What Made You A Conservative?

This is a repeat thread. It was first published in 2011 under one of our Open Blogger accounts, unsigned, so I don't which which cob put it up. But given that this is a slow day for content, I felt the subject is worth a revisit and might be fun to kick around some more. Just keep in mind that this is not me talking, it's somebody else, and the anecdote that the author relates did not happen to me. Although I was involved in an incident very similar to it, only I was the BAD GUY, the snotty little whiny crybaby kid. It's embarrassing, but true. Just read on and you'll find out what I'm talking about:

==================================

what made you a conservative?

I have a problem. Actually, I have many problems, some of which require ointment, but I'm not here to talk about those because I left my rash album at the in-law's place.

No, my problem as it pertains to politics is this--despite years of following politics, I still don't get how leftists think.

Oh, sure I know WHAT they think. But as far as what goes on those looney heads of theirs ... how they get from A-B, so to speak ... I got nothing.

And that's because I've never been a leftist.

Here's a story. You guys like stories, right? Those of you who can read?

Alright, so when I was 5 years old, I was over at the neighbor's house. They had two kids, Jeff, who was 7 years old and his sister, Jamie, who was 4 years old.

They'd just returned from McDonald's where their mom had apparently bought them each a box of McDonald's cookies. You remember those things? They were essentially animal crackers that they had re-branded.

So, the younger one, Jamie, burned through her box in a little under a minute. And as soon as she'd finished, she began howling through tears of outrage for some of her brother's cookies.

Her brother, predicably refused.

Then I saw something that made me dislike their mother for the next 15 years I knew her.

The mother saw her daughter's tantrum, then marched over and scolded her son for not "sharing," then ordered him to give the rest of his cookies to his gluttonous sister in order to appease her.

As he sadly handed over the rest of his box, I gaped in disbelief and anger. What mother would be so unfair to her son? What had he done wrong? Nothing! And here he was having his treat taken away from him simply because his snotty, crybaby sister demanded it.

She was the irresponsible one, not him! And she was being rewarded for it!

Oh, how I fumed. The sense of wrongness, of injustice, just overwhelmed me. HATED that woman for what she did.

And even though I had no political sense about me at that age, I now look back in amazement at how this story so perfectly illustrates the difference in thinking between folks like us and ... those ones.

Right? Because isn't that the basic idea--take from the person who's minding his own business and give it to the person who screwed up? And worse yet, scold the person you just took from for objecting.

I know the leftists don't see it that way, of course. And that's what I don't get about them. I'm simply not wired that way. And so they're totally alien to me, at least as regards to how they've arrived at such a twisted political worldview.

I actually wish I understood their thinking better so I could figure out how to more effectively win over the more squishy ones.

So here's what I was hoping to get from this post. I know some of you have made the journey from left to right. What I want to know is why you were a leftist in the first place, what made you change, and who had the most influence on that change?

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So that's the end of the 2011 material. I think this is important because as the 'woke' virus drives progressives farther and farther out into the extremes of insanity, more of them (perhaps not a great number, but there will be some) are going to start thinking, "whoa, this is definitely not what I signed up for" and be looking for a way back. So it might be helpful for them to see others like them, former fellow travelers, who successfully made the journey back to sanity. They might not agree with us on much, but that might come later. I think showing them kindness is more important in the early stages than discussing politics because, as the saying goes, before they care what you think, they first must think that you care.

Posted by: OregonMuse at 06:47 PM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 9/11.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 05:47 PM (xeTfp)

2 It wasn't so much that I wanted to be a conservative, it was that I reject so much of the platform of the Left.
Of which we are now drinking from a fire hose...

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 05:49 PM (aAP3z)

3 Called new thread below.

Posted by: gdgm+ at September 06, 2021 05:50 PM (HyPy9)

4 Bill Cliton.

Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 05:50 PM (mD/uy)

5 Got married and had kids. I went conservative very fast.

Posted by: Napoleon XIV at September 06, 2021 05:51 PM (AiZBA)

6 My decent amount of young common sense only increased, and the madness of postmodern progressivism did so exponentially faster.

Posted by: Blind Roscoe McGee at September 06, 2021 05:51 PM (vted1)

7 7

Posted by: LTCHAM at September 06, 2021 05:51 PM (O8Fe2)

8 I'm not a conservative as much as a realist pragmatist. Half the country has lost its mind, many in thrall to the ersatz religion of Leftism.

Posted by: Ignoramus at September 06, 2021 05:51 PM (ZHVt1)

9 Jimmy Carter.
My first vote for President was in 1984. I voted for Ronald Reagan.

Carter was persona non grata in my family. By the time I could vote, I had been paying attention.

Posted by: nurse ratched at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (U2p+3)

10 I pretty much started out this way. I guess this made me heartless as a youth according to Churchill. My Dad and his family were pretty hard right. Mom's were old school Democrats (which made them conservative even by the 80's.)

Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (csEWM)

11 Rush. No more to say.

Posted by: RustyG at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (bUQVF)

12 I was a liberal all my life (born and raised in the NE, kinda goes with the territory). 9/11 woke my ass up. I was disgusted by the things "my side" was saying about it. Nope, uh-uh, I am not one of you. It took some fits and starts for the scales to completely fall from my eyes. It was a process.

When I "came out" to my liberal family in 2004, they didn't take it well. They still think I'm nuts.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (xeTfp)

13 Some leftist commenting on the net that they'd like to rape Sarah Palin on an American flag while they hold their hand over her mouth and read her the Constitution (I thought these Democrats really don't like women, do they (?) nor do they know much about the Constitution). That, and the more I read about the background of Barack Obama and Bill Ayers supporting him, I didn't think I had anything in common with modern Democrats and that there were no more moderate Dems..

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (AJzTi)

14 I don't think I've ever been on the left, opinion-wise.

Posted by: BeckoningChasm at September 06, 2021 05:53 PM (OU+8W)

15 I paid bills.

Posted by: little boomer at September 06, 2021 05:53 PM (PNCY7)

16 My first presidential vote went to Ronaldus Magnus. I have always been a conservative. It has always felt like the right thing

Posted by: LTCHAM at September 06, 2021 05:54 PM (O8Fe2)

17 Barry Goldwater

Posted by: Bertram Cabot, Jr. at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (63Dwl)

18 I wanted my government to live under the same fiscal constraints as most Americans did, and still do. I wanted accountability to the voters for any vanity project.

So na�ve.

Posted by: Jak Sucio at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (jvt6t)

19 My 5th grade teacher, a card-carrying hippy, gave me a copy of Stranger in a Strange Land when I was in 4th grade. He was a friend of the family.
Hippies wanted to be Valentine Michael Smith, since I couldn't learn Martian, I realized that was just stupid.
Since 4th grade I've wanted to be Jubal Harshaw what with his personal responsibility and living with the consequences of one's actions. .

So a hippy helped me be conservative.
Irony can be pretty ironic sometimes.

Posted by: Veeshir at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (mpmL+)

20 Nothing made me conservative . I was born that way. I can make logical comparisons. I can determine cause and effect. I don't hold two diametrically opposite positions at the same time. I don't project my feelings to others. History doesn't start just yesterday for me and the ends never justify the means .

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (2DOZq)

21 Raised a garden-variety liberal, I moved to Russia in 1993. 6 months of living there converted me into the deplorable I am today.

Posted by: Tim at September 06, 2021 05:56 PM (kXgIY)

22 I've never really been a conservative, except that these days if you don't agree that women are superior and men are women who are exactly the same as men but better unless they used to be men in which case they're even better still etc etc etc--well, if you don't go along with that nonsense (and a lot more besides), you're "conservative".

Also I'm not a commie. So I'm "conservative" because if you're not a totalitarian, you're a "conservative".

I fell in with real conservatives (on this site and others) because conservatives will actually talk to others and discuss ideas.

Posted by: moviegique at September 06, 2021 05:56 PM (dhFCT)

23 Working on the Iron Range of Northern MN during the reign of Jimmy Carter and watching his ineptitude destroy a vibrant domestic industry... and my friends.

Posted by: ChuckALuck at September 06, 2021 05:56 PM (VjGsQ)

24 18 I wanted my government to live under the same fiscal constraints as most Americans did, and still do. I wanted accountability to the voters for any vanity project.

So naive.
Posted by: Jak Sucio at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (jvt6t)

When is the last time anyone discussed seriously the debt? And I will not consider that guttersnipe Ryan's posturing for the fucking rubes.

Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 05:57 PM (csEWM)

25 I voted NDP in my first election. After that there was a process of growing up, realizing the emptiness of liberals and, I'm ashamed to say National review.
I was also a supporter of Israel. That played in too.

Posted by: Brother Northernlurker just another guy at September 06, 2021 05:57 PM (cSyAR)

26 And Limbaugh.

Damn, I miss Rush.

Posted by: nurse ratched at September 06, 2021 05:58 PM (U2p+3)

27 I've been conservative my whole life because my parents raised my right.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 05:58 PM (kTF2Z)

28 Both my parents were liberal. I never paid much attention until 9/11.

Posted by: Jewells45 at September 06, 2021 05:58 PM (HOSkN)

29 Also I'm not a commie. So I'm "conservative" because if you're not a totalitarian, you're a "conservative".

I fell in with real conservatives (on this site and others) because conservatives will actually talk to others and discuss ideas.
Posted by: moviegique at September 06, 2021 05:56 PM (dhFCT)

^^This^^

Posted by: Napoleon XIV at September 06, 2021 05:59 PM (AiZBA)

30 Why conservative? Basic understanding and respect for history and human nature, mostly.

Libertarian-curious prior, Nader voter in 2000. 9/11 happened. W happened. President boyfriend and feckless GOP c*nts happened. Trump happened.

My transformation is complete.

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 05:59 PM (KnJdm)

31 Three months in Berkeley, during which time - as a right-on 21 year old grad student - I felt a philosophical tension that slowly grew. Then one day, walking through Sproul Plaza, I had a road to Damascus realization: the tension I felt was because I now saw in Berkeley the implementation of policies to which I'd subscribed three months earlier.

From that day to this, I've the conservative curmudgeon you've grown to love, or at least, to put up with. Pretty much the same thing, methinks.

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at September 06, 2021 05:59 PM (YqDXo)

32 I grew up conservative and never saw a reason to change. My father was a Republican, which back then pretty much meant conservative, and he died during Reagan's first term. I sometimes wonder what he'd have thought of DJT but I can't think of any reason he'd have reacted the same way I did

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 06:00 PM (y7DUB)

33 I'm not conservative. I'm more libertarian but not the corporate kind. Definitely not a populist, which is socialism with a pretty face. Just don't tell me what the fuck to do.

Posted by: Jack Burton Mercer at September 06, 2021 06:00 PM (P7Iz+)

34 Willowed

I get a 404 error.
Posted by: Jewells45

Last line of the error message!

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at September 06, 2021 06:00 PM (KwtXj)

35 I was 15 and had talked my dad into dropping me at the library of congress so I could do some primary source research for AP US history. The topic was Sen. Joe McCarthy. I discovered that "what everyone knew" was bullshit. There were fireworks and alarm bells at the moment I realized that the media lied and continued to lie.....once I saw it I couldn't UNSEE it.

That was the moment.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (ySQBZ)

36 Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden.

Posted by: klaftern at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (r4sI4)

37
Never been of the left in my political views but, to be fair, I have always held politicians in low regard no matter what party they claimed to be a member of.

What disturbs me now is the naked rapacity and greed of all politicians of all parties.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (pNxlR)

38 The simple ability to understand cause and effect. If you can't do that you are doomed to a shit life.

That and having to work for everything, even as a kid.

Posted by: Hatari Somewhere on Ventura Highway at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (WF/xn)

39 I went to college and found that the progressives horrified me in their attitudes and behavior, and on top of that were openly hostile to stuff I generally thought was important, but not deep into like the Bible (hadn't read through it at that point) and the Declaration of Independence (had only read the first and last paragraphs), and they really disliked men.

I got more into those as I got older and could appreciate why they're important, and increasingly found that progressives only connection to either was opposition. Also, just a basic observation that when in office, their guys avoided doing anything that is generally good for this country, instead favoring military actions that were a total waste of resources like Kosovo and Libya.

Posted by: Methos at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (kOpft)

40 No, my problem as it pertains to politics is this--despite years of following politics, I still don't get how leftists think.
-------------------

It's a waste of time. It's like figuring out how a photocopier works; what you get out of it is what someone else put into it, and it emerges unchanged.

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (YqDXo)

41 From World magazine:

https://is.gd/wpvJwY

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at September 06, 2021 06:01 PM (PiwSw)

42 I can't think of any reason he WOULDN'T have reacted the same way I did.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (y7DUB)

43 33 I'm not conservative. I'm more libertarian but not the corporate kind. Definitely not a populist, which is socialism with a pretty face. Just don't tell me what the fuck to do.
Posted by: Jack Burton Mercer at September 06, 2021 06:00 PM (P7Iz+)

I do not think the old labels fit the current moment. There is only this:

Those who wish for Freedom.

Those who want Control.

There is nothing else.

Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (csEWM)

44 Grew up in California. Saw the destruction caused by illegal immigration. This was before the floodgates opened in 1986.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (SchxB)

45 Pretty sure I have always been. My parents raised me that way. I remember as a kid my sister asked my dad the difference between a republican and a Democrat. He said Democrats like to spend money and Republicans like to save ( hahaha). I have always been conservative in every aspect of my life.

I think your parents and how you were raised is a big factor. I'm adopted but know my birth family and extended....they are all raging liberals.

Posted by: Molly k. at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (H1AD2)

46 I was never one of the cool kids in university. That helped drive me right.

Posted by: Brother Northernlurker just another guy at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (cSyAR)

47 I don't know what a conservative is anymore.

Posted by: Cat Ass Trophy at September 06, 2021 06:03 PM (y1UMU)

48 Nothing made me conservative . I was born that way. I can make logical comparisons. I can determine cause and effect. I don't hold two diametrically opposite positions at the same time. I don't project my feelings to others. History doesn't start just yesterday for me and the ends never justify the means .
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (2DOZq)

I can relate to this. I'm not terribly bright, and I'm pretty credulous and easily swayed by catchy slogans and anecdotes, but it doesn't take a lot of horsepower to take a second and think something through to its logical conclusion. That's all it takes, doing a quick "given x, where do we end up?"

Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:03 PM (ghoDT)

49 My dad taught me early the simplicity of conservative mind set. Never looked back.

Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at September 06, 2021 06:03 PM (fT38Y)

50 I remember Dad explaining the difference between needs and wants. He would provide the needs, he said, anything else I had to work for. Raised my children the same way.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 06:03 PM (kTF2Z)

51 I wonder how "Jeff" and "Jamie" behave as adults.

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (ACi07)

52 As a ute, I smelled a bunch of hippies as they passed me in the street giving me their stupid "peace" sign.

Made me a conservative and appreciative of washing my ass.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (R/m4+)

53 I never was a Leftist. I was raised Catholic, so the abortion issue has always been a non-starter.

Seeing that first pay stub after graduating college was enlightening.

My Dad was an old-time Democrat. He voted for Reagan in 1980.

Funny how a five-year old understand the Natural Law and the natural virtue of Justice.

Posted by: JAS, AoSHQ addict at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (xopIz)

54 I think I was always conservative. I can recall arguing in favor of the death penalty with another kid in junior high. For a short time I thought I was a libertarian until I figured out that everyone else who called themselves that were really just liberals who wanted legal pot and guilt-free sex. I will admit to voting for Clinton in '92 because Bush I was such a no-op and I thought "how bad can two southern guys be?" I learned from that and haven't made that mistake again.

Posted by: Oddbob at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (nfrXX)

55
*proudly displays Golden Party Badge*

Posted by: lefty-left Party membership No. 839724 at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (QzkSJ)

56 I've been trying to understand the "how" of a leftist for 25+ years.
I'm no closer. In fact, I understand them less.

I mean how in the F do you look at the results of your votes and say, "yes, more of this?!"

And I understand the "how" of the initial decision, that they reached it purely on emotion. But, it's the sticking with it, and making that choice over and over that completely escapes me.

And then the Words of the Prophets comes to me: "There's no saving some people."

Posted by: Lrrr at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (jIL4c)

57 Raised a conservative by my parents. Check that. Raised an American by my parents who knew this was the greatest country in man's history. God shed his grace on thee, as the song goes.

They knew tyranny first hand and fought it with their blood and tears, as did our neighbors. This was passed down to me and my siblings in many ways from talking politics, doing civic duties and responsibilities, teaching American history and more.

Posted by: Beartooth at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (UVMn8)

58 Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at September 06, 2021 06:03 PM (fT38Y)

--------------

Lurk less, comment more.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (kTF2Z)

59 I'm NOT a Conservative. Not in the modern sense of the word. I am a Constitutionalist. Something the modern 'conservative' lost out on a LONG time ago.

Now Conservatives are just interested in conserving THEIR power... not ensuring we are a free people.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (oHd/0)

60 50 I remember Dad explaining the difference between needs and wants. He would provide the needs, he said, anything else I had to work for. Raised my children the same way.
Posted by: Duke Lowell at

Amen, Duke.

Posted by: nurse ratched at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (U2p+3)

61 I've pretty much always have not been an insane leftist. I believed in the Constitution and considered it as part of the framework of how to live my life. Boy was I wrong about that.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (Tnijr)

62 Last line of the error message!

I saw it below. I sent an email to you.

Posted by: Jewells45 at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (HOSkN)

63 All kids know forced sharing is BS. My dad got me some premium artist's crayons, and when I brought them to school this proto-punk grabbed some and bore down so hard he broke them. I was furious and the teacher said I had to SHAAAAARE with the unfortunate Jimmy.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (Dc2NZ)

64 Growing up in Mass., I became a conservative when Ted Kennedy murdered a girl and continued to be re-elected decade after decade. Just kidding, I think I was born conservative, the Kennedy family really did keep me from ever voting democrat.

Posted by: Debby Doberman Schultz at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (a4EWo)

65 And I understand the "how" of the initial decision, that they reached it purely on emotion. But, it's the sticking with it, and making that choice over and over that completely escapes me.

The left is very good at blaming the shortcomings of their programs on other people.

Posted by: Cat Ass Trophy at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (y1UMU)

66 "given x, where do we end up?"
Posted by: hogmartin

attempts to solve for "why"*

Posted by: math-free Miklos at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (QzkSJ)

67 When I was in the service during the Carter administration. My first election I voted for Reagan.

Posted by: That Guy What Always Says Yeah Buddy TM at September 06, 2021 06:06 PM (Zzvjd)

68 I mean how in the F do you look at the results of your votes and say, "yes, more of this?!"

They don't care about the results, just the intentions as publicly stated. Hidden intentions don't register, even when obvious to other observers.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:07 PM (SchxB)

69 For me it was a couple of people making me examine my beliefs and stating them. Apparently l was old enough to realize that I didn't make any sense.

Modern Conservatism tends to defend norms, and as we have seen, change the norms and that changes the ground defended - and it almost seems that the big voices are not averse to the progressive world, just that they want to achieve it by conservative means.

this is why I was pushed in the direction of the classical liberals, and from there onto more libertarian stances.
I don't care what the current acceptable norms are, I would rather defend actual liberty and self ownership, thank you.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:07 PM (HG00O)

70 Every political quiz I ever took put me dead in the center, neither right nor left.
This is a bad place to be because you get hated on from every direction.
It's better to be all one thing or all the other...

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:07 PM (aAP3z)

71 Really been since I was a young teenager, probably reading books.

Posted by: Skip at September 06, 2021 06:07 PM (2JoB8)

72 I'm more of a reactionary than a conservative.

Posted by: G'rump928(c) at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (s4dNo)

73 My first election I took the young Democrat bus to the polls and voted for Reagan and Jesse Helms. I laughed.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (ySQBZ)

74 My Dad, and immediate family, were blue collar Dems. Dad was tough guy union shop steward for about half of his working life. Then, in his forties, he decided to go back to school and get his teaching certificate - at Kent State.

Whoa! He could not believe the garbage spewing from the professors' traps and reluctantly, very reluctantly, crossed over to the conservative side. He still had moments of brain lockup - upbringing/propaganda vs. observation - but, by in large, did the right things.

I was something to see.

Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (mD/uy)

75 For a short time I thought I was a libertarian until I figured out that everyone else who called themselves that were really just liberals who wanted legal pot and guilt-free sex.
Posted by: Oddbob at September 06, 2021 06:04 PM (nfrXX)

Disagree, the libertarian principle of leaving people free to pursue their own interests is also very much at the core of high school and undergrad proto-conservatives looking to get high and laid.

Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (ghoDT)

76 Hippies. Fucking hippies and their bullshit. That's what made me conservative.

Oh and Women's fucking Lib.

I am the last year or two of the Boomers, and was too young to be part of the hippie crap, but I surely remember all the marching and whining and protesting and spitting on people and dope smoking and draft card burning.

And women running around whining about being treated like sex objects while burning their bras and running around topless in hot pants and go-go boots.

I was still in single digits, age wise, and I can clearly remember thinking this is some crazy-ass shit right here. (Perhaps not in those exact words)

I have a natural born hatred of hippies and feminists, to say nothing of a predominantly English gene pool giving me a strong anitpathy towards the French.

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (bSf8L)

77 hogmartin, bullshit. You are one the smartest guys I know.

Posted by: Ben Had at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (89oik)

78 What made you a conservative?

W and Karl Rove. No balls.

Posted by: olddog in mo, Pontoon Captain* (like a real captain, only drunker) at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (EX3Vm)

79 I owe my conservatism to my parents, especially my dad. My dad was a staunch conservative and I was lucky to be raised with conservative Catholic values. We always had great discussions around the dinner table about politics, patriotism and religion. As a result all my siblings are all conservatives. My dad made sure of it.

Conservatism is just common sense, everything that liberalism stands for is just crazy, especially nowadays.

Posted by: redridinghood at September 06, 2021 06:09 PM (NpAcC)

80 >>> 59 I'm NOT a Conservative. Not in the modern sense of the word. I am a Constitutionalist. Something the modern 'conservative' lost out on a LONG time ago.

Now Conservatives are just interested in conserving THEIR power... not ensuring we are a free people.
Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:05 PM (oHd/0)

I'm trying to come up with something more intelligent to say than the usual "newsletter?"

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:09 PM (ACi07)

81 Listening to Rush Limbaugh with my granddad driving me home from school. Him pointing out the inconsistencies and hypocrisy of the left and teaching me to see through their bullshit led me to doing my own research as a teen and deciding early on what I believed.

Posted by: Jarrod at September 06, 2021 06:10 PM (wzvbJ)

82 Duke, will do. Thanks. Finally met some of youse guys in Denver. Maybe a new nic is in order.

Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at September 06, 2021 06:10 PM (fT38Y)

83 Am I a conservative?

Idk

I'm an anti-communist for sure.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (ySQBZ)

84 Read a lot of Commuism evils, but even if you were back in late 60s early 70s you couldn't believe how Leftism could flourished as it has.

Posted by: Skip at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (2JoB8)

85 I have always been conservative. My first presidential vote was for Ronald Reagan.

I have always been one to extrapolate out the consequences of a course of action.

For instance, feminists want their women to cut men off until abortion is "safe".

For men of good will's sakeI hope they do. Because then the only available women left to choose from are the ones who love children and don't use sex as a weapon.

Seems it would simplify the dating game for the good men out there.

Posted by: Just Lily at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (RLLZj)

86 Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (bSf8L)

-----------

Hi Tammy! Was wondering just last night where you went. Maybe you were here and I missed it, but it's good to see you!

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (kTF2Z)

87 I blame the sci/fi I read starting in 6th grade.
TANSTAAFL.

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (KwtXj)

88 I have a natural born hatred of hippies and feminists, to say nothing of a predominantly English gene pool giving me a strong anitpathy towards the French.

I refuse to submit for DNA ancestry tracing in case there's any French in there.

Oh, and, Hi Miss Tammy!

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (SchxB)

89 Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:09 PM (ACi07)

Has there ever been a Government, that gave up power over its own people, WITHOUT either violence, or the viable threat of violence, being involved?

I can't think of any historic precedents.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (oHd/0)

90 I remember the precise moment the switch flipped. I had always been a Democrat, but I guess I was starting to have doubts during the first Clinton administration. Back then I listened to NPR and also watched a lot of C-SPAN. One day I heard an NPR report on a Newt Gingrich speech that I'd watched live the previous day. NPR edited out the end of a sentence in a way that completely altered its meaning. It wasn't a natural place to make the edit either. They did it on purpose to make Newt look bad to their audience. I could never look at anything the same way after that.

Posted by: Art Rondelet of Malmsey at September 06, 2021 06:12 PM (fTtFy)

91 I refuse to submit for DNA ancestry tracing in case there's any French in there.

Oh, and, Hi Miss Tammy!
Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (SchxB)

My Forefathers were kicked out of France, probably for being too Manly.... 1656...

