Libertarian conservatism should attract socialists, liberals and environmentalists too

"All hope for change lies in a rEVOLution fought not with bullets, but with our minds." Jake Towne

On one of the unofficial Ron Paul websites, http://ronpaulrepublican.com/?p=139, is an article by someone running for office in Pennsylvania called Jake Towne. That's where I got the quote above. Yes it's idealistic, but Towne represents many aspects of the properly conservative mindset - constitutionalism, fiscal solidity, defence of liberty and an aversion to unnecessary wars. It won't solve all our problems, but it is a realistic alternative to established politics, which has left us with a democratic deficit, social decay and a bankrupt economy.

Many socialists are initially motivated by distrust of the establishment and opposition to injustice, and have been disillusioned by the Labour party and changemaker Obama bailing out the banks. The Ron Paul revolution offers a government not in hock to special interests like the finance industry. It's a free-market philosophy, but it blocks the too-cosy relationship between government and the banks.

Classical liberals and democrats should reject the Lib Dems' love of unaccountable supranational institutions like the EU. How can a liberal be happy with the EU-wide arrest warrant? Yet Nick Clegg, Vince Cable et al support it, because they believe that the supra-state apparatus of the EU is essentially benign. The Liberal Democrats support central planning also. Modern day liberals claim continuity with John Locke and 19th Century liberalism; however, Paul E. Gottfried in "After liberalism: the managerial state in the age of mass democracy" convincingly argues that modern liberalism is defined by a faith in progress through government planning by experts. This dictatorship of the bureaucrats, often in the teeth of popular (small 'c' conservative) opposition is clearly the antithesis of the 19th Century liberal belief in individual freedom. Only the name survives, so creating an illusion of continuity.

Some useful reviews of Gottfried's book are to be found here. Or use an Internet search.

Environmentalists who blame the free-market for local noise and air pollution should read Simon Jenkins' article about how how Labour Government policy has been captured by the airline industry. At least part of the answer is more Nimbys - i.e. local residents and awkward anti-government planning types - not Big Government.

On the right of the political divide, so-called Conservatives have bought into the central planning as much as so-called socialists and liberals. The way the Federal Reserve and Bank of England have kept interest rates artificially low, thereby creating the credit and housing bubbles, is a an example of central planning by supposed experts at its worst. The rule of experts is the defining feature of the managerial state, and people who call themselves free-market Conservatives have up to now bought into that.

Socialists who support bailouts for the rich; free-market conservatives who support utopian wars, big government welfarism, centrally planned interest rates and managed inflation, a form of theft; liberals who give more credence to the benefits of the managerial state than individual initiative. The participants of the late 19th/early 20th century ideological wars have been replaced by replicas; by keeping the old names though, they can create the illusion that the battleground is the same.