Quoting the Sage of Mecosta that a conservative ought “to preserve a particular people, living in a particular place during a particular time,” Pat Buchanan writes in a recent column that Russell Kirk, “the traditionalist, though not so famous as some of his contemporaries at National Review, is now emerging as perhaps the greatest of that first generation of post-World War II conservatives–in the endurance of his thought.”

It may be true, especially now as virtually every surviving ideology, from Neo-Con imperialists to Keynesian socialists, hits the windshield at 100 mp right before our eyes.

Yet Mr. Buchanan wonders what in America is left to conserve, noting that, ”In order to love one’s country, said Edmund Burke, one’s country ought to be lovely. Is it still? Reid Buckley, brother of Bill, replies, ‘I am obliged to make a public declaration that I cannot love my country. … We are Vile.’”

From the Great Society socialism, to 1960s race-riots, Vietnam and the Permissive Society we are not what we were, Mr. Buchanan says, wondering what is worth conserving.

With our editors’ permission, may we solicit some essays on what still really exists in America that is worth conserving and what may be, quite frankly, lost to all but memory? (Miss Robison, get out your pencil).

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