The New AA: Dr. Kimball’s Self-Help Program for Disillusioned Liberals
You’re seeing these sad people everywhere these days, especially in large East-and West-Coast urban areas and on college campuses. At parties they alternate between a melancholy, far-away wistfulness and a muttering “why me?”-belligerence. They’re touchy and quick to blame others, and they seem to suffer from night sweats and vague feelings of persecution. Their symptoms worsened suddenly a few days ago when it was announced that Paul Ryan would be joining the Romney ticket as candidate for vice president.
These people are not conservatives. It’s not clear that they’re liberals, exactly, either, though in recent history they have, as it were, caucused with liberals, that is to say, with people who identify themselves as liberals (never mind how illiberal their policies and sentiments happen to be). Above all, however, they are part of the tout le monde: the people who think of themselves as being on the right side of history (corollary belief: they think history has sides and a direction). They go to the right cocktail parties. They have “advanced” (i.e., establishment) attitudes about art, culture, and morals. They are part of that group Harold Rosenberg memorably denominated “the herd of independent minds.”
Tom Wolfe exposed an extreme version of this cohort in his essay on the Black Panthers hosted by Leonard Bernstein in his elegant New York apartment. Wolfe contributed the term “radical chic” to the language to describe the Bernsteins and their wide-eyed guests. What we’re dealing with here is not quite radical (though Obama may in fact be plenty radical himself, the semi-beautiful people who support him are not), nor is it wholly chic. It is a sort of “consensus chic,” though I appreciate the aroma of contradiction the phrase communicates, since that which is genuinely chic exists self-consciously apart from the consensus of hoi polloi.
First time around, these people voted for Obama, giving themselves a little frisson of self-satisfaction when they pulled the lever and, even more, when the emitted condescension about anyone who happened to vote for John McCain — they didn’t encounter such people often, but it always gave them a little thrill of self-satisfaction when they did. It wasn’t long, however, before doubts began to accumulate. The seas didn’t subside, as promised, nor did the unemployment figures. By now, they’re thoroughly depressed. Their man has clearly let them down, and the inadvertent comedy of Joe Biden screaming that Republicans are going to “put y’all back in chains” isn’t helping. Even worse is the news that team R&R, the Romney-Ryan express, is surging among young voters.
It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way. The good “Liberals” (i.e., the illiberal liberals) who voted for Obama the first time around, the mostly white, privileged products of elite schools and progressive attitudes, were supposed to be on the winning side of all such controversies. They were the enlightened ones. Republicans, the people who voted for John McCain and — Ohmygod! — Sarah Palin, didn’t go to the right schools; didn’t ingest the proper balance of gluten free, free-range, macrobiotic, whatever; wore the wrong sorts of clothes; had funny hairdos; owned guns; and (often) were God-fearing people who took religion seriously. Such people were less objects of pity than of contempt, though when their politics were not on view they provided vast fodder for interventionist government programs aimed at transforming these unfortunates into consensus-chic, testosterone-free liberals.
The deep problem now is how to help the vast regiments of disillusioned liberals. As I’ve noted in this space before, momentum towards Romney is mounting. Soon, I predict, it will be all but irresistible. And then the consensus-chic liberals who had supported Obama in 2008 will be ideologically homeless. It is up to us to offer them a helping hand: a two-step program of recovery. Self-knowledge is the first step. They must have the courage to stand up before their friends and say, “I’m John Doe, and I supported Barack Obama.” Their friends, most of whom are likely to be in the same position, will applaud and tell their own war stories. About the time they blacked out at an Obama fundraiser, or the time they couldn’t remember who James Madison was. There will be solidarity in numbers.
Once that critical first step is taken, the rest will be easy. Sure, there will be bad days, days when a copy of the New York Times will be open beside them in a taxi, with an article by Paul Krugman staring them in the face, or nights when they find themselves at a party in which some acquaintances have yet to confront their addiction. It will be hard not to join in, to have just one sip of the old intoxicant. But with every day that passes, members of this new support group will gain in confidence. Soon they will be ready to take the important public step of declaring their support for the candidates who want to help America prosper and help Americans help themselves, who are not ashamed to criticize Obama’s dependency agenda as a prescription for national servitude. I’m not saying the process is painless. But the satisfactions of having stood up for oneself are great. More and more people are doing it today. Which means that even more will be doing it tomorrow.
