A big mistake that conservatives have made is by badly over-using the terms "socialist" and "socialism", diluting them to the point of near irrelevance. Much like the way the liberals over-used the terms "racist" and "racism". Unfortunately, all these terms are important and do describe things, but the wingers on each end don't care.
By over-using the terms, conservatives have become the boy who cried wolf, and are providing liberals cover to push the country in the direction they really want, which is clearly a Euro-social democracy. In other words, many conservatives are literally, indirectly helping the liberals get precisely what they want.
This is why calm, reasonable, mature, honest conversation is so important, and why we remain in decay because of the lack of it.
The word socialism doesn't have the stigma it once did. Schools have been successful in presenting it in a positive light so it's hard to believe using the word is the cause of increasing socialism in our society.
I put a lot of the blame on media and pop culture where anything remotely conservative is lampooned and scoffed at.
Correct and correct.
The American Left has patiently but consistently changed American culture through education, media and popular culture over the last few decades, and the American Right has been an abject, feeble failure at stopping them. Pointing at the Left's actions and screaming "Socialism! Communism! Marxism!" clearly doesn't work and is making the Right look like reactionary clowns as the Left continues to turn the country into a Euro-social democracy.
My guess is that it's clearly too late, but if the Right wants to reverse this trend, it needs to improve its messaging skills by a factor roughly two thousand.
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The right is failing because it doesn't understand what is happening. There is an incremental cultural change that happens over time. It is inevitable and it cannot be stopped. The smart move is not to try and stop the change but instead to guide it in the direction you want it to go. Given that the extreme right doesn't even understand the nature of the change they are left with nothing but outrage.
It might be too late for the reactionaries since they are incapable of comprehending how this works. But the next generation of conservatives are more open minded to change. They have grown up in a society where having your own personal stereo and music collection in your pocket is normal. Instant replays are normal. Being in constant contact with friends and family 24*7 is normal. Googling whatever you need at the moment is normal. Individually these are not "cultural changes" since they are technical innovations. But they have changed culture by making communications, interactions and information operate on a different level.
Those that embraced these changes were the ones who set the tone and the direction. Doesn't mean that what they did was right, simply that they were in the right place at the right time. If you want to influence American Culture you need to be part of the communication. If you don't then you get carried along instead of deciding the direction that you want to go.
The next wave of this change is upon us right now. School kids are being issued with tablets and the content on those will determine what they learn. If you are not in a position to influence what is on those tablets then there is nothing that you can do to change the direction. That is the challenge facing the right.
