a great old quote i just discovered.

from a 1981 time magazine article about the nomination of sandra day o'connor to the supreme court:

Goldwater attacked directly a claim by the Rev. Jerry Falwell, head of the fundamentalist Moral Majority, that all "good Christians" should be concerned about the appointment. Scoffed Old Goldy: "Every good Christian ought to kick Falwell right in the ass."

man, that falwell just plain sucked, didn't he? go, "old goldy" go! lol.

all right, i'm sure the liberals who read this site don't agree with many of the policies he was championing way back when. if i looked into it, i probably wouldn't agree with some of them either, but let's leave that for debate another time. my point is that, before he passed away, goldwater remarked with dismay that the religious right hijacked the republican party. in fact, he was calling the religious right "extremists" as early as 1981 (see congressional record, 9.16.81).

here's an article about barry goldwater on LOGO regarding his being a staunch proponent for gay rights as early as the early 1990s. it references articles he wrote in the early 90s, including this one.

this is coming from the "godfather of the conservative movement." anyway, a quick glance over his views, at least in the last 20 years of his life, it appears that he (1) abhorred the religious right, (2) decided that abortion fell into the category of "individual rights" to be protected and (3) felt that gay people should not be demonized (again, "individual rights"). now the "conservatives" are all about "god!!", "no abortion!!!" and "gays will burn in hell!!!"

i think a "goldwater republican" nowadays would be seen as a "libertarian kook" or a "left winger" by current republicans.

man has this so-called "conservative movement" strayed...

(i'm embarrassed i never read up on goldwater earlier. i never paid too much attention when andrew sullivan would mention him. i just assumed he was in the same vein as jesse helms, which i admit was totally ignorant on my part. goldwater, in fact, probably didn't like helms that much.)