Comment by ileonichwiesz

It’s one of those cases where the label has stayed the same, but the thing it commonly describes has changed so much that the word just has multiple completely different meanings.

There’s the “let’s create National Parks to conserve our natural treasures!” conservatism and there’s the “let’s sell our National Parks to the highest bidder so they can drill for oil!” conservatism. It can mean fiscal responsibility and small government, or it can mean crypto scams and surveillance state.

This happens a lot when describing political positions.