And it's not just Bush. They did the same thing to Reagan. If you listened to those geniuses in our cultural and media institutions, you'd have thought Reagan was a blithering idiot.
The list is long of Republican/conservative politicians that the mainstream media has made out to be complete dopes. Ford, Quayle, Bush, Reagan, and now Palin.
John Fund was in town this week, and he sat down with Nigel Jaquiss of Willamette Week. In the interview, Fund says:
"I’ve noticed over the last 40 years that there have been lots of people who have developed a reputation for being dim, slow, clueless or out of touch.
Gerald Ford. Some guy named Reagan who was an “amiable dunce.” Dan Quayle. Even the first President Bush got a little bit of that. George W. Bush. Lots of people of national stature have had the “dumb” label slapped on them.
In that 40 year period, can you name one liberal politician of national stature who ever got that reputation, ever? There isn’t one. There isn’t one."
Think of that. He's right - there simply has NEVER been a single left/liberal/Democrat politician of national stature that they attacked for being a dimwit. On one level, I guess, it's easy to explain. They are leftist, and so they won't attack another lefty no matter how dumb.But I think the explanation goes a good bit beyond that, and it is quite revealing and also explains why the cultural left in this county is so often rejected by middle America.
Liberalism, at its core, is an elitist world view. It's a world view that in essence says that government should have expanded purview over individuals, because the choices people would make in the absence of government controls are wrong. This of course requires a ruling class - elites who have a higher level of consciousness than the masses, and they get to write the rules and enforce them.
Guess who considers themselves to be those elites? All those folks in charge of our cultural and political institutions: the mainstream media, institutions of higher education, the chattering class.
So what happens when national political figures who don't share their world view hits the stage? Well, by definition, they simply cannot be smart, because if they were, they would share their liberal world view.
And so it is obvious to them that Reagan, Ford, Quayle, Bush are dunces. They get to make jokes, snicker, and create their little collages of all their malaprops to prove how right they are.
The never do the same thing to guys like Al Gore or Joe Biden (who, as Fund points out, you could easily make look like a blithering idiot by stringing together a few video clips.) They give Al and Joe a pass because they CAN'T be stupid - these guys share their world view.
The best part of all this, however, is how the cultural left reacts when the general public just doesn't buy their narrative. They don't just come unhinged, although they certainly do that. They attack middle America that rejects their view.
Look what happened when America re-elected Bush. Look how they are treating Sarah Palin. And just watch (and enjoy) how much they HATE IT when regular everday Americans in flyover country reject what the cultural elites tell them about Sarah, and continue to like her.
They come absolutely unhinged, and they attack more, which drives people to reject them more, bringing on more attacks - and the cycle continues.
Just look at my buddy Jack Bogdanski. For years he has referred to Bush as "the chimp." He's written a constant stream of the nastiest and most mean-spirited invective. And now with the meteoric rise of Sarah Palin, Jack is quite literally over the edge.
He's blocking posters on his blog who disagree with him, in even the mildest way. (I am currently blocked from his blog - a fact I just think is downright funny, given that I have invited him to be my co-host on my radio show when Marc Abrams is out of town. "Jack, come on my show for the express purpose of disagreeing with me. Sure, Rob, but you can't post on my blog.")
And now he's just gone around the bend trying to keep alive the ridiculous conspiracy theory that Sarah Palin faked her pregnancy. Even his friends are telling him he's unhinged. He's actually analyzing the shape of Bristol Palin's breasts by way of claiming she is not currently pregnant!
You see the same loony-bin behavior at Daily Kos, Huffington Post, and Air America radio. Their world view basically requires them to show their contempt for anybody who doesn't share it, and when they realize that includes all of middle America, they prove again and again how much they despise them.
And that is the good news. Middle America never bought the notion that Reagan was stupid. Cultural elites said it so many times in their echo chamber that they thought everyone agreed. Middle America never bought the notion that Bush is stupid. And they certainly don't think Sarah Palin is stupid.
The fun part is watching their reaction when people dismiss their invective. They get hysterical. enjoy the show.
