Conservatism Approaching Double Face Palm Territory
Nov 10th, 2011 | 10 responses
It pains me to say it – well, not really because I actually enjoy writing about the idiocy of the right – but conservatism is fast approaching double face palm territory. Have you ever seen such a collection of losers, dunces, moral cretins, and blissfully unaware candidates for high office as showed up for last night’s CNBC debate?
You have a certified imbecile (Perry). A serial sexual harasser (Cain). A chronic flip flopper (Romney). A man who can’t keep his pants zipped (Gingrich). A lunatic (yes Paulbots – advocating a return to the gold standard is bat guano crazy). A religious zealot (Santorum). A Simon Legree clone (Michele “If anyone will not work, neither should he eat” Bachmann). And a candidate who can’t decide whose side he’s on (Huntsman).
It is to weep. At exactly the moment in American history when a rational, logical, coherent conservatism is desperately needed to counter the left’s drive to take us over a fiscal and cultural cliff, we not only get candidates who fall short in almost every substantive yardstick one might desire to measure the worthiness of a nominee, we also have conservatives en mass who cheer for ignorance, applaud mediocrity, roar for moral turpitude, and display an appalling lack of respect for basic conservative principles.
The Herman Cain fiasco is a case in point. One or two women coming forward might be cause for questioning the veracity of the accusers, or blaming the mess on the press. But 5 women coming forward with more rumored to be in the wings? This is not the liberal media going after a conservative candidate, or a case of Democratic women making false accusations. This is a clear pattern of behavior that is totally unacceptable to most rational people, and certainly to most of the electorate.
And yet, Politico reports Cain’s response to a question about hiring a CEO accused of harassment:
The embattled Republican candidate brushed aside the premise of the question and – as he did at an Arizona press conference Tuesday – described reports of alleged sexual harassment as a smear campaign.
“The American people deserve better than someone being tried in the court of public opinion based on unfounded accusations,” Cain said. “This country’s looking for leadership and this is why a lot of people, despite what has happened over the last nine days, are still very enthusiastically behind my candidacy.”
The audience was on his side: They booed the initial question and cheered his response.
Cain changed his original answer to the allegations at least three times, which brings up the question of whether he’s a serial liar as well. The press didn’t make him alter his narrative – he did that all on his own, with no help from the “liberal media.”
Don’t tell that to his supporters who appear to be blaming the media for their candidate’s transgressions and his inability to keep his story straight. It is ironic that after spending 8 years chastising Bill Clinton for his harassment of women, that so many conservatives would abandon reason and spin their hero’s behavior as an invention of the press. The only difference is that Hillary blamed the “vast right wing conspiracy” for her husband’s compulsive gropes while conservatives are desperately flailing about, blaming the press, David Axelrod, even the victims themselves for their candidate’s lack of couth and inability to control his manly urges.
Cheering Cain’s dismissive response to substantive allegations that 30 years ago would have doomed a candidate’s chances – as it did Gary Hart – was the low point of the campaign for me so far. “What are they cheering,” I asked myself? What could possibly be so praiseworthy in Cain’s response that would cause so many to ignore the facts and abandon themselves to mindless approbation?
The answer is a special kind of ignorance that ignores objective reality in favor of a ideological worldview that apes the worst of liberalism’s identity politics while selectively, and very carefully choosing fact flakes that buttress the underpinnings of a separate materiality that is unconnected to logic, rationality, and reason. They cheer Cain because not to do so would shatter the fantasy they have created about the media, their opponents, and the world as seen through the prism of rabid partisanship and excessive ideology.
Lumping all media together as “liberals” is idiocy. This is not to say that much of the media is without bias,or isn’t in the tank for Obama and the Democrats. But what ever happened to taking individuals one at a time and not judging them according to some ideological bias based on what they do? It is decidedly unconservative to play identity politics in this way, aping the worst of liberal ideology. Dismissing the Cain harassment story as the product of liberal attack politics doesn’t hold up to reasonable analysis – not when 5 different women have stepped forward to make accusations against the candidate. Blaming the messenger only reveals the right to be blissfully unaware of their own predicament
And yet, all of this is meaningless in the face of the epistemic closure found on the right as it relates to attitudes toward the media, objective reality, and a curious detachment on the part of many conservatives who ignore the painfully obvious shortcomings of their candidates for president — shortcomings that would disqualify them if the right was thinking rationally. Michele Bachmann’s statement on the poor being forced to work before they would be allowed to eat is real 19th century, social Darwinism stuff. Herman Cain’s ignorance of foreign policy is appalling. Rick Perry’s stuttering incoherence, ditto. How did these people get to be taken seriously as candidates by the right while a reasonably intelligent Mitt Romney – a man conservative enough for 80% of the country – is so reviled that many conservatives would rather see Obama president than the GOP candidate if the former Massachusetts governor makes it that far?
