Lifestyles of the White & Suggestible opens and closes with a Conservative of Color. The singer heard (but not seen) in the background is Lloyd Marcus, who provides the American Tea Party Anthem. Obama doesn't think it's about racism. Neither does Republican Chairman Michael Steele. An introduction to the beliefs of Conservatives of Color: Emancipation Revelation Revolution
posted by shetterly on Sep 16, 2009 - 29 comments

Canada's Tourism Minister, Diane Ablonczy, was stripped of responsibility for a Marquee Tourism Events Program budget of $100 million, after she gave $397,500 to Toronto's Pride Week festival, which attracts a million tourists to Toronto every June. The story was broken by backbench Conservative MP Brad Trost in the blog LifeSiteNews.com, who stated that most of the Conservative cauacus was shocked at the award, and that Ms. Ablonczy was stripped of the budget as punishment. Pride Toronto's response. The Tories run damage control.
posted by Quiplash on Jul 8, 2009 - 71 comments

"How do you talk about something like gangsta rap from a conservative perspective?" he said. "Are you going to critique it, or just disagree with it?" Friedersdorf tried gamely to square that circle in a piece exploring his conflicted feelings about dancing to Lil Jon at a wedding, but it was an essay that could have been written only so many times. A post-mortem on Culture11. (previously)
posted by Horace Rumpole on Mar 26, 2009 - 34 comments

A recent study [PDF] conducted by Benjamin Edelman (Harvard Business School) found that conservative and religious states consume the most online porn. "The biggest consumer, Utah, averaged 5.47 adult content subscriptions per 1,000 home broadband users....Eight of the top 10 pornography consuming states gave their electoral votes to John McCain in last year's presidential election..." [more inside]
posted by ericb on Feb 28, 2009 - 68 comments

The conservative (post-election) Crack-Up. In the wake of their recent defeats, many American conservatives have formed a circular firing squad, with some arguing that the GOP needs a little less GOD, while others say it's just a matter of returning to their roots. At this point, it looks like the party is headed for civil war and electoral disaster. Democrats and liberals may be enjoying the show these days, but what does the future hold for the GOP? (Previously.) [more inside]
posted by you just lost the game on Nov 19, 2008 - 102 comments

Another member of the "Pants Down Republicans" in trouble: PJ O'Rourke has cancer. [more inside]
posted by Potomac Avenue on Oct 17, 2008 - 60 comments

Anti-Conservative site Vote For Environment, has had over a million hits in just 12 days. Previously.
posted by gman on Oct 6, 2008 - 33 comments

Culture en péril - In these Canadian election times and in response to the recent Culture cuts from Conservatives - three of the best Quebec talents in music, theater and humor join forces and hit back hard (lol) with a highly satirical imagining of the replacement program (captioned).
posted by zenzizi on Sep 20, 2008 - 18 comments

Newfoundland's Progressive Conservative Premier registered his Anything But Conservative campaign today with Elections Canada. The same agency also deemed that the online vote swap on Facebook is in fact legal. They're hiring.
posted by gman on Sep 17, 2008 - 62 comments

Policy Exchange, the same British conservative think tank who brought you reports such as the tastefully titled The Hijacking of British Islam (previously), have released a new report, Cities Limited (pdf), which states that the only solution for people living in the North of Britain - where unemployment and poverty are high - is to abandon their homes and move south. Leader of the Conservative Party, David Cameron, minced no words in his response: "This report is rubbish from start to finish. I think the author himself said it might be a bit barmy. It is barmy. I gather he's off to Australia. The sooner he gets on the ship the better." Conservative bloggers have been very quick to distance themselves from the report, some going as far as to blame it on Liberal Democrats. Co-author of the report, Tim Leunig, a lecturer in economic history at the London School of Economics, defends his position.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing on Aug 14, 2008 - 32 comments

Have the Eurosceptics won? Despite the referendum in Ireland being badly lost, a rabidly nationalist media, and a tottering Labour government likely to give way to the most Eurosceptic government ever, pulling Britain out of the EU remains an obsession for a few rather than a concern for many. Even the Eurosceptic hardcore is fretting that once in power, David Cameron will have to cosy up to Brussels.
posted by athenian on Jul 26, 2008 - 32 comments

