you like, you may call the English oligarchs too fantastically unselfish. The case against them simply is that when they legislate for all men, they always omit themselves.

I think you can trace from this the Chestertonian criticism of the academic left and the bureaucratic state, and insofar as MAGA is opposed to that, they and Chesterton have a common enemy.

But Chesterton was never good at biting his tongue and making common cause against a common enemy - to H. G. Wells' great frustration - and I can't see him joining or supporting a movement that, by his own lights, is weak and cowardly.

critique of a nebulous “elite”, the only point of which is to spread a general mistrust in whoever happens to be in power

But enough about their wise and desirable traits.

My main complaint about the other side is their unthinking reflexive trust and support for their favorite elites. Seemingly changing their opinions and values on a dime when "the science" or some cabal of would-be technocrats sends out new positions for right-thinking people to hold.

There's a level of distrustful contrarianism that is maladaptive. The opposite of stupidity is not necessarily wisdom. But conservatives are onto something vaguely distrusting our self-appointed elites. Correctly recognizing that taking orders from the vanguard of the opposition is not a good idea.

National Order Through Self-Sufficient Economic Empowerment

1. National Unity

All American citizens unite under a shared commitment to the United States, rooted in the principle of self-determination as enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. Strong families form the foundation of national unity, with policies supporting marriage and child-rearing as patriotic duties.

2. International Equality

The United States receives equal treatment in its dealings with other nations, with international agreements that undermine American sovereignty or economic interests renegotiated or abolished. Trade policies prioritize domestic family-supporting industries.

3. Economic Self-Sufficiency

Policies ensure access to resources, infrastructure, and opportunities to sustain the American people and provide for future generations, including investment in domestic industries and infrastructure. Family wage standards ensure single-income households can support multiple children, with minimum wage calculations accounting for family size.

4. Citizenship and Civic Duty

Citizenship is reserved exclusively for individuals born in the United States to parents who are U.S. citizens or legally present on an immigrant-class visa at the time of birth, and individuals naturalized in accordance with U.S. immigration laws. Citizens from larger families receive priority consideration for civic honors and appointments.

5. Exclusive Voting Rights and Public Service

Voting rights for federal, state, and local elections are reserved exclusively for U.S. citizens. All public offices and public employment positions are held exclusively by U.S. citizens. Public service positions offer enhanced family benefits and flexible arrangements for parents.

6. Economic Opportunity for Citizens

The government ensures economic opportunities and a decent standard of living for all U.S. citizens, prioritizing citizens over non-citizens when resources are insufficient. Married couples with children receive preferential hiring and advancement opportunities in government positions.

7. Immigration Reform

Immigration laws are strictly enforced, with a merit-based system prioritizing the economic and cultural interests of U.S. citizens. Illegal immigration is prevented through robust border security and enforcement of existing laws. Immigration preferences given to intact families with children who demonstrate alignment with American family values.

8. Equal Rights and Responsibilities

All citizens have equal rights and obligations under the law, as guaranteed by the Constitution. Tax obligations are adjusted based on family size, with substantial credits for married couples with children:

  • Child Tax Credits: $5,000 for first child, $7,500 for second, $10,000 for third and subsequent children (married couples only)

9. Productive Work

Every citizen contributes to society through productive work, with individual pursuits aligning with the broader interests of the nation. Raising children is recognized as productive work, with Social Security credits awarded for each child raised to adulthood. Flexible work arrangements and career re-entry programs support parents.

10. Economic Justice

Unearned income through monopolistic practices is eliminated, and debt systems that burden citizens are reformed. Excessive financial speculation and profiteering are curbed. Student loan forgiveness programs for married couples based on number of children born within marriage.

11. War Profiteering

Personal enrichment from war or national crises is prohibited, with strict penalties for profiteering during times of conflict or economic hardship. Military families with children receive additional housing allowances and educational benefits.

12. Nationalization of Key Industries

Critical industries are nationalized or strictly regulated to ensure they serve the public interest over corporate profits. Family-supporting industries receive priority status and protection.

