Before the American Colonies were on the verge of independence, almost the entirety of of the colonies’ population wanted nothing but a reconciliation with Britain. It was not until a man by the name Thomas Paine wrote a pamphlet entitled Common Sense that the colonists were fully swayed onto the revolutionary side. Made for the common man, this pamphlet was used as more than just a tool to begin the shifting of the tides towards patriots; it was one of the first extremely successful published persuasive essays. Within its pages, this pamphlet contained irrefutable arguments against the king. Whether it be grievances fueled by unfair tariffs, or arguments that further supported the need for separation from the British, Thomas Paine found a…
Shelden begins by outlining the details of political life in Washington. She suggests that the unique situation that politicians were put into, “helped to define federal policy making from the earliest days of the new nation.” (Shelden, 3) While politicians had clear viewpoints on certain issues, that did not mean they hated others who did not share them. As is evident from this book, these men had frequent contact with varying political backgrounds and often discussed matters across party lines in cultural situations.…
Source 1 is considerably critical of conservative integrity, so much so that it may have well in fact been written by Rousseau himself. Questioning the moral integrity of those who believe in conservatism, the source blatantly calls out the faults that are present even in today’s conservative based government. Implying that the conservatives are not at all concerned with the common good, the source disparages a well known fact of conservative parties; that their reputation is arguably not the most principle. Since 2006, Harper’s government has done no favours to the conservative reputation, leading the Canadian economy into a spiralling downfall of debt and overspending. Ironically, Harper’s Economic Action Plan had promised to do just the opposite.…
Ronald Reagan’s, A Time for Choosing Speech, main points are as follows: did we still retain the knowledge of the definition of freedom according to our Founding Fathers? “It’s time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers” (Reagan 1). Did we still define government on those founding beliefs? A people that could be self-governed or would we continue to redefine our definition of government until it was completely transformed into totalitarianism. Reagan believed there was no right or left to decide between; he believed there was only a government and people evolving or decaying.…
In Professor Critchlow’s book “The Conservative Ascendancy”, we are provided history of the rise of the conservative right in modern America in the latter half of the twentieth century. We are delivered the earliest dilemmas after the crushing Goldwater defeat in 1964, through the rise and fall of the “Rockefeller” brand of Republicanism to Reagan through the Bush era. His history of the rise of conservative ascendancy from the earliest days of Goldwater forward brought back many memories and filled some gaps. Critchlow develops a comprehensive narrative of how the Republican party challenged the established Democratic majority which was still entrenched with a fusion of the last of the “New Dealers” as against the rising strength of the…
The decline of liberalism and the rise of conservativism…
Hochschild’s Stranger’s in Their Own Land Part I is all about the Great Paradox. The Great Paradox for Hochschild is why do red states dislike and not want federal government help and funds, when statistically speaking they are doing poorer than blue states in things such as “[wealth], teen mothers, more divorce, worse health, more obesity, more trauma-related deaths, more low-birth-weight babies, and lower school enrollment” (pg. 8). Hochschild especially focuses on the fact that the people in these states are worried about their terrible “industrial pollution” (pg. 9), yet do not vote or endorse policies and politicians that would attempt to have stricter environmental regulations.…
Loic Huber 191 In Harlan Ellison's Repent Harlequin Said the Tick-Tock Man, There is a very powerful overtone of criticism vis-a-vis conformity and collectivism. The story is directly tied to Thoreau's’ grandiloquent quote on civil disobedience. He uses his words to describe a world where the masses of men that inhabit this nation are essentially just machines: “They are the standing army...posse comitatus etc.” He insinuates that the average man is simply a cog in a bigger machine, which at all costs is designed to hinder entropy and individualism from prospering. He then declares that politicians are enforcers of logic and not of social platitudes: “Officeholders-serve the state chiefly with their heads; and as they rarely make any moral distinctions.”…
