What have we learned?

If someone came to me and said their drug dealer beat them up and stole their money I might say to them “What did you learn from that?” In a similar way I have been asking that question of myself over the last couple of days and am now ready to pose it to my fellow “conservatives.” What did we learn? I’m going to suggest several lessons we should take away from what we saw happen in D.C on January 6, 2021 if “conservatism” is ever to regain legitimacy. And make no mistake as of right now, we’ve lost our legitimacy.

1. Protests, Rallies, and other Mobs are not the domain of those who call themselves conservative. The street has always belonged to the left and it always will. Nothing good can come out of protests, rallies or other mass-tantrums. Any time a conservative group gathers in such a way, we paint a target on our back for the left to take aim. Mob mentality is an ugly thing and has been a contributor to the worst atrocities our world has experienced. It is the mentality that allows a normally sane and decent individual to act in a way they never would when thinking for themself. Let’s spend some more time thinking for ourselves and less time gathering in groups to shout and hold up signs. I think we need to recognize that the U.S. is not immune to suffering the same fate of many other nations throughout history. What we saw on Wednesday came dangerously close to the point of no return (i.e. an overthrow of the government). Think about it, a few more people get out of hand, a few more people injured/killed, and things go completely out of control and pretty soon there’s no turning back. That’s how governments fall. How about we just don’t put ourselves in that position?

2. Stop Blaming Others. I can already hear you and I’ll admit to having a lot of the same instincts myself: “If the media would just tell the truth, the election was rigged, what about ANTIFA causing problems at the rally,” and the list goes on. Just stop. Let’s again be a people who value individual responsibility.

Don’t expect the media to tell the truth — it’s just not the business they’re in. Their job is to sell advertisements and they will tell whatever story they think sells.

All elections will have a certain amount of fraud. It’s like losing a football game and complaining about the officiating afterward. You have to overcome it by outperforming your opponent. If you leave it close enough to be decided by fraud then you haven’t done your job. Also, nobody should be surprised by any of this and if the infrastructure wasn’t put in place to ensure the integrity of our elections then we have ourselves to blame for that.

Maybe ANTIFA and other bad actors did contribute to the problems on Wednesday. Maybe. So what? If you hold a rally then you’re responsible for making sure it doesn’t go sideways. If they were there and acting out, it should have surprised nobody — that’s what they do. So if the organizers of this rally weren’t prepared for interference by anarachist groups operating under false flag then that’s just stupid and irresponsible. The innescapable truth is that supporters of our president acted like 3rd world morons under the influence of mob mentality (see lesson #1) and the foolish encouragment of the President himself. No, I’m not giving him a pass on this just because he didn’t explicitly tell people to riot. His foolish statements on Wednesday played a part in this as did his foolish statements in the weeks leading up to it.

3. We should have zero tolerance for cults of personality. If you’re like me you voted for Donal Trump for some fairly simple and legitimate reasons. My reasons included his promises of less punitive fiscal policies, an end to foreign interventionism(perpetual warfare), the coming need for conservative supreme court appointments, and a poor opinion of his opponents. For the most part I think he’s made good on those promises — anyone else notice how less involved in stupid foreign wars we are these days? If I’m honest, I’ve also been pretty entertained by the way he exasperates the idiots in the national media — but that’s the childish side of me. All that said, he’s not the savior of our nation and he shouldn’t be elevated to super human status.

I remember being creeped out by images like this of Barack Obama:

To me they come across like propaganda posters of 3rd world dictators and I just don’t like the unrealistic portrayal of our political leaders in ways that elevate them above the rest of us. Just look how thoughtful he is.

Well, if those posters were creepy I don’t really know what to call some of the stuff our side has been pumping out lately. Have you been seeing anything like this?

Kim Jung-Un’s propaganda minister is blushing. This might be kind of funny but come on. Our leaders should be viewed as servants of the people — that means we shouldn’t be placing them on platforms of worship or even adoration. At it’s most benign this sort of stuff is just stupid, but it has the potential to contribute to something really dangerous. Cults of personality have never been good for those living under the thumbs of dictators and this kind of crap has been a key ingredient to all of the really bad ones in history — yes I’m thinking of Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, Kim, etc. It’s not appropriate to compare Trump to any of them — they are mass murderers and every time a media personaility or celebrity does so without being arrested as retribution it ironically proves he’s not really a fascist. However, we came very near to inadvertantly turning him into an autocrat this week and this garbage feeds the fire of mob mentality that is so dangerous. Let’s just stop it.

4. Establishment Republicans: you’re still wrong. I really hope the McConnell/Graham Republicans aren’t viewing this week as vindication — though I’d bet they are. I hope they remember that the only reason for a Trump presidency is that they abandoned conservatives and we were searching for an alternative. Get some principles and grow a spine.

If you’re like me then you really haven’t felt like you were represented in our government for a while now. That was the most attractive element of a Trump presidency — he was equally offensive to Nancy Pelosi as he was to Mitch McConnell. Well, if you’ve felt left out up to now, just wait. After the events of this week we can look forward to at least 2 years of punitive retribution from the party in power and we’ve given them all the justification they need to do it. If conservatism is going to stand any chance at all then I think these lessons need to be learned right away.