Then Newt tickles the Southern g-spot, by saying that his debating Obama will be a battle between “knowledge” and a “TelePrompTer.” I don’t think Newt realizes how his contempt and condescension toward Obama is riddled with racism.

Ta-Nehisi Coates argues along similar lines:

The notion that Gingrich is somehow unaware of that “food stamp president” has racial connotations, that he is being on the level when he says the black community should not be satisfied with food stamps, requires an extension of supernatural generosity. 

While it would not be terribly surprising if Newt had some dog-whistle scheme in mind when he harps on these points, I think another explanation better fits the evidence without extending to the former Speaker “supernatural generosity.”

A trend I have increasingly observed, especially here in DC, is that partisans of all stripes routinely underestimate the extent to which their antagonists are familiar with their reasonings and explanations.  For instance, on economic matters, conservatives often speak as if their counterparts on the left have never encountered public choice economics or are unconcerned about inducing perverse incentives or unintended consequences.  Likewise, liberals like to justify their opinions by harping on the existence of inescapable market failures (see the health care debate, for instance), as if no one on the right advanced beyond introductory micro. 

Instead, I have noticed that the politically interested (or at least the modestly intelligent ones) tend to be quite familiar with the various contrary caveats their opponents have stockpiled and have complicated their respective worldviews sufficient to accomodate them.  However, partially out of limited co-mingling but mostly out of a inflated view of themselves, these partisans assume that others have not done the same.  This misapprehension fuels one of the most seductive and pervasive fantasies I have encountered amongst politicos: that they will debate someone with hardset opposing views and leave their interlocutor stupefied  by the novelty of their arguments (or, even better, baptize a new co-religionist on the spot).

Newt Gingrich, himself a rounded dallop of thoroughly Washingtonian hubris, is this delusion made manifest and he is running a campaign whose primary promise is to allow Republican voters to experience vicariously their collective debate fantasy on live television.   This is why all Gingrich ads emphasize that only he amongst the Republican candidates can beat Obama during the presidential debates.  In this context, his argument about knowledge vs. TelePrompter is not some deeply coded appeal to his audiences’ suspicions of black people.  It is instead a more explicit appeal to a commonly felt belief that the President would be left speechless in the face of the arguments of true conservatives.

The silliness about food stamps and paychecks and speaking to the NAACP runs along a similar logic.  My sense is that Newt and his ideological confreres do not presume that African-Americans and the indigent are dependent on the government out of congenital shiftlessness, but because they have never been exposed to arguments in favor of working for a living (or else why would they still be unemployed and/or Democrats).  Thus Newt apparently thinks he can travel down from on high to the NAACP and, like Moses from Mount Sinai, deliver the gospel on hard work and self-suffiency to the audience (all of whom, this being the freaking NAACP, well-employed at present) and win hordes of dumbfounded converts to the cause. 

These presumptions looms so large across everything Gingrich does* not because he thinks so little of the President or African-Americans or anyone else but because he thinks so much (and so often) of himself.

*For instance, C-SPAN today had a rousing speech by the former speaker from Cape Canaveral wherein he declared that the only thing standing between us and permanent lunar occupation is an exhorting declaration from future President Gingrich and the promise to make the Moon the 51st state if enough people move there.

Amphibian populations are declining in numbers worldwide.  Not coincidentally, the earth’s ozone layer has been continuously depleted throughout the last fifty years.  Atmospheric ozone blocks UV-B radiation, a type of ultraviolet radiation that is continuously produced by the sun, and which can damage genes.  Because amphibians lack hair, hide, or feathers to shield them, they are particularly vulnerable to UV-B radiation.  In addition, their gelatinous eggs lack the protection of leathery or hard shells.  Thus, the primary cause of the declining amphibian population is the depletion of the ozone layer.

Each of the following, if true, would strengthen the argument EXCEPT:

A) Of the various types of radiation blocked by atmospheric ozone, UV-B is the only type that can damage genes.

B) Amphibian populations are declining far more rapidly than are the populations of nonamphibian species whose tissues and eggs have more natural protection from UV-B.

C) Atmospheric ozone has been significantly depleted above all the areas of the world in which amphibian populations are declining.

D) The natural habitat of amphibians has not become smaller over the past century.

E) Amphibian populations have declined continuously for the past 50 years.

The LSAC answer and the one that Tai, amongst others, would affirm to be correct, beyond the jump.

The LSAC says the answer is A.

Leaving aside the correlation-equals-causation fallacy that the author employs, the clear correct answer is E).   A) is, at worst, neutral, to the strength of the argument; E) disconfirms it, albeit weakly.  If there is, as the author suggests, a constant dimunition of the ozone layer over the past 50 years, then you would expect a constant increase in the amount of UV-B radiation reaching the Earth’s surface.  Again leaning on the author’s logic, if you assume that UV-B radiation is harmful to the survival of amphibians, you would expect this constant increase of UV-B exposure would lead to a constant increase in the death rate of the amphibian population (assuming no selection takes place).  

