The incoming generation

[dazzleman]

Conservative, obviously. After growing up in the current ultra-left-wing gay era, they will rebel against liberal judges and recoil in disgust. Especially when they find out they can't keep a decent percentage of their pay check, smoke cigarettes without being taxed to hell, or start a business without obsessive government regulation.

Yes, this era is so ultra-left wing. The liberals clearly have such dominance over government. They control the Presidency, the Congress, and the Supreme Court.

[/sarcasm]

In all seriousness, though, I just can't understand conservatives complaining over liberal dominance of the country. That would have been like liberals complaining in 1968 about conservative dominance of America. The bottom line is that the Republican party pretty much controls America, so if someone thinks the country is too liberal, you'd best blame the GOP. At some point the Republicans have to realize that they run the country, and can't keep blaming everything on the Democrats.

As for the question itself, it's hard to say. I think that young people are quite a bit more socially liberal than previous generations, though economically they might be slightly more conservative. It remains to be seen if this will hold up.

Last night, I saw an interview with (of all people) Jerry Springer, who is starting a new show on Air America.

He said some things that made a lot of sense, and took a contrary view to the view that conservatives control everything.  Basically, he said that the situation today is a reversal from the 1950s and 1960s, when conservatives were in control, and liberals were in rebellion.  He pointed out that today, people live their lives in a much more liberal way than before, even Republicans.  I think this is very true.

Today, liberals are the establishment and on the defensive, just as conservatives were in the 1960s, and the new ideas are coming more from the conservative side.  Liberals continue to push ahead with an aggressive social agenda, but this has helped lead to some political successes for conservatives.

[dazzleman]

Well, to some extent this is true. If you look over the long arc of history, the world has gotten more liberal over time, both socially and economically. Now, over the last 30 years the country has gotten more economically conservative, but we still are a lot more economically liberal today than we were in the 1920's, and there doesn't seem to be much chance that the entirety of the New Deal will be repealed, nor do most Republicans even want it to be.

Things that are taken for granted today, and that even most ardent conservatives would not support repealing, like the minimum wage, Social Security, Medicare, the 40 hour work week, paid vacation time, safety and health regulations for consumer products, child labor laws, CAFE standards, etc. were all, at the time, advocated by economic liberals and opposed by economic conservatives. Likewise, ideas such as equal rights for women and blacks, even at the basest level, were at the time advocated by social liberals and opposed by social conservatives. Of course, if you go back to thousands of years ago, there was a much, much larger gap between rich and poor than is true today; Opebo would have been spot on in many of his theories if he lived 100 years ago, and 1900 was extremely economically liberal compared to 1000 or 1200 or 1500 or 1700. And of course, socially, those who differ from what is considered "normal" used to have little to no rights at all.

Now, I don't believe this will continue in perpetuity, nor should it; I think that it's an exponential function, that will eventually slow down and for all practical purposes stop, once we achieve an ideal balance. Of course, unfortunately the balance has to be achieved in the average, as when things swing too far in one direction, they tend to swing too far in the opposite direction in response, and the cycle tends to repeat itself. Those in power get arrogant and overreach, and those out of power wise up and moderate, and eventually control of government changes hands.

So yes, over the long run, conservatives have been on the defensive, though in the short term, liberal frustration with an insufficient rate of progress has caused a backlash which can help conservatives when liberals go too far.

So yes, both parties have tended to move left over time. And it could be argued from a conservative perspective that change has tended to happen too fast, and the pace of it should be slowed. That's definitely an argument that has merit.

But, my point was that the Republicans are, at the moment, in total control. So it's basically put up or shut up time; conservatives can't keep complaining about things anymore. They have to face the facts that if they can't undo liberal changes in the current climate, then maybe these liberal things aren't as extreme as they thought.

As just one example, take Roe v. Wade. If a Supreme Court with 7 Republican appointees on it refuses to overturn this decision, then it seems kind of silly,, from a completely neutral perspective, to say that it was an extremist decision; you are obviously in the minority and a bit of an extremist if you are arguing that the current Supreme Court, with mostly Republican appointed justices, is way too liberal.

I actually think that we're more economically conservative now than in the 1930s and 1940s, at least as far as government policies go.  Back then, things like price controls were accepted, and there was much more of a sense that government could control the economy than I think there is now.  Maybe liberal/conservative is not the right axis, but we seem to believe more in the free market than we did then.  Can you imagine even a Democratic president today making an speech in which he excoriates Congress (as Harry Truman did) for failing to renew wartime price controls after the war, and says that price controls are the answer to inflation?  The last serious presidential candidate to even mention price controls on a broad scale, as far as I can remember, was Ted Kennedy in 1980, and he was soundly defeated by the hapless and unpopular Jimmy Carter.

Social mores have shifted back and forth between liberal and conservative over the ages.  I think both extremes cause damage, and when the damage becomes obvious, the pendulum shifts the other way.  In that regard, homosexuality has also moved in and out of acceptance over the ages.  I think it's a mistake to say that history has always moved in the "liberal" direction because that implies that liberals always equals progressive, when at times it can mean reactionary or defensive.  In my mind, progress should be positive, not negative, and much of what liberals have given us is negative in my opinion.

