Most of it I was already familiar with. This young generation (defined as those born between 1981 and 1988) are strongly liberal and the most Democratic of any generation. They also consist of a large percentage of atheists and agnostics. They’re moderately interested in politics, but what is interesting is their specific political attitudes.
Generation Next is less critical of government regulation of business but also less critical of business itself. And they are the most likely of any generation to support privatization of the Social Security system.
So, they apparently are for big business just as long as there is big government regulating it. They’re fine with privatizing Social Security which is something many conservatives supported. Related to all of this, they’re not critical of globalization. They think “that automation, the outsourcing of jobs, and the growing number of immigrants have helped and not hurt American workers.”
They are progressive and optimistic. Growing up with constant technological change, they embrace change. Going by other data, I think there two most defining moments are the 9/11 terrorist attack (fear) and the election of President Obama (hope)… from fear to hope.
I want to show a comparison between two kinds of conservatives.
Both of the following videos involve Cenk Uygur interviewing someone. The first video is an interview with a smarter conservative who makes reasonable statements. The second video is an interview with a conservative who comes off as a bit dense.
If you’re a conservative, try to sound more like the person in the first video.
If anyone ever did a combined search of “marmalade” and “I’ve just pissed in my pants”, there is a high probability that they’d find my blog at the top of the search results. I think I should focus on trying to corner this niche of the websearch market.
When was the Golden Age of the Free Market? It never existed.
The rich and powerful capitalists have always been trying to control the government and manipulate the markets… and they always will. The only place a free market might exist is in the village of some isolated tribe in the Amazon, but don’t worry the capitalists will figure out a way to find and destroy that village. No free man will be left alive.
Don’t worry about the government. The president, the congress, the senate… they’re all puppets. And the few who haven’t entirely sold their souls are powerless to do anything to change the system.
You could attempt a revolution if you like. But if you do, the Military-Industrial Complex and the police state will destroy you and everything you love. Join the Tea Party if it makes you happy. But know the FBI is keeping a record on every protester.
When one party is in power, vote for the other party… repeat again and again… nothing ever changes.
“When the oppressors give me two choices, I always take the third.”
-Meir Berliner (died fighting the SS at Treblinka), as quoted in A Language Older Than Words by Derrick Jensen
“Most Americans have no real understanding of the operation of the international money lenders. The accounts of the Federal Reserve System have never been audited. It operates outside the control of Congress and manipulates the credit of the United States.”
-Sen. Barry Goldwater
“It is well that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.”
-Henry Ford
“The regional Federal Reserve banks are not government agencies. …but are independent, privately owned and locally controlled corporations.”
-Lewis vs. United States, 680 F. 2d 1239 9th Circuit 1982
“The Federal Reserve banks are one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever seen. There is not a man within the sound of my voice who does not know that this nation is run by the International bankers.”
-Congressman Louis T. McFadden
“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.”
-Franklin Delano Roosevelt
“As soon as Mr. Roosevelt took office, the Federal Reserve began to buy government securities at the rate of ten million dollars a week for 10 weeks, and created one hundred million dollars in new [checkbook] currency, which alleviated the critical famine of money and credit, and the factories started hiring people again.”
-Eustace Mullins
“This [Federal Reserve Act] establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President [Wilson} signs this bill, the invisible government of the monetary power will be legalized....the worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency bill."
-Charles A. Lindbergh, Sr. , 1913
"When you or I write a check there must be sufficient funds in our account to cover the check, but when the Federal Reserve writes a check there is no bank deposit on which that check is drawn. When the Federal Reserve writes a check, it is creating money."
-Putting it simply, Boston Federal Reserve Bank
"We have, in this country, one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board. This evil institution has impoverished the people of the United States and has practically bankrupted our government. It has done this through the corrupt practices of the moneyed vultures who control it."
-Congressman Louis T. McFadden in 1932
“The few who understand the system, will either be so interested from it’s profits or so dependent on it’s favors, that there will be no opposition from that class.”
-Rothschild Brothers of London, 1863
"While boasting of our noble deeds were careful to conceal the ugly fact that by an iniquitous money system we have nationalized a system of oppression which, though more refined, is not less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery."
-Horace Greeley
"The Federal Reserve bank buys government bonds without one penny..."
-Congressman Wright Patman, Congressional Record, Sept 30, 1941
"...the increase in the assets of the Federal Reserve banks from 143 million dollars in 1913 to 45 billion dollars in 1949 went directly to the private stockholders of the [federal reserve] banks.”
-Eustace Mullins
“The financial system has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That Board administers the finance system by authority of a purely profiteering group. The system is Private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people’s money”
-Charles A. Lindbergh Sr., 1923
“Bankers own the earth. Take it away from them, but leave them the power to create money and control credit, and with a flick of a pen they will create enough to buy it back.”
