What would happen to the United States if Conservatives left?

[Foxfyre]

I didn't get that information from Wikipedia! I got it from Wikipedia.answers.com thank you very much, lol. Jeez! Your not going to make me look up why Tubman wasn't convicted are ya? You're not even paying me!

BTW, I don't think liberals are evil. Even liberal media extremists (they're just making a buck by screaming the loudest), I think liberals are simply more focused on rhetoric as opposed to results. I chalk it up to naivety.

Tubman was never convicted because she was never arrested. She helped slaves escape to the north until the fugitive law was passed, and then she helped slaves escape to Canada who had already abolished slavery--they once also allowed slave ownership. Even Harriet's association with Brown didn't create any problems for her personally. She finished out the slave years working as a cook and nurse and, according to some accounts, serving as a spy for the Union Army. After the war, she was given a gift of a small tract of land that I believe she farmed, took in refugees, and eventually donated part of the property for an old folks home. She died of natural causes early in the 20th century.

Not sure what Harriet Tubman has to do with the thread topic though.

 

[JohnL.Burke]

I didn't get that information from Wikipedia! I got it from Wikipedia.answers.com thank you very much, lol. Jeez! Your not going to make me look up why Tubman wasn't convicted are ya? You're not even paying me!

BTW, I don't think liberals are evil. Even liberal media extremists (they're just making a buck by screaming the loudest), I think liberals are simply more focused on rhetoric as opposed to results. I chalk it up to naivety.

Tubman was never convicted because she was never arrested. She helped slaves escape to the north until the fugitive law was passed, and then she helped slaves escape to Canada who had already abolished slavery--they once also allowed slave ownership. Even Harriet's association with Brown didn't create any problems for her personally. She finished out the slave years working as a cook and nurse and, according to some accounts, serving as a spy for the Union Army. After the war, she was given a gift of a small tract of land that I believe she farmed, took in refugees, and eventually donated part of the property for an old folks home. She died of natural causes early in the 20th century.

Not sure what Harriet Tubman has to do with the thread topic though.

I forgot what the topic was about ten pages ago.

 

[TemplarKormac]

I can answer the question this OP posed quite easily. What would happen to the United States if Conservatives left? This country would turn into something closer to what France is today. But liberals would be elated if such a thing were to happen, right? Come now, don't be shy.

 

[Circe]

There is no such thing as my facts or your facts.

There are just facts. The variable between you and I are which facts we know, and which we don't know. Each of us.

Well, how do you know your "facts" are true and mine are false?

Is it because you really, really believe your facts and want them to be true?

Hundreds of millions of people believe that Mossad or Bush had the Twin Towers in New York bombed on 9/11/2001. Perhaps you are one of them. Others think it was a group organized by bin Laden.

Facts are opinions you are signifying you hold strongly by use of the descriptor "fact." There isn't much you can do to reify them or confirm most things you call "fact." You just take them on faith.

I am not very interested in the epistemological confusion of people who think something is "true" because they very much want their own opinion to be taken as "fact." And namecalling everyone as "ignorant" who doesn't accept your opinions as fact ---- no.

Opinions are good markers for who is an enemy and who is an ally. They don't have any particular connection to reality other than that, IMO.

 

[Circe]

What law was she convicted of breaking?

Did I say she was convicted of anything? We know she broke the law (thank God). Breaking the law and being convicted of breaking the law are two different things. Again, this is another example of you twisting in the wind by your own words. Aren't you dizzy?

What do we call people in the US not convicted of breaking the law.

I was always taught "innocent". What were you taught?

"Not guilty."

Innocent is a different concept and usually not applicable.

 

[Bfgrn]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

I sense you are exposing the tips of multitudes of your brainwashed iceberg.

Heartening as it is to hear the growing criticism of Bush from within the GOP ranks, the idea that he's veered from conservatism is hogwash. Bush is the most conservative president we've had since probably Warren G. Harding—and perhaps ever. He has governed, wherever possible, fully in step with the basic conservative principles that defined Ronald Reagan's presidency and have shaped the political right for the last two generations: opposition to New Deal-style social programs; a view of civil liberties as obstacles to dispensing justice; the pursuit of low taxes, especially on businesses and the wealthy; a pro-business stance on regulation; a hawkish, militaristic, nationalistic foreign policy; and a commitment to bringing religion, and specifically Christianity, back into public policy. "Mr. Bush has a philosophy. It is conservative," wrote Peggy Noonan in 2002. Ah, but times change. Last June she complained, "What conservatives and Republicans must recognize is that the White House has broken with them."

