I do find many conservatives to be entertaining. I enjoy listening to them, even though I find myself disagreeing with some fundamental issues. Their rhetoric is usually more playful and not quite as angry or negative as the liberals are. Well, there are some exceptions, but generally they aren’t an unhappy bunch.
I used to tow their line. I used to believe that they were right (they are right-wing after all), but as I began to discuss things with conservatives on various Internet forums, I found that they were just as intolerant to opposing ideas as their liberal counterparts are. If you suggest that maybe we’ve fought enough wars and that we should cut military spending, you’re labeled a commie-pinko, never mind that you have been on record as stating that you believe in economic liberty. If you suggest that the Republican party is full of non-conservatives who will always be paying lip service to your ideals, you’re labeled a loon. If you supported Ron Paul, you’re a Paulbot.
And don’t get me started on the whole abortion debate. That’s a whole other post.
To bring this point home and contrast the divide I found myself in with conservatives and came to the realization that I was Antistatist, I’ve found two different reactions to the Wikileaks document dumps. One is from conservative pundit Barbara Simpson and the other is from libertarian pundit Vox Day. Rather than bore you by copying and pasting their columns here, I’ve taken the liberty of creating this video:
I think this illustrates the sharp divide between conservatives and libertarians rather well. One side wants to murder a foreign national for embarrassing the United States government and exposing its deceit and lies and the other praises Julian Assange as a hero for the Republic.
The truth is, ever since William F. Buckley, Jr. and Brent Bozell took over the conservative movement back in the 1950s, the focus has been on endless war. I think Buckley himself recognized the monster he had created late in his life when he openly opposed the war on terror. Too bad he didn’t recognized back when President Eisenhower did in his farewell speech where he blasted the military-industrial complex. It is unfortunate that conservative don’t see that our debt is just as much the fault of their politicians as it is the liberals.
Yes, liberals spend tons of money they don’t have on various programs that do nothing more than feed the nation’s parasites. But conservatives spend tons of money on bombs that maim children who just happen to be wearing Osama Bin Laden T-shirts and who are in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Listening to the two different voices, as monotone as they are, it is clear that Barbara Simpson has an IQ of about 90, maybe 95. She makes fallacious claims in a pathetic attempt to appeal to emotion. If she had any brains, rather than just being a babe in a bunker, she’d be ashamed of herself. I don’t know what Vox Day’s IQ is, but he certainly isn’t wasting it. References to supernatural creatures aside, he makes a very clear point on the fundamental nature of a free society and what has to happen in order for it to work. As I’ve stated before in my blog, you cannot have a government that classifies every casual memo and e-mail as top secret and expect Wikileaks to not happen.
I urge fellow conservatives to take a step back and do some soul searching. Are your arguments driven by rational thinking or pure emotion? Because if it is the latter, then you are no better than the liberals you oppose. Worse still, you will not be taken seriously by any politician and therefore your agenda will not be implemented.
I suppose it’s pointless, though, to ask that any person of any particular political persuasion commit to serious soul-searching. In America, our political ideology is more important than our religious beliefs, after all.