-Sir Josiah Stamp, former President, Bank of England
“All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.”
-John Adams
“Whoever controls the volume of money in any country is absolute master of all industry and commerce.”
-James A. Garfield, President of the United States
“A great industrial nation is controlled by it’s system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the world–no longer a government of free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of small groups of dominant men.”
-President Woodrow Wilson
“History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it’s issuance.”
-James Madison
“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a monied aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power (of money) should be taken away from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.”
-Thomas Jefferson
“The money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace and conspire against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, and more selfish than bureaucracy. It denounces as public enemies all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes. I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me and the bankers in the rear. Of the two, the one at my rear is my greatest foe.”
-Abraham Lincoln
“Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who makes it’s laws”
-Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild
In a recent post I mentioned a discussion I was having with a rightwinger in the comments section of an Amazon.com book review. The person seemed somewhat reasonable and intelligent, but didn’t offer much evidence to support his arguments. I’m fine with that as long as someone isn’t making extreme claims and that is where I finally took issue with this person. I explained, in one of my comments, my criticism of the anti-intellectualism that has become popular with some conservatives, and then this person provides a perfect example of this rightwing anti-intellectualism.
I wanted to use this example because it’s too easy to think of anti-intellectual types as backwards and stupid. That may sometimes be the case, but not always. The particular person in question, although no intellectual giant, is able to present himself in a reasonable manner in most of his comments. He can put together a coherent thought and articulate it with some clarity. He does even offer some meager evidence. However, his response to my evidence seems perplexing from a rational perspective.
My comment:
There was a study done in 2009 at University of Illinois by Peter Doran and Kendall Zimmerman which appeared in the January 19 publication Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union. From around the world, 3,146 earth scientists were surveyed which included experts in academia and government research centers.
The questions were checked by a polling expert to ensure there was no bias. There were two questions that are directly relevant to our. One question was about whether the mean global temperatures had risen since before the 1800s. And another question was about whether human activity had been a significant factor in changing mean global temperatures.
Around 90% of scientists thought that mean global temperatures had risen and 82% thought human activity was a significant factor. Just considering climatologists who are active in research, 97.4% thought human activity was a significant factor. Even petrolium geologists were almost evenly split with only 54% disagreeing with the majority of climatologists.
Doran also noted recent poll data about public opinion. Gallup poll shows 58% of the public agrees with climatologists that human activity contributes to global warming. However, most Americans are misinformed about actual scientific consensus. Only 52% think most scientists agree that temperature is rising and only 47% think most scientists agree that human activity is contributing. However, a World Bank international survey found that most people in most countries thought that scientists agree that climate change is an urgent problem that is understood well enough that action needs to be taken.
“The majority of climate scientists agree that global warming is primarily caused by human activities such as fossil fuel burning and deforestation. The conclusion that global warming is mainly caused by human activity and will continue if greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced has been endorsed by more than 75 scientific societies and academies of science, including all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Meteorological Society, the International Union for Quaternary Research, and the Joint Science Academies of the major industrialized and developing nations explicitly use the word “consensus” when referring to this conclusion.”"
And:
“A 2004 essay by Naomi Oreskes in the journal Science reported a survey of 928 abstracts of peer-reviewed papers related to global climate change in the ISI database. Oreskes claimed that “Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position. … This analysis shows that scientists publishing in the peer-reviewed literature agree with IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences, and the public statements of their professional societies.” Benny Peiser claimed to have found flaws in Oreskes’ work, but his attempted refutation is disputed and has not been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Peiser later withdrew parts of his criticism, also commenting that “the overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human impact. However, this majority consensus is far from unanimous.”"
The other person’s response:
Sorry Steele; the science just isn’t there. You think it is because there is a conspiracy of sorts. It’s not a deal where everyone set down and plotted, but the ball got rolling and everyone jumped on for their own gain. And there is a leftist move to redistribute wealth this way. Gore has multiplied his wealth many, many times just since promoting this issue. He has a vested interest and if he was a government official would probably be violating conflict of interest. As Dr. Gray says its all ocean currents. He also says the CO2 is good for the plants as we know from biology class. There are many scientists against this and many more who won’t speak out because of political correctness. Oh well, the left has only a few months left in power. Still haven’t read all your stuff; I’ll get back to you.
I only listed part of the data that shows consensus among climatologists. A survey of the data is presented in the Wikipedia article “Scientific opinion on climate change“. A number of respected organizations have referred to scientific opinion on this issue as a consensus: American Association for the Advancement of Science, US National Academy of Sciences, American Meteorological Society, Network of African Science Academies, International Union for Quaternary Research, and Australian Coral Reef Society.
