EVENT: CONNOR
As for conservative America… that’s my next dose of vitrol…
I notice that in many of my posts this past month, I’ve heaped more criticism on liberals than conservatives. Most of this boils down to my understanding of my audience… there are plenty of liberal and conservative blogs out there that lambast the other side, and none of them accomplish much. Why? Because I’m not seeking out a forum to be yelled at, nor am I likely to persuade anyone of conviction by simply yelling.
There are two alternatives for meaningful discussions: address my comments toward a liberal audience or attract a more conservative audience that is willing to hear me out. I’ve attempted both, but of course the first is more successful.
Most of my readers are liberal.
The question is then, what comments are useful… how can you productively inform or galvanize the choir. One method is constructive criticism. I’ve offered argument angled towards how the Left could work more effectively.
All that aside, that’s not what I’m doing now.
Right now I’m engaging the emotional side of the election results.
Some of my friends have stated that it’s time to “get over the loss” and take off the black shrouds.
I think it’s far too soon…
we’ve four years to compose ourselves and strategize, as liberals do so well.
I’m still steeping myself in the moldering or vitriotic bile that’s served Rush Limbaugh and Jerry Fallwell, and hell, Dick Cheney, so well over the years.
I’m still soaking in my anger, to bring it out for use next time I hear Bush flattered on the bus or across the telephone.
This is my injunction against conservative voters: I’ll not call you stupid or hicks or selfish, but simply wrong and responsible, and that through appealing to your emotions when I say the associations have merit.
Which associations?
The ones that make you distraught, and cause some starry-eyed film critic kid in each town to get black listed for making a careless remark:
That Bush Is Comparable To Hitler
We pulled out, as you recall (or not), of the Anti-Ballistic missle treaty, at a time when many politically unstable Islamic border states that could easily move arms across undermonitered borders of Russia and Kazakhstan.
We declined, as you recall (or not) to sign the Chemical Weapons ban out of an interest in American jobs, an interest that trumped our decade-long PR argument against Saddam Hussein’s villiany through chemical weapons. I’m from a town ruined by poverty and unemployment, but I don’t believe we need jobs in chemical weapons munitions.
We insisted, as you recall (or not) on a no-bid contract to Halliburton when our international relations could have used a boose from good, old-fashioned, conservative capitalism, instead of this warped trust between the executive branch and a private corporation.
Bush is absolutely correct when he says that this is an unconventional war, which I why I cannot fathom that his administration would insist on fighting it in the coarsest conventional terms; all muscle and no subtlety.
I cannot comprehend why we would “combat” terrorism by encouraging new recruits with a lack of balance, by unnecessarily depriving ourselves of eyes and ears in the Middle East (probably more useful that 100 Stealth fighters (with a $1 billion pricetage (that fall apart in the rain))) by alienating needed allies, or by throwing our own economy into a crisis with a tax cut that conservative economists have proven doesn’t spur the economy.
“It’s the economy, …!”
But why, why, why do we liberals, do we progressives find the desire to compare our ((probably) fairly elected) Commander in Chief to Hitler.
There are meaningful parallels.
Both incriminated their oppostion, accusing other groups of a lack of patriotism.
Both excited a patriotism that would brook neither comment nor criticism.
Both reduced the prerogative of other nations to a mere technicality.
Both based their policies on a religious base in a government that rested on a secular foundation (ie. by the way, the argument that the Founding Fathers wanted a Christian nation and therefore we should be is bunk… the Founding Fathers used a Christian moral code (part of whose scripture stated “render to Caesar”) but wisely derived their structure of government from the pagan Greeks via Rousseau. And for that matter, the Founding Fathers, the Hebrews, and the Greeks are no more infallible than the pope.)
Both pursued expansionistic policies.
Both excited powerful loyalty among their supporters.
Now that said, there are meaningful differences… there’s the whole Holocaust thing.
And if you read me right, you understand that the distinction is anything but trivial.
Bush has not, nor does he possess the means, to execute 10 million people. If such an act was attempted, the American public would lack the complicity that made the holocaust possible during the Third Reich. I will venture that Bush himself is enlightened enough to not consider nor desire such an agenda.
On a very important level, Bush is not, nor can he be compared to Hitler.
On another level, however, a close look at history (which not only repeats, but does so with such consistancy and frequency) allows us to recognize that
1) so much depends on circumstances
2) circumstances evolve… situations progress… systematically
The German people didn’t suddenly develop a taste for gypsy, Jewish, communist, Polish, and gay blood. It had to be set up. Germany of the early 1930s was emaciated, proud but humiliated, tired of political bullshit, and looking for a strong leader.
America today is divided, alienated from its allies, perceives itself as besieged. And so we dig in our heels. We elect a man who has demonstrated repeatedly no regard for the nuance, the delicate balance involved in running the world’s most powerful nation. We divide from without, forcing a world unable to feed itself to align themselves with us or against us. We divide within, forcing a people defined by dialogue to flash more images, shout more loudly, and lie more persistantly only to be heard. And we rally behind a leader whose rhetoric and passion and determination (determinism?) powerfully counters any comprehensive and forceful argument to the opposite.
Many Americans still believe Saddam has WMDs.
The Hitler observation has merit:
How are we setting ourselves up for tomorrow?
I’ve objected to past Republican presidents, to Reagan and Bush, and before I was born there was Nixon, on the basis that they have compromised the body and mind of America.
This president compromises our soul.
One compromise we should not brook.
To be continued…