[labgrade]

I'd submit that JFK was "more conservative" than any of our later day "conservatives."

The definition of "conservative" has changed so much as to no longer be recognisable in the former context.

As an aside & to make this more fun, I'm a rational anarchist (which should provide for some discussion, at the least) - we get to play with what "is," is, & the like.

Have at it.

[Blackhawk]

So? The whole country was a LOT more conservative then.

In CA, Tom M. was probably a LOT more conservative than Arnold S. He may have been just what the people of CA needed to. But, IMO, there was NO way he would ever have been elected in 2003 CA, and you don't get to swing at the ball if they don't elect you batter....

If you really want to torque the neocons off, ask them to define what "conservative" means. They get flustered when they find out it means maintaining the status quo ante. Ante to what? Ante to the last perceptible change. A "conservative" would want to go back to what things were like under.... Clinton! :barf:

I'm a fiscal conservative in that you have the right to keep what you earn as long as you pay your own way and you absolutely have the RKBA. But I don't want to go back to the way it was before integration even though racial preferences have royally screwed things up. Balance is entirely too unusual in the political arena....

[ARperson]

How can one be a rational anarchist? Isn't that an oxymoron?

[Brian Maffei]

I remember Heinlein talked about 'rational anarchist.' Have to find my copy of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress.

[LeonCarr]

Of course JFK was better than present day republicans, for one good reason, if not many others. Here is a clue: Marilyn Monroe :). She was second only to Jayne Mansfield for sexiness. Way before my time, but even a youngster can dream :).

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

[C.R.Sam]

JFK was better than any of our new Republicans That's damning with faint praise.

Sam

[labgrade]

"I remember Heinlein talked about 'rational anarchist.' Have to find my copy of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress."

Just so. It allows one to be slippery, not necessarily a defining statement. ;)

"That's damning with faint praise."

'Course. There's little praise to go around these days.

[TheeBadOne]

What Blackhawk said.

[NewShooter78]

See my sig line.

[Mark Tyson]

Yeah, Kennedy was a life NRA member too, as I recall. Guess that makes him an Evil Gun Nut Extremist Baby Killer to Sarah Brady.

[mec]

NRA life member and even had an MI he got through the DCM. Also liked to read James Bond and was a strong anti-communist. Back then, Communism was considered a REAL BAD THING. Things have changed. Back then a democrat could be an anti-communist. Now the democrats ARE the communists.

Anti gun politicians were called "fanatics" Senator Thomas Dodd D Conn.- the chief anti-gun demagogue, was considered a conservative. Victor L. Anfuso was the House of Representatives anti-gun figure. He finally had to spend most of his time denying that he was a communist and finally was hounded out of politics by second amendment supporters.

[444]

That is a given.
This country has swung so far to the left that a liberal democrat of the 1950s would be considered a right wing extremist today. This is one of the problems we face as gun owners in my mind. Many blue collar working stiffs grew up in democratic households or were democrats themselves because that was traditionally the party of the working stiffs. Today the democrat party has very little in common with those values, but tradition is hard to break. These people still vote democrat because they were brought up that way and always did it that way and fail to realize that the party today doesn't represent their views at all.

[Quartus]

Very true, 444.

Have to agree, by today's standards we'd be in hog heaven if we could get 30 or 40 JFKs in the Senate, a couple hundred in the House, and one in the White House.

[Don Galt]

I don't think you can be rational and not be an anarchist.

Really... I believe human rights are a rational requirement... objectively, they must exist, and objectively, given the nature of government, governmetns will violate them.

Hell, government IS a violation of human rights because a government is most basically defined as a group of people who claim power over a geographic area.

Well, if they don't own that area, they are claiming power in violation of the rights of people who do own property.

IOW, there is no logical difference between the US government occupyiing the US and the US government occupying Iraq. The only difference is the Iraqis are going to maybe get Iraq back! We're never getting the US back.... and at the point that the US government broke its covenent with the constitution (Say the Civil War at least, if not before) that government became illegitimate and thus was no longer the government instituted by the people who lived here. IT became an occupying army.

Hell, to be rational ,the government would have to have the explicit consent of everybody on a regular basis... IOW, kids who were born who had not signed off on their government would not be a part of the society, and the governmetn would have no rights.

There is no "social contract" that's just an excuse for socialism (Which is what we have now.)

The reason JFK is "conservative" is because he wasn't a socialist-- he was an anti-communist.

But what we have now, and have had at least since 1980 is two parties that are completely socialist-- the republicans and the democrats. Both of which have the same socialist agenda, both of which have the same lack of respect for the constitution.

And yet so many people are kept distracted by the whole two-party-road-show circus that they don't realize they republicans never even TRY to undo the damage of the democrats, and vice versa.

GOVERNMENT is a disease, masquarading as its own cure.

Government points out problems, claims to want to fix them, and then never does. Name a problem fixed by a government? Invariably they do more damage than they are trying to fix, and always will as a law of economics... look up the "broken window theory" for an example.

Therefore, by its nature, government is a violation of human rights. A rational person, who supports human rights, must, thus, support anarchism.

Government is the source of all the problems in the modern world. It is the solution to none.