What has happened to the conservative MIND?!

[SevMax2]

There were a few. Thomas Sowell. Victor Davis Hanson. Cal Thomas. The aforementioned William F. Buckley. William Safire. Robert Novak. The numbers are dwindling, because the MAGA mind virus has taken over. I assert that having to constantly defend stupidity and insanity has a real risk of mental decline. Now you get Jordan Peterson, a man who used to be somewhat profound, but has really gone downhill. Hanson ain't what he used to be, either, I fear. It's really a sad state of affairs in American conservatism, and this former Bircher is glad that I took the off ramp when I did. The conspiracy wing-nuts have taken over and even the John Birch Society would consider them paranoid, or at least the version that I once attended. Glenn Beck. Bill O'Reilly. Sean Hannity. Tucker Carlson. This is what passes for philosophy or intellectualism nowadays.

 

[MasterAnimus]

There were a few. Thomas Sowell. Victor Davis Hanson. Cal Thomas. The aforementioned William F. Buckley. William Safire. Robert Novak. The numbers are dwindling, because the MAGA mind virus has taken over. I assert that having to constantly defend stupidity and insanity has a real risk of mental decline. Now you get Jordan Peterson, a man who used to be somewhat profound, but has really gone downhill. Hanson ain't what he used to be, either, I fear. It's really a sad state of affairs in American conservatism, and this former Bircher is glad that I took the off ramp when I did. The conspiracy wing-nuts have taken over and even the John Birch Society would consider them paranoid, or at least the version that I once attended. Glenn Beck. Bill O'Reilly. Sean Hannity. Tucker Carlson. This is what passes for philosophy or intellectualism nowadays.

Before MAGA there was the Tea Party. Just a fancy name for "I can't believe a colored person is our president" party. Even Fox News was relatively tame prior to about 2008. Then they went full conspiratorial and started lying and being deceptive instead of having honest debates.

 

[Politruk]

The dumbing-down of American conservatism appears to have proceeded apace with the GOP's evolution into an ideologically pure conservative party.

Why is that?

 

[Politruk]

And recent discussion of birthright citizenship clearly indicates they ain't getting any smarter.

 

[Rightguide]

There's Pat Buchanan, for instance. I have read The Death of the West. No smart guy wrote it. Is this the best they can do any more?!

One of the best American public intellectuals today is Michael Lind -- who started conservative (wrote for National Review) and grew disillusioned. He wrote a book about that, Up from Conservatism.

Stop with the leftist propaganda.

 

[Rightguide]

The fact is the conservative mind as prevailed. The leftist mind has been driven into the intellectual wilderness.

 

[Politruk]

The fact is the conservative mind as prevailed. The leftist mind has been driven into the intellectual wilderness.

Communists and fascists sometimes win. Political victory does not prove intellectual superiority.

 

[Politruk]

Stop with the leftist propaganda.

You join the Communist Party first.

 

[TastySuckToy]

The fact is the conservative mind as prevailed. The leftist mind has been driven into the intellectual wilderness.

The Conservative mind:

-won the electoral college
-won the popular vote
-won all swing states
-won all three branches of government
-is winning the cultural war

I gotta admit, it's a good time to be a Conservative.

But if Conservatives want to keep winning in the future, then they should do a few more things:

-get leftists to believe there's too many people on the planet
-get leftists to believe humans are a bad influence on the planet, the less of them the better
-get the leftists to sterilize their children with drugs and surgery
-get the leftists to push hard for abortion and not having children at all
-get leftists to attack conventional family values and structures
-get leftists to adopt the most irritating, annoying and disgusting traits and mindsets possible to alienate all others

Nail those suckers down, and we could be looking at a heavily conservative future in just a short generation or two.

 

[Politruk]

-is winning the cultural war

Conservatives ain't winning THAT! In the long run, they can't. It's impossible.

 

[Rightguide]

The Conservative mind:

-won the electoral college
-won the popular vote
-won all swing states
-won all three branches of government
-is winning the cultural war

I gotta admit, it's a good time to be a Conservative.