However, answer E) does not measure the rate of death, but the overall population.  With a constantly increasing  death rate, one would expect the size of the population to diminish exponentially (integral of the death rate), rather than concomitantly with the shrinking of the ozone layer.  Thus, an observation like E) would serve to actively weaken the author’s argument and is the best answer for the question.

How . . . can we assure obedience among people who disagree with substantive ends that we favor and that have, somehow been at least partially embedded in the constitution?

Including within the constitution some of the trappings of liberalism may provide a solution to this problem. The feature of liberalism most useful in this regard is its uncanny ability (at least in our political culture) to persuade people of their duty to obey even when the politics of self interest and of moral responsibility fail. Viewed in one way, liberalism’s obfuscatory potential is precisely its problem. Supposedly expansive individual rights, supposedly free elections, a supposedly neutral playing field – all of these institutions serve to justify outcomes that should outrage us. On one view, then, outsiders should devote their energy to breaking down this ideology of legitimation.

The other view, though, is that this approach is either hopeless or foolish. It is hopeless because constitutional liberalism is too deeply engrained in our political culture to be displaced. It is foolish because any constitution, even my nonliberal one, will require a mechanism that convinces the populace to obey, and, given our present political culture, liberalism’s pretentions to being transubstantive provide such a mechanism.

It is important to understand just how limited and qualified this endorsement of constitutional liberalism is. First, I emphatically do not mean to endorse liberalism as a principled matter. My view is far removed from John Rawls’ position that liberalism is necessary for political justice in a diverse society. I do not even endorse the view that he rejects – that liberalism might provide a mere modus vivendi for divergent groups. Rather, my view is analogous to that entertained by some Catholics before Vatican II and before John Courtney Murray’s influential reinterpretation of Catholic doctrine for an American audience. Some pre-Vatican II Catholics treated religious toleration as a contingent good to be supported only when and to the extent that it advanced the interests of Catholics.  So, too, we might treat constitutional liberals as “useful idiots” who, at this particular moment in history, deserve our support because, but only to the extent that, they offer some protection to political outsiders and legitimation for good, nonliberal constitutional provisions.

His essay is short and correct in all of its particulars. Worth a read.

Hat tip.

Relatedly, Mitt Romney just lost the Iowa caucuses to Rick Santorum in a recount.

Well, I guess since there are no sidekicks and Sonic never speaks, it can truthfully be considered progress.

Robin’s thesis is that claims like Oakeshott’s about conservatism (and also, those of Hayek about classical liberalism) are nothing more than a mask for attempts to resist, and where possible, roll back the claims of the working class against their rulers.

I think this is broadly correct. Although there are people with the conservative disposition described above (and also, people who are attracted by radicalism as such), there is no inherent correlation between conservatism as a disposition and support for the political views commonly associated with conservatism.

There is an accidental association reflecting the fact that, taking the last two or three centuries as a whole, the ruling class has mostly been losing ground. First, the aristocracy was forced to share power with the bourgeoisie, and, then for most of the 20th century, the working class gained ground against the power of capital. Under such circumstances, people of conservative disposition will generally be found in opposition to the progressive demands being put forward by workers and their supporters.

Quiggin understands Robin’s thesis about “dispositional conservatism” the way Chris does — “nothing more than a mask” or, in Chris’s words, “it is a pretty lie told by intelligent conservatives to, knowingly or not, mask their true motivations.” I remain skeptical. First, because Robin repeatedly praises conservatism — real conservatism, as espoused by able conservatives (Oakeshott, Hayek, etc.) — as, e.g., “an idea driven praxis,” which suggests that he thinks there is a real conservative theory there, not just a reflexive desire to protect prerogative, coupled with self-serving lies. Second, because Robin is at pains to deny that his theory of conservatism requires or implies that conservatives must be deceptive — delude the downtrodden — to shore up their populist, non-elite, support. From the post just linked:

After writing that I believe conservatism is “an inherently elitist” ideology, Berman claims that that argument cannot account for the anti-elitist dimension of conservatism and that I “explain away right-wing populism as some sort of trick” to keep the masses in their place.

The problem here is that Berman seems to believe that elitism and populism are antipodal forms, where never the twain shall meet. Perhaps that’s why she overlooks my argument that elitism and populism are the mutually reinforcing, yet tension-ridden elements of a single project.

Rather than dismiss right-wing populism, I see it and describe it repeatedly throughout the book as fundamental—not just a recent phenomenon but coterminous with the entire tradition of the right.

Robin’s view that elitism and populism aren’t “antipodal forms” again undercuts conservatism’s need for smoke-and-mirrors, making it further unlikely that Robin thinks there’s much deception in play.

I’m agnostic about Robin’s account of conservatism (largely because I’ve been chastened by his blogspheric exhortations to read conservatives, deeply, before characterizing their politics), but it does fit some rightwing tactics to a Tea.

“Individualist feminism” is an example. It defines itself in opposition to the “socialist” or “radical” feminism (what we know as: feminism) to which it is a reaction (although, as a matter of tactical course, it claims to be the original).

