{"id":2013971,"date":"2023-08-28T06:46:02","date_gmt":"2023-08-28T10:46:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/conservatives-must-understand-where-they-went-wrong-before-they-can-go-right\/"},"modified":"2023-08-28T06:57:08","modified_gmt":"2023-08-28T10:57:08","slug":"conservatives-must-understand-where-they-went-wrong-before-they-can-go-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/conservatives-must-understand-where-they-went-wrong-before-they-can-go-right\/","title":{"rendered":"Conservatives: Learn from Past Mistakes to Move Forward"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fconservatives-must-understand-where-they-went-wrong-before-they-can-go-right%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2013971&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div class=\"article-content\">\n<p>The thing about greatest hits is that they are usually pretty\u2063 good. And \u200cClaes Ryn\u2019s\u2064 new book, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/American-Conservatism-Claes-G-Ryn\/dp\/1645720403\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Failure of American Conservatism and\u2064 the Road\u200d Not Taken<\/a><\/em>, is no exception. The volume collects articles, essays, and \u2063book \u2063excerpts \u200bspanning the decades of Ryn\u2019s\u200d distinguished career as an academic and public intellectual, and it provides a compelling diagnosis of where the right went wrong. It \u200balso offers a valuable \u2064contrast with Patrick Deneen\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/07\/17\/is-a-postliberal-america-even-possible\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">disappointing<\/a> new book, <em>Regime Change<\/em>, which is suspicious, even hostile, toward our founding. In contrast, Ryn roots his conservatism within our constitutional\u2064 order, battered and besieged though it may be.<\/p>\n<p>To be sure, and as Ryn notes in\u2064 an extended introduction, conservatism\u200d was \u201cup against high odds in a deteriorating civilization.\u201d The shame of conservatism\u2019s \u2064failure is not in defeat itself but rather in \u201cthe way in which \u2064it perceived and handled those odds.\u201d In particular, Ryn demonstrates that many of\u200c conservatism\u2019s failures to conserve\u200b are due to supposed conservative leaders who <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/conservatives-must-understand-where-they-went-wrong-before-they-can-go-right\/\" title=\"Conservatives: Learn from Past Mistakes to Move Forward\">embraced anti-conservative ideology<\/a>. Indeed, \u2063rather than republishing his own writings, Ryn could have proven this\u200b point by simply quoting Bill Kristol\u2019s tweets,\u200c with a reminder\u200b that Kristol was once considered \u2062a leading conservative intellectual.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2-long d-flex justify-content-center\" style=\"margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center; \" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-1702288359\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-1379703300879-0\" class=\"mb-30\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-051b2a7f815ac088f4e00cb8f3502ca0 fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-051b2a7f815ac088f4e00cb8f3502ca0\"><\/div>\n<p>However, Ryn\u2019s curated work offers further \u2063wisdom for conservatives from a \u2062source whose credibility \u200dwas earned by having been right when\u200d many others were going wrong. I began my graduate studies with Ryn \u2014 taking \u200bmany classes with him and eventually writing my dissertation under his direction\u2064 \u2014 at the tail end of the George \u200cW. Bush \u200dpresidency, and the events of those years particularly vindicated his long opposition to neoconservatism.<\/p>\n<p>Even setting aside all of his other accomplishments, Ryn ought to be honored for his prophetic understanding of how the intellectual and moral failures of the neocons would lead to political and policy disasters. As\u2062 this book demonstrates, he\u2063 made this case to both scholarly and lay \u200caudiences through lucid and compelling prose that was a model of bringing philosophical insight to bear on politics.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Leo Strauss vs. Tradition<\/h2>\n<p>Philosophical\u2062 questions about the nature of truth, reason, and \u2064history have <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/by-thanking-george-floyd-for-his-sacrifice-is-nancy-pelosi-valuing-death-over-life\/\" title=\"By Thanking George Floyd For His \u2018Sacrifice,\u2019 Is Nancy Pelosi Valuing Death Over Life?\">political implications<\/a> and effects. By the end of the Reagan years, Ryn had identified the fundamental flaws of neoconservatism, \u200bwhich \u2063he traced to philosophical failures by the influential political theorist\u200c Leo Strauss \u200dand his many disciples. As \u200bRyn observed, \u201cWhen it comes to addressing questions of moral universality and right, Strauss asserted, history and tradition lack all authority.\u201d This\u200b position \u2064was presented as anti-relativist,\u200b and even among conservative intellectuals, there was \u201clittle awareness of the radically anti-conservative implications of Straussian anti-historicism.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Many on the right saw Straussian\u200d appeals to universal \u2064principles and absolute\u200d truth as a bulwark against \u2064moral \u2063relativism, which is why they swallowed Strauss\u2019s rejection\u2062 of history and tradition. But we \u2062are finite, fallible beings.\u2063 We do not grasp \u2063the\u200d good, the true, and the beautiful in the abstract perfection of supposedly universal philosophical propositions but rather within the particularities of our historical existence.