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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (69990)	1/7/2003 2:17:13 PM
From: cosmicforce	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Conservative engineering means using principles that are well understood and whose results can be predicted with high reliability. Supply side economics was never a conservative economic philosophy, though most "conservatives" widely embraced it. In the 1980's when it was popular, out of a meeting of 1100 economists, only 15 called themselves "supply siders". For conservatives to usurp a term which more commonly means "prudent" or "generally accepted" seems to be active misrepresentation. Conservative principles in these political times are more likely to mean "reactionary" and only aim to stop social and economic change by giving preference to solutions used in the past by a select few individuals. That is anti-American where our 200 years have claimed that all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights. As we evolved, we generally moved in a direction where that became more true and not less true. It is becoming less true these days. That seems reactionary. The liberal use of resources is fine, if it is sustainable and you aren't using resources that don't actually belong to you. It is hard to transfer ownership of mineral resources which formed millions of years before humanity dropped from the trees to roam the savannah. Some of that resource is the property of our descendants, living and yet to live. Liberal use of anything is not a problem when the supply is infinite or practically so. Liberal use of solar photons to produce electricity is both conservative (as in prudent) and conservative as being proven to work for long periods of time in a cost-effective way. The economy of the planet has been based upon it for billions of years. For us to not use it as our economic fuel is radical and unproven. In Physics, conservative processes are those which are lossless (meaning you will have as much when you are done as when you started). Using that meaning, I don't think our current political processes are conservative of the Rights of People or Economic Freedom. I've got the facts on my side. Secret meetings in which the Oil Barons meet with Enron and within months the shareholders and pensioners are left holding the bag is not in any way conservative of wealth. Forcing bills through Congress like Homeland Security without adequate debate does not promote freedom, but curtails it. Jewel's point of "conservation" flows well with my point, though he didn't seem to think so. I couldn't tell what he meant for sure. My philosophy is more conservative and focused on conservation and prudence than any "conservative" philosophy ever discussed here on SI. [Palindrome grub!]