****
Thumbnail and photo courtesy shutterstock / Gts
I don’t doubt Dr. Kimball’s kindly intentions, but it is a cruel thing to strip people of their symbols of superior status. And who can foresee the consequences of depriving them of their push-button opinions and setting them loose in a world of actual thought? Better to leave them alone.
We don’t want to confuse them too much.
http://uselections2012blog.blogspot.ca/
I agree. Since those he is trying to rescue are also rabid supporters of abortion it only stands to reason that they will die out completely after a generation or two.
One waypoint for these disallusioned former liberals, who recognize that obamas far left economic policy is failing, but cant bear to join the same party that has those lowbrow socon culture warriers like Palin and Santorum, is to go libertarian, and vote for Gary Johnson. Libertarians have sound economics, but dont have all those socon positions that liberals really hate. Of course they never win, and are a bit too far out in some of their beleifs, but these people are so depressed they dont care about winning now anyway. And moving to Johnson is better from our point of view than voting for obama just out of fear of the socons. Libertarianism also has some chic with intelictuals and wont get the scorn in the faculty lounge that a full conservative will. The other advantage to this waypoint is libertarians can talk to regular conservatives without being totally alienated, and can even form cooalitions with them, since they at least agree on economics, and may learn to at least respect conservative socon beleifs, even if they cant yet agree with them. The other good thing is that it is a much shorter step to go from libertarian to tea party, since many tea partiers have libertarian leanings, and once they have made that step, they are ready to vote full repub, and with the tea party they will be where the real action is, and the future of this country.
[I live in Virginia, I lie to Pollsters]
I think using AA as a reference is unfair to AA. They are folks trying hard to accept individual responsibility.
I would suggest using ‘NO’; ‘No O’ (or O No!).
ta
I don’t lie to pollsters, I look at caller-ID and just don’t talk to them (they get dumped to my answering machine and they never leave a message.) I think it screws up their results more and adds to their frustration. Think about it – how many more calls can we force them to make, how much more time can we cause it to take, if more and more of their calls are “no answer”?
This gives me hope as well. Like most conservatives, my wife and I keep the blinds closed more often than not, and don’t spout off our political beliefs to a stranger on the phone. I always wonder if/how pollsters account for this phenomenon.
I’ll never forget the time in 2004 when I was leaving the polls and was approached by an exit pollster wearing a Kerry button. What was she thinking? I had no desire to talk to a stranger, especially one that might spit venom back at me. Those polls ended up being ridiculously skewed–I wonder why.
It doesn’t work like that, “Buck”. Pollsters and telemarketers work with a robo-caller that makes many, many calls, and then send an actual pickup to an operator. The robot at the center of this operation feels no frustration at all … or, if it does, it is masking this frustration until the glorious day it can throw off its human oppressors.
This is true. I’m ashamed to say that years ago I worked as a programmer at an outfit that developed telemarketing and polling systems. The dialer is a type of computer that is crammed with telephony boards. It is fed lists of phone numbers and just burns through them, patching answered calls through to live people (and populates their computer screens with data about the call along with an appropriate script) or to recordings depending on the system in question. The thing is, there are usually more lines dialing then there are live people, and the system doesn’t appreciably slow down on bad numbers, no answers or answering machines. Yes, there are heuristics that can detect a live answer vs answering machines.
Won’t work. This is mass mental illness, not an individual struggle over anything. Obama chic is just a symptom of a set — a very, very large set — of people who quit thinking on their own to become part of something larger that makes them feel good. It’s a kind of fantasy world where reality is the enemy and its purveyors are intellectual and cultural thugs, i.e., the rest of us. No amount of counseling, no handfuls of pills will break that barrier. The only solution is to isolate and humiliate them for a couple of generations. Maybe then it’ll sink in. But I doubt it.
