I wanted to post the astute comment of loyal reader arrScott, who's evidently in much better shape than I am.
Point of order: Bush is not a conservative. If you have friends who are happy about Bush's reelection, then neither are they conservatives.
The correct term for a candidate or a party that acts without principle to transfer wealth and power from the middle class to the very rich while cloaking themselves with the language of values and the personas of down-home folks is "Whig."
When you look at what Dubya stands for now and what the Whigs stood for in 1840, the similarities are amazing. Protect unearned property at all costs? Check. Tax wages but not wealth? Check. Increase government spending and debt? Check. Run an East-Coast educated aristocrat with a dubious military career who pretends to be a Western simpleton? Check. Engage in loose-money policies that encourage speculation and luxury spending but not sound investment or savings? Check. Refuse to talk about real policy intentions, instead talk about commitment to moral issues? Check. Give massive government contracts to politically connected corporations that engage in bribery and fraud? Check. Favor monopolies and no-bid contracts over competition? Check. Allow corporations to write the laws that govern their behavior? Check. Use churches as political machines? Check. Rely on activist judges to stifle democratic reforms in the states? Check.
It is time we stopped accepting the right-wing radicals' self-description as "conservatives." There is nothing conservative about their record in office or their agenda. They are Whigs reborn, and we ought to refer to them as such.
Excellent, excellent comment. If you don't understand the reference, I recommend "The Rise and Fall of the Whig Party" by Michael Holt, who was my history professor in college, who annually staged a dramatic re-enactment of the Sumner-Brooks caning that must be seen to be believed.
Anyhow. Just wanted to make sure everyone saw that. I'm going back into my hole. Until tomorrow.