The blueprint mapped by Obama the progressive
Now that it’s nearly a year into Obama’s presidency, I find myself having a recurrent experience: I’ll go back and read something from the past, but now with the perspective provided by the passage of time I experience an “aha!” moment in which the old text gains deeper meaning because it resonates with events that have occurred in the interim.
In that spirit, I plan to revisit and to expand and comment on a few of my old posts from before the 2008 election. The first is the following, originally appearing on this blog on November 3, 2008:
Many of the revelations about Obama that have come out in the past week have been excerpts from old interviews. I’ve even come across one myself—this piece that appeared in Harper’s two years ago, back when Obama wasn’t yet exercising such tight control of his mouth and his message.
It’s instructive to look at what Obama was saying when his every word wasn’t being scrutinized. Here, for example, is the 2006 Obama on how to be practical and to seem less radical than one actually is:
Since the founding, the American political tradition has been reformist, not revolutionary…What that means is that for a political leader to get things done, he or she ideally should be ahead of the curve, but not too far ahead. I want to push the envelope but make sure I have enough folks with me that I’m not rendered politically impotent.
Sounds as though Obama is saying he is tempering his more extreme agenda because he knows it wouldn’t get him anywhere. Makes a great deal of sense, actually. But he’s not denying that agenda. In fact, he’s biding his time [emphasis mine]:
…Obama said he had no doubt that if the Democrats controlled Congress, it would be possible to move forward on important progressive legislation.
The alternative, until then, is to be opportunistic and look for areas where he can get enough Republican support to actually get a bill passed. That, he said, “means that most of the legislation I’ve proposed [as Senator] will be more modest in its goals than it would be if I were in the majority party.”…
“Karl Rove can afford to win with 51 percent of the vote. They’re not trying to reform health care. They are content with an electorate that is cynical about government. Progressives have a harder job. They need a big enough majority to initiate bold proposals.”
Well, guess what? Obama may soon have his wish. If he’s elected President and both houses of Congress go strongly Democratic, he will finally have that “big enough majority”—and then some.
Looking back at this piece now, I wonder once again how it was that people believed this man would function as a moderate or from the middle. Although shortly after the election I expressed that hope, I was very clear towards the end of the 2008 campaign that I thought the vast preponderance of evidence was that Obama was not just a liberal but a true “progressive” and man of the Left, and would advance that agenda as best he could. The fact that progressives are angry at him right now for not succeeding doesn’t contradict the assumption that his goal would be to satisfy their wishes if it were only possible.
The 2006 Harper’s article linked at the beginning of my piece contains a few more tidbits that I didn’t highlight or quote then, but which have taken on added significance now. You can’t say Obama didn’t warn us, at least in the beginning—although he and the MSM set up smokescreens later, so that only those who had been paying very close attention knew what we were getting into.
Here, for example, is another passage from that Harper’s piece:
[Obama] managed to win a tremendous majority in his home state of Illinois despite rhetoric, and a legislative record, that marked him as a true progressive. During his first year in the state senate””1997””he helped lead a laudable if quixotic crusade that would have amended the state constitution to define health care as a basic right and would have required the Illinois General Assembly to ensure that all the state’s citizens could get health insurance within five years.
Please let that sink in: one of Obama’s initial acts on being elected to his very first public office was an attempt to codify health care as a basic and guaranteed right in the state of Illinois. This was back in 1997, which indicates how long-held his dream has been, and why he has pushed for so-called health care reform now despite the fact that the financial crisis makes this one of the worst times possible for such legislation. Combine this 1997 attempt of his with the sentiments expressed in the other quotes from Obama highlighted here, and it becomes clear that he understood long before becoming president that he would need to move quickly on his long-held agenda if he ever found himself in a situation in which Democrats held a huge majority in Congress, no matter what the economic situation and no matter what the public sentiment about the legislation.
Is it any wonder we are in the position we are in now? Is it any sort of puzzlement any more why the Democrats are “committing suicide” with this unpopular bill? Is there any doubt that Obama, Reid, and Pelosi et. al. are following a plan to get the camel’s nose in the door with this particularly weak and chaotic legislation while they can, and then push for greater and greater “reform” over time, “fixing it later?”
Obama laid it all out three years ago, and appears to have had the same ideas as far back as 1997 and even earlier. Back then, though, hardly anyone was paying attention.
[NOTE: A few more highlights from that 2006 Harper’s article:
—“In 2001, reacting to a surge in home foreclosures in Chicago, [Obama] helped push for a measure that cracked down on predatory lenders that peddled high-interest, high-fee mortgages to lower-end homebuyers.”
—“Throughout his campaign for the U.S. Senate, Obama called for social justice…” (see this)
—“Yet it is also startling to see how quickly Obama’s senatorship has been woven into the web of institutionalized influence-trading that afflicts official Washington. He quickly established a political machine funded and run by a standard Beltway group of lobbyists, P.R. consultants, and hangers-on.”]
