{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"Bonus Episode \u2013 2018 \u2013 The Year in Review","description":"Since the end of a year is dedicated to both reflecting on the past and looking towards the future, I thought it would be apropos to take a look back at where Saving Elephants has been this past year and\u2014more importantly\u2014the state of conservatism in 2019 and beyond.   No one wants to be a loser, and these days it seems like conservatives are in full retreat.  Whether that\u2019s a Trump supporter who voted for the president as some last-ditch effort to fight back at the Left as dirty as they were willing to fight us, or conservatives such as myself who see ourselves in the wilderness as we wait for adults to return to the political fray.  But what\u2019s important to keep in mind is that nearly every political tribe feels like it\u2019s losing these days.  You think progressives or liberals or socialists or any other group out there feels as if they have the upper hand?   The thing about conservatism is that it has a remarkable ability to endure.  Even when it\u2019s vanquished for a generation it will eventually re-emerge as people grow tired of the latest ideology that comes along and promises salvation.  When the ship of conservatism sinks, it becomes a submarine.   It\u2019s easy to forget that\u2014traditionally\u2014conservatism has not been popular.  Real conservatism\u2014not the shallow stuff masquerading as such\u2014has stubbornly insisted that, while we can strive for and, in some cases, obtain a \u2018good life\u2019, this world is not perfect and utopia isn\u2019t achievable.  It teaches that there will always be trade-offs in the things we want and that sometimes we have to \u2018order our loves\u2019 so that what we naturally want\u2014say, social justice or equality\u2014must necessarily come second place to other, more enduring values.  Perhaps most appallingly, it insists on each of us taking responsibility for our own lives.  Shallow conservatism teaches a version of this, but it usually means talking smack about freeloaders or \u2018people who are not us\u2019 not taking sufficient responsibility for their lives.  Real conservatism says we all have a duty to do so, not just the people who don\u2019t look like us or the people we don\u2019t like.   In my view, one of the greatest threats to conservatism emerging among young Americans is the widespread distrust of our institutions.  Millennials in particular are far less likely to attend church and have less confidence in our traditional political party establishment that past generations.  I DO NOT mean that this distrust is unwarranted.  But conservatism is all about restoring the institutions that have served us well from generation to generation\u2014not about radical efforts to destabilize the system.  I agree the system is broken.  It\u2019s time to roll up our sleeves and fix it, not tear it apart and just hope that\u2019ll somehow make things better.     ","author_name":"Saving Elephants | Millennials defending & expressing conservative values","author_url":"https:\/\/www.savingelephantsblog.com\/","html":"