14 comments:
Rob,
This is one of the most insightful posts ever to appear on the Internet. As a fellow bannee from bojack.org, I consider it a badge of honor to have called him on his borderline lunacy.
I'm not your "buddy." And Victoria Taft is not my "friend."
Sorry, Jack, but you ARE my buddy. People I like are my buddies. Whether they like me or not.
As if on cue, Bogdanski just proved your entire post to be spot on! These lefties simply can't restrain themselves.
Your post made the point that the left's world view is such that they have contempt for people who disagree.
Jack's rebuttal: expresses contempt for you and Victoria!
Rob when does Jack sub for Abrams again? That should be fun!
Rob, your post is right on. It is just another example of how some so-called progressives react when they cannot win on the issues. Martin Luther King Jr always asked that we judge a person by their character. How funny is it that progessives claim to have sole dibs on the ideals of MLK Jr, as if he was speaking only for them. Guess what? I think he was speaking to them, and they weren't listening.
If we were to critique liberal polititians on backgrounds, speech patterns, and/or mannerisms how easy would it have been to humiliate the likes of John Edwards, Barney Frank, and Jesse Jackson. We know better. Each of those men are intelligent, and have (or at least one time had) earned a level of respect among many voters, even if conservatives have often disagreed with them.
Liberals say that we should have expected much more from Palin, than only an ability to hold her own in this debate. But I can at least acknowledge that Biden is smart and likeable. He is a 35 year veteran of tough politics. All most anyone could hope for is to hold their own against him in a political debate. I think Palin did just fine because her position on the issues was clear, and that was enough for me. I didn't have to call Biden bad names to make my point.
The personal attacks on conservative candidates will continue until such time that the liberal name callers can win on the the issues. Not likely to happen soon so liberal politics 101continues. Thanks much, Charley B
Jack Bogdanski reminds me of Ward Churchill, the embarrassment of Univ Colorado, Boulder who was also unhinged. His actions reflect very poorly on Lewis and Clark.
Jack is also a very small person, who does not know how to debate rationally, so he bans people (who even he agrees with on 80% of the topics) who might dare to disagree with him. Jack's banning people from his blog is like the spoiled child who takes his bat and ball and runs home like a cry baby.
And how many Lewis and Clark Law professors actually think that the 911 attacks on NYC were an inside job done by Bush? Jack thinks they were an inside job. He is unhinged.
Rob,
Unfortunately, you lost this listener when you started having bojunk on the air. He's an arrogant jerk who, as you noted, bans people who disagree with him - no matter how civilly - because they have the audacity to disagree. That's simply pathetic. As if to accentuate how pathetic he is, he periodically drops into sites such as yours - and mine - to drop off a comment. He knows full well that we don't ban people as he does.
He's got such a huge ego that having him on the radio does all a disservice. As soon as I heard that you were having him on today, I switched channels. I've simply had enough of his egocentric bs.
There was a time when I had respect for him, and featured his blog in my sidebar as a daily read. Today, I have more respect for The Oregonian than for him.
Bojunk has been removed from my sidebar and replaced with links to thoughtful and respectful sources.
Anonymous 1:54 phrased it particularly well. FogBANski, you are a paranoid lunatic.
It may be written someday that the true weakness of democracy--or our latest attempt at maintaining a form of democracy--was the reliance upon the individual to take care of himself.
The cultural left appears to be a coalition of elitists and victim's groups. The elitists offer to right the wrongs of the victims. The victims are simply self-described victims. If you were an elitist, whose role was to help victims, you would find yourself in some definite ways apart from those who look at self-described victims--and rather than promise to erase the cause of their victimness, encourage them--to take charge of their own lives rather than succumb to their victimhood.
If you look at the state goals for education, you'll notice that more emphasis is put on children learning how to behave as a member of a group, rather than to excel as an individual. More concerned about being a citizen of the world, than as a citizen of the United States.