When Obama & Co. go down, as I hope and believe they will, the MSM–without whose tireless and invaluable help, willful blindness and lack of curiosity Obama & Co. could never have gotten within striking distance of the Presidency–has got to go down with them.
Wolla,
Self preservation will have the press telling people they were duped right along with us.
Or some other convenient mea-culpa will be given.
In the lunch room – ALL of my coworkers except 2 gave blank stares when I reviewed words with them that Obama said and relayed my opinion of how radical the man is.
His talk about taking oil company profits was one of those lunch room conversations. I explained Marxism and how Marxist that is and how our energy companies are competing against global companies and how in the HECK can a company compete and keep employees when competing globally if we have radical takings by the government.
So… the people in the lunchroom with selfishness and class warfare talked about how unfair it is and how much they are paying for gas and how the oil companies deserve the taking. I told them that destroying or taking that revenue will only weaken their position and leave us at the mercy of foreign companies.
And… if you take from ANY company the company can only try to pass on costs to consumers and the prices will go up higher.
And…. if you see profits from tech companies you see a higher profit margin.
Oh well. I tried. 🙂
Dear Neo (and, I’ll have you know, I voted for you today),
At first the magazine is Harpers. Later on it’s The Nation.
I do not believe the MSM is blind or willfully ignorant of Obama & Co. (but they want to insure that we are). They have been his dutiful accomplice with unflagging esprit de corps from day one. They have full knowledge of what he truly is and will continue to be his complicit partner. Unfortunately they will also continue to spin America’s righteous anger into something sinister, violent, racist etc. It’s a reckless gamble and they are playing for keeps.
SAB is right: They are playing for keeps. We must do the same, and if victorious, see this never happens again. But that’s a big if.
Nolanimrod: Oops! Those magazines must have been in the same file in my mind. Thanks, I will fix.
Looking back at this piece now, I wonder once again how it was that people believed this man would function as a moderate or from the middle.
I used to sak myself all the time when I was younger things like, “How could Germans have voted for Hitler? They must have known!”; or, “How could the Russian people have revolted so that the end result was Lenin, Stalin, Gulags, murder, repression, poverty, etc.?”
Now I know the answer since it just happened here in the US in the 2006 and 2008 elections.
On one level people get tired, bored, bullied, comfortable, nasty and fashionable (those are all closely related imo). They get shallow and lazy thinkiing that it couldn’t be that bad.
On a deeper level they lose one religion and are force fed another. This takes decades, even longer. Read a closer history of Russia and Germany and you see they traded true religion for false, and then opted for Stalin and Hitler. In the US, our current tragic state began with the education in schools especially, but also in mass media, pop culture, and art from about 1960 on. The dumbing down process that accompanied the mis-eductaion was a vital part of the project since now even people who know they have been captured and made slaves do not know where to turn for the proper arguments against their oppressors or for themselves.
We are all bees in the beehive now and there simply will be no getting out of line.
We are all Animal Farm, 1984, Brave New World now – and the joke is totally on us.
Did you ever in your wildest dreams imagine that by 2009 it would be nearly possible to think that both Russia and China (even as bad as they are) are freer places than the USA? Are they not? I think they very nearly are.
America is over. We liove in the USSA, and if we ever want any hope of reversing that we’ll have to start with admitting a few things, like 1) that it would be a reversal – i.e. that we can and must go back. The lie that we can never go back is part of the dogma of slavery we now live under; 2) that we really have lost our freedom and lost our republic and lost even the pretension of being governed by people who want the best for us and our country. None of those are true anymore, and we will never return to a time when they are unless we admit it; 3) ALL democrats are materially evil, at least. That is, they ma, at best, be misguided people. But none of them are good people and we should stop playing along as if they are. Good people do not kill the unborn. Good people do not steal your money at the point of a gun and give it to someone else. Good people do not let terrorists into our country and harrass our own people. Good people do not form death panels and ration health care and corrupt the whole health/illness/living/dying aspect of human being. Good people do not make inner-cities vote plantations – keeping people poor, drugged out, and violent so that they can get guaranteed votes.
There is more, but we must admit that Democrats do ALL of those things, or they triumphally vote for people to do those things. They murder and entire culture, and then after they visit a soup kitchen one day a year (or in a life) they call themselves ‘good’, and others do too.
We have to stop that. They are not “good”. None of them.
BTW: to forestall the morons – saying that no Dem is good (and that is what I am saying), is not to say that all, or any Repubs are good. That is a separate issue altogether. It is simply to state the rock solid fact that no Dems are good.
If there is one, name them and say why they are good. Do it I say, if you can.