It takes some major balls for a non-scientist to deny the consensus of thousands of scientists who are experts in the field of climatology. The climatologists who are the most active researchers are in fact the ones who show the highest agreement, but even the non-active scientists agree (and so presumably they aren’t receiving funding to bias their opinions). The person I was having the discussion with obviously hadn’t really considered the science in any depth and possibly thinks that scientists are part of the liberal elite trying to take over the world.
It’s fine if you have criticisms (assuming they’re based on critical thinking). Scientists can be wrong and the scientific method takes into account the errors of individual scientists. That is why we have peer-review, but the meta-analysis of the peer-review articles also shows support for anthropogenic global warming. Scientific consensus is based on the known facts. Some of those facts may turn out to be wrong or misinterpreted, and if that were to happen then scientific concensus would change. But it’s the worst kind of anti-intellectualism to dismiss both the known facts and the scientific concensus because they disagree with your preconceived ideology.
There are intelligent criticisms. As an example of a slightly more intelligent discussion between two skeptical non-scientists, watch the following video:
The obvious weakness of that discussion is that neither person is a climatologists or even a scientist. The person being interviewed is a journalist and does seem to be at least somewhat informed. It’s fair to criticize specific measurements and how accurate they might be. It’s fair to criticize how large the actual effect is on climate. Most climatologists aren’t fear-mongering about the end of the world. Even though there is a concensus about anthropogenic global warming, many scientists debate and disagree about the exact mechanism of global warming, the exact influence of human activity, and the exact influence on the climate in the near future. Nonetheless, the concensus remains.
The major failing of the discussion in the above video is that it doesn’t take into account the 97% of experts who do support anthropogenic global warming. It isn’t clear how much the journalist disagrees with the concensus itself or merely the conclusions extrapolated from that conclusion. I don’t understand the science well enough to fully understand the data he is referring to. All I know for sure is that only 3% of experts are skeptical about anthropogenic global warming. I think it’s fairly weak when skeptics refer to scientists within that 3% in order to “disprove” the conclusions of the 97%. If this non-expert journalist disagrees with 97% of expert scientists, then I think I’ll go with the concensus of the experts.
A maybe more important failing of global warming skepticism in general is that it supports the dismissal of the global problems we face. Even if humans don’t cause global warming and even if global warming doesn’t exist at all, we still are destroying entire ecosystems and poisoning ourselves. If you’re concerned about the issue of diseases, poverty, and human rights, then you should be concerned about pollution and environmental destruction. You can argue about the policies that should be implemented, but to ignore the problems themselves is insane.
Skepticism is good as all scientists strive to be skeptical. There, however, has been a failure of our education system and a failure of our media in teaching intelligent skepticism. I heard an interview on public radio with one of the scientists involved with Climategate. I thought the scientist was fairly humble and defended the science in a reasonable manner. The scientist pointed out an important issue. The media has failed in explaining the actual science of climatology. The reporters weak response was “So, you’re attacking the messenger.” The scientists was correct. The media just likes conflict and often does little to resolve conflict by intelligent reporting. The problem is most reporters don’t understand science to any great degree. Reporting done about science by a non-scientist isn’t likely to have much depth of analysis.
This post was more about the issue of anti-intellectualism than climatology, but if you want to read more about the issue of global warming and Climategate I’ve written about it previously:
I don’t entirely agree with the analysis in the video below, but I agree with the general argument. I really don’t care if people believe in the supernatural especially if someone is basing their belief on their personal experience. What I do care about is the massive failure of our education system.
Even if you teach kids logic and critical thinking skills, they may still belief in the supernatural. However, there is an intelligent way of thinking about even non-rational experiences and beliefs. For example, it would be helpful if kids learned the history of philosophy and religion so that they could understand the cultural context of their ideas and belief systems.
I thought this is showing how the culture wars started by the moral conservatives are slowly coming to an end. Abstinence only sex education has been a failure and lost its funding. Most Americans are against banning abortion. American fundamentalists preaching against gays in Africa has backfired and turned into an ugly mess. In every direction we look, the religious right is losing battle after battle. And now even conservatives politicians are feeling cautious about what they say.
My grandmother who is still alive was a little girl when the KKK was having it’s last great resurgence. It was with the KKK that the culture wars began. The Birth of a Nation was the propaganda film that popularized culture wars and this is why the religious right has ever since been associated with proponents of “white culture” superiority. With WWI, patriotic nationalism arose like never before and moral conservatism rode that wave. Moral conservatism, through the Southern Strategy, became directly aligned with the Republican party. The GOP has been fighting the good fight ever since and they gained great power by doing so, but times they are a’changing.
