Didn't the Old Man make a similar claim when he said that under
> capitalism, "all that is solid melts into air?" It was always weird to me
> that conservatives like William F. Buckley, a traditional Catholic whose
> magazine published under the motto "It stands athwart History, yelling
> Stop!" could also be a supporter of the most innovative and volatile
> socioeconomic system in history.
>
> I'm also reminded of Walter Benjamin's famous quip: "Marx says that
> revolutions are the locomotives of history. But perhaps it is quite
> otherwise, perhaps revolutions are an attempt by passengers on this
> train—namely the human race—to activate the break."
>
I've noticed before that the actual gains for which many leftists fight - union contracts, environmental protections, rent controls, etc. - are obviously conservative in their actual social effects. I'm not quite ready to challenge the advocates of unbridled capitalism for the conservative mantle, but God knows it wouldn't pose much of an intellectual challenge.
-- "Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre, mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen lytlað."