Neoconservatism vs conservatism?
Silver, Isidore
above interests are not shared by Reaganite conservatives and the third, defense of Israel, is viewed by them as a matter of pragmatic, rather than principled, necessity. Since, to the Reaganites,...
...b) small entre- preneurs who dislike regulation and a tax system which seems to bear hardest on the middle-class...
...The Reagan strategy for mollifying various conservative groups --by "buying off" corporate conservatives in the form of tax breaks, reduced regulation, and numerous excep- tions to his free trade "principles" and allying with the New Right on social issues --does not include many concessions to neoconservatism...
...Neoconservatives share some interests with these groups and, when they do not, uncomfortably and silently acquiesce to others, such as those of the corporate votaries of"big" and "helpful" government...
...Since liberals and others have failed to resolve that conundrum, perhaps neoconservatives should not be faulted...
...As the New Right becomes more histrionic, less willing to engage in political compromise, and more intolerant not only of homosexuals, feminists, and other Eastern urban excrescences, but even of Christian fundamen- talists who do not share their enthusiasms, neoconservative disenchantment will doubtlessly grow...
...Conservatives can readily appropriate "principled" neoconservative attacks on government's ability to help the poor into a justification for selfishness...
...neoconservativism's quest for a moral order can readily become the basis of a demand for that order through legal repression up to and including matters of freedom guaranteed by the Bill of Rights...
...Only on assertive opposition to the Soviet'Union --a point held widely on the political spectrum --is there an almost unqualified agreement between neoconservative and Rea- ganite concerns...
...The New Right conservative may share some of the same background and values of the others, but...
...The New Right is also contemptu- ous of neoconservatism's highest value --legal and social order --and is quite willing to upset tradition by startling means such as drastically limiting the jurisdiction of federal courts, especially in cases involving civil rights and civil liberties...
...Neoconservatives cannot resolve the fundamental dilemm~i of our time --how to achieve greater economic democracy while reining in democracy's excesses in cultural and social matters...
...I did mention four categories, but only listed three --for a good reason...
...Thus, ironi- cally, the neoconservative attack on liberal professionals and academicians is a projection of the fact that neoconservatives are themselves a power-seeking class cut off from liberal and radical roots, a class which vainly seeks to create some Euro- pean version of aristocratic order in a nation almost constitu- tionally incapable of achieving that (as DeTocqueville recog- nized one hundred and fifty years ago...
...On the rhetorical level, neoconservatives are important to their allies...
...Indeed, the dilemma of neoconservatism lies in the attempt to ally itself with four types of conservatives, despite an incomplete and politically fatal compatibility...
...The fourth type presents the greatest problem for neoconservatives precisely because the differences between the two groups are the greatest and because the Reagan admin- istration, at its core, most truly represents that type of conser- vative...
...Historical populism was a mixed, largely left-wing farmer movement which single- mindedly derided Eastern banking interests, urbanization, and, at times, both Catholics and Jews...
...The new right is nothing if not populist (in form) while neoconservatives deeply mistrust populism in both its histori- cal and contemporary versions...
...The neoconservative critique of the welfare state compromised the legitimacy of the liberal tradition and im- measurably aided in the process of dismantling the Great Society, many of whose programs --contrary to often over- heated rhetoric --were not failures at all...
...It is likely that neoconservative intellectuals will continue to rationalize even the most bizarre New Right attacks on legitimacy and order, since intellectuals can, 61 ~ course, rationalize anything...
...Since most neoconser- vatives are either Jewish or Catholic, live in urban enclaves, are tolerant of (though uncomfortable with) the former Eastern economic domination of the rest of the country, and believe that vox populi is not vox dei, they have few common pro- grammatic ties to populism...
...Just as Stalin had nothing but contempt for his apologists, so presumably will the New Right for its supplic- ants...
...The Nixonian appropriation of the Moynihan ap- proach was also a classic case of torpedoing a complex and perhaps worthwhile neoconservative initiative...
...and (c) northern urban, ethnic industrial workers who are conservative on social issues and liberal on economic ones, and who may yet desert the president on tax and spending cuts...
...when the "bad" Nixon decided the program was too compassionate, he lost interest in what would have been a reasonable and "principled" reform of the disastrous welfare system...
...Since, to the Reaganites, it appears to be more pragmatic to keep Saudi Arabia (and, now, apparently Iraq) happy, Israel's interests will always be at risk --as conservatives have demonstrated since at least 1969 when the "Rogers Plan" was floated by the Nixon administration and torpedoed by liberal opposition...
...but in this, neoconservatives will increasingly resemble Stalinist liberals and radicals of the 1930s...
...When the "good" Richard Nixon wanted a Family Assistance Plan, he turned to his then counselor, the omnipresent Daniel Moynihan, and got an ingenious program which combined compassion and the work ethic...
...But neoconservative cohcern for justice for the poor and com- passion for the powerless (which is real though unfocused) have been superseded by an exaggerated derisiori of liberals and a mindless alliance with conservatives, so its failure to articulate programmatic and specific solutions is significant, The neoconservative instinct is to compromise not with liberCommonweal: 430...
...Contemporary American conservatives may be (a) corporate leaders who abhor competition, free trade, and anti-trust and seek to har- ness government to their economic interests...
...he is a Wes- terner, a Southwesterner, or a newly prosperous Southerner, possessed of a passion to destroy "Eastern" power (corporate or governmental), and impelled by economic or religious fundamentalism (or both) to demand unquestioned conformity on both "single issues" and a programmatic attempt to rede- sign American institutions...
Vol. 108 • July 1981 • No. 14