It's certainly true that Bush hasn't delivered on every last item on the conservative wish list. But what president has—or ever could? What Bush's new critics on the right don't see, or won't see, is that to credibly accuse Bush of betraying "conservatism" requires constructing an ideal of conservatism that exists only in the world of theory, not the world of practical politics and democratic governance. It's an ideal that any president would fail to meet. In a democracy, governing means taking into account public opinion and making compromises. That means deviating at times from doctrinal purity.

Indeed, Bush's presidency, far from being a subversion of modern American conservatism, represents its fulfillment. For most of the president's tenure, many of the same folks who now brand him as an incompetent or an impostor happily backed his agenda. Republicans controlled the Senate and the House with iron discipline. They populated the federal court system, built a powerful media apparatus, and, for years after 9/11, benefited from a public climate of reflexive deference to the powers that be. From 2001 to 2007, the conservative movement had as free a hand as it could have hoped for in setting the agenda. The fruits of its efforts are Bush's policies.

So while conservatives may be disillusioned with Bush, they can't seriously claim it's over his policies. Another explanation seems more likely: When the Iraq War really turned sour in 2005 and the domestic catastrophes piled up, the appeal of being linked with Bush's legacy dimmed. Like mobsters turning state's evidence before they're sent up the river, former Bushies began to testify, throwing themselves on the mercy of the court of public opinion. The reason isn't that Bush is an imperfect conservative. It's that he's an unsuccessful one.

What iceberg next...Freddie, Fanny, Community Investment Act, ACORN?

Let's start here:

Here is what we DO know:

1) The financial crisis was not caused by low and middle income families buying a home.

2) It was not caused by dead beat poor people.

3) Fannie and Freddie were not to cause.

4) The Community Investment Act was not the culprit either.

The crisis was caused by private lending, to mostly upper middle class and the wealthy. ONLY 6% of of all the higher-priced loans were extended by CRA-covered lenders to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods in their CRA assessment areas. The majority of those foreclosed on were wealthy and upper middle class, plus a huge segment of speculators; buyers who were wealthy home flippers looking for a fast buck. They strategically walked away from investments that went sour, not from their 'homes'. They never had any intent on living there.

Only a huge amount of mortgage defaults at once could cause a rupture of the housing market. And only a huge amount of speculators dumping 'bad' investments all at once could explain it. Because if it were honest citizens who were buying a homestead, they kept paying even when they should have walked away. If those were the people to blame, it would have been a slow leak, not a rupture.

AND, what really sucks for the right wing propaganda of lies, all the way back to the late '90's there was one very outspoken and vocal critic of predatory lending practices, they even held protests at companies like Wells Fargo and Lehman Brothers...ACORN

But, if you need to make government the scapegoat for the private sector, it brings us full circle...Bush.

Maybe you just FORGOT...

Bush's 'ownership society'

"America is a stronger country every single time a family moves into a home of their own," George W. Bush said in October 2004. To achieve his vision, Bush pushed new policies encouraging homeownership, like the "zero-down-payment initiative," which was much as it sounds—a government-sponsored program that allowed people to get mortgages without a down payment. More exotic mortgages followed, including ones with no monthly payments for the first two years. Other mortgages required no documentation other than the say-so of the borrower. Absurd though these all were, they paled in comparison to the financial innovations that grew out of the mortgages—derivatives built on other derivatives, packaged and repackaged until no one could identify what they contained and how much they were, in fact, worth.

As we know by now, these instruments have brought the global financial system, improbably, to the brink of collapse.

End of the ‘Ownership Society’

 

[Foxfyre]

Did I say she was convicted of anything? We know she broke the law (thank God). Breaking the law and being convicted of breaking the law are two different things. Again, this is another example of you twisting in the wind by your own words. Aren't you dizzy?

What do we call people in the US not convicted of breaking the law.

I was always taught "innocent". What were you taught?

"Not guilty."

Innocent is a different concept and usually not applicable.

"Not guilty" or "not caught" which are NOT the same things.

 

[Foxfyre]

I can answer the question this OP posed quite easily. What would happen to the United States if Conservatives left? This country would turn into something closer to what France is today. But liberals would be elated if such a thing were to happen, right? Come now, don't be shy.

I gave a brief rundown on what I think the country would look like if the liberals left and conservatives had a free rein to run it. And they tore into me like a pack of wild dogs to ridicule or deny every word I posted.

But not one has offered to provide a snapshot of what the country would look like with all liberals in charge, which of course was what the OP asked for.

