Failure of Center-Right Conservative Values, Principles, Ideology, Philosophy & Polices

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Nov 4, 2008 4:58 PM EST

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

In the face of a great defeat, conservatives have their new talking points. They are trying to make the case that America is really a Center-Right country. See this video from ThinkProgress of how conservatives are trying to make the case.

Center-Right Country Watch: Conservatives Grasping At Straws

What Conservatives  fail to acknowledge is that Center-Right  Values, Principles, Ideology, Philosophy & Polices have failed and that the country is looking for a new direction. In case they need some help in understanding this,  they can always listen to what people say about Center-Right Conservative values below.

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Failed Conservative Values: Bill Honigman on Restrictive Intolerance and Porcupines

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Nov 3, 2008 12:29 PM EST

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

 I interviewed Bill Honigman, who is  the California State Coordinator of Progressive Democrats of America (PDA). He said conservatives are restrictive and intolerant like porcupines. While he doesn't think the values of individual conservatives have failed, he feels the values of the conservative movement have failed. I have to disagree with him there. I feel that individual conservative values have manifest themselves in the conservative movement and individual conservatives need to take 'individual responsibility' for these failures.

 Failed Conservative Values - Bill Honigman on Restrictive Intolerance

Conservatives tend to, in the nicest use of the term, want to conserve what they’ve got.  And so they are looking to hang on to, say their property, or their bit of family and what they perceive of as their family’s rights in a kind of identity of self that way.  It’s a little too, as far as I’m concerned, restrictive, meaning they’re not willing to reach out to people outside of their circle.  And to me that’s probably a fundamental difference. 

In the concept of rounding up or circling the wagons  and taking a little too much and being too guarded about themselves, and not being willing to share with their community.  And that translates into things like not wanting to contribute to, say, things like education and the infrastructure, and the whole tax revolution that occurred in this country in the last 30 or 40 years.  It’s all about people saying, “I’m tired of giving of myself.  I don’t seem to be getting back in return.” 

They just want to hang on to what they have.  And instead of saying to build society will require an investment, and maybe we just need better caretakers of the investment instead of not  giving money and our own resources.

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Failed Conservative Values: Markos (Kos) Moulitsas on Self-Delusion

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Oct 26, 2008 1:28 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

I interviewed Markos (Kos) Moulitsas, founder of the Dailykos.com and asked him about the failure of conservative values. For him, the conservative value of self-delusion was the greatest failure.  He says conservatives value their ideology over actual reality and he pointed out a series of examples of how this ideology  ignores reality.

"As long as our civilization is essentially one of property, of fences, of exclusiveness, it will be mocked by delusions."  Ralph Waldo Emerson

 Failed Conservative Values: Markos Moulitsas - Self-Delusion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=figH0eedcMY

 Edwin:  Have conservative values failed?

Markos:  Oh, yeah, the failure of conservative values, the bottom line is that it has no bearing on reality.  They created an alternate reality – cut taxes, lower the deficit, balance the budget – where global warming did not exist, where the world was invented 6,000 years ago, where science is bogus, where the best way to educate kids is to defund the schools. 

And this is the comeuppance.  When you base your reality on an ideology that has really no basis for reality, you’re doomed to failure.  When you have an ideology that says that government cannot work, you have to by default run a shitty government.  What’s the alternative?

Let’s say George Bush says the government can’t work, we need to shrink it.  So, when I appoint my director of FEMA, instead of appointing a horse lawyer, I’m going to appoint an experienced administer who knows about disaster management and logistics planning.  So when Katrina happens, the government does a fantastic job, making people’s lives better.

Suddenly, you have sort of a collision of ideologies.  When you say government can’t work, and you have government that works, where does that leave the conservatives?  In a really, really piss-poor place.

So, by default, Bush had to appoint the horse lawyer to FEMA, I could go down the list – in department after department it’s scandal after scandal.  I mean, it’s all because he appointed people who are not qualified.  Because they need to fail, they need to prove that government cannot work, and the way you prove government does not work is by running a government that does not work.

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Video: Obama-McCain - DFA Debate Watch Party - Sept 26 2008 in Berkeley CA

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 27, 2008 5:46 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

The Oakland DFA held a very successful debate watch party in Berkeley, CA with it's greatest meeting  turnout yet. Community members came out to support Barack Obama and Progressive Values.

You can see the video below to get a flavor of the event along with participant expectations and their evaluations of the debate.

