The Paleoconservative Mind

by Demophilus

I see those merry reactionaries at The American Conservative are, of all things, debating the goodness of World War II.  Now if we just get ourselves a time machine, and enough copies of Pat Buchanan's new book, we might be able to put the Humpty Dumpty known as Pre-Imperial America back together again.

Being neither a historian of 20th century diplomacy or military affairs (though that didn't really stop Buchanan, now did it?) nor someone who believes historical analogies tell us anything at all about the present moment, I won't get into the substance of this "debate."

However, I do think this little episode is a rather striking example of the workings of the Paleoconservative Mind (note the Kirkian capitalization). Many paleoconseravtives seem to have a tendency to love lost causes and narratives of declension, searching for that elusive turning point in which a noble and virtuous people began their long slide towards corruption and tyranny. Most frequently this Fall, in the American context, is located with the Civil War, but others see it with World War I, World War II, or the move away from the Gold Standard, to name just a few. I like to think of this mode of thought as nostalgia masquerading as analysis -- once, all was well, and incessantly reminding everyone of where we went wrong is the way to remedy it.

Now, I'm not trying to pick a fight here. I hold out the possibility (a remote one, though, I suspect) that things once were much better. I also think, regardless of the merits of their arguments, having defenders of lost causes around is an intellectually and even morally salutary thing. And yet...I also believe the language of decline is an easy way out, a way of avoiding hard moral and political choices in the present in the name of condemning all that we see as the manifestation of a more fundamental corruption. Life is always getting better and worse at the same time and the great task, especially for conservatives, is to carefully sift the good from the bad, to learn to revel in the complexity in which we find ourselves. I confess this is not a very emotionally satisfying thing to do. Strident moralism and sweeping condemnation really do feel good now and again. But its not, ultimately, a very helpful or responsible manner of discourse. This is not to say the particular example described above -- the recent TAC symposium on World War II -- exemplifies this. Yet it gestures in the direction of what I've just complained about, and it is out of an often profound admiration for some of the writers and thinkers that fall under the rubric of "paleoconservatism" that I wish they would expend their energy and arguments in a different way.

I'm obviously trafficking in something of a straw man argument -- but I think I am getting at something true, too.

Comments

[Brendan]

Look, there is a lot of truth to what you say, but on the specifics of the WWII debate, consider for a moment the state of national security discourse in this country:

World War II is a founding myth for most participants in this discourse. It is the model of a "good war" one that was fought for all the right purposes, and the only trouble with which is that we did not embrace it quickly enough. And this is not just a bunch of ape shit neo-cons running around seeing hitler behind every tree. Liberal Internationalists, Scowkroftian realists, wild eyed progressives--everyone looks at the second world war uncritically, and invokes it to justify all manner of positions.

It is certainly true that there is a real danger in declinist narratives and in being overly nostalgic. But I submit that it is not paleo-conservative nostalgia that is the major threat in today's discourse. The weight of opinion is all on the other side. If TAC can be provocative and engage a few people on this issue, then I think we should be happy about this fact--how many times have you heard munich analogies? Many more times than their have been munichs, I'll wager.