The word "conservative" needs to be killed dead forever as we discuss today's GOP.

[LBM20]

Message framing! Progressives/Democrats usually stink at it, and the perfect example is the insistence on using "conservative" to describe Trump and today's GOP members.

They are not "conservative."

They are "Right Wing." They are "Right Wing Radicals." They are "Right Wing Extremists."

Pick one. But they are certainly not "conservative." Eisenhower was "conservative." George H.W. Bush was "conservative."
Commentators David Brooks and George Will are "conservative." But not Trump and not the overwhelming bulk of today's GOP politicians, and not their tribal followers.

Enough of the lame, outdated, outmoded, and very weak use of "conservative" to describe today's GOP.

[chuckstevens]

1. Corporatist Reactionaries, who parctice "Trickle "On" Econmics

[CurtEastPoint]

2. Exactly: "Right Wing Radicals" or "Right Wing Extremists."

[Trust Buster]

3. Thank you. I have been preaching the same for awhile.

Look the term up in the dictionary folks and tell me if they meet the requirements. Watching democrats and the media credential these nuts with that term makes me nuts. Please refrain from using what I will only describe as the “C-word”.

[betsuni]

4. Meghan McCain keeps yammering on self-righteously about "conservative values."

One of her co-hosts on "The View" last Friday asked her, "Since when do you consider Trump a conservative?" I'd like to know just what exactly, in 2018, conservative values are.

[marylandblue]

5. Conservatives have always been about maintaining

or establishing a hierarchical order of haves over havenots. Edmund Burke created "modern conservativism" which created the idea that conservatism is about conserving the good of the past. Trump is simply reverting to an older form of conservatism, thus HE is the true conservative, not the "modern" conservatives.

[RandiFan1290]

6. another is calling them the 'gop' nt

[greymattermom]

7. I was in North Georgia recently

and all of the political signs were "conservative" none were Republican. I think that the Right Wing Radicals want to be called conservative, so let's just call them "Conservative Extremists" or something like that. They want the name, let them have it. Maybe Republican can go back to meaning pro business, lowering the deficit, instead of the death party. Let "conservative" mean the death party.

[Martin Eden]

8. Regressives

They have regressed to know-nothing bigoted reactionaries who are useful idiots for the oligarchy.

[Roy Rolling]

9. Anarchists

They are anarchists. They wish to destroy the U.S. democratic government and rely on no government, just corporations to manage America.

[Hortensis]

10. GOP no longer "conservative," yes; HOWEVER, personality is forever.

Don't let terminology screw up understanding.

Conservative and liberal are basic personality types that WE ARE BORN WITH. They're genetically determined. THEN environment gets involved and is also a powerful force, but it can't completely wipe out inborn traits. Half of all Americans are naturally conservative, cutting across all racial, religious, ethnic and gender types. And they always will be.

So, conservative and liberal are not synonymous with Republican and Democrat, it's just that increasingly cons gather in the GOP and liberals in the Democratic Party.

What is currently effectively "dead" or purged is TRADITIONAL CONSERVATISM as a guiding principle of the Republican Party. Abe Lincoln tried to define that as what he clearly felt was conservatism's great contribution to society. “What is conservatism? Is it not the adherence to the old and tried against the new and untried?” (He was no fool, he knew there was more to it.)

Traditional conservatism could be purged from the Republican Party over the last 40 years because there is no ingrained cultural tradition of conservatism as a political philosophy, just a knee-jerk response to events that can be harnessed by any bad leader.

(The liberal philosophy that lives in the Democratic Party, by contrast, arose during the Enlightenment, the Age of Reason, and the principles our nation was established on are intrinsically liberal and progressive -- equality, government of, by and for the people, etcetera)

What happened to the GOP is that after WWII conservative thinkers tried to develop what Lincoln expressed into an intellectual ideology for conservatism, and for the Republican Party. But as we see, the GOP was subsequently taken over by wealthy conservatives who have no interest in anything that doesn't increase profits. And with their takeover came the purge of any guiding principles and the mass corruption of Republican voters to their service.

So watch it when claiming conservatism itself is dead or it may roll over you while you watch. People eager to support their leaders' desire to privatize our 240+-year-old USPS (so they can pay $5 to send a card to the nearest group mailboxes to their aunt's house) epitomize the death of conservatism as a Republican principle, but they are conservative and very much alive.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. Well analyzed and well written. +1. . . . . nt

[certainot]

11. for 30 yrs it's been the party of limbaugh- who leads 300 think tank scripted idiots and liars

on 1500 radio stations creating an alternate reality and made to order constituencies

and when rove lost the white house the kremlin started moving in

when feinstein says the cons need to take on the nra she misses it - they need to take on the talk radio gods working for the nra

luckily artificial intelligence now makes it possible to get good transcriptions of the blowhards an order of magnitude cheaper ($5/hr at sonix.ai) right alongside all their advertisers. how many advertisers will continue to want to associate with them?