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:12 PM (oHd/0)

92 The 2000 election. I was 17 and at a boarding school. We were watching the returns on the rec room TV and the kids who voted for Gore were being total assholes. It's when I first heard how "awful" and "stupid" Republicans were. Made me think about issues and why people supported one guy versus the other afterwards.

Posted by: Mishdog at September 06, 2021 06:12 PM (cqAUI)

93 hiya

Posted by: JT at September 06, 2021 06:13 PM (arJlL)

94 I don't think I was ever rationally a leftist. I grew up in an all democrat family and didn't care much about politics. But I was a pretty dumb kid consistently until I was about 23 when stupidity and reality collided.

This was probably the first time in my life that I started thinking like an adult. At that point, freedom of choice and association with the personal responsibility that comes with it, an image of the vile slavery inherent in all leftist ideals, all of it just became apparent and axiomatic to me. Things that happened to me were my own damned fault and I needed to grow the heck up. I've always thought I have a great blessing that God has always shown me truth in its full light. A blessing and a dire moral imperative should I fail to open my eyes.

I won't say I'm a conservative because being a gen-xer, I get the feeling that this secular world has often crapped on me and there's a lot of it I did not then and do not now want to conserve. I strongly feel the idea that we've arrived at societal perfection that needs to be conserved is a leftist ideal now. But in answer to this post I've been the antithesis of a leftist all my adult life.

Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 06:13 PM (ZOfsH)

95 I'll add one more bit to my conservative upbringing. My personality is just leave me the F alone. I won't bother you and you do the same.

Posted by: Beartooth at September 06, 2021 06:13 PM (UVMn8)

96 As a young teenager I did hate the Flower Children, as said I knew there were evils to actually go to war on.

Posted by: Skip at September 06, 2021 06:13 PM (2JoB8)

97 I've always been a conservative. Didn't quite pay attention to politics until i was married and started to grow a family. My political leaning has only gone more right as the truth of life has been drilled into my thick skull. Talk radio was a way to try and test my ideas because i always wanted to be able to understand the arguments. Nobody wants to.live in a bubble.

Posted by: USNtakim deplorable still. at September 06, 2021 06:13 PM (0OmEj)

98 82 Duke, will do. Thanks. Finally met some of youse guys in Denver. Maybe a new nic is in order.
Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at

*happy dance *

Posted by: nurse ratched at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (U2p+3)

99 I owe my conservatism to my parents, especially my dad. My dad was a staunch conservative and I was lucky to be raised with conservative Catholic values. We always had great discussions around the dinner table about politics, patriotism and religion. As a result all my siblings are all conservatives. My dad made sure of it.

Conservatism is just common sense, everything that liberalism stands for is just crazy, especially nowadays.
Posted by: redridinghood

*fist bump
Same, minus the Catholic upbringing. Dad was Protestant.

Posted by: rickb223 at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (RTTbl)

100 Everyone is stupid somewhere, about something.

Leftists are just people who are politically stupid, believing in things that can't possibly work.

Sadly, because of Dunning Krueger, these idiots are confident that they are political geniuses who have all the answers for humanity.

They believe that there are people who can't be trusted with power. They know that is true, because every time they look in a mirror, they see such a person.

Posted by: An Observation sez China Joe not my president at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (QgRq4)

101 The media made me a conservative when I realized how biased and stupid they were. It was around 1992 and it was their reporting on Bush the Elder.

Posted by: Dr Spank at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (OsEWJ)

102 Raised in a family of dems, the old school type. Voted for Billy Boy the first go round and skipped the next election. Wasn't very political. Like others have said 9/11 changed all that. Started to pay attention to all things government and political on the national front. Haven't lived anywhere long enough in the last 20 odd years to care about the local stuff. Voted local but used the anti-abortion creed as my decision on a candidate.
Oddly enough I've learned more here at the HQ that's driven me farther right then in all the years prior to starting here.
Thanks to all of you Morons that helped on the road to political awareness.

Posted by: neverenoughcaffeine at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (2NHgQ)

103 I agree, except for the part about some of them looking for a way back. Our for-want-of-a-better-word "culture" is more self-centered, narcissistic and in need of instant gratification and validation than ever before. Just look at social media. My guess is that the ones who start thinking it isn't what they signed up for will simply double or triple down and go even crazier rather than admit they were wrong or risk losing the validation of their "friends." They will actually, in a sense, brainwash themselves. It's like nothing I've ever seen or read about before, but I think it's true.

Posted by: Pennsyltucky at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (lNHqD)

104 I voted for Reagan in my dorm room in 1984 via absentee ballot. My chads did not hang.
I see the destructive influence of liberal and progressive policies every day. I work with parents who have their children removed and I try to advocate for them in the legal system.
I abhor the government and what it fails to do and what it does do.
The lack of fathers in the home, the no consequences for bad decisions and the encouragement of living off the dole.
Most of my clients did not have a family that loved them. They also all feel entitled.

This country is doomed. One half of the children born today are born to single moms and they instantly get Medicare. You cannot support a child on $800 disability a month plus food stamps.

Of course the single moms think it is great. They do not work and they have numerous baby daddys or boyfriends that will shack up with them in a revolving door situation.

There are a few clients that crawl out of the plantation but most will be on it forever. And their kids will be too.

Posted by: Czech Chick at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (haWye)

105 I wasn't anything until Barky. I kept my head down and worked 18 hours a day. Barky made me realize we were in deep shit.

Posted by: Ben Had at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (89oik)

106 I was always conservative except for a brief drift to the left during grad school (natch), but Rush pulled me back. The first election I voted in was 1992 and I voted for GWH Bush.

Posted by: sinalco at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (yODqO)

107 Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at September 06, 2021 06:10 PM (fT38Y)

-------------

There ya go! Also, to all lurkers out there, if ever there was a thread to delurk, this is it.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (kTF2Z)

108 Two things happened, one fleeting and inconsequential in the grand scheme, the other not so much.

The first was when I was probably 14 or 15. I was flipping through the cable channels trying to figure out something to watch and when I hit the Community Access channel...there was a freeze frame of an aborted fetus, with text on the screen identifying it as such. One and a half seconds was all it took for me to become pro-life. I know it was a propaganda effort but I don't care.

The second was that when I was 16, a serial killer murdered two people I knew in separate incidents. He killed 7 people in total but was captured when his next intended victim was able to retrieve a revolver and hold him at gunpoint until the police arrived.

At that point I was irrevocably pro life AND pro gun, and here we are.

Posted by: wizardpc at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (AAMIa)

109 Young Republican boys at the UW were much better looking than the Young Democrats. Seemed smarter and more likely to go somewhere in life, too. But mainly better looking.

Posted by: LASue at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (Ed8Zd)

110 Disagree, the libertarian principle of leaving people free to pursue their own interests is also very much at the core of high school and undergrad proto-conservatives looking to get high and laid.
Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (ghoDT)

I am going to be harsh, and I apologize ahead of time:

freedom is also the freedom to do poorly and make really bad decisions on life. It also means you have the obligation to deal with the consequences.

To only be free to make good decisions is the freedom of the leash, of the monitored child, of the inmate on community supervision. It is cheap for your master because your cage is maintained, for free, by you for your masters.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (HG00O)

111 Oddly enough I've learned more here at the HQ that's driven me farther right then in all the years prior to starting here.
Thanks to all of you Morons that helped on the road to political awareness.
Posted by: neverenoughcaffeine at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (2NHgQ)

YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED...

Posted by: Horde Mind at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (oHd/0)

112
I think your parents and how you were raised is a big factor. I'm adopted but know my birth family and extended....they are all raging liberals.

Posted by: Molly k. at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM

that's correct in the inverse as well...I've secretly assumed that I was adopted, 'cause there's no way I could possibly be related to those people

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (DUIap)

113 As a Cold War kid, it was disgustingly obvious that Workers' Paradii like Cuba and the USSR were prisons for their own citizens. Leftist attempts to paint the West and the Soviet Bloc as opposite sides of the same coin, and constantly drawing moral equivalency between our occasional failings and their fucking Gulags, were patently bullshit. So what else was wrong?

Dad had volumes of William F. Buckley's essays, and they helped shape my outlook.

I've always been more of a Conservatarian.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (Dc2NZ)

114 I don't say I'm a conservative. What the hell is there to conserve? If asked, I'll say I'm a "normal-tarian". I can't stand phoniness, bullshit, and cheaters. But, beyond that, I just crave normalcy.

Which is a bit odd, because I'm weird. I don't look like it on the outside, though. Weirdness - I mean genuine weirdness, not the fashionable weirdness of nose piercings and blue hair - stinks.

Posted by: Hands at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (786Ro)

115 And their kids will be too.

Posted by: Czech Chick at September 06, 2021 06:14 PM (haWye)

Government does nothing well, least of all parenting.

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (KnJdm)

116 Duke, hello and ditto! Blanco, no one could ever suspect you of the least bit of Frenchiness!

Says the woman who married a man who is half French Canadian. Go figure.

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (bSf8L)

117 >>> 89 Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:09 PM (ACi07)

Has there ever been a Government, that gave up power over its own people, WITHOUT either violence, or the viable threat of violence, being involved?

I can't think of any historic precedents.
Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:11 PM (oHd/0)

I was going to say the Magna Carta, but that had a viable threat involved, didn't it... otoh maybe that's the least bad example of how things might be improved.

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:16 PM (ACi07)

118 1. Being an Air Force Brat for my first 13 years until Dad retired from the service;

2. Reading A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The Gulag Archipelago in High School;

3. Having Commies try to board my school bus to pass out their Commie Literature when I was in the 8th grade, and getting into minor fisticuffs with them;

4. Not being a dumbass and being able to think for myself.

Those are the things that made me Conservative.

Posted by: Sharkman at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (UXEgP)

119 freedom is also the freedom to do poorly and make really bad decisions on life.

Posted by: Kindltot

This is what I currently heard termed "living his/her best life."

Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (mD/uy)

120 freedom is also the freedom to do poorly and make really bad decisions on life. It also means you have the obligation to deal with the consequences.
Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (HG00O)

Not sure why you'd need to preface that with any kind of warning.

Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (ghoDT)

121 Government does nothing well, least of all parenting.
Posted by: flounder

More of a Senior Sibling

Posted by: Big Brother at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (QzkSJ)

122 I was raised in a conservative household, flirted with liberalism in the first years of college, and was back to conservatism by the time I was a junior. I think it was the Brady Bill that brought me back towards the right.

Posted by: Pennsyltucky at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (lNHqD)

123 *happy dance *
Sweet. Meet too, Nurse

Posted by: Wyoming Lurker at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (fT38Y)

124 Ashamed to admit I voted for Jimmy Carter - and then barely lived through the economic meltdown that ensued. Somebody shared a recording of Reagan's "Time For Choosing". Never looked back.

Posted by: Java Joe at September 06, 2021 06:18 PM (2p/1y)

125 Rachel Campos-Duffy is hosting Fox News Primetime this week.
I really admire her and Sean teaching their 9 kids about religion and patriotism. We need more families like hers.

Posted by: redridinghood at September 06, 2021 06:18 PM (NpAcC)

126 I was confirmed in my conservatism as I realized that the Left hates every, and I mean EVERY one of the Ten Commandments.

Posted by: JAS, AoSHQ addict at September 06, 2021 06:18 PM (xopIz)

127 Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:15 PM (HG00O)

That's the very definition of freedom. The freedom to fail. Or excel. Because in a truly free society, you will have multiple opportunities to do both.

Posted by: Jak Sucio at September 06, 2021 06:18 PM (jvt6t)

128 Posted by: Sharkman at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (UXEgP)

I grew up 1.5 miles away from a SAC Base. Watching my friend's Dads get deployed to Viet Nam, rang the reality bell for me.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:18 PM (oHd/0)

129 More of a Senior Sibling

Posted by: Big Brother at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (QzkSJ)

Buys you beer and smokes.

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 06:19 PM (KnJdm)

130 Once I made enough of an income and saw others taking it while sitting on their asses. Then, I also realized that the ones who cared to really improve the world weren't the liberals.

Posted by: Roy at September 06, 2021 06:19 PM (Ti+Tv)

131 This is what I currently heard termed "living his/her best life."
Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (mD/uy)

There are a number of serious alcoholics in my family, once they decided to live a better life is when they started to get clean and sober.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:19 PM (HG00O)

132 Gen X here, one word. Reagan.

Posted by: redchief at September 06, 2021 06:19 PM (Kab4E)

133 My dad and Rush. Funny thing all of my buddies from the old days all think the same way too.

Posted by: dartist at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (+ya+t)

134 I voted for Jimmy Carter while in college. Yeah that first paycheck and the hostage crisis and all the other stupid shit got me right.

Posted by: JAS, AoSHQ addict at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (xopIz)

135 I was confirmed in my conservatism as I realized that the Left hates every, and I mean EVERY one of the Ten Commandments.
Posted by: JAS, AoSHQ addict

Yes, and since most of the Commandments are covered by - "Don't be a dick", the left cannot do that.

Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (mD/uy)

136 I owe my conservatism to my parents, especially my dad. My dad was a staunch conservative and I was lucky to be raised with conservative Catholic values. We always had great discussions around the dinner table about politics, patriotism and religion. As a result all my siblings are all conservatives. My dad made sure of it.

Posted by: redridinghood at September 06, 2021 06:09 PM (NpAcC)

Same here. My dad was one of the smartest people I ever knew, although I didn't realize that until later.

Posted by: Jordan61 at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (hP4QN)

137 Evening.

Well, more libertarian than conservative (though I suppose the term "conservatarian" would be apropo) but it wasn't ever really a single thing. I suppose just an intuitive sense of the idea of liberty combined with being exposed to certain other ideas that just really jived with it before discovering writers who exposed me to other writers and imbibing it all in massive quantities. Maybe a few well placed Uncle Scrooge comics, too. I dunno.

I think the better question, at least in my case, would be to ask, "You made a conscious effort to keep up with news, current events and government. How did you become such a dork?" Just born this way, baby.

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (1Yy3c)

138 Not sure why you'd need to preface that with any kind of warning.
Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:17 PM (ghoDT)

Because I tend to scream and stomp and offend people.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (HG00O)

139 I am going to be harsh, and I apologize ahead of time:

freedom is also the freedom to do poorly and make really bad decisions on life. It also means you have the obligation to deal with the consequences.

That is not you being harsh, that is reality. Same for the part I didn't quote.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (SchxB)

140 Doofii running for student government on the basis of opposition to the Vietnam War always struck me as idiotic.

Posted by: Brother Northernlurker just another guy at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (cSyAR)

141 Reagan didn't make me a conservative, he made me a patriot.

Posted by: Roy at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (Ti+Tv)

142 wizardpc, sorry to hear you had to deal with something like that when you were young.... I bet you've had more than one ummm, canoe accident since then.

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (ACi07)

143 I've always been conservative, because I've always understood that bad choices I made were my fault.

Mom once told me she felt guilty because of my wayward years. I told mom not to feel guilty, because, at the time, I knew better, but, did it anyway.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (2SdPm) at September 06, 2021 06:20 PM (2SdPm)

144 If you enjoy reading History, I think it won't make you a conservative, but it might give you a sense that there are consequences for policies and philosophies.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:21 PM (Dc2NZ)

145 My parents had such books as "The 5000 Year Leap" lying around and I read that my sophomore year.

Imagine what it's like sitting in high school and realizing 1) your teacher is full of shit and 2) you know more than them

Like, this idiot's going on about left and right and I'm thinking "that's a stupid anachronism from the French that is misinformed-- the real political scale is anarchy to freedom to totalitarianism."

Junior year, I'm driving 25 miles to the bookstore to get Ken Hamblin's "Pick a Better Country" and Sowell's "Visions of the Annointed" (recommended by Rush IIRC).

Posted by: Lrrr at September 06, 2021 06:21 PM (jIL4c)

146 Becoming a gun owner. I had supported the CA assault weapon ban, but between that and the federal I had bought my first gun, a .22 bolt rifle. When Feinstein started shutting the door on the fed side, I figured I'd better get a high-cap pistol while I could. Took lots of training, learned lots of stuff, like the fact that the definition of an AW was BS. Started hanging out on talk.politics.guns and studying laws, criminal statistics, multivariate analysis, legal cases, started to see that the "gun control" crowd had almost no facts or results on their side. That led to more scrutiny in other topics where I usually found the same thing. I wasn't born a conservative, I evolved into one.

Posted by: socratease at September 06, 2021 06:21 PM (oqnjT)

147 Grew up in Boulder, so was a liberal by default? It was just sort of how everyone was. However, was raised with strong traditional values and church, so it was inevitable I would wake up and see that not only was I not liberal, never really had been. Just had bought into the narrative that conservatives were uncool, greedy old men.

Bill and Hillary Clinton did it for sure. Never liked them, thought they were both frauds from the get-go. What really did it was the Monica Lewinsly stuff where I saw all those supposed liberals and the media completely reverse themselves after their silly obsession with Anita Hill's alleged sexual harassment. It was all a game, always had been. Hadn't paid much attention or cared before that, was disgusted by all of them.

The great thing is that my parents and siblings similarly woke up around the same time, so there's not conflict within the immediate family. Sadly, extended family are Lefties, but not obnoxiously so.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 06, 2021 06:21 PM (bDqIh)

148 Barry Goldwater
Posted by: Bertram Cabot, Jr. at September 06, 2021 05:55 PM (63Dwl)

*Kneels at his holy name*

Peace be upon him.

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 06:22 PM (1Yy3c)

149 "I blame the sci/fi I read starting in 6th grade.
TANSTAAFL."

I suspect this is the same path that I took.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice. Asymptomatic raycist at September 06, 2021 06:22 PM (3D/fK)

150 Well I've never actually been liberal, at least by the increasingly insane and deconstructivist post-1980s definition, so not exactly an answer to the specific question. I was raised by a very conservative family--Rush on the radio and everything--and broke libertarian in college. These days I define myself as nationalist libertarian, i.e. stay out of the citizens' private business but things like borders and cultural affinity are kind of important if you don't want the medieval experience.

More broadly, I am an empiricist and a pragmatist (and also a Pragmatist, as the joke goes). I don't do faith, I don't do theory. I don't care about good feels, I care about what demonstrably works. Pretty much everything from my choice of occupation to my appreciation of history flows from this.

Through that lens, nothing that the intellectual left has pushed in my lifetime is even remotely sensible. It's all been feels-over-reals and wishcasting, so it does not appeal to me even a little bit. Moreover, most of those things are echoes of bad ideas that were already tried and failed spectacularly.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 06:22 PM (UewuT)

151 I come from a very liberal family. After seeing the USSR first-hand in 1976, I had rejected the Left, but what made me a conservative was indexing of income tax rates. In 1982, I was struggling to support my family on a meager salary, yet every COLA raise I got was eaten up because it pushed me into a high tax bracket. For me, the most important item in Reagan's tax reform bill was indexing income tax rates to inflation. This was a matter of simple justice. When I saw the Democrats, led by the Lion of the Senate, Ted Kennedy (aka Captain Oldsmobile) fighting that reform tooth and nail because inflation raised taxes without Congress having to pass a bill to do it, the scales fell from my eyes. I've been hard-core conservative ever since.

Posted by: Nemo at September 06, 2021 06:23 PM (S6ArX)

152 I was never a Lefty though i was a LOLbertaian. I have paid for all my shit since i was 15 years old and i too had the snotty sister who cried for equal shit from mommy and daddy (despite being 5 years younger and not working her ass off for autocratic horse trainers) ... and the parents caved every damn time. She didnt just want the same things, she wanted BETTER. And she got it too. And how i seethed! so yeah i dont like people feeling entitled to the same shit as a person who worked their ass off, skipped prom, and pretty much lived their life to support their dream, to get kneecapped by a little kid who wanted BETTER, because they couldnt stand seeing me have something she didnt. So in a way i know emotionally where leftists come from because i saw it. but its not pretty, and it comes from a person wanting to be AS GOOD AS... without having to work as hard, or sacrifice anything.

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:23 PM (ywuPa)

153 There are a number of serious alcoholics in my family, once they decided to live a better life is when they started to get clean and sober.
Posted by: Kindltot

Sorry - I was not being clear. I was trying to point out that many times, when I hear this term, it's being applied to dumbasses that are robbing a store, assaulting a cop or beating an old woman and then they go and get themselves killed by a decent human.

No disrespect is intended to those that actually do work hard to turn the bus around and start to make good choices. Good for them.

Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:23 PM (mD/uy)

154 Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice. Asymptomatic raycist at September 06, 2021 06:22 PM (3D/fK)

TANSTAAFL and Starship Troopers... Deadly Duo.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:24 PM (oHd/0)

155
I was raised American and Catholic.

Therefore, it started early when I first learned about what abortion was.

From there it went to Solzhenitsyn, Russell Kirk and later the Clarence Thomas hearings for the SCOTUS.

Now, the Left has completed their transformation to nihilism, emotions only, insanity, groupthink, terror, violence, and hate. Evil incarnate when you study their underlying philosophies. It's out in the open today.

Posted by: Sapwolf at September 06, 2021 06:24 PM (lzEbI)

156 Not seeing new nics so I'll sweeten the deal. Lurkers who make their first comment will receive an internet voucher, an ashtray, a broken paddle ball game, and this piece of string. Wait, I need the string. Everything but the string then.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 06:24 PM (kTF2Z)

157 My mom was French. The Vietnam war was a huge issue for her. She lost her only sibling, a captain in the French army, in Indochina in 1951 when she was seven months pregnant with my brother.

Her and my WWII vet, America love it or leave it democrat dad, had a number of high-decibel arguments at the kitchen table about what they would do if my brother who turned 18 in 1969 got drafted. My dad insisted he would go if his country called him while my mom insisted she would crawl over broken glass to get him to Canada.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 06:24 PM (xeTfp)

158 What made you a conservative?

W and Karl Rove. No balls.
Posted by: olddog in mo, Pontoon Captain* (like a real captain, only drunker) at September 06, 2021 06:08 PM (EX3Vm)

Rove is like the anti-Reagan.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (y7DUB)

159 Even in my more liberal years, I was always fiercely patriotic. The bilious hatred of the Left for America was puzzling and infuriating to Young Eris -- "then why don't you LEAVE?!?". People with nothing but the clothes on their backs escape hard lives to come here. Why don't you, with your education and funds, start over somewhere else?

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (Dc2NZ)

160 I was a hopeless waistoid living with my mom, painting the eyes on ducks in her ceramics shop when the only radio station I could get on her crappy AM radio started playing this new guy named Rush Limbaugh. I'm not saying it's directly related, but after I listened for a few weeks I quit smoking weed, started a computer repair business on the side, went back to Church and became a Ronald Regan style conservative. Rush was right.

Posted by: OleanderSalad at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (qTq4x)

161
What Made You A Conservative?

____________

Being born old.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (/U27+)

162 I don't think I "became" a conservative, it just grew on me. Water Gate was non-stop news growing up and it never rang true with me and I think that started to push that direction. I thought I might vote for Jimmy Carter, but my Dad asked me one day why I thought universal health care was the Government's job. Nice argument ensued, another hard nudge. Over the next 40 years, the obvious and non-stop lies, the irresponsibility made me a definite anti-Leftist. Reagan made me a Conservative, big help from Rush.

Posted by: ErikInTexas at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (UdmP5)

163 Doofii running for student government on the basis of opposition to the Vietnam War always struck me as idiotic.

They did keep the college's army out of it, so I'll have to give them that one.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (SchxB)

164 First president I ever voted for was Jimmy Carter in 1976. And the next four years was what did it for me.

Posted by: Shooter McGavin at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (Z8V5e)

165 For the ladies here, what's the consensus that made you be on the right? Family or peers?

I'll confess, my greatest fear in life, pretty much my only fear, is my daughter becoming a leftist and hating me like all these girls do on twitter. I think maybe, probably their fathers suck but this world sure does screw up young women.

Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (ZOfsH)

166 Oh and I should clarify I was raised by Yellow Dog Democrats. Old School Dems, not especially Liberal by any means, but brought up in the firm understanding that all Republicans, of not outright evil, were certainly purely agin' the workin' man, and therefore completely unworthy of the vote of any decent person.

(Now, my mama is a registered Dem and always has been, but she's got a little more practical world view, and as such, I don't think she ever has voted Dem, she just wouldn't have dared register as anything else, given my daddy and grandfather's political leanings.)

My Daddy, God rest his soul, was Dem til he couldn't stand it any more, and he voted Reagan both times. He wrote in George Wallace the prior two elections, if memory serves.

1984 was my first vote and The Ronald got mine. I was the only person my age that I knew, friends or family, who even voted. Couldn't believe it. I was so excited to be able to go vote!

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (bSf8L)

167 Ironically, I have most of the sensibilities and lifestyle of a leftist. But I've always felt a sense of patriotism and love of American history. And there is no room for that anyplace but the right.

Posted by: Resistentialist at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (m0lSB)

168 David Horowitz has discussed at some length his conversion from a red diaper baby to a conservative.

But introspection ain't easy, as it requires questioning your own worldview. Once you start noticing the logical contradictions in the Progressive narrative, such as "my body my choice" and "wear the mask/get the vaccines" the dam can start to break. But it goes even deeper than that.