But they can't. They hate me when I say that. But their MO is to accuse, blame, insult, and hate conservatives and point to all the evil they see in conservative history, point of view, proposals, actions, or vision. They don't seem to have any appreciation of their own history, and no liberal point of view, proposal, action, or vision, however. When asked to articulate that, they simply can't do it. So I guess it is just up to us conservatives to describe what a liberal America would look like which they will use for more ammunition to accuse, blame, insult, and hate.

 

[PMZ]

There is no such thing as my facts or your facts.

There are just facts. The variable between you and I are which facts we know, and which we don't know. Each of us.

Well, how do you know your "facts" are true and mine are false?

Is it because you really, really believe your facts and want them to be true?

Hundreds of millions of people believe that Mossad or Bush had the Twin Towers in New York bombed on 9/11/2001. Perhaps you are one of them. Others think it was a group organized by bin Laden.

Facts are opinions you are signifying you hold strongly by use of the descriptor "fact." There isn't much you can do to reify them or confirm most things you call "fact." You just take them on faith.

I am not very interested in the epistemological confusion of people who think something is "true" because they very much want their own opinion to be taken as "fact." And namecalling everyone as "ignorant" who doesn't accept your opinions as fact ---- no.

Opinions are good markers for who is an enemy and who is an ally. They don't have any particular connection to reality other than that, IMO.

Determining facts from opinions is how scientists make a living. The reason that conservatives are what they are is that it's work to do that and watching/listening to entertainers is not. Plus being told that what you wish to be true, is, feels good.

The problem with random opinions is that, if you are in the business of solving problems, opinions that are inconsistent with reality lead you astray. Fact based opinions lead you solutions.

As an example supply side economics has cost the US many of the trillions that we owe. Why did we throw that money away? Because politicians wanted to create the illusion of something from nothing, and it felt good to believe them.

"Ignorant" applies to facts, not opinions. It's a rampant problem in our times. We are probably at our ebb over history in critical thinking skills. The last time that that happened we called it the Dark Ages.

Everybody is entitled to whatever opinions make them feel good. As long as those people with dysfunctional opinions stay out of the way, and let the people who've taken the time to educate themselves in their specialty lead the way to solutions, things work fine. That's the kind of specialization that has built civilization. If, for instance, people depended on me to solve agricultural problems we'd be pretty hungry. But to think someone can watch Fox News and add to the solution to AGW is just plain bizarre.

 

[PMZ]

I can answer the question this OP posed quite easily. What would happen to the United States if Conservatives left? This country would turn into something closer to what France is today. But liberals would be elated if such a thing were to happen, right? Come now, don't be shy.

France is a pretty successful country today, and has been for centuries. Their biggest problem is that they tried the austerity solution to the Great Recession, and as it did everywhere, it failed them.

 

[PMZ]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

Can you name a conservative politician with an impressive list of accomplishments?

I can't.

 

[PMZ]

There is no such thing as my facts or your facts.

There are just facts. The variable between you and I are which facts we know, and which we don't know. Each of us.

Well, how do you know your "facts" are true and mine are false?

Is it because you really, really believe your facts and want them to be true?

Hundreds of millions of people believe that Mossad or Bush had the Twin Towers in New York bombed on 9/11/2001. Perhaps you are one of them. Others think it was a group organized by bin Laden.

Facts are opinions you are signifying you hold strongly by use of the descriptor "fact." There isn't much you can do to reify them or confirm most things you call "fact." You just take them on faith.

I am not very interested in the epistemological confusion of people who think something is "true" because they very much want their own opinion to be taken as "fact." And namecalling everyone as "ignorant" who doesn't accept your opinions as fact ---- no.

Opinions are good markers for who is an enemy and who is an ally. They don't have any particular connection to reality other than that, IMO.

Do you believe that there are things that are provably true and without exception? In other words the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth as demonstrated by evidence?

 

[PMZ]

Did I say she was convicted of anything? We know she broke the law (thank God). Breaking the law and being convicted of breaking the law are two different things. Again, this is another example of you twisting in the wind by your own words. Aren't you dizzy?

What do we call people in the US not convicted of breaking the law.

I was always taught "innocent". What were you taught?

"Not guilty."

Innocent is a different concept and usually not applicable.

"Not guilty" typically implies that the standards for "guilty" have not been proven by evidence. Innocent means didn't commit a crime. I don't know which applies best to Harriet Tubman.

 

[PMZ]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

I sense you are exposing the tips of multitudes of your brainwashed iceberg.

