Shouldn’t Conservatism Be the Biggest Tent of All?

“The Left” as a political group has a “big tent” policy:  they never kick someone out of the tent for failure to agree on all issues.  As long as they can agree on one thing–say, for example, Christians stink on ice–they get along like gangbusters.  Nevermind the fact that one group would gleefully stone his feminist or homosexual allies if given the chance.

But shouldn’t conservatism be the biggest tent of all?

It’s bad enough to witness GOP establishment RINO Senator McCain call his fellow senator “wacko bird” and CPAC refuse to allow Chris Christie and GOProud to even attend their conference.

Then I read an article by some dude named Cliff Kincaid, in which he breezily asserts that there is no such thing as a “gay conservative” unless the term “conservative” has lost all meaning.

Look.  You can believe that someone’s lifestyle is sinful as hell, and still let him in your tent.  You can believe that a particular governor is way too RINO to be nominated to a leadership position, and still let him in your tent.  You can believe that a certain brash young Senator is too libertarian, and still let him stay in your tent.

You can do this because that tent is so dang large.  At this point in American politics, the conservative tent is so friggin’ immense that the folks who don’t get along can just stay on opposite ends and never even see each other!

What’s more, they never have to worry about whether their political ally would eventually try to stone them.  This worry never arises because the single principle which supports this gigantic tent is such a rock solid foundation in and of itself:

Leave Me Alone.

That’s it.  If one believes that he should be left alone to run his own life, and if he is willing to leave others alone to run theirs, well come on in.  There’s plenty of room.

People may want to be left alone for different reasons, but the specifics aren’t mutually exclusive.  You do your thing, and I’ll do mine.

The funniest part is the fact that conservatives didn’t even build this gigantic political tent.  It was created for them by the pencil-pushing tyrants from all levels of government, county and city on up.  The tent is strong, waterproof and wind resistant, for it is tightly woven with the myriad regulations and restrictions that chafe us all.

All conservatives have to do is have enough sense to keep from chasing everybody away.

Top 25 Political Moms Contest–UPDATED

The Lonely Conservative has just taken the lead!

Thanks everyone for pitching in!  Mrs. LC herself has the rundown:

Our Army of Davids has been joining in to help us out, including: iOTW, The Other McCain, Blazing Cat Fur, The Camp of the Saints, DBKP, Conservative Hideout, The Pirate’s Cove, Ex-Con’s View, Maggie’s Notebook, and Moonbattery. Zilla, who is still trying to overcome her illness, has also written about the importance of this contest. (She’s moved up to 4th place.) But none of that does any good if all of you don’t take just a few minutes to click this link and vote for us. You don’t need to sign up. You don’t need to register. All you have to do is click the “vote” button next to each conservative blogging mom, or whichever is your favorite.

Plus some additions which Karen has updated:

Update: King Shamus has joined our quest [self-censorship here]

Update: Thanks to the First Street Journal for joining in! I love conservative bloggers, and all of our readers, too!

I think Karen is absolutely right:  it’s not about competition for competition’s sake.  The goal is to demonstrate that conservatives are the majority, and we are no longer silent.  We are no longer content with letting the political landscape lean further and further left, until “Very, very leftist” defines the typical Democrat.

“Very, very leftist” does not define the typical Democrat.

“Racist and fascist” does not define Pamela Geller, nor any of the rest of us conservative mommies.

We may not convert any of those self-proclaimed “Commie Mommies“ to our cause, but we can remind all other internet users that The Left does not have mainstream views.  We can remind Americans from all points on our political spectrum one simple fact:  “commie” is not a label to wear proudly.

Go vote for as many of us as you fancy!  Every 24 hours for the next three days!  See if you can get Edge of the Sandbox in the top 25.  Oh, yeah, and me too.

UPDATE:  Thanks for your help, Looking Spoon and Three Beers Later!

UPDATE #2:  As of 10:13 pm Central time, Sunday evening, Monologues of Dissent has retaken the lead.  Please do spread the word and we’ll hope for the best out of this neck-and-neck race.

UPDATE #3:  As of Tuesday afternoon, The Lonely Conservative once again has the lead.  Thanks for your help with this fun competition, Jen Kuznicki.  I’ve been voting for you, too, even though you are kicking my butt out of the top 25.  Ha ha!

FINAL UPDATE:  The link to Lonely Conservative’s quotes above is no longer available.  Perhaps the best thing to do is a bit of self-censorship, and a disclaimer, in an effort to avoid mandated censorship.

DISCLAIMER:  The above-quoted label “commie mommy” was found at the links embedded within.  At those links, as well as others, this label was used by the potentially offended persons to describe themselves.  This blogger makes no accusation as to whether these persons’ political beliefs are empirically leftist enough to be labelled as communist.  This blogger merely questions the wisdom of choosing this label to describe oneself.

News from the Rabbit Hole

Because we are in it, folks.