Video: Obama-McCain - DFA Debate Watch Party - Sept 26 2008 in Berkeley CA

Edwin Rutsch
 What Are Progressive Values? Documentary Project
 ProgressiveSpirit.com 
 and Study Group

 

Progressives Blast Failed Conservative Values! Part 2

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 22, 2008 7:49 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

 All the links didn't fit in the last post so here is part 2:

I've been asking people about the the failure of conservative values. Here are links to the latest batch of interviews that I just placed on Youtube.  The failed values that come up are quite varied, but those sighted most often are fear, hypocrisy, conservative family values, division, rigidity, hyper individualism, self-delusion, etc. I also ask people to create a  metaphor of what the Failed Conservative Values are like. These metaphors are often quite revealing.

In our Progressive Values Youtube group, we now have over 600 video clips of progressives talking about their values and telling how they feel conservative values have failed.

Here's the list of newly added interviews related to the failure of conservative values. Most of these were done at Netroots Nation 2008.

PArt 2: Progressives Blast Failed Conservative Values!

  Failed Conservative Values: Wolf Man Spike - Mind Control


  Failed Conservative Values - Jeremy Koulish - Hyper Individualism

  Failed Conservative Values - Al - Polarization Bulldozer

  Failed Conservative Values: Kimberly Yaman - Everyone has Values

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Progressives Blast Failed Conservative Values! Part 1

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 22, 2008 7:22 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

I've been asking people about the the failure of conservative values. Here are links to the latest batch of interviews that I just placed on Youtube.  The failed values that come up are quite varied, but those sighted most often are fear, hypocrisy, conservative familyvalues, division, rigidity, hyper individualism, self-delusion, etc. I also ask people to create a  metaphor of what Conservative Values are like. These metaphors are often quite revealing.

In our Progressive Values Youtube group, we now have over 600 video clips of progressives talking about their own values and telling how they feel conservative values have failed.

Here's the list of newly added interviews related to the failure of conservative values. Most of these were done at Netroots Nation 2008.

Part 1: Progressives Blast Failed Conservative Values!

  Failed Conservative Values: Markos Moulitsas - Self-Delusion

Failed Conservative Values Metaphor: Markos Moulitsas - Dodo Birds  

  Failed Conservative Values Metaphor: Thomas Tucker - Dodo Bird

  Failed Conservatives Values: Johanna Olson - Rigidity

  Failed Conservatives Values Metaphor: Johanna Olson - Tank v Seed

   Failed Conservative Values: Katherine Forrest - Rigidity

Failed Conservative Values Metaphor: Katherine Forrest - Ridged Structure

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Lipsticked Hydra at the Failed Conservative 'Value Voters Summit 2008'

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 13, 2008 5:13 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

This weekend conservatives are holding their annual Conservative Value Voters Summit 2008 in Washington DC.  Last year I wrote an article about the Summit and called for counter rallies to challenge this conference as part of a progressive effort to Take Back the Values Debate.  There didn't seem to be much interest or support of the idea among progressives.   Progressives still miss the point by spending most of their energy attacking Bush, Cheney, McCain, Palin, etc, instead of clearly connecting them to the underlying Failed Conservative Values of authoritarianism, fear, secrecy, deception, self-righteousness, hypocrisy, indifference, dogmatism, violence, etc. and offering the progressive alternative values.

While  critiques of the leadership of the conservative movement is important, these leaders are merely the latest heads of the Conservative Hydra. If you cut off one head, two more will grow in it's place. To kill the Hydra, you need to stab it in the heart from which the blood of failed values flow.  Yes, there needs to be a critique of failed conservative policies, leaders, institutions, principles, etc, but all of these flow from a corrupted spiritual values essence. A stab at each of these should be followed by a stab at the heart. All of these need to be tied back to the original toxics polluted spiritual spring from where they originate.  The critiques need to be directed at the source with the goal of putting the beast out of it's misery.  When the Hydra dies, then all the heads wither and fade on their own. It's a fools exercise to just attack the heads.

Conservative Hydra with Lipstick

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Failed Conservatives Values: Jim Hightower on Grasping Greed

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 9, 2008 1:44 AM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

Every morning I can't get out of bed until I've heard Jim Hightower on my local NPR radio station. It's my inspiration to face another day. So, it was a real treat to meet him at the Netroots Nation Conference in his home town of Austin, Texas. I asked Jim about the failure of  conservative values.  He said the failure is the ethic of greed and the alternative to this are the progressive values of fairness, social justice and equal opportunity for all people.

Failed Conservatives Values: Jim Hightower on Greed

Edwin:  Have conservative values failed?

Jim:   Yeah, because conservative values are essentially being expressed as an ethic of greed.  I got mine, you get yours.  You want education, go to a private school.  You want health care – buy it.  You want retirement – you make enough money during your life and retire in the South of France, or something.  What’s wrong with you. 

Rather than recognize that there will be no America if we don’t all share in the advantages that America does offer.  And I’m not talking about people on the dole, people trying to ride the coattails of successful people.  Folks are out there working their butts off.  They’ve been productive.  They have created wealth.  Enormous wealth.

