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well, to my mind it is pretty clear that conservatism is not a single entity. and it is obvious that there are no spokesmodels who Enunciate the Conservative Propositions of the Moment. but there is a consistent ideological framework that enables the coalition of conservative groups/positions to talk to each other and to elaborate common reference points both for themselves and with respect to whatever the imagine themselves to oppose.
you'd think that a politics like beck's--which is not coming from nowhere---that finds something kinda logical at the least about the notion of conservatives governing from a state of emergency to be quite strange. for example, you'd expect libertarian conservatives to flip their shit about it because nothing--at all--could be more opposed to their notion of rights and the constitution than a state of emergency, which suspends the constitution. you'd think that social conservatives would be at the least kinda perplexed by this as well---a state of emergency has nothing to do with their agendas, unless they're able to imagine that in the context of such a state the Leader would impose or be able to impose laws that advanced their interests that would otherwise not be possible to have implemented.
neo-cons typically are focused on the Great Game of Diplomacy really. i can see becks position as of a piece with some aspects of that, but i don't see it following directly from neo-con positions simply because they're oriented outward, toward the world.
but they do fit in with this kind of skeevy fascism-lite that we saw the bush administration default into after 9/11/2001.
what i think makes this both bizarre and dangerous (witness that period of the bush administration) is that i am not at all sure there are people--except maybe for glenn beck and the dude he is interviewing--who see this fascism-lite as a positive politics---i dont see people advocating it as central to their viewpoints---rather i see it as an implied position, something that follows from other things and that can shape actions in a situation like that which would follow another attack.
sometimes i think it'd be better for all of us were there a segment of the conservative movement that would embrace this stuff explicitly and advance it as a political viewpoint because then there'd be something discrete to go after, to debate--but it doesn't seem to me that we are in such a context.
were it not for the period after 9/11/2001, i'd be inclined to dismiss beck at al as rightwing populist nutjobs. and they are---but there's something stranger about all this.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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