A Pilgrim’s Digression

There is a contradiction at the heart of American conservatism that I’ve always found fascinating to contemplate.  Even in the days when I considered myself a conservative, I could not help but notice that among the most right-wing of conservatives, there is an almost treasonous dislike of the U.S. government and its representatives, with the exception of the people holding the guns: the military and those involved in law enforcement.  Myself, I’ve never been able to divorce the government from those charged with enforcing its will upon people.

Although I have high regard for individuals who serve in the military or the police, in short, I don’t trust either of  those entities as an indiscriminate unit.  This is especially true for the police.  I’ve always thought the British have a much healthier attitude towards their law enforcement.  Over there, the cops are called “the filth,” as in “the filth took away my license.”  That’s a much more powerful term than even the antiquated Americanism, “pig,” but it conveys (I think) a healthier sense of what the police are capable of.  A policeman can be as filthy as the next person.

I know there has to be someone in a society who holds the gun to our heads, otherwise society as a whole falls into anarchy; however, I don’t like that fact.  I can live my life just fine without either the government or its enforcers, as long as other people leave me be.  Of course we don’t live in that perfect world.  Anyway, all this is leading to a point I want to make.

I love reading news stories about bad cops.  There is something uplifting in a story about the disgrace of someone charged with keeping others in check, to the point that he can even kill us, if he feels it is necessary.

We have a small local newspaper here in town, seperate from the “official” paper that reports on all the light and happy topics in the community.  It’s called The Advocate, and it has a reputation for reporting the stories that the official paper won’t touch.

Our county sherrif’s 18 year-old son and a friend used his Dad’s police band radio to call in a false report of a crime, resulting in officers from all over the county as well as state police being scrambled.  The boy received barely more than a reprimand from the judge.  The Advocate reported on this travesty.   Somehow I think if an ordinary citizen had broken into the Sherrif’s car and used his radio for such a purpose, the punishment would have been pretty severe.

In another story, a deputy lost control of his car on his way to a report of a crime and crashed into a citizen’s house.  The resident was in the shower at the time, and she was injured and transported to the hospital.  The Advocate reported that when the homeowner tried to sue, the judge threw out the case because the county has “absolute immunity” from such lawsuits.  Not only that, but the county’s insurance provider doesn’t have to pay.  I guess this is why we take out homeowner’s insurance–just in case some cop crashes into our house while on duty.

My wife actually had a run-in with the cop in the above story, in a  restaurant here in town, which makes me completely unsympathetic to him.  I wouldn’t feel bad if he lost his job, at the very least because he damaged his patrol car.  Does that make me unpatriotic or unsupportive of “the police” as an entity?  Yeah, it probably does.  However, on the other hand, there are local cops I’ve met and liked; one of them even goes to our church with his family.

In another case I read about in The Advocate just today, a cop on the local drug task force has been suspended because his confidential informant claims to have had an affair with him.  He gave her money to buy meth so that he could arrest her buyer, but apparently something went wrong with the buy and her cover was blown.  When she was arrested on previous charges that were going to be dropped, if she cooperated, she claimed to have had an affair with the officer and that he fathered her child.  The paternity test exonerated the cop, but he failed a lie detector.

I don’t know why I like stories such as this so much.  I think it validates my perception that cops are just human and not to be trusted any more than anyone else.  I feel much the same about military personnel.  I appreciate that someone has to do that job, and it’s not easy.  However, I think it’s absolutely imperative not to be blind to the possibility that those in authority over us can do great harm–whether that person is a President, a congressman, a policeman, or a soldier.

I’d also like to add a bit of a plea here for papers like The Advocate.  It’s a monthly, so I’m sure its circulation is low, but it does a powerful job of exposing those in power in our community.  I’m sure those on the receiving end of its stories call it a “rag” and say that it spreads rumors and gossip, convicting innocent people in the process.  I guess that makes me a gossip-monger, because I truly love it.

I’ve noticed a meme developing in the mainstream media that suggests the Republican party is resurgent and that the conservative philosophy is finding its voice, as well as legs to stand on in the Obama era. What’s I find most interesting is the portrayal of this resurgence as something new and different.

The Washington Post has a story today about this movement, titled Republicans see long-term victory in negative stance. A House member, Pete Sessions, is even quoted in the article “[suggesting] the party is learning from the disruptive tactics of the Taliban, and the GOP these days does have the bravado of an insurgent band that has pulled together after a big defeat to carry off a quick, if not particularly damaging, raid on the powers that be.”

The problem is, I’ve heard it all before. I’ve been around awhile now. I was a Limbaugh conservative in 1991, before the name Bill Clinton was first spoken with a sneer in conservative circles. I distinctly remember that after the defeat of 1992, there was a similar “insurgency” aimed at defeating Clinton’s proposals and bringing down the man himself.  I’m just surprised that Limbaugh hasn’t begun playing his old “America Held Hostage” theme song from the early nineties.

Conservatives need to ask themselves, if in nearly 20 years they haven’t achieved their goals–broadly defined as smaller government and a defeat of liberalism on philosophical and pragmatic grounds–then when are they going to achieve their goals? And if conservative generals like Limbaugh are basically still fighting the same war they were fighting in the nineties, with no victory in sight, isn’t it time to fire the generals and bring in some new blood?

It took only a couple years of losses for Lincoln to fire McClellan. Limbaugh has been the de facto leader of conservatism for far longer than that, and to no good purpose. What has he accomplished for the conservative movement? It’s a philosophical movement without any appreciable effect on American culture or government.

I just can’t get over how it seems like conservatism is right back in 1993 all over again. As the Post article cites, even some Republicans “see this moment as equivalent to 1993, when the party handled a new Democratic president by resisting and capitalizing on any perceived overreach.”

But again I ask, to what purpose? If today we behold the Democrat party stronger, more united, more revitalized than it was even with the election of Bill Clinton, how can conservatives say they achieved anything in the almost 20 years since 1993?

If I were a conservative today, I’d be asking myself first whether the Republican party is worthy of my support (judging by the Bush administration’s many failures, and judging by the nomination of John McCain to run for President, I’d conclude not). The second question I’d ask myself is, with so little to show for my support of conservative ideals, and with a country trending more and more liberal and democratic, maybe the problem is not with my country or with liberalism, but with me.

Conservatives risk becoming philosophically Amish, that is, retrograde and irrelevant. The country is moving on around them, finding new solutions to old problems, changing in ways many find disturbing, but conservatives seem unwilling to recognize a need for change themselves. In their view, the problem they had in 2008 was not unwillingness to adapt, but a failure to cling more stridently to their outdated belief system.

If only Sarah Palin had been at the top of the GOP ticket.

Thus in 2009, we are witnessing a recap of the 1993 session when Republicans had no answers to our national problems, only defiance to the solutions proposed by the other side. If I were a conservative, I’d be saying, “No thanks, let me off this ride. I’m not going through this again.”

The road ahead for them is another dead end, if conservatives allow deaf old men like Limbaugh to lead the war effort with a two decades-old battle plan. In 20 years conservatives will once again be fuming about their betrayal by the Republican party, the loss of power in Washington, and the lack of any tangible change in the way our government works.

Maybe that’s the way people like Limbaugh like it. It sort of gives their contract a built-in renewal clause every couple decades or so.