Thread by @gerryconway

Conservatives have always had a functional misunderstanding of how government works and what it’s for— the idea that a government should operate under business principles of profit and loss begs the question: profits for whom, and defined how?

The “profit” good government produces is the health, prosperity, and security of its citizenry. That form of profit isn’t measured in dollars and cents. Using business metaphors to critique government is about as helpful as using sports metaphors to critique medicine.

“Good governance” isn’t and can *never* be “good business.” Government isn’t a business, it isn’t a household— it doesn’t and never has operated by supposedly “traditional” economic rules.

This is why the current #GOP government in the White House and the Senate has utterly failed to govern effectively in the current #CoronavirusPandemic— they literally don’t understand what government is.

Conservative political theory is deeply flawed when it compares government to business, obsessing over deficits, worrying about “economic efficiency”, displaying a gross incapacity to deal with the actual issues and problems of governance.

Under the best circumstances, conservatives provide a necessary check on progressive passions, a reality check on idealistic ambitions, but as they’ve proven time and again during eras of crisis— conservatives can’t govern.