WHY THE SUDDEN CONSERVATISM? - AT 9:23 A.M. ET:  The liberal New Republic has an informative piece on why some recent polls show a cultural shift to the right among Americans.  One Gallup poll showed the public pro-life for the first time since the poll was first taken.  Another poll showed narrowing support for gun control.  We are fair here, and will quote liberal publications when they have something important to say.  John B. Judis notes the history.  You can ignore the leftist spin that goes with it: 

Prosperity nourishes social experimentation and libertinism; a steep recession makes us want to preserve and protect family, job, and community, and to restore what we think we have lost. In so far as abortion is seen by many Americans as a threat to the sanctity of the family, opposition to abortion--or simply discomfort and displeasure at the idea of abortion--would surface during economic downturns.

Judis notes that, even during the great Depression, when leftist organizations flowered, there was a stress on what we now call traditional values.  A publication for the Young Communist League, discovered by the late historian, Warren Susman, actually said the following:

Some people have the idea that a YCLer is political minded, that nothing outside of politics means anything. Gosh no. They have a few simple problems. There is the problem of getting good men on the baseball team this spring, of opposition from ping-pong teams, of dating girls, etc. We go to shows, parties dances and all that. In short, the YCL and its members are no different from other people except that we believe in dialectical materialism as a solution to all problems.

Nothing like the light Marxist touch at the end.  Judis says:

I laugh every time I read this quote, but Susman was making a serious point--that even left-wing organizations were drawn in by the social conservatism that gripped the country during the economic crisis of the 1930s.

A piece worth reading.

May 24, 2009