The last great hope of the moral conservatives was George W. Bush who was a born again Christian. But now even Christians are starting to question the merits of politcizing religion. Recent polls show that most Americans think religion and politics should be kept separate. Political Christianity isn’t dead yet, but it certainly is ailing. In general, the alliance is weakening between Christianity and moral conservatism. The beliefs of Americans show a mix-and-match philosophy that is eating away at the dogma of fundamentalism. I saw statistics that show even most conservatives think “don’t ask, don’t tell” should be repealed.
The culture wars aren’t over yet and moral conservatives still have some fight left in them, but for certain conservative morality is losing its political currency as a wedge issue. The American public is becoming more socially liberal. The younger generation is most definitely socially liberal. Even political independents, fiscally conservative though they are, have become socially liberal.
I think it would be a good thing if the Republican party was no longer forced to be dependent on the support of the religous right. I think it’s no accident that as Republicans turn away from the culture wars that they start to remember the importance of fiscal conservatism. The Tea Party seems to be the attempt of true conservatives (such as Ron Paul supporters) to remind Republican politicians that they want their party back. It doesn’t mean Republicans will forget about religion, but it does mean that religion will become increasingly a personal issue rather than a political strategy.
I can be quite opinionated… as anyone knows who knows me. I’m not shy about my opinions most of the time. But my opinions are ususally nuanced and I don’t tend to shove them in people’s faces. I’m open to listening to the opinions of others.
On the other hand, I can be outright aggressive in stating some of my opinions. Some statements seem so obviously true based on the facts that I find irritating anyone who denies them… which isn’t to say my opinion is black and white even in those extreme cases.
I don’t try to hide my liberal bias. Part of my liberal preferences are just my personality and some are based on research I’ve done. I can’t help but be who I am and so my inborn liberal tendencies do cause me to be a bit unfair in my assessments at times. Usually, though, my desire to be fair and reasonable wins out.
My liberal bias particularly shows when I’m talking about certain topics related to conservatism. I don’t like Fox News, Roger Ailes, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, George W. Bush, Karl Rove, etc. I don’t like them not simply because they’re conservatives, but because they represent the worst of conservatism, the worst of mainstream, the worst of human nature in general… and I’ve written many blog posts with examples and data to back up this conclusion. That said, I’m not therefore promoting Democrats as a better solution to what ails the world.
Yes, Fox News is propaganda, Roger Ailes is a Republican operative, and Glenn Beck is a political hack… then again, I don’t generally trust any mainstream media. I find other mainstream news sources less annoying, but I never let my guard down when checking out the news. My annoyance with Fox News is that it’s slogan is “Fair and Balanced” which is an obvious lie. The other mainstream news outlets don’t make such ostentatious claims. No news source is fair and balanced… which doesn’t mean that reporters shouldn’t strive towards this ideal.
Anyways, I prefer alternative news sources because you have a better sense of seeing what you get and getting what you see. In mainstream media, any story has gone through numerous layers of people who decide what to approve, who decide how to present it, and who edit it down. The final product often is closer to fiction than reality. In the alternative media, there is less funding and so there are less layers between you and the information… and, if there is a bias, it tends to be more obvious.
In the political realm, yes, George W. Bush was one of the worst presidents that we’ve ever had and yes Karl Rove was a sinister mastermind… then again I don’t generally trust any mainstream politician. I pick on the Republicans partly just because their evil behavior can be just more blatantly obvious (the Patriot Act being a prime example. When Bush told a lie or was trying to obfuscate, it was obvious because he lacked (or maybe just pretended to lack) political slickness. Some liked Bush because he appeared to have no pretense and just said things as he believed. Assuming that is true, a lie blatantly told annoys me all the more because it insults my intelligence. The way Bush acted seemed to me like a child pretending to be a grownup, a child playing at some game… ya know, the whole Texas cowboy act or his wearing a flight suit. Whatever game Bush was playing, he wanted us all to play along and just ignore the man behind the curtain (ahem, Karl Rove).
I don’t assume that Obama doesn’t lie or that his policies are entirely motivated by some higher moral sensibility. However, Obama does seem to take the moral authority of his position seriously. He is just another Washington politician, but at least he makes his lies sound pretty and he inspires us in the process. Ultimately, I doubt the end result of Obama’s presidency will be much different than the end reult of Bush’s presidency. I’m of the opinion that presidents have a lot less power than we like to think. Politics is just politics. The politics we typically see in the media is just a show and there are people behind the scenes pulling the strings. But, with Obama, for a brief moment I can suspend my disbelief and let myself be carried away by the rhetoric. If we must have evil politics, it might as well be entertaining and uplifting.
So, am I being unfair to conservatives? If most of the mainstream media is propaganda and if most Washington politicians are evil, then why spend more time complaining about one side or another? I know I’m being biased in my liberal preferences, but I do complain about both sides even if my complaints about one side tend to be stated more strongly and more often.