The Confederacy of Dunces. The Village Voice's comprehensive election-season guide to right-wing political bloggers, by Roy Edroso of alicublog.
posted by XQUZYPHYR on Apr 15, 2008 - 54 comments

David Mamet: Why I am no longer a 'Brain Dead Liberal'. "The right is mooing about faith, the left is mooing about change, and many are incensed about the fools on the other side—but, at the end of the day, they are the same folks we meet at the water cooler. Happy election season."
posted by The Card Cheat on Mar 12, 2008 - 109 comments

Government is good. An unapologetic defense of a vital institution. [more inside]
posted by edverb on Oct 9, 2007 - 25 comments

PM Stephen Harper’s Canada Day greeting Harper adopts a hawkish, true-blue Tory tone for this year's Canada Day greeting, with an uncharacteristic (for a Canadian) shout-out to God: From championships in hockey to humanitarian and military leadership roles in Afghanistan and Haiti, we can say again this year, Canada is a citizen of the world and we make our contribution a positive one. And why shouldn`t we? From the natural wealth of the land that God created, to the talents, energy and imagination of people drawn from all the nations of the earth, we are a country that has been truly blessed.
posted by KokuRyu on Jul 3, 2007 - 75 comments

"Tired of the LIBERAL BIAS every time you search on Google and a Wikipedia page appears?" At Conservapedia, a "conservative encyclopedia you can trust," you can learn that "faith" is a concept "exclusive to Christianity," and about how Wikipedia is biased in matters such as its description of the Bell Trade Act of 1946, its gossipy treatment of the private life of NPR reporter Nina Totenberg, and its seeming acceptance of evolution. The Wikipedia bias entry also complains of a "rant" against the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, a group for which Conservapedia founder (and son of conservative gadfly Phyllis Schafly) Andrew Schlafly has worked. Signups are here; its take on evolution is criticized here.
posted by ibmcginty on Feb 23, 2007 - 153 comments

How Iraq and climate change threw the right into disarray.
posted by stbalbach on Jan 23, 2007 - 42 comments

This just in... FOX is reportedly shooting a two and a half hour pilot for a show whose working title is This Just In, which is described as being The Daily Show for conservatives. Joel Surnow, co-creator of "24" is behind the show and has been quoted as saying " [t]he way I look at it, almost every comedy show or satire show I see uses the same talking points against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. The other side hasn't been skewered in a fair and balanced way." Oh really?
posted by Effigy2000 on Nov 22, 2006 - 140 comments

Conservatives on why the GOP should lose in 2006. Let's quit while we're behind by Christopher Buckley • Bring on Pelosi by Bruce Bartlett • And we thought Clinton had no self-control by Joe Scarborough • Give divided government a chance by William A. Niskanen • Restrain this White House by Bruce Fein • Idéologie has taken over by Jeffrey Hart • The show must not go on by Richard A. Viguerie
posted by orthogonality on Sep 12, 2006 - 77 comments

Ultimate Wingnut Fantasy Wankball: "Fantasy football" (??) played with right wing bloggers. (Me, I think I want a raise.)
posted by Steven C. Den Beste on Sep 3, 2006 - 25 comments

South Park Refugees. "The G.O.P. used to have a sizable libertarian bloc, but I couldn't see any sign of it at the conference. Stone and Parker said they were rooting for Hillary Clinton in 2008 simply because it would be weird to have her as president. The prevailing sentiment among the rest of the libertarians was that the best outcome this November would be a Democratic majority in the House, because then at least there'd be gridlock."
posted by ZenMasterThis on Sep 1, 2006 - 107 comments

Every two years, like clockwork, the extreme right need a boost. aka "Best misleading headline ever." He's actually promoting his anti-equal marriage amendment. This FOX News headline is more accurate: Marriage Amendment Could Soothe Angry Right.
posted by andreaazure on Jun 2, 2006 - 66 comments

Are Canadians changing parliament? It seems that the minority government Conservative Party has introduced legislation to set fixed four year election dates, the third week in October. Some people seem to think it can work, and others don't. Evidently I fit into a minority position as I can't see the benefit of having a year long election runnup.
posted by pezdacanuck on May 30, 2006 - 40 comments

