Nowadays it is hard to find true commentary, well I say that
and I read some frequently. It seems so different though. When I was young, you
could read multiple columnists either syndicated through your local paper or
weekly either in Time, Newsweek, U S News and World Report and more.
Political commentary was an art form. It was a joy to read
and so much so that a friend and I tried to create a column similar in style to
Evans and Novak for our campus newspaper. He did the leg work so I do not know
what happened, however it was never approved. He said it was because of the
name we choose, yet I think it was something more. We were definitely
conservatives on a liberal campus. Our two first names when combined create the
name of someone famous. Our plan was to separate the names by a comma. We were pre
social media instigators by playing off another famous celebrity to get our
names out there. Again he said they
balked at our wanting to use this trick, however we both would have changed if it
allowed us to write. Apparently they didn’t offer for us to change our name.
We were two different conservatives, he was a true Reagan
conservative and I was still in my infancy of being a conservative and already
had what I now call contrarian conservative opinions, yet they are conservative
through and through. Our goal was to tackle the same issue and expand a broader
conservative viewpoint. We had hoped to break some new ground. Don’t have regrets
in life, however I wonder if we were given the chance would I have taken more
courses to improve my writing to help us out. That would certainly help me currently.
Nowadays though you just do not have the same feel and with
social media it is more about the clicks than the content. And try talking
about public policy, no one even knows what is liberal or conservative policy. Okay,
you can label a few policy initiatives as liberal or conservative, but not as
many as you might think in my humble opinion. With so many politicians trying
to stay relevant in social media or on the national news outlets they do not
break down what they are trying to actually accomplish.
Previously columnists would tear apart even their own side’s
public policy to try and affect what was being done. They worked hard to
dissect what the government was doing or influence public opinion with well
thought out arguments. Today, sheesh not so much.
And people label themselves, yet the label is more about
being on a side than understanding exactly what their side stands for. And
unfortunately the current crop of columnists even at their best have a limited
audience compared to what is going on in social media.
George Will was a must read for all conservatives, now him
saying he isn’t voting or isn’t voting for Trump or Biden was something I heard
completely by accident. If you want deep content you have to know where to go.
It is not at your fingertips. His relevance or lack thereof was completed by
the rise of Trumpism. And Trumpism isn’t conservative policy at all, just so
many people got to label it as such so here you are. A few items touch on
conservatism, but true or historic conservatism, nope just noise.
Anyway it is 2024 and the closest we have to true liberal or
conservative viewpoints and politicians are Elizabeth Warren and AOC on the
left and I cannot figure out who on the right since they have all attached
themselves like remora fish to a shark to Trump.
I don’t think not taxing tips is the same historic lower taxes
of the Republican party mythology. And actually some of the tax bills the
Republicans have passed are not really conservative policy by truly lowering
the tax burden of the country, but shell game bills to benefit the rich, this
is where my contrarian thinking comes into play; supporting big business is not
true conservatism, it is just supporting big business. If the liberals had done
it, would it be liberal policy?, both realistically and figuratively no, yet it
is not what should be conservative policy. Fox News just finished the sell job
to their masses. Grover Norquist may have had his tax pledge that the nominal rate
should be reduced for all Americans yet never got truly put into play as much
as for wealthy Americans. I just never bought into what he was selling would
actual come into fruition for the whole of the country.
Even Obamacare was not health care reform and actually could
have been a conservative action if done correctly, but it ended up being more
insurance nonsense than actual changes to our healthcare expenses. He just got
more people insured which kept health care costs artificially high since there
were now more people that had access to funds to pay. It was supposed to force
changes in costs and I think you know the answer to what happened. And it was a
liberal policy because Obama championed it. Honestly if you could overall
health care in America you don’t need to be liberal or conservative you just
have to do it and most people will give you all sorts of likes on social media.
So it goes, you have people telling us they are liberal and
conservative and will be glad to shout at you about it. Do they actually do
something as a liberal or conservative? Uh, no.
And as mentioned in a previous post, what happens if both candidates
come off as old as dirt in the upcoming debate? It won’t matter squat about
liberal or conservative at all, you have two parties scrambling to prop up
their disaster until one blinks and does the right thing and nominates someone
fresh. We can hope.
As always we need new parties and candidates.
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