Tuesday, May 02, 2006

The Lines Are Drawn   [Jonah Goldberg]

I've written a bajillion words about how one shouldn't over-interpret personal preferences into political philosophies (See everything I've ever said about Crunchy Conservatism, for example).

But here is something that causes me to reconsider. Matt Yglesias writes:

I will, however, disagree with Jonah Goldberg on this Coke Zero business; it's fine, but doesn't hold a candle to classic original Diet Coke.

Me Well, isn't that interesting. Matt calls the "original Diet Coke" a "classic." But here's the thing: Coke Zero is based on the Classic Coke formula. Diet Coke is based on the New Coke formula. One could argue that, as the conservative, I like the old school taste (I actually remember the change from classic (i.e. real) Coke to new Coke, it was a dark day). Meanwhile, Matt the young liberal not only prefers the shabby innovation, he actually thinks it has the more authentic — i.e. classic — taste.

It's tempting to see analogies to all sorts of things here. Matt thinks the current New Deal lite liberalism is not only superior, but that it emulates the classic form of American politics. Meanwhile, I would argue that the current liberalism is a merely a bad rip-off of a bad innovation to start with. But I won't do that because, hey, it's just a soda.

05/02 09:54 AMShare