In just these last eight years, the Bushites, for example.  But over the last 30, 40 years, we have been the ones creating the wealth, but we have not been the ones benefiting from that.  For example, most people’s income has gone down in real terms over that period.  Democratic administrations as well as Republicans. 

So that’s why there’s such a rebellion in the countryside these days.  Not just political, but in all aspects of life.  People are demanding change, and they  are making change.

Edwin:  Are they are fed up with greed?

Jim:   Oh, of course.  They don’t benefit from greed, and nobody really benefits, even those who are profiting from it.  Henry Travis, the hostile takeover king in New York City, who makes his money  by buying corporations with borrowed money from rich people to buy other people’s corporations, then selling off the assets of those corporations, firing thousands of people from jobs in that corporation – and then he pockets the money.   And he was making $51,000 an hour in 2006.

So the people who are fired didn’t benefit from that.  The people who founded the corporation didn’t benefit from that.  The people who maybe enjoyed the products of that corporation didn’t benefit from that.  That’s just raw greed, and it’s not serving America’s interests at all. 

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RNC GOP Conservatives Failed to Remember Small Town Values

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 7, 2008 12:46 PM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Here's a funny clip from the Daily Show's coverage of the Republican National Convention.  In their various speeches, conservatives made a big point of trying to connect their Failed Conservative Values to Small Town Values.  Yes, they never give up on the values debate and always try to add a new wrinkle to their rhetorical values debate arsenal.   However, this time the Daily Show's best darn news team on the planet went out to investigate.   As you'll see,  the problem is that conservatives just  can't remember what those values are.

Hopefully conservatives will stop insulting people from small towns by trying to project their Failed Conservative Values onto them.

Here are some suggestions from progressives about the values conservatives just couldn't remember. It's not hard they see why they are having a memory block.

 Fatally Flawed Conservative Value of  Hypocrisy

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Sarah Palin and the Same Failed Conservative Values

Written by: Edwin Rutsch on Sep 4, 2008 3:47 AM EDT

Linked to groups: East Bay for Democracy, Oakland DFA Meetup, Lake Park, San Francisco for Democracy, Alameda for Democracy, California for Democracy, Courage Campaign, Take Back Red California, Capitol Area Progressives (CAP) , What are Progressive Values? Study Group, DFA-Link Organizers, Walnut Creek DFA, Blog For America, Blogs United, DFA Film Club, DFA-Marin, DFA Night School, Silicon Valley DFA, brought to you by Dean Democratic Club of Silicon Valley, Framing Committee, Florida DFA, NJ for Democracy, Democracy for Florida, Democracy for New York, Democracy for Texas, Democracy for NYC, PA for Democracy, Democracy for Washington, Sacramento For Democracy, Democracy for Illinois, Democracy for Maryland, Philly for Change, Democracy for Ohio (DFO), Democracy for America Miami-Dade (DFAM), Washington Fair Elections, Michigan Democracy for America, DFALA, DFA at Netroots Nation (formerly YearlyKos) July 17-20, blog for America Test and Poll Group

Linked to campaigns: Obama for America

 Like at past Republican National Conventions, there has been a lot of talk about conservative values. Nothing new there, but this time the convention has the feeling of a sinking ship.  The conservatives are doing a lot of  talking about the exact same Failed Conservative Values that they have been talking about for the past 30 years. It's the same Failed Conservative Values of indifference, incompetence, compassionate conservativism and corruption that brought us the disaster of Katrina. It's the same Failed Conservative Values of authoritarianism, secrecy, deception and violence that brought us the failed invasion and occupation of  Iraq. It's the same Failed Conservative Values of selfishness, greed and arrogance that brought us Abramoff and a conservative congress mired in a culture of corruption. 

Sara Palin 
 
It's the same Conservative Family Values and Traditional Conservative Values of 'you are on your own', that have lifted the national misery index. It's the same fundamentalism, self-righteousness and hypocrisy that brought the sex scandals of Mark Foley, Ted Haggard, Larry Craig, etc. etc

The problem is that progressives, liberals and democrats are not directly taking on the Failed Conservative Values. Progressives need to call conservative values what they are. Failed!  It's not just failed policies, it's failed values.  Even conservatives shout from the rooftops that they base their policies on their values. Take them at their word. I see progressives repeatedly attack the failed conservative policies, but they will not directly attack the Failed Conservative Values.

I've interviewed over 100 people and asked them if Conservative Values have Failed?  They all had no problem coming up with example after example after example of  the failures. People know in their heart, in their guts, in their bodies, how conservative values have failed the country. It's time for progressives to stand up and confront conservatives directly at the values level. Start off by telling them directly and with the conviction you feel in your guts that their values have failed.

Here are just a few of the stories people have shared with me.

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