Why Are Liberals So Bad at Fighting? A Discussion Question
Beginning with the State of the Union address delivered by President Obama on January 27, it has become possible to hope that the Democrats at last have a leader who’s ready and able to lead them in battle against their opponents, that unprecedentedly negative and destructive major political party, today’s Republicans, and their various allies.
I, at least, have revived hopes.
But even if that is the case, an important question remains. Why are liberals so bad at fighting?
This question can be particularized into a few sub questions, such as: why did Obama take a year to start trying to make the Republicans pay a political price for their lying and their amoral quest for political advantage even at the cost of their nation at a time of several national crises? And before that, why did the Democrats in Congress, faced with a presidency whose lawlessness exceeded anything in American history, and whose virtually every communication was an exercize in deception and manipulation, remain so passive and wimpy when their oath of office required so much more?
Why is it that, while the Republicans tend to make a war out of almost EVERYTHING, the Democrats seem willing to make a war out of almost NOTHING?
These are serious questions. The problem they raise has certainly been noticed before– over the years, and in these days as well.
In a piece on Huffington Post in late January, Washington Monthly writer Steve Benen wrote:
Referring, for example, to Republican opposition to funding U.S. troops last year, Durbin said, “Some of the votes [Republicans] cast — we would be on trial for treason if we had voted against defense appropriations in the midst of a war.”
He added, “They did it with impunity.”
That’s true; they did. Every reckless, irresponsible, hypocritical, dangerous, and incoherent step Republicans take, they do so “with impunity.”
It’s not exactly a mystery. Republicans believe they can use tactics that ignore election results, make a mockery of democratic norms, and effectively prevent a governing majority from functioning because they’re pretty confident that Democrats won’t effectively raise a fuss, the media won’t care, and the public won’t know. And they’re right.
And then Benen goes on to propose the thought experiment in which the Democrats and Republicans were in the opposite positions from the situation today, and the Democrats were being as obstructionist as the Republicans are actually being now:
Now, in this hypothetical, what do you suppose the political climate would look like? Would the huge Republican majority simply wring its hands? Would GOP officials decide it’s time to try “bipartisan” governing? Would Republicans shrink from pursing their policy agenda? Would political reporters just accept this as how the system is supposed to operate, a dynamic in which a huge majority is simply preventing from governing?
Or would every single day be another opportunity for Republicans to be apoplectic about Democratic obstructionism? Indeed, how many marches on Washington would Fox News organize, demanding that Democrats allow the governing majority to function?
It’s not enough for Democrats to say, “If we stopped Republicans from governing, they’d scream bloody murder.” If Dems believe that, then maybe it’s time to scream bloody murder.
Benen ends up recommending to the Democrats that they consider what the Republicans would do were the situation reversed and then “do that.” I would NOT concur with that approach, since what today’s Republicans would do would be fully marinaded in lies and deceptions. But what need is there for lies when the truth –and especially the moral truth– should be such a potent weapon against those who practice the Culture of the Lie? If Bene’s point is that just as the Republicans would put up a fight, so should the Democrats, I agree with that.
But the Democrats, fully armed with such moral truth for most of the past decade, ever since the depravity of today’s Republican Party (led then by the Bushite regime) became visible, have left that powerful and righteous sword in its sheath. They left the Bushites largely unconfronted for offenses orders of magnitude beyond anything that got Richard Nixon pushed out of office. And they allowed the Republicans make gains this past year while practicing the most blatantly dishonest and degrading form of politics to force the failure of the only president our country has.
Why? What is it about liberals that gets in the way? Is there anything in the liberal vision or worldview that interferes with effectiveness in the waging of such political warfare? Anything in the liberal character structure?
What do you think is the solution to this mystery?
February 7th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
My thought on this is that they are essentially dependent
as their outlook is largely subjective.
February 8th, 2010 at 11:16 am
Don’t mean to over-simplify, because it is a worthy question and a complex issue, but a least one piece of the puzzle is probably the “politically correct” (ha!) notion that fighting is wrong. With that idea in the back of one’s mind, it’s pretty difficult to throw the first punch, or even defend yourself effectively.
