[WS:] I do not think it is the argument that she is making. I am still reading the introduction, but it clearly states that conservatives react to changing reality that can threaten their vision of it - "the conservative mind is extraordinarily supple, alert to changes in context and fortune long before others realize they are occurring." She contrasts that with liberals who "unfurl blueprint in advance of events."
I find that argument very compelling, so far. It dove-tails with other writings on the subject, such as George Lakoff's theory of conservative and liberal discourses or the "motivated cognition" argument http://faculty.virginia.edu/haidtlab/jost.glaser.political-conservatism-as-motivated-social-cog.pdf . In short, conservatives are naturally threatened by uncertain fluid environment are naturally attracted to rigidly hierarchical forms of organization. It seems logical that they are keenly aware of the "threat" from they escape to hierarchies and sense it way "before others realize it is occurring."
Wojtek
2011/10/3 Ferenc Molnar <ferenc_molnar at hotmail.com>:
>
> Conservative thought is always parasitic and mimetic, always reacting to left movements which are always original and liberatory? A rather rigid and self-regarding dualism, wouldn't you say? And one that is not convincing to me especially when Robin himself cites Edmund Burke as both the father of the conservative movement and a foundational theorist of Romanticism. Burke can lead to Hayek and the Hegelian Dialetic. The lineage of left and right political thought and action are a lot more promiscuous and messy than this argument appears to acknowledge.
> Also re: Thomas Frank. I'm a huge of fan of his "The Wrecking Crew".
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