The reaon for this is partly just my response to conservatives and mainstream culture in general. When Bush lied, why didn’t the mainstream media question the administration and do real investigative journalism? Why did the American public buy into it hook, line and sinker? Why do many conservatives still believe the lies? When Obama lies (or simply doesn’t live up to his promises), everyone is all over it.. the media obsesses over it, the rightwingers attack him, and the leftwingers complain that he isn’t progressive enough. Why did Bush get a free pas so often? Because of 9/11? Because he was a “War President”? Is Obama not a “War President”? Bush campaigned on bipartisanship and then acted entirely partisan when in office, and what was the response? There was a public call for national unity and Democrats bowed to his every wish and command. Obama campaigned on bipartisanship and then sought bipartisanship in office, and what was the response? There was Fox News attack-fest and the Republicans went into obstructionist mode.
When I look at what goes for mainstream liberalism, it seems fairly moderate. There are, of course, the polls that show most Americans favor a moderate form of progressivism, but that isn’t entirely what I mean by this. Obama seeks bipartisanship and his actions seem to be pretty much a carryover from Bush. Obama is a progressive in words only. Obama is just a politician. The so-called liberal media bias is only liberal in that it supports a liberal status quo. Mainstream America is slightly liberal and the media reflects that and shapes it to an extent, but there aren’t any flaming communists or populist progressives in the mainstream media. Social liberalism is just the natural tendency of modern society. Democratic and capitalistic idealism tends lead towards social liberalism. It isn’t any scheme of the “liberal elite”.
On the other hand, when I look at mainstream conservatism, it’s been moving towards more extreme manifestations. Maybe this is just the fundamentalist response to modernism as many have pointed out (e.g., Karen Armstrong). Ever since taking up the Southern Strategy, conservatives have been fighting against the liberalizing elements of modern society. They do succeed to an extent in obstructing and in riling up populist anger, but they seem to be fighting against the very nature of our society. Some conservatives try to explain their failure by claiming Republicans such as Bush have moved away from true conservatism. That is fair as far as it goes, but true conservatism hasn’t been allowed within the GOP for a very long time. What I consider true conservatism are the “live and let live” libertarians. The people who don’t want other people trying to control their lives and tell them what to do… whether it’s big government, big business, or big religion. Despite what they may think, the moral conservatives aren’t the true conservatives. The desire to control public morality inevitably leads to big government and the oppression of civil rights.
Maybe liberals have strayed just as far from true liberalism… I don’t know. I guess that I tend to emphasize social liberalism which oddly can at times be fairly in line with true conservatism. I think of social liberalism as being true liberalism. From my perspective, true conservatism and true liberalism have more in common than either have to their mainstream equivalents. The mainstream equivalents do talk the talk (Republicans call for smaller government and Democrats call for progressive change), but they don’t walk the walk. I’m more forgiving towards the Democrats in that they seem closer in their ideology to the actual emerging public opinion. Republicans too often just complain about the world, and their attempt to portray their complaint as populist is unfounded.
My ultimate bias towards liberalism isn’t in liberal ideology itself but in the overall liberal attitude. I’m an intellectual liberal which isn’t necessarily the same thing as a political liberal. However, there seems more similarity between the two than not. Mainstream liberals seem on average to be more intellectually respectable than mainstream conservatives. You can find intellectual liberalism within the conservative movement. Buckley attempted to make conservatism more intellectually respectable, but Bush was definitely the intellectual bottom of the barrel. Nowadays, within the conservative movement, the best examples of intellectual liberalism probably can be found among the libertarians. The problem is that the intellectually liberal libertarians recently haven’t had a place at the GOP table. Instead, the anti-intellectuals have become the loudest voices of the conservative movement. That bugs me more than anything.
I’m fine with someone calling Keith Olbermann a ranting pundit if they so wish, but Olbermann isn’t merely the leftwing equivalent of Glenn Beck. Unlike Beck, Olbermann isn’t an anti-intellectual. Even the more intellectual conservatives on Fox News such as Bill O’Reilly don’t seem all that impressively intellectual. I haven’t come across a popular rightwing equivalent of Noam Chomsky, for instance. I’m not saying that all conservatives are stupid, but I am saying the smart conservatives tend not to be as popular within the mainstream conservative movement.
So, if more conservatives were willing to embrace intellectuality instead of moral righteousness, then I’d be a lot less critical of the conservative movement. My complaint isn’t against conservatism as a general category. True conservatism, in fact, seems quite appealing to me. I wish more conservatives would think for themselves. I see the Tea Party being promoted by the Republican Fox News and being taken over by the Republican agenda. I’d love to see a true conservative protest movement. When liberals protested the Iraq War, no media outlet promoted the movement and the protest remained independent of mainstream politics. During Bush’s reign, you had to look to the Peace Protests in order to find the true conservative outcasts. But, now in Obama’s reign, it seems true liberals have less of an outcast status.