In other words, they drank the kool-aid.
They are the Borg. Only worse, because compared to Leftists, the Borg are charming and have a delightful sense of humor.
Or: F.A., as in Fantasy Anonymous, which is supported by the Fantasy Factory of Hollywood. To get the grip on reality one must undo the phrase,’we will lower the cost of health care and insure 30 million more folks.’
That sound you hear is cognizance and dissonance crashing into each other.
I have often thought a killer business would be a chain of “cognitive dissonance clinics”, which would set up like the transient Halloween or Xmas only stores in the malls, and given the amount of empty retail space you could get the rent for near to nothing. My genius plan of course always bumps up against the reality that 95% of trained psychologists will be suffering themselves, so it would be really hard to staff up and to get the licenses.
I’ve oft speculated at the potential angst that cognitive dissonance might cause among so many of the (Il)liberal Koo-Aid drinkers, only to discover that frequently the level of actual, verifiable cognition has been so that it’s no wonder that not too much dissonance was being experienced by these ersatz intellectual powerhouses.
Suggested Anti-Administration reading might begin with : http://www.amazon.com/Ruling-Class-Corrupted-America-About/dp/0825305586/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1345060821&sr=1-1&keywords=the+ruling+class, http://www.amazon.com/True-Believer-Thoughts-Movements-Perennial/dp/0060505915/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1345060888&sr=1-1&keywords=the+true+believer+-+eric+hoffer . This election will hinge on the individual vs. collective consciousness. We all need to act individually, that means talking to our friends, neighbors, families, and those we meet at work and those we encounter by chance. Remember 2000. Every vote counts. GBUSA
Bernstein was either a cheapskate or else did not understand the price mechanism.He complained that the only people he could find willing to serve as the menials at his party for feasting with panthers were all black. If the price had been right English PhDs would have flown the Atlantic to play Jeeves. Humbug!
Well said! A fundamental principle.
I give Bernstein a pass. He earned it with his music. Note that Jimi Hemdrix refused all requests to play benefits for the Panthers. One might say he was more hip than the radical chic.
I’m not as sanguine as Roger about our friends, the disillusioned Lefties. As T. S. Eliot wrote “Human kind cannot bear very much reality,” and that is especially true of Liberals.
Good on you if you still have enough patience to talk to hard core liberals about anything. I don’t. I’m tired of the condescension, personal attacks and name calling. They can bite me. I’m not interested in saving them because in the long run, they can’t be fought. They are the forces of nihilism, and you can’t beat their mindless destruction, you can only flee their path. See, e.g. New York, Massachusetts, California, and the increasingly leftist little urban pockets around the new south. My job isn’t to smarten them up, it’s to find a place and figure out a strategy to protect my family and livelihood from them.
You are 100% right, Joe
But I’d adjust one thing to say “I’m not interested in saving them because in the long run, THEY ARENT WORTH SAVING”
I’m a kind of “tough love” sort.
My attitude with the hip-but-now-bewildered do-gooder “Indies” is:
YOU shit the bed, so YOU figure it out.
Man-up and make a stand. You voted for an ineffective metrosexual because of his “perfect pant crease”, and youre wondering WHY he’s a failure?
Allow me to introduce you to the word “Duh”
Sometimes an Indie gets a spine…but usually only after they get mugged.
But he is not talking about Lefties….
They are part of that group Harold Rosenberg memorably denominated “the herd of independent minds.”
That is a good line. Apparently it does not occur to people that thinking “B” because the majority thinks “A” doesn’t make one an independent mind because their thoughts are still being dictated by others, only now it’s to gainsay them. A true independent mind thinks what he thinks because that’s what he thinks. But unfortunately, no one else will agree with that formulation so better to drop it.
Alfred Jarry was onto this. In one of the later Ubu plays, Ubu encounters an anarchist militia at drill. They simply do exactly the opposite of whatever their sergeant orders – so, of course, said sergeant has complete control of them.
(Dr. Kimball, is this reference obscure enough to impress you? I’m a longtime New Criterion subscriber. BTW, thanks for bringing Richard Wilbur to my attention, plus many others!)
