Conservatism for Dummies
Everything you wanted to know about Conservatives, but were afraid to ask.
Let's get the show on the road with a few revealing quotes.....
“The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brown shirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.”
“Rich ironies abound! Lies pop up like toadstools in the forest! Wild swine crowd round the public trough! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! Hypocrisies shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age reincarnated gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of Divine Grace.” - Garrison Keillor
"Conservatives want live babies so they can be dead soldiers." - George Carlin
"With conservatives it's an abortion, but with a chicken it's an omelet." - George Carlin
"Don't like socialism - get off the highways and out of the schools"
"Conservatives tell us government doesn't work and when they get elected they prove it."
"Due to recent conservative budget cuts, the light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off."
"When you're old and eating cat food, thank a conservative."
"Conservative Family Values: Your rights begin at conception and end at birth"
"Conservative Party: Your bridge to the 12th century"
"Fox News: Rich people paying rich people to tell working class people to blame poor people."
"If corporations are people, make them show us their birth certificates."
"While you [Tea Baggers] idolize the Founding Fathers and dress up like them, and smell like them, I think it’s pretty clear that the Founding Fathers would have hated your guts. And what’s more, you would’ve hated them. They were everything you despise. They studied science, read Plato, hung out in Paris, and thought the Bible was mostly bullshit." - Bill Maher
What do the Tea Party folks mean when they say they are fighting for liberty? The reality is they are fighting for the multi-billionaire oil baron Koch Brothers and Richard Mellon Scaife who are financing your tea party and their unaccountable private power. You're fighting for BP's right to coat your crawfish and shrimp with oil. You are fighting for the health insurance companies to call your C-section and work related cancer a pre-existing condition and deny you coverage. You are working for the right of the food industry to write their own safety rules - what's the problem with a little Listeria on your apricot or e-coli in your burger? Once they've finished destroying your middle class existence, perhaps you can mow their lawn.
As H L Mencken once said, "For every complex problem, conservatives have an answer that is clear, simple and WRONG."
"Jesus was a long haired, sandal wearing, peace-loving hippie who would have been much more at home at Burning Man than an NRA or KKK convention. Wasn't JC the guy who said "love your neighbor" and that "it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to get to heaven"? He healed the sick and fed the poor for free - just like a good communist."
"Remember when teachers, public servants, social workers, Planned Parenthood, NPR and PBS crashed the stock market, created the housing bubble and demolished the global economy, wiped out pension funds, took trillions in taxpayer funded bailouts, spilled millions of gallons of oil in the Gulf of Mexico, gave themselves bonuses for their failures and paid no taxes?? Yeah, me neither."
"What's more elitist than claiming that only you will go to heaven?"
"According to Roger Ailes original business plan for Fox news found in the Nixon Library, the network was intended as a partisan ploy to circumvent the "prejudices of network news" and deliver right wing propaganda to heartland television viewers. It's no wonder that studies show that Fox news viewers are the most misinformed of all news consumers. A better motto, as Jon Stewart suggested, would be "Fox News: We alter reality. You are sold a preconceived narrative."
Jon Stewart also pointed out that Mitt Romney "looks like everyone who ever fired your Dad." David Letterman thinks Romney looks like the guy on the golf course in the Levitra commercial...He looks like the guy who goes to the restroom when the check arrives...He looks like the guy who would run a seminar on condo flipping...He looks like the closer at the Cadillac dealership. He's Mr. Burns with better hair."
Calling Michelle Bachmann crazy does not do her justice. Rolling Stone journalist Matt Taibbi called her "a religious zealot whose brain is a raging electrical storm of divine visions and paranoid delusions, one of the scariest sights in the American cultural tableau, the T2 skeleton posing for a passport photo" and "grandiose crazy, the late stage Kim Jong-il crazy." Bill Maher put it this way about Michelle Bachmann: "The floor of a cave called and wants it's bat shit back."
For their brilliance and erudition, these conservative quotes are hard to beat:
"By the time I feed my family, I have maybe $400,000 left over." - Rep. John Fleming (Republican - LA) pleading poverty over the prospect of increasing taxes on the wealthy.
"I admired Hitler, for instance, because he came from being a little man with almost no formal education, up to power. I admire him for being such a good public speaker and for what he did with it." - Arnold Schwarzenegger, in Pumping Iron, commenting on who his heroes were)
"Literally, if we took away the minimum wage - if conceivably it was gone - we could potentially virtually wipe out unemployment because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level." - Rep Michelle Bachmann, (Republican - MN)
“That’s really where this battle will be won - on our knees in prayer and fasting. Remember: faith without works is dead. So we’re asking you to do all of it: pray, fast, believe, trust the Lord, but also act.” - Rep Michele Bachmann, (Republican - MN)
"I believe in an America where millions of Americans believe in an America that's the America that millions of Americans believe in. That's the America I love!" - Mitt Romney
"Capital Punishment is our society's recognition of the sanctity of human life." - Senator Orrin Hatch (Republican - Utah), speaking on the Senate Floor in support of the Death penalty.
