Conservatives All

In a relatively short February campaign speech, Mitt Romney used the word "conservative" 26 times. Does anyone know what that word means? Conservatives don’t know? For some reason they just want to hear it.

“Conservative” used to be a personal style, connoting a relatively staid demeanor and opposition to change. Republicans applaud Teddy Roosevelt, who championed conservation and reined in corporate greed.

As recently as the sixties, the philosophy was relatively clear. There was no question about what “conservative” meant to Barry Goldwater, in contrast to Lyndon Johnson. They were both eloquent in drawing out opposing visions for this country.

What a “conservative” stands for now is vague at best. He claims he will shrink government, but actually expands it, without raising taxes; he says derogatory things about government, wanting it out of his life, but into your bedroom; he seems to endorse solid, American values like baseball, lapel pins, apple pie, Chevrolet and guns, oh, and war, and is very responsive to corporate issues. In campaigning, these conservatives carefully say nothing specific about policies; they only smear their opponents, be they Democrats or fellow “conservatives,” who oppose their electoral objectives.

In scrutinizing politics, the editorial staff of Robbinsense has never before experienced anything like what has occurred in the last six months. Politics on our national stage has turned into comedy. One cannot tune in to the national news, be it CBS, MSNBC, CNN, or FoxViews, without being stunned into laughter.

Mitt Romney, the presumptive candidate, doesn’t fill squares for the "Tea Party" a loosely-packed bunch of whackos, most of who don't like black people and are resentful that we have a black president. While pandering to these offshoot zanies, the Republicans have presented a parade of marginal candidates, who have then been systematically shredded by each other, who are all awash in money presented by the Supreme Court, which seems to be the “legal branch” of the Republican Party, courtesy of "Citizens United.”

In response, Romney has contorted himself into the laughing stock of the country. He has chosen both sides of almost every important issue, sometimes contradicting himself in the same sentence: abortion, birth control, war/peace in the Middle East, bank bailouts, the Blunt Bill, health care, gay rights, Presidential apologies for American international atrocities. The only things that this man has not changed course on are 1) his insistence that he will undermine Social Security, 2) his determination to “balance the budget” on the backs of the poor, and 3) a defense of “American Exceptionalism.”

The up-coming election should be one of the most interesting in history---no “Tweedle-dee” and “Tweedle-dum” here. Obama is a known commodity: a measured, conservative man, with a slightly liberal agenda, driven by political expediency. The Republicans present a fascinating turn-around in their politics over recent times. Twelve years ago, the GOP cared only about winning. They stampeded behind George W. Bush, with a prominent pedigree and a hefty war chest, who promised to be a bland, conservative technocrat, but he turned out to be a radical in every sense of the word---and arguably the worst president in the modern era. Romney, aside from shamelessly pandering to his base and proposing the same policies as Mr. Bush, is literally promising to be more radical and an even worse president than he was! We know that a hard core of 20% to 30% will vote the Republican ticket no matter what. It will be interesting to see how many of the American people can forget this circus, and come to consider him as a viable candidate to lead our country. Good luck!