MSimon wrote:I was trying to be amusing, not present a solution. Evidently you were not amused.
Must have gone over my head.
MSimon wrote:
I do like the attitude of liberals - they like to try something new from time to time.
But that's just it. No they don't. They like to try stuff that's new to THEM, but it is NOT NEW to mankind. It's very old in fact.
MSimon wrote:
Conservatives however, screw it up by changing their principles based on how long a regime has been in effect giving no consideration to how well it works.
Again, nonsense. Conservatives advocate that which has been proven to work by prior history.
MSimon wrote:
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes.
"Change" for it's own sake.
MSimon wrote:
The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected.
As Lincoln said "Just because you call a tail a leg, doesn't make it so."
MSimon wrote:
Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition. Thus we have two great types -- the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins. He admires them especially by moonlight, not to say moonshine. Each new blunder of the progressive or prig becomes instantly a legend of immemorial antiquity for the snob. This is called the balance, or mutual check, in our Constitution. — G.K. Chesterton
Since we are quoting G.K. Chesterton, i'll quote him about his fence.
In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, "I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away." To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: "If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."
This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. If he knows how it arose, and what purposes it was supposed to serve, he may really be able to say that they were bad purposes, that they have since become bad purposes, or that they are purposes which are no longer served. But if he simply stares at the thing as a senseless monstrosity that has somehow sprung up in his path, it is he and not the traditionalist who is suffering from an illusion.
MSimon wrote:
Liberals from time to time learn from their mistakes.
Only the mistakes they personally make. They never remember the mistakes of their group, or history for that matter. When a Liberal realizes that his ideology is wrong, they become conservatives. They grow up.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —