#movement conservatives

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

A rare view of the Statue of Liberty from the balcony on its torch. This point of view has been closed since 1916.

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

November 30, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Dec 01, 2024

Cas Mudde, a political scientist who specializes in extremism and democracy, observed yesterday on Bluesky that “the fight against the far right is secondary to the fight to strengthen liberal democracy.” That’s a smart observation.

During World War II, when the United States led the defense of democracy against fascism, and after it, when the U.S. stood against communism, members of both major political parties celebrated American liberal democracy. Democratic presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Harry Truman and Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower made it a point to emphasize the importance of the rule of law and people’s right to choose their government, as well as how much more effectively democracies managed their economies and how much fairer those economies were than those in which authoritarians and their cronies pocketed most of a country’s wealth.

Those mid-twentieth-century presidents helped to construct a “liberal consensus” in which Americans rallied behind a democratic government that regulated business, provided a basic social safety net, promoted infrastructure, and protected civil rights. That government was so widely popular that political scientists in the 1960s posited that politicians should stop trying to court voters by defending its broadly accepted principles. Instead, they should put together coalitions of interest groups that could win elections.

As traditional Republicans and Democrats moved away from a defense of democracy, the power to define the U.S. government fell to a small faction of “Movement Conservatives” who were determined to undermine the liberal consensus. Big-business Republicans who hated regulations and taxes joined with racist former Democrats and patriarchal white evangelicals who wanted to reinforce traditional race and gender hierarchies to insist that the government had grown far too big and was crushing individual Americans.

In their telling, a government that prevented businessmen from abusing their workers, made sure widows and orphans didn’t have to eat from garbage cans, built the interstate highways, and enforced equal rights was destroying the individualism that made America great, and they argued that such a government was a small step from communism. They looked at government protection of equal rights for racial, ethnic, gender, and religious minorities, as well as women, and argued that those protections both cost tax dollars to pay for the bureaucrats who enforced equal rights and undermined a man’s ability to act as he wished in his place of business, in society, and in his home. The government of the liberal consensus was, they claimed, a redistribution of wealth from hardworking taxpayers—usually white and male—to undeserving marginalized Americans.

When voters elected Ronald Reagan in 1980, the Movement Conservatives’ image of the American government became more and more prevalent, although Americans never stopped liking the reality of the post–World War II government that served the needs of ordinary Americans. That image fed forty years of cuts to the post–World War II government, including sweeping cuts to regulations and to taxes on the wealthy and on corporations, always with the argument that a large government was destroying American individualism.

It was this image of government as a behemoth undermining individual Americans that Donald Trump rode to the presidency in 2016 with his promises to “drain the swamp” of Washington, D.C., and it is this image that is leading Trump voters to cheer on billionaires Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy as they vow to cut services on which Americans depend in order to cut regulations and taxes once again for the very wealthy and corporations.

But that image of the American government is not the one on which the nation was founded.

Liberal democracy was the product of a moment in the 1600s in which European thinkers rethought old ideas about human society to emphasize the importance of the individual and his (it was almost always a “him” in those days) rights. Men like John Locke rejected the idea that God had appointed kings and noblemen to rule over subjects by virtue of their family lineage, and began to explore the idea that since government was a social compact to enable men to live together in peace, it should rest not on birth or wealth or religion, all of which were arbitrary, but on natural laws that men could figure out through their own experiences.

The Founders of what would become the United States rested their philosophy on an idea that came from Locke’s observations: that individuals had the right to freedom, or “liberty,” including the right to consent to the government under which they lived. “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” Thomas Jefferson wrote, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” and that “to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

In the early years of the American nation, defending the rights of individuals meant keeping the government small so that it could not crush a man through taxation or involuntary service to the government or arbitrary restrictions. The Bill of Rights—the first ten amendments to the Constitution—explicitly prohibited the government from engaging in actions that would hamper individual freedom.