Long Tom is long gone, but his biggest mistake still lives on. SB 100 is the method with which our state's elite keep their boot on the neck of rural Oregon. We live to serve Portland urbanites. Rather than let us change and grow, we've become waiters and hoteliers for weekend runs by the Urban Elites. Worst yet, the rural elites who wish to be viewed favourably by their urban cousins, hence have no reason to view the elitist structures that have been established--and are growing--as having a harmful effect on the denizens of these culturally blighted areas. Want jobs? Using land is a bad thing...next question. Want cheap energy? We can't afford cheap energy, we need solar, wave or wind. Want independence? Can't have that. You'd hurt too many victims, the environmentalists, the preservationists, the ocean, the river, the earth.
Resource utilization is evil. Change is evil. Working is evil. Building new energy sources is evil if they aren't on the approved list. Making me responsible for me is another evil.
There are government programs out there to help me get past my own victimhood. The victimhood of self-reliance.
.
Why the HELL do you allow him on your radio show when this prick sensors you from commenting on his blog?!
Jack is a douche bag, and a hate-monger. You shouldn't be giving that a-hole a venue to air his views if he is censoring all dissenting opinions.
I know you want to be fair, but if he is banning your comments from his blog, don't allow his Nazi @ss to receive a paycheck from you radio station.
Rob,
You make a very good point here. A few years ago I mentioned to Jeff Mapes that the Democratic party had become the Dis-functional Co-Dependent party by taking power through any means, passing policies that cause crisis, come to the rescue with big government programs to help those oppressed by the crisis, then blame Republicans for being dumb and not caring. We may be spinning into a troubling cycle unless we find some more elected leaders who’ll stand up and say ENOUGH.
I think Bogdanski's meltdown is a result of the John Edwards "revelations". His inability to accept that he could have been so misled, so blind, so wrong about someone has gnawed away at his self-esteem to the point that he began lashing out in hopes of proving others equally wrong. Sort of a "validation by assassination", take 'em down with me reaction.
I'll have to check the timing of the Edwards thing, but it seems to coincide with the beginnings of the craziness.
His ego, though large, is apparently quite fragile.
In retrospect, I realize that there has been precious little (if any) self-deprecatory content in his blog during the couple of years I frequented it. That should have been a tipoff, but one prefers to think the best of folks.
Yay, I love this blog all over again! Rather than listening to what the media has to say, I find myself preferring the Finger-Nails-On-the-chalk-board station.
"Liberalism, at its core, is an elitist world view. It's a world view that in essence says that government should have expanded purview over individuals, because the choices people would make in the absence of government controls are wrong. This of course requires a ruling class - elites who have a higher level of consciousness than the masses, and they get to write the rules and enforce them."
So if the liberals win, I'll be ordering the 'Soy meal' at McDonald's for my children who are being treated for their emotional disorders diagnosed by mis-educated professionals and raised by strangers in public institutions which will be going nudist any day, who will send me to counseling for spanking my child who they insisted on raising for me by adults who may or may not be child molesters while I'm awaiting punishment via solar power in prison for throwing a rock at my neighbors vicious dog. Those will be good times...
"The cultural left appears to be a coalition of elitists and victim's groups. The elitists offer to right the wrongs of the victims. The victims are simply self-described victims. If you were an elitist, whose role was to help victims, you would find yourself in some definite ways apart from those who look at self-described victims--and rather than promise to erase the cause of their victimness, encourage them--to take charge of their own lives rather than succumb to their victimhood."
This is such an undeniable truth. Every facet of this statement is true, and sadly, it's an anti-american way of thinking. These lefty-crazies want so badly to protect me from myself... I'm not an elitist or a victim so I must be an idiot!
Just like Animal Farm...Some are more equal then others.
Fear those that will do anything for power.
ACORN busted today in Vegas for voter fraud...but then some are just more equal then others, just ask them.
Pinkie
I am glad you are more active on you blog again. Apparently you have a life as you don’t blog 24/7 as Jack does. I have given up Jack for good for all the reasons above. Can’t you find a more appropriate co-host when Abrams is out of town? Seems like every time he is on we also have to listen to the call in dribble of Tensk.
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