Conservatism Is Dead

[Sinatra]

McCain was perhaps the weakest choice as a candidate.

He is a moderate Republican - but hardly a Conservative.

Conservatism is far from dead, and polling data continues to speak to that truth...


America Is Still A Conservative Nation, Weekly Standard: Despite Obama's Election, Exit Polls Show Conservatives Still Outnumber Liberals - CBS News

The death of the Conservative movement was heralded in 1976, and then it emerged as the single strongest political movement for the next twenty years starting in 1980. No presidential candidate has since come close to Reagan's electoral and popular vote dominance exhibited by his 1984 re-election where he earned nearly 60% of the popular vote and carried 49 of 50 states.

Liberal Democrats are justified in celebrating their current dominance of American politics, but this current dominance is less than what they enjoyed in 1976, so they should remain wary of the long term potential of remaining the party of power.

 

[midcan5]

How many weeks will you wait before you post this again Midcan? It wasn't true before and it isn't true now.

Wow, an article just published. "Conservatism Is Dead" by Sam Tanenhaus An intellectual autopsy of the movement. Post Date Wednesday, February 18, 2009 My crystal ball is quite a thing!

To which SPECIFIC POLICIES are you referring? (There will be no forthcoming SPECIFICS, as this position can only survive in the ethereal vaguery inherent in 'implication.' The INSTANT this argument is carried into the gravitational influence of 'Specificity,' the truth begins to tear it apart...)

OMG - you have parodied yourself and what I said without even being aware of it. WOW! More myth. The specifics were right in front of your two eyes but please tell me they were closed and you were reciting from the echo chamber of wingnutville.

Let me guess... Midcan5 is a Public School graduate?

Some people cannot be educated. I'm guessing Midcan5 is still riding the short bus to school. I hope for his sake he's just a troll, because the only other explanation for his posts is stupidity.

That's a rather elitist and irrelevant comment, try again, this time think or at least try.

"Far more crucial than what we know or do not know is what we do not want to know." Eric Hoffer

 

[midcan5]

the 59 million people who voted for the other guiy would disagree

You cons said McCain wasn't conservative, he wasn't one of you. You're making midcan's argument for him.

So true, they are a confusing bunch.

 

[Red Dawn]

wrong...because McCain wasn't conservative and still 59 million voted for him just for the fact at how liberal Obama is

The conservatives couldn't win the GOP primary. Republican voters gave it to the most "liberal" guy in the field.

You're still making midcan's point for him.

please point to me who the true conservatives in the primary

that's the third time you made midcan's own case for him, so we'll just call it strike three.

weren't fred thompson and alan keyes supposed to be "conservatives"? Noboby supported old man thompson, he got blown out.

If republicans can't even find one single "conservative" that passes your litmus test to run in an open primamry in the most important electieon cycle in a generation, they must be totally discredited......... just like midcan said.

 

[Sinatra]

The conservatives couldn't win the GOP primary. Republican voters gave it to the most "liberal" guy in the field.

You're still making midcan's point for him.

please point to me who the true conservatives in the primary

that's the third time you made midcan's own case for him, so we'll just call it strike three.

weren't fred thompson and alan keyes supposed to be "conservatives"? Noboby supported old man thompson, he got blown out.

If republicans can't even find one single "conservative" that passes your litmus test to run in an open primamry in the most important electieon cycle in a generation, they must be totally discredited......... just like midcan said.

What generation would that be?

 

[PubliusInfinitum]

The problem is YOU DON'T BELIEVE IT. And you don't BELIEVE it BECAUSE YOU BUY IT. You believe that Neo-Cons ARE CONSERVATIVEs... thus your use of the term.

What they are, IS LEFTISTS... They're fascists and FASCISTS ARE LEFTISTS...

They're NOT CONSERVATIVES and when you assign "Conservative" TO THEM, IT ONLY SERVES TO UNDERMINE CONSERVATISM...