But in the middle of the nineteenth century, Republican president Abraham Lincoln began the process of adjusting American liberalism to the conditions of the modern world. While the Founders had focused on protecting individual rights from an overreaching government, Lincoln realized that maintaining the rights of individuals required government action.

To protect individual opportunity, Lincoln argued, the government must work to guarantee that all men—not just rich white men—were equal before the law and had equal access to resources, including education. To keep the rich from taking over the nation, he said, the government must keep the economic playing field between rich and poor level, dramatically expand opportunity, and develop the economy.

Under Lincoln, Republicans reenvisioned liberalism. They reworked the Founders’ initial stand against a strong government, memorialized by the Framers in the Bill of Rights, into an active government designed to protect individuals by guaranteeing equal access to resources and equality before the law for white men and Black men alike. They enlisted the power of the federal government to turn the ideas of the Declaration of Independence into reality.

Under Republican president Theodore Roosevelt, progressives at the turn of the twentieth century would continue this reworking of American liberalism to address the extraordinary concentrations of wealth and power made possible by industrialization. In that era, corrupt industrialists increased their profits by abusing their workers, adulterating milk with formaldehyde and painting candies with lead paint, dumping toxic waste into neighborhoods, and paying legislators to let them do whatever they wished.

Those concerned about the survival of liberal democracy worried that individuals were not actually free when their lives were controlled by the corporations that poisoned their food and water while making it impossible for individuals to get an education or make enough money ever to become independent.

To restore the rights of individuals, progressives of both parties reversed the idea that liberalism required a small government. They insisted that individuals needed a big government to protect them from the excesses and powerful industrialists of the modern world. Under the new governmental system that Theodore Roosevelt pioneered, the government cleaned up the sewage systems and tenements in cities, protected public lands, invested in public health and education, raised taxes, and called for universal health insurance, all to protect the ability of individuals to live freely without being crushed by outside influences.

Reformers sought, as Roosevelt said, to return to “an economic system under which each man shall be guaranteed the opportunity to show the best that there is in him.”

It is that system of government’s protection of the individual in the face of the stresses of the modern world that Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, and the presidents who followed them until 1981 embraced. The post–World War II liberal consensus was the American recognition that protecting the rights of individuals in the modern era required not a weak government but a strong one.

When Movement Conservatives convinced followers to redefine “liberal” as an epithet rather than a reflection of the nation’s quest to defend the rights of individuals—which was quite deliberate—they undermined the central principle of the United States of America. In its place, they resurrected the ideology of the world the American Founders rejected, a world in which an impoverished majority suffers under the rule of a powerful few.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[thashining]

Every accusation is a confession.

[its-terf-or-nothin]

I wish I knew who made this, I would love to credit her.

This is an excellent way to show that Right-Wing and Left-Wing political parties mirror each other and neither side is really all that different. Both wings on the bird have a shared interest in oppressing women, they just disagree on how to go about it. As Andrea Dworkin said, Right-Wingers want women to be private property, Left-Wingers want women to be public property.

If we want to achieve liberation we must abandon Left-Wing and Right-Wing political parties and create our own male-free radical feminist political party. Almost every political party, exception being radical feminism, was made by men, for men, at the expense of women.

[son-of-avraham]

I usually say that my judaism looks like conservative judaism since that's what is closest to what I do (and want to do), and also about my general beliefs... but if I'm honest, my judaism is just a tapestry filled with every little thing I adore about judaism. My rabbi described it as a smorgasbord, and that's true, as well, but in reality, I see my judaism as nothing but love

[ravensvalley]

#TheRavenKeeper

I'm still very busy but I always have the time between 2 trails for a quick stop to say hi.

So Hi Folks! And hope you all having a good day so far.

[troythecatfish]

To protect the Palestinian mountain gazelle is to protect the land. To fight for its survival is to fight for Palestine's liberation-free, whole, and uncolonized.

