Thinking Aloud About Conservatism . . .

For at least the past 45 years, I have considered myself a conservative, even a libertarian--well, libertarian with an asterisk (I believe in a large and fearsome military establishment). For part of my early life, I was a vaguely centrist, apolitical sort, but one who thought that America and the West were pretty much the best places to live. My great epiphany came while studying at UCLA in the early 1970s. I was appalled by the liberal mindset, even back then, which sought to denigrate America and its history, to ridicule and demean the great achievements of Western Civilization, and to point to some other system as "better." I had lots of doubts about this line of thinking, but just did not have the intellectual confidence to speak up and offer a counterargument. That aforementioned epiphany took place at the student bookstore where I happened to pick up an issue of William F. Buckley's The National Review and one of Norman Podhoretz's Commentary. I don't remember what exactly I read that night in those magazines, but whatever it was it made me realize it was OK to oppose the stifling liberal/progressive paradigm. I went on a reading binge of conservative thinkers from Europe and America, and basically ran a parallel education course for myself along with the leftist stuff unloaded on me daily in class.

http://www.thediplomad.com/2016/03/thinking-aloud-about-conservatism.html