doubleplusungood

One of the reactions to my post of 10/05/2012 was that the opening quote sounded "socialist". Hence, it could alienate the reader from the rest of the piece. Probably true. That also points to how the Right has already won in the U.S.

I think that illustrates both how far our understanding of the Founders, their influences and history generally we have traveled.I recommend to the reader a review of the concept of Socialism. Such as by visiting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism#History . 
You will note the term being coined in Europe in 1827. Quoting from the article:
"The term "socialism" was created by Henri de Saint-Simon, a founder of utopian socialism. The term "socialism" was created to contrast against the liberal doctrine of "individualism". The original socialists condemned liberal individualism as failing to address social concerns of poverty, social oppression, and gross inequality of wealth. They viewed liberal individualism as degenerating society into supporting selfish egoism and that harmed community life through promoting a society based on competition. They presented socialism as an alternative to liberal individualism, that advocated a society based on cooperation."
If you want to see another interesting take on this, how about a post-factual world one? I think this read is closer to how Americans think of the word "socialism". This article also appears in an "pedia", i.e., an online encyclopedia. This is ironic though, since the "encyclopedia" is a creation of The Enlightenment, and this one is anti-age of reason, anti-rational. Conservapedia, http://conservapedia.com/Socialism
My favorite thing in that article is this picture;



I think the Right in the U.S. has fully grasped the importance of Orwell's famous observation; "And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed -if all records told the same tale — then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.' "

It is kind of cute how the Democrats seem to be for the most part still tied to the Age of Reason / classical concept of the "fact". The idea that there are events in space time that are behind us along our common world line. At heart, such Democrats are the actual "conservatives" on the U.S. political landscape.

At this point you may want to consult a standard dictionary to refresh your recollection on what "conservative" actually means.

On the other hand, the Republicans for their part seem to approach the past as a stage for postmodern performance art. Such as that splendid performance in the Texas School Board a few years back. They decided, among other mind bending moves, to eliminate T. Jefferson from history texts. This was due to his apparently secular / Enlightenment views, which did not want to promote.

http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Intelligent_Design 

I think that Democrats, or "liberals" (who are actually similar to the classic concept of conservative, in the post-Clinton party) are ill equipped to oppose this. While many still consider facts to be important, they are as ill informed about history as are the Right. This is not because they feed upon some equivalent of the revisionism found in the books by Fox News pundits that "educate" their cat's paws. Rather, they do not care about history for the most part, and know little of it. This make's the Right's historical revision project easier.