If, as I suspect, liberalism is not so much a political or social philosophy so much as it is degeneration rationalized, and if we accept the law of thermodynamics that everything runs down and the historical fact that sooner or later nations, empires and civilizations fall, then the path to destruction must be marked by increased liberalism. Thus, it is not so much liberalism conservatives fight as degeneration and decrepitude itself, liberalism merely being a symptom of underlying rot.

So we must ask the classic questions about whether a civilization headed on the downward slope can ever hope to reverse its path, or if it is doomed. We may ask what the preconditions of resurrection are historically, and what it is we must do to bring about not merely reform but a drastic makeover. If we’re doomed, as some have openly said, then we need to ask what to do to survive and to take part as conservatives in the next civilization, whatever that might be.

Seems reasonable — if you’re unwilling to state what your ultimate principles are then anyone who’s willing to push to be allowed to do something is eventually going to gain his point. If that’s so, though, then after a while it’ll seem to make sense to regularize the situation and announce publicly that the ultimate principle is to let everyone do what he wants.

The question then is how to avoid the slippery slope. It seems the only possibility is to have some proclaimed transcendent orthodoxy — an established religion. The alternative is eventually to end up with a proclaimed this-worldly orthodoxy (otherwise known as PC) that everything’s the same as everything else.

Here are Robert Conquest’s three laws of politics, as brought to my attention by Derbyshire:

1. Everyone is conservative about what he knows best.

2. Any organization not explicitly right wing sooner or later becomes left wing.

3. The simplest way to explain the behavior of any bureaucratic organization is to assume that it is controlled by a cabal of its enemies.

I thought number two was by John O’Sullivan, and was also known as O’Sullivan’s first law, but maybe it was Conquest’s idea.