I have been biting my tongue, but I want to get something off of my chest. I am a conservative. I am first and foremost a social conservative. How conservative? Enough to scare the horses and the children. Let’s take one issue. I don’t believe that homosexual marriage should be legal. I don’t believe that homosexuals should be allowed to adopt children. I don’t believe that homosexuality itself should be legal.
I am a fiscal conservative. I don’t think that we should have automatic increases in federal budgets. I think that having each unit of government being required to reduce their budget by 1% next year would be a great way to start.
I am a second amendment conservative. It is quite likely that several members of my immediate family would not be alive today if it weren’t for a gun available that was used against an intruder.
Having said that, there are differences that I have with the current populist movement. (I say “populist”, not “conservative”.) Democrats have been cheating in elections at least since Lyndon Johnson’s 1948 Senate election. (Among other irregularities then, in Jim Wells County the voting register, at the end of the list, had hundreds of names in alphabetical order with the same handwriting.) However, I think that it is not only lazy and delusional, but also counterproductive to claim cheating every time that we lose. In 2020 I think that it is possible that cheating may have affected the outcome of the Senate elections in Georgia, but I don’t think that there is any way that it affected the outcome of the Presidential election. Trump lost. Bigly. Not understanding this hurts our chances of winning in the future. Claiming cheating after every congressional or governor’s loss only reminds me of the naivety of the (misquoted) comment by Pauline Kael: “I can’t believe Nixon won. I don’t know anyone who voted for him.”
On another issue: Ukraine is corrupt. Russia is evil. I don’t approve of everything that Ukraine does, but Russia is the one who invaded. Russia is the primary bad guy in this “special military operation”.
Just because Ukraine has done things wrong doesn’t make Russia right. If Russia decides to invade Finland, or Lithuania, or Poland, will many attempt to justify it, also?
I think that Mike Pence did the right thing on January 6th. If Vice-President Al Gore had done in January 2001, or had Joe Biden had done in January 2017 what many are insisting the Pence should have done in January 2021, those same people would be insisting strenuously that Gore and Biden couldn’t do that.
Vaccines have saved millions of lives worldwide, whether it is measles, polio, tuberculosis, or whatever. I believe that the Covid vaccine has diminishing value with repeated boosters, but I believe that the initial vaccines saved many lives. Yes, some died from the vaccine itself; but many more lives were saved. Anecdotal stories of people dying from the vaccine can be matched and outmatched by lives lost by those who did not have access to the vaccine. I personally had a good friend, who had no other health issues, die of Covid before the first vaccine was available to the public. I am thankful for the vaccines.
I am a conservative—neither a populist nor a leftist nor a deep state supporter. There are still many like me in this country. Promoting my views is more important to me than supporting any particular individual. I voted for Trump twice, in part because of his promises concerning judges, and in part because of the tragedies that voting for a Democrat would bring. However, I will vote for whoever has the best chance of promoting my values. There remain in this country conservatives who are neither left wing nor deep state nor populists. Our values are more important to us than power, than popularity, and more than any one individual.
Another “conservative” covidiot. Take your tongue and be gone.
Good explanation; thanks for posting it.
Read later.
I appreciate you expressing your thoughts. I agree with some and disagree with others, but I also believe we need a big tent to defeat this pervasive cancer that is creeping across the world. To defeat Mordor we need a coalition. And we are in dire need of leadership and direction.
I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. May he rest in peace.
However, blaming his loss on the absence of a vaccine is wrong, in my opinion. I blame government regulators. During the time of no vaccines, there were numerous COVID treatment options that were not only rejected by the regulators, they were even forbidden. These treatments included Hydroxychloroquine, Ivermectin (usually requiring a prescription), and also vitamin d, zinc, steroid inhalers, and more. These treatments were proven effective in numerous real trials with real patients, yet they were even prohibited by the government bureaucrats who even tried to remove medical licenses from doctors who used them.
Meanwhile, the only COVID treatment allowed was "Take Tylenol if you hurt too much, and call 911 if you can't breathe." I know, because that was the 'treatment' allowed for my daughter and her husband and my grandchild.
The odds are good that your friend died while on a ventilator. Most ventilated patients died (around 75 percent). I have a friend who's mother was hospitalized for COVID a thousand miles from his home. Her oxygen level dropped below 90, and my friend was told she was going to be placed on a ventilator. He dropped everything he was doing and flew to her side in Phoenix. He removed her from the hospital against significant protesting from the doctors and nurses, and placed her on the 'Zelenko Protocol' - Ivermectin, zinc, vitamin D, and more. She recovered and is doing just fine right now.
And we now have the start of the the GOPe kill Trump supporters will to support Trump.
The Deep state as with Twitter is everywhere.
I wonder if "V" is for victory or VENDETA
At best, you are ill-informed. The 2020 election was clearly stolen and Trump did not lose "bigly." You don't win the most votes ever by a sitting President, take 18 of the 19 bellwether counties, and have coattails that saw a net gain of 14 seats in the House and winning all 37 toss-up seats. No sitting president who has increased in vote total from his initial election has ever lost reelection. Trump gained 11 million more votes than he received in 2016. Do you believe Joe Biden received 81 million votes campaigning from his basement?
The Dems targeted GA, WI, AZ, MI, NV, and PA for election fraud. I would be happy to go over each state with you to detail how the fraud was committed.
In addition to using drop boxes (see 2,000 Mules), the Dems took advantage of mail-in balloting, ballot harvesting, ghost voters, illegal ballots, etc. State governors and the courts overrode the state legislatures and did not follow state law. The MSM, Deep State, and Big Tech colluded to defeat Trump, e.g., Hunter's laptop, $400 million in Zuckerbucks to facilitate ballot harvesting and registration of Des, real and imagined. Read Time's Molly Ball article, The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election
On another issue: Ukraine is corrupt. Russia is evil. I don’t approve of everything that Ukraine does, but Russia is the one who invaded. Russia is the primary bad guy in this “special military operation”. Just because Ukraine has done things wrong doesn’t make Russia right. If Russia decides to invade Finland, or Lithuania, or Poland, will many attempt to justify it, also?
The issue is not one of good or evil. Is our involvement in this proxy war in our strategic interests? With have no treaty commitment to defend Ukraine, unlike NATO members Poland and Lithuania, whom we are committed under Article 5. We are borrowing billions of dollars to send to Ukraine. We provide arms, training, and pay for the salaries and pensions of their government. Our annual debt servicing costs on our $31 trillion national debt are approaching $400 billion annually and will surpass the amount of money we spend on defense by 2029. Higher interest rates are driving debt servicing costs along with out of control government spending.
What is the US exit strategy for Ukraine? Will we have to pay for rebuilding the country? What controls do we have on the aid we have provided to one of the most corrupt countries in the world?
So how do you explain Florida? Even Miami Dade County went red. Do you know why? Because DeSantis fought voter fraud. Either mail in ballots give chance to voter fraud or they don't. Look at the difference.
Of the same cloth. I am afraid our conservatism will never again see power, unless the early voting and mail in voting is overhauled.