But if Conservatives want to keep winning in the future, then they should do a few more things:

-get leftists to believe there's too many people on the planet
-get leftists to believe humans are a bad influence on the planet, the less of them the better
-get the leftists to sterilize their children with drugs and surgery
-get the leftists to push hard for abortion and not having children at all
-get leftists to attack conventional family values and structures
-get leftists to adopt the most irritating, annoying and disgusting traits and mindsets possible to alienate all others

Nail those suckers down, and we could be looking at a heavily conservative future in just a short generation or two.

From the feudalism of the left to a new enlightenment of the right.

 

[Politruk]

From the feudalism of the left to a new enlightenment of the right.

More in the nature of a dark enlightenment.

 

[TastySuckToy]

From the feudalism of the left to a new enlightenment of the right.

The Conservative Right really couldn't have asked for a better enemy: "Give us an enemy that gleefully and forcifully promotes and advocates for their own destruction, and if we try to talk them out of it, they think we're the bad guys!"

 

[Politruk]

The Conservative Right

No longer exists in America. Only the reactionary right remains. Conservatism is cautious -- that is its only characteristic that has any value at all. No conservative would ever chant "Lock her up!" or "Molon labe!" or "End the Fed!"

 

[Politruk]

RWs on this board display their idiocy every day!

 

[butters]

There was a time when American movement conservatism had spokesmen of some mental heft, such as William F. Buckley and Russell Kirk.

But ever since the Reagan years, nobody to the right of the Democratic Leadership Council appears capable of anything above the intellectual level of a claymation Christmas special.

Why is that?!

well, the past 5 years had covid as a contributing factor... fewer republicans masked up or embraced social distancing, many more repubs than dems refused to get vaxxed once it became available, and way more defiantly engaged in social gatherings in packed quarters with no protection even as covid tore through the states... and covid affects the brain, just like any other organ.

damn, it seems unbelievable that covid first showed as a threat in 2019 and first confirmed case was 2020! 5 whole years ago

 

[Chernosoth]

Well educated conservatives know empires and civilizations rise and fall, and may leave little or no evidence they ever existed. We are in simultaneous declines of the American empire and Euro-American civilization. Denial, anger, and bargaining make no difference in delaying the decline. The most they can do is manage or mismanage the decline to a soft or hard landing on the next step down. They may also know Christianity and all the Abrahamic religions will probably be forgotten in the next few centuries.

 

[Politruk]

Well educated conservatives know empires and civilizations rise and fall, and may leave little or no evidence they ever existed. We are in simultaneous declines of the American empire and Euro-American civilization.

What makes you think that? Civilizations do not really have a life-cycle like living organisms do. All theories of historical determinism are fundamentally flawed. And our present civilization is not Euro-American, it is global.

 

[Politruk]

There has always been an anti-intellectual current implicit in conservatism, of course. Even William F. Buckley's God and Man at Yale was fundamentally anti-intellectual.

 

[Chernosoth]

National and civilizational decline covers everything, including pundits, thinkers, writers, etc. The colleges become less educational, and then they mostly shut down. Plain literacy could be a minority skill next century as most kids spend their lives on farms and never see the inside of a schoolhouse.

 

[Politruk]

National and civilizational decline covers everything, including pundits, thinkers, writers, etc. The colleges become less educational, and then they mostly shut down. Plain literacy could be a minority skill next century as most kids spend their lives on farms and never see the inside of a schoolhouse.

You're still thinking in terms of peak oil shutting down industrial civilization. That is not likely to happen -- our grandchildren will not be farmers.

 

[TastySuckToy]

Plain literacy could be a minority skill next century as most kids spend their lives on farms and never see the inside of a schoolhouse.

On what basis do you think people are going to live on farms next century?

 

[Randomguy126]

Lmao the utter stupidity on display is beyond comprehension

 

[Politruk]

Lmao the utter stupidity on display is beyond comprehension

You are definitely adding to the stupidity on display.

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

On what basis do you think people are going to live on farms next century?

He’s convinced the Republicans will destroy civilization.