In an interesting article in TIME Magazine, Fareed Zakaria wonders How Today's Conservatism Lost Touch with Reality.
Most of us readers here have know that for a long time, but to see it in a major weekly magazine? That's new and refreshing.
Of course, the right-wingers will be sure to decry the article, because it's in the "lamestream" media. However, Zakaria is a respected writer, and TIME is generally considered to be the more conservative of the two major weekly news magazines.
So, join me below the fold and read along.
Zakaria looks at the tradition of conservatism and wonders just what happened to the supposed reality-based movement:
Conservatism, [George Will] explained, was rooted in reality. ... the greatest conservative thinkers have said that to change societies, one must understand them, accept them as they are and help them evolve.
Watching this election campaign, one wonders what has happened to that tradition. Conservatives now espouse ideas drawn from abstract principles with little regard to the realities of America's present or past. (emphasis mine)
You think so, Fareed? What was the tip-off? I think for me, it was when the GWB administration talked about "creating their own reality."
He continues:
Consider the debates over the economy. The Republican prescription is to cut taxes and slash government spending -- then things will bounce back. ... what is the evidence that tax cuts are the best path to revive the U.S. economy? Taxes -- federal and state combined -- as a percentage of GDP are at their lowest level since 1950. The U.S. is among the lowest taxed of the big industrial economies. So the case that America is grinding to a halt because of high taxation is not based on facts but is simply a theoretical assertion... (emphasis mine)
Yep; it's the government's fault. After all, we conveniently forget that it's government spending that brings us jobs, industries, and ideas. And, if you think the government isn't involved in the spending to create jobs in any reasonable country, the next largest economy in the world (that would be China) is growing with the help of government involvement.
So, it's time for the new conservatism, the movement based on reality. Yes, "liberal" is the new conservative.
My model is correct. When you get older, you become a conservative. So, I'll bring my head out of the clouds, and I won't live in a Utopia any longer. My goal will be to help people who need it, help them get jobs, and health care, and a sense of dignity, and to spread the message that if you care about people, then you need to be working with the Democrats.
Because the Republicans have gone so far right, they've gone right over the cliff.