Free trade

[Gustaf]

NH, did you vote protectionist in the poll?

[NHPolitico]

NH, did you vote protectionist in the poll?

I can't recall, but I think so.

[Gustaf]

NH, did you vote protectionist in the poll?

I can't recall, but I think so.

OK...I was just wondering.

[NHPolitico]

NH, did you vote protectionist in the poll?

You wanted to know who cast the single vote?
I can't recall, but I think so.

OK...I was just wondering.

[Gustaf]

NH, did you vote protectionist in the poll?

You wanted to know who cast the single vote?
I can't recall, but I think so.

OK...I was just wondering.

Yeah, basically...

[opebo]

Plus, "nationalism" is an ideology and conservatism is supposed to be anti-ideological.

I don't know what you mean by that assertion.  What do you mean that conservatism is anti-ideological?

Well, rightwingers in Europe talked about "The End of Ideology" right alongside "the End of History".
All those "neoliberal" economic ideologues believe it to be totally unideological. Few things are further from the truth, however.

Neoliberalism is definitely idelogical, conservatism is less ideological than most ideologies though.

I'm sorry, but this discussion reminds me of a Seinfeld episode or a late-night dorm room debate.  

OK...I suppose the "sorry" means that I should be insulted...

I guess you have a right to decide how you'd like to take that comment.

OK, then I will view it as a personal insult...



No, I will, in the immortal words of Bertie Wooster, "let that pass".

Gustaf, you're a Wodehouse fan too?  He's my favorite writer - check out this story:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/727mvhkj.asp

[NHPolitico]

Okay, you can cite examples (some disputable), but what is the intellectual connection between conservatism and protectionism? I thought conservatives usually promote less government interference in business, less protection for unions and industrial laborers, on the basis of support for free enterprise. I thought this was the heart of economic conservatism-- the lassiez faire. So whats the issue here?

Here's another quote that explains it. Basicly, real conservatives don't want to be so reliant on the rest of the world in order for us to live the way we want to live.  It's an isolationist view, but it explains the isolationist view in away different from how people would automatically think of it (as a kind of head-in-the-sand policy or a policy of cowardice of whatever).  We aren't independent when we are so tightly linked to global markets. We are a state of the United States of the Earth.  It's Al Sharpton's "Jonestown Kool-Aid" analogy from the debates: cheap prices taste good, but what's the end result.  In fact, most of the things that taste good are bad for you, which is a cautionary tale that can be applied to lots of areas of public policy.  It feels good to get cheap drugs with a Medicare expansion, but Americans my age will have to pay for it later in a big way.  Americans have severe myopia regarding practically everything and we need a wake-up call. Cheap prices via Asian slave labor, for example, isn't a long-term plan, it's a short term plan.

"To the Old Right, however, manufacturing was a critical component of American power, indispensable to our sovereignty and independence, and the access road for working Americans into the middle class."

[Gustaf]

Plus, "nationalism" is an ideology and conservatism is supposed to be anti-ideological.

I don't know what you mean by that assertion.  What do you mean that conservatism is anti-ideological?

Well, rightwingers in Europe talked about "The End of Ideology" right alongside "the End of History".
All those "neoliberal" economic ideologues believe it to be totally unideological. Few things are further from the truth, however.

Neoliberalism is definitely idelogical, conservatism is less ideological than most ideologies though.

I'm sorry, but this discussion reminds me of a Seinfeld episode or a late-night dorm room debate.  

OK...I suppose the "sorry" means that I should be insulted...

I guess you have a right to decide how you'd like to take that comment.

OK, then I will view it as a personal insult...



No, I will, in the immortal words of Bertie Wooster, "let that pass".

Gustaf, you're a Wodehouse fan too?  He's my favorite writer - check out this story:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/727mvhkj.asp

My father is a huge fan, and has related much of it to me...but I haven't got around to reading a lot of it yet, they're lying around waiting for me...but I guess I'd be a Wodehouse fan anyway, especially after having watched 'Pimpernel Smith'.