Its' official, I've just been kicked out of the Anti-Trump Conservative Facebook group I often refer to in my podcasts (I also refer to them as the Lincoln Project Conservatives even though they have no formal affiliation with the LPC organization). This came after I responded to someone posting about Biden's perceived weakness to Russian and Chinese leaders. Occasionally a somewhat conservative take is posted, but then it is quickly debuted by anti-Trump conservatives eager to defend Biden because they believe, somehow, this is a slight against Trump. After reading the first 20 or so comments written in the first 10 minutes of it being posted (all comments where defending Biden), I decided to bring in some reason.
My Comment:
Asking this "conservative" (not really) group to criticize Biden is going to be an uphill battle.
I think that was pretty tame, but I got about 15 responses within minutes accusing me of Trumpism. If you know me or follow my stuff, I've been very critical of Trump and am not totally on the "Trump is the future of the Republican party" bandwagon. That being said, I did get a response of one of the group admins, a guy who happened to create this group organization.
Group Admin Response:
We’ll criticize him all day, Kevin. We just won’t unfairly crucify him like you do.
To be fair, I do like this guy and have had positive interactions with him in the past, but I was done with this kind of dishonesty.
My Response:
For one, I never "crucified" him. I'm simply pointing out this group will never criticize him because they are afraid that will somehow score points for Trump. That irrational thought process is why being anti-Trump, or being anti-[fill in any name here], is inherently anti-conservative.
Two, "we'll criticize" just means "we would but we won't." The reason you won't is the same as I explained above.
Three, this group abandoned any form of conservatism long ago. The news feed in this group matches the news feed on any left-wing Facebook group. This group is just "Left-wing lite" hiding behind what you call "principled conservatism" in which you've completely lost the meaning of. Conservatives like William F. Buckley Jr. are rolling in their graves embarrassed by the fact you keep "conservative" in the name.
I joined this group years ago (2016) because I thought Trump should not be the future of the Republican party. I understand the party is moving that direction and all criticism is warranted, but in taking up this task this group has either moved far to the Left or let in a bunch of people who just want to destroy the Right and you're just acting as a useful idiot (pardon the term - I'm not trying to insult you but it is an accurate application of this term). This group not only criticizes Trump and the Republicans, in ways that are fair and unfair, but also defends open Leftism. This group abandons all principles if it means they can attack Trump, and any criticism of Biden will result in a long list of comments defending him, even when the criticism is clearly warranted (ex: Biden's clear cognitive decline will prompt a bunch of armchair doctors to do some crazy mental gymnastics to explain away his cognitive issues on some childhood stutter which only started to negatively affect him now).
This group also does a great job at highlighting things that don't matter. The most important part of politics isn't the political, it's the cultural. The most important issue in America - by far - is the phenomenon commonly referred to as "cancel culture" which is just brushed off as 'not real' or 'it's a private business' by those who just don't want to talk about it. It's not "counter culture," it's "anti-culture" and it's destroying our ability to talk to one another under threat of cancellation. It isn't about "if it's legal," it's about "is it a net negative to society." Traditional conservatives, like Buckley, understood this. I know your typical response is "we allow for a wide range of thought," but one would think those thoughts, and ideas that come from them, would point in a more conservative direction considering it's a conservative group.
I'm still in this group because I want to hear what all sides are saying. I often refer to this group as the "Lincoln Project Conservatives" or just "Anti-Trump Conservatives." The recent downfall of the real Lincoln Project Conservatives wasn't surprising because they were a bunch of grifters who didn't actually have any principles. I don't think this group is made of grifters, and I'm certainly not accusing anyone here of any illegal conduct like the LPC crew, but the lack of principle is making this group insufferable to many conservative-minded people while pulling in a bunch of people sympathetic to the far-Left (not as far as ANTIFA or anything, but people who wouldn't even be considered liberal). I first admired this group because they fought against blind allegiance to one man or party, but it has now become the thing it was originally fighting against.
I didn't mean to go on this long, but at some point, you have to figure out what you stand for and be honest about it.
Reponses have mostly been along the lines of "TL;DR" before I was no longer in the group. I'm gonna miss those guys...
I was listening to some news updates when I heard this CNN clip about the potentially hazardous water in East Palestine, and as soon as I heard her ask the question about whether or not her guest would drink the water, I IMMEDIATELY thought of this clip from South Park. Enjoy.
In this special episode of The Engineering Politics Podcast, Truman from Return To Reason is back for a new video and podcast series titled ‘Revisiting The Road To Serfdom’ where we review F.A. Hayek’s classic work, The Road To Serfdom. This episode covers ‘Chapter 15: The Prospects of International Order’.
This will be an ongoing series that covers the entire book. We put a ton of work into making this insightful and relevant, so we hope you enjoy watching/listening as much as we enjoyed reading and recording.
Become a subscriber of the Engineering Politics Locals Community to support this content. Also, consider joining the @ReturnToReason Locals Community to show Truman some support.
In this episode of The Engineering Politics Podcast, I team up with Truman from @ReturnToReason to interview one of the most intelligent and influential creators in the space of philosophy today. Stephen R.C. Hicks is a Professor of Philosophy at Rockford University, Executive Director of the Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship, and Senior Scholar at The Atlas Society. He has written many books including Explaining Postmodernism and Nietzsche and the Nazis. We bring him on to talk about the social and political issues we are currently facing in America, and the West more broadly, and what the collectivist ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau might have to do with it.
Become a subscriber of the Engineering Politics Locals Community to support this content. Also, consider joining the @ReturnToReason Locals Community to show Truman some support.
In this special episode of The Engineering Politics Podcast, Truman from Return To Reason is back for a new video and podcast series titled ‘Revisiting The Road To Serfdom’ where we review F.A. Hayek’s classic work, The Road To Serfdom. This episode covers ‘Chapter 15: The Prospects of International Order’.
This will be an ongoing series that covers the entire book. We put a ton of work into making this insightful and relevant, so we hope you enjoy watching/listening as much as we enjoyed reading and recording.
Become a subscriber of the Engineering Politics Locals Community to support this content. Also, consider joining the @ReturnToReason Locals Community to show Truman some support.
In this episode of The Engineering Politics Podcast, I team up with Truman from @ReturnToReason to interview one of the most intelligent and influential creators in the space of philosophy today. Stephen R.C. Hicks is a Professor of Philosophy at Rockford University, Executive Director of the Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship, and Senior Scholar at The Atlas Society. He has written many books including Explaining Postmodernism and Nietzsche and the Nazis. We bring him on to talk about the social and political issues we are currently facing in America, and the West more broadly, and what the collectivist ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau might have to do with it.
Become a subscriber of the Engineering Politics Locals Community to support this content. Also, consider joining the @ReturnToReason Locals Community to show Truman some support.
In this special episode of The Engineering Politics Podcast, Truman from @ReturnToReason is back for a new video and podcast series titled ‘Revisiting The Road To Serfdom’ where we review F.A. Hayek’s classic work, The Road To Serfdom. This episode covers ‘Chapter 14: Material Conditions and Ideal Ends’.
This will be an ongoing series that covers the entire book. We put a ton of work into making this insightful and relevant, so we hope you enjoy watching/listening as much as we enjoyed reading and recording.
Become a subscriber of the Engineering Politics Locals Community to support this content. Also, consider joining the @ReturnToReason Locals Community to show Truman some support.