\u200b It is not relativism to acknowledge the limits of our capacities to apprehend, articulate, and instantiate moral \u2064truth. \u2064Rather,\u2062 as conservatives of all people ought to know, this is an important part of the moral life, which must be lived in the here and now, rather than\u2064 an abstract realm \u200bof universal propositions.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-ad7dd8699db0ee5391a6ad2e769fc493 fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-6\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-ad7dd8699db0ee5391a6ad2e769fc493\"><\/div>\n<p>Nonetheless, \u2063Strauss\u2019s disciples\u2062 encouraged conservatives \u2064to define and defend America based on just\u200d such abstract philosophical propositions, especially the Lockean \u200dflourishes Jefferson\u200b included in \u200dthe \u2064preamble of the Declaration of Independence. Thus, neoconservative studies of American political \u2064thought tend to focus on a few texts and figures, interpreting them through this ideological\u200d framework. Harry Jaffa\u2019s studies of Lincoln are a classic example of\u200d this approach, in which the much more complex realities of American history are\u2064 regarded as dross that must be\u200d burned away in order to\u200c refine the gold of\u200d universal philosophical propositions. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thepublicdiscourse.com\/2020\/03\/60698\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">purpose<\/a> of American conservatism, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thepublicdiscourse.com\/2020\/03\/60724\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">in this view<\/a>, is to protect, promote, and perfect the ideals that were beautifully expressed, but imperfectly realized, in the American founding.<\/p>\n<p>This historically <a href=\"https:\/\/www.catholicworldreport.com\/2020\/07\/21\/historical-fiction-at-the-service-of-lockean-liberalism\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">inaccurate<\/a> emphasis on the U.S. as a nation founded upon Enlightenment liberal ideals was dangerous \u2064to both conservatism and our constitutional order. As Ryn explains, \u201cBy propagating a rationalistic, anti-historical notion of moral right, Strauss \u200dand his disciples have created a deep prejudice against cherishing America\u2019s distinctive, historically-evolved Christian and British past.\u201d Loyalty \u200dis abstracted away from the \u200creal, historical America to an ostensibly\u200c timeless ideal. But \u200bas Ryn notes, \u200b\u201cthe old American constitutionalism is \u2063inseparable from the moral-spiritual and other\u200c culture that gave it birth.\u201d Formal rules and declarations of\u200b rights are incapable of long \u200csupporting our Constitution\u200d if the people who govern and are governed by it are no longer suited to it.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than focusing \u2063on reviving America\u2019s ailing culture,\u200d the\u2062 neoconservative reduction of the founding to a revolutionary regime of universal human rights suggested that the U.S. had a responsibility to \u2063spread\u2064 its\u2063 absolute standards of just government across the globe. And when they got the chance, the neocons tried. It sounded \u2064very noble to respond to the atrocities\u200c of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks not only by \u2063<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/amazons-reimagined-jack-reacher-is-a-thrilling-story-with-flat-characters\/\" title=\"Amazon\u2019s Reimagined Jack Reacher Is A Thrilling Story With Flat Characters\">killing bad guys<\/a> but also by spreading freedom and democracy throughout the world.<\/p>\n<p>But as Ryn saw, at a time when too few\u2063 of us on the right did, this effort was doomed. As he warned in a prescient 1989 essay in National\u2064 Review, \u201cConstitutional democracy is not the least demanding form of government, one easily implemented around the world. \u2064It \u200dis, on the contrary, perhaps the <em>most<\/em> demanding form of government imaginable, having extensive \u2064moral, intellectual, and cultural prerequisites.\u201d The success of real-world \u201cfreedom and democracy\u201d depends\u200d far more upon the cultivation of these prerequisites than the philosophical abstractions the\u2064 neocons held so dear. Kicking the dictators out was \u2064not enough for peace\u200d and prosperity to break out.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-4cf90dbbf93b9fadd5fff049c954edad fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-10\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-4cf90dbbf93b9fadd5fff049c954edad\"><\/div>\n<p>Ryn understood how supposedly benevolent idealism can provide cover for a selfish\u200d and malevolent\u200c will to power.\u2063 The \u2064sentimental humanitarian presumes his own virtue and arrogantly assumes a god-like knowledge over the complexities of human affairs, which he confidently \u2064rearranges\u200b in his schemes. In his pride, he presumes that his intellectual fancies are reality. Thus,\u200d the self-flattery of\u2062 sentimental humanitarianism can lead to terrible \u2063results \u200dwhen applied to the real\u200b world, which \u200bis \u200cless \u2064tractable than the mental landscapes of\u200b ideological dreamers.<\/p>\n<p>That such ideologues \u2062gained control of the \u200cconservative movement, misleading everyone from ordinary \u2063voters to President George W. \u2062Bush, demonstrates that something had gone badly amiss. Ryn\u200c argues that the neocons were able to hijack conservatism because of an inattention to philosophy on \u2063the part of\u2063 the movement\u2019s leaders, including William F. Buckley Jr. and others at National Review.<\/p>\n<p>The conservative movement often focused on politics to the point of missing essential cultural and academic\u2062 developments, neglecting both \u200bphilosophy and the imagination. Even now, when \u201cpolitics is downstream of culture\u201d \u200dhas become a meme on the right long enough to inspire pushback, the question is still largely \u2062confined to pop \u2062culture and tends to ignore the more complex ways in which politics and culture both influence the other.