Real conservatives are not necessarily bad people. They are not the blight progressives might think they are. Indeed, they can even be useful sometimes. Isn’t it a shame they’ve gone the way of the dodo bird?

Real conservatives want to conserve. They value tradition. They quite reasonably ask if a system is working, why fix it?

Of course just because something is working doesn’t mean it can’t be improved.  And it doesn’t mean it’s fair. Feudalism worked. Caste systems have functioned quite efficiently. Oppressive dictatorships can be remarkably efficient. Would you want to live under any of those conditions?

But conservatives can act as a brake on headlong change. And that’s not always such a bad idea.

Sadly, I bet you couldn’t name a dozen politicians today who fit that definition of a conservative.

Today’s “conservatives” very much want change.  They want radical change. And the kind of change they want is depressingly retrograde. They want to undo all of society’s material and moral gains.

They would return to a feudal society in a heartbeat – as long as they’re the lords and masters and we’re the serfs. They would revoke freedom of the press, freedom of speech, women’s rights and civil rights – all of the rights and  freedoms that democratic societies have won over the years.

And, all the time preaching religion, they would abandon the old, the poor and the sick to fend for themselves, refusing to let them even forage for the crumbs that fall from the rich man’s table.

How that “conserves” anything beats me. It squanders. It corrupts. It inevitably fosters degraded education, inadequate health care, rampant injustice and a myriad other afflictions that inevitably destroy a society.

If there are any true conservatives remaining, they should sue the charlatans who are abusing their brand so blatamtly today.

More on the death of conservatism