Comments on: The Conversion of David Mamet

By: kishke

kishke — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 21:35:14 +0000

I’m no economist, but I don’t agree that a conservative view would render economics a zero-sum game. I’d say the economic success of one person provides more opportunity for others. It’s a rising tide that floats all boats.

By: David Ross

David Ross — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 22:50:10 +0000

H. Arundel and Brightstar express some of my own reservations. I too am unsure that the Hobbesian vision is conservative in itself, though I do think that conservative governance is responsive to certain Hobbesian assumptions (i.e., conservatives reject overweening government power because they do not trust their fellow human beings to wield this power responsibly and morally). Nor is the Hobbesian vision that kind of conservatism that underpins the greatest art, But then, David Mamet is not the what I would call a truly great artist; he is merely an interesting and provocative artist. We will have to keep our eye on Mr. Mamet.

By: Derbyshire

Derbyshire — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 22:45:47 +0000

I admire Mr. Mamet as a playwrite-I am a littly iffy on him as a self styled philosopher of conservatism. In the dog-eat-dog world he envisions playwrites would have little place, as would the Jewish people.

The funny part of his recent conversion is the swiftness with which conservatives abandoned him as soon as his recent play came out. How completely typical.

By: Brightstar98

Brightstar98 — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 20:03:23 +0000

David – this is an interesting and well written piece by you, as always. But I have to quibble with the contradictions in Mamet’s own views. How does he resolve having this “realistic” and “unidealistic” view of humanity, and yet still still support Israel for obviously idealistic reasons? I completely agree with his moral and ethical reasons for supporting Israel, but they don’t seem to go with the rest of his worldview. According to the rest of his worldview, Israel should be left to fight it out on its own, and if they don’t survive it’s just the way of the world that the stronger (the Arab nations around it) win.

I really disagree with this whole idea that conservatism means that if one person wins, another person loses (maybe some conservatives who are more cynical believe this and are just out to grab whatever they can from life, but not me). That’s not the kind of optimistic, Reagan-style conservatism I was raised with. And it certainly doesn’t work when you apply it to Israel.

By: H. Arundel

H. Arundel — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 18:54:53 +0000

Another thoughtful piece, David. However, I have to disagree that conservatism at its core has this sort of Hobbesian, dog-eat-dog view of the world. I would certainly agree that we have a more clear-eyed view of the world, and we don’t persistently believe the whopping lies that the left does in the face of all contrary evidence (“Communism is great! It’s just never really been tried anywhere!”), but we also believe that people are fundamentally good. We couldn’t believe in freedom otherwise. After all, to believe that individual freedom works is to believe that people will behave in a fundamentally good manner if they have that freedom.

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