Heartening as it is to hear the growing criticism of Bush from within the GOP ranks, the idea that he's veered from conservatism is hogwash. Bush is the most conservative president we've had since probably Warren G. Harding—and perhaps ever. He has governed, wherever possible, fully in step with the basic conservative principles that defined Ronald Reagan's presidency and have shaped the political right for the last two generations: opposition to New Deal-style social programs; a view of civil liberties as obstacles to dispensing justice; the pursuit of low taxes, especially on businesses and the wealthy; a pro-business stance on regulation; a hawkish, militaristic, nationalistic foreign policy; and a commitment to bringing religion, and specifically Christianity, back into public policy. "Mr. Bush has a philosophy. It is conservative," wrote Peggy Noonan in 2002. Ah, but times change. Last June she complained, "What conservatives and Republicans must recognize is that the White House has broken with them."

It's certainly true that Bush hasn't delivered on every last item on the conservative wish list. But what president has—or ever could? What Bush's new critics on the right don't see, or won't see, is that to credibly accuse Bush of betraying "conservatism" requires constructing an ideal of conservatism that exists only in the world of theory, not the world of practical politics and democratic governance. It's an ideal that any president would fail to meet. In a democracy, governing means taking into account public opinion and making compromises. That means deviating at times from doctrinal purity.

Indeed, Bush's presidency, far from being a subversion of modern American conservatism, represents its fulfillment. For most of the president's tenure, many of the same folks who now brand him as an incompetent or an impostor happily backed his agenda. Republicans controlled the Senate and the House with iron discipline. They populated the federal court system, built a powerful media apparatus, and, for years after 9/11, benefited from a public climate of reflexive deference to the powers that be. From 2001 to 2007, the conservative movement had as free a hand as it could have hoped for in setting the agenda. The fruits of its efforts are Bush's policies.

So while conservatives may be disillusioned with Bush, they can't seriously claim it's over his policies. Another explanation seems more likely: When the Iraq War really turned sour in 2005 and the domestic catastrophes piled up, the appeal of being linked with Bush's legacy dimmed. Like mobsters turning state's evidence before they're sent up the river, former Bushies began to testify, throwing themselves on the mercy of the court of public opinion. The reason isn't that Bush is an imperfect conservative. It's that he's an unsuccessful one.

What iceberg next...Freddie, Fanny, Community Investment Act, ACORN?

Let's start here:

Here is what we DO know:

1) The financial crisis was not caused by low and middle income families buying a home.

2) It was not caused by dead beat poor people.

3) Fannie and Freddie were not to cause.

4) The Community Investment Act was not the culprit either.

The crisis was caused by private lending, to mostly upper middle class and the wealthy. ONLY 6% of of all the higher-priced loans were extended by CRA-covered lenders to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods in their CRA assessment areas. The majority of those foreclosed on were wealthy and upper middle class, plus a huge segment of speculators; buyers who were wealthy home flippers looking for a fast buck. They strategically walked away from investments that went sour, not from their 'homes'. They never had any intent on living there.

Only a huge amount of mortgage defaults at once could cause a rupture of the housing market. And only a huge amount of speculators dumping 'bad' investments all at once could explain it. Because if it were honest citizens who were buying a homestead, they kept paying even when they should have walked away. If those were the people to blame, it would have been a slow leak, not a rupture.

AND, what really sucks for the right wing propaganda of lies, all the way back to the late '90's there was one very outspoken and vocal critic of predatory lending practices, they even held protests at companies like Wells Fargo and Lehman Brothers...ACORN

But, if you need to make government the scapegoat for the private sector, it brings us full circle...Bush.

Maybe you just FORGOT...

Bush's 'ownership society'

"America is a stronger country every single time a family moves into a home of their own," George W. Bush said in October 2004. To achieve his vision, Bush pushed new policies encouraging homeownership, like the "zero-down-payment initiative," which was much as it sounds—a government-sponsored program that allowed people to get mortgages without a down payment. More exotic mortgages followed, including ones with no monthly payments for the first two years. Other mortgages required no documentation other than the say-so of the borrower. Absurd though these all were, they paled in comparison to the financial innovations that grew out of the mortgages—derivatives built on other derivatives, packaged and repackaged until no one could identify what they contained and how much they were, in fact, worth.

As we know by now, these instruments have brought the global financial system, improbably, to the brink of collapse.

End of the ‘Ownership Society’

The fact that there are still people claiming to be conservatives, even after the Bush/Cheney debacle, is the evidence that defines our problem. There simply are no facts that would support continuing to embrace conservatism after that clear demonstration of its impact in the real world.

So, what is going on? There must be an explanation for pervasive ignorance (as in ignore) of solid evidence. Of cause and effect.