13. Profit Sharing

Profits from large-scale commerce are equitably distributed, ensuring fair wages and economic stability for workers. Additional profit-sharing bonuses for employees with dependent children.

14. Social Security Expansion

Social Security is strengthened and expanded to provide robust support for retirees and the elderly. Parents receive additional Social Security credits based on number of children raised to adulthood. Retirement benefits increase by 10% per child for married couples.

15. Support for Small Businesses

Policies bolster the middle class by supporting small businesses, including tax incentives, low-cost leasing of commercial spaces, and preferential treatment in government contracts. Family-owned businesses receive additional tax advantages and preferential lending, with succession benefits for businesses passed to children.

16. Land and Housing Reform

Housing and land reforms ensure affordability, prevent speculative real estate practices, and provide access to property for public benefit. Pro-natal policies include:

  • Married couples receive progressive homeownership subsidies based on number of children born within the marriage (10% down payment assistance for first child, 15% for second, 20% for third)
  • Property tax reductions of 25% per child for married couples with children born of the marriage
  • Priority access to family-sized public housing for married couples with children
  • Zero-interest home improvement loans for married couples expanding homes due to children
  • "Family Formation Zones" with expedited permitting for larger single-family homes
  • Inheritance tax exemptions for family homes passed to children born within the marriage
  • Zoning laws prioritizing single-family homes, playgrounds, and community centers
  • Subsidized family vehicle programs for families with 3+ children
  • Energy and utility subsidies scaling with family size

17. Justice Against Harmful Actors

Strong measures are taken against individuals or entities whose actions harm the public good, with penalties reflecting the severity of the offense. Enhanced protections for families and children against predatory practices.

18. Legal Reform

The legal system is rooted in American constitutional principles, prioritizing justice and fairness over bureaucratic or elitist frameworks. Family courts reformed to support intact marriages and shared parenting. Marriage incentives include tax benefits increasing with marriage duration.

19. Education Reform

Quality education is accessible to all capable citizens, emphasizing practical skills, civic responsibility, and critical thinking. Funding is provided for gifted students from low-income families to pursue higher education. Pro-natal education benefits include:

  • Merit-based "Family Formation Scholarships" for top 10% performing female high school graduates who choose marriage and motherhood over immediate university enrollment, providing $50,000 grants for first child born within marriage before age 25, with additional $25,000 per subsequent child
  • Deferred university admission with full scholarships for these women after child-rearing years
  • "Motherhood Excellence Awards" providing annual stipends of $30,000 for 10 years to academically gifted women who marry and have 3+ children before age 30
  • Tuition reductions at public universities based on family size for children from intact marriages
  • Priority enrollment in quality public schools for children from larger families
  • Educational savings account contributions from the government for each child born within a marriage
  • Homeschooling support grants for married couples educating multiple children

20. Public Health and Wellness

Public health is protected by supporting families, ensuring maternal and child welfare, eliminating exploitative labor practices, and promoting physical fitness through community programs and sports initiatives. Enhanced pro-natal health policies include:

  • Comprehensive prenatal and postnatal care coverage for married couples
  • Paid parental leave extended based on number of children (12 weeks base, +4 weeks per additional child)
  • Annual health savings account contributions for each child in intact marriages
  • Free pediatric care through age 18 for families with 3+ children
  • Maternal nutrition programs and family wellness centers

21. National Defense

A strong, citizen-based national military protects U.S. sovereignty, replacing privatized military forces. Military families with children receive additional housing allowances, educational benefits, and priority base housing. Service members from larger families receive advancement preferences.

22. Media Integrity

Media outlets prioritize factual reporting and align with American interests. Foreign-owned media outlets require government approval to operate in the U.S., and content harmful to national unity or public welfare faces legal consequences. Media promoting strong family values receives tax incentives.

23. Religious Freedom

Freedom of religion is upheld for all denominations, provided they do not undermine national security or public morals. Materialistic ideologies that erode American values are rejected, emphasizing the common good over individual gain. Religious institutions supporting marriage and family formation receive enhanced tax benefits.