Mike Mc.: I agree with the first part of your post but disagree when you say no Democrats are good. I would say that Democrat policies are not good, but the vast majority of the Democrats I know are good but ignorant and/or uninformed and/or lacking in critical thinking. That is a big difference from what you’re alleging, I believe, although the end result is that they support policies that are very bad.
Baklava–Hey, at least you thought you could talk to your guys.
Neo and Baklava:
In the “Snakepit”:
When I worked for the Federal government, the people I worked for and with in my supposedly “professional, totally non-partisan and objective” research organization were–the vast majority of them–Democrats, and what passed for Liberals, i.e. definitely on the Left or the far Left, and many of my co-workers were militant Democrats and quite satisfied ones at that, and why not, it really paid off for them.
And, boy, many sure hated and denigrated Republicans, Conservatives, and the occasional gun owner or religious type (and they especially despised and vocalized about the Republican Presidents who headed the federal government they were supposedly working for, for some of the decades I worked there) and said so on almost a daily basis, and, again, why not; they thought nothing if it, for those were the “sensible,” the “obvious,” the only “right thinking” views and opinions to hold, the only views that anybody who was sane, “civilized” and “educated” could hold.
It was useless in the extreme to try to talk politics to any of that crowd–although they talked politics and trashed Republicans and Conservatives routinely–and, if you raised some Republican or conservative point or idea, somehow you got the reputation of someone who was not a “team player,” not “reliable,” not “stable,” you were on the outside, not the inside and not “one of us” i.e. you were a disruptive, uninformed, deluded crazy, and a knuckle-dragging barbarian, and not worth listening to. Or, perhaps, as one of my coworkers who was slightly conservative got labeled, you were pigeonholed as having a “quirky personality” and an “odd laugh,” which definitely eliminated him–he not being in one of the “protected” or “victim” classes–as a candidate for management.
On the other hand, if you were a member of one of the “protected or victim groups,” if you were a victim of discrimination like, say, a women, or gay, or Black, if you were discriminated against because at 25 or 55 you weighed 350 or 400 pounds or more and couldn’t walk by yourself, or reach down to see or tie you own shoes, or walk though a doorway except sideways, or have enough breath or stamina to really work, and were an oppressed victim of “fatism” or “lookism,” if you were an”indigenous person, ” an American Indian, a Hawaiian native, or an Aleut, you were “in like Flynn” and, once in, pretty much immune from firing, no matter how little work you did, or how insubordinate you were. If you were both gay and black or a woman and also had some claim to American Indian blood–no matter how faint or apparently fictitious-—so much the better, and you were even more insulated as a “twofer.”
Be a white heterosexual male or a Conservative, raise the inconvenient fact or argument, and you discovered that you just never got the plum assignments, as many promotions, or the goodies–like trips overseas–that the majority who believed the “correct things” or who were “oppressed” got.
Not a great environment, but great resources to work with, a chance to do some interesting research once in awhile, and a chance to very occasionally actually effect national policy or policy on an international level, and good pay, too, so, I hung on until I made the minimum requirements for retirement, and then blew the joint.
Bottom line–most of the “Democrats” I interacted with for 25 years were smug, ignorant, intolerant, unfriendly, often arrogant, thoroughly propagandized bastards, and none too educated or smart either.
Wolla Dalbo said “Bottom line—most of the “Democrats” I interacted with for 25 years were smug, ignorant, intolerant, unfriendly, often arrogant, thoroughly propagandized bastards, and none too educated or smart either.”
Reminds of a civilian employee of DOD I worked with. Smart at his job, and friendly enough, but told us he admired the Cuban Health Care system. Also tried to claim male/ female marriage really was just a western thing and we only saw “what we wanted” when we looked at other culture’s marriage. I suspected he was pushing for gay marriage without saying it.
hitler told everyone way ahead what he was going to do too. the opportunity to fulfill such plans creates a sort of megalomania with feelings of devine fate insuring success…
Thank you for your anti-Dem cry from the heart, Mike, which I share completely. The big challenge is to get Neo to agree, but she is being soft; bless her therapist softness!
No, not being soft. We’ve had this argument many times. I know what I was when I was a Democrat; I was merely uninformed. I was the same person I am now, exactly the same. I just did not have the proper information to come to the conclusions I’ve come to since. If my “A mind is a difficult thing to change” series tells you anything, it should tell you that.
Virtually all of my friends and family are Democrats. Yes, some of them (not even all of them) are intolerant of Republicans and/or conservatives. And yes, most of them don’t read as much as I do about politics, and yes, they tend to think with their hearts about it. But almost all of them are good people—good to their families, the people they work with, all of the usual ways in which we define general goodness.
I believe good people who support democrats do so out of a misguided notion that all risk is bad and lacking in compassion. Hell its risky to let people succeed or fail on their own.