Liberals seem more willing to embrace difference and self-criticism. If there had been as many conservative critics of Bush as there are now liberal critics of Obama, then we might’ve been able to avoid at least some of the mess we now find ourselves in. I’m critical of conservatives lack of criticalness (and by criticalness I don’t mean calling Democrats names), but maybe it’s just not in the nature of conservatives to be self-critical.
I was having a discussion (in the comments of an Amazon.com book review) with someone who seems fairly conservative but who says they aren’t Republican. This person’s views of liberals, however, seem traditionally conservative and this person didn’t make any statements that would contradict mainstream Republican views. The review in question was of a book by Cleon Skousen who has been popularized by Glenn Beck. So, it’s likely this person is either a Beckhead or a Tea Party protester… or maybe they just heard of Skousen through the conservative grapevine.
Skousen is representative of the far right in his association with the John Birch Society. The John Birch Society was so far right that the staunch conservative Buckley kicked them out of the conservative movement. Skousen was mostly a forgotten name until the recent rise of the Tea Party (or rather its recent promotion by Fox News).
My understanding is that the Tea Party was originally inspired by Ron Paul’s libertarian movement.
The Republicans saw Ron Paul as competition because he is closer to traditional conservatism than they are. Beck helped undermine Ron Paul’s movement, but later apologized after Beck had become the de facto leader of the Tea Party. Beck is a dissatisfied Republican who has turned to conservative thinkers such as Skousen who have been kept outside the Republican fold for decades, and apparently now that Buckley is gone those outside the fold are trying to get back in again. There is a weird struggle going on between the Republicans and the Tea Partiers, but unfortunately no matter which side wins the libertarians will be the losers. I saw a poll that showed Republicans considered libertarians only slightly less negatively than liberals.
I can see some attraction to libertarians such as Ron Paul and I sympathize some of the Tea Party’s complaints (even if not the ideological targets of their complaints). Even so, I just can’t stand Glenn Beck. I partly just don’t like Beck’s lack of intellectual depth (along with his fear-mongering and race-baiting), but more annoying is that Beck works for Fox News. Fox News is headed by Roger Ailes who has for decades been one of the major players in the Republican party (much credit can be given to him for the success of movement conservatism). I think Fox News’ interest in the Tea Party is a Republican ploy to take over this movement of dissent… which would mean the genuine complaints would get lost in talking points of Republican campaigning.
Despite the loony wingnuts, my sense is that there probably are quite a few reasonable and maybe even moderate people within the Tea Party movement. A while back, I posted a video (several videos in fact along with my own commentary) of someone who seemed reasonable and was complaining about what happened to the Tea Party once it was popularized (and practically taken over) by Fox News. Here is the video in question:
According to a Pew poll, the demographic that is the most loyal Fox News audience are rich white men… which also happens to be the demographic of those who run Fox News (how convenient). So, I don’t think Fox News actually has the average Tea Party protester’s best interests in mind nor do I think Fox News is genuinely promoting the complaints that drew many people to the Tea Party movement.
I may be a liberal, but I have libertarian leanings and I enjoy a good conspiracy theory as much as the next guy. During Bush’s administration, the liberals and libertarians joined together to protest the Iraq war. What did Fox News do? It (meaning the Fox News pundits such as Beck) defended the administration, ridiculed the protesters, dismissed the 9/11 families, and categorized Truthers as loony conspiracy theorists. Ron Paul was against the Iraq war which is a major reason he attracted the ire of Republicans and Fox News. The Peace Protest movement was even larger than the present Tea Party movement. Republicans and Fox News thought protesters were the scum of the earth, but when a Democratic president was elected based on a populist message of hope by a majority of Americans all of a sudden Fox News overtly started advertising for and generally promoting the Tea Party protests. Fox News was fine with the Patriot Act and only now do they worry about the government having too much power? Pardon me if I think this is a bit disingenuous.
So, Beck has been doing his best to popularize conspiracy theories and make them respectable once again for the conservative movement. The problem is that, in becoming dissatisfied with the GOP, Beck just went even further right. I prefer my conspiracy theorists to be equally critical of both the left and the right. Forget Beck. Give me Alex Jones. Compared to Beck, Alex Jones’ theories seem quite reasonable to me. Alex Jones truly stands outside of the mainstream and doesn’t pull any punches. It’s easy to see the biases of Alex Jones, but Beck is different as he works within mainstream media. Considering that Beck paid by the rightwing spin machine (otherwise known as Fox News), I can’t even know to what extent he is being honest or, even if he does genuinely try to be honest, to what extent he is being manipulated by his corporate handlers. Fox News is run by News Corp which is one of the wealthiest and most powerful transnational corporations in the world. If there is a worldwide conspiracy, I’m sure News Corp is one of powers behind it.
