Conservatives this, conservatives that...

[judy]

It drives me crazy when the media refers to right wing extremists as conservatives! And this goes for the Supreme Court as well...
A conservative judge would uphold Roe v. Wade, because the decision has deemed that a woman's privacy and right to choose were constitutional.
Please, refer to religious zealots and QAnon cultists as Extremists. NOT conservatives. Obama was a conservative, Biden is a conservative...Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, MTG, Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, etc. are extremists. Giving them the correct appellation might help keep them out of power...

[DeeNice]

1. louder for the people in the back...

I totally agree.

[Walleye]

2. Conservative sounds virtuous to our Calvinist culture

Liberals are wild sinners. One thing we do know is the conservatives don’t care for conservation

[johnp3907]

3. Yep.

Also, as Michael Nesmith might say: And I'll tell you something else too: the same thing goes for “Christian!”

[BComplex]

4. Amen!!

So true. Republicans have become whack-job extremists, to the person.

[andym]

5. call them regressives-- opposite of progressives

they want to regress to the culture and laws of an earlier time

[elleng]

6. YES!

[LenaBaby61]

7. Those people are not conservatives. They are out and out TERRORISTS who push for VIOLENCE.

And who wanted an election stolen by their fellow mostly WHITE HOMEGROWN TERRORISTS, overturned at ANY and ALL costs.

[pandr32]

8. Excellent point!

[Caliman73]

9. I'll just leave this here...

Obama and Biden are in no way Conservatives. Moderate Liberals are about the furthest right they could be classified on the political spectrum.

[DFW]

12. That's only if your spectrum goes from liberal/left to conservative/right

The OP rejects those labels, mostly imposed upon us by the likes of William F. Buckley, etc. So do I.

Obama liked to think things out before acting, was somewhat risk-averse, and took a cautious approach to things. He definitely rejected, and still does, the NRA’s extremely liberal attitude toward gun ownership. I agree with him that America should take an extremely conservative stance in how it permits people to own and use firearms.

But that is using the terms “liberal” and “conservative” as they are defined in English, my native language. In Republicanese and Foxese, they both mean something else entirely. I refuse to let speakers of Republicanese define what words mean in my language.

[Caliman73]

15. You do understand that there are political traditions called Liberalism and Conservatism yes?

The dictionary word of the individual attribute of "conservative" and "liberal" are not the same as what a Conservative or a Liberal are in political language.

They are not "Foxese" or "Republicanese" they are political philosophies that have a grounding over centuries.

When you spread a "liberal" amount of sunblock on your body is that Democratic or Republican policy plank?

When you are "conservative" about your bet on the Packers in next week's game is that informed by President Obama, or President Reagan.

It is silly to equate the vernacular and individual qualities of words when they also have specific meanings when used to describe political and social ideologies.

[soldierant]

24. Left and right are useful

to defferentiate economic positions. Authoritian and anti-Authoritarian are needed to differentiate that distinction. The Political Compass (dot org) lays this out very well. (My own scores are between negative 7 and negative 8 on both scales.)

It's when we try to include the Authoritarin vs. its opposite in the left-right scale that we get tangled up in our own definitions

[soldierant]

23. Ian Danskin. Innuendo Studios. The Alt-Right Playbook.

Yes. He really has their number.

[TheRealNorth]

10. We need a go-to phrase....

I like right-wing radical extremists or right wing Republican neofascists.

[Harker]

14. Yours are more polite than mine. n/t

[BlueJac]

11. Agree 100%

[Harker]

13. +33.

It's way past time.

[MLAA]

16. So, so true. You nailed it.

[JHB]

17. Nope. Conservatives have spent 50 years encouraging extremists...

...to identify as "conservative." That's the real conservativism in the US. "Real" or "moderate" conservatives can go figure out a new name to call themselves. They willfully handed their own label over to the Ahabs.

[Jilly_in_VA]

18. They should be called

REACTIONARIES. Because all they do is REACT. Maybe the worst of them are radical reactionaries.

[FakeNoose]

19. It was Rush Limbaugh who idealized the word "conservative"

Not that I was a regular Limbaugh listener - because I wasn't.

But I do recall him using "Republican" only occasionally, but "conservative" was frequently every other word on his show. Meanwhile "liberal" became a dirty-word moniker saved for whenever he criticized the Clintons, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi or whomever else he disliked at the moment.

I submit that Limbaugh's frequent use of the word "conservative" is the pattern they're following now. It prevents anyone from looking too closely at the crimes those people are committing because of Chump.

[alwaysinasnit]

20. I agree, but I think another term might work too. They're not conservatives, they are "regressives."

[gab13by13]

21. The last conservative Republican president

was Teddy Roosevelt.

[OMGWTF]

22. While we're on the topic of calling things by a more accurate name --

instead of saying "privatize" say 'profitize'.

[ymetca]

25. I thought they jumped the shark

with Goldwater's "extremism in defense of liberty" speech.

He at least had some semblance of respect for the idea that there was something out there to "conserve", albeit not really any kind of "environment" I can comprehend.

Whatever that insane coalition is doing now seems more akin to anarcho-capitalism fused with christo-fascism, and it certainly won't end well for any of us.

"Book of Eli / Mad Max --here we come!" --seems their rallying cry now.