How Bush Wrecked Conservatism

[ChairmanAgnostic]

by Gary Kamiya
http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2007/10/23/conservatism/index.html

Some very interesting commentary on what bush has done to us.

"Similarly, the moral impulse of conservatism has from the outset been caught in a welter of self-contradiction. When the Judeo-Christian injunction to help the less fortunate collides with the "I've got mine, Jack" ethos of Ayn Rand individualism, selfishness inevitably triumphs. Crony capitalism, corruption and unchecked greed have been the inevitable result. As a result, conservative morality in practice has been squeezed into an ever smaller, ever more theocentric core. The fact that the Christian right claims to stand at the pinnacle of American virtue is grotesque, but it's the logical consequence of the shriveling of conservative morality.

In one sense, George W. Bush's presidency represents the ugly culmination of all of these tendencies. But in a more important sense, it is a radical departure from earlier American conservatism. Bush has undermined core American institutions and values in ways that no previous president, Democratic or Republican, has ever done."


followed by:

"Bush covertly and duplicitously laid the groundwork for one of the longest and most expensive wars in American history. Bush declared that habeas corpus, a magnificent cornerstone of Western law, did not apply to those he designated, without judicial review, "enemy combatants." He claimed the right to lock those individuals up forever, without allowing them to bring their case before a jury. He made torture official U.S. policy, and was directly responsible for the American-run torture factory at Abu Ghraib. His approval of warrantless wiretapping constitutes perhaps the most serious frontal attack on the right of privacy enshrined in the Fourth Amendment in American history. He has made unprecedented use of "signing statements" to disobey laws he disagrees with, marginalizing Congress in the process. "

[kohodog]

1. Actually he wreckd the country, conservatives included (but not the rich)

And he may have hastened humans to extinction, either by "Armageddon" or the destruction of a human friendly environment. But the blame also goes to his both handlers and his enablers.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. I don't agree with 100% of the article,

and you make a very good point. But is fascinating how the mainstream is beginning to feel no qualms about attacking boy george