Something like 98% of Afghanis want sharia law. So they built it into their 2004 constitution. So. 50% of the population, women, are all for it too, though they are relegated to the status of property. *shrugs*

I don't know how you ever get past that internal dialogue.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (F0YaR)

169
I saw it below. I sent an email to you.
Posted by: Jewells45

Nothing came through...

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (KwtXj)

170 Has there ever been a Government, that gave up power over its own people, WITHOUT either violence, or the viable threat of violence, being involved?
---
Pinochet?

Posted by: Lrrr at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (jIL4c)

171 What a great thread.

I'm learning more and falling in love with the horde more every post.

Thank goodness I stumbled on this place.

Posted by: nurse ratched at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (U2p+3)

172 Now in my autumn years, I find my current political dispositions matching almost perfectly as when I was a 20 year old.
Distrust of Big Government, regardless of who was sitting in the Oval Office.
Especially distrust of Law, Lawyers, the Courts.
Distrust of most cops.
Distrust of news media, TV or print.
Add to that, current distrust of Big Medicine, Big Pharma.

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (aAP3z)

173 149 "I blame the sci/fi I read starting in 6th grade.
TANSTAAFL."

I suspect this is the same path that I took.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice. Asymptomatic raycist at September 06, 2021 06:22 PM (3D/fK)
---

YUP.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (Dc2NZ)

174 Oh, I suppose I should mention that despite all that I said, as a child I was pretty much a Democrat? Why? Mom. Mom is/was/actually still kind of is a bleeding heart liberal. So if mom was a bleeding heart lib that meant so was I and that meant the Dems were the good guys. Childish thinking, but I was a child.

I can still be a bit of a bleeding heart in some regards. A bleeding heart right-winger. If such a thing could ever exist here I stand.

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (1Yy3c)

175 Jimmy Carter

Posted by: Hurricane567 at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (MTFDr)

176 So, in reading through the comments, interesting how many of us seem to have the same authors in common.

Heinlein, Sowell, Solzhenitsyn, Horowitz.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (2SdPm) at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (2SdPm)

177 First president I ever voted for was Jimmy Carter in 1976. And the next four years was what did it for me.

Posted by: Shooter McGavin at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (Z8V5e)

Let's hope we get a post-Stinkfinger wave, then.

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 06:29 PM (KnJdm)

178
Heinlein, Sowell, Solzhenitsyn, Horowitz.
Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (2SdPm) at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (2SdPm)

my hero was William F Buckley
but unlike most girls i did love Heinlein and Larry Niven

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:29 PM (ywuPa)

179 My dad was a Navy man, and sat somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan. I learned my politics from him , but I'm not a "conservative " any more. There is nothing to conserve. Literally every institution in the country I once loved and long served has been colored by leftist scumbags.

I... am a revolutionary.

It's not a second American civil war. It's a second American revolution. Same principles, new people.

Posted by: Hawkpilot at September 06, 2021 06:29 PM (DMpoA)

180 Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 06:24 PM (xeTfp)

My antipathy for the French, while very real, does not extend to any French people I have ever actually met, all of whom have been delightful! Including all the Parisians I've interacted with in Paris.

I truly apologize if I offended you!

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:30 PM (bSf8L)

181 For the ladies here, what's the consensus that made you be on the right? Family or peers?

I'll confess, my greatest fear in life, pretty much my only fear, is my daughter becoming a leftist and hating me like all these girls do on twitter. I think maybe, probably their fathers suck but this world sure does screw up young women.
Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (ZOfsH)

Family, but the world is a totally different place now. As a parent, all you can do is your best.

Posted by: Jordan61 at September 06, 2021 06:30 PM (hP4QN)

182 When I was 20 Viet Nam was waning, and not in a good way. I thought of my buddy, who was ROTC, in country for a week, came home in a box.
All the while the commies were 90 miles off shore in a place called Cuba.
We could make war on commies 6 thousand miles away, but not 90 miles away?
Government is stupid, and not by a little.

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:30 PM (aAP3z)

183 what made you a conservative?
--------

The first time (I was about 18 then) that I encountered, 'From each according to his ability, to each according to his need'.

Now, that is implied in Christian personal imperatives which I subscribe to, BUT, the great distinction is that the Left are intent upon compelling their own means and methods of forcing compliance as suits their judgment.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 06, 2021 06:30 PM (pbStR)

184
Around 2093-2004 I started noticing the complete double standard in news coverage depending on the political affiliation of the individual being covered. It was particularly crude and obvious post 9/11. I had been sort of apolitical before that. It was a beginning.

I adopted some affiliations along the way, and discarded them as they proved to be part of the problem: LGF, W. Bush, and the GOP itself. By 2012, after Romney's despicable non-campaign, I concluded that absolutely no one represented my interests, and that approximately half the country saw reality differently than I did; and that no amount of facts or logic would change the view of this other half.

Seeing the corruption at a government agency (FDA) that affected me personally accelerated my loss of respect for the federal government.

When Trump came along, I was only aware of him initially as a controversial/outrageous public figure. My initial reaction was the same as many: He's not myncandidate, he's my murder weapon against the GOP, I had nothing left to lose. Whatever shortcomings Trump had, he absolutely proved himself, and revealed that the rotteness of our government is far worse than I ever dreamed.

Posted by: Semi-Literate Thug at September 06, 2021 06:31 PM (2iDSr)

185 What made me a conservative?

Bill Clinton
Willie Brown
George Bush

9/11 was the inflection point

Posted by: San Franpsycho at September 06, 2021 06:31 PM (EZebt)

186 What Made You A Conservative?

The Grift

Posted by: GOPe at September 06, 2021 06:31 PM (QzkSJ)

187
My parents were Rockefeller Republicans. Politics didn't figure in any dinner-table conversations. And until my mid-teens I was rather apolitical with, if anything, a bias to the Democrats. But I believed, as I still do, in the greatness of America.

I suppose the catalyst for me was reading Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago when it first came out.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at September 06, 2021 06:31 PM (/U27+)

188 Growing up in IL and seeing the Daley machine's corruption. Also reading about this in Mike Royko's columns in the Trib. Added to that was Rush.

Posted by: Muad'dib at September 06, 2021 06:32 PM (RrtlF)

189 "what made you a conservative?"

Courses in economics, finance.
Becoming a home owner.
Witnessing the decay of western civ.

Posted by: gp's Dark Energy Acceleration at September 06, 2021 06:32 PM (qpX6U)

190 I used to listen to mom and dad talk politics when I was a wee one. He was a catholic dem, she a lutheran rep. Didn't really pay much attention until I overheard mom talking about Mao, and then when abortion passed and I asked what that was. She told me in simple terms.

I've always thought I was normal. There is evil in the world. Carter was an abomination. My first vote was for Reagan. The Thomas hearings were the final straw that made me staunch.

Posted by: Infidel at September 06, 2021 06:32 PM (Kx3kq)

191 I can still be a bit of a bleeding heart in some regards. A bleeding heart right-winger. If such a thing could ever exist here I stand.
Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 06:27 PM (1Yy3c)

What issues are you bleeding-heart about? If you don't mind sharing.

Posted by: Jordan61 at September 06, 2021 06:32 PM (hP4QN)

192 I remember watching "Family Ties" in the 1980s, and thinking Alex P. Keaton was my kind of guy. That was not the point, of course. He was not supposed to have that effect. But for me, that is exactly what happened.

Posted by: Scanner Dan at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (TllQo)

193 For the ladies here, what's the consensus that made you be on the right? Family or peers?

I'll confess, my greatest fear in life, pretty much my only fear, is my daughter becoming a leftist and hating me like all these girls do on twitter. I think maybe, probably their fathers suck but this world sure does screw up young women.
Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (ZOfsH)
********
Definitely family. And because of my family values I was never afraid to stand up for what I believed in.
My parents made me strong and I was never afraid of peer pressure. I never backed down, if you couldn't handle it then don't be my friend.

Posted by: redridinghood at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (NpAcC)

194 I've been conservative my whole life because my parents raised my right.
Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 05:58

Same here Duke. I remember going to a party after the election of 1960 because my Mom worked to elect Nixon. In 64 my Dad had an AuH2o lawn sign in our very Democratic neighborhood, he had balls.

Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (55Qr6)

195 Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch :

I've been wondering how you and yours have been, so I am very happy to see you on the thread. Hope all is well at Casa Gushka!!

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (JrN/x)

196 The book that really opened my eyes to the reality of the left was, "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich."

When I first read it, I realized the methods used by Hitler to attain power were baked into the leftist playbook.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (2SdPm) at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (2SdPm)

197 The example of all the leftists that i have watched ruin their lives being on the dole. Death, addiction, poverty, over and over have made it easy to reject that life. Confirmed to me i had made better choices and developed a better character. Then disability hit me young. (40) now a decade later I'm sure being conservative had saved my life. If i were a left-wing nut i don't know how i would have coped. Found meaning in life other than the self destruction that I've seen in leftists. Although i hate that ssdi has been my safety net.still conservative though.

Posted by: USNtakim deplorable still. at September 06, 2021 06:34 PM (0OmEj)

198 Laughing to myself and seeing how out of place I am most places, as I am here. How could you ever be non conservative in the definition post 1930?

Posted by: Too Bad Costa Rica Sucks at September 06, 2021 06:34 PM (oWBc3)

199 Jimmy Carter. Four years of his nincompoopery, including his assuring us there was nothing to worry about regarding Soviet troops in Cuba because the Soviets "assured" him that they weren't for aggressive purposes(!) converted me. Plus of course his jackassy handling of the Hostage crisis. Plus I started noticing Democrats despised the Space Program. How "forward thinking" was that? Plus noticing how enthralled the "compassionate" Democrats were with abortion. Went into ROTC when I was 18 as a conservative youthful rebellion against my parents' liberal values. Voted for Reagan in '80, at age 20.

Posted by: JoeofPA at September 06, 2021 06:34 PM (CExkJ)

200 "I do not think the old labels fit the current moment. There is only this:

Those who wish for Freedom.

Those who want Control.

There is nothing else.

Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (csEWM) "

this !

Posted by: sock_rat_eez (YjYuE) at September 06, 2021 06:35 PM (Seiya)

201 Gushie!

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:35 PM (bSf8L)

202 this !

Posted by: sock_rat_eez (YjYuE) at September 06, 2021 06:35 PM (Seiya)

X2 and this.

I... am a revolutionary.

It's not a second American civil war. It's a second American revolution. Same principles, new people.

Posted by: Hawkpilot at September 06, 2021 06:29 PM (DMpoA)

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 06:36 PM (KnJdm)

203 My grand Uncle was held as a POW in Siberia for being shot down over russian occupied Germany in WWII and i think he was held there 20 years. My family were definitely not socialism loving jews after he came back. Not before either though. we were weird i guess

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:36 PM (ywuPa)

204 The leftist at foundation believes that life should be "fair". This word has multiple meanings depending on who's talking and depending on the circumstances but basically if something makes you unhappy or you can't get what you want then it's "unfair".

Like Racism is now anything/action is anything that isn't "fair" to those of other colors and a racist is anyone who disagrees with that definition and argues their position.

Me I've long understood/seen that the Universe is not fair. It is chock full of entropy. It began with the Big Bang (or whatever created the universe and the universe had to be created or at some time began to decay). Everything loses energy. Everything. Billion year old suns will die eventually. Even if it takes a real long time, it is not infinity or forever.

Thus the universe is not fair as fairness would require that nothing lose energy that all things would continue in existence and all existence would be filled with positive circumstances which would require an energy input or the lack of entropy.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 06:36 PM (nzLi4)

205 In 64 my Dad had an AuH2o lawn sign in our very Democratic neighborhood, he had balls.
Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (55Qr6)

------------

What a great sign. And, sadly, it would be completely over the head of most people, these days.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (2SdPm) at September 06, 2021 06:36 PM (2SdPm)

206 Growing up, from the age of 5 or so, with a solid and fairly comprehensive knowledge of the Bible and then, at 19....

-----

...Rush. No more to say.
Posted by: RustyG

Posted by: Taqiyyologist, Rickrolled by Jesus at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (OssQ4)

207 Delusions of grandeur is hard to overcome....like dating a virgin.

Posted by: Humphreyrobot at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (5sh7B)

208 I was always a conservative, I just didn't know it.

The first person I heard articulating everything I know to be true was Rush. I then read everything I could get my hands on. God and Man at Yale, conscience of a conservative, Thomas Sowell.

My family owned a small business and my husband and I started a business. That really helps.

Posted by: CaliGirl at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (IJ9BR)

209
Another aspect for me was cultural. In the late 60s and early 70s I despised the counterculture. I hated the teachers I had who were hippy-dippy. I didn't like rock and didn't watch much TV.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (/U27+)

210 For the ladies here, what's the consensus that made you be on the right? Family or peers?
___

My mom.

Didn't want to be anything like her.

Posted by: SMH - The War has been won, only the battles remain, as usual at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (G0h3n)

211 I've always been conservative, it runs in the clan. Our family has had a tradition of service dating back to the Revolutionary War. We span the Branches and the service runs from one and done to a career.

Nothing about my upbringing would point to me being liberal, I guess.

Posted by: irongrampa at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (KATBx)

212 I've been wondering how you and yours have been, so I am very happy to see you on the thread. Hope all is well at Casa Gushka!!
Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (JrN/x)

OMG MOKI!!!!

TAMMI!!!!!

I have been better but things are back on the upswing. i was in the previous thread. Health family and legal issues made life hard but thats clearing up now. I got lottery Tickets, did you?

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ywuPa)

213 When I started listening to Rush in the early 90s it solidified what I already knew. He was the first person I heard that would put it into words. His style put me off at first and I never did agreed with everything he said, but I suppose that before that I never considered myself to be Conservative, just able to think for myself.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (Tnijr)

214 >>> 159 Even in my more liberal years, I was always fiercely patriotic. The bilious hatred of the Left for America was puzzling and infuriating to Young Eris -- "then why don't you LEAVE?!?". People with nothing but the clothes on their backs escape hard lives to come here. Why don't you, with your education and funds, start over somewhere else?
Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (Dc2NZ)

Because they know, whether or not they admit it, that they need the icky Jesusland flyover types to do all the real work that feeds, clothes and shelters them.

(iirc our Congresscritters managed to exert themselves just enough during... the first bush term ?? to pass a law that strips emigrants of their assets before they can leave - but that still leaves education and experience)

Posted by: Helena Handbasket at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ACi07)

215
Nothing about my upbringing would point to me being liberal, I guess.
Posted by: irongrampa at S

Fist bump, my family served also and are still serving today. I worry for them.

Posted by: CaliGirl at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (IJ9BR)

216 I remember watching "Family Ties" in the 1980s, and thinking Alex P. Keaton was my kind of guy. That was not the point, of course. He was not supposed to have that effect. But for me, that is exactly what happened.
Posted by: Scanner Dan at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (TllQo)

Archie Bunker conservatized more casual viewers than anyone else on TV. Probably ate Carroll O'Connor alive knowing that, but since he made a TV ad for Ted Fucking Kennedy for president: good.

Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ghoDT)

217 I've always been conservative, it runs in the clan. Our family has had a tradition of service dating back to the Revolutionary War. We span the Branches and the service runs from one and done to a career.

Nothing about my upbringing would point to me being liberal, I guess.

Posted by: irongrampa at September 06, 2021 06:37 PM (KATBx)

Nice. Same here, except dating to roughly post CW1. And I am conflicted about whether I could be supportive of spawn military service.

Posted by: flounder at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (KnJdm)

218 I think I naturally arrived at this perspective because nothing in my life came easy. I struggled through school, worked in places where rewards came from sustained effort and hard work. I also made mistakes along the way and tried to learn from them. Yes basic graduate from the school of hard knocks.

Posted by: Honda at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (R7LyT)

219 What Made You A Conservative?

An abusive leftist fianc�. I prayed he would change, but I knew he never would. His politics informed his relationships - I was essentially worthless to him because I was a Christian and believed in the rule of law, which was officious to him. Yet he wanted to marry me. I couldn't figure it out, but I knew that the abuse would only get worse.

God was (and is) good and brought Mr. Moki into my life. The Bible states that married people should be equally yoked. I take it to mean both faith and politics.

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (JrN/x)

220 Why or how am I a conservative. Starts with 12 years of public schooling and a self identified sense of fairness.

Later, at work during the Clinton-Lewinsky trial, a coworker asked me what I thought of the whole thing. I told him it's what happens when white trash gets power and money. He didn't try to talk politics with me again...

Posted by: Rosasharn at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (PzBTm)

221 When I was in high school I had some hippy teachers (all men, sideburns, big lapels, paisley, bell bottoms, hair over ears).
THEY were the ones who made me read "Animal Farm", "1984", "Brave New World" and others.
Required reading.
I thank them for that.

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (aAP3z)

222 I was probably fairly left wing in high school, and I used to argue on the internet, mirc, MySpace, etc. The online chess forum I spent all my time in had a politics channel as well. I found myself unable to come up with moral justification for abortion when I was pressed on it, and changed my opinion. I was always "right wing" though when it came to antiquated notions like "working hard" and "personal responsibility" which are out of vogue in the ruling classes these days

Posted by: Pudding Head at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (S4Q9r)

223 I have been better but things are back on the upswing. i was in the previous thread. Health family and legal issues made life hard but thats clearing up now. I got lottery Tickets, did you?
Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties

Gushka! Nice to see you! I hope you are on the mend in every way.

Posted by: CaliGirl at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (IJ9BR)

224 I think I was always "conservative" temperamentally (using the term loosely, not as a movement).

But politically, where I stood has changed as time goes by.

70s - just a kid, didn't know didn't care
80s - Reagan Democrat
mid 90s to mid '00s - think tank conservative (shudder)
10s - increasingly disillusioned
Today - fuck it

Posted by: Hands at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (786Ro)

225 Tammy, you didn't offend me. My mother lived through the Nazi occupation. She had a hard life in some ways.
She lost her only brother to war, she didn't want to lose her only son. She perceived the Democrats as the party that was against war.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 06:41 PM (xeTfp)

226 Since the left is very selective about their science the idea of things decaying or changing state are anathema to them.

This especially goes for things human. They somehow think a bunch of animals will somehow be able to behave better than any other similar animals have ever acted in all of known history.

Since this is not possible the left has to come up with answers for this disparity and to correct the trend. This always causes conflict that eventually will lead to injury and death for all concerned at some point. Where at that point the whole thing starts all over again. You can't convince the left of any of this and so around the merry go round we go. Under different labels, different participants but it always winds up with most people dead and living like their long ago ancestors who lived in huts and trapped animals and wore animal skins. I don't know how to stop it other than the poisoning of all leftists once they reveal themselves as being one. But that has problems of it's own. And so we're stuck on this merry go round.

Try to enjoy the ride. It doesn't last all that long for most people.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 06:41 PM (nzLi4)

227 I told him it's what happens when white trash gets power and money.

I can confirm this, just make me president and see.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (SchxB)

228 I don't think I've ever been on the left, opinion-wise.
Posted by: BeckoningChasm

Same. Everything I experienced in life only solidified my belief. Even in my 20s as I fell away from the Lord, and hung with a very tie-dyed and patchouli-scented crowd, I always knew they, although my friends at the time, were not my people.

Posted by: Taqiyyologist, Rickrolled by Jesus at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (OssQ4)

229 For the ladies here, what's the consensus that made you be on the right? Family or peers?
---

I don't know if there's a consensus -- we're individuals.

I think the cultural influence of older parents from the Depression/WWII generation made me a bit out of sync with the crapulous decades of my youth.

Honestly, books had the biggest influence! Buckley, history, and SF.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (Dc2NZ)

230 Later, at work during the Clinton-Lewinsky trial, a coworker asked me what I thought of the whole thing. I told him it's what happens when white trash gets power and money. He didn't try to talk politics with me again...
Posted by: Rosasharn at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (PzBTm)

I'm still incredulous at how many people obvious lowlife trash like Slick conned.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (y7DUB)

231 reading about this in Mike Royko's columns in the Trib
--------------
He was great from his days at the Daily News. Met him a few times at the leather shop I worked at and at Billy Goats Tavern. Spicy fvcker.

Posted by: dartist at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (+ya+t)

232 168 David Horowitz has discussed at some length his conversion from a red diaper baby to a conservative.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (F0YaR)

Horowitz started out as a foreign policy/fiscal conservative, and I'm not even sure of how fiscal the "fiscal" part actually was. But I think he's growing in office, and the last time I watched one of his YouTube videos, he said he had become pro-life. Which cheered me.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (oOHrl)

233 Spent my 4 years of military under Jimmy, wasn't best of times then.

Posted by: Skip at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (2JoB8)

234
I have been better but things are back on the upswing. i was in the previous thread. Health family and legal issues made life hard but thats clearing up now. I got lottery Tickets, did you?
Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ywuPa)

{{{Gushka!!!}}}} {{{Tammi}}} Man, this is a banner day!!!

I hear you on the health and family stuff. I'm so sorry ab out legal issues but I hope the clearing up means that things are resolved and you won't have to deal with it much longer! I saw the jackpot on some feed and thought, "I could do some serious damage at Costco with that kind of dough.!"

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (JrN/x)

235 I really think my Grandfathers who i worshipped sort of indoctrinated me. as a small child i fell asleep to the "Mc Lachlan Group" "Wall Street Week In Review" and "Firing line" I thought Jeanne Kirkpatrik and William F buckley were rock stars. I wonder what they would think of this lot now?

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (ywuPa)

236 "...I think showing them kindness is more important in the early stages than discussing politics because, as the saying goes, before they care what you think, they first must think that you care."

I'm more than happy to admit someone like Glenn Greenwald into the fold - even though we probably wouldn't agree on much - than re-admit someone like Andrew Sullivan. NeverTrumpers can stay in the outer darkness.

Posted by: Darrell Harris at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (mdjgu)

237 Honestly, books had the biggest influence!
___

The Bible and SF for me.

Posted by: SMH - The War has been won, only the battles remain, as usual at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (G0h3n)

238 Better Country" and Sowell's "Visions of the Annointed" (recommended by Rush IIRC).
Posted by: Lrrr at Septemb

Vision of the anointed is an excellent book. I love Sowell.

Posted by: CaliGirl at September 06, 2021 06:44 PM (IJ9BR)

239 The first presidential election I was eligible to vote was 1972 Nixon/McGovern. I was a freshman in college and registered Democrat. Despite being opposed to the Viet Nam war, I just couldn't go for McGovern. His policies were too far left to suit me.

I voted for Nixon and changed my registration to small "i" independent. I gradually became more conservative as I got older; but never a Republican.

Posted by: jix at September 06, 2021 06:44 PM (DU7iZ)

240 >>NPR edited out the end of a sentence in a way that completely altered its meaning. It wasn't a natural place to make the edit either. They did it on purpose to make Newt look bad to their audience. I could never look at anything the same way after that.

THIS!
When I lived in the DC area I started listening to CSPAN radio during my commute. I would hear unedited seeches, hearings, etc.. Then I;d flip on the evening news and see how the media always took statements out of context in order to mischaracterize what a Republican said, or they would only show a clip of the one obnoxious grandstaning Democrat at a hearing instead of any of the interesting questions/answers from whoever was testifying.

Once you see the wizard behind the curtain with regards to the media you can see the narrative buidin, the deliberate choices of what is covered vs. ignored.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 06, 2021 06:44 PM (bDqIh)

241 When I was around 30 I was part of an author-focused fan mailing list that routinely got diverted into political flame wars.
I had made numerous disparaging remarks about the Constitution. Then said author challenged me to read The Federalist.
I considered myself rather well educated about history and political issues, so I took it as a challenge to prove how much mockery was really deserved, and started reading expecting to tear it about chapter by chapter.
Instead I was impressed by how much history was cited over and over. History I knew. Or at least thought I knew.
Around 2/3rds of the way through I was a conservative, even if I was not fully prepared to accept it. I have just gotten more conservative since then.

Posted by: Sam at September 06, 2021 06:44 PM (ohyxL)

242 I had a great teacher in high school who taught "History of Isms" and she was the first to talk about the real scale of "Liberty vs Statism" and not "Right vs Left".

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:45 PM (Dc2NZ)

243 I saw the jackpot on some feed and thought, "I could do some serious damage at Costco with that kind of dough.!"
Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (JrN/x)

yup.

My first thought was "I could train several generations of colts with that kind of money and buy a HELL of a farm!"

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:45 PM (ywuPa)

244 Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 06:41 PM (xeTfp)

There should always be people who are anti-war, even if they are dead wrong. War is a terrible thing. Necessary at times, and I believe some people thrive on it and live for it, and are made for it, but I am always glad that there are those who just cannot stomach it.

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:45 PM (bSf8L)

245 Those of you who can read?

In my youth, I had a bumper sticker that read "Illiterate? Write for free help"

I had more than one person ask seriously where to write.

Posted by: Duncanthrax at September 06, 2021 06:46 PM (a3Q+t)

246 I saw the jackpot on some feed and thought, "I could do some serious damage at Costco with that kind of dough.!"
Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (JrN/x)

yup.

