Why I Haven't Parted Ways With the RightCharles Johnson of Little Green Footballs writes
his road to Damascus post.
1. Support for fascists, both in America (see: Pat Buchanan, Robert Stacy McCain, etc.) and in Europe (see: Vlaams Belang, BNP, SIOE, Pat Buchanan, etc.)
Buchanan is a nobody; he hasn't had any credibility among sensible Republicans since the 1990s. Stacy McCain? Seriously? He's even more of a nobody than Buchanan. I don't know the Europeans much, but the BNP? Do many conservative bloggers write about their admiration for the BNP?
2. Support for bigotry, hatred, and white supremacism (see: Pat Buchanan, Ann Coulter, Robert Stacy McCain, Lew Rockwell, etc.)
Wow, just recycling names here. I don't know whether Ann Coulter has ever said anything that qualifies as white supremacism. And Lew Rockwell is not really on the right; he was dating Cindy Sheehan awhile ago, and posting at the Huff and Fluff.
3. Support for throwing women back into the Dark Ages, and general religious fanaticism (see: Operation Rescue, anti-abortion groups, James Dobson, Pat Robertson, Tony Perkins, the entire religious right, etc.)
I am an extremely reluctant pro-choicer, but I accept that I'm in a minority among Republicans. But it's not as if these people suddenly arrived in the Republican Party; they've been there for 30 years or more.
4. Support for anti-science bad craziness (see: creationism, climate change denialism, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, James Inhofe, etc.)
I don't know whether Palin is a creationist or not; a lot of the stuff she's accused of comes from liberal parodies of her.
Anyway, it just goes on and on. Look, there are problems on the Right. Glenn Beck is a fruitcake, and Michele Bachmann is nutty. But it's not as if the Left is free of their own kooks; see Joe Biden (who's not some congresswoman from Minnesota), or Markos (Screw 'Em) Moulitsas Zuniga. But let's talk about what's right with the Republicans:
1. Still the party of (relative) fiscal discipline. It looked like we were losing this title under Bush, but Obama has reminded us of what drunken sailors the Democrats can be.
2. Still the party of limited government. Obama wants to (gradually) take over 1/7th of the economy with his health care plan.
3. Still the party that has a sensible foreign policy that is not based on bowing and scraping to emperors and the like.
