Right-Wing Co-Opts The Word “Values.” But What Values?

Conservatives appropriate certain words and then toss them around like some kind of alphabet soup.  How many times do we hear Sarah Palin say “freedom” “liberty” “Constitution” and “troops” with very few other words in a fragmented sentence?  As I’m observing the “Values Voter Summit” in D.C., I’m watching another attempt of the right to own a word that is not their province.

Karoli at Crooks and Liars drove this home for me as I watched the video of Indiana Congressman Mike Pence, who revved up the crowd by vowing to “overturn Obamacare lock, stock and barrel.”  The crowd went wild. Pence won the straw poll for president among these “values”-lovers.

And how’s this for “values”: Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee opposes insurance for those with pre-existing conditions. Add to these embarrassing positions, GOP Alaska Senate candidate Joe Miller’s opposition to giving a helping hand to the unemployed, and to Medicare and Social Security; Newt Gingrich referring to the Health and Human Services Secretary as an advocate of tyranny for wanting to keep an eye on insurance companies’ rates, and Gingrich’s affirmation of Dinesh D’Sousa’s theory that President Obama is channeling his “philandering, inebriated African socialist” late father by imposing a Kenyan, “anti-colonial world view” on the United States.

How many of these “values” voters are the ones going to rallies to oppose the right of Muslims to have religious freedom in America by building houses of worship where they choose? How many of them have or promote fear of immigrants, even though they or their parents came from somewhere else? How many “values” voters advocate for a New York GOP gubernatorial candidate who sends out racist, sexist emails, and brags about it? How many “values” voters support a candidate who believes Obama’s liberalism makes him “anti-American,” lacks candor about her past, and yet would tell the “truth” to a Nazi hunting a Jew? How many “values” voters support a party that wants to make it illegal to be gay?

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.