Mr. Pruitt is no conservative, and he apparently has no intention of protecting the very things his own life depends upon: clean air, clean water, temperate seasons, and healthy soils in abundant and abiding supplies. More baffling than this is that people to the right of him, afraid that he won’t go far enough to completely bugger these necessities, are mad enough to call themselves “conservatives.” More baffling still is that members of the media, who like to congratulate themselves on how smart they are, are also mad enough to call all of these profligates “conservatives.”

Pruitt and Trump are nothing of the sort. Not a one of their fallen league is a conservative. They’re all wastrels and prodigals and renegades. Like Satan they complain of injured merit; they think themselves impaired. Like Moloch their sentence is for open war. But tell me: what are they conserving? 

To be a conservative you must conserve things. And to do that you must restrain passions.

Jason Peters, "'Conservatism' and the New EPA"

The answer to "What Is an American?" goes some distance in explaining why the Joneses and those who keep up with them live not as Thoreau did, nor as Berry does, but as bundles of unacknowledged contradictions: they have treadmills in their basements and riding lawnmowers in their garages; they drive to gyms across town (and over rivers) to ride stationary bikes (and use rowing machines). These exemplary citizens have been "educated" to be self-reliant and resourceful in schools funded by state lotteries and casinos. 

Jason Peters, Introduction to Wendell Berry: Life and Work