The real tragedy, from the perspective of the herd of independent thinkers who voted for Obama and are now in anguish over the reality of the last 4 years, is that many of them feel betrayed because their investment in the liberal consensus has not protected their real or perceived advantages. They have found, especially the younger herd members, that the only distribution so far managed by the Obama regime has been that of poverty, and that they were uniquely positioned to be the direct recipients of that distribution. Their jobs are gone, their social and economic position has been degraded to the point where they are once again living with mom and dad, and their prospects are increasingly dim.
I beleive that the REAL tragedy is that they will, in very short order, begin to believe that the only thing wrong with Liberalism and Progressivism was that they picked the ‘Wrong Guy’ to bring it about.
It will not be the underlying philosophy that went wrong, only that is was implemented wrong once again because Barack Obama simply wasn’t the right person with the right way to make it happen.
JD nails it, and I can use two words to prove he is right: Jimmy. Carter.
Yes, that’s how the progressive mind works. “Communism is wonderful in theory but….” They can never admit that progressive policies do not accomplish their purported ends and usually cause the results that they claim we need ever more progressive policies to fix. Progressive ideology is a vicious spiral that leads to ever larger and more intrusive and dysfunctional government.
I beleive that the REAL tragedy is that they will, in very short order, begin to believe that the only thing wrong with Liberalism and Progressivism was that they picked the ‘Wrong Guy’ to bring it about.
T’was ever thus. The very definition of insanity and irrationalism.
They have found, especially the younger herd members, that the only distribution so far managed by the Obama regime has been that of poverty, and that they were uniquely positioned to be the direct recipients of that distribution.
While there has been widespread distribution of poverty, there has also been a widespread distribution of spoils under Obama. He gave billions of dollars (hundreds of billions, actually) to cronies, supporters, bundlers, the UAW, government employees and the like. The fact that he’s impoverished so many others is perhaps an unfortunate side effect and clearly Bush’s fault.
There’s an old saying about being careful what you wished for. In 2008, liberals got everything they’d ever wished for in the election. They had complete control of Congress and the presidency was in the hands of the most liberal member of the Senate. There was almost nothing the Republicans could do about it. They enacted ObamaCare and over $700 billion in “stimulus” spending. It should’ve been a perfect opportunity to prove once and for all how well their ideas would work outside the academic environment. Only, in the real world, those ideas proved a dismal flop. Imagine the heartache of seeing everything you’ve believed fail dismally. Ultimately, they’ll blame that their ideas (like communism) only failed because “the right people weren’t in charge” (meaning themselves, of course). Perhaps a few will realize that just because a lot of people with more degrees than a thermometer say a foolish thing, it’s still a foolish thing. Oh, well. They can always return to drugs. Drugs are for people who can’t handle reality.
B Dubya! reread what you wrote that is just what they wanted to happen. Lose your job start your benefits package and wa la your now part of the great entitlement…Obama’s dependency agenda. For the Disillusioned Liberals that’s what you have when mama and papa take you in and say it will get better one day.
Yea good luck on having any type of conversation with that type of family….it doesn’t get better!
“As I’ve noted in this space before, momentum towards Romney is mounting. Soon, I predict, it will be all but irresistible. And then the consensus-chic liberals who had supported Obama in 2008 will be ideologically homeless.”
Liberals today remind me of a drunken man who picks up a woman in a bar. While the guy is drunk, the woman looks like the most beautiful female he has ever seen. But when he wakes up in bed beside her the next morning, sober, and sees this worn and haggered prostitute sleeping next to him, he asks himself, “What the hell was I thinking last night?”
Well, the liberals have just woken up and they don’t like what’s lying in bed right next to them. And they don’t know how to get out of it. Well, seems like the better part of valor is to pay the prostitute, learn from your stupidity, and move on with your life. Hopefully, liberals will learn from this mistake and will never again vote for a person who they know nothing about and who has achieved and accomplished nothing in life except manage to get elected to public office. If they have learned their lessons well, they will vote for Romney and Ryan in November. We can only hope.
