CONCLUSION: Why I became a conservative

[Reaganfan]

I like to see things in the big picture. I might get annoyed by something little and trace it back to something long-term or big. I was thinking this morning about what made me a conservative Republican. After all, the majority of my family is Democratic, my sisters voted for John Kerry and/or Barack Obama, my grandparents were strongly anti-Reagan/Bush, adored Clinton and are convinced George W. Bush is the worst President ever. My mother and father moved much further right than their parents, and my father switched parties to the Democrats in 1980 during the Reagan Revolution and never turned back.

My first memories of a Presidential election come from October 18, 1992. It was snowing outside on the day of my 4th birthday party. I remember spending the night at my grandparents house following the party for my grandmother's, my cousin's and my birthday. (She was 60, my cousin turned 12 and I turned 4 all within four days of each other)

After dinner, I went to sit on the chair with my late Grandfather, and he had on ABC News and Peter Jennings was covering the closing days of Campaign '92. Now, at four years old, I had no idea what liberal or conservative meant, only vaguely knew George Bush was the President and had no idea of polls or campaign charisma, ect. I remember seeing President Bush talking to a group of people in a quiet, gentler voice. I know now this was uninspiring and uncharismatic compared to the Clinton/Gore ticket, but at the time I was young and didn't think that way. Then they showed Governor Clinton, red in the face, screaming into the microphone. I have to admit, it was a bit scary as a kid, but my grandfather was enthused. I know now Clinton was rallying America behind his campaign but as a kid, I found it to be a bit ominous.

This wasn't the only example. I remember when "Dr. Frasier Crane" used to go on his hilarious screaming tangents on NBC's "Cheers", it used to scare me when I was young. Of course, I see those episodes now and laugh hysterically.

Maybe I was a softie. Who knows.



I didn't enjoy going to school, partly because I remember what life was like before school, before pre-school even. My mother enrolled me in pre-school in September 1992. I went there and saw my mom leave. It was the first time I was left alone. Indeed, I was not even 4 years old yet. The teacher, a heavy set woman in her late 20s/early 30s was trying to make me stop crying. She resorted to screaming at me to "grow up!" and "quit crying like a baby!" I was holding tight onto my cop teddy bear that I had for I don't know how long. She took it away and threatened to snap Officer Teddy's head off like an Iraqi insurgent. I screamed, "Give me back my bear!" although my 3 year old voice probably articulated, "Gimme brack my beer!" She said, "Will you stop crying if I give you the bear?" I remember bold face lying, "Yes (sniffle), I promise." As soon as Officer Teddy was back in my hands, I began wailing again. My mother walked in, white jacket on, blue jeans and black boots. Big 80s-style hairdo. I can still remember clearly her smile with open arms turning into a face of concern as I embraced her crying. I told her "The mean lady stole my bear and yelled at me". After a scalding from my mother, we left. I wouldn't begin preschool again for a year until September 1993. It was the first incident in my life that gave me less respect for "educators".

Anyways, by 1995, I began 1st grade. My teacher was in her late 50s, early 60s, and had been teaching since the 1960s. One time in class, sometime in late 1995, we were going to spend the whole afternoon coloring and using construction paper to make something (I can't remember what) but it was fun and easy and it would take us through the rest of the school day. I walked up from my desk to get a piece of construction paper and asked, "So this is what we do all afternoon?" A fellow student said, "Yeah!" I enthusiastically responded, "Oh my God, this is so fun!" A gasp came from fellow classmates. My teacher looked at me as if I had just told her to go to Hell. I looked around and said, "What is it? What did I say?" She leaned over and sternly said to me, "It's OH MY GOSH, not OH MY GOD. You DON'T say that!" I didn't understand. I went home upset. Did I say something wrong by using the word God? Why would saying God upset someone? I had no idea. It was my first ever brush with liberalism.



Campaign '96 went by blurred by the exultation of the iconoclastic 1990s. The big hair and Amy Grant-esque music I had enjoyed in my first years of life was replaced by the melancholic sounds of Alanis Morissette's "You Learn" and Joan Osbourne speaking about if (gasp) God was "One of Us". The days of going to bed with my dad sitting in his chair to the Johnny Carson theme were replaced with going to bed earlier for school to someone choking up blood on George Clooney on "ER" and sending me to bed with terrible visions of blood, or if not blood then haunting visions of Andy Sipowicz' naked butt. Indeed, perhaps I was too influenced by pop culture and done so at too young an age. Perhaps. But what changed during that time was the political culture, something I didn't fully grasp until I was older. Indeed, the conservatism of the 1980s spilled into my life in the early 90s. The days of watching carefree Bostonians sit around a tavern was replaced by relationship drama at a New York coffeehouse. The days of watching families like the Keatons and the Seavers were replaced by watching "Grace" be "under fire" as she recovered from alcoholism and tried to raise her kids by herself or "Ellen" coming out as a lesbian in her sitcom and in real life simultaneously. It was very depressing for me as a kid, and I didn't even know what liberalism was.