It's Time To Get Back To The Basics In Missouri: "A year after Republicans took control of state government, conservative lawmakers are promoting a wide range of social legislation designed to rein in sex and unshackle the Bible." One proposed bill, for example, would recognize a Christian God as the deity for most Missourians. Other bills deny alimony to ex-spouses who live with a boyfriend or girlfriend, ban all abortions, allow pharmacists, insurance companies, doctors and hospitals to deny treatment if the procedure or medication offends their moral values, and require sex education classes to teach that life begins at fertilization and that an unborn child has “sensory awareness” long before birth. Rep. Cynthia Davis, Republican and sponsor of several bills, said conservatives are tired of an overly permissive society in which high school students are taught how to use condoms. "...if the state starts paying for contraceptives we will have more babies than if we just teach people to not expect free prostitution from poor people. "
posted by Secret Life of Gravy on Mar 30, 2006 - 73 comments

Harper wins Tory minority government. Conservative Leader Stephen Harper will become Canada's next prime minister, as Canadians have elected a Tory minority government and ended a 12-year reign of Liberal rule.
posted by Robot Johnny on Jan 23, 2006 - 171 comments

George Will's column today (WaPo; reg. req'd) sounds a theme that's becoming common among "traditional" conservatives: A growing wariness of the Christian conservative movement. Andrew Sullivan has been discussing this at length (as has MeFi here), but more and more conservative commentators are beginning to allude to it, if only indirectly. And wasn't Laura Bush's comedy routine at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner specifically designed to distance the president from the movement?
posted by kgasmart on May 5, 2005 - 56 comments

Frist-led Telecast: Dems vs faith. Are we paying attention? [NY Times link]
posted by yoga on Apr 15, 2005 - 93 comments

Scenes from the Cultural Revolution. A compilation of quotes about American Universities as compared to Maoist propaganda.
"'If the system were fair,' says Larry Mumper, sponsor of the Ohio bill, 'Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity would be tenured professors somewhere.'"

"We will strike down the reactionary, bourgeois academic savants! . . . We will vigorously establish proletarian intellectual authorities, our own academic savants."
posted by borkingchikapa on Mar 20, 2005 - 60 comments

Southern Conservativism explained from the inside. "I get very antsy when I see this entire election outcome being blamed on radical conservatism or on ignorance or stupidity. Because really when people talk about "radical" conservativism, what they really mean is Southern conservativism, specifically the kind that originated in the Southern Baptist church in the late 70's/early 80's. And that makes me unhappy. I am an ex-Southern conservative." An interesting read coming out of the election fallout.
posted by FunkyHelix on Nov 6, 2004 - 131 comments

Pat Buchanan has realsed a new book called "Where the Right went Wrong" just in time for the Republican National Convention. The politics of war in the U.S. must make strange bedfellows if Pat Buchanan, Lou Rockwell and more recently Rep. Doug Bereuter of Nebraska can have anything in common with Moveon.org and Common Dreams. What does it mean for such a notable Republican to publish an anti-war book and be this critical of President Bush? Will moderate Republicans stay at home, vote third party or even switch to John Kerry? A growing trend or blip on the radar? [More inside]
posted by Bag Man on Aug 22, 2004 - 22 comments

An election will soon be taking place in Canada and the party led by Stephen Harper may form a minority government. Might as well know what these Conservatives stand for.
posted by johnnydark on Jun 1, 2004 - 44 comments

How the left's fear of a right-wing Christian conspiracy gets George W. Bush -- and today's evangelical Christians -- all wrong. Alan Jacobs (more from him here and here) suggests that the idea that President Bush's evangelical Christianity has an impact on his politics is really a misunderstanding of Bush, fundamentalists, and evangelicals.
posted by marcusb on Apr 10, 2004 - 20 comments

George Lakoff writes in his book Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think that the book began with a conversation about a single question that might be used to tell liberals from conservatives. His friend offered the question: "If your baby cries at night, do you pick him up?" Is there a basic belief that underlies all conservative and liberal positions? Lakoff's answer, that our politics are connected to how we view family, is summarized in this interview. Is he right? What about you, what makes you a conservative or a liberal?
posted by yoz420 on Mar 29, 2004 - 67 comments

There is no room for a left-wing Rush Limbaugh on the radio. "Do you think Karl Rove might have made a phone call to little General Powell, little Michael and said, 'Let's get this over with. Let's give him the fine and get this done with before Stern gets us all voted out of office,'" the National Enquirer’s Mike Walker asked Stern. "First of all, I know that for a fact," Stern answered. "I can't even tell you how, just like you can't reveal your sources. I have two sources inside the FCC. They know exactly what is going on. They had a meeting two weeks ago, freaking out. I seem to be making enough noise that people are realizing we could hurt George W. Bush in the elections. So they are trying to figure out at what point do they fine me. So, you are absolutely right."
posted by skallas on Mar 25, 2004 - 42 comments