My first thought was "I could train several generations of colts with that kind of money and buy a HELL of a farm!"

I must be short sighted. All I want to do is pay my debts and tell the world to go f itself.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 06:46 PM (SchxB)

247 There should always be people who are anti-war, even if they are dead wrong. War is a terrible thing. Necessary at times, and I believe some people thrive on it and live for it, and are made for it, but I am always glad that there are those who just cannot stomach it.
Posted by: Tammy al-Thor
___

You'd be surprised how many veterans become anti-war...especially nowadays.

Posted by: SMH - The War has been won, only the battles remain, as usual at September 06, 2021 06:47 PM (G0h3n)

248 I was a 'Leftard' of practicality. In New Orleans, the only thing anyone at City Hall looked at when you had to see 'em about getting a problem taken care of was whether the letter behind your name was a 'D'. I kept it as a 'D' until the CommuCrat PahTAY! decided to put the Farmer of EarthNuts up as its 'candidate' - then I switched to Republican and stayed there until GHWB ascended after the decampment of Ronaldus The Magnusicat, after which I declared as a Non-Affiliated Independent Conservative. That was an official category on the form in Jefferson Parish, LA. I thought I could do the same when I moved to Memphis after Katrina, but noooo ... so, I'm back to being a Depublican again (remember, they only let us think we have two parties - it's actually only a UniParty).

Posted by: Dr_No at September 06, 2021 06:48 PM (mu5GU)

249 Moki!

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:48 PM (bSf8L)

250 I thought I was a lefty but it turns out I was just going with the flow from being in college. The left pick away at conservatives a little at a time...constantly.

Then I got a real job and started paying taxes. then I bought a house. Then I got married. Then we had kids. I wasn't interested in politics until 9/11/2001. It was at that point I realized that liberals hated my guts without even knowing me. Because I live in Oregon, I don't advertise the fact that I am a conservative. I do know that outside of Portland, Salem and Eugene, the state is pretty conservative. As crazy as this state may sound to outsiders, the liberal governor usually only wins by about 6,000 votes each year.

Posted by: Lemmiwinks at September 06, 2021 06:48 PM (h1jJh)

251 What made me a conservative?

Understanding that if you want something, you have to earn it, not be gifted it.

Fighting in Desert Storm after being recalled to the Army after earning my college tuition by enlisting.

Fighting with college "professors" (who generally profess in nothing more than pure bullshit) on an almost daily basis.

Fighting with "teachers" who tried to indoctrinate my daughter with leftist nonsense on an almost daily basis.

That's what made me a conservative.

Posted by: jackcoke at September 06, 2021 06:48 PM (xxJ+H)

252
I must be short sighted. All I want to do is pay my debts and tell the world to go f itself.
Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at

That's the reason for Costco - stock up, hunker down.

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (JrN/x)

253 when young, with no experience to tell me otherwise, i thought my idealism was truth, which is the basis of most liberal ideology.

as i got older i gained experience and so discovered reality, verifiable truth.

i was always under the impression that (at least in America) my travels were typical for probably 95% of those that changed (natural progression) from liberal to conservative beliefs. reading the comments, didn't see it mentioned once so guess not : )

Posted by: uglykidmoe at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (yOPeD)

254 Gushka! Nice to see you! I hope you are on the mend in every way.
Posted by: CaliGirl at September 06, 2021 06:40 PM (IJ9BR)

well enough to ride my Goodie colt. so i feel blessed indeed. the other stuff will be chronic for a while. I would like to win the lottery so i could get married and forget the other unpleasantness, But a really nice young stallion, and three more under sadddle and going well has really improved my life. Last i was posting here i was looking at spinal surgery and hoping i would be independent afterwards. Now I am riding and very much my own girl

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (ywuPa)

255 Nixon got us out of Viet Nam.

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (aAP3z)

256 I was apolitical until I was about 23. Then Reagan was up for re-election, and we were on a Med Cruise, where me and my best buddy were trying to pick up on two Danish Girls in a bar.

We'd had a few, and started talking politics, when one of them kicked me under the table... and said 'you can't talk about your President that way!'... I said 'of course I can, I'm an American'.... whole thing really brought home the point that us Americans WERE very different.

But I became cynical a bit later when Reagan threw us under the bus in Lebanon...

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (oHd/0)

257 Posted by: SMH - The War has been won, only the battles remain, as usual at September 06, 2021 06:47 PM (G0h3n)

No, I absolutely get it. Especially nowadays, when they serve under such poor excuses for leaders.

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:50 PM (bSf8L)

258 Birth. Not kidding. I was born after Roe v Wade, and my mom was offered an abortion. She declined, obviously, but the story (she and my dad had two more after and the same thing was offered for them) affected me. In the 1990s, all the dems I knew were "pro-choice." I was a one-issue voter until I got out of college and formed better arguments for the other facets of "conservatism." I still prefer Classical Liberal, though.

Posted by: Catherine -who generally doesn't curse. at September 06, 2021 06:50 PM (IrCgw)

259
I'm still trying to discern the difference between the main talking points of the Democrat Party and the Chinese Communist Party.

Guess that makes me a conservative.
But most definitely NOT a Republican.

Just call me a man with no political affiliation. I can live with that.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 06:51 PM (sy5kK)

260 Tammi, how are things??

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:51 PM (JrN/x)

261 The first presidential race I followed in the paper was Nixon-McGovern. I remember that Nixon, love him or hate him, was fairly consistent, whereas McGovern' s stance changed each speech he gave. I asked my dad, why can't McGovern remember from one day to the next what he's said? My Dad, a very smart man who always had an answer for questions from his children just didn't have an answer for that.

Posted by: Rosasharn at September 06, 2021 06:51 PM (PzBTm)

262 I've long commented that the excerpt from Steven Pressfield's book Tides of War of Lysander's speech to the Spartans sums up the difference between Liberals and Conservatives to me.

I'll sub conservative and liberal for Spartan and Athenian and post just a snippet.

Conservatives are courageous but not bold. Liberals are bold but not courageous. Liberals do not fear God ; they seek to be God. Liberals reject modesty and self effacement. Boldness is a mighty engine but there is a limit. Boldness is impatient. Courage is long suffering. Boldness cannot endure hardship or delay ; it is ravenous and it must feed on victory or it dies. The bold man is prideful, brazen ambitious. The brave man calm, god fearing ,steady. The bold man seeks to divide; he wants his own and will shoulder his brother aside to loot it. The brave man unites. He succeed his fellow, knowing that what belongs to the commonwealth belongs to him as well.

In troubled times the bold man flails about in effeminate anguish, seeking to draw his neighbors into his misfortune, for he has no strength of character to fall back outings other than to drag others down to his own state of wickedness.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 06:51 PM (2DOZq)

263 Nothing about my upbringing would point to me being liberal, I guess.

Same here, going back three generations. In my 20s, I was in a 'question everything' mode. I held my beliefs up to the light, comparing them to the basic tenants of liberalism and found the later to be flawed and hypocritical. I think the biggest influence Rush had on me was his consistent exposure of the left's unctuousness. Rest in peace, El Rushbo. Miss ya bigly.

Posted by: Notorious BFD at September 06, 2021 06:52 PM (Xrfse)

264 You'd be surprised how many veterans become anti-war...especially nowadays.
Posted by: SMH - The War has been won, only the battles remain, as usual at September 06, 2021 06:47 PM (G0h3n)

I'd have no problem with war, if our government would get the hell out of the way, and let us win it.

Then actually FIX things, instead of betraying us, by making all of our work meaningless via politics.

I'm absolutely against non ending wars, with no clear objective...

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 06:52 PM (oHd/0)

265 Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 06:51 PM (JrN/x)

Everything is fine, thank you! You and yours?

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:52 PM (bSf8L)

266 >>> I remember watching "Family Ties" in the 1980s, and thinking Alex P. Keaton was my kind of guy. That was not the point, of course. He was not supposed to have that effect. But for me, that is exactly what happened.
Posted by: Scanner Dan at September 06, 2021 06:33 PM (TllQo)

Archie Bunker conservatized more casual viewers than anyone else on TV. Probably ate Carroll O'Connor alive knowing that, but since he made a TV ad for Ted Fucking Kennedy for president: good.
Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ghoDT)

Leftists suck at making righty antagonists. It either comes off as a laughable projection of their own desires or backfires completely and people see the creator's designated bad guy as the rightful good.

Posted by: Rorschach at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (ZOfsH)

267 I was born into a conservative family. My first vote was for Reagan. Rush Limbaugh was on our radio every day. That said, I have a sibling who is a stereotypical limousine liberal - sneering at the rest of us "right wing" rubes, so upbringing doesn't always matter. I remember as a pre-teen lauding some singer - don't remember who - and my dad saying, "Oh, yes, getting rich while singing how great it is to be poor." That always stuck with me & was the beginning of my awareness of how manipulative the entertainment industry & media are. What pushed me farther right was the increasing venom from the left over any point of disagreement, however minor. And guns.

Posted by: Hoplite Housewife at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (R1NI2)

268 My parents were both social workers and committed socialists. When I was 13, they took the family on a 3-month tour of Europe, hoping to show us the advantages of socialism. When I saw the abject poverty and the miasma of fear in East Germany and Yugoslavia compared to West Germany and Greece, I was convinced.

Posted by: Craig at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (JIRDZ)

269 255 Nixon got us out of Viet Nam.
Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:49 PM (aAP3z)

Sealed the deal for me also, even though I was only 14 or so. Have never voted for a 'D'. Never will.

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (7SwmH)

270 The course autocorrect gets me a couple of times.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (2DOZq)

271 Parents were basically conservative every 4 years for presidential elections but no real interest or involvement in politics otherwise. I was liberal in high school and early married life. Then had 2 children in the 80s and started to become conservative. Became a Catholic, the old school kind not the hippie dippie felt banners and kumbaya kind. Finally, read Witness by Whittaker Chambers.

Posted by: MammaB at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (KbHMJ)

272 After I gadiated from Dental School I did a residency in Newark NJ. THAT opened my eyes wide. By then I had already spent 2 summers in Israel at The Dental School In Jerusalem and walked all over Israel from the Sinai to the Golan. And THAT also turned me into a rock hard Conservative and Zionist.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (Irn0L)

273 She lost her only brother to war, she didn't want to lose her only son. She perceived the Democrats as the party that was against war.
Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 06:41 PM (xeTfp)
----------------

Lessee ... WWI ... Woodrow Wilson "kept us out of peace"

WWII - FDR

Korean War - Truman

Vietnam War - El BJ

A bunch of later brush fire wars - pretty much evenly split, I'd say.

Posted by: Deplorable Jay Guevara at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (YqDXo)

274 I was a Chomsky acolyte as a kid because my older siblings were, but also a bit of a contradiction as I'd always loved America and thought the Left did too. If my awakening to conservatism as a lad had a crystallizing moment it was during the 1980 campaign watching Reagan give a speech at the Statue of Liberty with his sleeves rolled up. I believed Jimmy Carter to be a loathsome, petty, vicious creature who had caused my family financial ruin and I just wanted to see him destroyed, but in that moment I saw Reagan as not just a politician who could defeat Carter but as a truly honest and possibly magnificent patriot.

Posted by: Ordinary American at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (H8QX8)

275 Growing up in a trailer park on the outskirts of the People's Republic of Chapel Hill. I learned early that the "progressive" left wanted kids like me to be their poster child, but not their friend.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 06:54 PM (byYVH)

276 I actually wish I understood their thinking better so I could figure out how to more effectively win over the more squishy ones.

I think this is where the tire iron enters the scene.

Posted by: t-bird at September 06, 2021 06:54 PM (lIIT7)

277 Hm. In my case, I grew up in a conservative family, but for some reason I'm naturally rebellious. So, started smoking pot and drinking in high school, adopted hippie and radical attitudes, then went to college and took a hard left. Bleeding heart, felt that people shouldn't suffer for their circumstances, it's the system's fault, America is a bully, blahblahblah.

So, college made me a leftist. In my late thirties, I went back to college, to study some accounting and economics. Econ 101 opened my eyes. I realized that economics describes what people do--not what they "should do (according to leftists), and that if I was wrong about that, I was probably wrong about everything else, too.

Posted by: April -- dash my lace wigs! at September 06, 2021 06:54 PM (OX9vb)

278 I'm more than happy to admit someone like Glenn Greenwald into the fold - even though we probably wouldn't agree on much - than re-admit someone like Andrew Sullivan. NeverTrumpers can stay in the outer darkness.

Posted by: Darrell Harris at September 06, 2021 06:43 PM (mdjgu)

Glenn is right on one, and only one, issue: the necessity of dismantling the surveillance state. But it's the most important issue facing our country today right now, so we can work with him.

I ignored him for years because I thought he was a self-aggrandizing dick, and he was, which was why he was a target for ridicule on this blog a lot, but he now seems to have gotten over that.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 06:54 PM (oOHrl)

279 My IQ.

Posted by: Eric at September 06, 2021 06:55 PM (a2F+C)

280 9/11, but mostly the entire fictional world the media and politicians continue to construct while they bemoan "misinformation" (that they themselves are the primary cause of, frankly). No wonder things are so fucked up.

Posted by: Gaff at September 06, 2021 06:55 PM (VtiCX)

281 I'm more like the original poster. I was always conservative. The entire thought pattern of the left just does not fit my world view in any way at all.

Posted by: astonerii at September 06, 2021 06:55 PM (B9VxK)

282 Even 45 years ago lefties seemed miserable.

Posted by: Brother Northernlurker just another guy at September 06, 2021 06:56 PM (cSyAR)

283 I was and still am mostly straight laced and a rule followed. I think that lead me to being a conservative.

Posted by: InCali at September 06, 2021 06:56 PM (ov5G+)

284 Don't get me wrong, I've always hated commies.
Even when I was in high school.
You gonna send me kill some, do it 90 miles away where the damn supply lines are shorter.
I'd fight for free Cuba this very day. I would supply my own weapons and transportation.
And do it for no pay whatsoever.
I'd even pay YOU for the privilege.

Posted by: cromulent curmudgeon at September 06, 2021 06:57 PM (aAP3z)

285 My Dad put an AuH20 sticker on my bike basket when I was a young girl.

Posted by: Debby Doberman Schultz at September 06, 2021 06:57 PM (a4EWo)

286 Yeah that post is a classic. I don't have any defining moment that made me a conservative. I blame my mind, I think just how I've seen the world operate and how I want it to be and that's just conservative.

Posted by: Draki at September 06, 2021 06:57 PM (hwhW9)

287 250 I thought I was a lefty but it turns out I was just going with the flow from being in college. The left pick away at conservatives a little at a time...constantly.
***********

I do believe in the adage "if you're 20 and not liberal, you have no heart, but if your are 30 and not a conservative, you have no brain", is still apt.

Because everyone at 20 is pretty effing stupid. I sure was. And around the time I turned 30, was convinced that most of what I was taught the world was, was instead crap. Once one's eyes are open, there is no way to close them.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 06:57 PM (sy5kK)

288 Archie Bunker conservatized more casual viewers than anyone else on TV. Probably ate Carroll O'Connor alive knowing that, but since he made a TV ad for Ted Fucking Kennedy for president: good.
Posted by: hogmartin at September 06, 2021 06:39 PM (ghoDT)

I remember seeing "Archie Bunker For President" buttons at the Grant's Department Store in 1972.

Posted by: Hairyback Guy at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (R/m4+)

289 I was a hopeless waistoid living with my mom, painting the eyes on ducks in her ceramics shop when the only radio station I could get on her crappy AM radio started playing this new guy named Rush Limbaugh. I'm not saying it's directly related, but after I listened for a few weeks I quit smoking weed, started a computer repair business on the side, went back to Church and became a Ronald Regan style conservative. Rush was right.
Posted by: OleanderSalad at September 06, 2021 06:25 PM (qTq4x)
-------
I love this, right down to the painting the eyes on ceramic ducks thing. Good thing Rush started out on AM radio!

Posted by: bluebell at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (wyw4S)

290 I was never a leftist, but back in my 20s a liberal Ripon Society type Republican. When I finished school, I took a job as a legal clerical assistant for the NY Civil Liberties Union (I got it through an ad, not because of politics--I figured their money was just as good as anyone else's for the same work).

My experience there with (with a couple of very notable exceptions) a real bunch of leftwing assholes made me the rightwing reactionary I am today.

Posted by: 370H55V at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (UsbFe)

291 Expanding on all that, I always thought I was an independent thinker, but man...those radicals sucked me right in. I bought it all--hook, line, and sinker.

Watching this happen to my mother now, in her 80s. It's really alarming.

Posted by: April -- dash my lace wigs! at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (OX9vb)

292 I hate being lied to. This is the beginning of responsibility and conservative thought. It drives 90% of my politics.

My dad regularly went to pro-life marches. I am confident that his voting was a net negative on pro-life politics because he watched 2 hours of news a day. If you asked him who on TV was pro-life, I bet he would shrug and say about half. If I told him none, out of maybe 50 regular personalities, I doubt he would believe me.

Similarly he was very anti-war, and this attitude meant nothing. When Trump said "The Iraq war was a huge mistake" at the primary, most LIV NPCs never heard.

Posted by: BourbonChicken at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (ybIRR)

293 My Sensei, when I was a dumbass, dope smoking knucklehead kid in high school straightened me out. Then I saw what the Carter administration did to my parents, and then he fucked up the hostage rescue attempt. I never wanted to be associated with such stupidity. Then Reagn came along and that was all she wrote.

Posted by: CrotchetyOldJarhead at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (GI9K/)

294 Besides my 269 comment incidents like the below influenced me:

16 years old, first job as a bus-boy. As waitresses went off shift, they would deposit 15% or so of their tips into the busboy pool. End of evening, 18 year old cashier 'K' would divide tips evenly among the busboys. Turns out 'K' was shorting the younger guys like me who lived at home because 'we didn't need the money as much' as the older ones who were on their own......

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 06:58 PM (7SwmH)

295 Her brother, predictably refused. ... and that little boy's name was Oregon Muse.

Now you know the rest of the story.

Posted by: zombie Paul Harvey at September 06, 2021 06:59 PM (UHVv4)

296 First off, I'm not a conservative. I, like 90% of the folks here, am a dyed in the wool moderate. And folks, that we may be called "conservative" shows how far the wheel has turned.

Posted by: Some Rat at September 06, 2021 06:59 PM (r1z5A)

297 Also once I saw the light, I never turned back. I read a lot, Winston Churchill was a favorite. And from early on, way before the terms RINO and JINO were coined I knew what they were. We used to call JINOs, "Self Hating Jews"

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 06:59 PM (Irn0L)

298 When I was 15, I spent 24 hours in a communist country. It was enough to convert me from a political agnostic (I was never left) to an avid anti-communist.

Posted by: Ankylus at September 06, 2021 06:59 PM (NqFTd)

299 I remember being chastised in high school for calling the NDP (New Democratic Party) Communists, which is basically accurate. Of course, the Dippers and unions, especially "public service" unions like, say, the teachers, are joined at the hip.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 06, 2021 07:00 PM (4olgK)

300 Started reading American Spectator in the late 70's when it was a broad sheet mag...wow, it was really pretty good. NR was okay, Buckley was all that really was okay, Sobran was nice...

I voted for Reagan in the first election I was eligible - and I have never voted for a Dem in my life and I was born and raised in the South....

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:00 PM (5iUNf)

301 I'm a nationalist because I want my country back that all my ancestors help build 350-400 years ago. I also want my people to not be replaced and genocided like they will be on the current course.
I want assets seized from the rootless internationals who have destroyed our country and its people the last 120 years, I want the resources returned to those they have targeted for destruction, I want them tried for sedition and treason and whatever Justice hands down to them and all of their little demons cast out of our country.
Anti Great Reset and Anti-GloboHomoPedo and Anti-Afrocentric Marxism (and all sub sets of Marxism from Feminism to Satanism).

Posted by: Widespread Pepe at September 06, 2021 07:01 PM (MSyE6)

302 High school, late 87 or 88.

I was (am) a contrarian and I'll argue for argument's sake.

We had to read the news in government class. After a week or two I was really confused. Why in the world would anyone be a Republican? They're evil, mean, racist, sexist, America-hating jerks (xenophobia and transphobia were not things, and homophobia was just becoming bad). Everyone hates them, I can't find a news article that says anything good about them.

I'M IN 100%!!!

Posted by: JB at September 06, 2021 07:02 PM (TO8Xm)

303 I was a Democrat until the 2008 primary. The open shenanigans to install Barack as candidate made me an independent.
Sarah Palin made me a Republican.
The HQ turned me into a conservative

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:02 PM (oEn12)

304 I read a lot, Winston Churchill was a favorite.

+1

Posted by: Notorious BFD at September 06, 2021 07:02 PM (Xrfse)

305 Because I live in Oregon, I don't advertise the fact that I am a conservative. I do know that outside of Portland, Salem and Eugene, the state is pretty conservative. As crazy as this state may sound to outsiders, the liberal governor usually only wins by about 6,000 votes each year.
Posted by: Lemmiwinks at September 06, 2021 06:48 PM (h1jJh)

6,000 votes. Heh.

Have you ever seen the Peanuts cartoon, where Lucy holds the football so Charlie Brown thinks that finally, this year he can finally kick it? That's what we do to conservatives. These stupid conservatives actually think their votes count.

Like we said, Heh.

Posted by: Dominion Voting Systems at September 06, 2021 07:03 PM (sy5kK)

306 >>He was not supposed to have that effect. But for me, that is exactly what happened.

It's funny how the icky conservative charaters in tv shows always end up being beloved, eh? They can effectively make you hate a conservative in the movies because it's ony a few hours, but in tv the designated cartoonish conservative such as A.P. Keaton, or more recently Alex Baldwin's Bill Donnehey on "30 Rock" or Nick Offerman's Ron Swanson on Parks and Rec become favorites.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 06, 2021 07:03 PM (bDqIh)

307 living in #Failifornia and having an IQ larger than my hat size.

Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:03 PM (+V9LB)

308 College

When I realized all this 'rebelling' that was going on around me was all because they had parent issues.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 06, 2021 07:04 PM (3798x)

309 9/11

Posted by: Max Power at September 06, 2021 07:04 PM (QCc6B)

310 Being gaslighted into giving save-the-planet talks as a fifth-grader and realizing a few years later that most of what I was being fed was BS.

School busing.

The Mayaguez.

The Carter administration though as others have noted in retrospect he looks pretty damn good compared to our most recent Democrats.

Posted by: JEM at September 06, 2021 07:05 PM (8erNz)

311 read a lot, Winston Churchill was a favorite.

+1
Posted by: Notorious BFD at September 06, 2021 07:02 PM (Xrfse)

Second only to Thucydides for quotes. Oscar Wilde comes in 3rd.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:05 PM (2DOZq)

312 I voted for Reagan in the first election I was eligible - and I have never voted for a Dem in my life and I was born and raised in the South....
Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:00 PM (5iUNf)

My mom was pretty upset when she found out about my politics...my Grandfather was the prosecuting attorney of Ft Smith, and later he was a state congressman, a dixiecrat..

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:05 PM (5iUNf)

313 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

314 This Canuck has always been pro-American. Always.

Posted by: N.L. Urker, the Phillips screwdriver of the gods at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (cSyAR)

315 Incidentally, I've met a number of former service members that are loyal Dems, AND are patriotic.

Though I suspect that pool is shrinking. I think at some point, you have to give up one or the other to keep your head from exploding. At least these days.

Influential authors? SF (esp. Heinlein, though he evolved too ya know) and Ayn Rand. But I read widely, and tried to fit it all into one pic. Impossible.

Leave Me The Fuck Alone. Yeah, that was me thru most of my adult life. I voted, but mainly to say fuck no to any tax increases -- ever. Gubmint will never have enough of your or my labors. Ever.

But I've come to realize that voting ain't enough.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (F0YaR)

316 Well I have perused the local Toyota dealership's used lot and settled on one that is within budget. A few others were contenders until I found three had the same airbag recall and one of the three also had a recall for stalling at high speed. Nope no way.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (3798x)

317 As noted, I don't really care what people do on their own time as long as it's consenting adults and not bothering other people. But I've always claimed this to be socially "permissive" rather than "liberal" because, being a millennial, I just never knew a time that liberalism wasn't dominated by authoritarian busybodies. Yeah, sure, supposedly there was a time before I was born that it was a do-what-thou-wilt thing. "Okay, boomer." But all I ever picked up on was the obsession with obedience and enforced compliance with arbitrary structures and various social experiments.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (UewuT)

318 I remember coming home on the school bus the day before the presidential election in 1968. A bunch of elementary school kids talking about it, basically we were all parroting our parents' opinions. They were all for Nixon. I was genuinely shocked because my family was voting for Humphrey (except my dad who went with George Wallace). This was on Long Island so not really a surprise that the Republican was the favorite, even with the kids.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (xeTfp)

319 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.
Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

Yup, Beluchi was inspiring.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (Irn0L)

320 Facts.

Posted by: Onlooker at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (Zkzfe)

321 Buckley was the only voice we really had but I couldn't stand him. I read some of Pat Buchanan's essays and saw him on the McLaughlin Report and thought he was great. He was something of an intellectual but had a direct, slashing style I admired.

