A War That Might HappenJonah Goldberg usually writes with a comic twist, but the foregoing article is serious in nature and I think he's closer to the mark than the OP or Rei.
Jonah Goldberg wrote:But the more important distinctions aren't philosophical. Whereas the old game of attacking even very conservative Republicans as sellouts was something of a direct-mail fundraising racket, the new cause is more like a real movement.
And that's why this time the infighting might lead to real war. For starters, the populists are much better funded and organized. Despite liberal doomsaying that Citizens United would give corporations a stranglehold over politics, we've seen the influence of big business decline in the GOP as new populist PACs have declared war on what they believe is the K Street wing of the party.
Also, public sentiment is much more on their side than you might guess from media coverage of the Tea Party. As political scientist Larry Bartels recently observed, the public is “more conservative than at any time since 1952.” That new progressive era liberals promised in 2008? It never happened. The public has grown more conservative during the Obama presidency. The catch: It’s grown less Republican, too.
In The Roots of Modern Conservatism, historian Michael Bowen argues that the familiar creation story of the modern Right that focuses on Barry Goldwater’s failed 1964 presidential bid skips the all-important chapters of the 1940s and 1950s. This was when the original “Me Too” Republican, Thomas Dewey, battled the legendary “Mr. Republican,” Robert Taft. (“Me Too” GOPers claimed they liked the New Deal, but that it was just run poorly.)
According to Bowen, the fight between Dewey and Taft had less to do with ideology and more with internal GOP politics. Desperate to gain control of the party, the two factions invoked — and often invented — ideological differences to justify their claims and grievances. Eventually, the ideological arguments became self-justifying, in the same way the Sunni–Shiite Muslim split started as a fight over the prophet Mohammed’s successor and was only retroactively imbued with profound theological significance.
Nucklepunch wrote:I have talked to a lot of (American) conservatives in my day and it seems one thing I have noticed is that conservatives seem to think that anything that is not ultra-conservative is automatically liberal.
They would suspect that you are a Thomas Dewey Republican. I supported George W. Bush. I voted for him. I maxed out contributions for him. I raised money for him. However, I did not agree with virtually everything he did. The political left called me everything in the book for my support of his presidency--most notably the Iraq War. I left the Republican party in 2006 over the Kennedy-McCain bill, because the Republicans started calling anyone who didn't agree with amnesty for illegal aliens "racist." People like me are why the Republicans lost the house in 2006. People like me are why they regained it in 2010. People like me are why we supported Ted Cruz defunding ObamaCare. People like me don't care that the liberal spin is that the shutdown hurt the Republican party. Why don't we care? We're not really Republicans anymore. We're conservatives. If we have to destroy the Republican party, who gives a shit? They have no problem screwing us, so why should we care about them?
nucklepunch wrote:For instance, I support an individual right to own guns but reasonable restrictions like background checks and registration requirements.
Ok, so what you actually support is not a right to own guns, but a privilege to own guns--a privilege which is subject to restrictions and registration. A right to keep and bear arms is antecedent to the authority of the state. It is absolute. It's purpose is to defend freedom from all enemies, both foreign AND domestic. As Rei pointed out in another thread, the overstatement by Americans with respect to gun control is that the Nazis came for the guns first. Actually, the Nazis supported a policy very much like your point of view. However, their restrictions were that Jews could not own guns, and everyone else had to register. So a movement conservative does not see your position as "reasonable." Me personally? If I hear an alliterative phrase, my scepticism is immediately piqued. "Reasonable restrictions" sounds very pleasantly unreasonable. It sounds like Republicans who talk of "repeal and replace" with respect to ObamaCare. To us, that sounds like, "What you like? Me fuck you hard and fast? Me fuck you long time? Which one you like?" To me, it sounds like you want to fuck me. No thanks.
nucklepunch wrote:Liberals grant this to be centrist but conservatives say it is ultra liberal.
Actually, sans the anti-Jewish regulations, it's identical to Nazi Party policy. So naturally this would offend the sensibilities of conservatives, who are small l liberals.
nucklepunch wrote:I oppose government run health care, instead I favor a national health insurance policy with private delivery, something along the lines of France, as opposed to the Beveridge system of England with public hospitals and what not. Liberals grant this to be centrist, whereas to conservatives it is "socialist."
Actually, it's national socialist. That's why Rei likes you. You are actually a national socialist. That's not broadly accepted in the United States, and it is not politically correct to state that you are a national socialist, because that gets immediately conflated with Nazism and anti-Semitism.
nucklepunch wrote:I oppose gay marriage and favor civil unions. Liberals grant this to be centrist. Conservatives think it is liberal.