Whats missing can be found in a quote from Helen Keller….
“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.”
Wolla wrote, “And, boy, many sure hated and denigrated Republicans”
Here in the belly of the beast in CA state government – I see the same thing. Luckily, being in IT most of the people I work with are at most apathetic but logical. They’ve swayed from being Obama fans to seeing how radical he is though they don’t follow the news like I do.
However – your statement above reminded me of some militant leftist Democrats who i overheard the day Condi Rice became Secretary of State. They called her vulgar racist names and my blood boiled so bad I almost walked over there and got myself fired (as a contractor) and told them how vile they were.
Luckily I held it together and walked away. My ears aren’t virgin. I was in the military for 6 years. Those people who think of themselves and compassionate and tolerant are evil to the core.
Neo,
You said, I would say that Democrat policies are not good, but the vast majority of the Democrats I know are good but ignorant and/or uninformed and/or lacking in critical thinking.
Question: Is a person who is ‘ignorant and/or uninformed and/or lacking in critical thinking’ a good person? I say not – not in the sense that I mean ‘good’.
Good is as good does, to Forest Gump the matter.
Or, if you want to go another way, then I would say they are ‘evil’ in the Augustinian sense of lack/absence/privation of good, and/or the parasitical nature of the Dem who lives only on the good others have created, but destroys it to live.
I refuse to make the admission that the ignorant is ‘good’. In this day and age, there is not even an excuse for ignorance. Simply isn’t. A person not aware today does not want to be. That is a desire fulfilled and it is an evil desired fulfilled to an evil end.
Good Dems remind me of Good Germans in the 1930s. They make it possible, and they know what’s afoot. Not detailed knowledge, but they know something ‘s bad, not quite right, yet they go along to get along, and don’t feel any responsibility to do otherwise. It’ll all work out.
Good to their families and to the people they work with? A lax standard…Read Wolla and Baklava above for your good people. Let’s tighten up our standards.
There is actually somewhat of a parallel discussion like this going on at Conservative Talk.
It’s worth reading, even though there’s some flame wars going on too. You have to read between the lines, or between the flames.
I’m kind of glad I didn’t get involved, although I was sorely tempted at times.
neoneocon’s post at 8:02 sums up my social situation as well. Unlike neoneocon, I’m less inclined to forgive these stupid stupid liberals. My husband is one, and we’ve agreed not to talk about anything political at all. Sad, but we’re a good couple anyway.
I do all my talking online or with two friends I can talk to. Most of the liberals I know absolutely refuse to consider other ideas than the fashionable ones because they live in a bubble. They don’t know what hardship is. They are white collar desk jockeys or the equivalent. They wouldn’t know how to survive in a crisis. John Ringo’s “The Last Centurion” describes them very accurately.
Yesterday I hosted a small gathering, and my guests started in on Sarah Palin and how she could see Russia from her house. I’m proud of myself that I did not even do an eyeroll. You may say that I’m a coward, but I’m beyond trying to convince liberals of anything. They are smug, uninformed, and stupid beyond belief. I’ve given up on them. Experience will be their teacher, even though they won’t know what hit them. I’m not the kind of person who needs to say “See, I told you so.” (the four most awful words in the English language)
I hope I don’t sound bitter in the above paragraphs. Actually, I’m quite encouraged by all the genuine revolutionary outrage that I see on this site and other websites. (Someone once called me a troll for saying that on another website.)
We are part of history, and our job is to save liberty and freedom. That is what we have to do. “To some generations much is given. To some generations much is required. This generation has a rendezvous with destiny,” as FDR so eloquently said.
Yes, it is up to us to do what we can to save freedom and free enterprise.
oops . . . “five most awful words . . . “
rickl: thanks for that link. It does seem to be a very similar discussion. I especially liked this response:
We have to consider that political ideology has somehow entered the fashion realm and exited the critical thinking realm for about half the people.
We saw it coming in the televised Nixon/Kennedy debates. We saw it in Bill Clinton playing the saxophone and appearing on MTV.
Whats sorely needed is a conservative resolve to creatively mock and ridicule the shallowness of people who choose their political leanings by the same methods they choose their laundry detergent or designer clothing.
In the end there is nothing hip or cool about being easily led through a path in life by an establishment pop culture that only desires you see the world though an emotionally driven one sided viewpoint.
Sheep are well known (in flyover country) for being extremely stupid. They make cows look smart. Like Neo’s “Good” Dems, they are not teachable. You can scare them, though.
Promethea,
I relate to you. I too in mixed company have censored my eye – rolls concerning the stupidity.
However, when it comes to my mate, I have sat her down and had a 15 minute discussion where I said that I have higher expectations. 🙂
I previously have had NO interest in celebrity news. I as a mate have stepped up and listened to all the things she is interested in including celebrity news. I now know who Liza Minelli is and all the idiosyncrasies of Brad and Angelina’s relationship.
