More liberals telling conservatives what’s good for them

Carol Iannone, writing at the Phi Beta Cons blog, has had it with liberal “conservatives” and libertarians such as David Brooks and Brink Lindsay who have been advising conservatives to abandon social conservatism. “[A]nyone asking conservatism to relinquish its stance for traditional values,” she retorts, “is asking conservatism to drop dead.”

Iannone references Mitt Romney’s idea that Reagan-Republican conservatism is a stool with three legs: patriotism and national defense, free market economics and limited government, and social values. Then she continues:

The standard for patriotism and national defense can be carried by moderate Republicans and moderate Democrats like Joseph Lieberman. The standard for free market economics and limited government can be carried by libertarians, only too well, I might add. But the standard for social values can be carried only by conservatives, the only political segment to care about them, and the only segment that understands the important philosophical and spiritual connections among the three. So we should recognize that when people tell us to relinquish cultural values as an ongoing concern, they are telling us to commit cultural suicide.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at August 06, 2007 10:59 AM | Send