The Radical and the Republican by James Oakes is a historical retelling about the struggle of two men, Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass, to put an end to slavery and the formation of their partnership that led to the ending of slavery. Both men came from vastly different backgrounds, but both strongly believed that slaves should be emancipated and given the benefits from their hard labor. However, in the beginning, their similarities ended there and they were not willing to be friends nor partners. Oakes argues that things could not remain this way due to the need for the passionate reformation and impulsive nature of Douglass paired with the practical political leadership that was exemplified by Lincoln were needed to finally liberate…
Riot is a term used to define and encompass various types of behaviors that are viewed as disorderly, including violence, destruction of property and clashes with those who enforce law and order. (Andrews, 2014, p. 288). Ideologies such as “conservatism” and “radicalism” hold opposing views as to how they perceive “riots” and their effect on society,. We can look at riots from particular perspectives by examining social order and disorder through “riots” and their relationship to the political ideologies of “conservatism” and “radicalism”. These two ideologies have decidedly different viewpoints of the causes and meanings of riots and the effect they have in promoting change, or as a result , the “strengthening” of social order.…
After a in-depth analysis of the American Revolution, I have come to the conclusion that the Revolution was an exaggerated version of English citizens and their emphasis on liberty and freedom in British society; the government in place during and after the American Revolution was a melting pot of half Monarchy and half Democracy. Historian Gordon S. Wood’s claims in the 1992 book entitled The Radicalism of the American Revolution that “if we measure the radicalism by the amount of social change that actually took place—by transformations in the relationships that bound people to each other—then the American Revolution was not conservative at all; on the contrary: it was as radical and as revolutionary as any in history.” His claim is very…
Like transcendentalism, Emerson’s religious beliefs were hazy. In chapter VII of Nature, titled “Spirit,” Emerson states that he believes “[t]he happiest man is he who learns from nature the lesson of worship,” Emerson is seeking a spiritual connection with God through nature, feeling his impact through the surroundings around him as opposed to the standard technique of prayer. The way Emerson practices spirituality is the ultimate individualistic religious experience. There are no guidelines, no strict rules, and no lofty requirements to make yourself worthy of God’s presence. You are free to appreciate God in whichever way you imagine.…
The most incommodious confusion is found in the definition of two most continual terms he uses in this book – “liberal class” and “corporate power”. One can assume that meaning of corporate power – in that it has something to do with commercial enterprises – however, a direct clarification from Hedges is much needed to augment the comprehension of his ideas in general. This principle goes for his use of the term “liberal class”, more so than anything else. For those who are unfamiliar of the term, he supplies no adequate definition of whom or what the liberal class is, in actual fact, other than a brief list of its supporting factions – “the media, the church, the university, the Democratic Party, the arts, and the labor unions” (Hedges 10); admittedly, this may be his form of…
The Conservative Movement arose to answer three major concerns. The first concern of the Conservative Movement was to repeal New Deal programs. Over the years this transformed into more of a fight against “big government” and New Deal programs were the central pillar of “big government”. The next goal of the Conservative movement dealt with the destruction of Communism and creating a foreign policy that exemplified this desire. According to the Conservative Movement, Communism was seen as a threat to America and the rest of world, and conservatives saw liberal foreign policy on Communism as weak and wanted to change US’s foreign policy to be more aggressive.…
Following the French Revolution of 1789, political ideologies began to surface as a result of an increased chance to engage in political discourse, something that was rare outside of the Monarch’s court. As ideas of liberalism, an ideology with a focus on individual human rights began to surface, conservatives with the desire to maintain the Ancien Regime retorted with anti-nationalistic sentiment. In his speech “What is revolution?”, delivered in 1852, conservative Friedrich Julius Stahl denounces the revolution, liberalism and nationalism. In his rhetoric, he warns that by placing humankind's rights and benefit over that of the Lord is a dangerous road to further transgressions. In contrast, the German Progressive Party’s Founding Program created in June 1861…