I’ve observed, and many studies have shown, that conservatives are happier than the leftists that we used to call “liberals.” Conservatives are more generous, more married, more religious, more fit, more humorous and more optimistic.
Unsurprisingly for a group with such traits, they have more and closer friends. They clearly love their country more. They work harder, they play harder, and they’re more likely to see meaning in life.
I don’t think conservatives are that way because they’re conservative. That’s a big load to put on a political outlook. No, I think they’re conservative because conservativism attracts people who possess those qualities.
And so conservativism shouldn’t be sold like Scientology. Conservativism won’t make you happy if you’re not already. But if you are happy, you’ll find a comfortable and natural home in conservativism.
Despite the problems of the world and the unending need for improving it, conservatives see a magical and spiritual place full of opportunity, adventure, joy and love. Conservatives see the world not as a glass-half-empty, but as a glass-half-full that gets fuller even as they drink from it.
Conservatives would be conservative wherever they reside. But I’m glad that so many are here in America, and I’m proud to be in their company. God bless the USA.
the Aspen beat 
Have a happy 4th, my friend. (Still waiting to have that 2nd drink, with you!)
It’s both. They go together, hand in hand. Although I know that Man’s institutions are imperfect, I trust in God and still do my best, with an optimistic outlook and a willingness to work, to make things work. And I realize that I am not the end-all and be-all of Creation.
This 4th of July I am perhaps more realistic than optimistic, as I realize all good things must eventually come to an end. But not without one hell of a fight! I hope most Americans are with me. But sometimes I wonder.
Yes, if only we were more activist in promoting and challenging .
Seems we are doing so to some extent, in some areas,but essentially , in Colorado’s Front Range, it’s pretty useless to.
We are vastly outnumbered at the elections, and the Republican Party here is moribund.
Essentially, in most cases nationwide, the courts are our only venue.
Outfits like Mountain States Legal Foundation, Pacific States Legal Foundation, and such affiliated orgs are doing yeoman’s work defending freedom .
In a nutshell … liberals, i.e., progressives and leftists, believe that all people are basically good.
Conservatives on the other hand … recognize that all people are born tainted with original sin.
Our Founding Fathers correctly recognized this conservative view of human nature explaining why they designed our Constitution and system of government with so many checks and balances thus preventing a single tyrant from usurping all political and governmental power.
The Left still adheres to ideologies that have already been relegated to the ash heap of history … collectivist centralized power states that they think will perfect the human condition and create a social utopia … a heaven on earth. We’ve seen spectacular failures of all stripes of social utopians during the past few centuries … the Jacobins; Karl Marx; Bolshevism; Mussolini’s Fascism; Naziism; Maoism, North Korea; Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge; the failure now occurring in Venezuela; etc. These ideologies all share the common notion that humans are perfectable (they are inherently good) and that a strong and centralized state is the means to achieve this political state of grace.
Conservatives believe that such states of grace only reside with God and that such notions of creating an earthly paradise through political power are not only false, but also lead to ruin. The idea of a social paradise here on earth is nonsensical … it is not of this world.
Here’s a great quote commonly attributed to Ronald Reagan:
“Socialism only works in two places: Heaven where they don’t need it and hell where they already have it.”
Link: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/719383-socialism-only-works-in-two-places-heaven-where-they-don-t
Your theology is bang on! What many of us don’t recognize about the Constitution and Bill of Rights is how fearful and defensive these documents are, being designed principally to keep us from being torn apart by wolves. Metaphorically, The Founders were attempting to erect an acropolis on the highest ground they could find, hoping that it was high enough.
When “Constitutional scholar” Barack Obama sneered at our “charter of negative liberties” — a series of “Thou Shalt Nots” — he was somewhat correct in his appraisal, but too much of a fool to understand why it’s that way. Unlike The Founders, I doubt that he had read Thomas Hobbes — only Marx and Alinsky — or that he really understood Christian theology, despite his hollow claims to Pastor Rick Warren prior to the 2008 election.
Barack Obama and his acolytes just piled on and added even more onto FDR’s list of four freedoms.
1. Freedom of speech
2. Freedom of worship
3. Freedom from want
4. Freedom from fear
While I have no problems with FDR’s first two, the third and fourth become much more problematic. Freedom of speech and worship, along with the other listed so called negative rights enshrined in our Founding Documents by the Founders, are freedoms and rights that do not impinge upon another person’s free agency. These are freedoms of the individual to be left alone to pursue his interests as long as those interests do not harm or coerce another.
But freedom from want and freedom from fear are both extremely subjective. Want can (and nowadays is) be interpreted as free food, free housing, free paychecks, free healthcare, free education, etc. Yet somebody ends up becoming accountable for all of these freedoms from wants. Are the farmers, grocers, doctors and educators expected to work for free to provide all of these freedoms from want? If so, then this becomes a form of slavery.
Abraham Lincoln once wisely and correctly observed and stated “I always thought the man that made the corn should eat the corn.”
If the costs for these freedoms from wants are to be born by the producer class (i.e., wage earners and wealth creators) then this too relegates these producers to a new form of slavery, or at least to an indentured servitude status.
Freedom from fear is another problematic one as it too is very subjective and open to mischief. We can now see this manifesting itself into the soft totalitarianism of safe spaces, cancel culture, other forms of political harassment, censorship and banishment all enforced by the Left and their proxies.
These diktats are used as a cudgel against anyone who wants a secure border, or who wants to keep more of what they earn, or who wears a red MAGA hat and just wants our government to have policies which put American interests first … all of which are big fears to the Left.
Basically … if your freedoms come at the coerced expense of another, then what you are describing is in no way a freedom but more closely resembles a relationship between master and slave.
Reference: https://www.fdrlibrary.org/four-freedoms
Reference: https://fedsoc.org/commentary/fedsoc-blog/labor-day-abraham-lincoln-free-labor-freedom-and-free-enterprise#:~:text=Or%2C%20as%20Lincoln%20put%20it%20more%20colorfully%3A%20“I,individual%20advancement%20in%20the%20American%20free%20enterprise%20system%3A
So true, thanks for laying it out!
Love the Ronald Reagan quote above! May God bless America abundantly with people who believe in and adhere to our Republic and Constitution.
I am happy reading this, Glenn! Happy Independence Day!
Stay happy, my friend. Your blog has certainly brought a great deal of joy my way.
All of what you say in this piece makes perfect sense, and we add that natural law should be considered in this kind of discussion as making sense to, and being acceoted and lived by, conservatives. So we conservatives do not have the distractions of the libs/lefties/”progressives”/moral relativists/subjectivists/humanists/secularists, meaning those distractions of avoiding common sense, ignoring reality, perverting logic, and without those distractions we conservatives live better, happier, and healthier lives.
All of what you say in this piece makes perfect sense, and we add that natural law should be considered in this kind of discussion as making sense to, and being accepted and lived by, conservatives. So we conservatives do not have the distractions of the libs/lefties/”progressives”/moral relativists/subjectivists/humanists/secularists, meaning those distractions of avoiding common sense, ignoring reality, perverting logic, and without those distractions we conservatives live better, happier, and healthier lives.
We meant to add that we agree that today, July 4th, Independence Day, should be a very happy day and we should enjoy, and will certianly, as you suggest, solemly vow to now let the loco/libs/lefties/”progressives”/moral relativists/subjectivists/humanists/secularists take our independence away.
And finally, keep up the great work!
The ideals of self-reliance and individual liberties drive most conservatives to lead better lives 🙂