24. Centralized Governance with Accountability

A strong federal government enacts these principles, balanced by accountability to the people through transparent institutions and elected representatives. State and local governments align with federal laws to ensure national unity. Family impact assessments required for all new legislation.

25. Commitment to the Nation

Leaders uphold these principles, prioritizing the interests of the American people above all else, even at personal sacrifice. Political leaders with intact marriages and children receive public recognition. Government support for genealogical research and family history preservation strengthens national identity. Federal funding for local family-oriented festivals and community gatherings reinforces cultural traditions that celebrate family life.

This reminds me of the National Justice Party "25-point platform" (yeah, I get the reference) that ended with the party imploding. The Trump masses aren't much interested in this stuff, they love Trump even when he said he'd cut rich people's taxes. And that's a good thing since these ideas are mostly bad. "Minimum wage calculations accounting for family size" is just going to mean employers don't want to hire people with large families.

mostly bad

It's a 25 point plan, you can't expect all of them to be winners. You'd have to not allow employers to a ask about family size.

I’ll commend you for cleverness, inasmuch as you added enough new material/adaptation to the modern American context to the 25 points of the NSDAP to prevent them from being immediately recognizable to people who weren’t already in on the joke.

It is worth noting that the change to the first post is large, and load-bearing. The 25 points began with the union of all Germans, not all German citizens - it was a specific pledge to incorporate Austria, the Czech Sudetenland, the Polish Corridor etc. into the Reich. @AvocadoPanic could have said "All Americans" instead with the implied dog-whistle that Albertans are included, and it would have been closer to the original and still relevant to MAGA policy.

I suspect were you to ask someone, "What is an American?", you'd get worse answers than the people who don't know what a woman is.

I'd be happier with language nearer the original, a pledge based on attributes more immutable than nationality. I don't have the language to express this sentiment while also keeping with the current year America context.

I'm not clear how 'All Americans' would imply Albertans are included. I'd be happy to include many people, unfortunately more and more nationality is useless as a descriptor. Some sort of Ahnenpass would be necessary to only include Albertans with 7/8 Albertan great-grandparents.

The title was a bit of a giveaway.

The NOTSEE acronym is kind of obvious, so I suspected it was cribbed even though I've never studied the original.

You'd like a 25 point plan that outlines a positive vision for a unified nation under conservative principles?

Well, there’s definitely a strong belief that the elites are evil - ridiculously, cartoonishly evil, to the point that they poison the water and the skies, intentionally derail trains, and start wars just to make common people suffer.

That’s not just a modern American phenomenon. If you screw people over long enough they will eventually think you’re doing it on purpose. In the the few years before the French Revolution there was a persistent conspiracy theory among the poor residents of Paris that the food shortages were an intentional plot to starve the French people. In Russia in 1916 there were endemic rumors that the Tzarina was a German spy who was intentionally sabotaging the war effort.

American conservatives do not excel as defenders of boomer rights, though. Literally, democrats are better at that. Home valuations are consistently much less ridiculous in red states, Trump doesn’t want to cut social security but democrats are the ones wanting to drive down the cost of labor(which retirees consume) and expand Medicare.

Progressivism's promise is that if it is provided with power and control, it will deliver a better life for society generally. It has been provided with increasing amounts of power and control for decades, to a point where it has visibly approached total sociopolitical closure for the forseeable future, and what it has delivered is stagnation at best and more often a steadily-growing avalanche of crises. Given its track record, it becomes extremely important for Progressivism to silence any attempt to establish common knowledge and chain-of-accountability for its monstrous failures. One obvious method is to claim that its critics only destroy, only tear down, only criticize, without offering any constructive alternative of their own.