“Well, the liberals have just woken up and they don’t like what’s lying in bed right next to them.”
So Hope and Change have transmogrified into Barack Beer Goggles and “Coyote Ugly” Joe. That means our task is to assure them that voting for R&R will be less painful than chewing your own arm off. That puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?
“Well, the liberals have just woken up and they don’t like what’s lying in bed right next to them.”
Coyote liberal
The dam holding the floodwaters (the truth) back is the media. It will only take one from the major networks to say, “I’ve had enough. The Emperor has no clothes.” The dam will break and President Obama will be exposed as a phony with no talent other than getting elected. MSM knows this, but they are in fear of losing their jobs if they admit it.
When the polls reflect a Romney landslide in the making they will pile on and get on the bandwagon.
That is when the president will be in mortal danger. It is better for “the cause” to have him martyred than exposed (MLK). It is also why Hillary will not be on the ticket.
I’m sorry. NONE of the networks will break ranks. They will never admit it. I know this because I’m a professional writer. Throughout the last twenty years I’ve watched magazines get in trouble by being too far left then “fixing” it by listing further left, then dying.
The reason is this: in the old world to move even slightly right, even to save your job as an editor, meant that you’d be unemployable if your gamble failed and the magazine died anyway. NO ONE would touch you. You’d be considered a traitor by the true liberals and a “fool” — like Palin. Good thing we kept her out of VP spot and got Biden instead, uh? Now, there’s a mind for the ages. (head>desk) — by the herd of independent minds. So you’d be out of a job and likely in middle age without any other skills.
Meanwhile if you moved FURTHER left, you’d be a hero to those people, and you’d get a new job as soon as the old one crashed. (TRUST me. Often more prestigious.)
Now things have changed, but not enough and certainly not for TV news. And they haven’t noticed/aren’t willing to believe how far and how fast they’re changing. The idea now is to run out the clock in old media before it crashes — most of these people are in their forties and fifties and confident they can do it (I think it will be a near run thing.) — enlightened self interest demands that they lean ever forward/list further left, so their next job is assured.
They will never break ranks until these media entities pass from this world and are replaced wholesale. Depending on wealth which affects rate of innovation, if Romney wins, I’d give them five to ten years. With the left in control they’ll get ten or a little over. I don’t believe in either case they’ll run out the clock.
So, don’t count on them to change. Hope that enough people are in new media now. (We who are have influence beyond our numbers, because we’re most of us the makers of ideas. This is why Obama is in as much trouble as he is. In the forties we’d all think he was a god of governance and trying unavailingly to save us from “Bush’s depression.” That we don’t is cause for hope and I agree with Roger we’re headed for victory.)
Don’t get cocky, continue working and don’t count on miracles.
Sarah,
Very good points…all I could add that is my outsiders observation:
None of them will ever say the Emperor has no clothes, because…
THEY ARE THE EMPEROR…
Barack is but a temporary 8 year occupant of what they view as THEIR court…
Time’s Grunwald has an article on Slate.com this week in which he tells us that Obama’s stimulus has been an enormous success.
That isn’t ordinary Kool Aid they are drinking… it’s laced with LSD or something.
I’m not sure the people who were drunk on their Obama-love have sobered up entirely. Even if they have, they may not be ready for AA. I think they’re more likely to try the hair of the dog: four more years of Obama. They’ll try to forget their present hangover and convince themselves that moonshine isn’t so bad after all.
ha ha! Lib-terd Anonymous (LA?).
I think you severely underestimate the ability of extreme liberals to deny reality. I live near Ithaca, New York (a/k/a Boulder East), and the liberals here don’t blame Obama for not getting things done. Instead, they continue to blame Bush, and now they also blame the Republican Congress. And anyone who blames Obama for anything is secretly a racist, unless they’re black, because, as everyone here has known for decades, blacks can’t be racists because they don’t have the POWER.
Every liberal I encounter here is planning on voting for Obama again.
He’s not talking about extreme liberals…
All liberals are extreme.
To have views so far from common sense and rationality is the definition of extreme.