Indeed, my mother can attest to this, my two least favorite shows as a little, little kid were "Murphy Brown" and "Designing Women". Every time I heard "Georgia on My Mind" come on, I would whine to which my mother would say, "Stop it!" in a funny voice. Despite the big hair, something about Candice Bergen and the ladies of "Designing Women" didn't appeal to me at all. I know now that the shows were about. "Murphy Brown" was about an independent professional woman who is a recovering alcoholic raising a child alone out of wedlock and embracing feminism. "Designing Women" was about the working and personal lives of four Southern women (including the liberal Dixie Carter) and one man (who happened to be wrongly convicted of robbery) in an interior design firm in Atlanta, Georgia. At the time, something about the show turned me off. I know now as an adult that both shows epitomized feminism, and liberalism. Indeed, I remember watching the movie "Grumpy Old Men" when it came out and at the age of 6, I was turned off by Ann Margaret's character. She acted kinda strange, I thought at the time. I know now that her character was a former teacher from Berkley College in California. That explains why her character acted that way. I didn't know it at the time, but what turned me off was liberalism.

Another aspect of popular culture was the movies. I grew up on comedies like "Big" and "Dragnet" and "Three Men and a Baby". I remember my best friend and I were over his other friends house one day. My friend suggested we watch a movie. We went over to my friend's friend's mother's movie rack under her entertainment center (remember those?) and saw three movies. "Jumanji". Robin Williams and a supernatural board game. Meh. Next! "The First Wives Club". At the age of 8, I was turned off instantly by the image of Bette Midler, Diane Keaton, and Goldie Hawn in their pant-suits holding cigars. Little did I know the film was about three divorced women who seek revenge on their husbands who left them for younger women (eye-roll). Next! "Philadelphia". We put on "Philadelphia". After all, it had Tom Hanks who was in "Dragnet" and "Big" and "Forrest Gump". Within minutes, I felt depressed, sad and weirded out. The only thing I knew about AIDS was that it was a disease that once you got it, you died. It was sad and scary. Perhaps had it been rated "R" instead of "PG-13", I wouldn't have watched it and been unnerved. It added to the lugubrious view I had of the 1990s.

I should add my second grade teacher, a young mid-20s woman, said following the 1996 election that she voted for Bob Dole. She then left mid-school year and moved to Texas with her husband when was stationed there in the Military. In retrospect, I'm guessing her Military husband probably contributed to her voting for Bob Dole since nearly all the young female teachers in America in 1996 were tilted heavily for Bill Clinton.

Of course, that didn't end my brush with liberalism and my eventual acceptance that I was a conservative. To be continued...

[Reaganfan]

My next brush with an educator with whom I ended up losing respect was in 3rd grade, in late 1997. She was married with children, in her late 20s/early 30s, and was trying to help me understand a math problem. I am not good in mathematics by any means, in fact, it is my worse subject. I couldn't grasp the math problem, and she responded by saying, "Ughh...you make me wanna pull my hair out!" I was shocked by this. A teacher saying something like that to a 9 year old kid trying to understand a math problem? It gave me the impression that "educators" might not be all they're cracked up to be.

By 1998, I had other priorities that didn't match well with kids my age, but nonetheless had friends in school and a couple that I hung out with outside of school. By 1999 my modern interests in weather and politics had grown on me and I was beginning to follow more current events day by day. I became a class clown, and one day my "art" teacher didn't take kindly to that and had the principal escort me to the office. As the principal came to get me, he had a "tough" look on his face, but for this liberal puppy dog, it was about as scary as making a funny face at the camera. Nonetheless, I complied. We walked down the hallways to the office and were in lock-step, walking almost in cadence right next to each other. He said, "Please don't walk behind me." I had noticed the perfect in step cadence we had, and at the age of 11 said calmly, "Oh, I wasn't walking behind you." He looked at me and said, "I can't believe you just said that! That's the rudest thing I ever heard! What you should have said was, YES SIR, I APOLOGIZE FOR WALKING BEHIND YOU!" My days of tears and crying due to yelling were over, and I now felt rage and anger. Once in the office the "counselor" came in, and he told her what happened. He said, "I asked politely not to walk behind me, and he said, "I'm not walkin' behind YOU!" He completely and blatantly lied and made it sound as if I had screamed at him. I scowled and blasted off, "Mr. (PRINCIPAL), you KNOW that's a lie!!" He seemed stunned. After all, I was 11 years old! I had enough and told him to quit telling lies and exaggerations and making things seem worse than they are.