February 8th, 2010 at 12:09 pm
Lets amend our manner of inquiry: instead of the Universal Positive assertion implied by the question, ‘Why are Liberals so bad at fighting?’, lets ask which liberals, are so bad at fighting, and why and lets ask was there ever at time when some Liberals could and would fight. This is far more interesting than the first question which is a stereotype.
Starting with Liberaals and Progressives who, in fairly recent memory could fight: for progressives, Teddy Roosevelt. He fought the corrupt practices of the GOP until they kicked him out of their party. He was also a military veteran. The New Deal was chock-full of fighters-men and women who fought in the courts, on the stump, and eventually in the military for the rights of human beings and to defeat Fascism and militarism. Then there was Harry Truman, a man of principle and courage, who fought in the army in WWI and helped keep the War Industries honest in WWII, and eventually served as a fighting Pesident. While his decision to drop the Atomic weapons is controversial, Truman fought for the men and women of this nation, and even faced the strong censure of his state by de-segregating the US military and his suggestion of a national health care system for the elderly. Then there was John Kennedy, who could have avoided military service but did not: he served honorably in many engagements, including the rescue of most of his crew in the PT109 event.
Upon becoming President he fought for civil rights and justice, and would have withdrawn the US from Viet Nam as he saw the corrupt and vicious nature of the South Vietmnamese government. This was not to be. Then there is George McGovern, a WWII bomber pilot who fought for peace and the poor and to end hunger. There was Hubert Humphrey who fought for good government and civil rights. Of recent passing there was Teddy Kennedy, a man of many seasons who served in the US Army’s BErlin Brigade, then fought for years to make America a juster, kinder place in which to live.
I am suggesting that those who know a real and early commitment to the welfare of this Nation, and its ideals and past (good, bad and ugly)who have been willing to face hardship and even danger to further it’s life and the lives of it’s citizens and future generations at some level understand
that the valuable must be defended from EVIL. As Richard Rorty says in “Achieving our Country” the war in Viet Nam traumatized the left and drove a wedge between the military and the nation: it also allowed in Academia the rise of extreme/relativistic post-modernist thought which told us there was very little actual value in the world, and that only brutes and fascists bore arms. These ideas are still rampant on the campus: fortunately ROTC seems more popular than it has been in some years.
One does not have to serve in the military to be a good citizen or even a fighter! As I have noted on this site before, not all soldiers turn out to be good citizens, either. But the idea that by presenting a moral program and then being cowed because there is opposition, even vile, treasonous opposition is worse than useless, because it shows the weakness of theory and principle alone, without deeds.
The current moment in time presents such situation: former community organizer-Barack Obama, very intelligent and capable on his own turf (roughly the lets make a deal crowd)has chosen NOT to fight-not to engage in a manner which would make the nation in this hard time understand that he will risk fighting with the most oppositional, most obstructionist, hypocritical, and vile group of professional politicians we have seen in some time. The president who has the numbers, the ‘bully pulpit’and the moral
weight, fails to rally the people to the cause of sustainability in health care,
education and social change: he is hiding behind ‘bi-partisanship’in the hopes the other side might just sign on to something he proposes (provided he gives up the moral and meaningful guts of his proposals) to please the right. There is honor in wanting bi-partisanship when the other side wishes to help bring about more good in the world/America. The other side is nihilistic, wants the President to fail, want liberalism to fail, and thinks they might accomplish that by their current course of action. At this rate they might be right. (see Paul Krugman’s work in the NYT today entitled America is not Yet Lost.)
Much of the Democratic leadership has grown up in the milieu of deal making and ‘bi-partisanship.’ they too have wanted to get along. OK, some of that is necessary, and fair. We are in a new time now when their is a serious crisis-or more accurately a series of crises, and the ultra-consevatives are hoping the Liberal(s) will fail through lack of will. President Obama, though a man of personal courage and conviction, needs to come to the electifying idea/reality that there are indeed real vbalues worth fighting for, as have many of his predecessors, like the Tuskeegee Airman, the men of the Red Ball Express and Martin Luther King Jr.
If he will fight, I mean really fight, he will have many followers. Now his closest followers seem to be men so tarnished by the bailouts and continuing save the rich mantra that he seems not only weak, but conniving.
February 8th, 2010 at 12:10 pm
This is an insightful question and one that I have pondered over the years.