Better than Alex Jones even, give me Robert Anton Wilson or Art Bell. Robert Anton Wilson made conspiracy theories truly entertaining. Art Bell, of course, is one of the greatest libertarian talk show hosts to ever be on air and he is a true libertarian… a “live and let live” kind of guy with a strong dose of openminded curiosity. Art Bell said Fox News sucks for its treatment of Ron Paul.
I started listening to Art Bell back in the 1990s. I wasn’t even all that interested in politics at that time. I suppose I’ve always been fairly liberal in my predisposition, but it’s only been in recent years that I’ve researched politics enough to have any clear opinions. I don’t remember exactly when I started getting more interested in politics. I remember attending some political meetings at the University, but other than sating my curiosity I didn’t care too much about any of it. I saw OutFoxed when it came out and that was my first awareness of blatant media bias and political spin.
The one and only time I voted for a president was for Nader in 2000. The reason I voted for Nader was because I heard him speak. It was the only time in my life when felt convinced that a politician genuinely believed in what he was doing. Nader seemed like a truly moral person. My voting for him wasn’t an ideological decision but was instead based on an assessment of his character. For whatever reason, not even Obama inspired me as much. Obama made inspiring speeches, but Nader inspired me simply for what I sensed about who he was. I have no desire to vote for the lesser of two evils and I refuse to play the rigged two-party game… not that I dislike Obama (I actually do like him as a person to some extent) and I can think of many people who would make much worse presidents (ahem, Palin).
The only political movement I ever was involved with was the Peace protests. At the University of Iowa, students and locals had set up a Peace Camp and they were there for quite a while. I hung out at the camp almost every day even when it was cold. It was the first time I felt like I was a part of something that mattered. Bush, of course, was the worst kind of politician. I’m drawn to pacifist idealism, but more importantly it seemed obvious to me how the Bush administration was lying. I still don’t understand why Bush’s lies weren’t questioned much at the time even by supposedly liberally-biased mainstream media. Even today, many conservatives still believe some of Bush’s lies that have been disproven for years. It truly bewilders me. And the Patriot Act… my God! The Patriot Act almost made me lose all hope.
It was funny that at the time when everyone was blaming Nader voters for Bush’s election. I knew Bush was bad news, but I had a theory about how good might come out of it. Even before Bush was voted into office, I knew he would be one of the worse presidents and I thought that it likely could lead to inspiring liberals to put forth a truly progressive presidential candidate later on. It turns out that I was more or less correct in that Obama’s progressive message indeed did get popular support after the horrors of the Bush regime. However, I didn’t predict how the horrors of Bush would linger on even after he was gone (Patriot Act, Guantanamo, etc). I didn’t believe in Obama’s hope hype, but I did want to believe that change was actually possible. I’m open to the hypothetical scenario that Obama might live up to his own progressive speechmaking, but going by his record so far it doesn’t appear all that likely. This is one time when I wish my cynicism would prove wrong.
These days, I’m not involved in politics at all other than writing about it. Obama and Bush, Republican and Democrat… it all seems the same to me or not all that different anyways. I just think of myself as a curious observer. I still listen to Art Bell’s show but now it’s hosted by someone else. Over the years, I have at times noted the wide spectrum of the audience of Coast to Coast AM. The callers and guests consist of liberals, new age gurus, pro-drug activists, Wiccan priestesses, Satan worshippers, Catholic preists, libertarians, conservatives, conspiracy theorists, cranks of various sorts, and even time travellers from the future. The slant of the show, since Art Bell started it, has always seemed socially liberal and politically libertarian. Art Bell himself used to be married to a Wiccan and he was the prototypical independent-minded libertarian.
I’ve recently been thinking about Coast to Coast AM in terms of the Tea Party. Art Bell was a supporter of Ron Paul. I suspect that libertarians and Tea Partiers probably represent a significant portion of Art Bell’s fan base. I’m also a fan of Art Bell, but I’m always wary of conservative libertarians adoration of Ayn Rand and I’m even more wary of the Beckhead Tea Baggers. On the other hand, I don’t think of myself as a Democrat. Many Democrats hate Nader voters like me as much as Republicans once hated Ron Paul supporters. I feel like I’m in a weird niche. The closest I come to finding a view that I identify with might be Noam Chomsky, but I recently met a Chomsky fan who was a rabid atheist and I don’t much like rabid atheists.
Part of me wishes I could be a libertarian, but in the US the libertarian movement has been taken over by pro-capitalists and the religious right. Of the conservative libertarians, I’d prefer the pro-capitalists because at least some of them are socially liberal. I read Ayn Rand in college. I liked her fiction somewhat, but then I read her nonfiction and it really turned me off. I just don’t understand the proseletyzing of free market idealism. As I see it, a free market has never existed and probably never will. Yeah, it looks good in theory… many things look good in theory.