Are you as dense as you appear to be? The main point of my post was exactly what you are saying, that the term Neo-conservative is deliberately intended to confuse people as to their ideological beliefs. If you want to criticize someone who agrees with you because you don't like colloquial definitions being used for the sake of communication and expediency, then all I can say is good luck to you.

Oh I hear ya... you clearly feel that leftists who use the conservative banner are bad for conservatism and bad for America... You clearly feel that Conservatism is Good for America... yet you keep using propaganda terms the left designed to undermine conservatism.

And that sport is my beef here... He who controls the language controls the argument; the left demands that they'll control the language... I reject that demand, out of hand and I'm not very tolerant of people who can't grab clues.

We're in a fight for our freedom; I take it seriously... either get your head in the game or get the fuck to the side line skippy.

 

[Old Rocks]

Conservatism isn't dead, but it has a serious problem. Neo-Conservatives have co-opted the conservative identity in much the same way that the word Liberal was co-opted by a group of people who were/are anything but Liberal. As long as those Neo-Con clowns are able to fool people into believing that their brand of national socialism is "conservative", the real conservatives will find it impossible to be an effective political force.

Right on. Well said, and true.

 

[PubliusInfinitum]

when media gets lost in an attempt at fairness rather than a truthful telling of the situation, it dilutes reality so that alternative views gain credence, not because they are right, but just because they are repeated.

Yes...the purpose of the media is not to be UNBIASED.

The point of having a free media is to GET IT RIGHT.

But since the media is a tool of those in power, we can pretty much forget about all that.

ROFLMNAO... I suppose we'd need to define 'power' and those who are "in power" to even know what that drivel means.

We can be sure that given the position is written tha the GOP has never been in power, as the media has not been controlled by them in the nearly 50 years that I've been around.

Of course, I'd love to have this cleared up... my bet is that when and IF she even tries, that the answer will not reflect an American perspective.

 

[glockmail]

I've thought this often as one after another of its policies and its actions fail. But the power of its echo chamber of institutions and media outlets hangs on, spinning any news into myth. Some time ago I wrote that when media gets lost in an attempt at fairness rather than a truthful telling of the situation, it dilutes reality so that alternative views gain credence, not because they are right, but just because they are repeated. Is cold hearted social Darwinist conservatism finally dead? I mean no insult to Charles on his birthday. We can only hope.....

Didn't you try this one earlier? If conservatism is dead, then why did queer marriage get the shit-can in California, of all places?

 

[PubliusInfinitum]

Conservatism isn't dead, but it has a serious problem. Neo-Conservatives have co-opted the conservative identity in much the same way that the word Liberal was co-opted by a group of people who were/are anything but Liberal. As long as those Neo-Con clowns are able to fool people into believing that their brand of national socialism is "conservative", the real conservatives will find it impossible to be an effective political force.

Right on. Well said, and true.

ROFL... see what I mean? You're now being complimented by radical leftists... Not because ya spoke up FOR conservativism, but because this buffoon equates NEO-Conservative with Conservative...

FYI: The phrase you're looking for is "Leftist REPUBLICANS"

FTR: this idiot has not a single post on this board which even POTENTIALLY speaks to Americanism in a positive light... OKA" Conservatism." She's been against the US Global war on terror, including the Campaign in Iraq, within that war and there is absolutely NO POTENTIAL for an American to be against the pursuit of the overt terrorists advocates who formerly lead the Baath Socialist Party of Iraq.

 

[PubliusInfinitum]

the 59 million people who voted for the other guiy would disagree

You cons said McCain wasn't conservative, he wasn't one of you. You're making midcan's argument for him.

You're an idiot... That is a rancid non sequitur. McCain is not and never HAS been a conservative.. McCain is a fascist...

How that fact POSSIBLY makes Midcan's argument is known only to you.

 

[garyd]

Dictionary conservatism is of course dead. No on ein the last twenty years has been overly fond of the status quo. But the libertarian Ideas of a smaller much less intrusive Federal government are very much alive but do not support the current status quo nor that of the Bush Regime.