But! She shuts me down and says she doesn’t want to hear about anything political.
She has apologized and didn’t realize how important it was to me. I gave examples concerning celebrities and politics. For instance when she actually told me how stupid it was that Sarah Palin said she can “see Russia from her house” and I told her that no that was Tina Fey. My sweetie insisted 3 times following that Sarah said that but wouldn’t entertain hearing what was actually transcribed on the Couric or Gibson interview.
With this higher expectation and treating each other with respect always – I insist that we hear each other and listen to each other.
Sure that means I must listen to her. But I already did that. 🙂 I love her and understand where she comes from because it hasn’t been an interest for her. But I demand that she ‘give’ me the respect of hearing alternative viewpoints instead of shutting me down due to lack of interest.
I don’t know how this will go Prom. We’ve been together 17 months. You may remember I bought a second house that she’s renting and bought her car and I didn’t share that I bought her son’s braces – all because she foreclosed, got her car repo’d and couldn’t afford the braces…. yet she’s been a state worker here in CA for 26 years with a very good salary.
When I had the conversation about too much debt and buying more than she could afford – she translated that into me saying she was a bad person. I said no – she is a good person – just the choices in spending put her in the position she was in whereas the choices I was making had me in the position that I was able to help her out.
Anyways. I started rambling. This is like therapy for many of us. Writing here.
Neo copied and pasted, “Sheep are not evil.
But if you call them evil, and treat them like your enemy, you can forget about any chance of educating them,”
That was well said. This is what I try to help Wolla and others see because when we write – Lord knows I’m nowhere near perfect – we must appeal to the good nature of liberals – who ARE misinformed.
If I treated my sweetie like she was evil. It would break us apart. She would NEVER be converted.
She is entertaining actual mildly deep discussion now. I limit these discussions to what I know she can handle. They last about 3 – 5 minute doses.
We had talks about the F-22, the new vehicles being made for Afghanistan, terrorism, programs for the poor and my philosophy, etc.
Concerning the F-22 – I learned from her that she thought that there was some secret plane somewhere in a bunker or wherever that negated any real need for the F-22. I asked who’s building it. Is it McDonnell Douglas? Boeing?
There are 1,000’s of people who build these planes where the contract was just canceled. It replaced a decades old plane and assures us air superiority. There is no secret plane being built by know nothing government employees. In the military blogs out there where there are knowledgeable people who know what the U.S. arsenal is – nobody is talking about any plane that is non-existent.
She just had this ‘feeling’ that we’ll be protected by some secret program.
She now sees how that sounds. She understands that are budget is pretty transparent and that what Donald Rumsfeld said about going to war with what we ‘have’ is true.
Donald Rumsfeld was excoriated for that comment. But there was no secret stash of better HumVee’s. Our men were getting killed and hurt because the enemy figures out a way to penetrate and they respond to what we have.
Now we have a better truck being built but it will take awhile to replace all of those trucks and … it shows up in a line item in a budget. It isn’t secret.
Why on Earth do these people call themselves “progressives”? Are they really pushing for anything more than a new kind of royalty, with themselves as the “royals”?
The more things change…
–
“Progressives” is now a screen word, used to deflect attention from other words such as “socialists.”
“Looking back at this piece now, I wonder once again how it was that people believed this man would function as a moderate.”
I voted for O for Senator based on his wonderful centrist speech in ’04. After he won, I looked online at his voting record: he never voted on a bi-partisan basis, even once when there was no political down-side. Even once. And then I realized he was a radical and that I would cut off my hand before voting for him again.
Many nice, un-radical, Americans have been deceived by this bum. Our enemy is ignorance.
I hope this isn’t a dead thread. I just want to share with you the first paragraph of a Christmas letter that I just received:
“What a year! Barack’s inauguration and multiple initiatives–the man has his plate full–and the seeming commitment of the far right to see him fail. There are moments in our country’s history when our populace seems loonier than others. Maybe Barack will appoint George Mitchell to help us negotiate a return to civility.”
There’s lots more, but I’ll spare you all.
This is the fog of self-serving smog that these dolts surround themselves with. They are so clueless. I simply must restrain myself or I will have no friends whatsoever.
It’s so sad that our so-called educated “elites” are a bunch of whiny fools who think it’s OK to insult people who disagree with them. Sad, sad, sad.
The problem here is that if those on the Left and Center who voted for and support Obama & Co. suffer from the effects of Obama & Co.’s domestic and foreign policies and failures, we–who opposed and voted against Obama & Co.–get dragged into the Pit along with O’s supporters, and suffer right alongside of them.
