{"id":40532,"date":"2017-03-15T00:10:40","date_gmt":"2017-03-15T06:10:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=40532"},"modified":"2017-03-15T00:10:40","modified_gmt":"2017-03-15T06:10:40","slug":"once-more-for-the-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html","title":{"rendered":"Once more, for the record"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Sen.<\/a>
Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater in 1964. Reagan giving a speech for the Goldwater campaign at the International Hotel in Los Angeles. \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since I\u2019m widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I\u2019ve been accused of believing that our borders should be completely open and that there should be no vetting whatever for foreigners\u00a0seeking to enter the United States.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The fact that I believe nothing of the sort, and, consequently, have never said anything that can be reasonably construed to endorse open borders and no vetting, plainly doesn\u2019t deter certain people from asserting\u00a0that false claim.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Perhaps more seriously, though, I\u2019ve been repeatedly denounced as a liberal because of my resistance to the proposed Trump policies. \u00a0Earlier tonight, for example, a poster on my Facebook page declared how \u201csad\u201d it is that I\u2019m \u201ca leftist liberal who hates the Constitution of the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The irony is that my reservations about the Trump executive orders on immigration come precisely from my being a conservative with strong libertarian leanings who loves<\/em> the U.S. Constitution and who cares deeply about such things as religious freedom.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Can I illustrate my conservative bona fides<\/em>? \u00a0Indeed, I can.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve done it before. \u00a0But I think it\u2019s probably time to do it again.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

My parents voted for Lyndon Johnson in 1964. \u00a0My brother and I, however, supported the conservative candidate, Senator Barry Goldwater (R-AZ), and, when my brother went to cast his vote, he took me into the polling booth where, as a preteen, I literally pulled the lever for the author of The Conscience of a Conservative<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

As a resident of California, I voted for Ronald Reagan every time he ran for governor or for president.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve subscribed to National Review<\/em> since I was thirteen years old, with interruptions only when I was living overseas (e.g., for part<\/em> of my mission in Switzerland).<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was a charter subscriber to the Weekly Standard<\/em>, and I still subscribe to it.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was a charter subscriber to First Things<\/em>, and I still subscribe to it.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I even went through an intense Ayn Rand phase when I was in my late teens. \u00a0I read everything she\u2019d published, including not just her novels but her non-fiction works.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I participated in two summer programs of the conservative Intercollegiate Studies Institute, one before my mission (at Stanford\u2019s Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace) and one just after (at St. Thomas Aquinas College).<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

When William F. Buckley Jr. came to speak at BYU during my undergraduate studies here, I was one of those who picked him up at the Salt Lake Airport. \u00a0(I had corresponded with him just slightly during my mission.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve spoken at least three times at the huge annual libertarian FreedomFest conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was a member of the Republican Party from the first moment I could vote until the night that Donald Trump, whom I don\u2019t regard as a conservative, accepted the Party\u2019s presidential nomination.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The first thing I ever published beyond student periodicals, I think, was an essay<\/a> in the Freeman<\/em>, a magazine issued\u00a0by\u00a0the conservative\/libertarian Foundation for Economic Education.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

As the winner of a national essay prize on the free market, I participated (along with such luminaries as\u00a0F. A. Hayek, Milton Friedman, George Stigler, James Buchanan, Murray Rothbard, and John Chamberlain, whom anybody familiar with conservative\/libertarian economics will immediately recognize) in the 1976 annual meeting of the Mont Pelerin Society<\/a>, which was held at the University of St. Andrews, in Scotland. \u00a0I seriously considered going into economics myself. \u00a0(My choice for graduate school would definitely have been the University of Chicago.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Although I liked Senator Bob Bennett very much personally and was shocked at the shoddy way the Utah Republican convention treated him in 2010, a friend and I had lunch with Mike Lee at Provo\u2019s Brick Oven restaurant to persuade him to run for the Senate.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And, to top it all off, I\u2019ve had dinner with Rand Paul.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And so on and so forth.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I would appreciate it if certain\u00a0Trumpists out there would stop calling me a \u201clibtard\u201d and\u00a0\u201ca leftist liberal who hates the Constitution of the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

By the way, I sometimes\u00a0carry a pocket edition of the Constitution with me, to read while I\u2019m waiting for appointments.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

A leftist?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hardly.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 Since I\u2019m widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I\u2019ve been accused of believing that our borders should be completely open and that there should be no vetting whatever for foreigners\u00a0seeking to enter the United States. \u00a0 The fact that I believe nothing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nOnce more, for the record<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Once more, for the record\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sic et Non\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/files\/2017\/03\/Goldwater-Reagan_1964.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html\",\"name\":\"Once more, for the record\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\"},\"description\":\"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Once more, for the record\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/\",\"name\":\"Sic et Non\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\",\"name\":\"Dan Peterson\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dan Peterson\"},\"description\":\"\\\"Life was very unsatisfying until I discovered Dan's blog, which gave me a reason to live.\\\" (gemli, 7 November 2019)\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/author\/danpeterson\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Once more, for the record","description":"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Once more, for the record","og_description":"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html","og_site_name":"Sic et Non","article_published_time":"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/files\/2017\/03\/Goldwater-Reagan_1964.jpg"}],"author":"Dan Peterson","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dan Peterson","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html","name":"Once more, for the record","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website"},"datePublished":"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00","dateModified":"2017-03-15T06:10:40+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045"},"description":"    Since I'm widely known to\u00a0have reservations about the temporary immigration bans that have been proposed by the Trump administration, I've","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/03\/once-more-for-the-record.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Once more, for the record"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/","name":"Sic et Non","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045","name":"Dan Peterson","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/5ed1a72d26805e35a503e3167599df7c?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dan Peterson"},"description":"\"Life was very unsatisfying until I discovered Dan's blog, which gave me a reason to live.\" (gemli, 7 November 2019)","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/author\/danpeterson"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1019"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40532\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}