{"id":31840,"date":"2009-03-04T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T02:40:24","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2018-02-05T11:04:15","modified_gmt":"2018-02-05T16:04:15","slug":"the_definitions_of_conservatism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2009\/03\/04\/the_definitions_of_conservatism\/","title":{"rendered":"The Definitions of Conservatism"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: We go to Buffalo. Jeff, thanks for waiting. It\u2019s nice to have you here on the EIB Network.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Rush, I can\u2019t believe this. For years: busy, busy, busy. Today, I called, it rang. I said, ‘Oh, my God, this can\u2019t be true,\u2019 but I\u2019m on the phone with ya.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Congratulations, sir, congratulations. I understand the feelings of exultation that you are experiencing.<\/p>\n

CALLER: It is an honor. I guess I feel like the Democrats when The Messiah took office, I guess. (laughs)<\/p>\n

RUSH: (laughs)<\/p>\n

<\/a>CALLER: But I\u2019ll tell you, Rush, I caught your speech on Fox the other day, and I gotta tell you, you did an absolute perfect job of describing conservatism. It was to a T. I think you enlightened a lot of people, and I\u2019ll tell you, I think you changed a lot of people\u2019s minds who may have been liberals at one time.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, we hope. Let me say something about my definition of conservatism. It was not actually the classical Burkean, Russell Kirkian definition of conservatism, and I purposely avoided that. I didn\u2019t want to get into egghead stuff. What I tried to do was define conservatism in a way that responds to the way we are characterized by media and leftists as haters, as bigots, as racists, as extremists and so forth. So that was the context in which I chose to define conservatism because that\u2019s what people think. You know, what people think of conservatism is what they\u2019re being told by people who are trying to malign and impugn all of us. So that\u2019s the framework in which I chose to define conservatism. I\u2019ll admit, it was very good, it was close, but graphical conservatism is far more intricately detailed than that, but that sufficed well, I thought. Thank you.<\/p>\n

CALLER: And I think you did a great job describing, or telling Republicans, what conservatives should be again.<\/p>\n

RUSH: It seems… You know, I\u2019m glad you mentioned that, because most of my critics of this speech are fellow conservatives — conservatives you\u2019ve never heard of, conservatives who have never contributed a dime to the movement or had any impact. But I want to address something you just said. It\u2019s a good point, a good reminder. Thanks.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: I mentioned before the break the CPAC speech and some of the things that have followed. Most of my critics are the blogger conservative intellectuals, the people who have really done nothing in shaping conservatism. They would like to, but they haven\u2019t really done anything. They\u2019re not out on the front lines. They hide behind their blogs, and they analyze. They treat themselves to how smart they are and so forth. I\u2019m being hit by these people pretty hard for a whole host of reasons. The way I look, the way I sounded, that it\u2019s horrible, horrible, horrible for conservatism that I\u2019m the face of it. Most of the criticism is coming from people on the right that you don\u2019t know. This is my point, you don\u2019t know who they are unless I would tell you and I\u2019m not going to tell you because they\u2019ve done nothing in this league, quote, unquote. <\/p>\n

But regardless, one of the criticisms that I have faced from these people is that I gave a totally rotten definition of conservatism, that I\u2019m such an idiot I don\u2019t even know what conservatism is. This is people supposedly on my team saying this. And, of course, my definition of conservatism, as I just explained, was to counter the public description, the left\u2019s description of us as conservatives, because that\u2019s what they think, people who aren\u2019t conservatives, that\u2019s what they think conservatism is. So my explanation was to counter that. The second thing that I\u2019m being dragged on the coals for is I supposedly advised Republicans to forget about policy and focus on principle and philosophy. These people are having a cow over the fact, ‘How can you come back without policy, you\u2019ve gotta have policy! You\u2019ve gotta have some strategic policies to announce to people, things that you\u2019re for.\u2019 See, this is what\u2019s happened to the conservative movement that the so-called best and brightest who you\u2019ve never heard of, and you won\u2019t on this program, the best and brightest in our movement don\u2019t understand the role of principle, and they don\u2019t understand the role of philosophy. <\/p>\n

If you have the principle down pat, and if you have the philosophy down pat, then by definition, the policies follow. But these people, by the way, want to change conservatism. They\u2019re trying to redefine it and make it Democrat lite, because they think the situations today are different than they were in the eighties, and of course we have to adapt with new policies. That\u2019s why they say the era of Reagan is over. But the era of Reagan was not policy. The era of Reagan was philosophy; the era of Reagan was principle. What was it that gave us, for example, the tax cut policy to raise revenue and wipe out a recession? Conservative philosophy and principle. The policy, the law, the idea, the way to get it implemented, descended from that. What was the policy that led to our victory in the Cold War and bringing down the Soviet Union? Well, it wasn\u2019t. It was a philosophy, it was principle, and it was based on the principle of freedom and that eventually regimes which oppress their own people will collapse of their own immorality if you just nudge them in the right way. <\/p>\n

You don\u2019t have to fire a shot. The policy people in that era were the ones that wanted us to meet with all the Soviet leaders. The policy people were the ones that wanted to get Reagan to tone down the lingo. The policy people are the ones that wanted to get into the minutia of writing all this gobbledygook that would then form legislation or party platforms which would lay out our position on how to defeat the Soviets. Well, before you do that you\u2019ve gotta have a philosophy and a set of principles that guide you. Our principles and our philosophy stood side by side. The policies create themselves, and the policies, as I say, descend from several principles, freedom, the founding, the preamble to the Declaration, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. It\u2019s amazing the policies you can write if those are your principles, it\u2019s like amazing the ideas you can come up with. <\/p>\n

