Our national priorities and ideological nuances

In a down economy with a large deficit, priorities matter. It is only when the money hose slows to a trickle that we realize we can only water our most prized policy petunias.

Okay, that was a little corny. But the point should be made that we’re at a critical moment of introspection in American politics. Listening to conservatives speak, one gets the impression that our political possibilities exist on a scale of small to large government.

It is clear where conservatives would like America to sit on the scale. What isn’t so clear, from a non-conservative’s perspective, is where liberals would like America to align itself.

This is because the range of options conservatives have forced on America does not represent or include the true sentiment of liberal ideology. Conservatives have repeated the mantra of “big versus small” like a heartbeat, and the effect on policy has been deleterious.

Liberals believe that government should be relatively more involved in doing what conservatives believe should be relegated to the private sector. The nuance of the disagreement between conservatives and liberals is lost in the “big versus small” mantra.

Conservatives equate liberal ideology with a desire to increase the size of government. Beyond increasing the size of government, liberal ideology seeks to meet the citizens’ needs it believes cannot be fulfilled by the private sector.

The lost nuance is the disagreement about what is done most effectively by the private sector and what is done most effectively by the public sector. To move beyond partisanship for the sake of the country, conservatives have to come to terms with the fact that both ideologies seek effective government.

In this regard, conservatives have lost their way. Rather than seek to reform and improve government, conservatives boxed themselves in through their own rhetoric. They’ve consequently simplified their own ideology. It has reduced the modern conservative movement to seeking a reduction of all government at any cost.

Instead of looking only at what can be trimmed away from the government, conservatives need to find ways to make the government function more effectively. To be effective is to use tax dollars wisely.

Rather than eliminating large swaths of the Clean Air Act as House Republicans have proposed, conservatives should examine ways to reduce the regulatory costs on businesses while still protecting the health of those affected by pollution.

Rather than refuse to include emergency disaster aid in the budget, Republicans should look at ways to strengthen infrastructure to reduce long-term disaster costs or force FEMA to innovate through internal reforms and cross-agency cooperation.

Conservatism must come to terms with science, and it must accept secularism as an inherent and essential facet of American government. To do so would allow the right to declare its commitment to traditional conservative principles such as conservation, the appropriate protection of the free market through selective regulation, civil liberties and other critical issues.

Republicans and Democrats should look past partisanship and work together to reduce the cost of government, not the scope of government.

—cdbabcoc@indiana.edu