<\/p>\n<p>Ryn\u2019s longstanding philosophical interest in the imagination runs deep and teaches us that winning the culture means more than just shoving conservative messages into the likes of Marvel films. Rather, to truly shape the culture\u200d for the better,\u2064 we need genuinely \u2064great art, which \u201cexpresses in an aesthetically compelling manner, not fragments\u200b or distortions of\u2064 human experience, but life in its totality, \u2064including its moral dimension.\u201d Such works are able to elevate and inspire the moral imagination, and to shape how both individuals and nations intuitively view the world.<\/p>\n<p>Though the work collected in this book is years, sometimes decades, old, it largely retains\u2062 its relevance to \u200bcontemporary disputes on the\u200b right. Neoconservatism has retreated, and\u2064 some of its most ardent champions have abandoned not only the \u2062GOP but also any\u200c claim to \u200bbe conservative, but it is hardly dead. Old neoconservative redoubts such as Claremont may have rebranded as MAGA populists, but they have\u2064 not \u2063reformed, and Ryn\u2019s work remains an essential antidote to their poisonous ideas.<\/p>\n<p>If\u200d there \u200cis a fault with this book, it is not irrelevance, but \u2063that\u2019s because so many of Ryn\u2019s writings were still on point, he included too many of them, making for a longer and more \u200drepetitive book than necessary. Nonetheless, this is an essential book for those serious\u200c about\u2063 confronting\u200d the failures of \u2062conservatism.<\/p>\n<p>Though it has received less attention, <em>Why Conservatism Failed<\/em> also offers an excellent counterpoint to\u2064 Patrick Deneen\u2019s recent book, <em>Regime Change<\/em>. In contrast to Deneen\u2019s antipathy toward the founders and the Constitution, \u2062Ryn recognizes their fundamental conservatism. \u2064He also\u200d emphasizes the importance of the unwritten constitution \u2014 all of those prerequisites for a self-governing people.<\/p>\n<p>Whereas Deneen seems to accept the\u2062 neoconservative narrative \u2062of the founding as an ideologically liberal project (Deneen just thinks this is bad, rather than good), Ryn \u2063emphasizes how the founders recognized the\u2062 fallenness of \u200cman and the consequent necessity for deliberation and constraint. Ryn asserts that \u201cthe Constitution\u2063 is the\u2064 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/judges-allow-challenges-to-anti-bds-laws-as-anti-semitic-violence-sweeps-u-s\/\" title=\"Judges Allow Challenges to Anti-BDS Laws As Anti-Semitic Violence Sweeps U.S.\">political expression<\/a> \u2062of a general view of human nature and society.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt embodies an entire American ethos\u201d and that the framers\u2019 approach to politics and life \u201cwas not only realistic and far-sighted but morally astute.\u201d That is why \u2064Ryn\u2019s conservatism seeks to conserve the Constitution, both in form\u2064 and in substance. He does not idolize the founders,\u2063 but he does honor them\u200b rather \u2062than\u2064 denigrating them as Deneen does.<\/p>\n<p>Ryn\u2019s conservatism thereby provides a superior foundation \u200bfor rebuilding the \u2062ruins of\u200b our culture and politics. He is well aware of the difficulties, and that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/top-union-leader-slams-bidens-job-killing-order-cost-us-jobs-needs-to-consider-future-of-country\/\" title=\"Top Union Leader Slams Biden\u2019s Job-Killing Order: \u2018Cost Us Jobs,\u2019 Needs To Consider \u2018Future Of Country\u2019\">political realignment<\/a> is not enough. And, to address the elephant\u2062 in the room, yes, Ryn\u2019s essays include a few balanced reflections \u200don Trump. Though Trump is\u2062 culturally far from Ryn, who is a gentleman and a scholar, Ryn acknowledges that Trump nonetheless \u200ccreated new possibilities within the Republican \u2062Party and\u2062 conservative movement. But those openings will \u200dbe wasted unless there is \u200balso a reconsideration among\u2063 conservative intellectual leaders, and considering Ryn\u2019s arguments is an \u2063indispensable part of that.<\/p>\n<p>Conservatives\u200b must understand where they went wrong before they \u2063can begin to go right.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-d430393b0dbd063ffa3b78709cb4116b fdrlst__b89e9-after-post-content\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-d430393b0dbd063ffa3b78709cb4116b\"><\/div>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\">    \t\t\t\t\t   \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>compelling overview of his insightful perspectives on American conservatism. Ryn&#8217;s book showcases his exceptional ability to dissect and critique conservative thought, offering alternative paths that were overlooked. With a collection of thought-provoking writings, this volume proves to be a remarkable addition to Ryn&#8217;s accomplished body of work, ensuring its place among the best.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":538,"featured_media":2013972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2013971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2013971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/538"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2013971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2013971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2013972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2013971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2013971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2013971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}