Yeah… I dunno if the “sane” Conservatives are actual Conservatives. Like, hear me out, I know people who totally understand me as a trans person are perfectly supportive and totally grock leftist talking points and even support fairly socialist economic theory … But they still carry their identities as “Conservatives” because it’s a brilliant bit of branding. For all purposes of actual ideology they are actually progressive, but that word “conservative” strokes the ego in a very particular way.

People think “conservative” as basically just meaning “Not prone to extremes” or “careful and measured” or maybe even “liking change to be slow and incremental” or “fiscally moderate” … None of this actually describes modern Conservative party ideology but they definitely borrow off the synonyms for votes. Because everyone is primed to think of their veiw as carefully reasoned and non-volitile these “conservative at heart” types really don’t realize that they are being tricked they just like the pretty label and are willing to let themselves be hoodwinked.