I’ve literally made this exact point but Christ on a stick people look at me like ice got a second head.
The Democrats are a big tent conservative neoliberal party. They are getting better, but that’s because to build a winning coalition they’ve got to be the big tent. Progressives have drug them kicking and screaming to the few good policy positions they have. Otherwise they are 1990s or 2000s Republicans without the southern twang.
Americans in general are politically illiterate. As in they don’t know what the damn words mean.
Most Americans have only heard the words used in the contexts that are being bitched about. And that’s intentional on behalf of the ruling class. It’s a framing of the conversation on a societal scale. More accurate information is out there, but to find it, one would need to either be intellectually curious (a dangerous trait to exhibit in the “wrong” setting) or stumble across it at random AND have the inclination to hear out something that goes against what they’ve been told their whole lives instead of rejecting it out of hand.
And now we are neck deep in yet another round of anti-intellectualism to further compound the issue. I’m not trying to make excuses, just provide context that tends to get lost amongst the “Americans are stupid” narrative.
In a liberal-democratic society, “conservatism” in the Burkean sense should normally mean maintaining liberal-democracy; and occasionally expanding its scope e.g. women voters, racial equality, etc. Replacing an existing liberal-democracy with anarcho-capitalism or theocratic fascism is not conservative.
In any society, “conservatism” should maintain public goods; knocking down the schools, libraries, and treaty alliances because a radical libertarian doesn’t know what they’re for is a Chesterton’s Fence violation!
Liberal conservatism is opposed to both communist revolution and fascist corruption. It allows for social-democratic experiments within the frame of liberal-democracy. It cannot endorse gerrymandering, institutional overthrow, or the abandonment of public goods which is the mainstay of the GOP.
I’ve literally made this exact point but Christ on a stick people look at me like ice got a second head.
The Democrats are a big tent conservative neoliberal party. They are getting better, but that’s because to build a winning coalition they’ve got to be the big tent. Progressives have drug them kicking and screaming to the few good policy positions they have. Otherwise they are 1990s or 2000s Republicans without the southern twang.
Americans in general are politically illiterate. As in they don’t know what the damn words mean.
Most Americans have only heard the words used in the contexts that are being bitched about. And that’s intentional on behalf of the ruling class. It’s a framing of the conversation on a societal scale. More accurate information is out there, but to find it, one would need to either be intellectually curious (a dangerous trait to exhibit in the “wrong” setting) or stumble across it at random AND have the inclination to hear out something that goes against what they’ve been told their whole lives instead of rejecting it out of hand.
And now we are neck deep in yet another round of anti-intellectualism to further compound the issue. I’m not trying to make excuses, just provide context that tends to get lost amongst the “Americans are stupid” narrative.
In a liberal-democratic society, “conservatism” in the Burkean sense should normally mean maintaining liberal-democracy; and occasionally expanding its scope e.g. women voters, racial equality, etc. Replacing an existing liberal-democracy with anarcho-capitalism or theocratic fascism is not conservative.
In any society, “conservatism” should maintain public goods; knocking down the schools, libraries, and treaty alliances because a radical libertarian doesn’t know what they’re for is a Chesterton’s Fence violation!
Liberal conservatism is opposed to both communist revolution and fascist corruption. It allows for social-democratic experiments within the frame of liberal-democracy. It cannot endorse gerrymandering, institutional overthrow, or the abandonment of public goods which is the mainstay of the GOP.
Yeah I don’t have a word for whatever the hell the Republicans have become. Even fascists see the utility of institutions.