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While many individual conservatives may be highly moral individuals, conservatism as a political, social, and economic force is morally bankrupt. It is based on everything staying as it is in our social, political and economic systems, when the world is changing faster than we can imagine. Conservatism is overly reliant upon expediency and the use of force to maintain the status quo, turning a blind eye to the realities of a changing world. Its members are against spending any money out of their own pockets, or on any program that is not to the immediate benefit of themselves or their associates. Charity they say begins at home, but their own charitable inclination, at home or out in the world, is inversely proportional to the actual wealth they possess.
If you should actually make some headway against their belief system, watch out! They will attack you, most probably verbally. But if you hit too close to one of the beliefs that lies at the foundation of their world view, physical violence, or at least the threat of it, is possible.
This is especially true concerning the government. Many conservatives are adamantly opposed to the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade, which made a woman's choice to terminate her pregnancy a private matter between her and her physician, stopping government interference in the matter, with limitations as the fetus came closer to being viable. (I would strongly suggest that if you have not done so, read Woodward and Armstrong's book The Brethren concerning the difficult choices made by Justice Blackmun in drafting Roe v. Wade.) Many of these same conservatives are the same people whose strongest objection to a system of national healthcare is that it will come between them and their physicians. If you bring up this contradiction, be ready for a fusillade of insults from your conservative antagonist, the least of which is "socialist baby killer."
The real problem with too many conservatives is that they tend to have a very strong streak of authoritarianism in their souls, as demonstrated by their love for hierarchical systems and their intolerance of people with ideas different from their own. John Dean wrote of these individuals in Conservatives Without Conscience, and Karen Stenner did a more detailed study of this phenomenon in her book The Authoritarian Dynamic.
This is coupled in many cases with a contrary desire to believe themselves almost wholly autonomous individuals, whose social responsibility ends with themselves, their family, and perhaps a very small circle of those who believe as they do. So their submission to authoritarianism is not to the government, but to the opinion of their friends and neighbors, family, business associates, and those they have been told they should listen to because of that politician or commentator's political, economic, or social beliefs. This, in my opinion, is a far more insidious form of tyranny than any "tyranny of the majority," simply because it is not obvious.
Immanuel Kant wrote in his Universal Natural History, that human beings have an "unsocial sociability," with conflicting inclinations to live both in society, and outside as an individual. The conflict arises, Kant continues, from human beings wanting to have company, but also wanting to have everything their own way. Only by their use of reason can human beings overcome this conflict: of living freely with others, while allowing others to live freely as well. To resolve this paradox through the use of reason must invariably involve compromise.
The real misfortune is that many (if not all) of these conservatives have no interest in listening to or using reason.
The most frustrating aspect of these conservatives and their way of thinking is the wide gulf between the facts they believe they "know," and factual reality. Let me give you some examples.
These conservatives complain about government bureaucracies who threaten their freedoms, but do not give a second thought to the corporate bureaucracies who impose themselves on their daily lives. These behemoths, through their interlocking system of credit ratings, consumer surveys, credit card records, etc., keep a far more expansive list of the activities in the average American's daily lives than any government bureaucrat could dream of in his wildest fantasy.
This isn't snooping; it's just good business practices, say these corporately blind, conservative sheep. For most conservatives, if it improves a corporate bottom line it can't really be bad, can it?
Ask that question of the gentleman in California who (according to the August 7th New York Times), having been out of work for many months, thought that he had finally landed a new job. That is, until his new employer checked his credit report and discovered it did not meet their standards, because he had been out of work for many months. ("To get out of the Army you have to be crazy, but if you want to get out of the Army you can't be crazy;" Joseph Heller, (1923-2005?), Catch-22.)
Another example of the difference of what these conservatives know, and what is true, concerns how horrible the Canadian and other National Healthcare Systems are in the Western Democracies. In spite of all of the horror stories promulgated by Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, et al.; the most recent survey I have seen of Canadian citizens show that eighty-five percent of Canadians are satisfied with their system, a percentage that is mirrored by the national healthcare systems of all of the Western Industrial Democracies, with a seventy-plus percent satisfaction rating even in that bastion of almost pure socialized medicine, Great Britain.
I think that it is time for the progressives, liberals, and moderates to understand that when you are dealing with authoritarian conservatives, you are not dealing with a rational individual. You are dealing with fanatics who will twist the truth, or make it up out of whole cloth, regardless of the consequences.
And they will not hesitate to use violence to silence those who oppose them.
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