The Pink Flamingo :: Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me

Are you getting as annoyed as am I over this constant invoking of the name of Ronald Reagan by conservatives and candidates who are terrified they are not going to appear conservative enough to a bunch of conservatives who are incapable of approving of anyone, including Reagan if he were here today? I know it is a long sentence, but I’ve had something like 5 hours of sleep since Tuesday so I’m not firing on all thrusters.

Perhaps we need to add an additional commandment to the list. Currently there are eleven, including the final one, the classic, “Thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican.” You might want to note that it doesn’t say “thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow conservative.” While I know today’s far far far right conservatives aren’t exactly living in the real world, it is entirely possible they might not comprehend the implications here. Ronald Reagan was a straight party man – Republican all the way.

The Twelfth Commandment should be:
Thou shalt not abuse the name of Ronald Reagan nor take it in vain.

I was listening to Cavuto on XM today while running around Roswell, New Mexico looking for alien life forms. My quest took me out to the old air base where I found the dead bodies of hundreds of airliners. I also discovered a few Ron Paul bumper stickers, so I knew I was on the right track. The last I saw of the owners of said vehicles, their heads were spinning in a counter-clockwise motion while they vomited pea soup. It was a remarkable spectacle. I swear they were waiting for the Mother Ship to come down and carry them to Planet Conservative Nirvana.

The reason I bring this up is because when conservative multi-millionaire talk show hosts and uber Reagonites go too far, they morph into tiny little Ron Pauls, ready to turn the world into the perfect conservative paradise. Then they will believe every conspiracy theory, and gasp in fear when they over-hear someone speaking Spanish along the NAFTA Superhighway on their way to the North American Alliance. The only thing that will be their salvation will be total, swift, and complete deprogramming, or a complete lobotomy.

Seriously folks, Cavuto mentioned that during the GOP debate the name of “Ronald Reagan” was used something like 34 times! Conservatives have become so attached to their own words that they appear to be unwilling to give them their freedom, and go on to other ideas. It’s a pity, really. We’re dealing with seemingly bright, highly motivated individuals who could greatly contribute to civil discourse in this country, but they have become incestuously linked to their idolatrous cult of Ronald Reagan that their washed brains need to be seriously deprogrammed.

When you repeat a mantra long enough, people begin to believe it. Unfortunately the pathology of Reagan cult leaders does not allow for introspection or the possibility that their ideas have become antiquated and reactionary. They do not even begin to consider the possibility that they are not the center of the universe. Their mantra of conservative this and conservative that has become so loud, so pervasive it has co-opted everything “Republican.” No longer is the Republican Party allowed to be the ‘big tent party’, it must be a special little club of the conservatives, by the conservatives, and for the conservatives, no one else need apply. Their minds have become so narrow and so self centered they cannot conceptualize that there are other things besides ideological purity.

They have so succeeded in spreading the myth of pervasive all consuming conservative dominance that no one is allowed to have a thought that isn’t their own ideological version of a Ronald Reagan who never was. In so doing, they have managed to alienate at least a third of the GOP who does not share their increasingly extreme views. They have managed to completely destroy what was becoming an excellent Hispanic base, doing unto them what Goldwater did unto another minority nearly half a century ago. It is more than obvious that they aren’t interested in winning elections. It is quite obvious all they are interested in is maintaining their version of ideological purity and the increasingly cult-like myth of a Reagan who never existed the way they fantasize his existence.

Today Neil Cavuto made the observation: Ronald Reagan did not have a Ronald Reagan to quote and fall back on. He did it himself.

It seems to me it is time for conservatives to either shut up, admit they are not Republicans and create their own ideologically pure political party or learn how to be team players with open minds. I have watched as previously rational individuals have relinquished their grasp on reality. Their rhetoric has become increasingly irrational and threatening. If a candidate does not do things their way, see things their way, do, act, and think exactly they way the multi-millionaire radio talking heads think they should, they are castigated, blackmailed, denigrated, belittled, and threatened. By doing this, these individuals have become the very thing Ronald Reagan detested.

Today’s multi-millionaire conservative talk-show and literary rock stars are destroying the Republican Party. The worst of it is very few of them are actually card-carrying Republicans. They would defect to any political party who would promise ideological purity. They are bullies. They threaten. They mis-represent. They destroy.

It is time for them to admit they are not Republicans and do the honorable thing and leave us alone. But then, honor is something they seem to be lacking.

I have the feeling if Ronald Reagan were around, he would not even recognize their very existence. Perhaps that’s the greatest tragedy of all.

Trackposted to Outside the Beltway, Rosemary's Thoughts, 123beta, Adam's Blog, Shadowscope, Big Dog's Weblog, Leaning Straight Up, Pursuing Holiness, third world county, Stix, The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns, The World According to Carl, Pirate's Cove, Global American Discourse, and Right Voices, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

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