Promethia-
George Mitchell would never appear for a TV interview standing next to one or more Republicans without prefacing his comments with the thought that the Republicans were mean spirited. And, the MSM and the Republicans standing there almost always let him get away with that crap. In fact, the very fact of making that statement showed that Mitchell was the person who is truly mean spirited.
The Democrats are kept in line by the emotions of envy and fear. The party is a conglomeration of victim groups to which the party gives fealty by claiming to “protect” them, even if many of these groups have aims diametrically opposed to the others (blacks versus teachers unions, Jews versus Muslims, feminists versus men, and on and on).
Neo:”good”, in a moral sesnse, that is “good” seen as a virtue, implies more than being well socialized, having good manners or having some superficial concern for those in their immediate circle. It implies a knowledgeable and open assent to good. It implies self-knowledge and knowledge of the world. The Good acknowledge the condition of man and the world, and what is good and bad in it, and chose the side of the good.
We speak of a dog, for example as “being good” but they are not “being good” in a moral sense for they do not have the capcity to make moral judgments; they cannot give moral assent. It is not given to them to make moral choices. This is not to say that they do not articulate the good; it is to say they are not making moral decisions, which is a wholly Human aspect and responsibility.
Are the Democrats you describe in fact being “good” to their families if by either design or ignorance they help more their families into a totalitarian collectivist state?
Are alcoholics “being good’ when they rationalize away their bad behaviors? If not, are Democrats being “good when they believe the bizarre slanders of the right by the media? Dalkbo has a quite accurate description of the average Democrat client–and that is what they are. Are the poeple you talk about “being good” to support this sort of immorality?
To put it another way, and to take it an absurd level to make a point (well maybe not that absurd): Would someone be a “good” parent if they covered for a child that was a mass murderer. Would they be a “good” parents if they were not troubled to find out the truth of their child’s behavior?.
These things that the Democrats believe and act upon, things which are profoundly evil and immoral, are not hard to figure out. They do not require high gifts or a high education. All the human are open to seeing the truth here. Why are they so willfully blind to it? Why do they tune it out.
There is some flaw there. Is it not a moral flaw, and is it not a profound one?
You seem to have a quite limited moral definition.
Perhaps they are more “well socialized”, than they are “good”.
Famously, Hitler loved children and loved dogs. He loved Beethoven too. This does not make him less evil. In fact, it makes him all the more evil.
Personally, i think the vast majority of them are ineducable, and are profoundly immoral. For most of history, they would not have been tolerated
It is my guess that you were less a liberal than an innocent. Perhaps the people you describe are the same, but I would not imagine, if I were you, that your case is typical.
The Democrats machine is in essence a traitorous and criminal enterprise. They need to be treated as such.
hattip: No, I do not have a limited moral definition. I believe yours is too harsh and unaware of the flawed nature of human beings and human knowledge and judgment, to which we ourselves are hardly immune.
I am planning a post or two that deal a bit more with what I mean. But the essence of what I’m saying is that ignorance or faulty logic can work to foster evil, but it is not evil itself. People can be good in their own orbit, or even in some larger sense, while still working for causes that ultimately have evil results. Ever hear of the law of unintended consequences?
Ever notice how liberals seek to advance every policy and position by simply asserting societal consensus and employing ridicule and shame to all outside deniers?
These people really can’t handle any opposition to progressivism. Just like the people on American Idol can’t handle being told they can’t really sing. Its all an arrogant narcissism that seemingly knows no bounds.
I recently had the opportunity to explain to my teenager the difference between democrats and republicans in terms that were crystal clear to her.
When she was in first grade her class had an easter egg hunt. Each child was asked to bring a dozen goody filled eggs to school for the hunt.
The teacher added some “golden” eggs to the mix of pastel colored eggs to give the children more incentive for the hunt.
My kid, being a real go-getter, ran around and found as many eggs as she could on her search for the golden eggs of which she found more than one.
When she returned with her basket brimming over with eggs the teacher promptly took her eggs and divided them up among the others who had not been as “fortunate” as she was. In the end everyone had a equal amount of pastel eggs in their basket plus a golden one.
Here’s our general conversation:
“Remember how you got out there and busted your tail to find as many eggs as possible?”
“Yeah”
“Remember how you felt when you found the golden ones?”
“Yeah”
“And then, they were divided up and given away?”
“Yeah, it really sucked, I worked really hard.”
“Well, there’s the difference. Republicans believe you should be able to keep most of your hard earned eggs/money. Democrats want the power to take away your hard earned eggs/money and give them to those who did not earn them.”
“That’s so not fair.”
She still feels the harsh injustice of it all:)
“”People can be good in their own orbit, or even in some larger sense, while still working for causes that ultimately have evil results””
Neo
I’d have to say this has to be one of the biggest stories of the times we live in. This awkward struggle among longterm friends who’ve somehow vastly departed philisophically, especially in the decade now ending.
