Behold the cat

And if after reading that last post, you're not quite sure about the difference between a "conservative" and a "reactionary," consider cats. My cats, specifically, but probably your cats as well.

A cat is a natural conservative. A cat has never met a change he liked. His basic mantra is "The best surprise is no surprise."

If a normal human toddler discovers a new toy on the floor when he enters the room, what happens? His eyes light up with interest and excitement. But behold the cat. If either of my cats comes downstairs -- after his postprandial nap of seven or eight hours -- and discovers one small item in the living room that he hadn't noted at the time he retired to his boudoir, he freaks out. He freezes. He moves his head up and down, back and forth, trying to improve his binocular vision. He approaches it in a slow circle. He sniffs. He touches it. He touches it again.

Then he ignores it. The next time he descends the staircase and sweeps into the room, he'll accept the item as an accepted part of the room's furnishings. Maybe, he now suspects, it's a desirable item after all, perhaps even one that he was clever enough to have thought of himself. You never have to tell a cat, "Dude, just get used to it!" Because they do.

What my conservative cats most resemble is the classical Republican conservative, like your rather stuffy but lovable great uncle, the guy who was initially horrified by the idea of Social Security or Medicare, but then quickly became accustomed to it once it was enacted.

A cat's a conservative, but a cat's never reactionary. My cats never pine for the good old days. They don't repeatedly tell you that kittens nowadays are spoiled rotten. They never brood over how great the living room was before I ruined it by introducing that new item. They never grab the item in their teeth and drag it outside, trying to restore the room to its primeval splendor.

My cats never sit before the TV, angrily snarling and agreeing when Fox News warns them that the "nanny state's" introduction of "new" items into one's living room is just the first step down the slippery slope to total chaos, leading step by step to shrinkage of all cat food rations, and -- ultimately -- Dogocratic Tyranny.

And that's why, even though I'm a liberal and my cats are conservatives, we get along just fine.