It's sort of like the puzzle of why people continue to smoke.

The only explanation that I can come up with is the effect of brand advertising through nearly pervasive media 24/7/365. Or, in shorthand, the Rush and Rupert et al Advertising Agency in the full time employ of the Republican Party.

I'd love another explanation, but can't find one.

The question to be answered is can democracy tolerate such a powerful force? For some time I thought no. Recently the evidence has switched to probably. At least for now.

The balance though that we are hanging in is how prescient were our founders in defining our contract with government in a way that protects us from monied interests purchasing influence over a majority of the electorate. Certainly in their experience there was nothing even remotely close to what exists today. What will exist tomorrow?

We are at a profoundly important milestone in the evolution of democratic government.

 

[PMZ]

I can answer the question this OP posed quite easily. What would happen to the United States if Conservatives left? This country would turn into something closer to what France is today. But liberals would be elated if such a thing were to happen, right? Come now, don't be shy.

I gave a brief rundown on what I think the country would look like if the liberals left and conservatives had a free rein to run it. And they tore into me like a pack of wild dogs to ridicule or deny every word I posted.

But not one has offered to provide a snapshot of what the country would look like with all liberals in charge, which of course was what the OP asked for.

But they can't. They hate me when I say that. But their MO is to accuse, blame, insult, and hate conservatives and point to all the evil they see in conservative history, point of view, proposals, actions, or vision. They don't seem to have any appreciation of their own history, and no liberal point of view, proposal, action, or vision, however. When asked to articulate that, they simply can't do it. So I guess it is just up to us conservatives to describe what a liberal America would look like which they will use for more ammunition to accuse, blame, insult, and hate.

While I have answered your question several times in this thread, I will do so again.

First, let me say, I do not favor a one party or philosophy government. What I do favor is a centrist government, so I will answer the question from the perspective of where we'd be without extremists.

Also the dilemma in this hypothetical is did this miracle occur pre or post Bush.

If pre Bush, it's pretty easy to assume that Gore/Lieberman would have been a nearly linear extension of Clinton/Gore.

If that was the case it's a pretty easy presumption to make that today we'd be debt free, at peace with Islam, working hard on the mitigation of AGW (with the resultant reduction in extreme weather), and well on the way to sustainable energy. If we assume that Obama followed them it's easy to project that, with a functional Congress, ACA would be in place but with substantial improvement from bi-partisan participation.

If your proposed scenario occurred post Bush, the biggest change would be a functional Congress, but I don't know how much different things would be as Obama has had to become pretty good at working around them out of necessity.

That's a short, simple guess on my part.

 

[Foxfyre]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

Can you name a conservative politician with an impressive list of accomplishments?

I can't.

Again it depends on one's definition of 'conservative'. But one of our more conservative modern Presidents was Richard M. Nixon, now perhaps the most maligned and hated of President at least before George W. Bush, but arguably also one of the most successful in getting things done.

He served only roughly five and a half years before being forced to resign in disgrace for a crime that would evoke only shrugs and yawns now.

During Nixon's five and a half years:

His administration stablized of relationships and lessening of tensions with Red China and the USSR including a treaty to limit strategic nuclear weapons.

He promoted or signed bills for numerous anticrime laws that have stood the test of time.

He presided over the first moon landing in 1969.

His economic policies, including revenue sharing, lessened the severity of a recession he inherited and coped well with a fuel shortage that for once was not our fault in any way.

In 1972 he was re-elected to a 2nd term by one of the widest margins on record at that time.

In 1973 he was able to announce that an accord with North Vietnam had been reached to end American involvement, a process completed under Gerald Ford.

He signed legislation ending the draft.

In 1974, his administration had negotiated disengagement agreements between the warring Israel and Egypt/Syria and paved the way for a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel five years later.
.
Nixon's environmental record is unmatched, with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt. Nixon's environmental accomplishments included his Council on Environmental Quality producing the National Environment Policy Act establishing rules to minimalize oil spills in the ocean and other environmental catastophes.

Nixon also created the Environmental Protection Agency and signed laws including the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

There were negatives and major downsides too, and stuff went on I will never appreciate or condone, but that is true of every administration. Few Presidents of our lifetime can boast the record that Richard Nixon had in a very short time.
__________________________________

But if you go back to the administrations that still embraced and respected the Constitution that the Founders gave us--these were the true conservative presidents--you find much to commend and admire.

 

[PMZ]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

Can you name a conservative politician with an impressive list of accomplishments?

I can't.