Posted by: Ordinary American at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (H8QX8)

322 Oops Animal Farm not house. When I saw Animal House years later though that was a revelation too.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (Tnijr)

323 Great topic, been absolutely wonderful to read all the stories.

Posted by: Skip at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (2JoB8)

324 At the state level: Jerry Brown.

His Caltrans head Adriana Gianturco and CA state failure to build ANYTHING useful for two decades.

Posted by: JEM at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (8erNz)

325
Everything is fine, thank you! You and yours?
Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at September 06, 2021 06:52 PM (bSf8L)

Tough summer - illness, issues, but we are hanging in there!

Posted by: Moki at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (JrN/x)

326 @315

The internet told me Heinlein was a Democrat til he got rich.

Not that I care.

Posted by: JB at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (TO8Xm)

327 Leftists suck at making righty antagonists. It either comes off as a laughable projection of their own desires or backfires completely and people see the creator's designated bad guy as the rightful good.

Posted by: Rorschach at September 06, 2021 06:53 PM (ZOfsH)

Well, they do now. Back then, Norman Lear and Carroll O'Connor made Archie Bunker actually human. He would occasionally show tenderness towards Edith and Gloria and even win arguments with Meathead sometimes. Nowadays, they'd just write him as a 1-dimensional monster spouting slogans.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:10 PM (oOHrl)

328 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.
Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

-----------

Listen to this man. He's pre-law.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:11 PM (kTF2Z)

329 By the way, today's US Democrats aren't really like their parents or grandparents Democrats.

They ARE, however, useful idiots (Lenin's term) for the rat-bastard Communists that have taken over much of the governing structure. Somehow they don't make the connection that if this country continues to go the way it is, many of them are going down, too. Hard.

Today's Democrats are, for the most part, globalist anti-Constitutionalists. Blame their pathetic Union appendage-sucking teachers in urban areas for brainwashing their student's minds and censoring any truth that goes against their biased and false narrative.

Posted by: Dominion Voting Systems at September 06, 2021 07:11 PM (sy5kK)

330 313 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.
Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

Knowledge is Good.

Posted by: Emil Faber at September 06, 2021 07:11 PM (PiwSw)

331 the Leftards i am surrounded by here in Lost Angels do not think, so debate is impossible: they feel, and even worse, they *BELIEVE* in their credos...

for instance, the Legislature passed a few bills that will turn the real estate market on its ear, and lay waste to large swaths of SFH neighborhoods. it's a lead pipe cinch that Brylcreem will sign it, even though its so bad that even true believers in Berzerkley are against it.

if he does, we can take our lot, which currently has a ~1700 sq foot house on 10,200 sq ft lot, and build two 2250 sq ft homes, 500 of which is an ADU, and 2 separate JDUs of no more than 800 sq ft for a total of 6 rentals on one lot. and we don't need to plan for parking, because we're within `/2 mile of major bus lines. approval is all magisterial, by right, and NO ONE can appeal, or otherwise delay the project.

with luck, this will fund an immediate departure from what used to be Paradise on Earth, and let Herself retire, finally.

Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:12 PM (+V9LB)

332 Lesson to liberal moms: When a poor kid in your carpool begs you to drop her off at the mailboxes, please don't insist on driving her right up to the step of the trailer so the all doctors' kids in the car can gawk. There's nothing wrong with trailer life, especially if it puts you in a "good school district." I just didn't want to be a spectacle.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:12 PM (byYVH)

333 Buckley was the only voice we really had but I couldn't stand him. I read some of Pat Buchanan's essays and saw him on the McLaughlin Report and thought he was great. He was something of an intellectual but had a direct, slashing style I admired.
Posted by: Ordinary American at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (H8QX

Buchanan coined the phrase "economically illiterate" for liberals - the neocons had a fit - 'he's too nasty' they all mewled...fuck them.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:13 PM (5iUNf)

334 Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 07:12 PM (evE25)

I think you are pissing in the wrong pool

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:13 PM (Irn0L)

335 >>> I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.
Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

Napoleon: Did we give up when Mr. Jones attacked the farm?

Snowball: Uh, wasn't that Mr. Frederick?

Squealer: Forget it, he's rolling.

Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 07:13 PM (ZOfsH)

336 His Caltrans head Adriana Gianturco and CA state failure to build ANYTHING useful for two decades.

Posted by: JEM at September 06, 2021 07:08 PM (8erNz)
---
i had cheerfully forgotten about that stupid bint...

Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (+V9LB)

337 Apropos of nothing, my neighbors are having a deck party. It's been going on since late afternoon. It still cracks me up to see how the voice volume ratchets up as the booze flows. One gal sounds like she's yodeling through a Marshal stack. I'm guessing morning is gonna be kinda harsh for her. Heh.

Posted by: Notorious BFD at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (Xrfse)

338 Heinlein's first novel For Us, the Living is a very hard slog to read because RAH is beating the pulpit with his messages.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (3798x)

339 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about.
----

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (Dc2NZ)

340 Animal Farmhouse would have an entirely different outcome. Napoleon. Dead. Snowball.Dead. Old Major. DEAD.

Posted by: Boxer at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (Tnijr)

341 Oh they are restarting the trials at Gitmo. 2 weeks

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (Irn0L)

342 My dad grew up in a democrat blue collar union family in Staten Island, NY. I can still hear the arguments he would have with his dad about how the dems were frauds and not for the working man. I thank him every day (he passed way too young in 2004), for raising me right, to work hard, and good things will happen. Thus, I was naturally a conservative.

Posted by: Tofer732 at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (89kln)

343 327 Stopped being a conservative in the 1990s, when the Neo-cons became the cons. If "Conservatism" means globalism, endless wars, open borders, mass immigration, bad trade deals, and tax cuts for the rich - count me out.
Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 07:10 PM (evE25)

That was basically me in 2010. I thought Bush 2000 was a necessary evil to keep musloid fuckery from spilling over onto domestic soil, but wasn't super enthusiastic about Bush 2004 and by the time 2008 rolled around no fucks were given. Sure, King Barry sucks but whatever realpolitik the neocons had was long gone and they had morphed into whiny losers obsessed with the Cold War.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 07:15 PM (UewuT)

344 Conservatism" means globalism, endless wars, open borders, mass immigration, bad trade deals, and tax cuts for the rich - count me out.
Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 07:10 PM (evE25)

That's not what it means.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:15 PM (2DOZq)

345 i truly believe that a lack of consequences or a yearning for such as well as a large dollop of envy and a desire to manage ones betters, is at the base of many liberal impulses. they are fearful resentful people who dont like to pay for their mistakes and in a way i sympathize but i dont agree with them

Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (ywuPa)

346 So in a way i know emotionally where leftists come from because i saw it. but its not pretty, and it comes from a person wanting to be AS GOOD AS... without having to work as hard, or sacrifice anything.
Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 06:23 PM (ywuPa)

Gushka! Long time, no see. Hope all is well with you!

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (nq4Dd)

347 As a child I absorbed the idea America was the land of liberty, that we had fought to establish our liberty and had helped other nations defend their liberty, and it seemed obvious to me that this was the right side to be on.

I think that this IS the founding conservative ideal here in the land of liberty: to be on the side of liberty, and that is what is so horrifying about or now straight-up totalitarian communist Democrats. They are better-than-okay with stolen elections, so long as it is their side doing the stealing, with no concern at all that they have demolished one of our most important liberties (the liberty of the people to choose their leaders) and our most important protection for liberty (that if tyrants ever try to take over we can always use the ballot box to peacefully "throw the bums out").

If their 2020 election stealing sticks and gets cemented in place by further stolen elections we will from that point on be as unfree a people as the Russians under the USSR or the Chinese now under surveillance-state communism in China.

Posted by: Alec Rawls at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (wh9C3)

348 Thus, I was naturally a conservative.
Posted by: Tofer732 at September 06, 2021 07:14 PM (89kln)

He sounds like a great guy - he raised his family right,

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (5iUNf)

349 Done with M.A. & Commodus
For so reason season 2 is Julius Caesar

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:17 PM (oEn12)

350 I'm not anti-war at all. I am most opposite, but my limiting principle is simple. The ability to achieve good outcomes through war (look to both sides of the Korean DMZ if you need an example) is within a limited window of time, whereas the loss of blood and treasure accumulates mercilessly. So after 20 years I gradually became anti-war on practical grounds.

I hate the chickenhawk argument, it is only made by moral midgets.

Posted by: BourbonChicken at September 06, 2021 07:17 PM (ybIRR)

351 It aggravates me to no end how many sheep can't recognize the difference between a wolf and a sheepdog.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:18 PM (2DOZq)

352 off Dominion sock

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:18 PM (sy5kK)

353 I grew up 1.5 miles away from a SAC Base. Watching my friend's Dads get deployed to Viet Nam, rang the reality bell for me.

Posted by: Romeo13

My Dad retired from the Air Force in 1976. I remember talking to him about what he did in the service shortly after he retired. He said: "Well, I was ROTC and got an Aeronautical Engineering Degree in 3 years from St. Louis University, and then, fortunately, I washed out of flight school and ended up in the Titan II Missile program."

I said: "Why was it fortunate you washed out of flight school?"

His answer: "Most of the guys who made it through flight school in my class were killed in Vietnam."

Posted by: Sharkman at September 06, 2021 07:18 PM (UXEgP)

354 353 It aggravates me to no end how many sheep can't recognize the difference between a wolf and a sheepdog.
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:18 PM (2DOZq)

It may be our undoing.

Posted by: Ordinary American at September 06, 2021 07:19 PM (H8QX8)

355 Has there ever been a Government, that gave up power over its own people, WITHOUT either violence, or the viable threat of violence, being involved?
---
Pinochet?
Posted by: Lrrr at September 06, 2021 06:26 PM (jIL4c)

Speaking of Pinochet, I seem to remember one of the triggers for the crisis that led to Pinochet's overthrow of Allende was a truckers' strike. One can hope that the truckers' strike in Australia leads to a similar outcome.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 06, 2021 07:20 PM (nq4Dd)

356 A judge, in a few words, taught me to be self-sufficient and not complain.
I met with the judge in hopes he'd bend the child custody laws a bit so I could go to a different school. I stretched the truth and claimed that I would thrive at that school.
The judge asked, "In your school, is there a library?"
"Yes," I said.
He asked, "In the library, are there books?"
"Yes," I said - and knew where he was going.
He said, "That's all you need to thrive."
After that, I practically lived in the library. I felt that no matter what problem I faced, there was always a book with answers in the library. I just had to find it. That judge helped mature me quite a bit.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:20 PM (byYVH)

357 One gal sounds like she's yodeling through a Marshal stack
------------
Reminds me of a girl I knew in College

Posted by: BunkerintheBurbs at September 06, 2021 07:20 PM (s94di)

358 Conservatism" means globalism, endless wars, open borders, mass immigration, bad trade deals, and tax cuts for the rich - count me out.
Posted by: rcocean
----------

I think you mean that that is what it means to you.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 06, 2021 07:21 PM (ELgVT)

359 It aggravates me to no end how many sheep can't recognize the difference between a wolf and a sheepdog.

Well, the wolves are promising free shit, which does cloud the sheep's minds.

Posted by: Blanco Basura - moronhorde.com. Not insurgents, counterrevolutionaries. at September 06, 2021 07:21 PM (SchxB)

360 Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 07:10 PM (evE25)

Since you are obviously a raging Leftie, your posts are the opposite of the thread topic.

But when did that ever stop a Leftie from trying to hijack a conversation?

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:21 PM (sy5kK)

361 the Leftards i am surrounded by here in Lost Angels do not think, so debate is impossible: they feel, and even worse, they *BELIEVE* in their credos...
(snip bit about SB-9)
Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:12 PM (+V9LB)
---
they are all now having kittens over the bill "how did this happen?" "how can we stop it?" etc... (it's on Brylcreem's desk to be signed, possibly tomorrow.)

they see absolutely NO link between how they vote, and what comes out of Sacto. i know one clown who is sure "something MUST be done!" about our free range vagrants, but when you ask him how he's going to help the ones that aren't interested in the various services being offered, he says he refuses to believe that happens, and said so in a public meeting when i asked the question.

they voted to let "non-violent" criminals out of jail, etc, and can't understand why crime went dramatically up. now they whine on ND that they don't feel safe, even in their homes... but they're dead set against firearms, and want everyone disarmed, for safety. they also want cops
de-funded... but they also want to be "safe", whatever that means...

Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:22 PM (+V9LB)

362 Since you are obviously a raging Leftie, your posts are the opposite of the thread topic.

But when did that ever stop a Leftie from trying to hijack a conversation?
Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:21 PM (sy5kK)

Exactly

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (Irn0L)

363 Heinlein, Sowell, Solzhenitsyn, Horowitz.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing

The Big Four.

Posted by: Sharkman at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (UXEgP)

364 My story is pretty boring, politically.
My parents were both Republicans, so I inherited that as I didn't get rebellions until later in life.

I was also pro-Military, I was going to be a soldier for my cold war childhood, so Democrats and Hippie lovers were right out. I was also raised Christian, another strike against the Democrats and Communists (but I repeat myself)

Finally, I was raised with the idea of objective right and wrong, with the idea personal responsibility, with the idea of the greatness of America. And as I got older and tested those teachings, I found them valid, still.

Posted by: I'm Garth Marenghi: horror author, dreamweaver, visionary, plus actor at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (eeRB6)

365 They are not liberals or libertines they are 'those ones', - the other.

Posted by: Braenyard at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (U9XSa)

366 Leftists are like vampires, instead of stakes through the heart it is Thomas Sowell

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (3798x)

367 Lefties are always raging

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:23 PM (oEn12)

368 Husband got nine nails in his tires at work after being outed as a conservative.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:24 PM (byYVH)

369 347 i truly believe that a lack of consequences or a yearning for such as well as a large dollop of envy and a desire to manage ones betters, is at the base of many liberal impulses. they are fearful resentful people who dont like to pay for their mistakes and in a way i sympathize but i dont agree with them
Posted by: Gushka can has Kitties what plays Fetch at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (ywuPa)

Agree with this. They lack self confidence, afraid to be self reliant.

Posted by: Hatari Somewhere on Ventura Highway at September 06, 2021 07:24 PM (amQTv)

370 They stepped on Barry Goldwater big time. Would you like the government off your back? Look at Goldwater. See what his approach would do to the swamp. See what Ike's warning, if heeded, about the military industrial complex would do to the swamp. Too bad Rick Perry had that brain fart about disbanding several Cabinet departments.

Go, Horde!

Posted by: 80'smusic fan at September 06, 2021 07:24 PM (glGDV)

371 370 Husband got nine nails in his tires at work after being outed as a conservative.
Posted by: Coki

Where did y'all live when that happened?

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:25 PM (oEn12)

372 The dems are the "we want only to serve man" aliens promising everyone will have their wishes met. Just get on the spaceship. Now.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:25 PM (xeTfp)

373 >>>I didn't think I had anything in common with modern Democrats and that there were no more moderate Dems..
Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (AJzTi)
-----------

Welcome home.

Posted by: Braenyard at September 06, 2021 07:26 PM (U9XSa)

374 V, they have a sous-vide cookbook?

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 06, 2021 07:26 PM (3798x)

375 373 370 Husband got nine nails in his tires at work after being outed as a conservative.
Posted by: Coki

Where did y'all live when that happened?
Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:25 PM (oEn12)

Oakland, Cali.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:26 PM (byYVH)

376 Going to war must have:

An issue or cause in our national interest.
A clear mission that defines what victory looks like.
A determination among the citizenry to win.

Have those and I'm good with it. Don't and I'm anti war.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:27 PM (kTF2Z)

377 374 The dems are the "we want only to serve man" aliens promising everyone will have their wishes met. Just get on the spaceship. Now.
Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:25 PM (xeTfp)

Perfect! Haha!!

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:28 PM (byYVH)

378 I was a default liberal. I care about poor people and the environment. I didn't really identify with a party. I voted Reagan because I knew that would bring the hostages home, but I do not remember how I voted in the next couple of presidential elections. I certainly did not vote single party.

Then I started working for Focus on the Family. They had a short broadcast on family issues, published Citizen magazine, and started the Family Research Councils in various states. I remember Dr. Dobson warning about Clinton selling us out to China and the things Jocelyn Elders wanted to teach to children. As I learned more about the inner working of the ruling class and the horror and exploitation involved in the abortion industry, I became conservative. It was obvious that liberals were not really helping people or the environment or anything else.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:28 PM (6RgRK)

379 346 That's not what it means.
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:15 PM (2DOZq)

The RNC and its media familiars would like to have a word with you.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 07:29 PM (UewuT)

380 Pitch the titles - they're worthless. Those days are over. Normals need to organize against Corporatism using Gomper's labor tactics of the early 1900's. We will need to make alliances with groups "conservatives" historically have found suspect. It's a New World. Embrace it and fight.

Posted by: MikeN at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (2ayBL)

381 NGU, when you were in Israel, did you go to the top of Masada?

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (kTF2Z)

382 He sounds like a great guy - he raised his family right,
Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:16 PM (5iUNf)

Thanks, he was. One thing I am struggling with today is convincing my kids of the value of hard work. My wife and I have been very successful, and the kids are not to want for anything. I tell them of how my dad worked two jobs to keep a roof over our heads, and food on the table. Or how my wife and I both worked our way through college. I hope it clicks at some point.

Posted by: Tofer732 at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (kUGet)

383 What's ironic is that in general , conservatives are more environmentally conscious and more charitable than liberals by a long shot.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (2DOZq)

384 Nails in the tires, that's awful. I believe some rather mild pushback comments I made at work circa 2003 tarnished my reputation with the owners of the company. All three were hard left. This was a company where a woman had a George W. doll dressed as a cowboy hanging from a noose in her cubicle. Once it was known I was a conservative I more or less got Othered.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (xeTfp)

385 Speaking of arguing with libs, it's time for Rosh Hashanah in California.

May all the morons be written for Life

Posted by: San Franpsycho at September 06, 2021 07:32 PM (EZebt)

386 Because all my teenaged cohorts were LibCong.

Posted by: Earth Pig at September 06, 2021 07:32 PM (eZpzP)

387 NGU, when you were in Israel, did you go to the top of Masada?
Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (kTF2Z)

Many many times. Been there over 25 times. Used to lead UJA tours

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:32 PM (Irn0L)

388 Is rcocean a raging lefty or is he pointing out what "conservativism" tends to mean because of those who claim the mantle of conservatism?

I've long felt we need a new label for the majority of what used to be the "right", "conservatives" and whatever other label that was pinned on us mostly by leftist corporate media.

Don't have a clue what that should be. Not enough of a wordsmith. At this point I think it's imperative that we do relabel ourselves for clarity and focus.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 07:33 PM (nzLi4)

389 385 What's ironic is that in general , conservatives are more environmentally conscious and more charitable than liberals by a long shot.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (2DOZq)

Liberals are only generous with other people's money.

(hey wait, that's a great proverb ( *scribbles note* ))

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:33 PM (oOHrl)

390 I'm not sure I was ever not a Conservative.

Posted by: Puddleglum at September 06, 2021 07:33 PM (QFVV9)

391 I was raised strict Baptist, with a strong emphasis on right and wrong. Everything about our house screamed "conservative". When I went away to college, I had a couple of shocking experiences that enraged me, and I joined up with the liberals. I even became a member of NOW. But then I opened my Bible back up and got over it. Never looked back. Liberalism isn't logical or beneficial in any way that I can tell. It does a great deal of harm.

Posted by: grammie winger at September 06, 2021 07:34 PM (45fpk)

392 Liberals are only generous with other people's money.

(hey wait, that's a great proverb ( *scribbles note* ))
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:33 PM (oOHrl)

Also made a pretty good movie about that LOL

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:34 PM (Irn0L)

393 When I was at the University, it was a time where you could actually discuss politics. I was by nature contrarian and found myself always defending the conservative view. It just became too easy. I won most debates as clear as day. The very reason why the left will not debate is because their positions and problem solving measures are not only wrong but antithetical to what they want to solve.

Posted by: Spock at September 06, 2021 07:34 PM (IinWq)

394 390 Is rcocean a raging lefty or is he pointing out what "conservativism" tends to mean because of those who claim the mantle of conservatism?

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 07:33 PM (nzLi4)

I agree, he hasn't said anything that would make me think he's a raging lefty, just his disgust at some of the same "conservative" policies that Trump was also disgusted at.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:35 PM (oOHrl)

395 Posted by: redc1c4 *OTUS Zhou Bai-Din Cheated & we all know it at September 06, 2021 07:22 PM (+V9LB)

That's just...I don't even know what to say, except being that stupid should hurt.

Posted by: Jordan61 at September 06, 2021 07:36 PM (hP4QN)

396 Many many times. Been there over 25 times. Used to lead UJA tours
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:32 PM (Irn0L)

-----------

An amazing place. Eleazar Ben Yair VS Flavius Silva. Still has lessons for today, in my opinion.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:36 PM (kTF2Z)

397 I did not realize that Julius Caesar, under Crassus, was the guy who finally defeated Spartacus... is this true?

Posted by: vmom stabby stabby stabby stabamillion (oEn12) at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (oEn12)

398 I agree, he hasn't said anything that would make me think he's a raging lefty, just his disgust at some of the same "conservative" policies that Trump was also disgusted at.
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:35 PM (oOHrl)

No he was a tad to vehement in his dislike. And as someone else said it had nothing to do with the topic of the thread. He used it to spread dissent in our ranks, using tired old hackneed terms. Nothing positive at all.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (Irn0L)

399 The RNC and its media familiars would like to have a word with you.
Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 07:29 PM (UewuT)

Fuck them. I'm conservative, you don't get to define me.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (2DOZq)

400 Well, they do now. Back then, Norman Lear and Carroll O'Connor made Archie Bunker actually human. He would occasionally show tenderness towards Edith and Gloria and even win arguments with Meathead sometimes. Nowadays, they'd just write him as a 1-dimensional monster spouting slogans.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:10 PM (oOHrl)

They intended to make Archie a laughingstock 'conservative'; it didn't work. Years later, they tried again with Duck Dynasty; that too failed.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (F0YaR)

401 Hey everybody, again.

I don't think I was ever 'liberal,' but I did consider myself a 'mainstream Dem' for a long time. I do remember being a little put off by how confident Reagan seemed all the time. I felt he would have come across better if he seemed a little more down to earth. Now I realize, he was down to earth, just more optimistic than I was.

Believe it or not the journey started with me in college. I had a boss who was obnoxious, but first got me listening a bit to Rush Limbaugh, who turned me off but made me realize conservatism was a real philosophy worth looking into.

I also found myself surprisingly open to the arrival of Newt Gingrich, pleasantly surprised by 1994 (I felt it would usher in a new era of centrism), and could just never bring myself to hate Bill Clinton, who would at least listen to conservative ideas, unlike Obama and lefties today.

I think what finally pushed me over the edge was the abject hate shown to GWB after 2001. It turned me off profoundly, and started me to where I am now, far more right-wing than I ever thought I'd be.

I'm at the point now where if I embarass myself online or elsewhere with my POV, I'm not sure I care anymore.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (L2ZTs)

402 osted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:36 PM (kTF2Z)

As soon as Israel opens back up so to speak I am taking my near 50 days of leave and going to visit my family there

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:38 PM (Irn0L)

403 I've said this before, Jerry Falwell did more damage to Christianity and conservatism in this country than anything or anyone else. He made it so easy for the left to argue that Christian conservatives were a mortal threat to the Republic. That fat, shiny, smug, face turned legions of non-Christians and nominal Christians into implacable foes. He was one of the ravening wolves Christ warned us about.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:39 PM (xeTfp)

404 As soon as Israel opens back up so to speak I am taking my near 50 days of leave and going to visit my family there
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:38 PM (Irn0L)

--------

Would love to take my family there, but I don't think it's in the cards. I've been there twice, back in the late 80s, and I'll always have a warm spot in my heart for the people of Israel.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:40 PM (kTF2Z)

405 Continued:

Re embarassing myself, just a week ago I went apeshit at sitcom writer/producer Ken Levine's blog over an obnoxious lefty commenter. He was always dragging in hateful jokes about GOPers, even on topics that had zero to do with politics.

I'm finding sometimes being an asshole works, because since then I haven't seen this commenter bring up politics once. I am hoping Levine, who himself is stupid left but not as overall obnoxious about it, pulled that commenter to the side and told him to stop.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:41 PM (L2ZTs)

406 I... am a revolutionary.

It's not a second American civil war. It's a second American revolution. Same principles, new people.