"The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians." - Pat Robertson, former Republican candidate for President, from a fundraising letter, 1992
"Exercise freaks are the ones putting the stress on the health care system - Rush Limbaugh
"How can I be anti-women? I even judged the Miss America Pageant!" - Rush Limbaugh
"The only way to reduce nuclear weapons is to use them." - Rush Limbaugh
"Hunger can be a positive motivator." - former State Rep Cynthia Davis (Republican - Missouri), arguing in a press release against a school program that feeds poor children, suggesting they should get jobs instead.
"Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what to do." - former New York Mayor and staunch conservative, Rudy Giuliani
"I'll tell you why [religion is not a scam], in my opinion. Tide goes in, Tide goes out. Never a miscommunication. You can't explain that. You can't explain why the tide goes in." - Bill O'Reilly, employing the argument from ignorance to prove God's existence.
"There's a growing body of evidence that radiation in excess of what the government says are the minimum amounts you should be exposed to are actually good for you and reduce cases of cancer." - Ann Coulter, on the Bill O'Reilly Show, March 18, 2011
No treatise on conservatism would be complete without a few quotes (among the thousands in which he butchered the English language) from the dumbest US president and most obtuse conservative in history(and hey there's a lot of competition), a doltish buffoon who is the essence of "shit for brains", George W. Bush:
"Yo, Harper! The President of Nigeria." - George W Bush
"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." - George W Bush
"You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test." - George W Bush
"The illiteracy level of our children are appalling." - George W Bush
"You bet I cut the taxes at the top. That encourages entrepreneurship. What we Republicans should stand for is growth in the economy. We ought to make the pie higher." - George W Bush
"There's an old saying in Tennessee, I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee, that says, fool me once, shame on, shame on you. You fool me, you can't get fooled again." - George W Bush
"This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table." - George W Bush
"My pro-life position is I believe there's life. It's not necessarily based in religion. I think there's a life there, therefore the notion of life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness." - George W Bush
"I'm honored to shake the hand of a brave Iraqi citizen who had his hand cut off by Saddam Hussein." - George W Bush
"The law I sign today directs new funds and new focus to the task of collecting vital intelligence on terrorist threats and on weapons of mass production." - George W Bush
"The future will be better tomorrow." - George W Bush
"It's a time of sorrow and sadness when we lose a loss of life." - George W Bush
"Tribal sovereignty means that, it's sovereign. You're a—you've been given sovereignty, and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And, therefore, the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities." - George W Bush
"I'm the master of low expectations." - George W Bush
Hundreds more like this are posted on the internet, with references.....
(shit, this needs to be updated to include some choice comments from one Donald J Trump!)
The Conservative Manifesto
What is a Conservative?
Conservatives have never believed in democracy. From the pharaohs of ancient Egypt to the self-regarding conquering thugs of ancient Rome to the glorified monarchs, warlords and popes of medieval and absolutist Europe to the present global financial oligarchy, in nearly every structured society throughout human history, there have been people who have tried to constitute themselves as an aristocracy. These fanatics of hierarchy, aristocracy and craving to control others are what are called "conservatives". But the most insidious and devious feature of conservatism is deference to authority by the credulous masses, a psychologically internalized posture taken by the common people that the wealthy ruling oligarchy are better people than they are. Edmund Burke, deemed the father of conservatism, wrote in his Reflections on the French Revolution, referred to working people and the lower classes as the "swinish multitude", a hateful proto- fascist epithet that speaks volumes about the mind-set of conservatives in general.
I submit that throughout history and including the present, Conservatism has for the most part been a morally bankrupt authoritarian political philosophy, antithetical to freedom, justice, democracy and civilized society for all. It’s an amoral doctrine of self-interest and how to create a government of the rich, by the rich and for the rich. In short, it’s an authoritarian inflexible political philosophy based on class, status, possession, greed, power, hierarchy and the sanctity of private property - a depraved aristocratic political anachronism that, like monarchies, ought to be tossed into the moral and intellectual trash bin.
Conservatives continually endorse freedom, but only in the sense that you have the freedom to inherit the family fortune, own a yacht with a helicopter pad, enjoy a stay in the Imperial Suite at Park Hyatt in Paris - or be born in a ghetto to crack cocaine addicted parents, live in a cardboard box on skid row and drive your new Lamborghini to a minimum wage job at Walmart.. They love wars, but never fight and die in them, graciously conceding that patriotic duty to the credulous working classes while they sit home and collect dividends and capital gains on their wartime investment portfolio. They also endorse the freedom of a chemical or oil company to use a river or ocean as a dumpster if it is conducive to profit.
Conservatives by the way are not steadfastly against all change, only change which is opposed to their historical entitlements and vested interests.
What do "modern" conservatives believe?
Conservatives believe in tax favors for the rich, tax hikes on the poor, dumb kids, smart bombs, and that what's good for Walmart, Goldman Sachs and Exxon Mobil is good for our country.