I like to think i could sit down for a beer with JFK and have a coherent conversation with words like liberty and freedom being mentioned more than a few times. I also feel like pointing out to some my off the path friends that they would most certainly have views that JFK would find very odd indeed and blatantly anti American to boot.
Thats just one way i like to look at it to somehow ground myself in this philisophical whirlwind that does demand test of ones sanity.
Neo wrote, “he flawed nature of human beings and human knowledge and judgment”
I’ll be the first to admit it.
We prop up our own ideas and dismiss as dolts people who we disagree with. For the most part we do it for good reason. Sarah didn’t say she can see Russia from her house and it isn’t a good time to raise tax rates during a recession … but I digress…
Some great philosopher said, “Humanity’s struggle is against confusion”.
I see it every day in even a black and white setting such as technology (I’m in IT). There is gray in every topic including IT, science, etc.
Sure +5V is +5V. But where do we go from here? What should our strategy be? Among the group of IT people there is a wide variety of opinions and we are ALL STONG-HEADED 🙂
Each of us have for YEARS worked to foster better relationship but just last week we had a disagreement on how to move forward with the website we are developing that deeply cut a few of us.
As we have worked together for 10 years we know how to repair those cuts (if it is our interest – it is mine).
It seems to me though that when it comes to politics – leftists believe in their hearts that conservatives are mean-spirited, cruel and evil where at least conservatives recognize that liberal (rank and file) have rose-color glasses, are well-intentioned, etc – but the results of their desired policies would be harmful.
There are a few mean people that I’ve run across like the Condi haters I mentioned and the Democrat leaders who are taking ends-justify the means approaches like Obama himself.
But for the most part Wolla and others – Democrats are good people who mean well – just sadly misinformed.
As Neo posted a few times – there are plenty of surveys on topics that show that CNN viewers and Obama voters are not as well informed on the issues as McCain voters.
So do we beat Obama voters on the head with that info… 🙂 YEs. I mean no.! 😉
I changed from liberalism in 1991. It was due to the exposure to alternative viewpoints.
It will happen if we approach it well.
“progressivism” is pandora’s box.
I belong to a group of people that are often demonized, misunderstood and almost impenetrable to those on the outside. (No, it’s not sexual in any way, I’m a very conventional person, that way.) As a result this is one of the MOST leftist groups I know. My friends who are gay have observed the same. As have friends who belong to various “minorities” (And here I’d like to point out women aren’t a minority, but they think they are and that our mental/emotional narrative as a species being somewhat behind the times, women tend to think of society as the fifties — when they were indeed excluded from business and the world at large.)
Part of this of course, is because the left has “pandered” to those minorities, in words if not in deeds. But this is not all. These people are not stupid. Or no more stupid than other groups. By now they should have realized that the democrats/socalists/progressives don’t actually do anything GOOD for them. Look at gays and the continuous bait-and-switch on their agenda by “progressives.” So, why do they remain?
Because there’s something MUCH deeper going on. It’s also part of the reason our mental landscape is set circa the fifties and we tend to think of a uniform society, I think.
Human beings want to belong. When we started out — in the prehistory that defined our social programming, belonging was the difference between surviving and not. Small groups of people enforced comformity of behavior and belief, as a means to avoid scisms. The group that stuck together and worked as one survived. This is encoded in our DNA.
So now we come to this scary time when we feel we have the right to be as different as we want to be and most of us revell in it. Except that at heart we still want to belong. We want to be part of the large group. (I’m using a poetic “we” here, since many of us on this blog are proud outliers.)
Socialism and its offshots appeals to these people with the tales of the “large family” and the society that looks after you. It lulls many people who are alienated from their families by virtue of who they are into believing that they will belong to something greater than themselves.
I will point out that a lot of Obama’s true-believer blindness might come from his fractured family life contrasted with the promise of the society-as-family. He too wants to belong. More, he wants to create a condition in which other kids like him have somewhere to belong. I’m not saying he thinks about this, but I think it’s part of what drives him. Unexamined, of course.
(Does this mean he’s good? No. I believe he’s a narcisist using the rest of society in his psycho-play with no regard for who we are or what we want. To him, we’re not quite human.)
Are there good people on the other side? I think so. Otherwise why would they continually rationalize and tell themselves tales about how this will be better for EVERYONE? They demonize us because they’re good and have an unquiet conscience. What’s happening is pandora’s box. They sign on to leftism/socialism without quite knowing why but in most cases because this beautiful image of belonging draws them like a syren call.
And as one bad consequence after another comes flying out of pandora’s box, they cling all the tighter to that box and find more and more excuses for it. Why?
Because at the bottom of that box there is still the hope — the one thing that never left. And they still hope that somewhere, somehow, they’ll belong.