It seems to me that critics of Progressivism have no shortage of constructive alternatives to Progressive doctrine. When we have spent seven decades concentrating every scrap of social, political and economic power into the hands of Progressivism, though, almost all of those constructive alternatives are either going to involve demolishing things Progressives have built or routing around them entirely. This is the nature of misallocation: you either have to re-allocate, or simply eat the sunk-cost loss. Progressives have built an unworkable system and then condemn us for not offering an explanation of how to make it work, but there is no reason to entertain this chicanery. I cannot tell you how to operate America's current educational system through tinkering at the margins, but that does not mean I do not have a pretty good plan for how to educate my children, or ideas that I think are positive-sum on how to build a new general education system from scratch. "The current system has to come down" is the fault of the system and its designers, not my abilities as a critic. I can explain at some length how serious engagement with Christianity builds community, personal development, support networks, family formation, long-termer preferences, all the necessary building blocks of durable community that more than a half-century of liquid modernity has destroyed in most other contexts, but there is no way to integrate these insights into a sociopolitical system whose designers explicitly see total exclusion and eventual elimination of Christianity as a foundational part of their social program.

Likewise for economics, rule of law, foreign policy and most other questions of governance. The problem is not a lack of constructive alternatives. The problem is that, at a certain point along the seizure-of-power gradient, all constructive alternatives reflect the common nature of the problem, which is that one faction has seized all the power and escaped all accountability for its wielding.

which is that one faction has seized all the power and escaped all accountability for its wielding.

Republicans have managed to get elected roughly half the time, so it seems like it's you who's trying to escape all accountability here. If you say they couldn't do anything because of progressive Republicans, well, maybe you should have won more elections.

And it's not like the Right has no successes. Desegregation busing was heavily limited. Welfare reform in the 1990s. You even managed to overturn Roe v Wade and ban abortion in many states, which did nothing to create the "community, personal development, support networks, family formation, long-termer preferences," etc. that Christian conservatives tell us their ideology brings, but you did do it.

Republicans have managed to get elected roughly half the time, so it seems like it's you who's trying to escape all accountability here. If you say they couldn't do anything because of progressive Republicans, well, maybe you should have won more elections.

These two sentences contradict one another.

It isn't surprising that the anglosphere right has greater problems attracting young people than the right in the rest of the west. AfD, Sweden democrats and national rally do fairly well among young voters. The rather aimless right in the anglosphere fails at attracting young people and successful people. A young highly educated person is simply going to find the aesthetics and the values of mainstream conservatism boring and unappealing.

Why the anti-immigration right tends to do better in non-anglosphere than anglosphere countries has a lot to do with the differing electoral systems. The main center-right party in Sweden, the Moderates, isn't much sexier than the UK Conservatives but because Sweden uses proportional representation (as opposed to FPTP) a vote for SD isn't going to risk feeling wasted like a vote for Reform in the UK might.

Conservatism is not an ideology. It's an orientation. Moreover, it's an orientation against a reference point, (which is why today's conservative is yesterday's liberal etc.)

People confuse this because contrast the term with liberalism, which can mean two things.

  1. Is just the opposite orientation of conservatism, and
  2. is an actual ideology - prioritization of safeguarding individual freedom and equal rights through rule-of-law and representative government

Most of the useless polticial showerthoughting is downstream of the confusion caused by the fact that the word liberal can refer to either, which conservative can't.

Both the complaints of liberals not being liberal, or conservatives not being ideological, or of assuming conservatives are ideologically illiberal etc.

At the end of the day, both American Conservativism and Liberalism are big tents each containing both liberals and illiberals.

Conservatism is not an ideology. It's an orientation. Moreover, it's an orientation against a reference point.

One thing I love about the 1991 August Coup in the Soviet Union is that it’s about the only time and place in history where you could be a Conservative Communist.

Most of what makes modern politics/political actors difficult to understand these days is not understanding that classical liberalism is [now] a "conservative" position, and taking what groups call themselves at face value rather than thinking about it for 5 seconds and figuring out that yes, actually, progressives are the most conservative movement today (in the "develop nothing ever, be safety-obsessed all the time, impose nonsensical social controls out the ass, sanction sex, hate the young, old women > young men" senses that popularly characterize conservatism).