The next day in School, I was sent from class right to the principal's office. He told me that for precautionary reasons, he had to check my book-bag for weapons!!! I was stunned! Why would I ever break the law or threaten people? What had I ever done? So he put his hand in my book-bag and patted it down. It's probably the most action he has seen before or since. Of course, this was likely fueled by the fact that my father was a Police Officer and Columbine had just occurred. Nevertheless, I was insulted and enraged that a merit roll student who happened to be a class clown would be treated this way while the kids who skip school don't get so much as a slap on the wrist. This further intensified my dislike for our education system.

As this was occurring, the 2000 election was going on and clearly my teachers were supporting Al Gore, some of them vocally, others you just knew. This was in contrast to my one teacher who, despite being liberal, was adamantly pro-life and told me she voted for George Bush. By now, the issues made sense. Bush's "I want to let people keep the money they earn" made more sense than speaking of "brackets" and "lock-boxes". At least it did to me.

My teachers had an interesting view of me. On the one had, they always told me they thought I was more mature than people my age and very intelligent, but on the other hand I confronted their teaching tactics often while using political justification and that was not something they were used to, especially not from an 11 or 12 year old kid. Another incident happened in early 2001 when my friend and I were messing around by our lockers one Friday afternoon. The teacher saw this and thought we were really fighting. We tried to explain but weren't given a chance. We ended up in the office and the vice principal made us shake hands. We were trying to hold back our laughter. We were friends, not enemies...but the teachers thought we should use diplomacy to "ease the tensions". Their notion that there were no "bad boys" got under my skin.



Indeed, by Freshman year of High School in 2004, there were bullies who picked on me. Despite repeated attempts to go all the way to the principal's office, nothing was ever done. I was even told once that I was the one they were tired of due to my constant inquiries into trying to make the bullying stop.  One time a teacher tried to sound tough. "Okay Mike...I've had enough of these assholes!" His idea was for me to wear a wire connected to a tape recorder to try and "catch the bullying in the act". My father came in and scalded the teacher for such a stupid idea. When I was confronted with violence, I responded, and I got in trouble as well. Indeed, this solidified the idea that there wasn't good and bad or right and wrong but no matter who started it, it was both our faults. I was dumbfounded as to why this was. Were "educators" cowards? Or did they sympathize but were afraid to take action due to the fears of legality? Indeed, I felt as though I was in George Orwell's 1984 every time I walked into school. Cameras everywhere, locked doors, security guards whom I could probably even take, it seemed almost surreal. What happened to the good old days? Schools were becoming almost like prisons.

I left public school in June 2004 following my Freshman year, and graduated high school via a charter school. Indeed, I was fed up with so-called educators. I later came to realize that liberalism catered to everything that had angered me as a kid. Anti-religion, the "no bad boy" notion, the fear in the post-Columbine world. All of this made me Palin-esque to where when I hear someone is a teacher, I sometimes find myself rolling my eyes as well...

To be continued.

[Reaganfan]

I was a trouble maker too, and could get angry, but I think class made a difference. I was clearly an upper middle class kid from "south of the boulevard," who was not afraid to make clear I would not be pushed around, so I was given a long leash. I was also not physical in the way Naso was. My dad wrote me 30 absence excuses at once, because I told him my first period biology teacher was a hopeless dumb and a joke, who could not even get the baby talk text book we used right. Thus I chose to sleep in. I got an ASS in that class, rather than an AEE, for non-attendance.   In any event, the teachers in general were not that political, some conservative, and almost all betas, particularly the men. But as opebo keeps reminding me, class does matter.

Great story Naso. I am quite enjoying it.

I was only violent when I stood up for myself after a physical assault.

It's very easy for those who are critical to attack me, demon me, and mock me and think I'm a joke. That's fine. But what I'm trying to get across is that from the youngest age, everything about liberalism, feminism, or the things that catered to them whether in our education system, through pop culture or otherwise, turned me off well before I even knew what liberalism or feminism was. This should be a clue that perhaps political ideology stems from a young age.

