(Surrender? Compromise? Comp-render?) Tap-dancing in the dark.
Nope, that’s not the Bruce Springsteen tune from the 80s. It’s what John Hood, Raleigh’s Mr. Conservative and Renfield to one Mr. Art Pope, is doing these days: 
Modern American conservatism weaves several strands of thought — constitutionally limited government, free-market economics, time-honored virtues, and prudent statesmanship — into a fabric that is both large enough to encompass a majority coalition and strong enough to withstand that coalition’s inevitable twists and strains.
Two thinkers whose ideas inspire American conservatism, Edmund Burke and Friedrich Hayek, were neither Americans nor self-described conservatives. Burke, an 18th-century member of Parliament, defended the American Revolution, criticized the French Revolution, and was associated with the “Old Whig” faction of classical liberalism in the British politics of the day. Hayek, the 20th-century Austrian economist who spent some of his career in United States, described himself as an Old Whig or classical liberal.
I knew it. In tried and true fashion, he delves into some babbling about some obscure stuff that nobody is going to call him on without checking out a bunch of books from the library. (*Oooooh, look how much smarter I am than YOU ARE.*) MORE:
Yet both are venerated by today’s conservatives, in part because of their careful, historically grounded arguments for prudence. “Circumstances,” Burke wrote, “give in reality to every political principl
e its distinguishing color, and discriminating effect. The circumstances are what render every civil and political scheme beneficial or noxious to mankind.” In Hayek’s case, he counseled his fellow advocates of individual freedom to recognize that “human civilization has a life of its own, that all our efforts to improve things must operate within a working whole which we cannot entirely control …”
At the present, North Carolina conservatives are confronted with a prudential question: what to do about House Bill 2. Enacted nearly a year ago in response to Charlotte’s passage of a poorly constructed anti-discrimination ordinance, HB2 has come to dominate the state’s political discourse.[…]
It’s dominating political discourse because our rudderless, leaderless, principle-free state GOP allows it to do so. Our legislators and lieutenant governor appear to be all out of ideas. The game plan appears to be picking up any ball tossed their way by big donors and running it across the finish line (before the voters catch on). MORE:
[…] Some like it that way. Roy Cooper and his team actively lobbied Democrats during the 2016
campaign not to discuss any accommodations with Republicans on the issue, while also encouraging boycotts against the state and raising campaign funds from concerned business leaders to use against then-Gov. Pat McCrory. On the other side, there are Republicans who believe HB2 was a reasonable response to Charlotte’s provocation and ought to remain intact, as well as out-of-state conservative groups that see North Carolina as a pivotal battleground in a twilight struggle to defend traditional values.[…]
Dancing’ John is going to mimic the driveby media and decline to tell you the truth about what HB2 said. HB2 maintained that laws governing employment issues should be statewide and uniform. Basically, it argued that you need to bring changes in law to the legislature for a vote. It also argued for keeping locker rooms and bathrooms AS-IS. Boys in one, girls in the other. This headed off attempts by the gay mafia to shake down and intimidate businesses in Charlotte and other leftist meccas. It put limits onbureaucratic tyranny and the expansion of government power. Sounds like something real conservatives ought to love.
[…] Rep. Chuck McGrady (R-Henderson) and a bipartisan coalition have devised a new “repeal and
replace” response, HB186. It repeals HB2 and explicitly grants municipalities the authority to enact anti-discrimination ordinances that go beyond state law to include such categories as sexual orientation or gender identity. However, it explicitly excludes access to multi-occupancy bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms on non-municipal property from such ordinances — describing it as “a matter of general, statewide concern.”
In response to concerns about overly broad anti-discrimination ordinances intruding on the religious conscience of private individuals and institutions, the bill excludes religious groups and nonprofits while allowing citizens to initiate a referendum to challenge any newly enacted ordinance, just as some city charters allow citizens to challenge other city actions.
The McGrady bill won’t make everyone happy. It doesn’t fully comport with my own preferences. But for conservatives, it has at least one compelling virtue: it is prudent.[…]
Ah, Mr. Conservative praising the King of North Carolina RINOs. The former head of the Sierra Club. A regular F-
grade in the Civitas rankings (El Pope familia). McGrady’s “compromise” extends “equal and fair” access to all resources in North Carolina . (
Holy Trotsky, Batman!) It also offers employment protection to trannies and illegal aliens and strengthens the power of the unelected Human Relations Commission. There is not one damn thing conservative about any of this. (Dancin’ John appears to be confusing the terms ‘compromise’ and ‘surrender.’)
All of you people who keep donating to Hood and Pope, Inc. need your heads examined. These people have teamed up with the AFL-CIO, Planned Parenthood, Chris Fitzsimon and now the left-wing of the House Republican Caucus. They’re no longer shaking up Raleigh. They’ve got their hands in the cookie jar like the rest of the players up there.
John Hood is nothing but a Fifth Columnist. Look that one up historically, During the Spanish Civil War, General Franco commented on his campaign against a certain Socialist held city by saying, ”I have four columns marching on the city and a fifth column ready to rise up inside it”. John Hood is the enemy within, doing the work of the left while claiming to be of the right. We see it on issue after issue and this is just the latest one. If he were not related to Pope, he would likely have been out on his ear a long time ago. Hood appears to have been co-opted by some of those he appears with on that useless NC Spin show.
