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...agree with some of the language police stuff). However, it's time to take on this word "conservative."
Bush Cartelists are NOT conservative. They are extremely RADICAL on the fascist end of the spectrum. Their federal deficit alone is enough to bust the word "conservative" forever, but there is so much more.
A conservative CONSERVES--whether it's peoples' savings, or a community's time-honored cultural traditions, or an historic downtown area that people love, or government budget surpluses, or forests, water, air and wildlife, or the 7 years of stored grain to feed the people during drought.
Conservatism = CONSERVATION. Being responsible, thinking and planning ahead, not being greedy or thieving, considering everyone's welfare.
A conservative thinks of the FUTURE and makes plans to leave something to his/her children, and to future generations.
A conservative also respects TRADITION, whether social tradition or Constitutional traditions, principles and precedents, or religious teachings, or the use of language--and is slow to approve of anything that will disturb the common weal (cause conflict, break the peace, or unsettle relationships among people).
A conservative is LAW-ABIDING, both personally and as to expectations of others, and is respectful towards the law, the common rules that make civilized life possible.
The Bush Cartel conserves NOTHING and respects NOTHING. It is the front group for predatory capitalism--a particular species of capitalism that has nothing to do with genuine, hardworking business people or trade--and has everything to do with UTTER GREED and SELFISHNESS OF THE FEW, gone mad, and gone global.
A true conservative (for instance, Barry Goldwater) would be horrified at what the Bush Cartel is doing.
On the social front, they are attempting to dismantle 100 years of social progress and consensus on women's rights, civil rights and liberties, and a host of other common values that hold us together as a nation. This is extremely radical, and disturbing of the common weal.
On the labor front, they are attempting to dismantle about a hundred years of progress on worker's rights, and 50 years of progress on correcting the downside of capitalism (its tendency to crash and impoverish and starve millions of people). The social safety net--Social Security, et al--STABILIZES capitalism. The Bush Cartel is bent upon pulling out the pins that hold our financial system in place. This is extremely radical, and could lead to massive disturbance of the common weal, including bloody revolution.
On the legal and Constitutional front, first and foremost, they are attempting to create a religious state--utter anathema to the Founders of our country, who were determined to end Christian religious warfare--the plague of Europe--and to prevent this pestilence from tearing the new republic to pieces. Never, never permit a religious faction to gain control of the government. Never! NO ESTABLISHMENT OF RELIGION! None! Never! No!
Additionally on the legal front, they have ZERO respect for international law, or for Constitutional constraints on U.S. military aggression, and are outright shredding Constitutional protections against search and seizure and other well-established rights, as well as shredding long established treaties.
I could go on and on. Everywhere you look in the Bush regime you find the most RADICAL, EXTREMIST and DISTURBING policies imaginable. Unjust war. The torture of prisoners. Extraordinary tax cuts for the rich. Deficit and eliminated services for the poor and the middle class. And plundering of the earth and its resources.
No conservation.
No conservatism at all, in any respect.
And if you'll think back to when this word "conservative" began to have its meaning turned upside down, it was with the looting of the Savings and Loan institutions, in the 1980s, under Reagan. Several other radical policies were also initiated at that time (re-writing the tax code to favor the rich; illegal covert war against Nicaragua (in violation of a specific law passed by Congress--thus flouting the Constitution); and the busting of the air traffic controllers' union). (Another was eliminating a free university education for all qualified students.)
But it was the looting of the S&L's (consequent upon Reaganite deregulation) that really signaled the change. Prior to that time, the S&L's were sacred. They held the wealth of the nation, mostly in the savings of the little people, with a very conservative but highly safe interest rate.
The S&L's were an icon of Republicanism, and true conservatism. The poor were protected and could plan ahead. The rich could use some of the money safely and conservatively. Everyone could count on this safe haven and all were encouraged to accumulate at least a small "rainy day" fund.
All gone, all smashed to bits and looted, by RADICAL policies that favored predators and thieves. And now these RADICALS are back with a vengeance--determined to loot and pillage whatever they didn't get on their first raid, and to appropriate our entire military establishment to enforce their greed throughout the world.
The LIBERALS are now the conservatives--who want to CONSERVE our consensus social policy, who want to BALANCE the federal budget and think and plan ahead, who want to PRESERVE the New Deal safety nets, who want to CONSERVE fuel and find a common sense alternative, who want to PROTECT forests and water and wildlife and CONSERVE these resources for future generations, who want to RESTRAIN predatory capitalism, who want to PROTECT workers' rights, who are RELUCTANT TO INTERVENE in other countries, and are cautious and law-abiding in international affairs, and who want the rich to pay their FAIR SHARE of society's costs.
The "conservatives" are pirates, brigands, "robber barons," pillagers and looters, thrilled by chaos and disruption as an opportunity for thievery (their "philosophy" crudely revealed by Donald Rumsfeld when he equated the looting in Iraq with freedom).
The liberals stand for the social order. Cautious, careful, conservative, mindful of the limits of society's and nature's resources, and aiming at a decent life for all.
This stark contrast erodes somewhat on issues of global free trade. Liberals led the way, incautiously and to the detriment of all but the rich, with some of them fooling themselves that the opening of borders would benefit all--the result being the worldwide proliferation of sweatshops, destruction of US labor protections, huge damage to our planetary environment, and other ills.
So I'm not sure I would want to call myself a liberal (with all that "free trade" baggage). But one thing I am dead certain of: Those whom we call "conservative" are NOT conservative. Not even a little bit.
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