https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/02/opinion/sunday/political-polarization.html
An article that observes part of our problem in BOistan, but fails to really understand it. It is worth reading it. A quote ...
People often say that our problem in America today is incivility or intolerance. This is incorrect. Motive attribution asymmetry leads to something far worse: contempt, which is a noxious brew of anger and disgust. And not just contempt for other people’s ideas, but also for other people. In the words of the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, contempt is “the unsullied conviction of the worthlessness of another.”
I argue that we did not experience this situation even close to fully until the Obama years. In the Obama years the "dominant party", the modern leftist Democrats, who I refer to as "The Party" (TP) experienced total control for the first time since at least the 1960's, if not "ever". Why?
Because prior to the 60's, the "Solid South" was all "Democrat", but those were conservative Democrats. Being anti-Christian, or as we see recently, anti-Semitic, let alone Socialist was beyond the pale. Sure, they often had big majorities in both houses and won the presidency by large margins, but those margins included many Democrats that were much more conservative than today's "moderate Republicans" ... they were Christian, pro-family, pro-life, pro-military, pro-business, pro-gun, strongly patriotic, hard working, etc
After the initial foray of using the Deep State to attack political enemies -- Watergate, the Democrats again had all the apparent cards, but Carter himself was at that time a fairly conservative Democrat, and many of the Democrat elected officials from the south were still conservative.
Post Reagan, they had two years that were a prelude to the BO years -- they had the presidency and both houses of congress, plus a left leaning judiciary, however, the Senate still honored the 60 vote filibuster, and even Bill Clinton at that point was aware that moving too far left would likely hobble his presidency. He attempted Hillarycare, and was rewarded for that attempt at government overreach with the loss of the House for the first time since 1954!
The election of BO in 2008 was a total loss of control of all levers of power by Republicans in a way that was unprecedented in American history. Because the left leaning SCOTUS was willing to legislate from the bench, the power of Administrative / Deep State, plus the D party being universally far to the left of what even FDR or LBJ were, conservatives found themselves no longer living in "America", a country where even a strong political majority was limited by the Constitution, and the supposed jealousy of the houses of congress to prevent a president from usurping his authority.
BO was even allowed to use a "phone and a pen" to act as a monarch, and in fact,
even usurped the long jealously guarded power of the House of Representatives to be the chamber with the "Power of the Purse".
While the election of Trump and both houses of congress in Republican hands in 2016 might seem similar, it quickly became obvious that it was not at all so, because the Deep / Administrative State, the Judiciary, the media, and the elites of BOistan immediately declared war on Trump and Republicans, seeking to overturn the election. The author of the article would like us to "disagree better" ... because the competition in the market of ideas is beneficial.
So what can each of us do to make things better? You might be tempted to say we need to find ways to disagree less, but that is incorrect. Disagreement is good because competition is good. Competition lies behind democracy in politics and markets in the economy, which — bounded by the rule of law and morality — bring about excellence. Just as in politics and economics, we need a robust “competition of ideas” — a.k.a. disagreement. Disagreement helps us innovate, improve and find the truth.
The author is completely correct in a rational, historical, enlightenment sense. I maintain however that he just doesn't understand that we now live in ... BOistan.
Take a look at today's campuses. Read a couple books like "
The Coddling of the American Mind", "
Political Tribes", or "
The Suicide Of The West". The idea that the free exchange of ideas in a "market of ideas" is a primary GOOD is an AMERICAN ideal based on Western civilization. BOistan does NOT share that vision! BO and the nation he created sees Western civilization as BAD ... in "
Dreams from My Fathers" he explicitly sets out to "destroy the colonial powers", which WERE "Western civilization", and replace it with a 100% leftist tribalist, socialist, centrally controlled world state. THAT is the "the world" he declared himself to be a citizen of -- NOT "America"!
Why is MAGA so triggering to the left? Because as they say regularly, AMERICAN WAS NEVER GREAT! America was founded by white people who took it from native people and held slaves. It did not truly provide equal opportunity to all, and it certainly did not provide the goal of the left, equality of result! "America" as understood for over 200 years of it's history does NOT fit with the goals of the left, and one of the specific areas it does not fit is relative to competition of any sort as being "good". The left sees "rule by experts" as the proper solution, NOT some free market of anything ... certainly not ideas or products!
It would be wonderful for this territory to return to Western civilization and values, but while the author of the column, and even the authors of may of the books above may believe that "reasonable people" will look at their arguments and agree, I maintain that if you look at Ilhan Omar or Ocasio Cortez and their level of popularity, you see that the mood of the left is NOT toward any return to what Western civilization was based on, but rather to continue the path started by BO -- to see it's continued destruction.
The intent of today's left, which clearly includes the entire Deep / Administrative State at the Federal, State and Local levels (all unionized employees), the universities, the major corporations (Google, Amazon, Apple, etc), the vast bulk of the legal system and the media is a centrally controlled totalitarian state that explicitly prevents any form of disagreement, and immediately labels such disagreement "hate speech". MAGA itself is considered "hate speech" in many quarters.
It would be wonderful if we could talk our way out of this by "disagreeing better", however a short look at the current trends of the Democrat congress ... all out war on the president, including attacking and jailing anyone associated with him including family, failure to censure anti-semitism, and promises to pack the SCOTUS to destroy the main thing gained democratically in the last election -- I think you will agree that the way this is headed is not a "talking" or "voting" war.
TP has made VERY clear that they only honor elections that are in their favor, and they seek to overturn those that are not. They don't want to talk, they don't want to vote! They want to WIN and RULE! ... and it their eyes, it is simply for our own good ... we irredeemable deporeables!