Not that we haven't tried- "right is the new left" was nearly 10 years ago now (and people still just don't get it)- but ultimately the failure to understand who and what the groups are (and the groups themselves don't help either, to be fair, and this is mostly an advantage to progressives/the media's faction) will destroy anyone's ability to think logically about politics.

Haidt's 6 Foundations apply just as well (or even more) to the average progressive than they do to the average traditionalist, but as soon as you say the C-word, people start thinking they only apply to Boomercons and they shut right down.

Nobody gives a darn about that musician. He's a one hit wonder and now he's gone. Google trends says his popularity lasted a few months at most.

Conservatism does have an ideology. Clean safe streets lined with trees, single family homes, and white picket fences. Young people working starter jobs around town in stores and businesses knstead of shitskins.

Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

Young people working starter jobs around town in stores and businesses knstead of shitskins.

You are allowed to express racist sentiments here, but we do ask for more effort than slurs as punctuation. Your log is a bunch of warnings and a tempban, and this post indicates that those warnings are not penetrating. I'm banning you for three days this time; other mods feel free to lengthen if it seems appropriate.

Young people working starter jobs around town in stores and businesses knstead of shitskins.

Unemployment rate is close to zero, anyone who looks for a job can get one. And it will shock you to learn that white people have higher incomes and higher employment rate than non-whites.

And the labor force participation rate is...? Unemployment rate is only part of the picture.

People who aren't looking for jobs won't get them, yes.

Nearly every group with light skin has high incomes and low unemployment in America, including nonhajnali groups like Maronites, Russians, Jews, etc.

Note also how pathetic the message is. Woke black tells his people "I'll get you jobs as doctors, lawyers, politicians, and CEOs." This guy tells whites "I'll get you the job standing behind the counter at 7/11." THAT'S all you can realistically aspire to.

Nobody can "get" you a job as a doctor or a lawyer or a CEO (well, unless it's a CEO of a scam) without walking a long way there (I omit politicians because it's not a job like any others). You can't just "become" a doctor without studying hard for years, and if you're already capable of that, the wokes would just slow you down. The only thing the wokes can offer you is to pressure the system into devaluing your work by lowering the criteria. They still won't be able to make you a doctor overnight, but they will make people wonder whether your training had been as rigorous as the other folks'.

And I don't really see any way to get into the job market but beginner-level jobs (unless you win the birth lottery and your family is rich, at which cases again you don't need the wokes already). Maybe the message of "if you want to succeed, try working hard" is "pathetic" compared to "scream victimhood hard with me and get all the stuff for free" but the latter - unless you become a con artist and join the grifter class, which is not for everyone - is a lie.

Conservatism does have an ideology. Clean safe streets lined with trees, single family homes, and white picket fences. Young people working starter jobs around town in stores and businesses knstead of shitskins.

Nah, it's gotten to a point where someone ranting against "suburbs" is as likely to be on the Right as on the Left. You're going to see even more of this after the 2026 midterms.

Define the terms please. There's a version of this I might agree with, if for example by Conservatism you mean it's Boomer implementation, but that's not a problem of Conservatism qua Conservatism, that's a problem of Liberalism writ-large.

My life sucks, boo out group isn't really lyrics that inspire or offer novel insights.

What? There may have been a time that political thinkers would sell you dreams of a shining future, but currently the entire political spectrum is based on "my life sucks, boo out group".

It isn't surprising that the anglosphere right has greater problems attracting young people than the right in the rest of the west.

Isn't this completely false? Last I've seen they had trouble attracting young women, with young men flocking to the in droves.

Isn't this completely false? Last I've seen they had trouble attracting young women, with young men flocking to the in droves.

"Droves" is an exaggeration - Trump won 18-29 men 49-48 per the 2024 exit poll, which is about the same margin he won the electorate as a whole by. He does better with the middle-aged than the young among white men and women, though not among ethnic minorities. The gender gap is only marginally higher for the young than the middle-aged and only marginally higher in 2024 than 2020 - the massive youth gender gap reported e.g. here didn't show up at the ballot box. What did happen is that Trump lost the youth vote (of both sexes) less badly than the Republicans normally do in a close election.