As for Roe vs. Wade, I think this decision was an example of judicial activism at the time it was made, and the Supreme Court upheld it because they are loathe to reverse recent decisions that they have made, except in extreme cases.  As I've said earlier, I don't believe judges should be making social policy, but as a person who dislikes the feminist movement, it could be said the Roe vs. Wade was a benefit in that it has forced the feminists to mortgage almost their whole movement to defending it on an ongoing basis, something that wouldn't have been necessary had the decision been made through the democratic process.

[dazzleman]

I see your point. Courts tend to like to stick up for each other; they don't like to overturn each other. Judges are kind of a clique in a way, even if they don't agree with each other. You see the same thing with cops; if you go to court to fight a traffic ticket, the judge is biased towards the cop, and the cops will often lie to back each other up. So yeah, there is some cliquishness there, but not as much as some people would have you believe.

Still, the point stands; if these "extreme liberal" decisions are wildly unpopular with the public, then it makes no sense for conservatives to fear overturning them; doing so could only be in their best interest politically, right? If they fear overturning them, does that not at least provide a tiny shred of evidence for the theory that they might not be so extreme after all? That maybe they are not overturning them in part because they fear a political backlash?

Well, conservatives have had the overturning of Roe vs. Wade as a goal, but I understand your point about the risks to conservatives of overturning it.  I never claimed it was a wildly unpopular decision.  I do say it was controversial, and not based on a sound reading of the constitution, in my opinion.  I think it would have been better to decide the issue through the democratic process, but clearly there are plenty of people who favor the decision.  That doesn't make it right.

Cynically speaking, I think that court decisions like Roe vs. Wade often do more to invigorate the opposition than the winning side, and conservatives have used these types of decisions to gain support.  Some people argue that the Massachusetts Supreme Court re-elected Pres. Bush when they took an activist stance on gay marriage.  And how many Democratic voters were lost by court decisions on busing, which was wildly unpopular with white voters? 

I think that deep-down, conservatives are very ambivalent about overturning Roe vs. Wade from a political point of view.  It's kind of like German re-unification as a goal during the Cold War.  Nobody really wanted it, but it was necessary to state it as a NATO goal.  Once it was possible, we then had no choice but to support it, as we had been pushing for it for so long when we thought it impossible.  The overturning of Roe vs. Wade could invigorate those who favor it.  Still, I think it would be better for the country to have issues such as these decided through the democratic process rather than judges.

[dazzleman]

I agree, courts overreaching definitely can create a backlash, even if the majority supports the decision. An angry and organized minority can be more powerful (and it can well be argued that they should be more powerful) than a contented and apathetic majority, no doubt about it.

My view is that pro-lifers often understand the risks of a backlash that you speak of, and they realize that overturning Roe v. Wade would tilt the balance of energy on the abortion debate to the pro-choice side. Politics matters just as much as principle in many of these cases; a lot of times, special interest groups want to keep an issue in the public view, rather than solve it. Of course, this happens on both sides; I'm definitely not accusing only the pro-life side of doing this. But it has to be acknowledged that this is a reality of politics.

I agree, though, that judical activism should only be used in extreme cases. The courts should act as a stopgap to block blatantly unconstitutional laws, but the burden of proof should rest with those seeking to strike down the will of the majority. The courts are a necessary check and balance against legislative and executive power run amok, but should not be legislating from the bench.

With your last paragraph, Eric, you sound like a Republican.

I am often troubled by the fact that an angry, organized and energized minority can have more power than a happy and apathetic majority.  There are some cases where this can be good, such as when the majority favors blatant racial discrimination, or something like that.  But I don't think it can be ASSUMED that this is a good thing, as many "progressives" do.  Often, a movement that starts out being something good turns bad, and it often takes a long time for the majority to recognize and react to it.

[dazzleman]

Yes, the power of the Dark Side is difficult to resist.

Otherwise, you are pretty spot on again. There should be a balance, though unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your view) we can't control the basis on which people vote. If people care about one issue only, and insist on voting on that issue alone, well, that's their perogative in a democracy. That's what I was mostly getting at with an angry, organized minority having great power, in that if they vote on one issue alone, they can have enormous power out of proportion to their numbers. Also, those who have money to contribute to candidates, and care passionately about an issue, obviously have a disproportionate impact. I would like to see greater public funding of campaigns to help minimize this problem, and more free airtime for candidates, but that's probably a debate for another thread.

Sadly, the reality is that society will never find the right balance.  It is part of the human condition.

No matter how well we do in building a fair society (and results so far are mixed), somebody will be unhappy, and there will always be an unhappy minority trying to build a majority around policies that they favor, or if they despair of building a majority, getting the courts to declare their ideas constitutional rights, and therefore sacrosanct.

I have a theory about the life cycle of ideas and solutions.  I think that ideas and policies go through a natural life cycle, and through the natural progression of things, something that starts out as being the answer to a problem later becomes part of the problem, or the problem itself.

Certainly, this happened with welfare.  Welfare was started to address a problem, and later became the problem, or at least part of it.  Unions were started to address a problem, and are now a contributor to problems in certain areas.  The civil rights movement, in my opinion, has now degenerated to the point where it is contributing to the problems of blacks and contributing to racial division, rather than ameliorating them, as the original purpose was to do.  The women's movement has degenerated to the point where it is close to being an anti-male hate group.

Ideas, and the policies they spawn, need to be reviewed and updated on a regular basis to prevent these things from happening.  What was once a radical idea becomes mainstream, sometimes too mainstream, and another radical idea must rise up to address the problems created by the older idea, and the policies it spawned.  That is where "organized and energized minorities" come in.