<p>By ANDREW KLAVAN | Posted Tuesday, April 24, 2007 4:30 PM PT
The thing I like best about being a conservative is that I don’t have to lie. I don’t have to pretend that men and women are the same. I don’t have to declare that failed or oppressive cultures are as good as mine.</p>
<p>Nor do I have to say that everyone’s special or that the rich cause poverty or that all religions are a path to God. I don’t have to claim that a bad writer like Alice Walker is a good one or that a good writer like Toni Morrison is a great one. I don’t have to pretend that Islam means peace.</p>
<p>Of course, like everything, this candor has its price. A politics that depends on honesty will be, by nature, often impolite. Good manners and hypocrisy are intimately intertwined, and so conservatives, with their gimlet-eyed view of the world, are always susceptible to charges of incivility. It’s not really nice, you know, to describe things as they are.</p>
<p>“Ridiculous. Take the worst stereotypes of liberalism and pretend that it’s what all liberals believe.”</p>
<p>I live in Liberal Land, so I can definitely see it. A good friend lives in Conservativeville and says that she runs into the worst stereotypes there, too.</p>
<p>The only thing I’ve ever seen which remotely resembles the self-righteous narcissism of the current right was the self-righteous narcissism of the “New Left” of the 60’s and 70’s. I suppose it’s easier to maintain your absolute blindness to every aspect of the world you find uncomfortable to think about if you just continually repeat how morally superior you are in every way to anyone who dares to express an opinion you don’t already agree with. It takes a lot of self-absorption to be able to write something like “If you molest a child, there’s always a chance that you can get the ACLU to defend you as a cultural innovator” and consider yourself both clever and a bold truth-teller.</p>
<p>I would not advertise my connection to the writer of this article. This says nothing about Conservatism and instead displays this man’s intolerance, rudeness, and arrogance.</p>
<p>The truth hurts, does it not. Just remember this: Arguing on the internet is like running in the special olympics. even if you win you’re still ■■■■■■■■. And yes, that applies to me too.</p>
<p>That was one of the stupider openings I’ve ever read - because god knows there’s no liberals who legitimately believe what they say they do! All liberals are hypocrites - only conservatives can be forthright and say what they believe without being contradictory!</p>
<p>Gee, what a surprise! [/sarcasm] An “aren’t conservatives wonderful” article from the house organ of the “David Horowitz Freedom Center”, set up and funded (to the tune of $15M) by the same group of right wing organizations which have funded most of the dissemination of right wing propaganda in America for the past 30 years: the Olin Foundation, the Bradley Foundation, the Mellon-Scaife Foundations. <a href=“http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipientgrants.php?63[/url]”>http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipientgrants.php?63</a> Do the people who get this claptrap spoonfed to them ever bother to look behind the curtain to see who is manipulating them?</p>
<p>In all, about what you would expect from a publication edited by a man who considers Anne Coulter to be “a national treasure.”</p>
<p>This is the reason I dislike labeling myself. I’m socially liberal and fiscally conservative and have my own way of looking at everything in between. The way I see it is my personal views and opinions don’t really matter much to anyone but me anyway, so I choose to start off positively and assume everything and everyone has a right to their ideas…unless there is a valid, socially responsible and compelling reason to for me to be against it.</p>
Your opinions matter every single time you vote for any office because your vote impacts the individuals who are chosen to represent all of us. You can keep your views private, but, as long as you vote, the effects of your opinions are anything but personal. I don’t have a problem with the rest of your post, but I had to point this out.</p>
<p>Right-wing foundation money is peanuts compared to what Ford Foundation, Pew, etc. have been spreading about to effect change in this country for decades–in addition to the relatively new additions of Gates and Soros money. Only difference is that the left is more paranoid (that vast right-wing conspiracy, and all). Look up the numbers yourselves if you care to be honest about it.</p>
<p>That “tune” above is $15 mil over 16 years. Peanuts.</p>
<p>The difference (since we’re all about honesty and all) is that government money is funding right wing causes…(and that’s MY taxpayer money, over whch I have no say, contrary to foundation money, which is by direct donation from like minded individuals), funding religious initiatives, Christian schools and organizations, as well as abstinence education, etc., all attempting to “affect change” (and doing a swell job too).</p>
<p>Want to compare those millions and billions to the Ford Foundation? Let’s go for it! :)</p>
<p>Conservatives do not have a monopoly on the “political correctness” accusation.</p>
<p>For some reason, quite a few conservatives get into censorship mode when it comes to</p>
<ol>
<li>criticizing Israel</li>
<li>supporting stem cell research</li>
<li>supporting equal treatment for gay couples</li>
<li>supporting a woman’s right to choose her life or her unborn child’s life</li>
</ol>
<p>I’m proud to call myself a liberal, a classical liberal.</p>
<p>Edit</p>
<p>I forgot to mention number five - criticism of the current President. Apparently, Steven Colbert’s roast of our President last year was utterly unacceptable.</p>
<p>“I’m socially liberal and fiscally conservative”</p>
<p>This is pretty close to what I am, which puts me in the extraordinary position of disagreeing with the administration about virtually everything. I’m a budget hawk. There’s nothing conservative about borrowing money.</p>
<p>Actually, both terms have become so polluted/politicized that they have lost any real meaning (anyway, both “conservatives” and “liberals” on the extremes are a bit wacky, imo).</p>
<p>But if we take the term “liberal” to mean something along the lines of being progressive or “for change for the better” - then The Founding Fathers were “liberals” (if not radicals; and actually the New Englanders who started the whole “rebellion” were very much radicals) as was Abe Lincoln and many other great American leaders.</p>
<p>The thing that gets me is that the new conservatives (particularly those more along the social/religious lines) actually have quite a bit in common w/ the conservative, fundamentalist Islamists (I find it ironic and amusing that Bush is pushing for secularism in the Middle East, while at the same time, pushing for a more fundamentalist Christian agenda here at home).</p>
<p>Me too, Hanna. I have never understood why Democrats are called “Tax and Spenders”, when the biggest budget breakers in history have always been those fiscally irresponsible Republicans.</p>
<p>Show me a fiscally conservative, socially liberal candidate, of ANY party, and that person has my vote.</p>
</p>