Posted by: Hawkpilot at September 06, 2021 06:29 PM (DMpoA)

Excellent point. I will use this often in future discussions about this topic.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:41 PM (sy5kK)

407 They intended to make Archie a laughingstock 'conservative'; it didn't work. Years later, they tried again with Duck Dynasty; that too failed.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (F0YaR)

Right. The A-and-E TV execs thought they were signing a bunch of dumb rednecks to do a show, but what they got was a bunch of smart rednecks who knew what they were doing and also didn't need them and didn't care if they got fired.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:42 PM (oOHrl)

408 Those of you who can read?

Redding is fun the mental

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:42 PM (yrol0)

409 They intended to make Archie a laughingstock 'conservative'

And they intended to make "Dr Strangelove" anti-war and yet most conservatives like me love that movie!

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:43 PM (Irn0L)

410 319 I read Animal House when I was about 12. That's what got me to see what Communism was all about. I knew after that that any move in that direction would be a slippery slope.
Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 07:06 PM (Tnijr)

Yup, Beluchi was inspiring.
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:07 PM (Irn0L)

I guess f'd meant Animal Farm......

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (7SwmH)

411 I was a mess growing up. for "reasons". Still have issues. But wargaming from 10 years old, reading history and SF all influenced me.

My times in the chem and bio labs taught me pragmatism. And I was leading people in college. Cutting open a fetal pig was an absolute revelation I can feel even today. Wow, look at the order. I became a Deist at that moment, from being raised Shinto.

Still think I am pragmatic, and not conservative.

In the process of maturing, I wondered about the fate of nations. Because we were all one race. I strove to prove that.

Now I have a good handle on mechanisms of governance, binary decisions, and how to be a good, non-corrupt politician. Even when my budget is totally inadequate for the emotional needs of my constituents.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (u82oZ)

412 I would love to visit Israel, but at this point, I do not believe I will ever be allowed on an airplane again, since I am an unvaxxed terror threat.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (6RgRK)

413 No disrespect is intended to those that actually do work hard to turn the bus around and start to make good choices. Good for them.
Posted by: Tonypete at September 06, 2021 06:23 PM (mD/uy)

nah, I wasn't clear myself. Living your best life is a cop out, laying flat, thinking this is as good as it gets, why do more?

Living a better life means you have to get up and do something. Once you determine to do something you can get better.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (HG00O)

414 Foreign policy: my 6th grade Fairfax Co. Public School teacher (INORITE? This was '78-'79.)

Domestic policy (though I'm a live-and-let-live kinda person): 1) getting my first paycheck during h.s. senior year and seeing how much tax was taken out; and 2) summer after h.s., smoking pot for the first time and realizing gov't had no business running my life.

Posted by: SFGoth (KAi1n) at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (KAi1n)

415 I would wish for Israel to be more vocal about the realities going on there vis a vis the vaccine and covid.

While they're claiming here that the non vaccinated are spreading the disease, Israels experience is just the opposite as they were like 80% vaxxed and yet four months later the vaccine is proving ineffective and that those vaxxed seem to be catching a more virulent form of covid and carrying a larger viral load to spread around.

This needs to somehow get into the daily news and off the conservative sites. It will possibly put a halt to these immoral mandates and the lies told by Fauci et al. But of course the Tech and corporate media don't like facts that are counter to their perceptions.

We can only hope.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 07:44 PM (nzLi4)

416 That was another factor in my upbringing. I had a conservative English teacher, Mrs Galvin, who had us read Animal Farm. And 1984 was actually all the rage to read at my high school in 1984, the year I graduated.

Even at my most liberal, I had enormous respect for George Orwell.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (L2ZTs)

417 It is GOD's Will I be a conservative. And shaitan could not make me a democrat no matter how much he tries.

Posted by: Eromero at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (0OP+5)

418 When Big Govt owns your healthcare, they own you:

To protect the health system, weve got everybody locked down, and were going to move to a situation where to protect the health system were going to LOCK OUT people who are not vaccinated. If youre making the choice not to get vaccinated, then youre making the wrong choice.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (yrol0)

419 Studying economics in the early 90's with Rush on the radio.

Posted by: p-squared at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (0CzL1)

420 Losing Ground (Charles Murray). That book rocked my world.

Posted by: Best Thief in Lankhmar at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (yhzCS)

421 Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:39 PM (xeTfp)

I think you're confusing him with someone else.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:45 PM (2DOZq)

422 I agree, he hasn't said anything that would make me think he's a raging lefty, just his disgust at some of the same "conservative" policies that Trump was also disgusted at.
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 07:35 PM (oOHrl)

That's my take as well. But I tend to go overboard giving the benefit of the doubt.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:46 PM (6RgRK)

423 I became a conservative because of common sense. I was a child when Roe v. Wade became the law of the land, and I was horrified. I also remember being a small child and finding Leftists attempting to ban Christmas programs and celebrations every single year, and watching Madalyn Murray O'Hair attack any and every form of religious expression in America. Add to that witnessing people spitting on and insulting the soldiers who managed to survive Vietnam, and my beliefs were firmly cemented. From being okay with murdering babies, to spitting on soldiers, to attempting to ban a holiday which inspires generosity and good will, these people have always seemed to me to be absolutely batshit nuts.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (VDbGO)

424 You are not the boss of me.

Posted by: EdmundBurkesShade at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (RJCvt)

425 The very reason why the left will not debate is because their positions and problem solving measures are not only wrong but antithetical to what they want to solve.
Posted by: Spock at September 06, 2021 07:34 PM (IinWq)

Well, not a lot of us are going to argue logic with Spock, I don't mind telling you...

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (5iUNf)

426 What issues are you bleeding-heart about? If you don't mind sharing.
Posted by: Jordan61 at September 06, 2021 06:32 PM (hP4QN)

Oh, when I say bleeding heart I don't mean liberal or leftist on particular issues. What I mean is sometimes what I think about a particular issue or event can, on rare occasion, be at odds with my gut reaction.

Oh, actually, there is an example! Refuge for Afghan interpreters. My gut pities these people and wishes a better outcome for those poor souls. My considered opinion is we really should have told them to get in the back of the line until we got every single one of our people out and everyone of our NATO allies out before even considering such a thing (or if it should be considered at all).

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (1Yy3c)

427 Nope. Jerry Falwell is the demon I'm thinking of.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (xeTfp)

428 Don't tread on me. Take your pick.

Posted by: EdmundBurkesShade at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (RJCvt)

429 I became conservative when I went to buy my first house. I was 22 and interest was 18 muthu fucking percent.

FUCK CARTER BIDEN OBAMA et al.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:48 PM (yrol0)

430 I am surprised they are not burning all copies of Animal Farm and they could never make Animal House today, or Blazing Saddles. And that says all you need to know about the left and why I am a free speech conservative

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:49 PM (Irn0L)

431 Jordan: I'm bleeding heart about minimum wage.

Yeah I know, I'm a communist...

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:49 PM (L2ZTs)

432 I will add that my Naval Service was a big help. You are in a small village set in a hostile sea. Keeping people safe (as OOD, etc) means good decision making. Plus I saw how we all added up to make a ship work.

Bad leaders and bad decisions were punished. Good leaders kept moving up. I got my desire to push good people from that time.

Nothing is given to you at sea. You have to make it work.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (u82oZ)

433 Nope. Jerry Falwell is the demon I'm thinking of.
Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (xeT

And what did Jerry Falwell do that makes you think he's a demon? One example would be sufficient.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (2DOZq)

434 390 Is rcocean a raging lefty or is he pointing out what "conservativism" tends to mean because of those who claim the mantle of conservatism?
-------------

When a Leftie can't defend their position intellectually, they start name-calling against their opponents.

So, yes, rcocean is a Lefty.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (sy5kK)

435 Nails in tires...I'm sure their children love their parents except when they walk the walk...talk the talk...deceive the world of their nature.. Mom dad think tank tag team World wrestling.

Posted by: Humphreyrobot at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (5sh7B)

436 "Refuge for Afghan interpreters. My gut pities these people and wishes a better outcome for those poor souls."

Americans are so sweet and innocent. Everybody in the world has good intentions.

Posted by: JB at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (TO8Xm)

437 Remember, Progressivism is a RELIGION.

This means they don't have to explain why their worldview conflicts with reality. They just believe it and it is what it is. "Blind faith" _never_ described a Christian nearly as much as it describes a Progressive.

Their virtues are unbalanced parodies of Christian virtues, and their sins much the same. Their Inquisition is Wokeness, their prophets are the media, their priests are the "experts" and the technocrats.

So, "sharing" is not balanced with temperance. "Sharing" in and of itself is a virtue, and damnit, it WILL be observed.

I've always been a conservative, like I've always been a Christian. It was taught to me early, with my mother's milk. And the older I get and the more I learn about God, the more easy it is to recognize Progressivism for the heresy and idolatrous religion it is.

Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 07:51 PM (2nnuG)

438 I'm at the point now where if I embarass myself online or elsewhere with my POV, I'm not sure I care anymore.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (L2ZTs)

Impossible here qdpsteve - its an embarrassment free zone, your thoughts are always welcomed...

Unless your Kurt, now that I think about it.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:51 PM (5iUNf)

439 You have to realize that fighting the left is continuing the mission of those who came before, protecting the Republic to ensure it remains viable.

It's called our heritage.

Posted by: irongrampa at September 06, 2021 07:51 PM (KATBx)

440 When a Leftie can't defend their position intellectually, they start name-calling against their opponents.

So, yes, rcocean is a Lefty.
Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (sy5kK)

Yup

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:51 PM (Irn0L)

441 432 I am surprised they are not burning all copies of Animal Farm and they could never make Animal House today, or Blazing Saddles. And that says all you need to know about the left and why I am a free speech conservative
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:49 PM (Irn0L)

Napoleon and Pinkerton both played the Ace of Spades.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:51 PM (yrol0)

442 I appreciate Reagan while he was president it wasn't until years later reading Russia's book "The way things ought to be" that so perfectly expressed what I believed. My grandfather also had an influence. One of the hardest working men I know. I miss him alot. Rush too. World needs more men like them

Posted by: Our Country is Screwed at September 06, 2021 07:52 PM (D3cJf)

443 Remember the blog, Protein Wisdom?

Jeff Goldsomething (I forget the blogmaster's name) got so fed up about all the lefty hate that got sent his way, that by the time the blog ended, he was openly posting info on how to sabotage leftists' belongings, including their cars.

I actually like that.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:52 PM (L2ZTs)

444 #436 @LeftCoastDawg,

That's another thing. Whenever I found myself in disagreement with a Leftist, they never could adequately argue their point. They always had to call me names, before bravely running away. It is a universal hallmark of the Left.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (VDbGO)

445 Handed out bumperstickers for Al Gore in 1988.

ZOD IMPERIAL.

Posted by: ZOD at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (xK9An)

446 And what did Jerry Falwell do that makes you think he's a demon? One example would be sufficient.
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:50 PM (2DOZq)

------------

He used to Gospel to enrich himself. Now a question for you. Give me one televangelist who is more dedicated to spreading the Word than he is to himself. One example would be sufficient.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (kTF2Z)

447 Boswell, thanks. :-)

I also went absolutely apeshit at Jeff Wells/Hollywood Elsewhere a few weeks ago. Since then I've refused to even look at that blog. I went ahead and told him, I hope he gets himself cancelled (he's always whining about wokistas going after other center-lefties like himself, but doesn't GAF when actual righties get cancelled).

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:54 PM (L2ZTs)

448 One example would be sufficient.
Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (kTF2Z)

Billy Graham.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (6RgRK)

449 Sam, Madalyn Murray O'Hare paid dearly. One of her employees murdered her because she reneged on a deal with him and was nasty about it. (A nastier woman never lived.) They found her in a shallow grave, hands tied behind her back, plastic bag over her head.

Unfortunately her son and granddaughter were also murdered. They aligned themselves with that horrible woman and came to a bad end because of it. Another son of hers repudiated her beliefs, had no contact with her. Smart move.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (xeTfp)

450 My Mom and Dad grew up poor during the depression. Poor then meant unless you accepted charity, begged or stole you didn't eat. Dad went in the CCC when he was 16, the Army at 19. They credited FDR with saving Dad's life. They worshiped FDR and were lifelong democrats.

My first vote was for JFK and continued that way through Carter vs Ford. I would have probably voted for Carter against Regan, but was living outside of the country, Could not believe anyone would vote for a washed up actor.

I stood in line for hours to vote for Regan in his next election and have never voted for a democrat for national office since. Regan was a PRESIDENT. the rest of these guys were actors. It made my heart sing when Trump was elected. I'm still a JFK liberal at heart

Posted by: Javems at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (gi0xn)

451 And in other news. the Puyallup Fair (I refuse to call it the Western Washington Fair) opened over the weekend, and Little LCD and Girlfriend enjoyed the day there.

And on the way home (my house is kinda in between), Little brought me 6 Fair scones. They taste the same as they were 10, 20, 50 years ago. Fresh baked with butter and a giant dollop of raspberry jam. From local raspberry farms.

Good boy.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (sy5kK)

452 Emmie, even Billy got a bit too comfortable being wealthy and connected by the end of his life, IMHO.

I'd love for there to be one televangelist who doesn't become a multimillionaire by the time they retire and/or pass away.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:56 PM (L2ZTs)

453 In college I had a professor teaching a course on great men in history, and he had the belief (outlandish even then) that very few individuals are entirely responsible for most all the progress in human history. I concluded he was right and small government impedes these people the least. So, self interest led me to be intrrdsted in small government.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at September 06, 2021 07:56 PM (rE6X7)

454 Jeff Goldsomething (I forget the blogmaster's name)
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:52 PM (L2ZTs)

Heh! He's Jewish. It's either -Berg or -Stein.

Jeff Goldstein, by the way.

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 07:57 PM (1Yy3c)

455 JuJuBee, yup re O'Hair.
I find it impossible to have any empathy for how she ended up. It wouldn't surprise me if she had some people murdered herself.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (L2ZTs)

456 Once it was known I was a conservative I more or less got Othered.
Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (xeTfp)

Yep. "Progressives" love to bully. You can't escape it, even with headphones, they'll shout and provoke and disrupt. You just have to remain calm or walk.

Posted by: Coki at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (byYVH)

457 #436 @LeftCoastDawg,

That's another thing. Whenever I found myself in disagreement with a Leftist, they never could adequately argue their point. They always had to call me names, before bravely running away. It is a universal hallmark of the Left.
Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (VDbGO)

And another thing, we are all in this together. Now we here, we "conservatives" will not always agree on everything, and sometimes it gets a tad heated. But it should be painfully obvious at this point that we are far past the point where we can find any common cause with the left. So any attempt divide us by throwing firebombs into our discussions is counterproductive and tends to make me think you are a wolf in sheeps clothing

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (Irn0L)

458 Al Gore telling Frank Zappa that he was a fan and then following up with the "but evil music lyrics"spiel told me all I needed to know about that fuckwit.

Posted by: Boxer at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (Tnijr)

459 I also went absolutely apeshit at Jeff Wells/Hollywood Elsewhere a few weeks ago. Since then I've refused to even look at that blog. I went ahead and told him, I hope he gets himself cancelled (he's always whining about wokistas going after other center-lefties like himself, but doesn't GAF when actual righties get cancelled).
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:54 PM (L2ZTs)

Yeah, you know what is great about here? We all pretty much know each other and let each other rant our rants. We don't always agree...but you can get let the COBs or Ace know you have an opinion and they're pretty okay with that...I enjoy a lot of the give an take.

You're not getting that with Jeff Wells...he could fucking care less.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 07:59 PM (5iUNf)

460 Robert, thanks!
I believe he had Amanda hateful whatserface (she worked on the Edwards POTUS campaign) trying to get him doxxed at one point.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:59 PM (L2ZTs)

461 I'm still a JFK liberal at heart
Posted by: Javems at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (gi0xn)

Tide boats
all lifted

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:59 PM (yrol0)

462 even Billy got a bit too comfortable being wealthy and connected by the end of his life, IMHO.

You don't go to the hundreds of places Billy Graham went to and meet all the hundreds of leaders Billy Graham met, without becoming connected. As to wealth, I don't know about his finances.

Posted by: grammie winger at September 06, 2021 07:59 PM (45fpk)

463 460 Al Gore telling Frank Zappa that he was a fan and then following up with the "but evil music lyrics"spiel told me all I needed to know about that fuckwit.
Posted by: Boxer at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (Tnijr)

PRMC

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (yrol0)

464 Boswell, thanks and true.

Wells has already posted at his blog that he more or less expects to have to pay the bills doing Doordash within a few years. I admit I'd love to see it happen. Only way he'll ever learn is to lose everything.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (L2ZTs)

465 431 I became conservative when I went to buy my first house. I was 22 and interest was 18 muthu fucking percent.

FUCK CARTER BIDEN OBAMA et al.
Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 07:48 PM (yrol0)

You realize that you've just dated yourself, right? No problem by me, though. And I completely agree with the rest of your statement.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (sy5kK)

466 sorry

PMRC

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (yrol0)

467 454 Emmie, even Billy got a bit too comfortable being wealthy and connected by the end of his life, IMHO.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:56 PM (L2ZTs)

It sounds like you are describing Robert Schuller rather than Billy Graham. Schuller was quite the name-dropper.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (6RgRK)

468 Billy Graham.
Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (6RgRK)

-----------

Fair enough, but Graham was more than just his television ministry. His works live on to this day. You can't say the same about Falwell, Bakker, Osteen, et al.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (kTF2Z)

469 Its just like The Boys From Brazil except there are millions of them. And they are a littler tanner....maybe from southern Germany.

Posted by: Humphreyrobot at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (5sh7B)

470 "If you're not a born-again Christian you're a failure as a human being."
Jerry Falwell

This a-hole spent most of his time judging others and finding them wanting. A petty little small-g god. He should've spent more time removing the log from his own eye.

Posted by: JuJuBee at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (xeTfp)

471 Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 07:58 PM (Irn0L)

Famous scene in the movie Roadhouse, where Swazye says... be nice...... until its time not to be nice.

How will we know...

You won't, I'll tell you.

F THAT! ITS TIME TO NOT BE NICE.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (oHd/0)

472 You realize that you've just dated yourself, right? No problem by me, though. And I completely agree with the rest of your statement.
Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (sy5kK)

I was 61 in July.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (yrol0)

473 Emmie, fair point. Schuller I know was rather embittered by the end of his life. He lost almost everything once he fell out of the Christian zeitgeist and had to sell the Crystal Cathedral.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (L2ZTs)

474
Billy Graham still holds the records for most saves at Yankee Stadium

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (DUIap)

475 PMRC

The Mothers Of Prevention

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (Tnijr)

476 F THAT! ITS TIME TO NOT BE NICE.
Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (oHd/0)

Amen Brother

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (Irn0L)

477 Honestly, books had the biggest influence! Buckley, history, and SF.
Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 06:42 PM (Dc2NZ)

I adored H. Beam Piper, L Neil Smith and Heinlein.
In fact, I found Piper and Smith when I was working a summer job all the way across the state from home, and was poking through a thrift shop.

Reading the Gulag Archipelago in high school didn't hurt either. (if THEY get it wrong, who can get it right?)

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (HG00O)

478 I'm still a JFK liberal at heart
Posted by: Javems at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (gi0xn)

1962 JFK would be to the right of 2019 Donald Trump.

But both had a similar resume when banging hot women.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (sy5kK)

479 I don't see how what the guy said was particularly tollish. He was naming the same names that everyone else here does (Erickson, McConnell, etc.), and suggesting--correctly--that through their influence theirs is the definition of conservatism that Joe Sixpack is made familiar with. Whatever.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (UewuT)

480 Anna Puma

Heinleins personal life was a mess with some good stuff. Just another example of "Do not read a comprehensive biography of an author you like to read." But his best stories pointed to a better truth.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (u82oZ)

481 Falwell, Bakker, Osteen, et al.
Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (kTF2Z)

If anyone causes one of these little ones those who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:02 PM (yrol0)

482 Billy Graham.
Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 07:55 PM (6RgRK)

And his son Frank.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (nzLi4)

483 #451 JuJuBee,

Yeah, O'Hare's son William had a vision of Christ and left atheism, going on to found the Religious Freedom Coalition. O'Hare denounced and disowned him for this, in an act she called a "post-natal abortion." She truly was one of the nastiest human beings ever to live, and I'm reasonably certain she is spending eternity in the company she always sought.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (VDbGO)

484 I never got the grifter vibe from Billy Graham. He seemed genuine to me.

Posted by: four seasons at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (PisyI)

485 465 460 Al Gore telling Frank Zappa that he was a fan and then following up with the "but evil music lyrics"spiel told me all I needed to know about that fuckwit.
Posted by: Boxer
--------------------------------

It reminds me how much fun it was/is to watch the video of Dee Snider (Twisted Sister) testifying in Congress and ripping them all a new poopchute.

For those who have never seen it:

https://tinyurl.com/323aap6

Posted by: Pennsyltucky at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (lNHqD)

486 Conservativism now means Pat Toomey, Paul Ryan, Ben Shapiro, Erick Erickison, David French and Jeb Bush (who just called for "us conservatives" to support climate change)

BULL FUCKIN SHIT. Only left wingers like the NY Times and Washington Post and other left wingers think or say shit like that

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (Irn0L)

487 rcocean

You are not thinking. You are emoting.

US Constitution 2.0 Pragmatism is the best term I can come up with.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:04 PM (u82oZ)

488 Billy Graham actually had a daytime TV talk show at one point. One of his guests was... Woody Allen.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:04 PM (L2ZTs)

489 I was a Anti Communist Democrat for years. Joined the Army out of High School during the Cold War. I believed that we could defeat the Soviet Union with out firing a shot if we just stood firm. Guess that made me a Reagan Democrat.

After the Soviets fell I switched to Republican. Not because of anything nationally just I wanted to vote in Republican primaries to get more folks like Reagan elected.

Posted by: Big V Caffeinated at September 06, 2021 08:04 PM (oSy3T)

490 "Pat Toomey, Paul Ryan, Ben Shapiro, Erick Erickison, David French and Jeb Bush"

Those guys are not conservative. Try again.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 08:06 PM (Tnijr)

491 So gore was dancing about architecture.

Posted by: Humphreyrobot at September 06, 2021 08:06 PM (5sh7B)

492 Only way he'll ever learn is to lose everything.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:00 PM (L2ZTs)

Yeah, been there wishing destitution on a lot of these moops - might happen. But I'm guessing with my luck that it won't...these guys always snicker their way out of their problems.

I must admit, its been just a fantastic feeling to see the Weekly Standard and other Never-Trumpers struggle though - I get it that this is a dog eat dog industry - but these grifters have stolen enough dog chow to last a lifetime. They may whine that gravy-train time is over, but they've sucked from the dinner bowl long enough now.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 08:06 PM (5iUNf)

493 What made me conservative?

I grew up poor with an insane mother, and got tired of poverty and insanity.

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:06 PM (Lzpvj)

494 I actually kind of wish Dems would go back to the kind of rhetoric they used in the 1970s and 80s. It was cutting, but almost never all-out evil and hateful like today.

Remember Ann Richards' description of George HW Bush in 1988? "Poor George. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (L2ZTs)

495 This guy has to be a joke or a not funny sock. No one individual can be this stupid

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (Irn0L)

496 I was channel surfing not too long ago and came across a Billy Graham crusade from maybe the 60's. I couldn't turn it off. He was truly a captivating speaker.

Posted by: Caesar North of the Rubicon at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (BMmaB)

497 The Mothers Of Prevention
-----------
Weasels Ripped My Flesh

Posted by: dartist at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (+ya+t)

498 200 "I do not think the old labels fit the current moment. There is only this:
Those who wish for Freedom.
Those who want Control.
There is nothing else.
Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 06:02 PM (csEWM) "

this !
Posted by: sock_rat_eez (YjYuE) at September 06, 2021 06:35 PM (Seiya)

clearly!

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (sy5kK)

499 My parents were conservative, so I was conservative. It was reinforced when I got my first paycheck at 15 and saw that I didn't make what I thought I made because of taxes.

Posted by: ptleahy at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (6wB8G)

500 Boswell, also good point.

I think part of the reason Jeff Wells is the way he is, is he's a recovering alcoholic. By all accounts, he was much more easygoing and tolerant when he was a drunk.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (L2ZTs)

501 I'm Cajun to the bone and a big believer in laizzez faire. Don't fuck with me and mine and I won't fuck with you and yours. In a nutshell, leave me alone to live my life as I see fit. C'est tout.

Posted by: one of the quiet ones at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (HeKhk)

502 In December of 1962, when I was 11, my family visited Berlin. The Wall had been put up the year before. That visit. That experience.

Posted by: Ameryx at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (0O5t+)

503 Remember Ann Richards' description of George HW Bush in 1988? "Poor George. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (L2ZTs)

When Eagles played at UT stadium in two thousand something (first concert in 20myears there) she was booed.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (yrol0)

504 rcocean

Back it up with reason. Your arguments are vapid and jejune. I doubt you have ever been entrusted with responsibility, and thrived from that.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (u82oZ)

505 Billy Graham actually had a daytime TV talk show at one point. One of his guests was... Woody Allen. Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:04 PM (L2ZTs)

IIRC Jesus hung out with some interesting people too. I've never been a fan of preaching to the choir.

