Cosplaying as Conservatives
The pretense of Republicans who call themselves conservatives
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Pop quiz: Which of our two major parties favors a big government approach to governance with lots of bureaucracy and oodles of regulation?
The envelope, please…
…And the answer is, both of them!
There is a difference, of course, between modern-day Republicans and Democrats. Beginning with FDR’s New Deal and its innovative efforts to respond to the Great Depression, the Democratic Party pursued policies that grew the government by taking on the responsibility of social welfare (e.g. Social Security, unemployment insurance) and by supporting the economy through spending on programs such as the Civil Works Administration and Rural Electrification. The subsequent efforts to forge a victory in World War II required more spending, resulting in greater growth of the Federal bureaucracy. This opened the way for continued expansion of government in the post-war years under both Democratic and Republican Presidents and Congresses: Lyndon Johson gave us the Great Society and Richard Nixon the Environmental Protection Agency.
The post-war, business-oriented Republican Party favored the classic laissez-faire approach to “democratic capitalism”, ie. low taxes and little regulation. It was socially moderate in contrast to the Democrats, whose electoral successes were partly predicated on the uneasy coalition of Southern segregationists and Northern labor. If there were an ideology at the core of Republican conservatism in the mid-20th Century, it was the idea that the government’s touch on the private sector and people’s lives should be as light as possible.
American conservatism of the post-WWII era was espoused by thought leaders like William F. Buckley and Russell Kirk. Its ideology is easily distinguished from today’s right-wing populism that likes to identify as “conservative”. From a national origin based in part on a reaction to an overbearing monarchy through the growth of private-sector behemoths during industrialization, American conservative philosophy evolved to include, among many, beliefs in a small federal government fiscally based on less spending and lower taxes; preservation of individual rights and freedoms; free market capitalism unencumbered by regulation; and opposition to collectivization and statism, both prominent features of authoritarian regimes.
In contrast to this ‘traditional conservatism’, today’s version is marked by a startling rejection of the ideology and the principles that underpinned the movement’s previous iterations. Over the last 50 years, these principles have been ‘more honored in the breach than the observance’ Moral clarity and individual responsibility guidelines have dissipated, and pragmatic governance replaced by grievance-fueled political theatrics. White Christian nationalism is at the vanguard of this trend, though it bears no resemblance to the “love-thy-neighbor” tenets of Christian theology. It is a pretense, a counterfeit justification for authoritarianism, a masquerade intended to fool ‘some of the people all of the time’.
This transformation occurred over decades.* The election of Donald Trump, arguably the most immoral and corrupt man to be President, was the penultimate event in the decades-long rotting away of American conservatism. The cancer below the surface became an open sore, startling the nation on January 6, 2021. A battle that had long gone on with insufficient public notice burst into the open.
History shows us that, when the responsibilities that accompany freedom are ignored, those who benefit from a system that doesn’t require them to play by the rules will inevitably take advantage. The Great Depression and the financial collapse of 2008 are prime examples. These events also provide insight into how a minority with resources is able to manipulate our political institutions. Given the outsized role of money in our electoral politics, we should consider this minority a would-be plutocracy.
Conservatives in Name Only (CINOs)
The actions taken by the current Republican majority in the House of Representatives and in various Republican-controlled state governments are not only inconsistent with conservative orthodoxy but more in line with an authoritarian government. There are numerous recent examples.
Here in the free state of Florida, Governor DeSantis and his merry band of the Republican supermajority in the legislature have been busy injecting the power of the state into all phases of society. The six-week abortion ban, the public campaign against transexuals, and attacks on the freedom of expression and thought, especially on all levels of public education, have been well-publicized. The state’s Education Department recently issued curriculum guidelines that included highlighting the “benefits” slaves earned from their bondage, including the acquisition of skills that eventually helped them in doing other things in life. This is literally a whitewashing of history and a ham-fisted attempt at the indoctrination of children.
When it comes to the free market, apparently businesses can only be unhindered by government if they avoid outraging the Governor’s sensibilities. The kerfuffle with The Disney Corporation, the state’s largest taxpayer, began over its “wokeness” when its CEO spoke out against 2022’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill. The enacting of a tough law designed to deter the employment of illegal immigrants is backfiring: It has led to an exodus of migrant workers from the Sunshine State causing severe labor shortage in mainstay Florida industries such as agriculture and construction. Some data indicates up to 60 percent of the state’s farm workers are illegal immigrants. Add to this the shortage of teachers and the difficulties the state’s universities are experiencing in attempting to fill and retain professors.
Perhaps Florida is just not the sub-tropical paradise that attracts retirees and tourists. As The News-Press reported earlier this year, the state tops the list of states people most want to leave. The rising costs of homeowners insurance and the declining numbers of companies that will even issue policies is a continuing crisis. The fact that 20 percent of all leprosy cases in the US have occurred in the state (!) is dumbfounding. The big-government conservatives running the state continue to be more concerned with cultural politics, focused as they are on drag shows and the reading materials available to children. Woke, it seems, is not the only thing that comes to Florida to die.
Florida is not unique, although it is drawing more media attention lately as his floundering Presidential campaign has exposed DeSantis’ political miscalculations. The GOP controls a majority of state governments, holding “trifectas” (control of the governorship and both legislative houses) in 22 states compared to the Democrats’ 18. In six other states with Democratic governors, the Republicans control the legislatures. Voters choose their leaders, of course, but partisan gerrymandering and restrictions on voting have allowed politicians to choose their voters. (Democrats also engage in these redistricting shenanigans when in power but the Republicans are better at it these days.) The result in these times of performative politics is an increasing emphasis on states using political power to intrude into their citizens’ lives.