Of course, I was fronted the question about the Patriot Act vs. school security. Of course we needed to alter the way the law was after 2001 to help increase security, but to treat our own schoolchildren as if they're the enemy, then refusing to treat any child differently than the child at fault is absurd.

[Reaganfan]

The funniest thing about my political opinions are that many other Americans feel the same way as I, only they aren't as open about them, or they articulate them differently. I also understand that my humorous reputation is cause for the lack of seriousness with anything I say in a venue like this, and I expected that.

Keep in mind, the mainstream political bias against Republicans is the same thing. Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, Sarah Palin....they're all attacked by the mainstream media in the same way someone like me is mocked and attacked on the forum. When did I ever say, "All liberals don't like the word or say the word God"? I didn't. But clearly, I highly doubt a female teacher in 1995 who was angered that a student said "God" was a conservative. Yet the argument against me is that I believe that "liberals don't say God." You're generalizing...hmmm......I thought I was accused of that. Also, what my pop culture references were getting at is the fact that everything else aside, I had a predisposition against pop culture that I later found out clearly conformed to the liberalism of the 1990s. I didn't think that at the time at all, but I clearly remember disliking it at the time. So it's a political reflection on the past, not a critique.

As the Bush era began roughly 10 years ago, I began to realize how easy to was to establish my political philosophy. Simple questions, simple answers. Are you for or against the death penalty? For. Are you for tax breaks for the middle and lower incomes and should rich people pay more, or should taxes be cut equally for all Americans regardless of income? Naturally, the latter. Why should the rich be made the bad guys just because they're rich. Keep in mind, I never disliked rich people. In fact, I'm envious of them and see Donald Trump as an American business success, not someone to mock. Why liberals do, I don't quite know. Perhaps they are so concerned about the little man that they falsely see the rich as the enemy of the lower and middle class.

Of course, this discussion is useless for many. Liberals think I lack the intelligence to come up with informative answers and opinions. That isn't the case at all. It's the question of whether or not I feel that type of intellect applies to certain situations, or whether a more laid-back, causal approach is the more reasonable route to take.  Take Election 2000 for instance. The reason why Al Gore lost wasn't because of anything other than the way he framed the debate.

GORE: I referred to the Dingle-Norwood bill. It is the bipartisan bill that is now pending in the Congress. The HMOs and the insurance companies support the other bill that's pending, the one that the Republican majority has put forward. They like it because it doesn't accomplish what I think really needs to be accomplished to give the decisions back to the doctors and nurses and give you a right of appeal to somebody other than the HMO or insurance company, let you go to the nearest emergency room without having to call an HMO before you call 911, to let you see a specialist if you need to, and it has strong bipartisan support. It is being blocked by the Republican leadership in the Congress. And I specifically would like to know whether Governor Bush will support the Dingle-Norwood bill, which is the main one pending.

BUSH: Well, the difference is is that I can get it done. That I can get something positive done on behalf of the people. That's what the question in this campaign is about. It's not only what's your philosophy and what's your position on issues, but can you get things done? And I believe I can.

Note the difference in lengthiness, articulation and simpleness of the answers. Clearly, if this were posted on the forum and I said what Bush said, I would mocked for simply responding "The difference is is that I can get it done." You know it's true. Yet, 50 million Americans elected that man, and 62 million Americans re-elected him. Does that make them all "stupid" or "simpletons"? You say I read into things alot, often times it is the liberals who over-analyze, over-critique and unfairly mock and ridicule people who might not want to frame a debate as if we're all in a college classroom.

Perhaps sometimes conservatives don't want to get intellectual, or don't feel it is necessary. Sometimes, most of the time, it isn't necessary.

When they say, "the jokes on him" or they would love a "psychiatrist to do an analysis" or they "feel pity for me" they are proving my point. This thread is a comedic thread. I created it to express opinions while implementing humor. It's the same when conservatives take Jon Stewart seriously as a left wing commentator when by his own admission, although his politics are left wing, he does it for comedic purpose. Those whose responses including things previously mentioned are missing the comedy of the thread are taking it too literally, too seriously, and trying to frame it in a liberal, psychological mindset. If this is the case, then I have news for them, the joke's on them. Thank you for proving my point and being the number one reason why I am a conservative.

[Reaganfan]

I want to know what happened to the bear

For some people, the bear is easy to see. Other's don't see it at all.

[Reaganfan]

I like to see things in the big picture.

Good for you, Naso. Too bad your efforts are largely unsuccessful.

Didn't you lose power? Dammit Irene...