George Lakoff tells how conservatives use language to dominate politics "Why do conservatives appear to be so much better at framing? - Because they've put billions of dollars into it. Over the last 30 years their think tanks have made a heavy investment in ideas and in language. In 1970, [Supreme Court Justice] Lewis Powell wrote a fateful memo to the National Chamber of Commerce....He outlined the whole thing in 1970. They set up the Heritage Foundation in 1973" "So if you go on Fox News....and the question is, 'Are you in favor of the President’s tax relief program or are you against it?' -- it doesn't matter what you say. If you say, 'I’m against tax relief,' you're still evoking that framing. you're still in their frame..."

"George Lakoff, a professor of linguistics and cognitive science at the University of California Berkeley, is a specialist in the technique of "framing," a communication tool that creates a "frame" for a message that defines the terms of the debate." (Interview with Lakoff )
posted by troutfishing on Jan 14, 2004 - 75 comments

Conservatism: resistance to change, simplistic black and white ethics, and the acceptance of inequality. In what's sure to be considered a controversial paper by many, Berkeley psychologists analyze conservatives to see what makes them tick. The criticisms have already begun. [official press release here]
posted by skallas on Jul 27, 2003 - 66 comments

Many members of the Bush administration have strong ties to philosopher Leo Strauss. Can this representation of his views be accurate? ... Strauss believed that he alone had recovered the true, hidden message contained in the "Great Tradition" of philosophy ... that there are no gods, that morality is ungrounded prejudice, and that society is not grounded in nature. (This Times profile doesn't make him sound as creepy, but is vague about his actual ideas.)
posted by lbergstr on May 7, 2003 - 18 comments

"You rats! You stinking rats who hide in the sewers! You think you can go after my income? You think you can kill my advertisers? You think I'm Dr. Laura? You think I'm gonna roll over like a pussy?..."
Thus did MSNBC's newest hire, Michael Savage, react to the information that GLAAD is meeting with the head of programming to protest his hiring. What's more, he feels the Bush administration owes him an investigation of GLAAD and any other group that protests his hiring, because "I have millions of people who vote. Mr. Bush wants to get re-elected, and just consider me a politician at that point. I'm going to ask for a trade in favor. If they keep it up, my favor is going to be I want these groups investigated."
Some of Michael Savage's comments regarding America, homosexuals, and the state of the country can be read or listened to here or at his Paul Revere Society site linked above.
posted by amberglow on Mar 3, 2003 - 61 comments

Conservatives dispute Bush on Islam Bush critics, we are told, though they support him believe his statements about Islam are basically political and that Islam is not a peace-loving religion. Though I am not sure on this issue, I do not think citing a passage or two in this or that holy scripture is sufficient to apply to any religion, since what it does (or has done) differs often from what it's stated position is. In this article I find myself torn between disliking in general anything that right-wing conservatives utter and also disliking anything that Bush has to say! My shortcoming, no doubt.
posted by Postroad on Nov 30, 2002 - 43 comments

Return of the vast right-wing conspiracy? Al Gore is quoted in the New York Observer: "Fox News Network, The Washington Times, Rush Limbaugh—there’s a bunch of them, and some of them are financed by wealthy ultra-conservative billionaires who make political deals with Republican administrations and the rest of the media …. Most of the media [has] been slow to recognize the pervasive impact of this fifth column in their ranks—that is, day after day, injecting the daily Republican talking points into the definition of what’s objective as stated by the news media as a whole." Has Al Gore lost his mind?
posted by Durwood on Nov 27, 2002 - 114 comments

White House Wages Stealth War on Condoms The government is waging a covert war on condoms. Fact sheets on the effectiveness of condoms in preventing the transmission of the AIDS virus have disappeared from government sites. Right wing activists have been appointed to the the presidential AIDS panel. Government audits of AIDS activist groups who protest these policies have begun. So, apparently only evil-doers have sex outside of marriage, and they deserve to die horrible deaths.
posted by dejah420 on Nov 20, 2002 - 166 comments