Any one thinks we need more federal ionvolvement in education has missed the fact that inspite of trillions of federal dollars spent on education we still trail the rest of the developed world in math and science though our kids feel great about their level of ignorance...

 

[midcan5]

Didn't you try this one earlier? If conservatism is dead, then why did queer marriage get the shit-can in California, of all places?

That line is too funny and so absurd it belongs in a comedy. It is hard to even reply to, think about the implications for a moment. LOL

You're an idiot... That is a rancid non sequitur. McCain is not and never HAS been a conservative.. McCain is a fascist...

OMG again, now the republican candidate is a fascist!!!! The absurdity never stops, no wonder conservatism is a failure it hasn't a clue.

To repeat myself, the only thing conservatism can do is criticize those who want to move society forward. We can disagree on 'forward,' but there is no question after Reagan/Bush Jr that conservatives cannot do much else.

A Short History of Conservative Obstruction to Progress | Conceptual Guerilla

 

[PubliusInfinitum]

Didn't you try this one earlier? If conservatism is dead, then why did queer marriage get the shit-can in California, of all places?

That line is too funny and so absurd it belongs in a comedy. It is hard to even reply to, think about the implications for a moment. LOL

Uh... You didn't reply to it... you DO know that, right? The reason that it's hard to reply to is that you're argument is being effectively challenged and the implications within that argument are being discredited... Now you DO realize that your failure to advance a cogent response is a concession to the point which contested it... don'tcha?

You're an idiot... That is a rancid non sequitur. McCain is not and never HAS been a conservative.. McCain is a fascist...

OMG again, now the republican candidate is a fascist!!!! The absurdity never stops, no wonder conservatism is a failure it hasn't a clue.

"now?" No... Mccains' been a fascist for decades...

I can't help but to notice that you seem desperate to disagree, yet ya can't seem to find a reasoned basis on which to do so; resulting in your projecting a pathetic appeal to what you perceive is a popularly held opinion....

Now you DO know that there is no actual correlation between the volume of people that embrace a given position and that position being one which is well reasoned, intellectually sound and logically valid, Right? This means that just because a lot of people agree with a position, that the position is a valid position that should be considered... YES! All those people CAN BE and usually ARE: WRONG.

By that I mean to ask you to state the SPECIFIC elements of your position which establish that that to which you were responding was 'absurd...'

To repeat myself, the only thing conservatism can do is criticize those who want to move society forward. We can disagree on 'forward,' but there is no question after Reagan/Bush Jr that conservatives cannot do much else.

So you feel that repeating a discredited position will somehow reinvigorate it with some measure of validity? How might that work?

Your position rests upon a false premise... Conservatives criticise left-think because it leads to chaos, calamity and catastrophe; we advance policy initiatives which are well reasoned, intellectually sound and logically valid and such ideas never fail to lead to PROGRESS... or 'move society forward; ya see knot-head, we disagree with the notion that our society has to embrace leftist policy in order to stimulate an economy which is slowing as a result of it's having cycled through a catastrophic bust cycle brought on by leftist policy; we further disagree that our culture 'moved forward' by embracing deviant behavior which human experienced proved REGRESSIVE 2000 years ago... ya see Einstien, ... where a society RETURNS TO THAT WHICH REQUIRES IT TO RE-LEARN THE LESSONS which discredited a given deviant behavior TWO HUNDRED CENTURIES AGO... that SOCIETY IS MOVING BACKWARDS... just as where a society is going from PROSPERITY TO DEBT... THAT MOVES SOCIETY BACKWARDS; and BACK does NOT equal FORWARD...

Understand? (She most definitely does NOT understand...)

 

[Patriot2009]

Liberalism, that is true liberalism, where liberty is revered is just as dead.

