Conservatism

Conservatives Miss the Point about NPR and PBS

by Laurence M. Vance April 16, 2025

National Public Radio (now known as just NPR) aired its first broadcast in 1971. It was created by LBJ’s Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which also created the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) for television. The CPB received $525 million in federal funds in fiscal year 2024. According to the NPR website: NPR is an independent, nonprofit media organization ...

Republicans Can’t Make Up Their Mind on Education

by Laurence M. Vance August 9, 2024

The new Republican Party platform was adopted at the Republican National Convention last month in Milwaukee, their first platform in eight years. Every four years at their convention, Republicans adopt a new party platform, but at the 2020 convention in Charlotte, the Republican National Committee (RNC) “unanimously voted to forego the Convention Committee on Platform, in appreciation ...

Conservatives, Hate Crimes, and Victimless Crimes

by Laurence M. Vance December 1, 2023

Libertarianism and conservatism have been described as “uneasy cousins.” There are some issues where they can unite in opposition to the terrible policies of progressives: the green new deal, universal health care, free college tuition, gun-control laws, taxpayer-funded abortions, defunding the police, etc. But even when they seem to agree on something — like hate-crimes laws — the inconsistency ...

Foreign Aid Shows True Nature of Conservatism

by Laurence M. Vance November 1, 2023

After the horrific attack on Israel by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, conservatives wasted no time in denouncing U.S. foreign aid to the Palestinians. Although it was not their intention in doing so, they showed the true nature of conservatism. Advancing American Freedom, an “organization advocating for Conservative values and policy proposals” founded by former vice president ...

Have Religious Conservatives Lost Their Minds?

by Laurence M. Vance August 17, 2023

Although the phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the Constitution, the concept is based on the First Amendment, which reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, ...

Republican Déjà Vu

by Laurence M. Vance February 1, 2023

The year was 1994. A Democratic president had been in the White House for two years. The Democrats controlled the Senate and the House of Representatives. House Republicans issued a document detailing the actions they would take if they gained control of the House. Republicans were projected to win big. A midterm election was held. A red wave then swept ...

Two Agendas

by Laurence M. Vance October 1, 2022

Although the next U.S. presidential election is not until 2024, this is still an election year. Most candidates are running for state and local offices. On the national level, voters in the 50 states only vote for three offices. They select members of the House of Representatives by district for two-year terms, two senators for six-year terms, and, by ...

7 Ways the Right Has Failed Americans

by Laurence M. Vance July 6, 2022

Earlier this year, Republican members of the House held their three-day annual retreat, the House Republican Issues Conference, in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. “Americans are facing the worst inflation crisis in 40 years and struggling to make ends meet,” said Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, chair of the House Republican Conference. She also mentioned “record high gas prices, a ...

Republicans Fail to See the Real Issue with Head Start

by Laurence M. Vance February 14, 2022

President Biden’s “Path out of the Pandemic” mandated that four groups of people be vaccinated against COVID-19: all federal executive branch workers, contractors that do business with the federal government, health care workers at Medicaid- and Medicare-participating hospitals, and employees of private-sector businesses with 100 or more employees. Federal courts have struck down three of these mandates. ...

The State of the Republican Party

by Laurence M. Vance August 25, 2021

Former vice president Richard “Dick” Cheney was one of the architects of the senseless, immoral, and unjust wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—just as he was one of the architects of the foolish first invasion of Iraq (Operation Desert Storm) as secretary of defense under George H. W. Bush. Before this, he served for ten years in the U.S. House ...

The Conservative Hypocrisy on Menthol Cigarette Ban

by Laurence M. Vance June 7, 2021

Many Americans perhaps don’t realize that Congress gave the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority over tobacco in 2009.  Nor do they know that the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (TCA), enacted that same year, banned the sale of flavored tobacco products, with the exception of menthol-flavored cigarettes and flavored cigars. But by now, I suppose that ...

Would the Republicans Have Saved Us?

by Laurence M. Vance April 1, 2021

If Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) had not gotten sick and resigned his Senate seat, then the title of this article would have been “Will the Republicans Save Us?” After serving in the Georgia state house and senate, Isakson served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004. He was re-elected in ...