Forget the self-aggrandizing PR. Republicans don’t believe in free markets, small government, family values or personal responsibility. Prostrating themselves before Donald Trump, the amoral and unscupulous, demonstrates that that was all a fraud. This came as a shock to movement conservatives who had bought their own BS about their party’s principles since at least the Reagan administration. It was what they were selling. They thought it’s what their voters were buying. Then came Trump.
Rick Wilson told Reason in 2018, “We are no longer a party that believes in fiscal discipline. We are increasingly a party that doesn’t believe in the law. And we’re less and less a party that thinks that conservatism is about principles and policies, and more about a man and a mob.” We saw both in all their glory on Jan. 6, 2021. Investigations and prosecutions are ongoing.
Paul Krugman appeared on MSNBC Wednesday night to discuss why in Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s assessment defending freedom — as in the “radical left” is coming for yours — takes precedence over protecting his consituents’ lives. The “freedom of the grave,” as Hayes put it.
The radical right, Krugman noted in his column, sees wearing masks or getting vaccinated as matters of personal choice. So is driving drunk, he allows. There are laws and penalties for making that choice. So why not similar concern over pandemic-related choices that put others at risk?
Krugman writes (emphasis mine):
My answer is that when people on the right talk about “freedom” what they actually mean is closer to “defense of privilege” — specifically the right of certain people (generally white male Christians) to do whatever they want.
Not incidentally, if you go back to the roots of modern conservatism, you find people like Barry Goldwater defending the right of businesses to discriminate against Black Americans. In the name of freedom, of course. A lot, though not all, of the recent panic about “cancel culture” is about protecting the right of powerful men to mistreat women. And so on.
Once you understand that the rhetoric of freedom is actually about privilege, things that look on the surface like gross inconsistency and hypocrisy start to make sense.
Why, for example, are conservatives so insistent on the right of businesses to make their own decisions, free from regulation — but quick to stop them from denying service to customers who refuse to wear masks or show proof of vaccination? Why is the autonomy of local school districts a fundamental principle — unless they want to require masks or teach America’s racial history? It’s all about whose privilege is being protected.
Thus, cruise ship companies are prohibited in Ron DeSantis’s Florida from requiring their passengers to have vaccinations, prohibited not only from protecting their customers but from protecting their businesses. No choice for you!
Of all the hills to die on, Krugman observed last night, you have a right to endanger other people’s health is a demented one.
Dante Atkins’s comment on Shontel Brown’s primary win Tuesday over Nina Turner in Ohio reminds us again that the self interest motivating people not always involves money:
It is the same reason telling conservative-leaning voters that they are “voting against their best interests” gets under my skin. It’s a lefty dog whistle for “stupid” that others hear loud and clear. Right before smart lefties ask for their votes and wonder why they are rebuffed. (And an attitude unwelcome on my canvass.)
Some people value their privilege over cash. Protecting that in their minds is their best interest.