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Samrob

(4,298 posts)
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 10:27 AM Jan 2023

The problem is not that conservatism is all bad. Everything that is different from what we like is

not always "bad." The real problem is that there are few if any real conservatives around who really love America, want what is good for the nation and not just what is good for themselves. McCarthy is a perfect example of a self-serving, narcissistic, bigoted, ignorant tool of the powerful fascists controlling the anti-democratic forces among us. To whom they will sell out is the big problem. Trump has already shown us that these people are willing and able to sell out America to the highest bidder who will enrich them and their families. They sellout our children to unbridled gun and weapons access to the NRA to keep the eyes of their brainless base on their guns instead of looking at and thinking about what is going on around them and how they are being used. Attacking science, education, and fair taxation is their way to ensure that they can stay in power. Right now, it seems as though there are not enough people actually "woke" enough to effectively do anything about them. Too many are too comfortable to care about others or their the future of their prodigy.

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The problem is not that conservatism is all bad. Everything that is different from what we like is (Original Post) Samrob Jan 2023 OP
The answer has to be education. There is no excuse for that kind of mentality. walkingman Jan 2023 #1
They're not conservative at all. We need to stop calling them that. paleotn Jan 2023 #2
That's the one appealing part of conservatism Sympthsical Jan 2023 #5
What Howard Dean said about George W. Bush wryter2000 Jan 2023 #3
I think it's a mistake to keep letting the GOP call itself conservative. Ocelot II Jan 2023 #4
Conservatism: murielm99 Jan 2023 #6

walkingman

(8,843 posts)
1. The answer has to be education. There is no excuse for that kind of mentality.
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 10:37 AM
Jan 2023
"Attacking science, education, and fair taxation is their way to ensure that they can stay in power."

Who in their right mind thinks that is a winning solution to anything.

paleotn

(19,861 posts)
2. They're not conservative at all. We need to stop calling them that.
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 10:51 AM
Jan 2023

Conservatism, in the traditional sense, falls back on tradition and slow, cautious change. I don't think that includes a coup or the Jan. 6 putsch. Much of what our media calls conservative these days is actually a radical movement bent on demolishing tradition and remaking America along neo-fascist lines.

Progressives keep us moving forward. Conservatives, normally, keep us from getting to far over our skis. In rational debate, both sides compliment each other in creating sane and sensible legislation. Much of what's called conservative today is anything but sane and sensible.

Sympthsical

(10,411 posts)
5. That's the one appealing part of conservatism
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 11:12 AM
Jan 2023

That there is an idea that institutions have evolved and exist for many reasons - many of them not immediately perceptible. If they're going to be changed or even outright removed, do so cautiously and with great thought.

I tend to agree with that thinking in most things (obviously not all). People who want to Tear It All Down oftentimes don't know what it is they want to wreck or the kinds of inadvertent damage they can incur by doing so.

That said, the current incarnation of the Republican Party is not that. They've been doing great damage to institutions and removing pillars that were put in place for many reasons. Trump was the proverbial bull in the china shop. There's quite a difference between "shaking things up" which is appealing to many voters and "Burning the place down" which is the province of the radical.

With increased partisanship and polarization, institutions have become less understood and less respected and "Burn It All!" has a lot more power than it used to. We have some of that on our own side with the authoritarians who hate expression and think due process is for suckers.

But we've got nothing on Republicans who sat back or supported the bombs Trump was throwing at our election system culminating in January 6th.

I have no idea what these people are, but they aren't conservative.

Ocelot II

(122,868 posts)
4. I think it's a mistake to keep letting the GOP call itself conservative.
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 11:08 AM
Jan 2023

They are not conservatives. They are radicals. Traditional conservatives advocated for maintaining the status quo - favoring incremental changes if any changes at all, but this GOP want to upend all kinds of established policies and principles. A "conservative" SCOTUS suddenly took away a right established for 50 years; GOP wants to take away Medicare and Medicaid. Traditional conservatives favor "small government," meaning a government that imposes minimal regulation and involvement with the actions of private citizens. But this GOP is only against regulating businesses to the extent it affects profits (and in the case of DeSantos, corporations he deems too woke and diverse), but they desperately want to regulate private behavior they don't approve of, especially women's reproductive rights and just about everything having to do with trans people. An old-school conservative would have been appalled at the siege of the Capitol and all the other attempts to overturn the 2020 election, but these guys are down with it because they didn't get the results they wanted. That's not conservative.

Back in the Nixon-Reagan-Bush I & II eras I regularly argued with old-school conservatives, including my own parents. The arguments often had to do with the role of government, but always involved the place where a particular policy fit on a spectrum of government involvement. Nobody ever wanted to blow up the system or even considered the possibility that it could happen at the hands of "conservatives."

murielm99

(31,658 posts)
6. Conservatism:
Sun Jan 8, 2023, 11:13 AM
Jan 2023

1. Limited government (Dept of Homeland Security)

2. Rule of Law (Jan. 6)

3. Peace through strength (Iraq war)

4. Fiscal responsibility (Reagan deficits)

5. Free markets (Oligarchs)

6. Human dignity (Taking away of women's healthcare and rights)

Living up to their supposed ideals? Not so much.

I have a feeling that a lot of DU members can come up with better examples.

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