Well put, Portia.
Portia . . .
What you wrote is so true. I happened to talk on the phone today with one of my old friends who thinks Obama is godlike, and she is completely unaware of anything wrong with him. She started talking about how he’ll bring us and the world together. She really believes this because she HOPES it is true, so it WILL be true.
There are millions and millions of people like this. Facts simply don’t matter to them. They believe they are contributing to society by making good wishes.
Socialism (otherwise known as “community”) is so appealing as a concept. Its hard to explain why socialism leads to misery and poverty. It’s not obvious, and HOPE is so much easier to understand.
Ellen Degeneres plays a game called “Go or no Go”.
So many of her contestants are incredibly dumb !
Prom,
I like hope.
Hope is contagious.
Nobody will rip my hope away from me !
You have to appeal to that person with hope.
Fire can put out fire. Hope can re-direct hope.
A happy vivacious enterprising smart young wise woman can bring a liberal woman to her knees. 😉
I meant to add – Sarah Palin or somebody like her is dangerous.
Promethea, I meant to add I have a friend who grew up in a country that was colonized by the UK — what you said above about wanting to become kings and queens…
I think this is one of the examples of “chickens coming home to roost” but not as wassname thought.
European “colonialism” by and large displaced the old tribal hierarchies in the colonized countries. This was a GOOD thing — whatever else you hear — as those were corrupt and canibalizing (sometimes literally) those under them. Probably that tribalism and those who ruled the tribes were responsible for backwardness and misery that made “colonialism” easy.
Enter communism. To combat the free world in the occupied areas, they turned to those same displaced hierarchies and taught them how to use the language of equality to acquire power. It has now come full circle. The US “progressives” were infected (sometimes literally, as in Obama’s father and others who came over here) by these “anti-colonialists” and the spirit of the movement became the same. They want to be olligoi (sp?) and govern over us by right of birth as “the best”. They’ve already managed to install this hierarchy in education and entertainment and a few other fields. They want the same for the society at large.
If you look at those fields, you’ll realize what a mess this would be for society.
(And on that, before the election, someone with clearly foreign syntax was howling on a blog that Obama DESERVED to “rule over us” because he was descended from kings and queens. I think this is what we’re facing, just not so open among homegrown “progressives”. Perhaps it is not an accident that all of a sudden I’m seeing a lot of “psychology” books claiming our entire personality is programmed by genes. They also seem to be embraced byt he left, which has swung from the infinitely perfectable man to this, without pause. All whichever suits their ascendency over us, as the “deserving” people, right?)
Baklava . . .
I believe in hope too, but the kinds of people I’m talking about think they can defy the laws of nature–the same kind of person who thinks wild grizzly bears can be befriended.
So deep am I in Lalaland that I know a biology professor, a PhD, who can’t stand the thought that animals eat each other.
Portia . . .
I noticed the same thing you did–progressives switch their views whenever they feel like it. There is nothing consistent about their beliefs except thinking that Americans “deserve” what ever bad things happen to them because they’ve been successful. Successful black and minority individuals automatically become “white” and therefore “evil.” Except for Obama, of course. He’s a god that will show us the way to a community of nations.
Promethea,
On what you said to Portia.
It’s a certain amount of lack of follow through (laziness)
When you play chess – you need to see 2-4 moves out and what the opponent might do or it’s over.
All of us have the capability – but will they give you or I the respect of doing so.
I “expect” it from my partner. It’s barely working but I understand the limitation given the lack of interest.
But what is the said consequences of wanting to “take” from the “successful”. Having somebody walk that through on what it means for the economy means seeing the disastrous consequences of having an enforcing government take from the successful to give to those who do little towards their success.
Usually people will shut down and give simplistic platitudes about – well they can afford it – or – shift to the deficit – or – shift to evil bad companies or billionaires like Bill Gates.
Look people you are in the top 1% of income earners if you earn $400,000 in America !
http://content.kiplinger.com/tools/income_rank/
One more point – if you taxed the top 1% at the rate of 100% you’d only raise $400 billion in revenue. That is less than the stimulus package.
Our government is unsustainable at current policies and spending levels. The obligations are too high.
Baklava,
I am thoroughly (mis) educated with a liberal arts degree. Trust me when I say — these people were my professors, my colleagues, my occasional lecturers — these dunces don’t know economics from a hole in the ground. For one they absolutely believe it’s a finite pie. Which is why they know there is enough for everyone. (Which is kind of like — I still have money, I have checks in the checkbook) and that everyone could live in genteel poverty. SHOULD live in genteel poverty. Themselves excepted, of course, for all the trouble of you know… helping distribute.
And neither do most “well-intentioned” journalists know economics.
Because of their work – they actually cause more misery and it would pain them to know it because I do believe they are well-intentioned – as was I when i was a liberal.