Am I the only one left who thinks of conservatism as a philosophy
of opposition, a defiant creed that aims
to challenge the hegemony of organized liberalism? The
reason I ask is because of
a rather strange article in today's Boston Globe:
Where . . . will the next big conservative ideas come from?
A few young thinkers are offering intriguing new intellectual
frameworks for conservative principles. . . .
[T]heir ideas provide a glimpse of what the search for new ideas
looks like, and how conservatives might come up with a new
conceptual scaffolding in what are, politically and economically,
unfamiliar times.
A rather strange article, I say, because one of the "young
thinkers" named is Reiham Salam of the New America Foundation
(NAF). If that causes some conservatives to scratch their heads,
take a gander at the NAF board of
directors. To say that the most recognizably "conservative"
name on the list is Francis Fukuyama would be to say
everything that need be said, were it not for the presence
on the NAF board of Berrnard L.
Schwartz.
Ring a bell? Yep, the same Bernard L. Schwartz who
gave more than $1 million to Bill Clinton and Democrats, and
whose Loral Space & Communications was fined $20 million for
providing sensitive missile technology to Beijing.
Obviously, Schwartz is just the fellow to sponsor
the development of "intriguing new intellectual frameworks
for conservative principles." Another of the "young thinkers"
named by the Globe is Megan McArdle, who supported
Barack Obama in the last election. Such are
the fonts of "the next big conservative ideas," you
see.