[goldenwaves]

wow! purity culture and censorship in fiction sure is getting scary out there isn’t it!

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

December 26, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

DEC 27, 2023

On December 26, 1991, the New York Times ran a banner headline: “Gorbachev, Last Soviet Leader, Resigns; U.S. Recognizes Republics’ Independence.” On December 25, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev had resigned, marking the end of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, often referred to as the Soviet Union or USSR.

Former Soviet republics had begun declaring their independence in March 1990, the Warsaw Pact linking the USSR’s Eastern European satellites into a defense treaty dissolved by July 1991, and by December 1991 the movement had gathered enough power that Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine joined together in a “union treaty” as their leaders announced they were creating a new Commonwealth of Independent States. When almost all the other Soviet republics announced on December 21 that they were joining the new alliance, Gorbachev could either try to hold the USSR together by force or step down. He chose to step down, handing power to the president of the Russian Federation, Boris Yeltsin.

The dissolution of the USSR meant the end of the Cold War, and those Americans who had come to define the world as a fight between the dark forces of communism and the good forces of capitalism believed their ideology had triumphed. Two years ago, Gorbachev said that with the collapse of the Soviet Union, "They grew arrogant and self-confident. They declared victory in the Cold War." 

The collapse of the USSR gave the branch of the Republican Party that wanted to destroy the New Deal confidence that their ideology was right. Believing that their ideology of radical individualism had destroyed the USSR, these so-called Movement Conservatives very deliberately set out to destroy what they saw as Soviet-like socialist ideology at home. As anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist wrote in the Wall Street Journal: “For 40 years conservatives fought a two-front battle against statism, against the Soviet empire abroad and the American left at home. Now the Soviet Union is gone and conservatives can redeploy. And this time, the other team doesn't have nuclear weapons.”

In the 1990s the Movement Conservatives turned their firepower on those they considered insufficiently committed to free enterprise, including traditional Republicans who agreed with Democrats that the government should regulate the economy, provide a basic social safety net, and promote infrastructure. Movement Conservatives called these traditional Republicans “Republicans in Name Only” or RINOs and said that, along with Democrats, such RINOs were bringing “socialism” to America. 

With the “evil empire,” as President Ronald Reagan had dubbed the Soviet Union, no longer a viable enemy, Movement Conservatives, aided by new talk radio hosts, increasingly demonized their domestic political opponents. As they strengthened their hold on the Republican Party, Movement Conservatives cut taxes, slashed the social safety net, and deregulated the economy. 

​​At the same time, the oligarchs who rose to power in the former Soviet republics looked to park their illicit money in western democracies, where the rule of law would protect their investments. Once invested in the United States, they favored the Republicans who focused on the protection of wealth rather than social services. For their part, Republican politicians focused on spreading capitalism rather than democracy, arguing that the two went hand in hand.

The financial deregulation that made the U.S. a good bet for oligarchs to launder money got a boost when, shortly after the September 11, 2001, attacks, Congress passed the PATRIOT Act to address the threat of terrorism. The law took on money laundering and the illicit funding of terrorism, requiring financial institutions to inspect large sums of money passing through them. But the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) exempted many real estate deals from the new regulations. 

The United States became one of the money-laundering capitals of the world, with hundreds of billions of dollars laundered in the U.S. every year. 

In 2011 the international movement of illicit money led then–FBI director Robert Mueller to tell the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City that globalization and technology had changed the nature of organized crime. International enterprises, he said, “are running multi-national, multi-billion dollar schemes from start to finish…. They may be former members of nation-state governments, security services, or the military…. These criminal enterprises are making billions of dollars from human trafficking, health care fraud, computer intrusions, and copyright infringement. They are cornering the market on natural gas, oil, and precious metals, and selling to the highest bidder…. These groups may infiltrate our businesses. They may provide logistical support to hostile foreign powers. They may try to manipulate those at the highest levels of government. Indeed, these so-called ‘iron triangles’ of organized criminals, corrupt government officials, and business leaders pose a significant national security threat.”

