smug and self-righteous untethered from principle unhooked from reality

[bigtree]

Leonard Pitts Jr. is Shocked to Find Modern Conservatism is Nothing but Corrupt, Dishonest, Divisive Claptrap

{snip}

Conservatism, an ideology once driven by principle, has shrunk until its purview can be, and often is, delineated in three syllables: God, guns, gays. Worse, it has embraced a win-at-all-costs ethos and intellectual dishonesty that are, even by the seamy standards of modern politics, astonishing.

To pick just one illustration: Last month, Karl Rove praised the choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate, citing among other things, her two long years as governor of Alaska and her experience as mayor of Wasilla, which has a population smaller than some apartment complexes. This came a few weeks after Rove said Tim Kaine was unfit to be Barack Obama's running mate because Kaine had been governor of Virginia "only" two years, before which, he was mayor of Richmond which, with about 200,000 residents, is "not a big town."

Now, I don't care what your ideology is: You cannot, if you've got half a brain, define that as anything but hypocrisy. And if true conservatives hate seeing that kind of duplicity associated with conservatism, I understand.

But I have a question: Where have you been the past 15 years? Where were you when conservatism was untethered from principle, unhooked from reality? Where were you when it became smug and self-righteous, when it traded its integrity for situational outrage, its honor for ballot box success? Where were you when it got hijacked?


read more: http://www.modbee.com/opinion/national/story/429138.html

[LaStrega]

1. "which has a population smaller than some apartment complexes"

Brilliant line. k+r

[opihimoimoi]

2. 5000 is the number just mentioned on TV.....OMG

Where he asks??? At the PUB PIG TROUGH sucking up that Kool Aid Swill

[LaStrega]

3. No joke ...

The high school from which I graduated had just over 5,000 students (9th through 12th grades)

[Odin2005]

5. WOW!!! The ENTIRE school district I went to had less then 200 student's total.

The size of entire grades averaged around 20. It is in a little dinky farming community in NW Minnesota, about 50 miles NE of Fargo.

[LaStrega]

6. My graduating class was 1,788 ...

Only one parent was allowed in the auditorium ... anyone else had to watch the commencement from teleprompters situated in other rooms. Lemme tell ya, that was a *loooooooong* night. Yawn fest.

[LiberalHeart]

4. Whew. I thought this post was about me. n/t

[bemildred]

7. It's been around five decades at least, since conservatism had anything to do with principles.

About as long as since Las Vegas was a sleepy little desert town.