The best answer I have come to is a sense of morality. Without an existing code of conduct or morality people are rudderless. “I”, “me”, and “mine” become of paramount importance.
Without morality people can and will do anything to give themselves advantage over others. A perfect example of a government that operates completely outside of any rules of morality is Germany prior to World War II.
Perhaps it is because liberals would rather reach a consensus with their adversaries than fight with them. It may even be that they are afraid. Lack of intestinal fortitude on the part of the democrats plays completely into the hands of the Republicans and they use it to very good effect.
I wish I knew the answer. I do know this aversion is leading this country into a very dark place.
We do not normally think of history as being shaped by silence, but, as English philosopher Edmund Burke said, ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph [of evil] is for good men to do nothing.’
As far as I can see liberals are doing nothing.
February 8th, 2010 at 12:17 pm
I think there are several things going on here.
First, liberals value being “nice” and they don’t want to be seen as contentious.
Second, many liberals, especially Barack Obama, value working together (bipartisanship), and don’t want to give up the illusion that if we just try harder the other side will just have to start working with us.
Third, many liberals have boundary problems, and can’t tell the difference between being “nice” and being “walked on”.
Fourth, we use words like “freedom” and “respect” without defining them, not realizing that we mean completely different things when we say them: the Left pictures freedom as having to do with equality, while the Right sees freedom as enforcing a stratified, hierarchical society, and the freedom is just for the people at the top. The Right wants the government to stay out of business, but tightly regulate personal morals, while the Left wants the government to stay out of our personal lives but tightly regulate business. Each side sees this as “freedom”.
And, fifth, the Right has become infiltrated with, and led by, sociopaths (or psychopaths — same thing), who have no conscience at all. People who have a conscience have a lot of trouble dealing with sociopaths because they just can’t imagine having no conscience at all. And, conversely, sociopaths can do anything at all to normal people and not feel the least bit bad or ashamed or embarrassed about it. They are just fascinated that people get upset when you hurt them. They love the drama of it.
These sociopaths are genuinely evil: they lie with no compunction, they cheat, they very consciously set it up so that people are hurt by their policies and they like it. Sometimes they go out of their way to not only make rich people richer, but to make poor and middle class people poorer, even when they don’t have to to make money.
It is almost impossible for someone “nice” to deal with a sociopath. Since you cannot shame them or embarrass them, and are unwilling to coerce them or kill them, what can you do but be a victim? This is where the lessons from Sociology should be heeded (but aren’t often enough). The lesson is that, giving the question of “should I be honest or should I cheat?” in this situation, the answer that proved to be most effective in tests and games and real life, is that you act honestly and kindly until the other side cheats, then you act to protect yourself and stop being nice. The Left seems to have never received the second half of that lesson.
February 8th, 2010 at 12:35 pm
How to make sure there are Americans who will serve the best interests of their nation? Plato argued in the Republic that only those who had served as warriors could be elvated to the philospher king status, having shown courage and then achieving the wisdom to know when and not when to fight. Robert Heinlein’s solution was to make military service totally voluntary-but then to disenfranchise all those who did not serve.
My solution requires an education sysstem geared to adventure, ethics and civics as well as to math and science. It should be repeated again and again, that the sole purpose of the education system IS NOT to provide workers for corporations. As far as being an American citizen is concerned, one is obligated to the Constitution first, and to his fellow citizens. I believe a mandatory period of service in some form would help instill a sense of value in our way of life, of our fellow citizens and thus help encourage the fighting side of men and women in what the American Philosopher William James called the ‘Moral Equivalent of War.’
Furthermore, I believe this overabundent praise of business and wealth has been a serious mistake in this nation. The Europeans have been far wiser in their social arrangements since the end of WWII than we.
February 8th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
Democrats tend to be people who think of themselves as victims, and whining comes more naturally to them than fighting. They are the party of women, the party of school teachers, the party of the envious, and the party of the agrieved.
February 8th, 2010 at 3:36 pm
Maybe its not the method but the message. Oops, don’t want to go there. Oh well, just a thought…
February 8th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
All the moral explanations available will not outweigh the political implications of pandering to the election needs of those called centrist republicans & democrats. They want to be reelected and, their parties want that also. This is aided and abetted by interference from organized Religion, a slap at Jeffersonian separation of Church and State.