Gay marriage is a different issue. That suggests you are just soft in the head. Liberals present you with a series of choices, and you pick what you like. Movement conservatives aren't united on this issue, because some defend traditional marriage for its own sake. For me, it's Octavian Caesar's law. It's
Lex Julii, and liberal divorce laws and non-punishment for extra-marital sex already rendered it unfit for its intended purpose. So to add homosexuality to the mix as though equality had anything to do with it at all, and continuing to restrict the cardinality of the agreement suggests that you basically let others do your thinking for you. Do you want international socialism, or national socialism? You choose national socialism. I would too, but I'd prefer smaller government in general. So I don't accept the choices presented. That makes me a radical extremist outside the mainstream of American society.
nucklepunch wrote:I oppose socialism and free market capitalism, favoring capitalism with reasonable regulations. Liberals grant this to be centrist but conservatives always say it is liberal if described in any greater detail beyond the surface.
If you've never read Mein Kampf, you should. Hitler is absolutely vilified in the press. He is not treated fairly at all. I'm sure Rei might agree. If you listen to many American politicians, they really don't sound--on a policy basis--much different from Adolf Hitler. "Bush = Hitler" was often thrown at me when I supported Bush. The Iraq War was never going to result in some traditional colonialism as critics often suggested. Rather, it was to preserve American hegemony (oil priced in dollars, government neutral too or friendly with the US, control of weapons, and to preempt a hostile force, etc.). Yet, some of his domestic policies like prescription drugs for Medicare are very much FDR-style Democrat policies. A politician who does that sort of thing creates aggregate demand for rich producers while buying the votes of the poor. It's not the same as wealth redistribution, because you more or less get a voucher that can only be spent on prescription drugs. National socialism is an alliance between rich industrialists and the working classes.
nucklepunch wrote:Liberals do not see me as one of them, but conservatives always seem to see me as a liberal. Why?
It's actually much like the last line I quoted from Jonah Goldberg:
Jonah Goldberg wrote:Eventually, the ideological arguments became self-justifying, in the same way the Sunni–Shiite Muslim split started as a fight over the prophet Mohammed’s successor and was only retroactively imbued with profound theological significance.
Conservatives see the split between national socialism and international socialism the same way. It's still socialism. Muslim fundamentalists don't say, "Hey, those Unitarians are cool, but the Catholics and the fundamentalist Christians are not my bag." They see Christians. You aren't really a conservative. You are actually a fascist, but it's impolitic to say so in the United States since we defeated a fascist alliance during the second world war. Yet, liberals are okay with that, because they are socialist too. You aren't one of them, but they aren't as afraid of you as they are of me.
nucklepunch wrote:Additionally, why is it that conservatives in America always think they are the victims? America is the most right-wing country in the industrialized world yet conservatives act like unless it is totally their way, we are living in a dystopian socialist society. I don't get it.
When they talk about "fairness," "wealth redistribution," "helping the poor," "taxing the rich" and so on, they are basically talking about fucking our lights out.
Rei Murasame wrote:Being called a 'liberal' by them then simply means that you are something that is not them and they can't be bothered to find out exactly what that might be, so you would be called 'liberal' even if you were a Fascist or a Socialist. Ironically, the American so-called 'conservatives' are actually the liberals themselves.
I understand that you and I don't agree philosophically, but I take your opening tone as a bit of a put down. It's more of the "conservatives are stupid" meme. Nucklepunch is a fascist at heart, but that term is considered an insult in the United States. You can hold that view in the United States, but you just can't call it fascist. That's political correctness for you. I do think with some significant distance from the Hitler years, it is very helpful to deconstruct America's non-stop anti-Hitler propaganda. Hitler was a very interesting leader. Just like the American Civil War produced a lot of "firsts," so did the Nazis. They were the first to establish the link between smoking and cancer. They were the first with guided missiles. They were the first to put jets into production. The problem with American Jews is that they cannot give any credit to Hitler's major accomplishments, because of his pogroms against the Jews--which were very real and very brutal. Yet, the autobahn systems we see around the world today? Hitler inspired that. The Volkswagen Beetle the hippies loved so much? Hitler commissioned that.
There are some dumb conservatives, just as there are in any faction. However, I don't think it's fair to merely say that we're epistemically blind. Nucklepunch is a fascist, but it's forbidden to say so in America. If I said, "Nucklepunch, you are a fascist." He's likely to take offense. If I call you a fascist, you say "Thank you." Even you have to call it "neo-corporatist" though because of liberalism's non-stop libel of Hitler. So given that even I can see that, do you at least have some appreciation why I can't stand the political left in the United States?
