"What's in a name?"

Our Venerated Iconic Leaders do not define us. Far from it; we often want to be nothing like them.

The big mistake that Conservatives make (one of them, anyway) is to justify their conservatism by wrapping themselves in the shrouds of Conservative icons such as Barry Goldwater, Dwight Eisenhower and their sainted Ronald Reagan. They fail to realize that the politics of these men is often at odds with the stated goals and ideals of "modern" Conservatives...often radically so.

Goldwater, for example, had a real problem with the intrusion of religion into politics, and said "Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [GOP] party, it's going to be a terrible damn problem." He also said something interesting that modern Conservative lawmakers should listen to, but won't: "Politics and governing demand compromise."

Eisenhower believed in feeding the poor, in Social Security, in labor laws, in farm programs, and he believed that Big Oil was trying to undermine these. He also spoke rather strongly against political extremism, which is something that the politics of today absolutely thrives on.

And as for Saint Ronald, whose name is guaranteed to come up in any discussion that touches on Conservative/Republican Superiority (and such conversations are ten-a-penny; you can't spend a day on Facebook without having or dodging half a dozen of them), the point on which he deviated the farthest from what is now the conservative norm is his stance on gun control. Reagan supported background checks and supported (signed into law, in fact) firearm restrictions that are considered nothing short of Liberal gun-grabbing by the modern Right.

But along with this particular set of political blinders, there's another position held by the Right, and one not without some historical justification: That the Left/the Democratic Party were not always the champions of the downtrodden that they claim to be, nor were the Right/the Republican Party always their foes. The problem with this view is that it treats the Left and the Democrats, as well as the Right and the Republicans, as monolithic entities who have always been, and always will be, what they are now.

The fact is that neither Conservatism nor Liberalism, neither Republican politics nor Democratic politics, have stood still. In fact, they have all moved considerably, and they have never moved in lock-step. The party of Lincoln was not the party of Nixon, which was not the party of Bush, which was not the party of McCain or Romney or Boehner. Nor is the Democratic Party still the party of Andrew Jackson, nor was that party the party of Franklin Roosevelt or that of John F. Kennedy or...well, you get the idea.

Ultimately, claiming kinship with such towering personalities from the past can be self-defeating, since the party of today would seldom look kindly upon the policies of its historic icons, and vice-versa. (And while I do see this in either party, I see it more in the actions and policies of the current Republican party.) It would be as incorrect to credit the modern GOP with Lincoln's great deeds as it would be to blame the modern Democrats for deeds done in an era when that party was so strongly influenced by the old Southern Democrats that championed Jim Crow and who had never gotten over the excesses of Reconstruction. 

We should never ignore our past or the words and actions of those who came before us, but we should never look into the past and say, "See? He's of the same party as me...I'm just like him!" because nine times out of ten we're not like them, would never want to be like them, would stand resolutely against anyone who dared to do or say such things now. We need to realize that our cherished historical icons were, perhaps, not the people that we want, even need, them to have been. We need to look at them anew, warts and all, and not ignore their faults or credit them with more virtue than they possessed.

Or, if your respect for history is so low that you can't let go of your idealized icons, then I suggest you go watch something on The History Channel about the aliens who built the Ark that rescued all the unicorns from Atlantis. You'll be happier.

The Blues Viking
The opinions herein expressed are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.