Liberty:

1. freedom from arbitrary or despotic government or control.
2. freedom from external or foreign rule; independence.
3. freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice.

when so called liberals call for government ownership of confidential medical records, or when government calls for tracking chips to be put on vehicles of private citizens, or when government attempts to control behaviors as basic as choice of food and drink and how warm or cool you keep your home, or when government calls for a larger and larger share of one's income, i think it is safe to say Liberalism is dead.

Uhhuh, the libertarian wing chimes in...?

 

[Skull Pilot]

Liberalism, that is true liberalism, where liberty is revered is just as dead.

Liberty:

1. freedom from arbitrary or despotic government or control.
2. freedom from external or foreign rule; independence.
3. freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice.

when so called liberals call for government ownership of confidential medical records, or when government calls for tracking chips to be put on vehicles of private citizens, or when government attempts to control behaviors as basic as choice of food and drink and how warm or cool you keep your home, or when government calls for a larger and larger share of one's income, i think it is safe to say Liberalism is dead.

Uhhuh, the libertarian wing chimes in...?

and is anything this libertarian said in the above post untrue?

Let's see, mileage tracking chips in cars.

Gov. mulls gas tax hike to highest-in-nation 50.5-cents - BostonHerald.com

Trips would be measured by a chip installed in a vehicle inspection sticker as soon as 2014,

How about government controlled thermostats?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/11/us/11control.html

Next year in California, state regulators are likely to have the emergency power to control individual thermostats, sending temperatures up or down through a radio-controlled device that will be required in new or substantially modified houses and buildings to manage electricity shortages.

Banned foods?

Banned: 9 Foods You're Not Allowed To Buy

How about the government wanting to "Guide" your doctor in his medical treatment, under threat of punishment if he doesn't comply with government dictated treatment plans?

Bloomberg.com: Opinion

What penalties will deter your doctor from going beyond the electronically delivered protocols when your condition is atypical or you need an experimental treatment? The vagueness is intentional. In his book, Daschle proposed an appointed body with vast powers to make the “tough” decisions elected politicians won’t make.

so yeah I might be a "paranoid libertarian" but you're completely clueless if you think the government won't try to enact more controls over you.

 

[midcan5]

Your position rests upon a false premise... Conservatives criticise left-think because it leads to chaos, calamity and catastrophe; we advance policy initiatives which are well reasoned, intellectually sound and logically valid and such ideas never fail to lead to PROGRESS... or 'move society forward; ya see knot-head, we disagree with the notion that our society has to embrace leftist policy in order to stimulate an economy which is slowing as a result of it's having cycled through a catastrophic bust cycle brought on by leftist policy; we further disagree that our culture 'moved forward' by embracing deviant behavior which human experienced proved REGRESSIVE 2000 years ago... ya see Einstien, ... where a society RETURNS TO THAT WHICH REQUIRES IT TO RE-LEARN THE LESSONS which discredited a given deviant behavior TWO HUNDRED CENTURIES AGO... that SOCIETY IS MOVING BACKWARDS... just as where a society is going from PROSPERITY TO DEBT... THAT MOVES SOCIETY BACKWARDS; and BACK does NOT equal FORWARD...

Your replies more than others consistently confirm my, and many others, take on conservative ideology today. Empty myth, just words. As far as specifics, can you read what you wrote above and find anything other than BS? But allow a few specifics, FDR took over after at a time similar to today in which republican ideas failed. That he did so was a good thing as fascism was growing in this country as in many others during that time. FDR's work till Reagan is considered the golden age in America. Reagan again believed in voodoo trickle down and again the economy collapsed. You do remember, 'it's the economy stupid.' Maybe not.

Enter Clinton and a time of libertarian simplemindedness, but at least C got a few things right, he raised taxes. For the record so did Reagan but by that time the deficits sunk Bush Sr's administration. Then we have the selection of Bush Jr. by a supreme court that deserves hell for all the hell this buffoon created. And low and behold, the people threw your fools out again, and now another democrat must put things right. Sorry that you know none of this I didn't realize you were only twelve.