The place where right populism really is an old man's game is the UK. Reform's vote is younger than the Conservatives, but not by much.

My read is that the MAGA is in the middle of the pack in terms of right-populist movements ability to appeal to young men. Looking at the exit polls for the 1st round of the Polish presidential election, the total right-populist vote (PiS+Confederation+Crown) is flat by age but the young voted for the kekkier right-populist parties whereas the old voted for the more traditionalist PiS. The 2024 French legislative elections showed the Left winning the youth, RN winning the middle-aged, and Macron's party winning the old. The same picture applies to the 2025 German elections.

"Droves" is an exaggeration - Trump won 18-29 men 49-48 per the 2024 exit poll

SSCReader said it was 56%?

My read is that the MAGA is in the middle of the pack in terms of right-populist movements ability to appeal to young men.

That's fine. I just have issues with calling that "greater problems attracting young people".

Depends on the exit poll. You can find 56% (Guardian), 52% or 49% depending on where you look. I took the high end because if that doesn't count as droves then neither does any lesser number. You could split it and say it is roughly 52% plus or minus 3 maybe.

Really we'd have to define the terms of what does greater problems and droves mean before any of the numbers can tell us anything. For me "droves" would have to be over 60% at least and consistently getting under 50% would be greater problems attracting X. But that's really just squinting at it and going off vibes. One could make reasonable arguments for very different numbers I am sure.

SSCReader said it was 56%?

My source is the CNN exit poll as reported on Wikipedia. I'm happy to defer to someone with a better data source.

The Catalist report has a reputation for being more accurate than exit polls, but the free online version doesn't include the sex/age crosstabs. Matt Yglesias did a Substack post based on what is presumably the paid version of the report and says that the big picture was a mostly-uniform swing apart from the big swing to Trump among Hispanics and (to a lesser extent) Asians.

That's fine. I just have issues with calling that "greater problems attracting young people".

I don't think we disagree here.

Isn't this completely false? Last I've seen they had trouble attracting young women, with young men flocking to the in droves.

Trump got about 56% of men under 30, while Harris got about 59% of women under 30 (55% Harris to 42% Trump overall for 18-29, because more women vote than men). But the young men were most concerned about the economy, so it's hard to tell how many are going to the right vs how many were just voting against the current party because the economy sucked. Presumably some of those 56% will shift back if the economy sucks again in 2028, but we can at least say that they are willing to vote for Trump/the right, even if some of them weren't specifically flocking to the banner. Trump was up from 36% in 2020 to 42% of 18-29 in 2024, so there was certainly a swing.

However as I pointed out previously Bush got between 45% to 49% of the 18-29 vote when he won in 2000 and 2004, so Trump hasn't got back to where conservatives were a couple of decades ago. How that vote shakes out in 2028 is probably going to determine if we can see a long term swing rather than a single election cycle swing.

That's all fair enough,but given those numbers I think it's also fair to dismiss the claim that they're having trouble attracting young people (men in particular), unless some kind of supporting argument is provided.

I would say it's fair to say they are still having trouble attracting young people overall. Even Bush at his best with the post 2001 bump couldn't break 50%, (I think Reagan was the last conservative to do so in 1984). It's also fair to say they aren't having trouble attracting young men specifically and that Trump appears to have reversed that trend somewhat.

I suppose it depends what you mean as "trouble attracting". Not being able to get a majority of a group for 50 years, maybe qualifies? I'd suggest the claim Democrats are having trouble attracting men is true for similar reasons. They haven't got 50% of men (though Obama in 2008 got close), since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

but currently the entire political spectrum is based on "my life sucks, boo out group".

You don’t actually believe that’s true, do you? Like, clearly there are many people — people well within the mainstream Overton window of the two major American political parties, and certainly those within the mainstream of other Anglosphere countries — who do not fit this description at all. One could point to the “Abundance Democrats” and the “Tech Right” as two ascendant factions made up very largely of successful, optimistic, non-resentful individuals.

