If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. I think conservatism is really a misnomer just as liberalism is a misnomer for the liberals — if we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.
– Ronald Reagan.
(Via Glenn Reynolds.)
That was then. (1975, to be exact.)
This is now:
So it is now the federal government’s role to micro-manage baseball and to prevent a single Florida woman who is trapped in a living hell from dying with dignity. We’re getting to the point when conservatism has become a political philosophy that believes that government – at the most distant level – has the right to intervene in almost anything to achieve the right solution. Today’s conservatism is becoming yesterday’s liberalism.
— Andrew Sullivan
My, how times change!
Of course, there’s still plenty for me to disagree with on both sides. Conservatives who disagree with me will always call me a liberal, while liberals who disagree will call me a conservative. It’s their call; not mine.
The Reagan quote appeared in Pejman Yousfezadeh’s TCS piece which wondered whether the “marriage” between libertarians and conservatives can be saved.
It may take a Hillary, now and then.