Welfare reform. Where did that policy come from? Oh, yeah, there might have been people working deep down with the sleeves rolled up on the intricacies of the operation and how to implement it, tell the states what to do. But the concept was we\u2019re destroying lives with welfare. We\u2019re going to get people back to work, we\u2019re going to get them off welfare because we love them and because they want them to be something. We want them to get something out of this life they have been born with more than sitting around and subsisting on something that\u2019s very little from the government with no future. Now, that\u2019s the philosophy, that\u2019s the principle, that too much government destroys lives, damages the future of a lot of lives, we want to stop this because we love people. Before we get to this point, did any of you who object to welfare on the humanitarian grounds that it is destructive of families and people, did you need somebody to explain a policy to you before you understood that welfare was bad? Or was it just instinctive, you just know, you\u2019ve had kids or whatever, the more you give people without requiring them to earn it, the more you are seeing to it they\u2019ll never be able to earn anything and you\u2019re going to have to take care of them the rest of their lives. And we believe that ultimately is destructive to people and it insults them. They\u2019re capable of far more, but we look at them and say, ‘No, you\u2019re not, we have to take care of you because you\u2019re incompetent.\u2019 <\/p>\n

Well, that\u2019s not who we are by virtue of philosophy. That\u2019s not who we are on the basis of principle, and I don\u2019t care whether it\u2019s 1980 or 2009. That hasn\u2019t changed and look at what\u2019s happening. Obama is reversing welfare reform. The stimulus bill, or one of these pieces of legislation, does away with it. The states are going to now get more money from the federal government based on how many new welfare cases they create, how many more people are added to welfare rolls. You have to be ever vigilant against this stuff because the left is always going to try to undo anything done that emancipates people and gives them freedom. So these people on my side are taking me over the coals because they think I eschewed the notion — even Rich Lowry at National Review didn\u2019t understand it. He\u2019s the editor of National Review, which descends from William F. Buckley. I never said I was against policy. Of course you need it, but policy guided by what? If you\u2019re going to have policy that says we need to be more like Democrats, we need to identify this particular group of voters and come up with a plan and a party policy that goes and gets them, fine, but you\u2019re changing conservatism when you do that. You\u2019re not using a conservative philosophy or principle to go do that, you\u2019re starting to look at people the way Democrats do. And you\u2019re looking at them on the basis, ‘Well, have to win elections.\u2019 Yeah. But we got a blueprint for that that our own party is ignoring. <\/p>\n

So I would urge all of you, don\u2019t be talked out of what your instincts tell you. We\u2019re all conservatives here, and those of you listening who are new to the program who might be tempted to cross over, we\u2019d love to have you. But if you\u2019re a liberal or moderate, independent, however you describe yourself, I\u2019m addressing the conservatives for the moment. Don\u2019t let yourself be talked out of your instincts. Don\u2019t let yourself be talked out of what\u2019s in your heart and what you know by virtue of life experience. By the way, Rich Lowry is not one of the critics. Lowry is not one of the people I\u2019m talking about. He praised the speech, he just said it was the one area he disagreed with. But what I fear is that even on our side, what is conservatism is now up for debate, people are trying to come up with their own definition and idea of it and using what they think is their superior intelligence, smarts to overpower the whole concept just so they can be hailed and touted as smart and revolutionary, evolutionary, moderate, modified conservatism to fit the times, which seems to be one of the things that they are doing. <\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think the Constitution needs to be modified to fit the times. The liberals think that. I don\u2019t think the Declaration needs to be toyed with. Chris Matthews asked the other day on his show, ‘Do you want to live in a world where Limbaugh is writing the Constitution?\u2019 I don\u2019t have a desire to change it, Chris. Works fine for me. I\u2019m trying to defend it and protect it against people who are trying to change it. So I\u2019m not opposed to policy, but principle and philosophy, those are the two things that we need to get us back on track and understand what our objectives are. It would seem to me, given what\u2019s happened with the Obama administration, the things that they\u2019re wanting to enact, that our philosophy and principles ought to just be staring us right in the face. They should be larger than ever. They are the antidote. Conservatism, as it\u2019s always been known, is the antidote to what is happening here. And one day, don\u2019t know when, the antidote will be the vaccine, whatever you want to call it, the nation will take it, the nation will get the vaccine and we\u2019re going to fix all this just as we did in the eighties. I don\u2019t know how much destruction is going to have to occur before that happens, but it will eventually happen. <\/p>\n

In the meantime, ladies and gentlemen, I urge you not to cower and not cave when people make these attempts on you to modify, moderate what you\u2019ve always known to be the principled base and foundation of conservatism, \u2019cause that\u2019s the first battle we face before we even get to Obama. We\u2019re just trying to stop Obama, slow him down a little bit now, but there needs to be a unified opposition to it. I am willing to take that role since Rahm Emanuel and Obama have anointed me the leader. <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: By the way, as to policy, ladies and gentlemen, I have proposed a policy, a bipartisan stimulus plan. My policy was proposed in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal<\/a>. It was a brilliant policy, hailed by many as a genuine bipartisan compromise, rejected entirely by the Obama administration. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: We go to Buffalo. Jeff, thanks for waiting. It\u2019s nice to have you here on the EIB Network. CALLER: Rush, I can\u2019t believe this. For years: busy, busy, busy. Today, I called, it rang. I said, ‘Oh, my God, this can\u2019t be true,\u2019 but I\u2019m on the phone with ya. RUSH: Congratulations, sir, congratulations. 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