by toomanyrichies | 2025-07-12 20:30:10+00:00
The only novel element that Trump brought to the GOP was profiting from his office financially, through meme coins, extortion via threats of executive orders, gifts of $400 million aircraft, foreign emissaries booking stays in Trump-owned hotels, etc. But American conservatism has always been destructive at its core.

Who would you consider to be a standard-bearer of "conservatism" as you define it? Ronald Reagan? Barry Goldwater? Phyllis Schlafly? William F. Buckley Jr.? Rush Limbaugh? Newt Gingrich? Karl Rove? Tucker Carlson? Lee Atwater? John Ehrlichman?

Because those are the same people who paved the way for Trump et al.

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1. Ronald Reagan

- Legitimized the use of cultural wedge issues (e.g. "welfare queens," states' rights at the Neshoba County Fair) that racialized politics for electoral gain.

- His sunny rhetoric masked an increasing detachment from policy detail, paving the way for style-over-substance populism.

- His deregulation and anti-government messaging sowed distrust in institutions, which Trump exploited more fully.

2. Barry Goldwater

- His radical anti-government ideology and rejection of civil rights legislation marked the beginning of the GOP's shift toward Southern racial resentment and individualist extremism.

- His campaign normalized ideological purity tests and rejection of moderation in the Republican Party.

3. Phyllis Schlafly

- Promoted a cultural traditionalism rooted in opposition to feminism, secularism, and elites (core parts of Trumpist rhetoric).

- In her later years, she explicitly supported Trump and authored The Conservative Case for Trump.

4. William F. Buckley Jr.

- Helped unify disparate elements of the Right, including libertarians, traditionalists, and anti-communists. He also flirted with exclusionary ideas (e.g., defending segregationists early in his career).

- His gatekeeping role arguably failed to permanently expel conspiracists and racists from the movement, who re-emerged in Trumpism.

5. Rush Limbaugh

- Arguably did more than anyone to mainstream conservative media as a vehicle for outrage, identity politics, and misinformation.

- He regularly mocked facts, science, and expertise. He directly influenced the tone and method of Trump's political communication.

6. Newt Gingrich

- Gingrich normalized scorched-earth partisanship and delegitimized opponents as enemies, revolutionizing GOP politics in the process.

- His "Contract with America" and leadership style eroded congressional decorum and promoted grievance-based politics.

- He created the climate where performative politics and obstructionism became normal.

7. Karl Rove

- Pioneered data-driven wedge-issue campaigning and appealed to the Christian Right in ways that prioritized winning over policy consistency.

- Promoted executive power and political tribalism, both of which Trump exploited.

- His famous quote ("We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality...") precipitated the GOP's conversion to post-truth politics. [1]

8. Tucker Carlson

- Carlson became one of Trumpism's most effective propagandists, repackaging white nationalist themes in more polished rhetoric.

- Embraced anti-immigrant sentiment, anti-elite populism, and authoritarian sympathies—all central to Trump's base.

- Helped shift the conservative movement fully into post-truth, post-policy identity politics.

9. Lee Atwater

- Helped refine the Southern Strategy (using racial resentment in coded language) to mobilize white voters.

- The Willie Horton ad (1988). Exploited white fears of Black criminality, linking Democratic opponent Michael Dukakis to a Black man who committed violent crimes while on furlough.

- Trump’s political brand is built on humiliation, name-calling (“Crooked Hillary,” “Sleepy Joe”), and no-limits partisanship. This directly echoes Atwater’s ethic (Atwater said he'd make Willie Horton into Dukakis' running mate, and expressed willingness to go as negative as needed to destroy opponents).

10. John Ehrlichman

"The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and Black people. We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or Black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and Blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."

John Ehrlichman, as quoted by journalist Dan Baum in Harper’s, April 2016.

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I posit that any philosophical / political difference between most conservative figureheads that you might name, and Trump himself, is more a difference in degree than a difference in kind:

Dog-whistle racism => overt bigotry

Narrative spin => post-truth politics

Ruthless attacks => personality-driven dominance

Cultural wedge issues => culture war extremism

A political philosophy that is so fundamentally rooted in asking “What about me?” instead of “What about them?” was always going to end this way.

1. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/846190-we-re-an-empire-now-...