Hence, how do they look squarely in the face at Bush’s being told of an impending possible disaster in Crawford in August 2001 and, ignoring it, aspects of the Downy Street Papers, and the Blair-Bush Crawford meeting in 2002, and torture, and violation of privacy, when a federal judge and a University Law Professor say that is all acceptable. To fight lies, means, in this country, not to be re-elected.
When I see Bush-Chaney or Palin-McCain bumper stickers, I think of well-to do farmers (who want t be left alone, except by government subsidies) and employed/retired, highly paid who have not at all been affected by the recession. (I am 70 years old and contributing to the care of 7 grandchildren while still full-time employed).
The culture has changed dramatically from the fighting Republicans and Democrats of the T. and F. Roosevelt eras, and now one problem is Congress, allowing too much, for too long, from the other “balancing’ , independent, branches of government. The Supreme Court is supposed to be impartial; but Alito says…no, that is a lie…..and Scalia’s sons work on the Bush campaign while, he passes judgment in 2002 on a Florida State matter, by chance awarding the presidency to that same Bush.
The public is too busy finding jobs and postponing the payment of bills to take umbrage, and the opportunists in Washington know that only too well. And so the malignant cycle persists, with fleeting hopes that Obama mediation, that confronts without the weaknesses of a washed out compromise, might begin the movement out of the Reagan-Clinton-Bush years.
February 8th, 2010 at 3:50 pm
A number of excellent ideas have been ventured here so far. (And I gather that the question has brought some unfriendly to liberalism forward to add their voices.)
The one point that I’d like to underscore in particular is one made by Richard: namely, that not ALL liberals have been incapable of effective fighting.
Indeed, if there was any deficiency of the fighting spirit in FDR –or, indeed, in the whole post-New Deal liberalism that continued on for a generation following FDR’s death– I am not aware of it.
I’ve mentioned before FDR’s combative response to the forces opposed to him:
Fighting spirit? I should say. And this from the man who did more to advance an essentially liberal vision of America and its government than any other.
February 8th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
BTW, to David R., a question. This is the second time that you’ve made a statement that seems to imply that you believe liberals are, by and large, people who depend upon the government.
Do you think that most liberals are on the government teat? Do you think that most of the people who advocate for government programs to provide a safety net for the American people are also people who have an expectation of needing those programs themselves?
February 8th, 2010 at 5:38 pm
BTW, to David R., a question. This is the second time that you’ve made a statement that seems to imply that you believe liberals are, by and large, people who depend upon the government. ABS
David R Says:
February 7th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
My thought on this is that they are essentially dependent
as their outlook is largely subjective.
Andy, I didn’t mention government. I wasn’t thinking of any particular institution nor of welfare recipients of whatever type.
I was simply observing the mentality and outlook I have encountered.
I would like to just let the conversation continue among yourselves
as being too detailed would seem unfriendly -not intended. And while I believe I do not share the outlook and attitude I am obviously in agreement
on a number of things we would like to change.
FDR did not share that outlook and attitude either. He had the spirit of the pioneering entreprenuer; he was just operating in the field of government and inspired millions of Americans. I can’t see his like compared to today’s progressives.
(Oh ! Wait a minute!. . yes ! Maybe Barack Obama ! ! ! ! !) Well, at least he is in the field of government . . for now..
February 8th, 2010 at 7:38 pm
“Democrats tend to be people who think of themselves as victims, and whining comes more naturally to them than fighting. They are the party of women, the party of school teachers, the party of the envious, and the party of the agrieved.”
Yeah, right. Like Max Cleland. Oops, maybe I should have mentioned a woman. How about Tammy Duckworth.
February 8th, 2010 at 9:13 pm
Here’s a passage from Krugman’s most recent op/ed, this morning. His column is about the dysfunctionality of the Senate, and how it is making America ungovernable (with a nice analogy to a dysfunctional Polish governing system of several centuries ago, in which ANY ONE of the members of the legislating body could veto all legislation). But in this one passage, there’s a point that is depressingly vivid in raising the question on which this thread is based:
February 9th, 2010 at 12:21 am
To Todd: thanks for the nods to Max Cleland and TAmmy Duckworth, both serious amputees from military service-both liberal democrats.
