Lightning Joe - a piece of work
Corporatists don't need no stinking conservatives!
posted Saturday, 9 February 2008
In Washington and Wall Street, "conservative" has now become a code word for "corporatist," which is what the beltway power crowd really is. So it's no wonder these far-right-wingers are being taken by surprise, by the emerging sentiments of REAL conservatives, who are finally beginning to realize that they have been pawns in the corporatist takeover of our government.
More and more conservatives with voices -- authors, commentators, retired military officers, former civil servants who've resigned in disgust -- are speaking out to say that the traditional conservative impulse has been used as cannon fodder, in the Owning Class's war on the rest of us. Corporatists have so thoroughly co-opted the conservative moniker, that they now think they ARE conservative, by and large, rather than the neo-liberal profitists (pirates) they really are.
The danger now, to real conservatives, is that this misidentification may now be so engrained in the dialog, that no-one will remember that real conservatives DO have fellow-feelings, rather than just bottom lines. Real conservatives are starting to realize that the me-first-and-only royalists now in power are not committed to any sort of religious principles or community values, no matter their rhetoric. Indeed, urge a corporatist to give to the poor, and his first question is whether or not he can get a tax break by doing so.
The natural corporatist response to natural disasters, is to sell evacuees "vacation-evacuation" packages, as if a homeowner having his or her home and community destroyed, should view that as a golden opportunity (one worth paying for!) to get drunk on a beach somewhere. Would these same flights take on non-paying passengers, who simply want to get away from the flying bricks and timber? Don't bet on it. And after the wind dies, the profitists tear down the usable remaining housing, to erect expensive gated condo communities, for a massive profit, while homelessness runs rampant. And what do they care? You don't turn a profit doing people favors!
The only thing wrong with the old, servicable, and cheap housing that was left standing in New Orleans after Katrina, was that the "right" people didn't own it! So the whole condo scam was perpetrated to make sure that the right people made money from the disaster.
Contrast that profitting-on-disaster impulse, with the principled genuine-conservative response to disaster, which is to come to the aid of those in trouble, even if it takes from their own pockets. This charitable impulse was once cited by the profitists as the "proper" way to handle social safety-nets, soup lines and unemployment -- even retirement. Proper, that is, for OTHER people to do, with their OWN money. It's obviously a BAD thing for a corporatist to do this with his own money, unless he comes out ahead somehow.
Such impulses to help those less fortunate are so far from the new beltway definition of "conservatism," as to be laughable, yet the corporatists were only too glad to offload such burdens onto those chump "old" conservatives and religious types, who can't in good conscience let people starve. And yet, the corporatists have portrayed themselves as in the fold of conservative sentiment. Up to now, real conservatives have eaten it up, because the corporatists are more than willing to lie about their motives, in order to get into good conservative graces.
McCain is "surging" because he's a real conservative himself, which is why he doesn't fit with the self-annointed Neo-Crony Washington establishment. Romney bombed out because he was only "conservative for a day," -- and people could tell the difference.
I'm oh so liberal, myself, but I have no problem with REAL conservatives. So long as their convictions are honestly come by, there will be a middle ground of discussion and compromise, which is all one can ask of a democracy.
But Corporatists don't care about compromise, and refuse to discuss differences. Compromise means less profit. And discussion, in their view, only gives the "enemy" (and EVERYONE is their enemy!) a chance to screw them -- which is what they would do, if roles were reversed. Losing possible profits is against the Corporatist religion. But it's not at all against their profit-religion to LIE for profit, which is how they've gotten where they are, and how they stay there.
It feels dirty, even to talk in these terms. Bring back REAL conservatism, and maybe we'll have somewhere to go as a country!
More and more conservatives with voices -- authors, commentators, retired military officers, former civil servants who've resigned in disgust -- are speaking out to say that the traditional conservative impulse has been used as cannon fodder, in the Owning Class's war on the rest of us. Corporatists have so thoroughly co-opted the conservative moniker, that they now think they ARE conservative, by and large, rather than the neo-liberal profitists (pirates) they really are.
The danger now, to real conservatives, is that this misidentification may now be so engrained in the dialog, that no-one will remember that real conservatives DO have fellow-feelings, rather than just bottom lines. Real conservatives are starting to realize that the me-first-and-only royalists now in power are not committed to any sort of religious principles or community values, no matter their rhetoric. Indeed, urge a corporatist to give to the poor, and his first question is whether or not he can get a tax break by doing so.
The natural corporatist response to natural disasters, is to sell evacuees "vacation-evacuation" packages, as if a homeowner having his or her home and community destroyed, should view that as a golden opportunity (one worth paying for!) to get drunk on a beach somewhere. Would these same flights take on non-paying passengers, who simply want to get away from the flying bricks and timber? Don't bet on it. And after the wind dies, the profitists tear down the usable remaining housing, to erect expensive gated condo communities, for a massive profit, while homelessness runs rampant. And what do they care? You don't turn a profit doing people favors!
The only thing wrong with the old, servicable, and cheap housing that was left standing in New Orleans after Katrina, was that the "right" people didn't own it! So the whole condo scam was perpetrated to make sure that the right people made money from the disaster.
Contrast that profitting-on-disaster impulse, with the principled genuine-conservative response to disaster, which is to come to the aid of those in trouble, even if it takes from their own pockets. This charitable impulse was once cited by the profitists as the "proper" way to handle social safety-nets, soup lines and unemployment -- even retirement. Proper, that is, for OTHER people to do, with their OWN money. It's obviously a BAD thing for a corporatist to do this with his own money, unless he comes out ahead somehow.
Such impulses to help those less fortunate are so far from the new beltway definition of "conservatism," as to be laughable, yet the corporatists were only too glad to offload such burdens onto those chump "old" conservatives and religious types, who can't in good conscience let people starve. And yet, the corporatists have portrayed themselves as in the fold of conservative sentiment. Up to now, real conservatives have eaten it up, because the corporatists are more than willing to lie about their motives, in order to get into good conservative graces.
McCain is "surging" because he's a real conservative himself, which is why he doesn't fit with the self-annointed Neo-Crony Washington establishment. Romney bombed out because he was only "conservative for a day," -- and people could tell the difference.
I'm oh so liberal, myself, but I have no problem with REAL conservatives. So long as their convictions are honestly come by, there will be a middle ground of discussion and compromise, which is all one can ask of a democracy.
But Corporatists don't care about compromise, and refuse to discuss differences. Compromise means less profit. And discussion, in their view, only gives the "enemy" (and EVERYONE is their enemy!) a chance to screw them -- which is what they would do, if roles were reversed. Losing possible profits is against the Corporatist religion. But it's not at all against their profit-religion to LIE for profit, which is how they've gotten where they are, and how they stay there.
It feels dirty, even to talk in these terms. Bring back REAL conservatism, and maybe we'll have somewhere to go as a country!
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