Again it depends on one's definition of 'conservative'. But one of our more conservative modern Presidents was Richard M. Nixon, now perhaps the most maligned and hated of President at least before George W. Bush, but arguably also one of the most successful in getting things done.

He served only roughly five and a half years before being forced to resign in disgrace for a crime that would evoke only shrugs and yawns now.

During Nixon's five and a half years:

His administration stablized of relationships and lessening of tensions with Red China and the USSR including a treaty to limit strategic nuclear weapons.

He promoted or signed bills for numerous anticrime laws that have stood the test of time.

He presided over the first moon landing in 1969.

His economic policies, including revenue sharing, lessened the severity of a recession he inherited and coped well with a fuel shortage that for once was not our fault in any way.

In 1972 he was re-elected to a 2nd term by one of the widest margins on record at that time.

In 1973 he was able to announce that an accord with North Vietnam had been reached to end American involvement, a process completed under Gerald Ford.

He signed legislation ending the draft.

In 1974, his administration had negotiated disengagement agreements between the warring Israel and Egypt/Syria and paved the way for a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel five years later.
.
Nixon's environmental record is unmatched, with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt. Nixon's environmental accomplishments included his Council on Environmental Quality producing the National Environment Policy Act establishing rules to minimalize oil spills in the ocean and other environmental catastophes.

Nixon also created the Environmental Protection Agency and signed laws including the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

There were negatives and major downsides too, and stuff went on I will never appreciate or condone, but that is true of every administration. Few Presidents of our lifetime can boast the record that Richard Nixon had in a very short time.
__________________________________

But if you go back to the administrations that still embraced and respected the Constitution that the Founders gave us--these were the true conservative presidents--you find much to commend and admire.

A couple of points.

Here's some comments from Wikipedia re Nixon.

"Political scientist Walter Dean Burnham noted the "dichotomous or schizoid profiles" of presidents, which can make some hard to classify. Historian Alan Brinkley said, "There are presidents who could be considered both failures and great or near great (for example, Nixon)". James MacGregor Burns observed of Nixon, "How can one evaluate such an idiosyncratic president, so brilliant and so morally lacking?"[1]

You're one of the only people that I know who would consider Nixon conservative. Why do you?

"But if you go back to the administrations that still embraced and respected the Constitution that the Founders gave us--these were the true conservative presidents--you find much to commend and admire.[/QUOTE]"

I don't know of any US administration that didn't embrace and respect the Constitution. We've always followed to the letter.

What's the evidence to support your claim?

 

[Foxfyre]

Can you name a conservative politician with an impressive list of accomplishments?

I can't.

Again it depends on one's definition of 'conservative'. But one of our more conservative modern Presidents was Richard M. Nixon, now perhaps the most maligned and hated of President at least before George W. Bush, but arguably also one of the most successful in getting things done.

He served only roughly five and a half years before being forced to resign in disgrace for a crime that would evoke only shrugs and yawns now.

During Nixon's five and a half years:

His administration stablized of relationships and lessening of tensions with Red China and the USSR including a treaty to limit strategic nuclear weapons.

He promoted or signed bills for numerous anticrime laws that have stood the test of time.

He presided over the first moon landing in 1969.

His economic policies, including revenue sharing, lessened the severity of a recession he inherited and coped well with a fuel shortage that for once was not our fault in any way.

In 1972 he was re-elected to a 2nd term by one of the widest margins on record at that time.

In 1973 he was able to announce that an accord with North Vietnam had been reached to end American involvement, a process completed under Gerald Ford.

He signed legislation ending the draft.

In 1974, his administration had negotiated disengagement agreements between the warring Israel and Egypt/Syria and paved the way for a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel five years later.
.
Nixon's environmental record is unmatched, with the possible exception of Teddy Roosevelt. Nixon's environmental accomplishments included his Council on Environmental Quality producing the National Environment Policy Act establishing rules to minimalize oil spills in the ocean and other environmental catastophes.

Nixon also created the Environmental Protection Agency and signed laws including the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

There were negatives and major downsides too, and stuff went on I will never appreciate or condone, but that is true of every administration. Few Presidents of our lifetime can boast the record that Richard Nixon had in a very short time.
__________________________________

But if you go back to the administrations that still embraced and respected the Constitution that the Founders gave us--these were the true conservative presidents--you find much to commend and admire.

A couple of points.

Here's some comments from Wikipedia re Nixon.