To Kim: I looked up anti-social behavior in the new DSM4T-R, the ‘official word’ on psychiatric/behaviorial disorders. Sure enough, there and elsewhere I found multiple lists of characteristics for this type: persistent lying or stealing,superficial charm, lack of remorse or empathy: inability to care about hurting others, lack of realistic long term goals, narcissism,, tendency to violate the rights of others, substance abuse aggressive and violent behavior, disregard for the safety of self or others and persistent disregard for social rules, obligations and norms.
The Raeagan Administration has the record I think for law-breaking scandals: The last administration certainly stands out here.
Andrew, I know you have been a warrior. Thanks for continuing on this path.
February 9th, 2010 at 2:45 am
And thanks to you, Richard, and so many others who bring their energy to NSB, for joining me on that warrior’s path.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:15 am
Much about which to speculate; no easy conclusions. I tend to value Robert Parry’s work on the media side of this. He consistently reports that the non-liberals, the neocons have mastery of compliant corporate-controlled media; and use them accordingly to reinforce & re-reinforce lies about liberals to a substantially disaffected, poorly informed populace eager to scapegoat somebody or something. The attackers also have Frank Luntz to frame the message in a poisonously effective way. We have a counterpart for re-framing Luntz’s message to represent countervailing power in Drew Westen, author of The Political Brain, but do not apparently see the wisdom in what he has to offer. Perhaps, it’s not so much that liberals can’t or don’t want to fight, but don’t know how to do so effectively.
February 9th, 2010 at 5:40 pm
Here’s another version of the question:
Can any of us explain why liberals as a group are so frightened?
(At least they appear so to me. I would add that the depth of unconsciousness fear in Republicans may in fact be deeper, but is expressed via the ‘perpetrator,’ rather than ‘victem’ stance).
***
Another thought: as a group the Republicans express their lack of integrity in the fashion that various NSBer’s have described in detail.
As a group the Democrats express their lack of integrity by appearing ineffectual, spineless, and perhaps guilty/fearful of exposure re- their own dependence on powerful, monied interests.
February 9th, 2010 at 5:51 pm
Richard H. Randall –
And thank you for your cogent thoughts above, as well as your nod to the Bible, I mean, DSM4T-R.
I believe that the character pathology known as “personality disorder” is very relevant here. Much has been learned about PD’s in the past few decades.
I can discern a mix of anti-social, narcissistic, (and although excluded from the current version of the DSM4T-R) sadistic PD – in many folks on the Right.
February 9th, 2010 at 10:38 pm
I had forgotten that psychologist Erich Fromm first coined the term malignant narcissism in 1964, describing it as a “severe mental sickness” representing “the quintessence of evil.”
In his book The Heart of Man, Fromm characterized the condition as “the most severe pathology and the root of the most vicious destructiveness and inhumanity.”
More recently Kernberg described malignant narcissism as a syndrome characterized by a narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), antisocial features, paranoid traits, and ego-syntonic aggression.
Other symptoms may include an absence of conscience, a psychological need for power, and a sense of importance (grandiosity).
Pollock wrote:
“The malignant narcissist is presented as pathologically grandiose, lacking in conscience and behavioral regulation with characteristic demonstrations of joyful cruelty and sadism.”
Malignant narcissism is highlighted as a key area when it comes to the study of mass, sexual, and serial murder.
(parphrased/excerpted – Wikipedia)
*****
There appears to be an awful lot of this on the Right.
February 10th, 2010 at 11:00 am
Could you explain, HMJ, how the spinelessness and ineffectuality connects with “a lack of integrity”?
February 10th, 2010 at 11:43 am
Andy,
My first thought is simply that there are clearly times when the imperative is to “take a stand.” At such moments integrity (via a number of its meanings) demands that we take a stand, take a risk, stick our neck out.
This is exactly what seems to be missing (other than a few notable exceptions) from the Democrats in Washington.
Example: Nazi Germany (which I think most people would agree merited the label “evil”) provided countless instances, both within Germany and internationally, where the question of courage and integrity was starkly at issue.
Does this answer your question?