"Why Conservatives Can't Govern" by Alan Wolfe

Kelso’s Corner » Blog Archive » The $10 Trillion Hangover - Paying the Price for Eight Years of Bush (Harper’s)

Regarding replying to the homophobe's idiocy. Some things are just too stupid for comment.

 

[midcan5]

DiamondDave disagrees with my assessment and the author's assessment of the death of conservatism. But he hasn't any ideas on which to challenge the failure of conservatism, he can only do the childish act of negative reping something he cannot allow into his limited intellectual world. But given the collapse of the middle class since Reagan, it has to be clear to any fair minded person that something is wrong. Before Reagan, from FDR, American society grew and the distribution of wealth across all social classes meant everyone had a stack in America. America's financial and world power were proof positive liberal ideas works, so what happened that wages have only gone up for the rich? Do I really have to use the word again? The test of any theory of thought is in results and the results are in and conservatism, thank goodness, is dead. RIP

"... [David] Brooks had moved through every important conservative publication—National Review, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, the Washington Times, the Weekly Standard—"and now I feel estranged," he said. "I just don’t feel it’s exciting, I don’t feel it’s true, fundamentally true." In the eighties, when he was a young movement journalist, the attacks on regulation and the Soviet Union seemed "true." Now most conservatives seem incapable of even acknowledging the central issues of our moment: wage stagnation, inequality, health care, global warming. They are stuck in the past, in the dogma of limited government. Perhaps for that reason, Brooks left movement journalism and, in 2003, became a moderately conservative columnist for the Times. "American conservatives had one defeat, in 2006, but it wasn’t a big one," he said. "The big defeat is probably coming, and then the thinking will happen. I have not yet seen the major think tanks reorient themselves, and I don’t know if they can." He added, "You go to Capitol Hill—Republican senators know they’re fucked. They have that sense. But they don’t know what to do. There’s a hunger for new policy ideas.""

The Political Scene: The Fall of Conservatism: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

 

[Annie]

DiamondDave disagrees with my assessment and the author's assessment of the death of conservatism. But he hasn't any ideas on which to challenge the failure of conservatism, he can only do the childish act of negative reping something he cannot allow into his limited intellectual world. But given the collapse of the middle class since Reagan, it has to be clear to any fair minded person that something is wrong. Before Reagan, from FDR, American society grew and the distribution of wealth across all social classes meant everyone had a stack in America. America's financial and world power were proof positive liberal ideas works, so what happened that wages have only gone up for the rich? Do I really have to use the word again? The test of any theory of thought is in results and the results are in and conservatism, thank goodness, is dead. RIP

"... [David] Brooks had moved through every important conservative publication—National Review, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, the Washington Times, the Weekly Standard—"and now I feel estranged," he said. "I just don’t feel it’s exciting, I don’t feel it’s true, fundamentally true." In the eighties, when he was a young movement journalist, the attacks on regulation and the Soviet Union seemed "true." Now most conservatives seem incapable of even acknowledging the central issues of our moment: wage stagnation, inequality, health care, global warming. They are stuck in the past, in the dogma of limited government. Perhaps for that reason, Brooks left movement journalism and, in 2003, became a moderately conservative columnist for the Times. "American conservatives had one defeat, in 2006, but it wasn’t a big one," he said. "The big defeat is probably coming, and then the thinking will happen. I have not yet seen the major think tanks reorient themselves, and I don’t know if they can." He added, "You go to Capitol Hill—Republican senators know they’re fucked. They have that sense. But they don’t know what to do. There’s a hunger for new policy ideas.""

The Political Scene: The Fall of Conservatism: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

Sorry, you lost me. Started with Diamond Dave, went on a rant about Brooks. Then linked to someone else.

I understand upset, but can you bring some clarity here?

 

[texas]

Conservatism will be dead until they can relate to the youth of America. As long as there power base is from the south, they will never be able to relate. Look at the up and coming Republicans Sanford and Jindal. For those govenors to popular they have to bend over for the religous right, which will make them unpopular in the rest of the country. In my opinion.