Way to go, Joe

I'm a frequent reader of Joe Carter's blog "Evangelical Outpost." Theologically, it's safe to say he and I are on fairly common ground. Politically, I knew we had some differences of opinion when he became involved in blogging for Fred Thompson's campaign back in the days before Fred even officially entered the race. I consider Thompson the fallback establishment candidate, but I could understand Joe's throwing in with him.

What surprised me was the attempted smackdown he posted Thursday on Ron Paul and his supporters. The more applause and attention Paul's positions get, the more the establishment tries to portray him as the leader of some sort of "lunatic right," the Republican equivalent to the Democrat's problems with MoveOn.org. As I acknowledged on Joe's site, some of Paul's supporters certainly act juvenile online and in person. That alone, however, doesn't mean the campaign's positions are as untenable as Joe portrays them.

I suppose it does seem nuts to believe in consistently limited Constitutional government in this day and age of the Heavy Handed State. Certainly it's a view that swims against the current. What amazes me is the automatic dismissal of Paul's campaign positions on taxation, government programming, etc, as utopian or (in Joe's words) adolescent, when in fact they represent a return to how we once managed our nation's affairs! In other words, this isn't some newly dreamed up system. It's a desire to return to the way the Founders set things up. Since we can clearly see the negative results of our tinkering with their system, is it really juvenile to want to hit the reset button? The irony is Joe seems to be saying that growing up includes accepting a fairly large role for government in our lives, when the traditionally conservative position was that growing up meant taking responsibility for our own lives, rather than relying on ever-more intrusive "public assistance."

And there's the rub: the labels "conservative" and "liberal" have broken down. Conservative (at least, in the U.S.) once meant defending the limited Constitutional republic. Now, "conserving" the status quo by definition means defending activist government, both at home and abroad. This is why I believe we're witnessing a political realignment. Sadly, that includes watching otherwise clear-thinking and interesting writers like Joe not only cling to the myth of Republican Party conservative virtue, but also fall prey to logical fallacies he himself once described. To wit, "No mature adult, however, should take (libertarianism) seriously," is little better than the "No true Scotsman" fallacy. You're smarter than that, Joe. We're brothers in Christ, but brothers can disagree--even past adolescence.