In 2021, Congress addressed this threat by including the Corporate Transparency Act in the National Defense Authorization Act. It undercut shell companies and money laundering by requiring the owners of any company that is not otherwise overseen by the federal government (by filing taxes, for example, or through close regulation) to file with FinCEN a report identifying (by name, birth date, address, and an identifying number) each person associated with the company who either owns 25% or more of it or exercised substantial control over it. The measure also increased penalties for money laundering and streamlined cooperation between banks and foreign law enforcement authorities.

But that act wouldn’t take effect for another three years. 

Meanwhile, once in office, the Biden administration made fighting corruption a centerpiece of its attempt to shore up democracy both at home and abroad. In June 2021, Biden declared the fight against corruption a core U.S. national security interest. “Corruption threatens United States national security, economic equity, global anti-poverty and development efforts, and democracy itself,” he wrote. “But by effectively preventing and countering corruption and demonstrating the advantages of transparent and accountable governance, we can secure a critical advantage for the United States and other democracies.” 

In March 2023 the Treasury told Congress that “[m]oney laundering perpetrated by the Government of the Russian Federation (GOR), Russian [state-owned enterprises], Russian organized crime, and Russian elites poses a significant threat to the national security of the United States and the integrity of the international financial system,” and it outlined the ways in which it had been trying to combat that corruption. “In light of Russia’s further invasion of Ukraine,” it said, “we must redouble our efforts to prevent Russia from abusing the U.S. financial system to sustain its war and counter Russian sanctioned individuals and firms seeking to exploit vulnerabilities in the U.S. financial system.” 

The collapse of the USSR helped to undermine the Cold War democracy that opposed it. In the past 32 years we have torn ourselves apart as politicians adhering to an extreme ideology demonized their opponents. That demonization also helped to justify the deregulation of our economy and then the illicit money from the rising oligarchs it attracted, money that has corrupted our democratic system. 

But there are at least signs that the financial free-for-all might be changing. The three years are up, and the Corporate Transparency Act will take effect on January 1, 2024.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[wachinyeya]

From water-testing polluted rivers to measuring radiation levels, ordinary people are taking environmental research into their own hands.

[its-terf-or-nothin]

[surviving-the-next-4-years]

The Republican Party is now split in half, the MAGA Cult and the Republican Traditionalists.

The Republican Traditionalists are waiting to kick Trump from the Party entirely and bring it back to the Traditionalist style it had prior to Trump. But do they have what it takes to defeat the MAGA Cult which is determined to redefine the Republican Party into being a full Trump Cult.

[relaxedstyles]

[philosophicalconservatism]

Are the angry American women who are flirting with embracing South Korea's 4B movement also going to embrace that movement's rejection of Transgenderism?

[ravensvalley]

#WildHabitat

It should be built the simplest way as possible to not disturb the environment… always in tune with nature. Be concerned with protecting the natural environment and the planet.

[blondebrainpowered]

Kittens interacting with a Newton's Cradle.

[dayofphylosophyorideology]

The Conservation Movement—also known as nature conservation or environmental conservation—is a broad, historical, and multifaceted movement aimed at preserving, protecting, managing, and restoring the natural environment, biodiversity, and Earth's resources. Rooted in both scientific understanding and ethical considerations, the conservation movement spans over two centuries and involves a dynamic interplay of politics, ecology, economics, law, and culture. It emerged in response to industrialization, habitat destruction, overexploitation of natural resources, and the extinction of species. Today, it is a global effort integrating local, national, and international initiatives with a growing emphasis on sustainability, ecosystem resilience, and justice.

The conservation movement began in the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly in Europe and North America, as a response to rapid industrialization, deforestation, and the decline of wildlife populations. The Enlightenment and the subsequent Romantic movement cultivated an appreciation for nature, prompting early naturalists, artists, and scientists to advocate for the intrinsic value of wilderness.

