Le Sabot Post-Moderne

Which is precisely why I'm frustrated by Conservatives' blind spot when it comes to companies that make weapons systems and gasoline rather than Hollywood movies.

Blind spot or not, though, it's good to have you back! Didja know Speeding Lisa has its fifth-anniversary concert on May 28? Not sure I'll be able to attend but definitely trying.

That's GREAT! Is it going to be at Club 44? I've become the Speeding Lisa apostle to the missionary people. A lot of my friends want to see them. Let me know if you can make it. We'll boogaloo til we puke. Or something.

Ooh! Ooh! Me, too! Can't wait to see the infamous Speeding Lisa.

Ouch--I know what you mean, and I don't think you even have to be apologetic as a conservative. Just think of it as being "conservative" about baseball.

We had a similar incident here in Louisville a couple of weeks ago with the KY Derby. Several jockeys sued to have advertisements put on their silks using the "free speech" argument. The ones that sued won a temporary injunction.

I'm all for free speech, and even the right for advertisers to promote their product (my undergrad was in advertising), but there comes a point where taste is legitimately invovled.

In the same way (most) conservatives don't think the right to bear arms means that individuals should be allowed to own ICBMs, business ventures and free speech shouldn't be allowed to run completely unbridled at the expense of other values. In this case, taste.

I'm with you, Disco, regarding the overcommercialization of baseball. I feel that the men for whom stadiums were named are rolling around in their graves at their stadiums being renamed for the highest bidder. And those bidders keep changing so you can never remember what team plays in what stadium anymore as the names are always changing. Shameful. And if I wanna watch a commercial, I will do just that - don't bombard me with it on the players or bases themselves!

I seriously thought we might be about to turn a corner in this shameful practice a couple of weeks ago. Now we are veering over to football, despise it though I do, because I thought it might have implications for MLB when Pat Tillman died, and within hours fans began publicly calling for the new Glendale (AZ) arena that is being built for the AZ Cardinals (wish that were a joke) to be named for Pat Tillman. It would have been a) very appropriate and b) a reversal in the trend of putting profits before people. Had they done so, it would have been years, perhaps a whole generation, before anyone would have dared take the war hero's name off the stadium to call it Taco Bell stadium or whatever. But they quickly dashed my hopes to the ground. Within hours, they said the plaza within the stadium would be named for him, meaning they were free to still rent the name of the stadium to the highest bidder, something that was no doubt figured into the cost of the stadium when the budget for it was approved. What does it say when we as a society can't honor a man who was so inspired to defend his country that he walked away from the NFL and all the money and glory that goes along with it to earn 18,000 a year until his untimely demise in that service? The thing is, society would have. But business is business, I guess. :(

If it helps you, don't think of yourself as agreeing with Ralph Nader the politician, think of it as agreeing with Ralph Nader the consumer advocate. That's when everyone felt free to appreciate him.

I like the ICBM analogy. That's one of the things I like about conservatism, is its lack of absolutism. Reality is rarely sacrificed to an overriding idea or ideology. There's a healthy pragmatism to conservatism.

Autmom-

That really is too bad about the stadium. I've never thought to ask before, but where are you in from? If you'd rather not say in a public forum, I understand. I'm enjoying our meetings of the mind, but we still no so little about one another. :)

As for Nader, even his consumer advocacy can be pretty tendentious and partisan. But I'll hold my nose in this instance...

Nah, I don't mind saying. I'm in Mesa, AZ, south and east of Phoenix. I love it here. I have so idealized this place in my writing, yet today I was shocked to drive past a brand spanking new Hooters near my home. Ugh. I guess no place is perfect. So what else would you like to know?

As a Bushie I'd think you'd have, at the very least, an appreciation for the fact that Nader cost Gore the 2000 election, therefore your man became Pres. :)

As for the lack of absolutism in conservativism, perhaps I am misunderstanding you here. Conservatives are the most black-and-white thinkers I know. You're either with them, or you're viciously against them and possibly even going to Hell to boot. But maybe you are talking theory and I'm talking practial application.

Nader was right about the dangers of owning a Volkswagen Bug — The old ones were and still are definately drive at your own risk.