Conservatives believe in wrapping themselves in the Confederate flag (or whatever flag is currently available), singing National Anthems glorifying war, burning the social safety net so it pollutes the air, and repealing the entire twentieth century.
Conservatives believe in government of, by and for the wealthiest 1% and that if the 99% don't like that, they can buy off their own politicians or emigrate to Afghanistan.
Conservatives believe in serving tea steeped in prejudgment, fear, anger, bitterness, paranoia, intolerance, jingoism cynicism, hypocrisy, and selfishness; then calling it a philosophy .
Conservatives believe pizza is a vegetable, pepper spray is a food product, mustard gas and napalm are barbecue condiments, bamboo under the fingernails is a manicure, water boarding a shampoo, global warming a liberal hoax, the Bible is the unvarnished truth of a Sky-God who created the Universe by pulling a light switch and that we'll eventually find those weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
Conservatives believe in "clean" coal befouling spacious skies, amber waves of abstinent teens and purple mountains of middle-class debt.
Conservatives believe that public education is just another entitlement that needs to be cut, that Ronald Reagan and George W Bush were intellectuals, that access to University ought to depend on your father being a former president and the size of his contributions to the University coffers and that 2 + 2 = whatever Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh say it is. They are also the folks that call fellow conservative Barrack Obama a "socialist". But any conservative like Obama who utter or can write a grammatically correct sentence and sound like an intellectual is referred to as a "socialist" by other conservatives.
Conservative believe in tightening eligibility for unemployment, welfare, and food stamps, while relaxing gun control laws, because what we really need are more desperate, jobless and homeless people with access to weapons.
Conservatives believe corporations are people, all rich people are automatically "job creators," women who use contraception are sluts, the gay can be prayed away, abstinence is the most effective birth control method, poor people deserve to be poor because it's their own damn fault, the Girl Scouts have a secret lesbian agenda, evolution is the work of Satan, the Bible trumps the Constitution, Donald Trump trumps the Bible, Fox News is actually "fair and balanced," the U.S. president is a Muslim sleeper agent from Kenya and conservatives are the ones who understand the "real world."
Conservatives believe in capital punishment, imperialistic wars and protecting the lives of unborn fetuses - but once born, throw them overboard and into the capitalist tsunami without a life jacket.
Conservatives believe John Boehner's crocodile tears will trickle down and stimulate the economy.
Conservatives believe that if historical reality doesn't fit your preferred narrative, you simply create your own and call it history.
Conservatives believe in cutting social services while giving multimillion-dollar tax subsidies to Bible-themed amusement parks, because it's more important to take your child to see Jesus ride an animatronics dinosaur than to understand science or be able to treat her Type 1 diabetes.
Conservatives believe in shipping jobs overseas - except for CEOs, lobbyists, Starbucks baristas and their own illegal nannies and illegal slave laborer.
Conservatives believe in weapons of mass deception, bought elections, and pharmaceutical erections.
Conservatives believe they've just seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary in a grilled cheese sandwich and a vision of Jesus in Dominos pizza.
Conservatives believe America was a better place when there were Hummers on the street, Bushes in office, Jack Bauer in prime time, prayer and Bible readings in schools, abortions in back alleys, gays in the closet, segregation on buses and only white male property owners can vote.
Conservatives believe in proclaiming themselves pro-life until you pass through the birth canal, at which point they become "go screw yourself" aficionados and couldn't care less if you don't have health insurance, can't feed your family or get executed for a crime you didn't commit.
Conservatives strongly believe in law and order, one for them and one for the rest of us. They also strongly believe in social security. It's called prison.
Conservatives believe in proclaiming that they steadfastly and unflinchingly support our troops with the proviso that they're not one of them..
Conservatives believe that abstinence-only education has worked so well for their pregnant unwed teenage daughters that it should be replicated all across the nation (with this draconian policy, the US has the highest unwed teenage pregnancy rate in the world - 1 in 3). Conservatives believe that anything liberals believe must necessarily be false, which is why they believe that low-flow toilets and energy efficient light bulbs pose a bigger threat to our way of life than melting ice caps. Conservatives believe in stoking fears about government death panels, and then cheering the idea of letting uninsured patients die, because they clearly have no idea what irony means.
Conservatives believe in railing against the estate tax, even if they're living in trailers.
Conservatives believe in the kind of ass-backward logic that says even though 9/11 happened under George W. Bush's watch, it was Bill Clinton's fault, and even though Barack Obama was the one who ordered Osama bin Laden murdered, Bush deserves the credit.
Conservatives believe that electrified fences and Taser guns should be considered comprehensive immigration reform.
Conservatives believe in abolishing the Department of Education and cutting school funding because it's a known fact that uneducated simpletons are more likely to grow up, join the military and vote Republican.
And more than anything else, conservatives believe that no matter how big an economic calamity you create, how big a hole you blow through the deficit, how badly you botch wars, or how drunk you were on trickled-down Kool-Aid when you drove the country into a ditch, everything is still the fault of liberals.
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