The other day, I saw Mike make a very interesting statement and I'd like to paraphrase what he said. He said something about how there's a lot of these "economic conservatives" out there who believe strongly in government stepping out of the way of monetary affairs and free trade and free markets. While that is all fine and dandy, he pointed out that economic conservatism can only get you so far. He used the example of a person going to prison and how it costs more to house one person in prison for 1 year than it does to put a student through all four years of college and buy them books. Good point. Mitt Romney was right when he said that a strong country is based on three things: strong familys, strong economy and strong military. However, he gets it wrong when he puts a strong economy and a strong military right in there with strong families, as the strong families belong in a category all to themselves. A country with strong families can remain strong even in times of economic turmoil and strong families are the basis of a strong military since good soldiers realize that they are not in the military for themselves but to protect the freedoms of their families.
Hence conservatism that doesn't value the family first is a weak form of conservatism which will eventually give way to the tenacious grip of liberalism that seeks to destroy social conservatism first and then following that destroys the fiscal conservatism and security conservatism.
I like to think of it this way: Social conservatism is the foundation for the other two conservatisms. Social conservatism is the first one that liberals go after and seek to destroy. Social conservatism is the one that stands firmly on the 1st and second ammendments of the constitution, defends the rights of every individual, doesn't bow to new cultural fads (gay marriage, abortion, etc). Without social conservatism, economic conservatism and security conservatism really have no basis and eventually fall to liberalism completely.
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