Maybe I should just forget about all of the various movements and just think of myself as an independent.
I think I was happier when Republicans were in power. Republicans are just blatantly evil in how they abused power. Democrats in some ways just seem more sneaky. Plus, with Democrats in power, the libertarian movement has become even more conservative because of all the people no longer wanting to identify with the failed and failing GOP.
It pisses me off. I’ve been a critic of mainstream politics for much of my adult life. I’ve always been attracted to conspiracy theories about secret societies, alphabet soup agencies, the military-industrial complex, the Federal Reserve, and the One World Government. I can’t say I necessarily believe in any given conspiracy theory, but the general attitude appeals to me. I can’t stand that the likes of Beck has become the mainstream representative of conspiracy theories. Beck may be mainstream, but he is more whacko than some of the cranks that I’ve heard Art Bell inteview. I’m sure Beck means well and all. It’s just that he seems like a dupe. Maybe I’m being overly critical. Am I wrong to mistrust the change of heart of a supporter of Bush and the Patriotic Act? Beck says he leans towards libertarianism, but I’ve never heard him criticize imprisoning American citizens as enemy combatants or criticize the torture of suspects that may or may not be terrorists. If that is leaning towards libertarianism, I’m sure glad Beck isn’t leaning away from libertarianism. How can Beck be considered the voice of populist dissent, the defender of constitutional rights?
Okay… there was a point to all of this. My thinking was partly incited by the discussion I mentioned at the beginning of the post. The person (who I shall call “he” from now on) I was debating seems like a typical conservative in seeing liberal bias everywhere. He mentioned the documentary Indoctrinate U which is available in it’s entirety on Youtube.
The person on Amazon.com seems reasonably intelligent and capable of critical thinking to some extent, but his views of liberals is rather simplistic… maybe he hadn’t been exposed to many liberals besides encounters with strangers on the internet and portrayals of “libruls” on Fox News. I assume that this documentary represents his own views as he seemed to be using it to support his arguments. This is the type of conservative that befuddles me. He says he isn’t a Republican even while espousing very conservative views. He seems somewhat moderate in his attitude all the while saying he wants to read Skousen who represents extreme conservative bias. All in all, he seems be in the general vicinity of the audience of Fox News (which apparently exists in an alternative dimension from the one I happen to occupy).
I’m fine with criticisms and disagreement. I’m not one to denounce Beck or the Tea Partiers for feeling that the government doesn’t represent them. I agree with their general sentiments. I agree that there is a bias in the media and in education and in the mainstream in general, but what is up with seeing a conspiracy everywhere which is led by some kind of liberal elite (be they Socialists, Communists, Marxists, or Nazis… or, even worse, maybe all of them combined).
I did end up watching the entire documentary. Basically, it’s a conservative version of a Michael Moore production but not quite as entertaining. Many examples are presented with little context. In response to one of the reviews, the maker of the documentary admitted to being biased and thought it unfair for someone to criticize his bias.
Why is it so hard for people to look at the real sources of oppression and propaganda? What is the point of blaming one party or another, one president or another, one mainstream news source or another? One group wants to blame big government and the other group wants to blame big business, but a little bit of research shows that there isn’t any great distinction between the two. The family and financial connections, the revolving door, the inherited wealth and social position… power is power. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Conservatives buy guns in fear that the liberal elite are going to destroy democracy or something, but who are they going to point the gun at? When the oppressive forces come (assuming they aren’t already here and haven’t been here for a long time), they’ll come for conservatives and liberals alike. Anyways, I doubt even the gun-toting paranoids will see them coming because the new form of political oppression probably won’t come by overt force.
There is no liberal propaganda scheme to brainwash the children of conservatives. The professors and news reporters really aren’t all that liberal (compared to true socialists and progressives) and anyways most of them are just as deceived (or more so) than the rest of us. The conspiracy (whatever it may be) is systemic to our entire society. This is why someone like Derrick Jensen probably is closer to grasping the actual conspiracy than any outright conspiracy theorist.
Why are conservatives so afraid of the government now with Obama in Washington? Obama hasn’t even come close to passing anything as scary as the Patriot Act. Obama is no more a Communist than any other president. I just don’t get all of this paranoid fear-mongering. Yes, there are real things to be afraid of, but I don’t see much point to all of this blind rage and righteousness, all of this ideological warring. Many, many people have been warning about conspiracies for decades… yet we’re all still here and the political game continues. What is behind this sudden sense of urgency? Is it just the economic downturn that gets conservatives all riled up? Mess with their jobs, their money, their houses… and there will be a revolution.