Substantively, it has a dream that one day women will be free to stand on their rights, as the moral equals of men, and demand to be prostitutes and homemakers. (Example: “Ifeminists believe that freedom and diversity benefit women, whether or not the choices that particular women make are politically correct. They respect all sexual choices, from motherhood to porn.”)   Individualist feminism also likes to re-imagine a woman’s getting harassed in the workplace as her enjoying the fruits of sexual liberation. (From the same source: “[What's our take on] [v]erbal sexual harassment? If women want an equal right to explore their own sexuality, they risk encountering the offensive sexual attitudes of others.”)

Other times, it just deploys the rightwing tactic Robin identifies really, really badly: “If possible, [socialist feminists] use the state—even the patriarchal state, the nemesis of women—to enforce their version of a just society.” What, if not an opportunistic kludge of feminist terminology and a rightwing bugbear, is the “patriarchal state”?

Having gone real deep into Robin’s corpus, it has become clear to me that Mark Lilla’s New York Books review of The Reactionary Mind, which I previously praised, is disingenuous. Though you wouldn’t know it from reading Lilla’s essay, Robin is well aware that his account of conservatism stands opposed to Lilla’s, Andrew’s, and most other conservative intellectuals’. Robin has also responded to their arguments at length. His responses are thoughtful, and his conception of conservatism could well be right (heh).

But I have some questions. Right now I’m particularly puzzled by two aspects of Robin’s vision of conservatism.

(1) The relationship between conservatism, the preservation of hierarchies of power, and violence. In his exchange with Larison Robin defines conservatism as committed to the preservation of intimate hierarchies of power and subordination (master over serf; white over black; man over wife; male over female), but in this piece he suggests that conservatism’s commitment to the preservation of hierarchies and its commitment to violence [Robin's conservatism isn't particularly lovely] both stem from a deep-seated longing for excellence and “the sublime,” which leaves me unsure of how the attitudes and commitments associated with conservatism are supposed to nest. (Is a sense of the sublime most fundamental to conservatism? Is a commitment to hierarchies that in turn results in, and is reinforced by, a commitment to the sublime? Is the conservative intrinsically violent, or is the marriage of conservatism and violence a conceptually accidental, though understandable, association? Etc.?)

(2) The relationship between “dispositional conservatism”* and conservatism itself. Robin repeatedly denies that the dispositional conservatism of Oakeshott (and Andrew and, in some moods, William F. Buckley) is actually conservatism. (Best denial here). So what is dispositional conservatism? At times he suggests it is just an eccentric intellectual fancy, unworthy (or too worthy, depending on your point of view) of being designated a politics. But other times he treats the dispositional conservatives as the real deal. He calls Andrew a “prominent voice on the right,” and in both the Larison exchange and Reactionary Minds he lumps Oakeshott with Palin, the Nazis and the greater conservative pantheon:

I use the words conservative, reactionary, and counterrevolutionary interchangeably: not all counterrevolutionaries are conservative…but all conservatives are, in one way or another, counterrevolutionary. I seat philosophers, statesmen, slaveholders, scribblers, Catholics, fascists, evangelicals, businessmen, racists, and hacks at the same table: Hobbes next to Hayek, Burke across from Palin, Nietzsche between Ayn Rand and Antonin Scalia, with Adams, Calhoun, Oakeshott, Ronald Reagan, Tocqueville, Theodore Roosevelt, Margaret Thatcher, Ernst Jünger, Carl Schmitt, Winston Churchill, Phyllis Schlafly, Richard Nixon, Irving Kristol, Francis Fukuyama, and George W. Bush interspersed throughout.

If the visions of Andrew and Oakeshott are both supposed to be conservative in Robin’s sense, as opposed to mere eccentricity, then what is dispositional conservatism? Is it just a flattering self-image? Does it reduce to actual conservatism? Or is dispositional conservatism its own point in conceptual space, real and irrelevant? In which case, how are Andrew and Oakeshott conservatives in Robin’s sense?

~~~

* Dispostional conservatism. In one of the posts already linked, Robin quotes Andrew to describe dispositional conservatism: “There is a distinctive conservative strain of non-violence, pragmatism, restraint and limited government that is at peace with the New Deal. How else to expain Eisenhower or the first Bush or Reagan in some moods?” In another of the linked posts, he also takes his own crack at characterizing dispositional conservatism:

Conservatives, at least by reputation, are supposed to be calm, reasonable, quiet, averse to the operatic, friendly to the familiar.  They don’t go looking for trouble in far-off lands. They stay home, tending their gardens, patching the roof, taking care of their children. They want to be left alone. They’re not interested in history’s adventure. They want to leave things be, even if things aren’t so great, because they know that trying to change things, particularly through politics, will only make them worse.

Of course, reading Lilla’s piece you’d think that Robin was wholly unaware of this phenomenon (as opposed to centrally concerned with it). Pshaw.

Newt Gingrich is the first person I have ever seen suffer the reverse-Godwin: when someone compares your opinions to that of neo-Nazis in an attempt to disparage the supremacists.