One could point to the “Abundance Democrats” and the “Tech Right” as two ascendant factions made up very largely of successful, optimistic, non-resentful individuals.

I haven't observed either to be a coherent concept. Someone recently gave Elon as an example of the "Tech Right", and he's pretty quick to complain about he's outgroup the last time I checked. As for "Abundance Democrats", are they the ones constantly blaming "NIMBY's" for everything? Also, neither one of them is particularly credible in their promises of a brighter future, though I suppose that's another topic.

You claimed that

currently the entire political spectrum is based on "my life sucks, boo out group".

Even if you can find example of the people I’m pointing to saying their outgroup sucks, you’re still missing the “my life sucks” part. Elon Musk’s life manifestly does not suck, nor does he appear to be under any illusions that it does. To the extent that he criticizes his enemies (political or otherwise) it is because he believes they’re making America worse, or making the world worse; he definitely doesn’t seem to be claiming that they’re making his own life worse. (Except for maybe on the trans issue specifically, given the way it has impacted his family life.)

Similarly, the main figures in the “Abundance Democrats” — assuming such a faction does indeed exist — focus their criticism on “NIMBYs” — again, let’s assume for the sake of argument that such people exist and are reliably identifiable — because they believe that such people are actively preventing American society from addressing a major issue that is negatively impacting the lives of many people. Notably, though, the Abundance Democrats are largely financially successful people who can currently afford housing without too much difficulty. (Or who live in subsidized housing, as students, academic faculty, etc.) The housing crisis isn’t wrecking their lives, and they’re not motivated by personal grievance. They do genuinely appear to want to fix a problem, even if that problem isn’t a problem for them specifically.

Even if you can find example of the people I’m pointing to saying their outgroup sucks, you’re still missing the “my life sucks” part.

What, "my cars are not selling because of vandalism and smears against my company triggered by my political activity" does not count?

Elon Musk’s life manifestly does not suck,

Does Trump's, or Vance's?

Similarly, the main figures in the “Abundance Democrats” — assuming such a faction does indeed exist

You're the one that posited their existence!

because they believe that such people are actively preventing American society from addressing a major issue that is negatively impacting the lives of many people.

Yes, that's what "my life sucks" meant in TheDag's reductive summary.

You're the one that posited their existence!

Correct, I was asking you to accept that position as well, at least for the sake of argument.

What, "my cars are not selling because of vandalism and smears against my company triggered by my political activity" does not count?

Correct, that definitely does not count as “my life sucks” in anywhere near the same way as Oliver Anthony style “I’m personally oppressed and downtrodden, and it’s my outgroup’s fault” populism.

Yes, that's what "my life sucks" meant in TheDag's reductive summary.

I don’t think so. I think there’s an important qualitative difference between populist “rage and vengeance” grievance on the one hand — which is what the OP is attributing to Anglophone conservatism — and the technocratic/futurist “we’ve identified the problems, and it’s time to let smart and successful elites determine how to fix those problems” institutionalism of the factions I identified.

Correct, that definitely does not count as “my life sucks” in anywhere near the same way as Oliver Anthony style “I’m personally oppressed and downtrodden, and it’s my outgroup’s fault” populism.

I wish I knew who the hell that was. Anyway, since we agree it's not about Trump, looks like w agree OP's thesis can be dismissed.

I don’t think so. I think there’s an important qualitative difference between populist “rage and vengeance” grievance on the one hand — which is what the OP is attributing to Anglophone conservatism — and the technocratic/futurist “we’ve identified the problems, and it’s time to let smart and successful elites determine how to fix those problems” institutionalism of the factions I identified.

How can I determine that this is, in fact, the case, rather than it being a Russell's conjugation?

I wish I knew who the hell that was.

Literally the guy the OP was mostly about. You know, the guy referenced several times by name in the post you replied to.

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