Conservatives have demanded that fathers live up to their responsibilities because kids turn out much better when they grow up with dads than when they don't. Right-wingers also regard the family as the most essential building block of democracy. The family teaches, nurtures and loves. It protects one from the hardships and challenges of the outside world. The most common argument against parental rights in this case is that Fidel Castro views Elian as property of the state.
Historical analogies are quite popular, too.
But the analogies don't work. Slave-masters began their denigration of the black family by separating spouses and ensuring that young men grew up with masters, not fathers. My friend and fellow pundit Chris Matthews has suggested viewing the controversy from a different angle. Suppose Elian came over not with his mother and her boyfriend, but his father and the dad's girlfriend. Suppose that the mother were crying to get him back.