Hood prattles about historical and intellectual matters in his pronouncements because he has no ability in practical politics and absolutely no political savvy. He is what George Wallace used to call a ”pointy headed intellectual”.
The entire Locke collective is past it’s prime and needs to be put down, like a lame horse.Thankfully few people listen to them. Otherwise Trump would not be president. No where in the country was the vitriol toward Trump as great as what came out the mouths of John Hood and his gaggle of yes men and women.
In a post the day before this one, you write that the ideological fight for the nation’s future boils down to liberal v. conservative and “freedom v. statism.” Yet you defend a law that inserts the government into individuals’ personal potty choices. That’s a big, steaming pile of statism right there. Taken to its logical conclusion, HB2 would require strip searches or forced ID checks, which would trample the Fourth Amendment.
Genu-wine personal freedom-lovin’ conservatives would say the individual’s free choice trumps society’s collective comfort. You and I may suspect a butch-lookin’ “lady” is all man down below, but neither you nor I nor the government has the right to check the plumbing. It’s called leaving people alone unless they injure you or your property, and it’s the cornerstone of conservative/libertarian theory.
Adding insult to injury, HB2 has no teeth. It’s symbolic statism, but statism nonetheless. A law that can’t be enforced is no real law at all. It’s a nanny-state joke.
You clearly are ignorant as to the provisions of HB2. HB2 preserves the choices of private owners of restrooms and locker rooms to regulate them any way they want to. It is the Democrats, the far left, and Governor Cooper who want to dictate bathroom / locker room policy to owners of bathrooms and locker rooms. It is the Democrat position and that of the Peoples Republic of Charlotte that is statist.
The only bathrooms and locker rooms that HB2 defines who can be allowed in them are those in government facilities like schools. Government has a right to make rules for facilities it owns.
HB 186, on the other hand, is statist in that it would authorize local governments to tell the private owners of bathrooms and locker rooms who they have to let in them.
It is never ”prudent” to cave in to bullies; not in real life and not in politics. The way to successfully deal with bullies is to stand up to them. Mr. Hood does not quote a single one of his dead intellectuals who say it is a good thing to surrender to bullies, and that is because it is not. Thomas Jefferson said it well when he said ”millions for defense but not one cent for tribute.”. Mr. Hood thinks our GOP elected officials should run around like scared little girls with their panties in a twist over a threat of bullying by a pack of leftwing university presidents, who are the tail wagging the ACC dog, and a handful of far left CEO’s who have become serial corporate bullies.
We should not be letting threats from left wing university presidents dictate public policy in North Carolina. That is a horrible precedent, but it is exactly what Mr, Hood wants to do. Once they succeed in bullying the legislature on one thing, where will they stop? They won’t. Giving in to bullying just encourages more bullying.
The legislators behind HB186 are girly men with no backbone. They are disgrace to the Republican Party. These surrender monkeys need to be tossed out in the next primary.
It is also not ”prudent” to start establishing mere behaviors as protected classes, especially not behaviors based on mental illness like gender denial. That just opens the door to a whole lot more behaviors being set up as protected classes. Did any of Mr. Hood’s dead intellectuals call for mere behaviors to become protected classes? No, I didn;t think so.
It is also not ”prudent” to coddle illegal aliens as a protected class by allowing protective ordinances based on ”citizenship” as HB186 does. But then again, wasn’t Mr. Hood a big supporter of Gang of 8 amnesty backer Marco Rubio for president? Maybe that is what this is really about. Mr. Hood was vocal in his opposition to President Trump, which is something we should always remember about him.
Fascinating that the quote you borrowed from the 3rd President of the United States was a specific reference to Muslims. Some things never change.
John, how very, um, progressive of you. Calling every expression of something you don’t like “bullying” is a liberal tactic, don’t you know? Are you saying that corporations don’t have the right to vote with their wallets? ‘Course they do, and so do you and I. You’re really just mad that their wallets are outvoting yours. Money talks, BS walks, and under Citizens United, money is free speech.
This bathroom business has so-called conservatives tying themselves in knots. We all used to be against big government, but now it’s okay if the nanny state is policing potties. We all used to support businesses’ right to advocate for limited government, but the social busybody neocon wing has decided that sticking our noses in other people’s bathroom stalls is more important. Consistency, folks, consistency!
Sam, I do not know whether you are stupid or you just think we are stupid.
It was the Charlotte City Council that went nanny state on bathrooms and locker rooms, as did the Obama regime trying to dictate that all bathroom owners in the case of Charlotte, and schools in the case of the Obama regime had to allow people of the opposite sex in bathrooms. HB186 continues that nanny state approach.
HB2 is a fight against the nanny state by providing that all private owners of bathrooms and locker rooms are free to regulate them as they wish. Of course most will adopt common sense and keep the grown men out of the locket rooms and bathrooms with women and little girls, but that is totally up to them under HB2
The only bathrooms and shower rooms regulated under HB 2 are government owned bathrooms and shower rooms, and HB 2 provides for common sense as to those. This part of HB 2 was a necessity since the Obama regime was playing nanny state against common sense in this area.
Maybe you are just dense, but it looks like you are deliberately spewing false information.
As to corporations, the appropriate way for them to engage in political matters is through their political action committees, not corporate bullying. Corporations have absolutely no right to demand that elected officials do their bidding on any issue. Politicians should represent the voters, not the special interests. Special interest politicians should be removed from office.