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Erick Erickson penned a great retort to Kurt Schlichter’s piece advocating a strategic abandonment of adherence to the rule of law — if not to greater principles of liberty and Judeo-Christian morality.
However, Erickson failed to provide a strategic alternative. If Schlichter’s position represents A, then Erickson is anti-A.
What conservatives need, and are yearning for, is B. A Plan B, a third way, a different way of thinking and acting out of the box.
Let me sketch out the values underlying the strategic alternative, before I explain how the strategy can be executed. Values matter, not because we’ve been taught that. Values matter, because they will guide us when the unpredictable occurs and we need to adapt, react and respond on the fly.
The first value we need is respect for the individual. The second value is respect for the rule of law. I’m afraid that using Leftist tactics against Leftists compromises those values, but also endangers our families and sense of belonging.
However, the strongest argument against using Leftist violent tactics arises from understanding the most critical difference between us, and the Left. It is sad to say this, but it is necessary: A substantial number of Leftists have nothing they’ve earned, taken pride in, or no one whom they care about. Just ask yourself the last time you remember seeing a smiling Leftist.
Conservatives are the opposite. We care about our families, about our history, our sense of who we are. This carries on to our communities and certainly to our faith. All of those things are endangered by violence. If we were to adopt Leftist violence as a modus operandi, we would be jeopardizing all those things we hold dear. Yet our battlefield opponents would have no such emotional grounding; they have nothing, so they feel they have nothing to lose.
In any physical confrontation, the side that “doesn’t care” has a huge advantage over the side which does. It’s as simple as feeling the risk of loss, the fear of loved ones being hurt or deprived. Our opponents don’t share those emotions. That alone tilts the battlefield. It’s an emotional advantage.
Our sense of morality, our sense of limits on what is permissible behavior, also presents a handicap. Again, quite simply, there are actions we will not take. Our Leftist street opponents may have, literally, no limits. Nothing is out of bounds for them.
To sum these thoughts up, to adopt Leftist violence is to fight this cultural (if not civil) war on a battlefield where the Leftists set the terms of battle, we are unfamiliar with the terrain and where we have no discernible advantages — not one — to compensate for our moral limits.
So what are conservatives to do?
First, we can resolve to fight this battle on our terms, on our terrain and when we choose to engage. There are plenty of spaces in our lives where we retain control, and can retain control tomorrow and beyond. While Leftists are now overtly pressuring and punishing conservatives with economic reprisal (from censorship based on arbitrary violations of website terms of use, to hiring and firing decisions based on political expression), we still have economic and intellectual capital. We just have to use them.
Secondly, we need to become bold and exercise our “stakeholder’s veto.” That means asserting the power which comes from holding and owning capital. Many of us are homeowners; some of us own and run businesses. We are in positions of authority and control. That does not mean we have a mandate to be bullies, but nor does it suggest we must be timid in the face of attempts to destroy our economy, our culture and our institutions. It means we must stop feeding the hands which seek to choke us.
Conservatives have often been our worst enemy, supporting our opponents while they return the favor by refusing to patronize our businesses or hire us. Yet there are ways to exercise our power, quickly and quietly and without the risk of confrontation. Informal boycotts, reflecting just your conscious choice to select one brand instead of another, based on an ideological screen, are ways to impact the bottom line of large corporations which feel there is no penalty right now for offending or denigrating our values. (A great resource for this is the 2ndVote website which allows you to search for companies based on some major issues.) Meanwhile, those of us in the management corps have the decision-making power and should — and corporate fiduciary duties of due care and loyalty actually require us to — base decisions on our values. There is a clear economic rationale; our opponents too often push values which undermine the performance of any private-sector enterprise. Put simply: Marxists make bad employees.
Innovators don’t succeed by waiting for permission. They are disruptive by nature, and here, disruption means to compete with an eye towards winning. When we innovate, we can and should start our own businesses and support each other. The networks need not be formal. Many immigrant groups came here and built their own institutions — religious, economic, educational, social, even quasi-governmental. We can do the same, and it may be true that now, we must do the same.
Success can never be assured. However, these simple steps will help us assert some independence from control by Leftist-controlled institutions. Once that is achieved, we can begin functioning from an emotional platform not of fear, but of hope. Instead of reacting, we can start acting, building our own enterprises and running the show with a renewed mission and deeper sense of urgency.
Conservatives cannot begin to take back our culture and our institutions while fearful for our jobs, our careers and our families. Economic independence is a quickly achievable goal which, once attained, prevents our enemies from destroying those things most meaningful to us.
Once we can afford to fight, the foundation will be set for additional strategies to reclaim our nation.
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