A Warning to Those Who Try to Understand Conservatism

Conservatism is the result of low-effort thought. It's what happens when public policy issues are filtered through ignorance or laziness. That should be a warning to anyone who wants to understand the administration of American institutions. When an administrator claims to be a conservative, expect him to be incompetent. Expect him to be appalling ignorant of well-established principles of the sciences most important to public policy administration.

Economics, especially, is a area of mystery to conservative elected officials. They ignore what has been shown to be effective in favor of fads and misunderstandings. Supply-side economics is an example. It reigns over conservative public financing theory despite its proven failure. Why? Who knows. Maybe supply-side just feels good. It's a way to convert a human vice, greed, into a principle.

Now we're seeing a new manifestation of conservative incompetence. Despite the triumph of the Affordable Care Act in the Supreme Court, conservatives in state government are vowing to prevent it from being implemented. They say they will not accept the Medicaid expansion and will not create the health insurance exchanges which are important to the expansion of health care to all Americans. What possibly could be driving such resistance to what is an obvious benefit to millions of Americans -- and not just any Americans but residents of their own states. What could be causing them to filter-out the obvious good of expanded health care access to leave only intransigence?

The only answer immediately apparent is their flawed approach to public policy analysis. Somewhere between the presentation of a new idea and its final understanding, the facts are pummeled with ignorance. The resulting reaction to new ideas leaves the rest of us to conclude the conservative brain is a jumbled morass where knowledge is lost to wander aimlessly forever if it has survived at all.

Be warned!