Autmom-

I'm speaking historically. Modern conservatism came into being as a reaction to the French Revolution. It's been at war with "isms" throughout its history. We speak of conservatism as an "ism", but it's really more of an impulse, or a very broad stream of thought than a defined ideology. Everyone from French Royalists to Goldwaterites can fairly lay claim to the name. Specific expressions of conservatism have defined beliefs and ideas, but there is never a grand 'Idea'behind it all. Not, likesay, Communism with its materialist dialectic and one-size-fits-all analysis of history. Conservatism is almost postmodern in its denial of sweeping metanarratives and panaceas.

There ARE some things that are virtually universal to all expressions of conservatism. Key among these is a belief in human imperfectibility. In many expressions, particularly in the States, this is based on a belief in the Fall. And this belief is the pragmatic basis of conservatism. Once you accept that humans are imperfectible, and that all problems aren't located simply in societal organizations and structures, you lose the faith in Utopia that has led to things like the French Revolution or the gulag.

That's what I mean by healthy pragmatism. Conservatives have believed that you can make positive changes in society, but that human nature and culture isn't infinitely plastic.

As for the "vicious" part, I have a differing perspective. For decades conservatives were the nice, Queensbury rules types, and the Dems rolled them repeatedly (Nixon being a notorious exception.) Even when Cons won a short-lived majority, they were so cowed that Dems were able to de facto run things quite often.

Further, it was the Left who invented the "politics of personal destruction." Look up Robert Bork sometime for an example. His last name is now a verb meaning "to be screwed over for political advantage." The Left is the side who invented accusation as a substitute for debate. As it's been said, the real definition of racist, bigot, sexist or homophobe is 'someone winning an argument with a liberal.'

It was the Left which tied Bush to the dragging death of a black man (after he'd signed death warrants for the guilty parties), who tied him to black church burnings, and who were talking about shooting him on Air America the other day. It's the Left who compares conservative tax cuts to loosing the dogs at Selma and refers to conservatives as Nazis at the slightest provocation.

So while there are some vicious conservatives, I don't think we're alone in that circle. . .

OK, thanks for the clarification...
but I do remember Robert Bork! He was the first, it seems, to become a victim of the now accepted litmus test regarding abortion to be appointed to any higher court these days. Be pro-choice or else! Some choice!

As for the history of conservativism, I'd say you've used your 30 years to do a bit more reading than I have in mine, or perhaps only different reading. You've certainly given me a few things to look up anyway - which is good! I like a good challenge :)

As for substituting accusation for debate - I don't know who invented it, but it was apparently a lesson well learned by this White House. Anyone who dares to disagree with them finds themselves being maligned publicly, they even turn on their own people. They didn't like what Richard Clarke had to say, so he was now declared to be "out of the loop." Nevermind what kind of President would allow his chief counterterrorism expert to BE out of the loop. Colin Powell was the only thinking person in the Cabinet, it seems, in that he lacked the red-eyed fury to hasten the war, and he has shown the most reticence since our new, free Iraq has gone to hell in a handbasket, so now he too, is "out of the loop." Again, nevermind what kind of President allows his Sect'y of State to be out of the loop. Anyone who is perceived as venturing the least bit from this administration's party line is subject to a smear campaign.

What's ironic is that this term is not applied where it actually fits. Both Congress and the President were kept "out of the loop" on the abuse photos scandal, by Rumsfeld's letting the report that told him about it collect dust on his desk, and then by his failure to mention it to the Congress when he addressed them just hours before the story aired on 60 Minutes. This leads me to believe that he somewhere way deep down hoped it would blow over without notice. Which tells me his way of thinkihng is out of the loop with the rest of America. But many of us knew that when we heard such pronouncements like, "Freedom's untidy!" with regard to looting in Baghdad's streets. And the fact that the adminstration seriously thought we would be welcomed as liberators in Iraq, so to heck with a post-war strategy, it will all just fall into place, a Jeffersonian democratic state will simply emerge from a land ravaged by a dictator for the past 30 years. Now who's out of the loop? Just plain loopy if you ask me. But I digress... :)

How did we get from MLB to this?