February 10th, 2010 at 12:59 pm
In a way it does, but in a way it is also a tautology. To say that the lack of integrity is expressed in spinelessness, and that integrity involves the moral courage to stand up for what you believe in, is then to say that the lack of courage is expressed in a lack of courage.
But I can also see that it could be meaningful to say that the Democrats’ lack of integrity consists of a lack of courage, whereas the Republicans’ lack of integrity consists of a lack of principle. One lacks the courage of their convictions, the other side lacks the convictions.
Yes?
February 10th, 2010 at 2:21 pm
If folks on the Right would actually “get in the ring” with competent liberals, they would surely lose. This is because right-wing rhetoric is full of holes, and those who spout it usually come across as dense or dishonest.
However, it appears that are a thousand ways to ACT as if you’re fighting/arguing/disputing/refuting when in fact you’re skillfully avoiding the fight. Conservatives who even want to have discussions at all with liberals, who seem to want to defend their views or probe the views of liberals — I’m in the habit of thinking that those folks aren’t the conservatives we have a problem with. The real problem is the silent conservatives, who clam up when the discussion shifts to politics. They are not simplistic or stupid people, but they seem to act as if they’re personally offended that someone would challenge their right to adhere to simplistic views. Probably their justification has something to do with the successful characterization of liberals as “smarty-pants liberal elitists.”
I think liberals should fight, but under no circumstances should they abandon the high ground. Also, the liberals I know are usually quite predictable about whether they buy into liberal pieties, liberal “bad arguments” (like pro-choice). Conservatives seem touchy about the common idea that they’re stupider than liberals, so their anxiety about that I believe could be exploited; however, regarding what I said about not abandoning the high ground, trying to exploit that could be a dangerous game.
February 10th, 2010 at 3:14 pm
I agree with that– completely. It’s not a matter of US beating THEM but of GOOD defeating EVIL. If we were to use lies to beat their lies, then LYING would still be the winner. It’s TRUTH that should win.
Regarding that idea of the right not “getting into the ring,” as I see it, the nature of this fight does not require anyone to be in the ring, i.e. to face the fighting liberal. THis is a battle for public perception and public understanding. So all that is required –say, of Obama– is the right way of talking ABOUT (rather than TO) the right-wing so that it stands exposed and discredited for what it is.
February 10th, 2010 at 3:26 pm
The 2 primary reasons dems can’t fight well are:
1. The right uses easy-to-understand lies while dems must answer with dull, complex truth.
2. (more important) the broadcast media constantly and subtly backs up the GOP and refuses to play fair arbiter. This has allowed the right to pretend that everyone is dishonest and there’s no one to tell the unbiased truth.
So the public discourse need not be about facts, since there is no source of truth that everyone can agree to trust.
When the dems in Texas “fled” the state in order to prevent a redistricting, which gave the GOP 5 extra seats in congress without the need to get 1 extra vote, I watched numerous news reports about this and ALL ridiculed the dems, and not even 1 explained why they did it or how the GOP was being anti-democracy.
Nor did they pursue countless other stories of GOP malfeasance and deceit, like Tom Delay being part owner of a sweatshop that forces women to have abortions. Did you hear about that on air anywhere?
How shall Dems be bold in this environment? Plus all the liberal comics constantly making jokes that totally buy into the GOP) narrative.
Perhaps if we pressed back on the media instead of blaming the dems for being understandably wary, perhaps if rank and file liberals gave dems good poll numbers instead of all the public hand-wringing about their “weakness,” then they might feel emboldened to take bigger risks.
We blame our leaders for OUR faults our faults and weaknesses. Like Ed Schultz excoriating the Democrats and then concluding with the complaint that they lack solidarity. It appears no one picked up on the irony of that.
I wish everyone on this blog would start writing to the Democrats with encouragement, and to the news shows with complaints.
February 10th, 2010 at 4:05 pm
I agree, with the proviso that my encouragements would be encouragements to fight! Fight hard and fight smart.
There are times these days when I get the feeling that Obama has turned that corner. But he does it gently, which is OK. So long as there are others to take the gloves off. Gibbs the other day spoke of SHelby’s multiple holds as “silliness.” Wrong tone, methinks. Weak.