Texas has leaped into the big government game feet first with a series of laws intended to cement GOP control. The Republicans took aim at the Democratic stronghold Harris County (which includes Houston) by passing bills that gave the state oversight over that county’s elections. In public education, a recently-passed law would allow unlicensed religious chaplains to provide “counseling” to students. The chaplains would be compensated by funding appropriated for school safety.
Throughout these Republican-controlled states, intrusions into the private lives of citizens are the Holy Grail of faux conservatives. To wit:
Enacting abortion bans in the wake of the Supreme Court’s overturning Roe v. Wade last year has not satisfied the CINO's desire to inject government into women’s lives. Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, for example, has been requesting women’s medical records from hospitals within the state. He then joined with 18 other Republican AGs to request the federal government drop a rule prohibiting states from obtaining medical records from states where abortion remains a legal choice.
Various attempts are underway in GOP-controlled states to ban contraception.
The Underlying Meaning: One Theory
American society faces the reality that inevitable demographic changes are taking place. Sometime in the next few decades, whites will no longer be a clear majority as a they have been since the nation’s founding. It may well be that the mostly white, wealthy class, the 1 percent, will work to maintain their power as the society changes. This is not an implausible theory. And it is no less implausible that promoting divisive politics, a politics of fear, is the strategy they will employ to solidify control.
It is just a theory. Whether it’s called authoritarianism or fascism, it is an attempt by a plutocratic class to wield power over a large population using the institutions of the state to enforce conformity. The perversion of traditional conservatism is a convenient tool- it offers the fearful a sense of security by cloaking the erosion of democracy in the ersatz ad mixture of the Christian bible and the Constitution. It is expansive enough to allow racists and anti-Semites not only a voice, but a role. And it utilizes the mechanism of representative democracy to elect chaos actors as our political leaders.
When we lose faith in the institutions of a free society, not only government, but media and business, too- we are susceptible to anything that promises a sense of order and stability. Perhaps it would be only fair to heed the warning issued in the Christian bible to beware of false prophets.
*The capture of the Republican Party by anti-democratic forces is a story told in many chapters. I will discuss some of these in the next few months.
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Having spent many years in deep South classrooms while pursuing non-political influence in the general public arena, I know many things that extremist conservatives don't. In education resources are scarce with southern states school districts employing the lowest paid teachers in the country. Try coping with standing of your state as 45th through 49th in the nation's teacher pay rankings year after year. Try keeping your morale high as the winds of classroom/school segregation, increasing homeschooling, ill-trained administrators, scant benefits from school boards blow through your state, town and school. No book banning is needed when libraries are hard-pressed to update their stacks routinely. No curriculum manipulation is needed when inattentive students and distant parenting rules your classroom.
Some enlightened leaders in big city systems rely on grants from the federal Department of Education to stay reasonably up to date in curriculum, teaching and equipment. In New Orleans there was a unique improbably consortium of parochial and public schools to institute STEM schools. That's Science-Technology-Engineering-Mathematics programs. It was national funded and stipulated courses that could be found nowhere else in K-12 schools. After college-level programs such as genetics, computer aided design, anatomy and physiology, algebra logic and television production were approved by the Louisiana Board of Education, bright students from the entire city thronged to enroll with enrollments doubling each semester. But a renewal grant was never approved as the archdiocese sabotaged it fearing loss of so many tuition-paying students from their academic but traditional classrooms. No subversion by politicians was necessary like in Florida's Statehouse and Legislature and a Republican House of Representatives in DC today.
Plus the 1980's and 90's saw reversal of the parties in the Deep South. No more Dixiecrats--Southern Democrats with segregation sentiments--as the party turned Republican. The GOP started embracing white supremacy as New Orleans elected David Duke to the legislature, setting him up for a run at the national presidency. Nobody want to publicize the switch, so voters simply followed the sentiments of their cult leaders even then. Democratic rule in the Old South turned Republican.
In religion the dominant Southern Baptists slowly abandoned New Testament and Gospel scripture of Christ with 2 Commandments explained in parables and returned to the popular Old Testament stories of the Pentateuch and Moses with 10 Commandments. Despite hatred for blacks and Jews, Southern whites follow more Jewish law ironically with its vengeance and fear of God tenets which they regularly misrepresent and misconstrue. Pastors are neglecting their callings to truth and the Way as their teaching gives way to politics.
Socially the races are resegregating as schools become 99% black in central cities while white suburbs pretend to be integrated. In public meetings, blacks and whites sit on opposite sides of the room. Candidates get votes with 'more black is better' slogans, or stick to your own kind populist rhetoric. No effort is made to integrate schools outside of a limited number of civil rights-minded teachers and principals. So is it a wonder that legislatures get supermajorities of whites and gerrymander their permanent status despites demographic changes favoring minorities? Not enough eligible voters are registering or voting to change the fundamental swing toward segregation, authoritarianism, dumbed-down citizens and religious bigotry.
Political and religious revivals are needed to focus citizen attention on issues beyond their daily survival toward national principles of freedom, individualism, creativity, neighborliness, tolerance and other high principles that ruled for centuries in America and seemingly brushed aside in today's political infighting. If there was one way to start returning to stable, unified nationalism it might be to stop the press and politicians, if not voters, from referring to elections, states and campaigning as battlefields. We used to have 'horse races', now we have warring parties in elections. Battle ground states should be called 'competitive' again. Platforms could again emerge as candidates appeal to our better angels. Stop the warfare references in politics and present issues to attract peoples' attention. Our future as a nation depends on it.