Conservatives rare species on campus "A poll by the Enterprise Institute showed that professors registered as Democrats outnumbered Republicans at Stanford, 151 to 17. At Berkeley, the lopsided score was 59-7. At Cornell, 166-6. And so on." When I was in college, I guess I was too busy trying to earn my degree to notice if conservatives were allowed to exist or not. I don't remember much political indoctrination in my physics or differential equations classes. Are the campuses really like what this columnist suggests?
posted by munger on Oct 21, 2002 - 148 comments

The Red On The Blue (And On The Button): Terry Eagleton's description of T.S. Eliot's politics is easily the best definition of traditional Conservatism written by an untraditional Marxist I've ever read.[More Inside]
posted by MiguelCardoso on Oct 7, 2002 - 25 comments

Sweden bucks the trend. In a heated election yesterday, Swedish voters ended the European left's losing streak. Despite having the highest taxes in the industrialized world, Swedish voters rebuffed the tax-cutting, center-right parties that proved so successful in Denmark, Austria, Italy, Portugal, France and Holland. With Germany's Socialists suddenly ahead in the polls, and the implosion of Austria's far-right Freedom Party, is the center-right revolution in Europe out of gas?
posted by Ljubljana on Sep 16, 2002 - 23 comments

Americans against World Empire. This Conservative/Libertarian coalition presents analysis, articles, links, opinions and rants from every corner of the political spectrum. ""Perpetual war serves a number of purposes.....It is under wartime conditions that the U.S. state will, at least initially, face the least resistance as it finishes the......process of gutting the Bill of Rights and voiding inconvenient parts of the U.S. Constitution......It is under wartime conditons that all opponents of U.S. policies anywhere in the world, including within the U.S. itself, can be most easily labled 'terrorist.'" This statement would have come from a conservative in 1940. Today it is from the Left. (Alternative Press Review, spring 2002).
posted by Mack Twain on Jul 14, 2002 - 6 comments

How talk radio went right-wing. Or further proof that the airwaves are owned by corporations and not by the American people. Regardless, its an interesting look at how politics changed the radio landscape.
posted by skallas on Jul 7, 2002 - 34 comments

Is It Racism If You Admit You're A Racist But Decry Racist Behaviour? Geoffrey Sampson, Professor of Natural Language Computing at the University of Sussex in the UK is likely to be sacked from the Conservative Party for his defense of "racialism" as a legitimate human emotion. In an interview on this morninn's BBC Radio 4's "Today" programme, he said recognising people's racial prejudices is a scientific fact has nothing to do with espousing discriminatory behaviour. The Observer coyly shrank from linking Sampson's offending article but it wasn't difficult to find: here it is. Judge for yourselves.[My two cents and a question for UK Mefis: as a conservative, I'm quite impressed with Ian Duncan-Smith's(the new Tory leader's)efforts to dissociate himself from the Tory Party's reactionary bastions(e.g.The Monday Club) and attitudes. Is it just a pose, electioneering or is there something to it?]
posted by MiguelCardoso on May 13, 2002 - 33 comments

George F. Will, a professed conservative, has criticized President Bush, not once (on steel tarrifs), not twice (on policy towards Israel), but thrice (on campaign finance reform) this month. Am I missing something, or is Bush not adequately protecting his right flank?

Granted, Will is a conservative of the tory variety, but it's still a noticeable change in tenor since fawning over Bush's decision on stem-cell research.
posted by sillygwailo on Mar 31, 2002 - 34 comments

Why Are Left-Wing Brits Like Hitchens, Amis And Rushdie Supporting President Bush? In this terrific article, The New Statesman's John Lloyd dares to pose the question. To which I would add my own: so far as the campaign against terrorism is concerned, isn't the standard Right/Left dichotomy becoming an increasingly American thang? [Please look inside Ty Webb's "Axis of Evil" post for an interesting discussion on the Hitchens/Bush (dis)connection]
posted by MiguelCardoso on Mar 11, 2002 - 37 comments

The Conservative Intellectual's Matchmaker Quiz: Just answer the questions - whichever ones you like - and you'll know the name of your potential real-life conservative sweethearts. Not to mention a great collection of like-minded, mostly highbrow and academic links. Ideal for lying, trouble-making lefties too![more inside]
posted by MiguelCardoso on Jan 14, 2002 - 9 comments