Reply #12: I think 'conservativism' has many meanings

[LeftishBrit]

Firstly, I agree that one cannot/should not 'eradicate' conservativism, as that would require totalitarianism.

Also, there are many 'conservative' individuals and parties in various parts of the world that are conservative just in the sense of distrusting radical change, and preferring to stick to tradition/ the status quo. While I would not vote for this position, I accept it as valid, and think it in fact quite useful for left-wingers to have to *justify* the changes they support, rather than just run headlong into them. In that sense, the conservatives offer a potentially useful brake.

The more liberal Conservatives can in fact be moderate progressives. (To give an example from an area that I know well, in the UK, some Conservative Education Secretaries have been much more progressive than some Labour ones, for example.)

However, I do consider the extremes of free-market libertarianism to be dangerous. I would guess that far more people worldwide have been killed by the poverty resulting from extreme free-market ideology than by any terrorist group, for example!

Also - and this is perhaps really my biggest concern about Roberts in particular - I think that there is EXTREME danger in anyone promoting xenophobia; pandering to racism; promoting the concept of 'enemies within', of certain ethnic or religious groups not being true citizens or needing to prove their loyalty more than others. My perception of Roberts is that his views would correspond more to those of the far-right parties in Europe - the BNP in England or the National Front in France - than to mainstream conservatives in these countries. The BNP and the National Front are also opposed to the Iraq war - and they are probably NOT overall as economically RW as someone like Roberts! But they have the same exaggerated preoccupation with 'national identity'; with the evils of multiculturalism; with the dangers of Jews, Muslims and immigrants having influence over our countries. It is this sort of attitude that seriously worries me, and which I think it's important for progressives to repudiate under all circumstances.