Posted by: Caesar North of the Rubicon at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (BMmaB)

506 Remember Ann Richards' description of George HW Bush in 1988? "Poor George. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (L2ZTs)

Her daughter killed about the same number as Hitler.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (yrol0)

507 rhenni, really? Didn't know that.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (L2ZTs)

508 507 Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (evE25)

The Moron Streamed Media thinks "dudes with hoo hoos can have babies"...

like men being men and chicks being chicks calling Davey Fwench conservative does not make it so.

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (Lzpvj)

509 I never got the grifter vibe from Billy Graham. He seemed genuine to me.
Posted by: four seasons at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (PisyI)

He was not a grifter and neither was Falwell. Falwell was just more political so he got more of the left riled up and slandered by then. He helped deliver a victory for Reagan with the backing of the moral majority. .and by the way his net worth was a 1/3 of Billy Graham's.

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (2DOZq)

510 OregonMuse

Thank you for a great topic.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:10 PM (u82oZ)

511 " No one seems to share your opinion in the MSM.
Posted by: rcocean "

Damn. Now I have to rethink my life.

Posted by: f'd at September 06, 2021 08:10 PM (Tnijr)

512 Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (evE25)

Those are labels placed by corporate media and unfortunately accepted by many as being true. Many of those labeled.

I wish for a different label that has more meaning and yet none of the baggage that "right wing" and "conservative" has acquired.

All those you mentioned are in fact leftists except for the economy. (generally that's how it goes) There are many more that are conservative and fundamental but those words have become loaded and are also no longer operative but then that's always been a leftist modus operandi; to use language to destroy those they disagree with and manipulate others.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 08:10 PM (nzLi4)

513 Posted by: one of the quiet ones at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (HeKhk)

Laizzez faire ONLY works, if they fear you. There are always people who want to control you... to take your freedom.... ALWAYS.

When the People fear the Government, there is tyranny..

When the Government REALLY Fears the People, there is Freedom.

Posted by: Romeo13 at September 06, 2021 08:11 PM (oHd/0)

514 >>> It reminds me how much fun it was/is to watch the video of Dee Snider (Twisted Sister) testifying in Congress and ripping them all a new poopchute.

For those who have never seen it:

https://tinyurl.com/323aap6
Posted by: Pennsyltucky at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (lNHqD)

Dee Snider is a leftist shit bag.

Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 08:11 PM (ZOfsH)

515 514 rhenni, really? Didn't know that.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:09 PM (L2ZTs)

Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, will step down later this year. ... Ms. Richards, the elder daughter of Ann Richards, the former governor of Texas who died in 2006

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:11 PM (yrol0)

516 519 Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:10 PM (evE25)

No the Constitution in the end is what the people tolerate of those clowns in the Lee-Washington swamp.

CONservative inc is part of the grift.

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:12 PM (Lzpvj)

517 384 Or how my wife and I both worked our way through college. I hope it clicks at some point.
Posted by: Tofer732 at September 06, 2021 07:31 PM (kUGet)

My parents put me thru college - but I made sure both of mine (sons) went thru too - with no debt and with the understanding they are to pass it on should they have any progeny...

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:12 PM (7SwmH)

518 #459 NeverGiveUp,

I'm not trying to "throw firebombs" or "divide" anyone here. I was just agreeing with LeftCoastDawg that liberals frequently can't adequately argue their viewpoints, and have to resort to name-calling. I don't hate Jews, or Catholics, or non-whites, yet the Left insists on calling me and those who agree with me, "Nazis." I've also never supported Socialism in any form. The Nazis were Socialists. Point this out to a Leftist, and the shrieking and name-calling go up to eleven.

Think what you want of me. I work nights and rarely get to contribute here any more. Doesn't change the fact that I absolutely adore Ace, think he's the funniest writer on the internet, and I think the Moron Horde provides the funniest and most intelligent comment section in the world.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:12 PM (VDbGO)

519 Rerun from june with Trump on Hannity. Boy I miss that guy.

Posted by: dartist at September 06, 2021 08:12 PM (+ya+t)

520 I think rcocean is playing troll with some of you.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 08:13 PM (kTF2Z)

521 490 Conservativism now means Pat Toomey, Paul Ryan, Ben Shapiro, Erick Erickison, David French and Jeb Bush (who just called for "us conservatives" to support climate change)

BULL FUCKIN SHIT. Only left wingers like the NY Times and Washington Post and other left wingers think or say shit like that
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:03 PM (Irn0L)

If I was driving in a blinding winter snowstorm on a mountain pass and saw any of these people off to the side in a broken down car, I would continue on my way and let them die, as they let so many Americans die in the Middle East over the last 30 years.

Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:13 PM (sy5kK)

522 What made me a conservative?

Liberal chicks didn't know how to fuck right.

Posted by: ZOD at September 06, 2021 08:13 PM (xK9An)

523 Washington City, the yankee capital.

Posted by: Eromero at September 06, 2021 08:13 PM (0OP+5)

524 By all accounts, he was much more easygoing and tolerant when he was a drunk.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (L2ZTs)

Man - this is a great point! No one suffers more than one who must listen to a convert!

A newly converted Catholic, or a newly converted Carrie Nation 'drink is the devil' evangelist, or a newly converted conservative, or a newly converted social media promoter - they all are over the top torturers to others in their social sphere - they don't even realize it or care.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 08:14 PM (5iUNf)

525 rcocean

Does what you believe work for a wide, diverse society? I say no, based on results.

Good decisions make for good outcomes. Leftists fail at that constantly. They are unschooled, emotional, and racist colonialists. Only they can lead their unwashed lessers. Just ask them. You show this in your debased "arguments." I yawn.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:14 PM (u82oZ)

526 My parents put me thru college - but I made sure both of mine (sons) went thru too - with no debt and with the understanding they are to pass it on should they have any progeny...
Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:12 PM (7SwmH)

yep

I am working on same deal. I will ever have grandkids but inherited 4 boys under 6. I am working with my lawyer to get them thru school.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:14 PM (yrol0)

527 Some used to work for national review. All call themselves conservative. ANd are called that by the MSM. No one seems to share your opinion in the MSM.
Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (evE25)

LOL, that is proof positive of who you are. MSM? Your fuckin kidding me right

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:14 PM (Irn0L)

528 Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 07:47 PM (1Yy3c)

Sympathy tempered by pragmatism is a great thing. To build the barn without counting the cost is not wise.
Of course, even better than what you state would have been to say, "Hey we're out of here" 15 years ago and set up the orderly exit you describe THEN. At 20 years, it was going to be (at best) a goat rope.

Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (2nnuG)

529 What's ironic is that in general , conservatives are more environmentally conscious and more charitable than liberals by a long shot.
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:31

That is very true Just... Having farmed for 32 yrs I can attest you won't find a group of more dedicated environmentalists than farmers. The land is their income and they want to treat it well and improve it.

Coincidentally my grandfather was one of the first CCC workers. Then he started farming the family farm when his Dad died. Put all those ideas into practice and I preserved them. After Grandma died some 30 yrs later they sold the farm, I was done and all the grass waterways were torn up.

Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (55Qr6)

530 Duke Lowell

He is too inept for me to take it personally. Like a 3rd grader arguing with one that has lived a lot and learned.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (u82oZ)

531 ever NEVER

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (yrol0)

532 535 Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:14 PM (Irn0L)

The US has been suffering an inforwar op for at least 20 solid years, and some folks have gone full retard Stockholm Syndrome on the narrative.

It is not pretty.

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (Lzpvj)

533 405 Ive said this before, Jerry Falwell did more damage to Christianity and conservatism in this country than anything or anyone else.

- - -
Anything or anyone else. . .I do not know much about Mr. Falwell, but that comment is not accurate on its face. Peoples beliefs are a condition of their heart. However, I do not disagree that Falwell may have been a good excuse for them though

Posted by: L at September 06, 2021 08:16 PM (O/0WU)

534 (Part 1)

I used to work in a library. Specifically, it was the city's processing center were books were prepared for the shelves for all the county's libraries... stamped, jacketed, and entered into the then brand-new computer card catalog. It was kinda boring work, so there wasn't much else to do but talk.

Next to my station in the back was the lone IT guy who kept the system running. Honest-to-god mainframe computers in a special cool room, and his sectioned-off area with terminals and the various repair parts needed. I didn't actually talk much to him; he was quiet, and suffered from intense migraines a lot.

Me, I was a cookie-cutter Democrat, a Clinton-voter who hated the Republicans. My first vote was for frikkin' Dukakis, I'm ashamed to say. One of the other co-workers was a full-on leftist, and mostly when we talked we spent all our time agreeing with each other.

But that day he wasn't there.

It was shortly after a mass shooting, and the office people were all talking about it. The IT guy was there, and of course I was spouting off the usual anti-gun nonsense. Guns should be banned, nobody needed them, etc.

Posted by: Bram Stoker's Chocula at September 06, 2021 08:16 PM (AutUY)

535 I'm at the point now where if I embarass myself online or elsewhere with my POV, I'm not sure I care anymore.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (L2ZTs)

Greetings qdpsteve - how you are doing well.

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (7SwmH)

536 Rush. No more to say.
Posted by: RustyG at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (bUQVF)

What's funny to me is Rush made me _more_ of a conservative, partly because I started arguing with him (talking to the radio, IOW), especially when I thought he wasn't answering the right part of the question.

Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (2nnuG)

537 That is very true Just... Having farmed for 32 yrs I can attest you won't find a group of more dedicated environmentalists than farmers. The land is their income and they want to treat it well and improve it.

Coincidentally my grandfather was one of the first CCC workers. Then he started farming the family farm when his Dad died. Put all those ideas into practice and I preserved them. After Grandma died some 30 yrs later they sold the farm, I was done and all the grass waterways were torn up.
Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (55Qr6)

See duck turkeys deer bass redfish

et al

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (yrol0)

538 Boswell, exactly.
Wells replaced alcohol with leftism.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (L2ZTs)

539 What's ironic is that in general , conservatives are more environmentally conscious and more charitable than liberals by a long shot.
Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 07:31

I personally, in two different careers, did more for Gaia than all of Greenpeace, ever.

We can talk responsible development, but the Left ignores carrying capacity. They are destroyers of the environment.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (u82oZ)

540 Anon In Kalifornia, hey thanks! Hope you're doing well too.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (L2ZTs)

541 543 I'm at the point now where if I embarass myself online or elsewhere with my POV, I'm not sure I care anymore.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:37 PM (L2ZTs)

Greetings qdpsteve - how you are doing well.
Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (7SwmH)

Oops! That should read 'hope you are doing well...."

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:18 PM (7SwmH)

542 I honestly don't know the answer because I haven't done the television thing in eons, but how often do guys like David French show up on Fox News? I ask because, rightly or wrongly, that *is* the voice of conservatism to many Americans.

I do agree with the guy further up who was saying that labels were stupid and positions and goals much more important. This argument strikes me as being the proof of that assertion.

Posted by: CppThis at September 06, 2021 08:18 PM (UewuT)

543 Fantastic story, Oregon Muse.

Posted by: Ladyl at September 06, 2021 08:18 PM (+4oV5)

544 547 Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (u82oZ)

The American way of life and prosperity are the prime destroyers of mother Earth!

//Duh Left

"We must allow as many human beings as possible into America and ensure they all live middle middle class lifestyles!"

//Also Duh Left

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (Lzpvj)

545 Is rcocean helping our debate by being obtuse? Someone here can make a ban-hammer call. If needed.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (u82oZ)

546 Living in San Francisco for 20 years with all their peace, love, tolerance and understanding. The childish na�vet�, arrogance, envy, hate, and intolerance beneath the thin veneer of the San Fran left was suffocating and horrifying. Would make conservatives of us all should anyone bother to peek behind their carefully bedazzled hippy beaded curtain.

Posted by: Juryrock at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (hwS4H)

547 Billy Ocean. Caribbean Troll?

Posted by: Jak Sucio at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (jvt6t)

548 sven, all that means is that the left wants to destroy as many people as possible.

Put 'em all in the same basket, then put the basket in the industrial shredder.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:20 PM (L2ZTs)

549 {{{ Ladyl}}}

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:20 PM (u82oZ)

550 Posted by: LeftCoast Dawg at September 06, 2021 08:13 PM (sy5kK)

OH I would stop and pick them up.

So I could take them somewhere really remote where they didn't even have their busted car to shelter in. Then I'd wish them well and drive off knowing I've rid the universe of some really useless oxygen breathers.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 08:20 PM (nzLi4)

551 Billy Ocean. Caribbean Troll?
Posted by: Jak Sucio at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (jvt6t)

Caribbean Queen
Now we're sharing the same dream
And our hearts they beat as one
No more love on the run...

Posted by: Billy Ocean at September 06, 2021 08:21 PM (R/m4+)

552 Give me one televangelist who is more dedicated to spreading the Word than he is to himself. One example would be sufficient.
Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (kTF2Z)

Define "televangelist"? I can point to a couple of pastors who are also online who are men of God. John MacArthur and Charles Stanley for two. Also Chuck Colson.

Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 08:21 PM (2nnuG)

553 Is rcocean helping our debate by being obtuse? Someone here can make a ban-hammer call. If needed.
Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:19 PM (u82oZ)

I vote in favor

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 06, 2021 08:21 PM (Irn0L)

554 556 Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:20 PM (L2ZTs)

They get their kicks off of purposeful failure and loving human misery they want more victims.

Posted by: sven at September 06, 2021 08:21 PM (Lzpvj)

555 (Part 2)

He kicked my ass. Utterly destroyed me. Every argument I made countered perfectly, every line I spouted slapped down with logic and facts.

Afterwards I realized just how badly I'd lost the argument. He even apologized the next day, apparently feeling bad that he'd embarrassed me. But I told him that he didn't need to. I realized I knew nothing about the subject.

I wish I could say I turned into a conservative that day, but I didn't. It took years more. I voted for goddamned Clinton AGAIN the next year. But that was the day the first cracks in the dam appeared, and as I read about guns I was introduced to other conservative thought along the way. By 2000 I was solidly conservative.

Posted by: Bram Stoker's Chocula at September 06, 2021 08:22 PM (AutUY)

556 561
I vote in favor
Posted by: Nevergiveup

Calling someone. Wait for it.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:23 PM (u82oZ)

557 After Grandma died some 30 yrs later they sold the farm, I was done and all the grass waterways were torn up.
Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 08:15 PM (55Qr6

A fascinating story Farmer - It's rather a sad story of the family farm nowadays. My dad's wife own's a ranch in Illinois - cattle ranch. The family turned it over to a farm management firm as is often the case with inherited ranches. The family try to stay active, but the rules and regulations governing the ranch make it way too problematic for them to keep it for much longer...better to sell to a large cooperative that use their political muscle to get what they want...sad.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 08:23 PM (5iUNf)

558 If I could venture an opinion here, I would say that rcocean's first comment was missing the word "if"

"If" those people rcocean mentioned are the face of conservatism you can also count me out.

I await your call to ban me also.

Posted by: Somewhere South of I-80 at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (weGKL)

559 Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 08:21 PM (2nnuG)

--------------

You know the difference between a televangelist and a pastor who has an online presence.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (kTF2Z)

560 If Dole had won in '96, I'd bet Gore would have won in 2000.

W was far from perfect, but much better than Gore.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (L2ZTs)

561 GWB @560- When Rush was alive I listed to talk radio on patrol. Now I listen to John MacArthur, Charles Stanley etc.

Posted by: Eromero at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (0OP+5)

562 Those guys are not conservative. Try again."

Really? Some used to work for national review. All call themselves conservative. ANd are called that by the MSM. No one seems to share your opinion in the MSM.
Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:08 PM (evE25)

Um. That's the point.

The msm are leftists, OF COURSE we don't share opinions with them.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (ySQBZ)

563 There's a someperson who comes here every once and a while to point out all the dirty backstabbing deeds done by GOPe, Republicans, etc.. and everybody agrees, Yeah screw those guys!

And then they go, Yeah screw Conservatives! And everybody goes wut? This continues for a few days, things get weird, and then they get banned. But they come back.

I agree that the term, or the idea of conservativism has lost its usefulness. The term traditionalist, "trad" as the kids say, might be more in line with what good people want, but even that has an arbitrary meaning depending on the person's tradition. But whatever argument you're trying to make by attacking conservatives isn't being made in a cognizant manner.

Posted by: banana Dream at September 06, 2021 08:25 PM (ZOfsH)

564 Remember Ann Richards' description of George HW Bush in 1988? "Poor George. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:07 PM (L2ZTs)

She was a fave of the NPR types.

rocean jabs Patterico all the time; at least he used to. My guess is his conservative cred is legit.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 08:25 PM (y7DUB)

565 better to sell to a large cooperative that use their political muscle to get what they want...sad.
Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 08:23 PM (5iUNf)

Also used to exorcise Death Taxes.

Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:25 PM (yrol0)

566 Boswell, exactly.
Wells replaced alcohol with leftism.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:17 PM (L2ZTs)

I think we can both agree...a poor substitute.

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 08:25 PM (5iUNf)

567 It was a long journey for me. While still young, I fell for that line that nice people care about those who are less fortunate, and that the Democrats, who are always banging on about that shit, were the nice ones.

Boy, was I wrong about that.

I think that while for most of my life I was actually living mostly like a conservative, I had many character flaws that could be attributed to that Democrat bogus "fairness" b.s.

9/11 showed me the ugly left, and as that onion gets peeled, each layer is uglier than the one above it. So I had to turn my back on Democrat politicians (and now I have to turn my back on most Republican politicians as well).

Cost me most of my friendships, which doesn't say much for those friendships. But I don't care.

The current climate is like a crucible, and I become more conservative the longer it goes on.

Posted by: Miley, the Duchess, #SuperStraight #EnemyOfTheState (Mzdiz) at September 06, 2021 08:25 PM (Mzdiz)

568 Off topic but I picked up a preformed burger at the grocery store and cooked that for dinner and Jesus H Christ that thing was thick enough to choke a donkey!

I'm full. Very full.

*Fart*

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 08:26 PM (1Yy3c)

569 Captain Hate, I love seeing the conservatives jab the lefties at Patterico. Only reason I keep tuning in there. (Pat banned me from commenting there last year.)

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:26 PM (L2ZTs)

570 Posted by: NaCly Dog

In Fairness Salty, our system of government, founding documents, their history, ect... was not created and founded for a wide diverse population.
Any subversive actions taken upon the Founding Stock/Heritage Americans since the beginning would have our Founding Fathers and People implementing Physical Removal in the form of war.

This is made clear in the Preamble and other documents.

Posted by: Widespread Pepe at September 06, 2021 08:26 PM (XNnz8)

571 The leftist hiring leftists and calling them conservatives only fools idiots.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 08:26 PM (ySQBZ)

572 Miley, the Duchess, #SuperStraight #EnemyOfTheState

Your Grace, with your good man publius in your corner, you have reached an enviable waypoint.

Long may the Duchess of the Carolinas thrive.

Hand kiss for you, and a respectful tip of the hat to him.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:27 PM (u82oZ)

573 Maybe it was my 3rd grade teacher who announced to the class that, whatever the Supreme Court decided, she would continue to begin the school day with the Pledge and reading from the Good Book, just as she'd always done these [however many] years she had been teaching. She seemed about a million years old to me then, but her steadfastness, more than 50 years ago, has stayed with me.

Posted by: Texican ette at September 06, 2021 08:27 PM (8TfZ+)

574 Posted by: Somewhere South of I-80 at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (weGKL)

Sadly, he is correct on those people being some of who the average person that watches only the network news thinks of when they hear the word conservative.

That's not conservative's fault but it does need to be admitted.

Posted by: jakee308 at September 06, 2021 08:28 PM (nzLi4)

575 Good to see you, Miley! I hope Publius hasn't given up on us.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 08:29 PM (6RgRK)

576 ONT is nood.

Posted by: Duke Lowell at September 06, 2021 08:30 PM (kTF2Z)

577 Widespread Pepe

I use my definition of diversity. Not genetic code on a Boltzmann distribution.

But different possible solutions within an overall framework. Group-think like the Left is to be avoided for real progress. And the un-clubbable people, not a social credit to their name, advance Civilization. Bynot being satisfied with the now.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:30 PM (u82oZ)

578 Well, you can't do much about people who absorb the utter crap on network news and believe it.

Uninformed voters are a plague. But the AVERAGE iq is 100.

50% above, 50% below.

Life typically will bite them in the ass or they'll overdose or go to jail. Or get a job in the msm.

Posted by: dagny, first of her name at September 06, 2021 08:31 PM (ySQBZ)

579 Nood

Posted by: Robert - Iron Maiden, Senjutsu, OUT NOW!!! at September 06, 2021 08:31 PM (1Yy3c)

580 560 If Dole had won in '96, I'd bet Gore would have won in 2000.

W was far from perfect, but much better than Gore.
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:24 PM (L2ZTs)

Al Gore did more to corrode the social fabric of this country than W ever could, or did. Between popularizing anthropogenic global warming, and contesting the 2000 election, the damage he's done to the country (and the world) is immense. On top of that, he made more money than Bill Clinton ever did, and he showed the leftists that came after him the way to do it; make a show of leftist compassion for the cameras, and make obscene amounts of money on boards, stock options and consulting agreements behind the scenes.

Posted by: Darrell Harris at September 06, 2021 08:33 PM (mdjgu)

581 I stopped going to Patterico's site long, long ago. Stopped going to a LOT of sites a long time ago, as these "conservative" sites were no longer in any way conservative.

It's just like the GOP. I used to routinely fall for their, "Donate NOW to help us fight the evil Democrats!" crap, when in truth, Mitch McConnell and many in the UniParty happily make their money no matter who is in charge, and always fail to fight for their own voters. Who represents me? Well, the few who comprise the Freedom Caucus, and that's about it. Ted Cruz is about the only glimmer of hope in the US Senate, the rest are garbage. We really don't have any representation in government, and certainly don't get much at the Supreme Court.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:33 PM (VDbGO)

582 551 Fantastic story, Oregon Muse.

Posted by: Ladyl at September 06, 2021 08:18 PM (+4oV5)

Yes, it is. I only wish I had written it.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 08:34 PM (oOHrl)

583 477
Billy Graham still holds the records for most saves at Yankee Stadium
Posted by: AltonJackson at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (DUIap)

Yet another reason to love this place.....

Posted by: Anonymous Guy in Kalifornia at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (7SwmH)

584 That's another thing. Whenever I found myself in disagreement with a Leftist, they never could adequately argue their point. They always had to call me names, before bravely running away. It is a universal hallmark of the Left.
Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 07:53 PM (VDbGO)

You are so correct. I was at a dinner party, and as dinner was grilling, I made a negative comment about TFG.

This one pair of attendees, hearing my bad words about their God Emperor, decided to attack me personally. They barely knew me, from our loose ties to the dinner host.

And so, I asked them why they decided to attack me personally, when I hadn't said one word against them personally. I hadn't said "the retarded Barack voters thereof", though you could have possibly inferred that from my criticisms.

And that was it. Bitching about the Purple Lipped Emperor was all the trigger they needed. I called them out on that, and never saw them again.

Sometimes, small favors.

Posted by: GnuBreed, no circumstance at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (F0YaR)

585 I'm bleeding heart about minimum wage.

Yeah I know, I'm a communist...

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 07:49 PM (L2ZTs)

Jordan Peterson interviewed Bob Murphy and they went into this deeply.
they discuss it quite eloquently.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (HG00O)

586 My Grandmother, Liz, died in 2017 - she ended up being the best friend I ever had. When I was at college at UW-Milwaukee, I lived with her and my Grandfather, Joe. Liz was so strong-minded - Mark Belling radio show used to screen her off the program because she used different names to get on the show. "Elizabeth, you sound like "Betty" from Northshore". I was reading the Milwaukee Journal in the car one day, and she said "Communist Bullshit". Grandpa Joe (such a sweetie) said "shush". (the only person Liz ever listed to was Joe.) I hated that she was interjecting her opinion into aspects of my new "enlightned" life. She was right about every single thing. I miss her every day. When she taught me about the Depression and WWII and the lengths you need to contribute to the honorable things in life, I realized, and have been spouting since my 20's, that the Baby Boomer generation is the most selfish in the history of this nation. I am proven right more and more every year I am alive.

Posted by: kimmber at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (o0agZ)

587 Nice thread, OM!

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (Dc2NZ)

588 I have been one since forever. I saw the left's actions during the Vietnam War, and concluded that they were not interested in defending the country, and more then that, seemed to be actual fellow travelers with the communists.

Nothing I have seen changes that belief.