"Political scientist Walter Dean Burnham noted the "dichotomous or schizoid profiles" of presidents, which can make some hard to classify. Historian Alan Brinkley said, "There are presidents who could be considered both failures and great or near great (for example, Nixon)". James MacGregor Burns observed of Nixon, "How can one evaluate such an idiosyncratic president, so brilliant and so morally lacking?"[1]

You're one of the only people that I know who would consider Nixon conservative. Why do you?

"But if you go back to the administrations that still embraced and respected the Constitution that the Founders gave us--these were the true conservative presidents--you find much to commend and admire.

"

I don't know of any US administration that didn't embrace and respect the Constitution. We've always followed to the letter.

What's the evidence to support your claim?

Not taking that bait Saigon. I get really weary of you folks who are not the least bit interested in discussion but keep moving the goalposts and asking questions that have already been answered.

So what does an all-liberal America look like to you?

 

[Bfgrn]

Not a big Bush fan myself. I'm a conservative, he's not. I don't blame Bush for everything either. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, I believe, were also accomplices to todays economy.

I sense you are exposing the tips of multitudes of your brainwashed iceberg.

Heartening as it is to hear the growing criticism of Bush from within the GOP ranks, the idea that he's veered from conservatism is hogwash. Bush is the most conservative president we've had since probably Warren G. Harding—and perhaps ever. He has governed, wherever possible, fully in step with the basic conservative principles that defined Ronald Reagan's presidency and have shaped the political right for the last two generations: opposition to New Deal-style social programs; a view of civil liberties as obstacles to dispensing justice; the pursuit of low taxes, especially on businesses and the wealthy; a pro-business stance on regulation; a hawkish, militaristic, nationalistic foreign policy; and a commitment to bringing religion, and specifically Christianity, back into public policy. "Mr. Bush has a philosophy. It is conservative," wrote Peggy Noonan in 2002. Ah, but times change. Last June she complained, "What conservatives and Republicans must recognize is that the White House has broken with them."

It's certainly true that Bush hasn't delivered on every last item on the conservative wish list. But what president has—or ever could? What Bush's new critics on the right don't see, or won't see, is that to credibly accuse Bush of betraying "conservatism" requires constructing an ideal of conservatism that exists only in the world of theory, not the world of practical politics and democratic governance. It's an ideal that any president would fail to meet. In a democracy, governing means taking into account public opinion and making compromises. That means deviating at times from doctrinal purity.

Indeed, Bush's presidency, far from being a subversion of modern American conservatism, represents its fulfillment. For most of the president's tenure, many of the same folks who now brand him as an incompetent or an impostor happily backed his agenda. Republicans controlled the Senate and the House with iron discipline. They populated the federal court system, built a powerful media apparatus, and, for years after 9/11, benefited from a public climate of reflexive deference to the powers that be. From 2001 to 2007, the conservative movement had as free a hand as it could have hoped for in setting the agenda. The fruits of its efforts are Bush's policies.

So while conservatives may be disillusioned with Bush, they can't seriously claim it's over his policies. Another explanation seems more likely: When the Iraq War really turned sour in 2005 and the domestic catastrophes piled up, the appeal of being linked with Bush's legacy dimmed. Like mobsters turning state's evidence before they're sent up the river, former Bushies began to testify, throwing themselves on the mercy of the court of public opinion. The reason isn't that Bush is an imperfect conservative. It's that he's an unsuccessful one.

What iceberg next...Freddie, Fanny, Community Investment Act, ACORN?

Let's start here:

Here is what we DO know:

1) The financial crisis was not caused by low and middle income families buying a home.

2) It was not caused by dead beat poor people.

3) Fannie and Freddie were not to cause.

4) The Community Investment Act was not the culprit either.

The crisis was caused by private lending, to mostly upper middle class and the wealthy. ONLY 6% of of all the higher-priced loans were extended by CRA-covered lenders to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods in their CRA assessment areas. The majority of those foreclosed on were wealthy and upper middle class, plus a huge segment of speculators; buyers who were wealthy home flippers looking for a fast buck. They strategically walked away from investments that went sour, not from their 'homes'. They never had any intent on living there.

Only a huge amount of mortgage defaults at once could cause a rupture of the housing market. And only a huge amount of speculators dumping 'bad' investments all at once could explain it. Because if it were honest citizens who were buying a homestead, they kept paying even when they should have walked away. If those were the people to blame, it would have been a slow leak, not a rupture.

AND, what really sucks for the right wing propaganda of lies, all the way back to the late '90's there was one very outspoken and vocal critic of predatory lending practices, they even held protests at companies like Wells Fargo and Lehman Brothers...ACORN

But, if you need to make government the scapegoat for the private sector, it brings us full circle...Bush.

