In the second of three essays about conservatism Terrence Heath looks at the question "Should we?" In the first essay he asked, "Can we?" He noted that progressives answer with "Yes, we can!" and conservatives answer, "No, we can't."
The answer to the question "Should we?" falls along similar lines. Looking over the challenges and crises of the last year Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, "I wish we had been able to obstruct more."
As with the previous essay it comes down to deciding if a problem is an injustice or merely unfortunate. Is having 8 million people out of work a crisis and an injustice, demanding action? Or is it unfortunate, a problem that will correct itself in time, and something we should simply do nothing and wait?
If it is merely unfortunate we should do nothing because doing anything would be an overreaction.
This attitude points out the difference between:
Empathy -- intellectual identification with the thoughts, feelings, and attitudes of another
Compassion -- feeling deep sympathy or sorrow for another’s misfortune, accompanied by the strong desire to alleviate the suffering.
Members of the GOP say they have lots of empathy. Jesus taught compassion.
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