No doubt that pragmatics play a role in every political ideology and there are few true ideologues anywhere, but to the general proposition that the right is less principled than the left, I don't think it holds. — Hanover

You are quite hung up on insisting that the right acts out of "principles." I don't deny that (and, so far as I can tell, no one else on this thread does, either). But members of ISIS are also acting out of certain principles when they saw off prisoners' heads on videotape. Stalin and Mao acted out of certain principles. What of it? It is those principles you raised which I'm here examining and critiquing.

The general thought by the left of those on the right is that they are either (1) wealthy and greedy and only trying to create policies that protect their advantaged state, or (2) poor and stupid and have been duped by the #1s into supporting policies that are against their interests.

It's no more logical to criticize a poor conservative for voting against his interests than it is to criticize a rich liberal for voting against his interests. In either case, the vote is being cast because the person thinks it's the right thing to do, not because it may or may not put more money in his pocketbook (assuming he's a guy with a pocketbook).

Or because the largely white, rural poor which favors the GOP has been misled by demagogues to think that the source of their woes lies with Muslims, illegal immigrants, gays, and God-hating liberals.

A rich person who decides to give up a little money he probably won't even know is missing is not equivalent to a poor person who harms himself economically with his vote; there is an asymmetry there.

Or course I don't want poison in my water. The slippery slope works both ways: Should we deregulate to the point of immediate death or should we regulate to the point of putting everything under shrink wrap to the point of immediate death. The truth is the that the right and the left are on a sliding scale, with the right wanting less regulation and the left wanting more. The terms "right" and "left" describe the relative positions of location on a spectrum after all.

So, being on the right, you agree that some environmental regulations are meant to safeguard the welfare of human life, contrary to your above claim that the right doesn't believe that some such regs are meant to protect humans?

We all agree that the death penalty should be applied to the guilty. If we limit it to cases where there is positive DNA support, and admission of guilt, and videotaped evidence, would you support it? I think not. That is to say, your objection isn't fear you've got the wrong person, your objection is that it simply is counter to your sensibilities. In fact, if I removed your every objection (racial, economic, etc), I still think you'd object. You're standing behind rationalizations and pretense, and that is the objection of the right to your objections.

I don't support the death penalty in most cases, because I don't believe that the state should be in the business of meting out such punishments. I am hiding behind no "pretense" whatsoever: if you think that I am shy about expressing my viewpoints, then you obviously have not been reading my posts over the years as closely as I've been reading yours.

As I said above, even if one supports the death penalty in principle (e.g. many conservatives), one cannot defend its use in practice due to the dysfunction of our legal system, the epistemological problems of identifying the guilty (especially given the number of defendants who have been sentenced to death only on the basis of that most flimsy of evidence, namely eyewitness testimony), etc. You agree that the death penalty should be applied only to the guilty, but clearly many innocent people have languished on death row, and would likely still be there (or even dead) were it not for the intervention of the Innocence Project and other organizations.

Sure, if the typical person advocated the death penalty because he thought that someone else would not kill for fear of being killed, then he'd be a consequentialist. I really don't think that's why folks want the death penalty. I think they'd tell you that they don't care what happens as a consequence of the guy's death; they just think he deserves it. I will agree, though, that the typical person (right or left) hasn't sorted out the distinctions between consequentialism and deontology, but religious positions tend heavily toward deontology as a whole.

I can't speak for what "folks" think, but I can say that the deterrence justification has been invoked many, many times in support of the death penalty (including by GW Bush, a certain former gov. of Texas). I don't deny that considerations of desert factor in (indeed, some juries have explicitly appealed to Biblical principles in advocating for a convicted murderer's death sentence), but deterrence is a consequentialist notion.

don't doubt that the right's beliefs stand on "principles," only that many of said principles are ill-founded, and not as unified as you seem to think. — Arkady

No doubt that pragmatics play a role in every political ideology and there are few true ideologues anywhere, but to the general proposition that the right is less principled than the left, I don't think it holds. The general thought by the left of those on the right is that they are either (1) wealthy and greedy and only trying to create policies that protect their advantaged state, or (2) poor and stupid and have been duped by the #1s into supporting policies that are against their interests.

It's no more logical to criticize a poor conservative for voting against his interests than it is to criticize a rich liberal for voting against his interests. In either case, the vote is being cast because the person thinks it's the right thing to do, not because it may or may not put more money in his pocketbook (assuming he's a guy with a pocketbook).

I understand that there is skepticism in some quarters about climatologists' ability to predict climate or to reconstruct past climates, — Arkady

That is the general criticism of the right, along with the view that the current measurements encompass a fairly small window of time. Anyway, I'm not getting dragged into an anti-global warming debate here (as I'm far more equivocal than many of my right sided brothers), but I do think there is a real argument that must be made regarding the impact of global warming regulations in terms of how effective they'll be and how much economic damage they may cause. There must be some balancing test there, and there is a considerable ideological divide in the left's general view that the earth and its many creatures have inherent value that approaches the value of the average human being. The right would disagree and would happily see the death of all sorts of creatures and the destruction of all sorts of environments if it meant people could live better lives.

So, for instance, the Clean Air Act and regulations governing mercury levels in drinking water are not meant to protect humans? Who or what are they meant to protect? — Arkady

Or course I don't want poison in my water. The slippery slope works both ways: Should we deregulate to the point of immediate death or should we regulate to the point of putting everything under shrink wrap to the point of immediate death. The truth is the that the right and the left are on a sliding scale, with the right wanting less regulation and the left wanting more. The terms "right" and "left" describe the relative positions of location on a spectrum after all.

And even if the death penalty is desirable in principle, in practice it is riven by so many problems, both institutional, legal, and epistemological, that I don't believe that any reasonable person can defend its use. — Arkady

We all agree that the death penalty should be applied to the guilty. If we limit it to cases where there is positive DNA support, and admission of guilt, and videotaped evidence, would you support it? I think not. That is to say, your objection isn't fear you've got the wrong person, your objection is that it simply is counter to your sensibilities. In fact, if I removed your every objection (racial, economic, etc), I still think you'd object. You're standing behind rationalizations and pretense, and that is the objection of the right to your objections.

Deterrence has been cited many times as one reason for having a death penalty. And appealing to the consequences of the death penalty (i.e. deterrence, in this case) is definitely a consequentialist argument. — Arkady

Sure, if the typical person advocated the death penalty because he thought that someone else would not kill for fear of being killed, then he'd be a consequentialist. I really don't think that's why folks want the death penalty. I think they'd tell you that they don't care what happens as a consequence of the guy's death; they just think he deserves it. I will agree, though, that the typical person (right or left) hasn't sorted out the distinctions between consequentialism and deontology, but religious positions tend heavily toward deontology as a whole.