Sunday, August 11, 2024

To Save Conservatism from Itself, I Am Voting for Harris

David French: I'm going to vote for Kamala Harris in 2024 and -- ironically enough -- I'm doing it in part to try to save conservatism. ... The only real hope for restoring a conservatism that values integrity, demonstrates real compassion and defends our foundational constitutional principles isn't to try to make the best of Trump, a man who values only himself. If he wins again, it will validate his cruelty and his ideological transformation of the Republican Party.

Comments

This:

Since the day Donald Trump came down that escalator in 2015, the MAGA movement has been engaged in a long-running, slow-rolling ideological and characterological transformation of the Republican Party. At each step, it has pushed Republicans further and further away from Reaganite conservatism. It has divorced Republican voters from any major consideration of character in leadership and all the while it has labeled people who resisted the change as "traitors."

I'm often asked by Trump voters if I'm "still conservative," and I respond that I can't vote for Trump precisely because I am conservative. I loathe lying, sex abuse, pornography and adultery. Trump has brought those vices into the mainstream of the Republican Party. I want to cultivate a culture that values human life from conception through natural death. Yet America became more brutal and violent during Trump's term. I want to defend liberal democracy from authoritarian aggression, yet Trump would abandon our allies and risk our most precious alliances.

The only real hope for restoring a conservatism that values integrity, demonstrates real compassion and defends our foundational constitutional principles isn't to try to make the best of Trump, a man who values only himself. If he wins again, it will validate his cruelty and his ideological transformation of the Republican Party. If Harris wins, the West will still stand against Vladimir Putin, and conservative Americans will have a chance to build something decent from the ruins of a party that was once a force for genuine good in American life.

#1 | Posted by tonyroma at 2024-08-11 12:40 PM

"I'm often asked by Trump voters if I'm "still conservative," and I respond that I can't vote for Trump precisely because I am conservative. I loathe lying, sex abuse, pornography and adultery"

Partisanship trumps everything. So many characteristics of Trump are FAR from conservative. Any honest conservative would agree.

#2 | Posted by eberly at 2024-08-11 12:52 PM

It's morphed into a carny/pseudo-religious scam-fest.

#3 | Posted by schifferbrains at 2024-08-11 01:12 PM

"Far from conservatism"

Such as?

Trump is the embodiment of today's "conservative".

I remember two certain DR jackasses heaping praise on Trump and going so far as to claimed he "reflected their values and interests"
You know, "conservatism" and all that diarrhea

But now apparently "honest conservatives" will tell you otherwise. Yup, sure
And they won't go along with trumps antics for very long, (4 years later) either

-- and your pathetic rehabbing. "Conservatives" didn't even hesitate to fall in line for this cretin, a cretin "conservatives" continue to defend, justify and support mind you.

#4 | Posted by ChiefTutMoses at 2024-08-11 03:43 PM

#4

When Trump is toast, we'll hear things like we heard about Joe McCarthy after McCarthy became a national pariah.

"Donald who? Never liked or agreed with the guy"

#5 | Posted by AMERICANUNITY at 2024-08-11 04:07 PM

"Donald who? Never liked or agreed with the guy"

Well, they've been saying "I don't like Lewzer, but..." for years now.

#6 | Posted by REDIAL at 2024-08-11 04:25 PM

-and your pathetic rehabbing. "Conservatives"

I'm not rehabbing anybody, moron.

Anybody who supports Trump and claims it has something to do with his conservative values isn't an honest conservative

They're just partisan.

Which is the author's point.

#7 | Posted by eberly at 2024-08-11 04:36 PM

I totally get where he's coming from. A Thrice married hedonist Who Lies cheats and steals constantly can in no sense represent conservatism and that he is currently the face of the Republican party is a grotesque parody of conservative values.

#8 | Posted by Tor at 2024-08-11 06:45 PM

#6 | Posted by REDIAL

I've said for years that Trump will go down in American history as more reviled than Joe McCarthy when it's all said and done.

#9 | Posted by AMERICANUNITY at 2024-08-12 12:07 AM

Until Fat Nixon, his crotch fruit and his little minions (sporkfoot, hoebert, jordan, johnson, vance, cruz, gohmert, graham, etc) are purged from the GQP it is beyond saving.

trumpturdism is a mental disease and the GOP wholly embraced the lunatics.

Fat Nixon, no matter how badly he is crushed in November, he will cry that the election is stollen and he will try to steal the election either through his minions in state government (which the democrats have a plan to deal with) refusing to certify the election if Harris wins, sporkfoot and others in the house and senate have stated that they will refuse to certify the election if Harris wins, and finally through the courts claiming the "data breach" dotard executed himself influenced the election and he is entitled to a do-over.

This is what happens when you put children in charge of adult stuff.

#10 | Posted by Nixon at 2024-08-12 08:04 AM

"Trump is a deeply unwell man. He is a deeply psychologically disturbed individual. If he were a member of your family, you'd be taking him, you'd be staging an intervention and taking him into a psychiatric hospital. He is, as I've been saying, a narcissistic sociopath, a pathological narcissist and a sociopath as defined by the American Psychiatric Association. These are, historians will tell you, the traits of authoritarian dictators throughout history."

George Conway

#11 | Posted by SomebodyElse at 2024-08-12 11:30 AM

I believe so called conservatives need to take a hard look in the mirror of what they 'feel', they actually represent. One might say Trumpism is the puss coming to the surface of a long untreated infection of baser instincts that's been a part of the 'conservatism' movement since.. well, forever.

#12 | Posted by igashosparks at 2024-08-12 02:19 PM

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