Letters to the Editor
Dawggone
Published Letters: 451 Editor's Choice: 69
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One other point to Paul's response
[Read the article: The right-wing brain in action]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Every political idealogy has its own myth, power and value system. For the RWA it's mythology lies in moral purity and clarity, often couched in religious themes or even reversions to former more chivalrous or glorious pasts. Its power, of course is strength, particularly military strength with all its saber rattling and wars of opportunity. It's value system is accumulation of personal wealth, control over resources and power in a world defined as a zero sum game.
The Clinton presidency, like the Weimar Republic and the Italian monarchy, was attacked for its moral relativism, sexual depravity and diplomacy centered foreign policy of weakness. It stood for all the things RWA's despise at the RWAs first attacked Clinton's child of the Sixties relativism as unpatriotic and then his sexual peccadilloes as morally depraved. This also explains the oddly extreme level of vitriol thrown at him by people whose own personal lives were far from virtuous. It wasn't about Clinton, it was always about asserting a RWA ideology on the American people.
We are now reaping the whirlwind of the real evil underlying this ideology and the only response from its apologists is that the left has not yet managed to clean up their mess.
Oh, and Shooter, if authoritarianism is the best political game in town you should visit North Korea. Fifty years of the most authoritarian rule on the planet, it is a veritable Utopia.
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Huh?
[Read the article: The right-wing brain in action]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Bill Clinton declared war on Iraq??!!
Did the Germans also bomb Pearl Harbor?
Restricting admission to campaign rallies to "true believers" is RWA.
Surrounding oneself only with loyal sycophants is RWA.
Purging attorneys not zealously dedicated to using their position to pursue the party ideology is RWA
Abrogating fundamental and Constitutional liberties and protections in the name of protecting the fatherland is RWA.
Engaging in wars of opportunity is RWA.
Claiming a divine right of presidency that answers only to God and not the American people is RWA.
Demanding Microsoft open its code to discourage monopoly and promote competition is not RWA.
Got it, yet?
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One thing to consider
[Read the article: The right-wing brain in action]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]This discussion is not about conservatism or liberalism, but a fringe sect of right wing authoritarianism. The confusion lies in the fact many contemporary RWAs call themselves conservatives. Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Charles Krauthaumer, Dinesh DiSouza et al are not conservatives. Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley and Nelson Rockefellor would hardly recognize them and certainly would disdain them for their ideology.
Oddly, this cabal of authoritarian imperialistic extremism masquerading as a conservative ideology does not overtly express its disdain for the conservative cause the way left wing ideologues attacked their liberal brethren.
Maybe it was the temperment, but people like Herbert Marcuse, Che Guevera, Leon Trotsky et al, were more than happy to denounce their liberal brethren as weak or morally depraved. RWA's probably do this in secret, which explains how moderate Republicans have been made so cowed.
Yet, the Krauthaumers who see Iraq as a plum that must be picked, the D'Souza's who believe it must be kept for its importance to our national interests (read oil), and the Tom Delays who believe anyone who doesn't believe in their ideology is an enemy who must be destroyed at all costs without forgiveness (read if you must his book). These are people who worship absolutes. Conservatism stands for principles but never feared testing them and knew when to defend them. That is considerably different from suppressing all dissent at all costs.
Liberalism is not afraid of conflict or battle. Every liberal principle and freedom we now enjoy came at a great struggle and much cost spanning three centuries. The world's most apacolyptic war of the modern world was waged and won by one of the most liberal democracies and ideologies on the planet. Only to have the RWA's the McCarthys to come in and knife the wounded during Truman's presidency.
We are liberals on this site debating conservatives. Yet what we have not distinguished nor succeeded in pointing out is that the people Glenn Greenwald is talking about are not conservatives and those who are, or who may have honest issues with our liberal beliefs are supporting people who are not their friends, but thier enemies; fascists. No conservative or liberal would look four years after a disasterous war based on false premises and still demand blind loyalty to the truth of its cause-not unless you are Germany or Japan in 1944.
One of the many admirable traits of liberalism was its power to reject the more absurd and threatening notions of extremism that sought to undermine principle of individual liberty to an all knowing all powerful state. For example, we libs are all for kicking in our tax dollars for a jointly managed universal health care plan, we just don't want the worst plan of the most corrupt greedy regime of demogouges shoving it down our throat.
What amazes me is why conservatives let themselves be pushed around by these chickenhawks prattling about in their brownshirts or flightsuits and making empty threats. The internet records a million bytes of liberals challenging extremism. When will we see conservatives standing up to those who pretend to be their own but exploiting them for the worst of purposes.
It's not the moderate liberal we should be demanding, but the moderate conservative. Judging by the early returns on the GOP candidate trail no one should hold their breath.