Conservatives have always had a vision for America that was at odds with the "ideals" set forth in the Constitution. The ideals were informed by the liberalism of the Enlightenment era, even if they were never implemented fully. There were many within the coalition of founders who were pushing for "All Men" (as in mankind) to mean ALL, including women, Black people, etc... Although White Supremacy was baked into the cake of the United States, there were those who opposed the idea. Those people were never Conservatives. To be fair, I am sure there were some Conservatives and moderates who for religious reasons, may have seen White Supremacy, slavery, discrimination, etc... as sinful.
As Conservative heads toward its eventual landing place, policy has become irrelevant. What matters is POWER. So, just like a bank robber who is surrounded inside the bank, with hostages... everything becomes a bargaining chip. Because Democrats/Liberals/Progressives, actually care about ALL people; because we actually want to live up to the ideals of the Constitution, Conservatives can "bargain" with anything. We want freedom and democracy for Ukraine. We want Russia to stop invading its neighbors in a vain effort to bring back the Russian Empire. Conservatives don't care. They can use that to try to gain power. We want to use government to make people's lives better. They want POWER. Anything they can use to gain some advantage, even if it goes against what people may have thought was a deeply held principle, Conservatives will use. At the end of the day, they are working toward a society where there is a strict hierarchy, like during the times of absolute monarchy, where a small group of people are at the very top, and the rest of us are like subjects, working only to maintain the power structure. Family values, small government, fiscal responsibility, border security, tough on crime; all of that is bullshit they use to keep a base of voters together. If they are able to get it so that voting is irrelevant, we will see those talking points fall by the wayside.
We need to remember and understand that Conservatives DO NOT want to govern. They want to rule. They do not have deeply held beliefs other than that THEY deserve to be in power. Everything else would be a matter of their desires at any given time.
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