The Indie-hipsters he (might) be talking about are no less “extreme”
They are weak minded and morally frail, in the “extreme”.
We cannot turn them to the Right, any more than we can cause them to gain muscle…
It must be a change in their own priorities, and of their own political fortitude, to make such gains THEMSELVES.
And quite frankly, I just dont think the cowardly weaklings they typically are, will it in them to do so.
I wish I could agree with you, but I think you give them too much credit. It takes a man to admit he was wrong, and in the “testosterone-free” herd you will not find such a creature.
The people you describe will instead double down, and the election will be a close one.
As insane as it sounds, I see a lot of people who feel even more committed to 0bama than they did before.
That’s fine, but, as with everything Obamaesque, it deals with vague generalities. There are specific populations that will be impoverished by the mega-shift from Bam.
Specifically, how will Biden and his family and other dems similarly situated replace the revenue from selling access that they now enjoy. What about the presidential appointees who are basically unemployable in a normal world who will be cut off from high pay, fabulous expense accounts and crony/lobbyists willing to subsidize every outrageous whim?
Who will look the other way when blacks commit crimes, union leaders loot dues and pension funds, illegal aliens are no longer “advantaged,” lefties, everywhere, are forced to recognize the stupidity of their words?
The most dramatically effected population will, of course, be the “journalists” and media types. After five years of doing nothing but echoing Bam’s ravings, they’ll have to work hard, very hard, digging out and manufacturing bad things about Bam and the dems. As retroactive transparency opens the filthy workings of what Bam and his thieves actually did, the media will have to work so hard trying to cover and argue against facts that are not sufficiently reverential.
What about these poor guys?
I agree with Rex. It’s not just extreme liberals … most of the Obama voters I know plan on voting for him again. It’s still all Bush’s fault — and it’s the fault of the Tea Party and the Republican House. Or it’s not that bad.
After eight years of hating Bush with a passion, they are simply too emotionally invested in the Democrats to change. They have no problems justifying Obama’s actions even when Obama did the same things as Bush. It’s just not a problem when they do it.
Most of them say Obama is too conservative and sold out to the Republicans, that they played too nice with Republicans, and that was the real problem. They BELIEVE this. What they need is a Real Liberal to straighten things out.
They give Obama and themselves every benefit of the doubt, and put the most uncharitable interpretation on anything the GOP does.
What disturbs me most is the willingness to parrot Democratic talking points. It’s truly a herd.
I hope this election breaks wide open as Mr. Kimball predicts and proves to be a fundamental realigning election for the GOP. But I wouldn’t count on it. Not yet.
It is up to us to offer them a helping hand: deportation to one of their favorite workers paradises in the hold of superannuated Nigerian-registered ocean-going fish-processing factories.
Why should these fools live in a free society that they so plainly hate?
<>
Well the Libs are getting a dose of the reality of “good intentions” over experience/wisdom/statemanship/patriotism.
The realities of high unemployment, soaring food/gas/utilities prices, etc do not have to be reiterated here.
The Democrats are in panic mode and considering the consequenses of dropping Biden for Hillary to keep BHO in power. Obama’s a shrewd politician who knows when he’s facing defeat. If he brings Hillary on board he may win re-election; but he knows the Clintons will force him out of office so they’ll be back in power. A real Hobbson’s choice!
However, if Hillary joins the ticket and Romney/Ryan is elected, the Clintons may be handed a defeat that will end their political viability.
However, mark my words, the Obamites are scheming to remain in office by some means if BHO loses the election; the first president not to simply pack bags, turn the Oval Office to the next president and go home. Bank on it!
Damn, Professor. I’ve heard the phrase “Ride through them, they’re demoralized as hell!”, but until now I didn’t know that entreaty came with the call to stop the horse and stomp them into the mush. Ouch!
Standard USMC Infantry assault tactics call for an “exploitation/pursue by fire” phase after over-running the Objective.
Reason being, if they fought to hold on to it in the first place, it might be important enough to them to try and immediately re-take it before youre settled in.
So, bayonet them while the’re down, and keep shooting as they run.
Because they might not (all) be dead (yet).
