Rick Perry and the Boy Scouts

Justin Elliott finds the key to Rick Perry's politics in a book -- not Fed Up, his 2010 political manifesto, but his 2008 love offering to the Boy Scouts:

Where Fed Up was a feat of opportunism, an attempt to pander to the newly-founded Tea Party, his earlier book was both a true labor of love (he received no advance and donated all proceeds to the Scouts’ legal defense fund) and a stirring call to protect the integrity of the nation’s traditions. For the Perry of On My Honor: Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts Are Worth Fighting For “culture war” is no mere euphemism: He not only thinks of military siege as an apt metaphor for the state of American culture—he’d like to enlist Boy Scouts as his preferred ground troops.

In that way, On My Honor’s odd mix of autobiography and polemic underscores what truly animates Perry—and, needless to say, it isn’t tax policy. His real political passion is the protection of traditional American institutions against elitist attacks. It’s no accident that even though Perry’s campaign is supposed to be founded on his economic record as governor of Texas, he’s been having trouble staying on message.

In making his book-length indictment, Perry paints with a startlingly wide brush. “Student campus unrest, rejection of authority, the ‘self-esteem’ movement, moral relativism, and the demands of secularists all gradually fused into a series of attacks on American institutions,” he writes in the book. We learn that he disdains “secular humanism,” the “self-esteem movement,” and youth sports leagues that don't keep score. For good measure, he compares homosexuality to alcoholism, and supports corporal punishment of children.

It is amazing to me how many people's politics are all about things that have almost nothing to do with the government. Rick Perry loves the Boy Scouts and hates hippies. Fine, that's his business. But it becomes our business when people whose main interests are cultural gravitate to politics and rather thoughtlessly take positions they identify as "conservative" on other issues, especially taxation and foreign policy. If what you really want is to preserve small town American life, then you should not be opposed to the regulation of business, because it is mainly unregulated capitalism that is remaking the country. Small town values are under attack, not from liberals, but from capitalism. Yes, there are a few hot button issues (abortion and acceptance of homosexuality are the main ones) where the government is heavily involved in Perry's concerns. But by and large Perry's agenda is apolitical. I think the confusion of the nostalgic moral crusade with pro-business, anti-tax policies is a huge corrupting factor in American politics, leading many people to vote for things they don't really support.