In the United States, the roots of the movement can be traced to the transcendentalist thinkers such as Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson, who emphasized the spiritual and moral value of nature. Thoreau’s Walden (1854) is widely considered a foundational text for American environmental thought. The 19th century also saw the rise of the “wise-use” philosophy, articulated by figures like Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the U.S. Forest Service, who argued for the scientific management and sustainable use of natural resources.

Simultaneously, a more preservationist perspective emerged, most famously represented by John Muir, the founder of the Sierra Club. Muir argued for the protection of wilderness areas for their aesthetic, spiritual, and ecological values, independent of human use. His activism was instrumental in the establishment of Yosemite National Park and the broader U.S. National Parks system.

In Europe, similar impulses took form. In the United Kingdom, the romanticized vision of rural landscapes and concern over the degradation of common lands led to early conservation societies, such as the National Trust (founded in 1895). Germany also fostered a robust conservation ethic, influenced by scientific forestry and the Heimat (homeland) movement, which emphasized regional identity and nature protection.

The development of ecology as a scientific discipline in the late 19th and early 20th centuries provided a critical foundation for the conservation movement. Pioneers like Ernst Haeckel (who coined the term "ecology"), Frederic Clements, Charles Elton, and Aldo Leopold advanced understanding of ecosystems, species interdependence, and ecological succession.

Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac (1949) marked a turning point by introducing the “land ethic,” a philosophy that called for a responsible relationship between people and the land they inhabit. Leopold argued that humans are part of a larger ecological community and must act as stewards rather than conquerors. This ecological view significantly influenced later environmental ethics and conservation biology.

The rise of conservation biology in the 1980s further integrated scientific research with conservation practice. Conservation biology is a mission-oriented discipline that focuses on understanding and mitigating biodiversity loss, managing endangered species, and designing protected areas. Key concepts include population viability analysis, habitat fragmentation, genetic diversity, metapopulations, and ecological restoration.

The institutionalization of conservation was facilitated by the creation of national parks, wildlife refuges, and environmental regulatory bodies. In the U.S., the establishment of Yellowstone National Park in 1872 as the world’s first national park signaled a new era in public conservation. The U.S. Forest Service (1905), National Park Service (1916), and numerous state-level conservation agencies laid the groundwork for resource and landscape protection.

Globally, conservation gained momentum with the founding of organizations such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN, 1948), World Wildlife Fund (WWF, 1961), and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP, 1972). These institutions helped develop international frameworks, promote conservation funding, and coordinate transboundary conservation efforts.

Legal frameworks also evolved, including landmark legislation such as the U.S. Endangered Species Act (1973), the Clean Water Act (1972), and the National Environmental Policy Act (1970). International treaties, including the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES, 1973), the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands (1971), and the Convention on Biological Diversity (1992), created binding mechanisms to protect ecosystems and regulate resource use.

Post-World War II decolonization and the rise of global environmentalism brought attention to conservation challenges in the Global South. Many of the world's biodiversity hotspots—such as the Amazon rainforest, Congo Basin, Southeast Asian archipelagos, and coral reef systems—are located in developing countries where conservation often intersects with economic development, indigenous rights, and poverty alleviation.

In some instances, conservation policies imposed by international NGOs or governments led to the displacement of local communities, creating what critics term “fortress conservation.” This has led to growing advocacy for community-based conservation approaches, which integrate local ecological knowledge, respect indigenous sovereignty, and aim for equitable benefit sharing. Examples include the CAMPFIRE program in Zimbabwe, participatory forest management in India, and locally managed marine areas in the South Pacific.

The intersection of conservation with development goals became more prominent through initiatives such as sustainable development, biosphere reserves, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly Goal 15 (Life on Land) and Goal 14 (Life Below Water).