Maybe you just FORGOT...

Bush's 'ownership society'

"America is a stronger country every single time a family moves into a home of their own," George W. Bush said in October 2004. To achieve his vision, Bush pushed new policies encouraging homeownership, like the "zero-down-payment initiative," which was much as it sounds—a government-sponsored program that allowed people to get mortgages without a down payment. More exotic mortgages followed, including ones with no monthly payments for the first two years. Other mortgages required no documentation other than the say-so of the borrower. Absurd though these all were, they paled in comparison to the financial innovations that grew out of the mortgages—derivatives built on other derivatives, packaged and repackaged until no one could identify what they contained and how much they were, in fact, worth.

As we know by now, these instruments have brought the global financial system, improbably, to the brink of collapse.

End of the ‘Ownership Society’

The fact that there are still people claiming to be conservatives, even after the Bush/Cheney debacle, is the evidence that defines our problem. There simply are no facts that would support continuing to embrace conservatism after that clear demonstration of its impact in the real world.

So, what is going on? There must be an explanation for pervasive ignorance (as in ignore) of solid evidence. Of cause and effect.

It's sort of like the puzzle of why people continue to smoke.

The only explanation that I can come up with is the effect of brand advertising through nearly pervasive media 24/7/365. Or, in shorthand, the Rush and Rupert et al Advertising Agency in the full time employ of the Republican Party.

I'd love another explanation, but can't find one.

The question to be answered is can democracy tolerate such a powerful force? For some time I thought no. Recently the evidence has switched to probably. At least for now.

The balance though that we are hanging in is how prescient were our founders in defining our contract with government in a way that protects us from monied interests purchasing influence over a majority of the electorate. Certainly in their experience there was nothing even remotely close to what exists today. What will exist tomorrow?

We are at a profoundly important milestone in the evolution of democratic government.

There have been a few conservatives who have spoken up, David Stockman, David Frum and Bruce Bartlett come to mind. But they have been so heavily ostracized, rebuked and censured that most conservatives have gotten the message. Parrot the party line, conform, march in lock step or face the right wing firing squad.

Here is an op-ed Bruce Bartlett wrote after former Bush speechwriter David Frum exposed that Republicans at the beginning of the health care reform process made a strategic decision to make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. They were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994.


David Frum and the Closing of the Conservative Mind
25 Mar 2010
by Bruce Bartlett

As some readers of this blog may know, I was fired by a right wing think tank called the National Center for Policy Analysis in 2005 for writing a book critical of George W. Bush's policies, especially his support for Medicare Part D. In the years since, I have lost a great many friends and been shunned by conservative society in Washington, DC.

Now the same thing has happened to David Frum, who has been fired by the American Enterprise Institute. I don't know all the details, but I presume that his Waterloo post on Sunday condemning Republicans for failing to work with Democrats on healthcare reform was the final straw.

Since, he is no longer affiliated with AEI, I feel free to say publicly something he told me in private a few months ago. He asked if I had noticed any comments by AEI "scholars" on the subject of health care reform. I said no and he said that was because they had been ordered not to speak to the media because they agreed with too much of what Obama was trying to do.

It saddened me to hear this. I have always hoped that my experience was unique. But now I see that I was just the first to suffer from a closing of the conservative mind. Rigid conformity is being enforced, no dissent is allowed, and the conservative brain will slowly shrivel into dementia if it hasn't already.

Sadly, there is no place for David and me to go. The donor community is only interested in financing organizations that parrot the party line, such as the one recently established by McCain economic adviser Doug Holtz-Eakin.

I will have more to say on this topic later. But I wanted to say that this is a black day for what passes for a conservative movement, scholarship, and the once-respected AEI.



"The debt explosion has resulted not from big spending by the Democrats, but instead the Republican Party's embrace, about three decades ago, of the insidious doctrine that deficits don't matter if they result from tax cuts."
David Stockman - Director of the Office of Management and Budget for U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

 

[noose4]

I put this topic here because I want honest answers and no flaming. As a right leaning guy I love the left and wouldnt want to see them go. But why does the left hate Republicans so bad? Their history is after all the Anti-Slave party. p.s. sorry about any typo's I wrote this on the fly because I am so curious what would you think happen to the US if cons left

Today's Republicans are not the Lincoln Republicans they are not even the Reagan Republicans, now some fiscal conservatism can be a good thing but opposition to all social programs and most expenditures will quickly turn us into a third world nation, we have already fell behind European nations in so many areas, we must advance as a people and not become a nation where the wealth is in the hands of a very few and everybody else struggles.