[HootieMcBoob]

19. This! nt

[Bernardo de La Paz]

12. Nope. Kill the words "Republican" & GOP. Weld the brands to Trump brand. Keep them glued together

Conservative, in its original truest incarnation, is a respectable political stance.

After all, true conservatives are conservationists as one aspect.

But, as we all know, the word has become corrupted in America in the last 50 years to the point of being a caricature. It will in time get rehabilitated but first it has to completely divorce itself from the RepubliCONmen Party which is long past its Best-Before date.

The Party is the true evil. They put Party before country. Trump is the apex, the pinnacle, the epitome of 50 years of RepubliCon effort of dirty tricks, gerrymandering, voter suppression and hypocritical evangelical dominionism.

The USA is really a liberal progress Democratic leaning country when you remove the Republicon pollution of the political landscape.

[TxVietVet]

14. A blogger named "Rack Jite" coined a new name for them

many years ago.

CONSERVANAZIS


Their conservanut hero, Limbaugh, loved to demonize FEMINAZIS.

Change the wording a bit and see how it feels.

Who would know that the GOP reich wing nuts have now become "The Conservanazis".

[dawg]

15. They are fascists. It's silly to pretend otherwise.

Words have meanings.

If they were conservative, they would be concerned with preserving existing norms, traditions, and values. They clearly have no such concerns.

The word "fascist" may carry lots of baggage. But one can be fascist without necessarily being genocidal.

Call it a "kinder, gentler" form of fascism.

[lastlib]

16. I had a PoliSci professor who told a class....

..."there are no conservatives in America, only liberals who are confused about what kind of liberals they are."

But that was before Illinois Nazis. I hate Illinois Nazis. and all the other kinds too.

[DAngelo136]

17. No, as far as I'm concerned

Conservatism is and has been a bankrupt ideology. Brooks, Will and Bush are the same fruit of that poisonous tree.

"Q: What is conservatism?
A: Conservatism is the domination of society by an aristocracy.
Q: What is wrong with conservatism?
A: Conservatism is incompatible with democracy, prosperity, and civilization in general. It is a destructive system of inequality and prejudice that is founded on deception and has no place in the modern world."

I would urge people to read the rest of this article at: http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/conservatism.html
It lays out exactly what it is and why it should be defeated and thrown upon the ash heap of history.

Another train of thought along the same lines from The Conceptual Guerilla:

"When you cut right through it, right-wing ideology is just "dime-store economics" – intended to dress their ideology up and make it look respectable. You don’t really need to know much about economics to understand it. They certainly don’t. It all gets down to two simple words.

"Cheap labor". That’s their whole philosophy in a nutshell – which gives you a short and pithy "catch phrase" that describes them perfectly. You’ve heard of "big-government liberals". Well they’re "cheap-labor conservatives".

"Cheap-labor conservative" is a moniker they will never shake, and never live down. Because it’s exactly what they are. You see, cheap-labor conservatives are defenders of corporate America – whose fortunes depend on labor. The larger the labor supply, the cheaper it is. The more desperately you need a job, the cheaper you’ll work, and the more power those "corporate lords" have over you. If you are a wealthy elite – or a "wannabe" like most dittoheads – your wealth, power and privilege is enhanced by a labor pool, forced to work cheap."

http://conceptualguerilla.com/essays/defeat-the-right-in-three-minutes/

Read these articles and you will understand the true nature of the beasts and how to defeat them.

[Still In Wisconsin]

18. You are, of course, exactly right.

According to my dad, who is in his 90's and in my opinion one of the wisest people around, Ike was the last true conservative we had in the White House.

[Grins]

20. I use Reich-Wing...

...”Reich-Wing” conservatives or Republicans. And today there is no difference. Been using that ever since I read John Dean’s book on conservatives and his chapter on the research of same by Prof. Bob Altmeyer(sp?) .

[ProudMNDemocrat]

21. Today's Republicans are not CONSERVATIVE.......

They are against everything Christ preached when it comes to the good of all humanity and what is decent.

[ThoughtCriminal]

22. Neo-feudalists

And that includes the "conservatives" (Will, Bush, McCain, and all the Reagan worshipers) who led the GOP to where it is now.