Rei Murasame wrote:The contradictions are actually easy to catch because they will usually make the error of paying lipservice to outcomes that their own policy choices cannot ever possibly come near facilitating ever (eg, the contradiction between spouting anti-immigrant rhetoric while simultaneously placing immigration-loving capitalists in charge of society), and then you can completely unwind them from there since their contradictions run extremely deep to the point where they are fundamental contradictions.
Would it be fair to suggest that most of their contradictions compromise liberal capitalism for fascism though? I think that's the bigger question here, because almost everything Nucklepunch has said is fascist.
Nucklepunch wrote:The thing of it is I outflank them on the right in terms of protectionism, immigration, and foreign policy, at least in that I advocate what was once considered to be the "conservative" position. Now protectionism is seen as an attack on free markets, as is a restrictive immigration policy, and even though the so-called "conservatives" today advocate a Wilsonian internationalist foreign policy based around hawkish utopian liberalism they still take my views on foreign policy to be liberal, all while spouting off what they think "history" taught them.
Protectionism is probably more mercantilist than fascist, but labor unions support that sort of thing too. Most conservatives oppose amnesty for illegal aliens, but are more liberal when it comes to legal immigration when it serves the national interest (economic mostly). Conservatives are hardly Wilsonian. Maybe lured by neoconservatives. I certainly fit that bill for a time. I definitely do not like the UN and that sort of thing, which is all Wilsonian.
Nucklepunch wrote:I can't name a single pragmatic American conservative/libertarian on this forum.
As an ideology, the pragmatism happens in the market, not in the political policies.
Nucklepunch wrote:I am sick and tired of this extremism that is taking over my country! I just wish they would leave us normal people alone, let us have our Social Security and Medicare and go start a utopian Glenn Beck colony somewhere.
Well, it was our country. Social Security and Medicare are fascist policies. Again, please, please, please read Mein Kampf. Just understand national socialism so you can proudly say who you are and what you believe. I don't disagree with everything Hitler did either, but I think his military strategy was a disaster. You are going to have to address the demographic bomb though. Now that ObamaCare is law, it's coming sooner rather than later.
Daktoria wrote:Today's (northern) conservatives are lost people. They don't understand how to relate with each other, surrendering their souls to industrial institutions. They've grown paranoid and are willing to behave like animals for social hierarchy because they've lost their grace.
They have also sold out to Nucklepunch's "reasonable regulations." We have a graduated earned income tax with exemptions at the low end of the income curve. Notice that we don't have that for non-earned income? Savings? Capital gains? It's become a self-serving system. Poor people cannot accumulate capital, enjoy compound interest without taxation, or receive probate and tax free inheritances up to a point. We can get back to that, but the nucklepunches of the world want someone else to give it to them. It makes them feel loved or something. It's not even complex math. Why not a $20k a year unearned income tax credit, or earned AND unearned? See what I mean? People would have leisure time again. That's a HUGE threat to Wall Street.
Let me give you a humorous anecdotal example on why a lot of "progress" is just unnecessary business. I was watching Pawn Stars (conservatives watch television shows where people are working when we're not working). Rick Harrison appears in a commercial touting safety razors, and completely bashes all the double, triple, etc. disposables. He shaves his head--I have a very full head of hair, but a heavy beard--so he has some cred. I go onto Amazon and look around. The cookies track, and everywhere I'm seeing things like razor clubs with the double-bladed style disposables that would defeat my objective. I finally find and buy myself a single-blade double-edged safety razor along the lines of King Gillette's from 1901. I've used it for the last two days. Brilliant! Great clean, close shave, no cuts. Miss a few days shaving? No trouble with the stubble. It's brilliant. 100 year old technology works better than the two-to-five blade razors that cost so much money. I've been fooled by all this bullshit for years. I haven't seen the ad since. Probably Gillette came in, bought the company and paid a lot of good will for non-disclosure. That's like the Browning M2. 100 year old .50 cal design is absolutely the most incredible gun. Why fuck it up?
The issue is that someone like me going for a much cheaper, and much more effective single-blade safety razor ultimately introduces deflation. The banking cartel cannot survive if we are satisfied. They need a high velocity of money.
nucklepunch wrote:This is why conservatives constantly emphasize work and bash liberals for being "lazy" or at the very least favoring policies which promote laziness.
We bash them for laziness, because they want us to pay their way. Liberal politicians in the United States do nothing more than bribe people to vote for them. RINOs don't like us, because they can't do anything for us. We don't want to be bought. We want the government out of our lives.
nucklepunch wrote:Finally American liberalism does not have socialist roots (in spite of what some will say) but social gospel roots.
That was true until the New Deal. It actually became rather nefarious with the Great Society--creating inter-generational welfare dependents who MUST vote for the welfare party. Mitt Romney was actually criticized for pointing this out in his 47% remark. The New Deal worked for many European immigrants, but it made many others simply dependent on the state.
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