Maybe They Could Apply Some of That There, "Intelligent Design"

This is just precious:

When we started RedState in May of 2004, we used a website program called Scoop — the same program a lot of similar sites on the left used. But, as the number of visitors to our site grew, Scoop kept crashing on us.

If we’d been a liberal website, we would have been able to fix the problem quickly and relatively cheaply. The online left loves Scoop. Unfortunately, there weren’t really any conservative Scoop developers out there to help us. We kept crashing and were out of money. We had to close down or take drastic action.

[... blah blah, substitute blog package wasn't all that, still can't scale, etc. etc.]

So we’ve decided to move ahead with our upgrades without delay, and despite not having the cash on hand – hoping and praying that RedState.com readers like you will help us make up the shortfall with a generous donation.

[emphasis mine]

Jon Stewart returns to the air tonight, and I hope he finds time for this item, as it's simply hysterical on so many levels.

First off, the idea that "liberals" have engaged in a vast conspiracy to keep Web server developers away from Conservative bloggers in general, and RedState in particular, is completely ludicrous. "Conservative" leaning software developers have been around for ages. We know them as purveyors of malware and spam.

Or perhaps RedState's problem is that "Conservative" Web developers are all staunch supporters of the chief principle of Conservatism — "Pay us." In other words, they can't find any volunteer developers.

But the biggest laugh is that "Conservatism," at least as it has been marketed in this country since Reagan (and, to be honest, long before that) has been the camp of Personal Responsibility, of "Get a job, you dirty fucking hippie," of "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps." The idea of unconditional charity — of a handout — is anathema to them. (Conditional charity, however, is a staple of Conservatism, as a review of their political donations illustrates.)

So here they find themselves at the endpoint of their system of "ideals" and "principles." They lack the in-house talent to scale their software (which they got for free, by the way) and they are unable to convince other "Conservative" Web developers to compromise on their "Conservative" principles and do the work for free. So now RedState is asking their readers to compromise their "Conservative" principles — give them a handout — because RedState doesn't want to follow the other major principle of "Conservative" wisdom, which is that, in a laissez-faire quasi-Darwinist "free market," inferior products/services should simply die off.

Simply precious.