That’s not a definition of conservatism; it’s a confession of how the modern Left governs. Conservatism says the law binds everyone because rights come from nature, not the state. The real “in-group” today is the activist class that breaks laws in the name of justice and calls accountability oppression. Projecting your hypocrisy onto your opponents doesn’t make it profound, just predictable.
Quite right. The modern Left confuses “understanding” with “pathologizing.” They don’t debate conservatives; they psychoanalyze them from the safety of faculty lounges. The Democrat Party’s current strategy seems to be moral superiority by attrition, lecturing the electorate into oblivion while wondering why the middle class has quietly slipped away.
* Be specific about the government programs you want to cut. Whenever Republican politicians get serious about cutting the federal budget they run into effective resistance. Much of it comes from Republican voters
* Allowing the individual states to determine laws to protect labor unions, the environment, minimum wages, consumer protection, and safe working conditions will lead to a race to the bottom.
* Liberty for who do to what? Liberty for the rich means power over the rest of us.
* I have read gun lovers write about "The God given right to own guns." I have read the Bible in various English translations from cover to cover including the Apocrypha eight times. I never read anything about the right to own guns. If I missed something, tell me the name of the book, the chapter, and the verse where gun ownership is protected by God. .
* So do I.
* Beginning with the administration of Ronald Reagan, whenever Republican have the power to do so they cut taxes for the rich and raise military spending. How is that fiscally responsible?
* Liberals do not do that either.
* I have pointed out that the reality of conservative politics is different from that.
* SkyBubble, thank you for expressing conservative cliches that fall short of the conservative reality.
A right is nothing more than something a government chooses to grant. If you think you have the right to criticize the government, do not move to North Korea. If you suffer a serious and expensive health problem and think you have the right to health care, you better move to a country with socialized medicine.
The Great Depression convinced liberals that the government has an important role to play in the economy.
Rights aren’t granted by government; they are demands imposed on our government by the governed, enforced by law, tradition, and, when necessary, the willingness to die for them. Free speech isn’t Congress’s gift; it’s a condition of the government’s very existence. Treating rights as optional perks is exactly how you end up in North Korea.
The Great Depression didn’t prove that government is essential; it proved that bureaucrats see opportunity in chaos, claiming credit for solutions they didn’t invent.
Countries with democratic governments and social democratic economic systems are not moving in the direction of North Korea.
The Great Depression emerged from the Stock Market Crash of 1929. In 1929 the GOP controlled both houses of Congress, the presidency, and the Supreme Court, so you cannot blame that on the Democrats.
Rightard 
Our Constitution prevents that eventuality in America.
The Great Depression wasn’t a Republican invention; it was a government failure born of the Federal Reserve’s blunders, global debt, and protectionist tariffs. The GOP may have held office, but it was Democrat-led progressives before them who helped plant the seeds, the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 ring a bell? FDR didn’t fix it either; he just stretched the misery until WWII forced the economy to move again. Both parties had fingerprints on that disaster.
Then let's change the Constitution.
You need to reach as far back as 1913 to find a reason for the Great Depression. The Great Depression happened because during hte 1920's the business community and the stock market were insufficiently regulated by the government.
While much of what you say is true, it doesn't paint the whole picture. Ultimately, the failures that led to the Great Depression can be accurately laid at the feet of the Federal Reserve, who consistently did the exact opposite of what would have corrected the stock market crash of 1929, which should have been easily survivable - but for the Fed's actions.