Conservation employs a wide array of strategies to preserve species, habitats, and ecosystem functions. These include:

Protected Areas: The cornerstone of global conservation efforts, protected areas range from strict nature reserves to multi-use biosphere reserves. The IUCN categorizes these areas into six types, depending on the level of human activity allowed.

Species Conservation: Efforts include captive breeding, reintroduction programs, habitat protection, anti-poaching measures, and conservation genomics. Flagship species (e.g., tigers, pandas, elephants) are often used to garner public support.

Habitat Restoration: Restoration ecology seeks to rehabilitate degraded ecosystems. This involves removing invasive species, reforesting, reintroducing native flora and fauna, and restoring hydrological cycles.

Landscape and Ecosystem-Based Conservation: Strategies such as ecological corridors, integrated land-use planning, and conservation mosaics aim to preserve ecological integrity at broader scales.

Ex Situ Conservation: Botanical gardens, seed banks, zoos, and cryopreservation facilities act as repositories for genetic material and living specimens.

Marine Conservation: Marine protected areas (MPAs), sustainable fisheries management, coral reef restoration, and efforts to reduce ocean pollution are key components of marine conservation.

Despite extensive efforts, conservation faces numerous and intensifying threats. Chief among these are:

Habitat Loss and Fragmentation: Driven by agriculture, urbanization, logging, and infrastructure development, habitat destruction is the primary driver of biodiversity loss.

Climate Change: Alters species ranges, disrupts phenology, exacerbates extreme weather, causes coral bleaching, and threatens entire ecosystems.

Pollution: Includes nutrient runoff (eutrophication), heavy metals, plastic waste, and air pollutants, affecting both terrestrial and aquatic systems.

Invasive Species: Non-native species can outcompete, prey upon, or bring diseases to native flora and fauna.

Overexploitation: Unsustainable hunting, fishing, logging, and trade in wildlife products continue to drive population declines.

Sociopolitical Conflict: War, corruption, weak governance, and lack of enforcement undermine conservation efforts.

Conservation is not solely a scientific endeavor—it is also deeply philosophical and ethical. Key debates include:

Anthropocentrism vs. Ecocentrism: Whether nature should be protected for its utility to humans or for its own intrinsic worth.

Deep Ecology: A philosophical movement that promotes the inherent value of all living beings, regardless of their utility.

Environmental Justice: Focuses on the fair distribution of environmental benefits and burdens, particularly for marginalized communities.

Ecofeminism: Examines the links between the oppression of nature and the oppression of women.

Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK): Recognizes the value of indigenous and local knowledge systems in managing and understanding ecosystems sustainably.

Modern conservation is increasingly interdisciplinary, incorporating technologies such as remote sensing, GIS mapping, environmental DNA (eDNA), drones, AI for poaching surveillance, and bioacoustics. Citizen science, open data, and participatory monitoring are also expanding public involvement.

“Rewilding” has emerged as a radical conservation strategy, involving the restoration of self-regulating ecosystems and the reintroduction of keystone species (e.g., wolves in Yellowstone). Debates continue over the ecological, ethical, and political implications of such approaches.

The concept of “Planetary Boundaries” and “Half-Earth” (proposed by E.O. Wilson) have gained traction in scientific and policy circles, promoting limits to human encroachment and the protection of vast areas for biodiversity.

Conservation finance is another growth area, including mechanisms like biodiversity offsets, green bonds, carbon markets, and payments for ecosystem services (PES). These aim to align economic incentives with conservation goals, though they remain controversial in practice.

The conservation movement is one of the most significant and enduring human responses to the ecological crises of the modern world. It has evolved from elite wilderness preservation to a global, pluralistic movement that engages science, policy, philosophy, and communities. As biodiversity loss accelerates and the Anthropocene unfolds, the conservation movement continues to adapt, guided by a blend of ethical imperatives, scientific understanding, and social responsibility. The future of conservation will depend not only on scientific and technological advances, but on inclusive governance, cultural shifts, and a redefinition of humanity’s relationship with the natural world.