Can the 1960s counterculture be blamed for contemporary conservatism?

[Fuzzy Bear]

Today’s conservatism has its roots in the sheer reaction to the expansion of the welfare state and the prominence of the entrepreneurial movement.  Today’s conservatism is about less taxes, less debt, less government control, less government bureaucracy/more privatization of government services, and a rollback in affirmative action and immigration.  It is a response to the demographic changes in America that project America to be a “majority minority” nation by 2050 on the part of folks who (A) remember a much different America, where the middle class was more prominent and stable, and (B) where welfare benefits didn’t seem so easy to come by for so many.  Its roots are in blaming the recipients of government aid for the loss of jobs and the increasing national debt that many Americans don’t understand, but are frightened by.  This isn’t much difference from the Nixon/Reagan conservatism that was very much opposed to the counterculture, but the conservative movement today has a libertarian/isolationist streak reminiscent of Barry Goldwater and Robert Taft.

As crazy as the nutty base of the GOP seems to be, there are more points of conversion between the right and left than it appears.  On national security and personal privacy, on ongoing military involvements, and on the issue of large corporate bailouts, the right and left have found convergence.  I doubt very much that if an economic collapse on the order of 2008 happened tomorrow, there would be the kind of bailouts that occurred in 2008-2009.  The conservative movement of today is somewhat less beholden to corporate interests and seems to have repudiated the neocons.  This is a major sea change.  Ron Paul seems more mainstream GOP than he was in 2008 and Rand Paul is very much the GOP frontrunner right now (for what that’s worth).