The deep problem now is how to help the vast regiments of disillusioned liberals.
The help would have to be dispensed in the form of self-service. But, it takes a crew to set up and maintain a self-service buffet, and that is largely empty in the Republican offering, and right now the buffet is poor, it’s missing several entrees and what is there is served cold.
It’s a prosaic thing to say, but the way to convert millions of pious miled souls is to expand the menu by talking about issues left untouched now:
Personal background: Mitt should offer ten years of tax returns in exchange for complete records from Columbia. Barack Hussein will dismiss that with a sneer, but at least five million votes would be gained overnight.
Education: the disastrous performance of educators in this country cannot be denied. Attack on our grand failure in the hypercritical field of human resource development, all the while noting the wealth-for-vote deal with the devil with the unions, and the history of proposed sad-sack education “reforms” deals they push every year.
Industry: if Gubmint Sachs and GM are too big to fail, then they’re too big to profit. Every man can understand that logic. Note in big speeches that the law was overthrown by a crooked judge who ruled over the political bankruptcy proceedings of GM and Chrysler, which somehow screwed corporate bondholders in a deal that shifted $25 billion in equity to the UAW, the socialist party’s most famous private sector voting bloc. This is another Deal with the Devil.
Law: hammer continually on the enumerated powers and the 10th Amendment, and that most of the federal gubmint is illegal, even holding a kind eye to the Commerce Clause. Beat on that federal employees are overpaid, unproductive… hell, they’ve become a middle upper caste, as have also members of public sector unions in most states (Illinois, Wisconsin, California, Maryland et al). This must be squared with our dying fisc, and with the ideal All Men Are Created Equal.
Foreign aid proclaim that upon election exactly $0.00 will be spent on foreign aid, including the IMF. When the globo-socialists squeal, Mitt and Paul must immediately demand that an accounting of how successful foreign has been for us. Shotgunning free money across the world while the U.S. taxpayer is suffering would be a highly charged subject. Keep asking about the $5 billion the State Dept. lost on that dearly departed wood pallet in Iraq. Could it be that the Moslems stole it? Just maybe.
Moslems except for where it comes to money, don’t say a bad word about Moslems. Just press the fact that we’re broke now and we’re tired of losing lives, legs, eyes, arms and hands to help set up Sharia states. Bud don’t dare criticize Sharia because: 1) the public isn’t ready for the horrible truth about Moslems, and 2) neither are Mitt and Paul.
Do these things and win the election. Win the election and the country is saved, at least for now.
So what you’re saying is that we’re screwed.
;^)
I find the easiest way to bring them around is to talk money. That is, if they have jobs and are not accepting various forms of welfare from the govt. There is NO getting through to those, but my self described “liberal” friends are very “conservative” when it comes to spending their money. lol I just bring up how much taxes the govt. keeps out of their checks and they jump right on that bandwagon! Then I tell them we have ‘common ground’. They love that. I’m not proud of manipulating them this way, but if I don’t do it someone else will. All’s fair in love and war right? We are at war and have been for awhile in this country.
That is, if they have jobs and are not accepting various forms of welfare from the govt. There is NO getting through to those…
To a bookie, this is the central variable of to make book on the campaign. If you’re right that they can’t be swayed because they too are engaged in a deal with the devil, the false promise of permanent free money, then Romney will probably lose. If that happens, the only hope left is winning control over both houses and putting a check on Prez Barack Hussein Duex. That would flush him out into still more open illegality (diktat), which might finally wake up the pigheaded among us.
The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.
- Margaret Thatcher
The main thing my liberal friends don’t seem to get is that you can’t tax income that doesn’t exist (or that you can’t find) and that you can’t force people to work harder just so they can pay more taxes. They built this system of entitlements that buys them votes so they can keep growing the programs to buy more votes. Watch California.
Try this one on them: “No nation ever taxed itself into prosperity.” Then watch their heads explode.
Then, a trick question: “To whom does your life belong?”
If the answer is, “to me, of course,” then the response is: “then why do your endorse people, policies and laws that claim precisely the opposite?”