1.  Congress needs to worry about government jobs more than private-sector jobs.  This is why Senate Democrats are pushing a bill aimed at shoring up teachers and first-responders.  Hey, don’t look at me like that.  Vice-President Biden says so.

2.  Perhaps someone should tell Biden that government spending is already 41% of our entire Gross Domestic Product.  Forty-one percent!

3.  A mayor in the grip of the Obama administration’s regulatory stranglehold cries, “uncle!”  Oh, and she’s a Democrat.

4.  Organizing for America is running an art contest.  Submit your Agitprop for Obama Government, and you may be a winner!  Really, it’s not just satire.  It’s a real contest.

5.  Some writer over at the Business Insider thinks it’s hard to tell the difference between her selection of Tea Party v. Occupy Wall Street signs.  (Psst.  Each sign is dead easy to judge, if one is actually familiar with the Tea Party Movement.  Here’s a couple hints for the uninitiated:  American flags in the background=Tea Party!  Sign makes little or no sense=OWS!)

Have a great rest of the week.  If you find a way out of this rabbit hole, do let me know.

Nerd Heaven

Well, this nerd’s heaven anyway.  So brilliant.

“the economy’s not a class you can master in college
to think otherwise is the pretense of knowledge.”

Word.

Brings me back to undergrad.  I earned my business degree with an emphasis in economics.  By the time I reached senior level courses, none of it made any sense.  My professors would rattle off premises and formulas and act as though it all made perfect sense, but it sounded more like the chanting of magic spells.

I memorized what I had to, regurgitated it and promptly forgot everything but the accent with which the Cambodian professor said, “International zeh-Bahnk,” by which she meant the IMF.

Funny to look back on it now.  I chose economics because of my freshman level macro-economics class, which was taught by a nice young non-Keynesian who I would never see again.  The introduction of that simple supply and demand chart made a profound impression.  The idea that price served a function, that it was not arbitrarily set–revelation!  That macro-econ class thrilled me somehow (yes that’s why I’m a nerd), and I didn’t find that kind of thrill again until I read The Road to Serfdom almost twenty years later, on Instapundit’s recommendation.

The realization that I have this econ degree and yet had never even heard of Hayek–well that was a revelation too, just not a good one.  Still angers me to think about what a complete waste of time all those classes were.  Oh well, at least I didn’t major in Women’s Studies.

Rush Limbaugh introduced me to politics at roughly the same time as my econ 101 class.  1990? (I’m really bad with dates, just ask hubs about the date inscribed in his wedding band).  I worked at a sporting goods store, and the fellow in charge of inventory would listen to Rush in the warehouse.  Next thing I know, I’m lingering in the back to listen when I should be helping the customers out front.

At the time I didn’t even realize economics and politics were related.  I also didn’t realize the philosophical influence of my favorite Heinlein books.

It just takes awhile for a thick girl like me to put the pieces together, that’s all.

Sometimes I wonder, though, what it’s like to have been a “liberal” in the past and then convert to conservatism.  Perhaps my lack of conversion is the reason it’s hard for me to accept the fact that so many people embrace the irrationality, lunacy, and evil of Collectivist Thought.

Whew, enough rambling.  I’ve strayed far from the reason of my post, to share the latest Keynes v. Hayek rap:

The EconStories website is here, via Instapundit of course.

For any of you who actually missed the first one:

And if you are a nerd like me, maybe that’s not enough.  Hear from the creators of this unlikely rap duo here:

Abandon Ship?

Is it time to start a third party?

That question comes up on a regular basis.  For good reason, of course:  the GOP sucks, generally speaking.  That suckage notwithstanding, my gut reaction to this question is always:  no.  It is not time to start a third party.

Why?

I pondered that question on one of my runs, or dog walks, or school trips, or summat.  Can’t remember which.  Anyhow, in a typically annoying fashion, I shall answer the question with a question of my own:

Has the left made its progress through the ascendency of a third party?

No.

Sure, there are leftist “third parties” out there:  the Green Party, the Socialist Party, the Communist Party, the Labor Party, the Socialist Labor Party, the Workers Party, to the Working Families Party, just to name a few from this Wikipedia list.

But.  Did these ”third parties” actually create the major leftist mile (mill) stones of today, from the Great Society to Obamacare?

No.  It’s all Dem, baby.

Far-left groups have influenced Democrat thinking, no question.  But did they do so by being an electorally viable party?

No.

In the same way, the Libertarian Party and the Tea Party do not need to be electorally viable in order to influence Republican thinking.

We do not need a third party.  We need to be working overtime to infiltrate and influence the GOP.  Just as the left did the Dems.  For us, the November 2010 election was only the beginning.  If the advance made so far is inadequate, that is our bad.  We should have been infiltrating and influencing well before Obama was elected.

Our bad.

Let’s just hope our bad hasn’t cost us the whole of our liberty.