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Revival? Conservative politics was at its peak in the mid-2010's after the Tea Party wave and it has been all downhill since then.
Tell me you're too young to remember Reagan without using those words ;-)
The Republicans never even held the Federal House in the 1980's. While Reagan himself was immensely popular, his downballot effects were muted, especially after 1984.
The Republicans in 2016 held more state houses and more governors mansions than they had held simultaneously since the 1920's. In 2014, the Republicans had their largest Federal House majority since the end of WWII. Electorally -- barring event driven setbacks like 2008 -- the Republicans had managed to build a juggernaut by 2016 that rolled state government after state government into their column. There was a point in the 2010's when the Republicans had Democratic state legislative control on the cusp of going single digits. Then, after groaning halt and reversal in 2016 and 2017, the trend reversed hard in 2018 and, since, they have lost 8 governorships and the Democrats have gained unified control of state legislatures that used to either be Republican or split, net.
If you consider that Tucker got O'Reilly's slot in 2017, it seems less that he was a voice of a conservative revival and more that was a harbinger of the old one's doom.
The Republican party is not the same thing as conservatism. In the 70s, 80s, and 90s, there were lots of conservative Democrats in elected office; now there are basically none. I agree that conservatives were in a better position in 2017 than they are in 2023 or were in 2009, but it’s certainly not an all-time high watermark for conservatism.
They were at a high in the last few decades, at least.
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