Michael McGowan asks “what is conservatism?”

PLUS: Cody Barr makes the case for Colton Bennett, AG Labrador defends Medical Freedom Act, and Prop 1 gets big out-of-state dollars

Defining terms

Michael McGowan of North Idaho submitted the first of three guest opinion pieces that attempt to answer the question “what is a conservative”? It’s a question that vexes those of us in the center-right political discourse.

We need an explicit study.

For that we must start at ground zero. What does the word ‘conservative’ even mean?

• Conservative, adj. — Inclined to preserve the existing order of things. (Reader’s Digest Great Encyclopedic Dictionary, 1967)

Nothing revelatory there. It’s probably what most of us would have pulled out of our own heads if asked. But the existing order may be this or that, good or bad. The word ‘conservative’ by itself has nothing to say about what we are conserving.

For comparison, let’s look at the antonym:

• Liberal, adj. — Inclined toward opinions or policies favoring progress or reform.

Note that “progress” is an ambiguous and loaded term. The “progress” may be toward good or bad, but the word evokes, in most minds, an assumption of good. But in fact, the word ‘liberal’ in itself has nothing to say about what progress or reform is being attempted.

The morally neutral character of the words ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’ shows up clearly when we view the broad lines of western political history.

Speaking of conservative

Cody Barr is a Republican PC in Moscow, and he says that House candidate Colton Bennett is the real deal:

For years, voters in Legislative District 6 have heard candidates promise conservative leadership, only to watch those same candidates soften once they arrive in Boise. This November, we have a genuine chance to change that pattern by electing Colton Bennett to represent District 6A in the Idaho House of Representatives.

Just take a look at Bennett’s résumé: he enlisted in the U.S. Army straight out of high school, served seven years on active duty and in reserve, deployed overseas as a combat medic, and rose to the rank of staff sergeant. He came home to Moscow (now Troy), built a career as a medical assistant at Gritman Medical Center, presently serves as a Firefighter/EMT at Kamiah Fire and Rescue, and started a family with his wife, Sydney. He didn’t wait for permission to serve his community — he’s been doing it as a precinct committeeman for the Latah County Republican Party.

Labrador defends Medical Freedom Act

A federal court dismissed a lawsuit that sought to let a commercial daycare exclude Idaho children based on their parents’ private medical decisions, delivering Attorney General Raúl Labrador and the State of Idaho a complete win in defense of the Idaho Medical Freedom Act.

U.S. District Judge Amanda Brailsford granted Attorney General Labrador’s motion to dismiss in Le Soleil Child Care v. Labrador, rejecting every claim brought by a Boise-area daycare and three parents who asked the court to strike down the law and let daycares turn away children whose parents decline certain medical interventions like vaccines.

The Idaho Medical Freedom Act, signed by Governor Little in April 2025, prohibits businesses, schools, and government entities from denying a service, a job, or access to a public building because of a private medical decision a person made for themselves or their child. Businesses remain free to run their operations, and to speak their minds, on every other front.

Out-of-state billionaires bankrolling abortion in Idaho

The Too Extreme For Idaho PAC issued a press release yesterday calling attention to who is funding Prop 1:

According to a timed contribution report filed September 21, 2026, the committee received more than $1.7 million in contributions in that report alone. Of that, at least $1.25 million came from liberal mega donors with addresses far outside Idaho’s borders:

• Michael R. Bloomberg (New York, NY) — $250,000

• Government That Works PAC (Washington, D.C.) — $650,000

• Gwendolyn Sontheim (Minnetonka, MN) — $250,000

• PGSR Trust (San Francisco, CA) — $100,000

• Blair Hull (Chicago, IL) — $50,000

“Idaho voters don’t need Michael Bloomberg or a D.C. PAC hand-picking our laws for us,” Dee Sarton, spokesperson for Stop Prop 1, said. “When New York billionaires and Washington political committees are writing six-figure checks to change Idaho’s abortion laws, that’s not a grassroots movement — that’s an attempt to buy an outcome our own communities never asked for.”

Video of the day

Nick Freitas and Christian Heiens try to figure out how to unite the squabbling factions of the right before we all pull each other off the cliff:

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