I might implore you to slightly change your perspective. "What makes the most sense" is a dangerous standard because people have flawed perspectives just as part of the human condition. Sometimes the thing that seems to make most sense to people is a terrible idea that leads to immense suffering. I far prefer the option that leads to the best results, even if it doesn't make sense to people that it does so.
But seriously, you can agree to the premise that you're somewhat conservative. Pragmatism requires a certain amount of conservative thinking. Agema agrees to thinking that way, and Silvanus definitely thinks that way whether willing to admit it or not. This is the sort of thing I try to get people to see the distinctions between philosophies. Even a staunch progressive has more philosophically in common with me than they do a communist, assuming they are genuinely progressive and not just coopting that word as cover for their revolutionary leftism. Likewise, conservatives have more in common with progressives in their reasoning than they do with theocrats or even libertarians. An American conservative and a libertarian will often find common ground in their conclusions, but the reasoning to get there is infinitely different. And instead of appreciating that, society as a whole has just drawn a line between right and left (where that line is drawn may vary), and treats one side of the line as one team and the other side as the other team, even though the line typically takes the whole ball of pragmatic people, cuts it in half down the middle, and hands each half over to fringe idealogues.