Excuse me while I bemoan the state of conservatism by giving myself a double face palm.
10 Responses to “Conservatism Approaching Double Face Palm Territory”
The Republican party and the conservative movement spent decades cultivating and pandering to the theocratic neanderthal base. The Koch brothers and FOX news empowered them. Now it’s 2011 and no reasonable conservative/Republican will run because they know the base will eat them alive.
Does this mean you accept that reasonable Republicans exist Ron ?
I believe there are although in the past their have been more. Many of the reasonable Republicans have left the party. Reasonable doesn’t mean I agree with them all of the time. Rick has demonstrated that he is reasonable even though we agree on very little.
How many “unreasonable” Dem’s are out there, Ron? Ones cultivated and groomed by George Soros and addicted to loading up at the Daily Kos and listening to Chris Matthews and Lawrence O’Donnell?
I’m telling you folks that both sides are guilty; both sides have elected officials that have sold out to Big Money; both have radical, unmoving groups who wear blinders all day, and don’t take them off when they go to bed at night.
Lobbing grenades is not helping; it is not working.
Dude the Dem’s had 2 presidents that were worse than Cain ever thought of being even if every bit of the accusations are true. Bidden the VP is the biggest foot in mouth in politics. Right now it’s a target rich inviormant but really the exaggeration is a bit much.
A correct statement (title of an article) would be “GOP Presidential FIeld Approaching Double-Face-Palm Territory,” and even then it likely could be called hyperbole.
Expand that accusation to “The Republican Party Approaching…” to cover goings-on in numerous states (including where the public rejected one notorious action, in Ohio), and that would definitely be hyperbole.
“Many of the reasonable Republicans have left the party.”
I left it about 20 years ago myself, but lately they’ve been flat out ridiculous.
I look at someone like Hunstman and think “I could see myself voting for that guy.” While I don’t agree with him on every issue, he seems reasonable enough. Yet in the context of today’s GOP, he’s the outcast. Not because of his policy positions, but because he seems reasonable!
But the reason these men are the candidates of the Republican Party is that the things they say are what most of the remaining supporters of the party believe in. They believe that every criticism of their belief system or those they perceive as their “leaders” is because of a conspiracy of the liberal media, much as the concept of AGW is a conspiracy of liberal climatologists who get money because of rigged research to support a liberal plan to control society. It can’t be because they might actually be wrong about anything. Since Cain is their man, when he blames the media he must be right. Of course the most fanatical of them at this point are the (using my preferred term) the Paulistas. How many conspiracy theories are they buying into now? The pattern is broad. Look at the denial of evolution. It isn’t science, according to many Republicans. It’s an evil plan of liberal atheists to deny the existence of God. Unfortunately conservatism has evolved…only it’s morphed into a denial of modernity and the facts we are faced with in our world as it really exists in 2011.
I decided to not support the Republican party when I was 17 years old (1980). During that presidential election, the GOP put R. Reagan and G. Bush as their candidates. Bush had declared Reagan’s economic proposals ‘voodoo economics’. He was right. Reagan had promised to 1) balance the budget 2) increase defense spending and 3) lower taxes. At the end of his two terms he basically took a clue from Meatloaf in declaring, “Two out of three ain’t bad.”
Since that time, we have been borrowing obscene amounts of money and pissing away the Social Security trust fund (by using the excess taken in by the department and yet still borrowing more)! During the Clinton years it looked like the government might have finally seen rationality–nope. $4.5 trillion turned into 9+ (iirc) during the Bush 2 era. During that era (2001-2008) we entered into two wars yet CUT taxes (first time in U.S. history that a president cut taxes and did not ask for a force size increase when going to war).
The Republican ‘handlers’ decided to outsource much of the war to private contractors. I’m not claiming to be a military genius, but virtually all nations that have relied on mercenary armies have failed (and often been taken over by those mercenaries). Some things are best NOT left to private corporations; the military is one that comes to mind.
Now the Republican party seems hell-bent on eliminating as many regulations as they can get away with. For those who ‘might’ not understand what a government regulation is, history often calls them laws. I am not allowed to take a gun and shoot my neighbor just because she smokes–there’s a restrictive regulation if I’ve ever seen one! Although the GOP may not be advocating allowing random murder, they ARE advocating unrestricted financial shenanigans. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t that what got us into this 9% unemployment in the first place?
Ohio finally realized that police, fire, teachers, and others happen to be their neighbors–and therefore should not be enslaved! Gee, that was nice of them. Maybe now Wisconsin can suggest something similar to their governor. Meanwhile, we still have Georgia and Alabama running into severe problems in trying to find migrant workers to pick vegetables and construction workers to rebuild flood-ravaged cities. Their governors and legislators don’t seem to realize that chasing away your illegal immigrants might have that particular effect.
LOL Rick Moran writes an honest post and all the crickets attack Ron and Democrats…