Posted by: Bones at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (ADqJK)

589 Until the 1984 election, I'd voted pretty much solid dem (well, Anderson in 80). But after Reagan's SDI speech, and the instant pile-on by the left, all of whom had been shrieking about the impending nuclear holocaust, it finally hit me that the left wasn't that interested in anything except politics and power. The immediate "that can't work, and even if it could it would be destabilizing and ruinously expensive, and it just can't work" from people who should have been eager to explore the possibility of making ICBMs obsolete was an eye-opener. (And there's quite an echo of that, I think, in the left's response to anything concerning HCQ or ivermectin.) I've not always been happy with the available choices in our elections, but I haven't pulled the lever for a dem at the state or federal level since, and only a couple of times for locals.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at September 06, 2021 08:37 PM (JzDjf)

590 Kindltot, hmmm, thanks.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:37 PM (L2ZTs)

591 Darrell Harris, all true, thanks.

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:38 PM (L2ZTs)

592 Getting into it with a bunch of Mexican nationals in California at a cookout will open one's eyes.

Posted by: Martini Farmer at September 06, 2021 08:40 PM (BFigT)

593 Captain Hate, I love seeing the conservatives jab the lefties at Patterico. Only reason I keep tuning in there. (Pat banned me from commenting there last year.)
Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:26 PM (L2ZTs)

I keep forgetting you were another sane outlying point at that online asylum along with happyfeet and narciso. I can't even stand lurking there anymore; like I'm condoning torturing small animals.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 08:40 PM (y7DUB)

594 #584 GnuBreed,

We always back our positions with fact and reason. Leftist "beliefs" always seem to rely primarily on emotion. Once you are laying out fact and logic to support your position, they are left with nowhere to go. Therefore, you're a "Nazi."

I don't know why "Nevergiveup" has declared me a "wolf in sheep's clothing" who is here to divide people. I've been a loyal reader of AoSHQ for a long, long time. When I worked day shift I was a frequent commenter here. I made Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs go absolutely apeshit back when he was deleting all of his posts documenting the fraudulent, photoshopped propaganda put out by the Palestinians. Been here a long time. Sucks to be viewed as an outsider and an enemy.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:42 PM (VDbGO)

595 Stopped going to a LOT of sites a long time ago, as these "conservative" sites were no longer in any way conservative.

I deleted a lot of bookmarks after the election when everyone got smoked. Why read people who don't know any fucking more than I do? Especially sites that have massive circle jerks about how well informed they are.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 08:44 PM (y7DUB)

596 Sam Adams

I may suggest develop a known nic, and not a new one. There have been many trolls lately, which puts people on a hair trigger. With a known nic, we can debate or ignore, as the case may be.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:46 PM (u82oZ)

597 Captain Hate, thanks.
I got banned because I told an asshole who was questioning Trump supporters' patriotism to "shut his porcine asshole." This individual, as it turns out, is a cop.

(For the record, I think all lefty bloviators are pigs.)

Posted by: qdpsteve (L2ZTs) at September 06, 2021 08:46 PM (L2ZTs)

598 #588 Bones,

Exactly! They have NEVER been on our side. At least, not since somewhere in the 1960's. THAT is why a bunch of Southern Democrats became Republicans. It wasn't about them being "racist." They didn't want to belong to a party that no longer loved AMERICA.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:47 PM (VDbGO)

599 A few people like Russell Kirk tried and more or less failed to define conservatism academically. Part of the issue in the US is that the founding fathers were both radical but conservative at the same time. Socially, the US had an upper class but few of them did not work unlike England's lords. So social mobility was and has been a tradition in the US. The Framers were radical in dispensing with traditional forms of govt as well as dividing powers coupled with federalism. The society itself was set up on lockean propositions to promote liberty and protection of rights. What guided them was a willingness to correct errors, a grounding in understanding human behavior, and a willingness to cooperate. IE pragmatism in means with definite outcomes firmly supported, liberty, justice, and moderation with all extremes sanded off.

Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 08:49 PM (xunV5)

600 #595 Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt,

What the hell happened to conservatives? What happened to Bill Kristol? Pictures of him with little boys? What happened to Peggy Noonan? What happened to ANN COULTER?

WTF happened to our people? When did they all go NUTS?

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:50 PM (VDbGO)

601 See duck turkeys deer bass redfish

et al
Posted by: rhennigantx at September 06, 2021 08:
-----
Cam I get some of what you are smoking?

Posted by: Farmer at September 06, 2021 08:52 PM (55Qr6)

602 #596 NaCly Dog,

This has ALWAYS been my nic. You and I have talked before. I just don't get to contribute much here any more. When I get off work at 3:00 a.m., I still have to make some dinner and then try to read the comments. I've found that when I just attempt to jump in, people largely ignore me. I haven't been trying to bother people here. This is the best site on the web, with the funniest and most intelligent commenters in America.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:54 PM (VDbGO)

603 So, I have to support Naclydog in his choice. I am of the right, but a pragmatist in that we should unify more around outcomes on the right than specific policies, dogma, and personalities.

Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 08:55 PM (xunV5)

604 Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 08:49 PM (xunV5)

The founding fathers were a mixture of what we would define as Conservative and Liberal today. They came together to fight a common enemy. Once that was over the real fight started and it has been going on to this day,

Posted by: Just a side note at September 06, 2021 08:56 PM (2DOZq)

605 #603 Whig,

Is it safe to assume that by "personalities" you are referring to Donald Trump?

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 08:56 PM (VDbGO)

606 Sam, see my above comments why a lot of media types and gope types hated Trump. They have their own pet policies, personality networks, and dogma. They also either benefitted from those financially and power wise. They forgot the general welfare of the people including their fellow voters in doing so.

Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 08:59 PM (xunV5)

607 Sam Adams

"with the funniest and most intelligent commenters in America."

And then there is me!

You adda lot. I appreciate your posts. But your posting looked like you took 'rcocean' as a new nic. It was surprising, and glad it is not true.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 09:00 PM (u82oZ)

608 E pragmatism in means with definite outcomes firmly supported, liberty, justice, and moderation with all extremes sanded off.
Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 08:49 PM (xunV5)

Thus Franklin's worry - "a Republic if you can keep it." The founders wanted all that you say, but they left open the idea that if the populace, or some imagination of it as we have now, wanted certain branches to join forces, they could overwhelm the will of the people and that all that stood in their way was the "sovereignty of these states" which any federal government would seek to overcome - see the Voting Rights Act of 1965. We have the perfect storm that Franklin thought would happen much sooner...

Posted by: Boswell at September 06, 2021 09:01 PM (5iUNf)

609 For every Kristol and Noonan Trump lost he brought in 2 or 3 working class people.

Knocking the neo-cons and the unquestioning free traders down several pegs and learning how to fight is the best thing to happen to the GOP.

And yes, Trump has been even better than Reagan, though maybe it's a close call.

Posted by: Ohio Guy at September 06, 2021 09:01 PM (h/mlN)

610 Sam Adams,

Trump unmasked them all, although drunk-before-Noonan just embellished things with pretty words with no ideological consistency.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 09:01 PM (y7DUB)

611 I supported Trump early in the primary season when the race was between him and cruz. I felt that bushism was an abject failure and hilldawg was unthinkable due to both policy and actual knowing her before she became a national figure but was a state one at the time.

Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 09:02 PM (xunV5)

612 I wouldn't say I was apolitical as a child; I knew justice when I saw it and the adult obsession with "sharing" always did rub me wrong. But it was when I picked up The Federalist Papers in high school, after reading some excerpts in my AP History class, that I became politically aware.

Since then I've considered myself a classical liberal. For a time, however, my mile-wide libertarian streak and abhorrence of petty (and non-petty) tyrants trying to run other people's lives almost blew me off-course on abortion. It wasn't until I saw the heartbeat on my own ultrasound that I knew not only that there was a human life in there, but one to whom my own life would be subordinate. Forever.

First vote was Reagan '84. I remember being grateful he was alive to run. Imagine if he had been taken from us two months after taking office.

Posted by: It's Always Something at September 06, 2021 09:03 PM (bP7mo)

613 What's wrong with "right wing"?
Posted by: rcocean at September 06, 2021 08:01 PM (evE25)

Because we're not that. I prefer Constitutionalist. And Evangelical Christian. And a supporter of Western Civilization.

Posted by: GWB at September 06, 2021 09:06 PM (2nnuG)

614 Posted by: NaCly Dog

I nation is defined by its People who share blood, history, and culture. Western Civilization is Euro-Centric. Our nation was founded by 80% Anglo-Saxon with Northern Germanic thrown in. Hell, read the 1790 Naturalization Act because clearly our Founders designed our country to be highly exclusive for a reason as many Whites were denied.

I have nothing against other people. I have witnessed my nation being targeted for extermination based on a Tower of Babel thinking. It never works. Noticing every group tribes up because it's in our DNA to do so while The Founding Stock are denied these Natural Rights elevating the Rights of Minorities to a special class giving them free reign to subvert and openly match towards genocide of my People the Founding Stock an act of war and never should have been tolerated.

Wanting to conserve this country for my family and my People's children and grandchildren for generations to come while pointing out my Blood is being targeted for genocide doesn't make me a bad person. The people doing the subversion and sitting on their hands in silence thus allowing such genocide to occur are the ones drawing first blood.

Posted by: Widespread Pepe at September 06, 2021 09:06 PM (XNnz8)

615 Ohio Guy and Captain Hate,

I agree with both of you. Trump ripped off the blinders to how corrupt and incestuous our DC insiders are, and God, how they HATE him for it! He also revealed how thoroughly corrupt our FBI is. Washington simply can't have that. If Donald wasn't going to play their corrupt games, then they were going to go along with the most fraudulent election theft in all of history. And they did.

Trump IS the best president of my lifetime, right after Reagan. I will never forget the first time I saw Reagan speak. After enduring years of Jimmy Carter, he gave me lasting hope. Never thought I'd see a better president. I was wrong. I'm still praying for Trump 2024.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:07 PM (VDbGO)

616 Boswell, the republic may well come to an end but ideas that resonate with people never truly die. We use the political system as best we can while we can but prepare for sailing the storm in a skiff made of paper if we must.

Posted by: whig at September 06, 2021 09:08 PM (xunV5)

617 For every Kristol and Noonan Trump lost he brought in 2 or 3 working class people.

Rove hates appealing to the working class; every time someone mentions the Reagan Democrats he gets apoplectic.

Posted by: Captain Hate Won't Forget Ashli Babbitt at September 06, 2021 09:08 PM (y7DUB)

618 By the way, Reagan was still the FAR better communicator.

And Donald Trump fights like Tyson in his prime.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:09 PM (VDbGO)

619 587 Nice thread, OM!

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Live! from the Dungeon of Discord at September 06, 2021 08:35 PM (Dc2NZ)

Yes, it did turn out nicely, didn't it?

Of course, I can't make these things happen on command. It's teh Horde that makes them so.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 09:10 PM (oOHrl)

620 Yeah, Trump was stealing the Democrats union voters! He was winning with ordinary people! Karl Rove just can't STAND that, can he?

Idiots. We are governed by GARBAGE.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:11 PM (VDbGO)

621 Because Trevor Noah laughs at "Make America Great Again" and none of his YouTube followers can think of anything to be proud of. My list? The moon landing, Voyager II, Hubble Space Telescope, Chuck Yeager in X-1, private space flight, high tech and the internet, Apple, MTV, YouTube, defeating the Nazis, Lincoln and the Union Army freeing the slaves, Frederick Douglas, building the panama canal, lifting millions of its citizens out of poverty, free speech, the university system, the highway system, Appomattox and the peace made by Grant and Lee, Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement, Robert Perry reaches the North Pole, Charles Lindbergh solo crossing of the Atlantic, the national park system, individualism, individual home ownership, millions of families raising their children the way they choose, farms that feed the world, big juicy Texas sized steak, the Inchon landings, women's suffrage, the Lewis and Clark expedition, Woodstock, driving between states without having to pass a border checkpoint, Ralph Lauren, Levi Strauss, Marilyn Monroe, the stock room guy who fills your order at Amazon, the Met, the innocence project, bourbon, George Washington's Farewell Address ..

Posted by: Steven N. Gosney at September 06, 2021 09:11 PM (02QMW)

622 Oregon Muse, God bless and keep you, and thank you for this thread!

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:11 PM (VDbGO)

623 Gettysburg Address, Medal of Honor recipients, Ernest E. Evans, jazz music, blues music, funk, rap (ok, maybe not rap), the big four of thrash, stand up comedy, Ellis Island, real football, basketball, baseball, the miracle on ice, Tiger Wood's 5th Masters, 4 time world's strongest man Brian Shaw, Robert Gallo, St. Damien of Molokai, Robert Jarvik, Thomas Sowell, The Golden Gate Bridge, Mark Twain, Henry Ford, Coke, Frank Lloyd Wright, Thomas Edison, the Dad who teaches his children to work hard and be respectful of others, Walt Disney and Walt Disney World, the Wright Brothers, Elvis, Van Halen, Michael Jordan, Prince, Frank Sinatra, Andy Warhol, Richard Petty, Stan Lee, classic movies, Star Wars, Star Trek, classic TV, Fender, Martin and Gibson, Gustav Stickley, Louis Comfort Tiffany, reliable utilities such as garbage pickup, electric, and clean water and sewer, average Joes being able to raise their family in a nice house and move up, Alaskan Crab fisherman, powerline workers, the Marshall Plan, compare pre-WWII Japan to post WWII Japan, the Declaration of Independence, a nation of laws, not men, ... but other than that, WHAT HAVE THE ROMANS EVER DONE FOR US

Posted by: Steven N. Gosney at September 06, 2021 09:13 PM (02QMW)

624 #621 Steven N. Gosney,

So very well said!

Could have had bourbon a little higher on your list, but other than that, greatness!

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:13 PM (VDbGO)

625 Captain Hate,

Yeah. You're right. But Rove is a hanger on and he told Bush not to fight back against media smears, giving him a 30% approval rating for his troubles.

If we're being honest, Bush was useless, but Rove was a horrible strategist and bears some blame for 2008.

Hopefully Republicans steer clear of him in 2024 (Trump will if he runs again).

Posted by: Ohio Guy at September 06, 2021 09:14 PM (h/mlN)

626 Widespread Pepe

Well stated and reasoned.

Hand Salute.

Two.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 09:15 PM (u82oZ)

627 I genuinely regret defending Bush every hour of every day for eight years. A man who won't lift a finger to defend himself doesn't deserve it.

And then the jackass started attacking Trump....

Go EFF yourself, W.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:16 PM (VDbGO)

628 Widespread Pepe,

Ditto.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:18 PM (VDbGO)

629 Because Trevor Noah laughs at "Make America Great Again" and none of his YouTube followers can think of anything to be proud of.
Posted by: Steven N. Gosney�

In fairness, if Trevor Noah seems a little retarded, it's because he's a fucking retard.

Posted by: Drink Like Vikings at September 06, 2021 09:22 PM (ysvD0)

630 Sad Adams,

"I genuinely regret defending Bush every hour of every day for eight years"

THIS.

No more.

If our candidate/senator/governor/president won't fight against the Left, then he/she doesn't deserve to be there in the first place.

Posted by: Ohio Guy at September 06, 2021 09:26 PM (h/mlN)

631 I stood still while all political parties moved to the left.

Posted by: leber at September 06, 2021 09:30 PM (MxeFh)

632 leber,

"I stood still while all political parties moved to the left."

That's entirely accurate.

And to me, completely inexplicable.

Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:36 PM (VDbGO)

633 In fairness, if Trevor Noah seems a little retarded, it's because he's a fucking retard.

Posted by: Drink Like Vikings at September 06, 2021 09:22 PM (ysvD0)

Has Trevor had his gender reveal party yet?

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 09:49 PM (oOHrl)

634 Posted by: Sam Adams at September 06, 2021 09:11 PM (VDbGO)

Thank you for your kind words.

Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader, Pants Monitor & Social Distancing Professional at September 06, 2021 09:50 PM (oOHrl)

635 Frankly, I don't give a shit what other people think. I seem to be more accepted today by Conservatives so if I need a label for my beliefs, then I guess I would be a classified as a Conservative.

I do believe in a number of thing that go against the Conservative label which sometimes shock other "Conservatives".

Posted by: pawn at September 06, 2021 10:13 PM (Re9MM)

636 Nothing "made" me a Conservative but 9/11 made me a Militant American.

Posted by: pawn at September 06, 2021 10:15 PM (Re9MM)

637 Good to see you, Miley! I hope Publius hasn't given up on us.

Posted by: Emmie at September 06, 2021 08:29 PM (6RgRK)

He hasn't given up on you at all. But incivility makes him furious, as it does every proper Southern man, and he's cooling off. It may take awhile.

Posted by: Miley, the Duchess, #SuperStraight #EnemyOfTheState (Mzdiz) at September 06, 2021 10:37 PM (Mzdiz)

638 Your Grace, with your good man publius in your corner, you have reached an enviable waypoint.

Long may the Duchess of the Carolinas thrive.

Hand kiss for you, and a respectful tip of the hat to him.

Posted by: NaCly Dog (u82oZ) at September 06, 2021 08:27 PM (u82oZ)

Thank you on both our behalves, Salty. We're very fortunate to have found each other.

My job is to be careful not to get into a position which will require him to kill someone. I take that very seriously.

Posted by: Miley, the Duchess, #SuperStraight #EnemyOfTheState (Mzdiz) at September 06, 2021 10:40 PM (Mzdiz)

639 This is something that many Northerners don't understand. There is a reason why people in the South are polite to each other, for the most part.

Posted by: Miley, the Duchess, #SuperStraight #EnemyOfTheState (Mzdiz) at September 06, 2021 10:42 PM (Mzdiz)

640 My first paycheck..."who is FICA and why did they take my money?" Then the minimum wage went up, and despite making more on a check, I could no longer afford to buy our products (pizza) because the prices went up, too. Then I realized a year or so later that the Democrats were really into protecting sea turtle eggs but thought baby humans getting murdered was a okay. By the time I was eligible to register to vote, there really wasn't option for me but Republican.

Posted by: nmissi@gmail.com at September 06, 2021 11:38 PM (appmN)

641 Living and working outside the US. Not tours or vacations but years spent overseas. Being spat on in the street during the Iraq war. Having an entire room at a party get up and silently leave when the host introduced me as an American. I began to question my ideals and beliefs, reexamining everything. I studied Judaism, the Founding Fathers, and the writings that inspired them. I left America a Trotskyist and returned a conservative. If you view leftist ideology as a religion its not so hard to understand their thinking.

Posted by: wilbeforce at September 06, 2021 11:43 PM (WwvPi)

642 Bill Clinton. He didn't make me a conservative, but he damn sure made me stop voting for Democrats, permanently.

Posted by: NCDave at September 06, 2021 11:52 PM (gyVN+)

643 In college I was doing a paper on the strategic balance between the U.S. and Soviet Union. During the course of my research I discovered that 85% of the agricultural output of the Soviet Union at that time was being produced on 1% of the farmed land. I thought it was a typo and dug further into it. Turned out to be an accurate statistic. The 1% of the land that was producing 85% of their crops were all the tiny private lots of land owned by homeowners wherein they could sell their produce for a profit in farmer's markets. The huge tracks of State owned land (the 'collectives') that were supposed to be feeding the nation were an abject failure. You know, from those, according to their abilities, and to those, based on their need. Despite Socialism being hammered by college professors even back in the 70's, I was able to recognize the fundamental flaws of socialism and why as a system it could never succeed.

Posted by: P Converse at September 07, 2021 06:07 AM (v36gJ)

644 I think that I've always been right of most of my friends. I liked making and saving money, got married when many people did not. When, after 3 years of marriage, I got a positive pregnancy test, I surprised myself by being delighted. Thoroughly enjoyed having, and raising, kids (3 of them).
Just couldn't openly support 'THOSE HEARTLESS PEOPLE". I was anti-Reagan, like everyone I knew.
I even rooted for Gore to win the election, and hoped that the Supreme Court would make a last-minute save.
Then, 9/11 happened.
I started to see the difference between Liberals and myself, when - oh, so quickly after the 'event where somebody did something' - they resumed their Hate America diatribes.
I realized the change that I had undergone only when I heard the Zell Miller speech, and was thrilled to hear my concerns addressed.
America has spent years getting to this point - it will not turn on a dime. Expect a lot of work, particularly at the state and local level, to turn that ship around.
I'll be moving to another state shortly, and my focus for the next few elections will be those many city and county-level positions that control a LOT of money.

Posted by: Linda S Fox at September 07, 2021 06:35 AM (HZfQV)

645 This is easy, Barack Hussein Obama. Then watching the way conservative sycophants were absolutely mortified of treating him like they treated Bill Clinton began my understanding of how completely and utterly worthless conservatives are. You are all Pavlov's dog but your trigger is not a bell it is the word, racist. You all believe in neoliberalism just as strongly as those you think of as your enemies. Equality is your North star and you will brook no criticism of it, no matter how mild or how true. So you are retarded and weak boomers who know neither the shot nor the solution.

Posted by: RandbotFan at September 07, 2021 08:00 AM (7E3C4)

646 Birth of first child.

Posted by: dad29 at September 07, 2021 08:17 AM (mzJmr)

647 Lots of little things adding up. My family were all professing old-school Democrats (most still are), but I fooled them all - I believed them when they said we should treat everyone equally and look out for the little guy and question authority (ha, remember that one?), and not blindly trust the government. Then when I got to college, and I saw how they behaved when given the power and authority to actually do all that they promised, and they turned out to be huge frauds?

It's not so much that they moved me to the right - although they certainly did - but more that, as I stood my ground on the above, they drifted away. If I changed at all, it was in learning what was necessary to be able to practice what they preach. They hate conservatives for many reasons, not least of which is that most of us turned out to be far better liberals than they ever were.

Posted by: nightfly at September 07, 2021 10:06 AM (KT41q)

648 I've had pretty much the same beliefs throughout my life. In my younger days, those beliefs made me a Prog, now they make me a conservative. Strange.

Posted by: Bob at September 07, 2021 10:45 AM (d+5Bz)

649 Democrat's betrayal of the Vietnamese and Jimmy Carter. History repeats itself..

Posted by: Sixiron at September 07, 2021 11:28 AM (c4Wfm)

650 College

The hate and anger Leftists spewed ticked me off. The hatred of men from the Womyn's organization. The hatred of white people from the Black newspaper. The disavowing of the student government election when their pet cause was defeated so they did the election over to get it to pass.

Posted by: hadsil at September 07, 2021 11:30 AM (55qP6)

651 Jack Kemp. Ronald Reagan. Thomas Sowell. Friedrich Hayek. Adam Smith. Walter Williams. And then striving to understand the world around me from what I learned from them.

Posted by: Reasonman at September 07, 2021 11:52 AM (p0fzs)

652 Witnessing East German soldiers guarding a minefield...

On his side of the fence. Made an impression.

Posted by: Danimal28 at September 07, 2021 12:29 PM (8O629)

653 I pretty much started out this way. I guess this made me heartless as a youth according to Churchill. My Dad and his family were pretty hard right. Mom's were old school Democrats (which made them conservative even by the 80's.)
Posted by: Aetius451AD at September 06, 2021 05:52 PM (csEWM)

Same here! I never had a phase where I thought Democrats were other than Communist, traitorous scumbags. The Old Man nearly got killed in Vietnam fighting Commies, and when I read the Communist Manifesto in Junior High, I thought it was ridiculous and specious.

I have come to the conclusion that Communism is seductive because it purposely conflates charity with collectivism, and most people are empathetic.

Posted by: Retired Buckeye Cop is now an engineer at September 07, 2021 02:13 PM (pJWtt)

654 I took an interest in politics all the way back to 68 when I was 5yo. I remember the 68 riots and the hating and self loathing of the lefties for America and our service men. Then the sell out of Vietnam by the Dems cemented in my view the Democrats were demonic. Everything they have done since reinforces the thought.

Posted by: raemu10 at September 07, 2021 06:37 PM (F7W6I)

655 Election season 1980, I was 9 going on 10. I was reflexively pro-Carter because my parents were die-hard libs so that meant I was one too. By 1984 (actually soon after the 1980 election but I didn't realize it right away), I was a Reaganite and solidly Conservative. My dad called me the family's Alex P. Keaton. I took it as a compliment. I think I was just at the right age to know how much things sucked under Carter compared to how I felt about things with Reagan as president. The optimism was palpable. When he asked, "Are you better off now than you were 4 years ago?" I could confidently say "Yes, I am." It just made sense that conservatism was the better option. As I got older it was reinforced by educating myself and observing others who came and went in my life. Conservatives always seemed happier, friendlier, and more successful at life. That's what I wanted to be.

Posted by: Brian448 at September 07, 2021 08:41 PM (LJrK0)

656 I'll take a swing at That.

They have a misguided idea about what Should be. You Should give up what is yours to someone who has already had theirs, IF that is necessary to make peace, which really is not peace, in the home.
Bad mom,spoiled little girl and a boy who will be damaged by being made to feel like he does not matter,, his resentment towards the sister and lack of respect for mom will shock mom.

Posted by: Nolan Parker at September 08, 2021 06:12 AM (DK70w)

657 Al Gore and John Forbes Kerry who ran for POTUS.
It also changed my political persuasion to Republican.

Posted by: obsidian at September 08, 2021 09:27 AM (KetHX)

658 Attended UC Berkeley in the late 70s, saw nascent leftyism up close and personal. Did not like it.

Posted by: HarvardR at September 08, 2021 12:32 PM (hl+QW)

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