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It has been about nine months since I pasted here last. I like the freedom on this site to have total control over my content. A problem with most web servers is that they restrict what you can do by setting up templates and other restrictive practices to enable people who don't write their web pages from scratch. I lost the password for the account but I was able to get it back, and was able to edit my pages.
TopI couldn't be happier that the Republican Party has selected Mitt Romney as its Presidental candidate. Romney seems to be doing everything he can to disredit himself. He has made mistake after mistake and the result is that he appears to be what he truely is, a spoiled rich kid, and the poster child for the 1%, not a regular guy who is concerned about all Americans. In fact he has just committed the worst gaff, having been caught saying that most people want entitlements they haven't earned. He is what the Republican Party has truely become, a political party for elites that want to take power away from a majority of Americans.
TopConservatism is admitedly complex and people will insist that the differences between people who use that label matter. There is a fairly universal tendancy among all of these views. Perhaps is it best portrayed by the affected snobby speech of William F. Buckley. The tendancy is to be elitist, to think that people belong in different catigories, classes, and that one is in one of the better-most deserving groups, and that others have less virtue and so not deserve what people in one's selected group have and feel entitled to.
We need look no further than the off the cuff remarks made by Mitt Rommey, yesterday, captured at a closed meeting by a hidden camera. It was not intended for public consumption as the Republican Party trys to peruade a majority of voters that it can best represent their interests. It may represent the intrests of people in business, or of people with money, but there is no assurance that favoring these elites translates into promotion of the general interest.
TopThe differences between Conservatives may consist of what elite each individual thinks he belongs to. The important commonality is that the attitude is basically not tolerant and it is non inclusive, that is why the private comments Mitt Romney made are so important. The elitist groups are as varied as individuals. The obvious ones are entrapaneurs, business management, the wealthy, religious sects, people concerned with financial control, racists.
The core belief of the non-inclusion is that most people are not deserving of the benefits one has or wants. It can run the range of views where people think themselves to be morally superior to people who feel competative with people not like themselves to more extreme hostility to people who are different, anti-gay, or non-Christian, for example. The elitism is central to the belief, however. One may think that citizenship brings rights that should not be extended to all non-citizens, under law, that does not mean a general xenophobia, for example.
Conservative comentators have defended Romney's remark, which he has nat retracted, by saying that most Conservatives agree with him. If that is the case, Romney is preaching to the base, which is a minority. If Romney wants a majority, maybe he shouldn't alienate the elderly on Medicare and Social Security, who paid into those programs and who still work and very often vote. But then again he seems skilled at keeping the focus on himself for shooting from the hip and hurting himself. That is good, the GOP deserves what is happening.
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