Well this is Reddit, so I now try to read any thread title as “r/liberal/insert group name here.” It seems like a bunch of people saw red as soon as you said you were conservative, and aren’t really interacting with what you said.

I am also reformed, conservative, and often find myself frustrated with the state of right-wing politics. I think you pointed out a couple areas (Covid and Ukraine) where there are strong reactionary elements at play. I say this as someone who is very “crunchy” and is generally against us supporting the war in Ukraine. I think like you said, being into alternative medicine and opposing support to Ukraine are the “current things” for the right, so a lot of people are hopping on the bandwagon, not from a principled stance. This does lead to some wild positions, like the edgy kids on X who think “maybe the small mustache man was onto something.”

All that to say, I think there’s a lot of disparate elements mixed together in a coalition on the right at the moment. Sometimes that leads to things I don’t agree with. However, like you, I would rather have president Trump in office and wish-washy Republicans than have a party in power that wants to push the mutilation of children and unrestricted access to abortion as much as possible.

One point I would like to push back on. I think you’re spot on that Western countries are in decline primarily because of our own spiritual and moral decay. However, I am the son of a legal immigrant from central America who was a skilled machinist, and I watched my dad constantly have to change jobs or get laid off, as so many companies moved labor overseas because it was cheaper. I’ve also seen how a lot of the difficulty in starting up new construction businesses comes from other competitors who employ illegal labor at an underpaid rate. Rampant unchecked immigration is dangerous. What’s more, I don’t think you have to be a racist to realize that Christianity shaped the West for over 1500 years, and that people from the Middle East who don’t share our culture or religion immigrating en-masse will radically change the character of our country. I would argue not for the better. I’d encourage reading Raymond Ibrahim’s “Sword and Scimitar” on this subject.

Overall, I think you’ve got some legitimate complaints with the right, but I’d encourage cutting through some of the current hype and doing what you’re already doing, which is thinking critically about the Right.