I want some of the thunderation FDR directed at HIS foes.
February 11th, 2010 at 3:03 am
Andy wrote:
“But I can also see that it could be meaningful to say that the Democrats’ lack of integrity consists of a lack of courage, whereas the Republicans’ lack of integrity consists of a lack of principle. One lacks the courage of their convictions, the other side lacks the convictions.”
Yes, right on target.
Appreciation also to Sam Gruen and William Meyer for your clear articulation of some key dynamics. Your words will help me to continue thinking about the vital question posed on this
thread.
I feel quite concerned about DNC and Washington liberals’ apparent lack of both urgency and cogency. Besides their lack of skill at creative confrontation and effective use of the media, it almost seems that they in essence have a laissez-faire attitude — as if nothing is seriously wrong…..and there is. Also, confusion – that ‘deer in the headlights’ look.
I was also thinking about the reality that a great many folks on the Right are abuse victims (even if only from the imposition of intense religiousity in childhood). In this sense they have already experienced the dark side, even though they have been distorted by, and remain deeply unconscious of what has happened to them.
(And of course, like a certain percentage of abuse victims, rather than face and work through the inner devastation, they externalize it by inflicting new pain on others).
The liberal types that I’m thinking about also remain unconscious and deeply unaware of the human shadow, not to mention incompetent when it comes to dealing with it. I almost have the sense of such people being like overprotected, naive children or adults who have never faced the opportunities for initiation (growing up, maturity) that the pain of major life crises can offer.
Both parties seem lost in myths about the American Dream – whether it’s about greed and ‘gettin’ what’s yours’ or some namby-pamby vision of ‘The Great Society.’
There are hard (and, the more we put it off, increasingly harder) truths to be faced. And the liberal base seems clueless.
At one level it seems accurate to say that a very large element of the problem is a lack of maturity. It’s as if both of the parties in Washington (and their counterparts elsewhere) are essentially composed of (adult) children.
Or, as if the folks can be broken down to two types of adolescents: the attack-dog, out of control, mean-spirited, contemptuous, grandiose and entitled kind – whose parents (through abuse or emotional abandonment) have raised them to live without regard for others. (What a glorification of selfishness).
And the other type: ineffectual, but semi-kind and gentle kids who have never learned to defend themselves, never learned to fight, and basically just want everybody to get along, follow the rules, and live a nice life. These kids show up as naive about both the healthy use of power and the ever-present potential for its misuse.
Almost as if they have absorbed the life-lessons that can be learned when one’s back is really up against the wall.
In both cases the parents show up as basket-cases, with little ability to help these children to become balanced, capable, deeply self (and other)-valuing individuals.
February 13th, 2010 at 6:51 pm
A key question is *why* liberals apparently have a blindspot when it comes to seeing right-wing evil clearly, and secondly why they seem clueless re- taking urgent and effective action in relation to it.
Both liberal “nice people,” and right-wing crazies (plus their sympathizers) seem a bit like spoiled (over-or underprotected) children – who have not been helped to see and face life – as it is.
It’s the job of parents to reign in any immature viciousness and lack of impulse control (and not doing so by themselves being vicious or impulsve). Without this parental influence children turn can easily turn into entitled, grandiose bullies, running wild.
It’s also parents’ job to help empower their children in the face of bullies and life’s other “slings and arrows.” That is, to observe their children carefully and help steer them away from taking a “victim stance” in relation to life’s difficulties and the all too frequent abuse of power which all children encounter, sooner or later (usually sooner).
Life has always had it’s share of “bad guys” – people who are sadistic or manipulative or indifferent. There have always been grossly self-centered people, as well as over-ambitious climbers who lack both empathy and scruples, and will do whatever is necessary to get “come out a winner.”
What kind of parent allows a child to be denigrated or swept aside by these kind of folks? (…Be they teachers, peers, clergy, or relatives).The failure to teach one’s children the tools to avoid these fates or at least hold their own – consititutes another form of grossly inadequate caretaking.
I do prefer Obama’s level of decency, (relative) maturity and relative uprightness to the sordid mendacity, gloating contemptuousness, and militant ignrance of the conemporary right.
But, give me a break. Naiveté – at his age…in his position? he’s supposed to Lead the democrats…forward.