Go a couple steps further
Ask them, if the government gives you a tax cut is the government giving you money, or are they just not taking the money which was yours to begin with? Simply, who does the money belong to you the citizen/laborer or the political class to buy votes.
And ask them why “The Stimulus” which funneled billions to Obama’s cronies supposedly to create jobs (and did not) is not called the true Tricke Down Economics. What is the theory behind the stimulus? Keeping more of your money to invest as you see fit is Trickle Down Economics, taking your money and giving it to cronies, is Stimulus.
People are so brain washed.
Folks, please remind people of the voting schedule for the Presidential election:
Republicans: Tuesday, November 6
Democrats: Wednesday, November 7
A service provided by People Capable of Critical Thinking (PCCT)
Tangential comment…. My wife the Math major (years ago) referred to R&R as R-squared. Nice, unintentional tie-in on her part to the whole “Paul Ryan represents Obama’s most horrifying nightmare: Math.” meme. QED.
“As I’ve noted in this space before, momentum towards Romney is mounting. Soon, I predict, it will be all but irresistible.”
Let’s hope so. But we can’t get cocky. As noted in “Bored of the Rings”:
“Fortune strums a mournful tune
For those whose campaigns peak too soon.”
Liberals, the illiberal liberals are called Progressives now, the regressive progressives, the lemmings who follow the brilliant foot-in-mouth teleprompted orator who leads from behind.
Need more pretzels?
According to Drudge, Hillary will not be on the ticket (told you Obama was shrewd…), and he’ll stick with Biden. Check out Rudy Giuliani’s take on Biden being unfit for the presidency (derangement) if he had to take over. Great asset for Republicans!
Hillary and Bill also kno what a disaster these 3 1/2 years have been, and what a debacle the next would be under Obama. If Hillary were Obama’s VP, and would share blame for the crisis we’d face by 2016, she’d have no chance of winning the presidency.
In fact, I’m surprised Bill isn’t out stumping for Romney right now!
Such fantasy on the part of conservatives.
Mistakes were made.
That comment about still letting liberals feel they are on the right side of the culture wars–a form of saving face–is important. I don’t bother talking to my lesbian friends about, say, gay marriage or gun control or (still) Iraq. That goes nowhere.
But I can talk to them about crony capitalism, Greece, and arithmetic. That conversation actually works, and allows them to still feel oh so superior to Tea Partiers. They might even stay home on election day.
Joseph RWII @ 18,
What’s with these Drudge-reported giant buys of ammunition by TSA, Ag Dept, SSA ??? Yeah. I’d say The Obamanos are leaning forward to a Presidentiariat For Life kind of accommodation for November 2012.
Woke up thinking that in the middle of the night. I’d barely noted the story with my conscious mind.
I haw having similar thoughts on this.
A> Preamble for a President-for-life bid.
B> Preparation for the possibility of social unrest/uprising ala what has happened in the Middle East.
C> Buying up all this ammo has the effect of creating a lack of supply in the civilian ammo market which will of necessity drive up retail prices. By making ammo unaffordable they will be doing a stealth run around the 2nd A.
Keep in mind that in A> and B> above, it matters little which Federal Agency has the ammo when the time comes. Moving the ammo from alphabet agency X to alphabet agency Y is just an exercise in bureaucratic slight of hand.
Oops — I kant spel. haw should be was.
I appreciate that the cowards were afraid of being called ‘racist’ and voted for the clown the first time, but please God, don’t let them show how STUPID they are, by voting for him again!
If you meet one of these fellow travelers you should console them with the following thoughts:
don’t worry about not finding a job or losing the one you have. you can settle down with food stamps and go on welfare for the rest of your life.
your social worker can help you apply for all kinds of benefits you haven’t even heard of.
its ok not to have much of a future, and to live on the work of other smarter people.
if Obamacare causes a shortage of doctors, you don’t need to see a doctor if you have a health problem there is no need to worry. its ok if you can only get to be seen by a nurse. a nurse should be good enough for your kind of person.
One waypoint for these disallusioned former liberals, who recognize that obamas far left economic policy is failing, but cant bear to join the same party that has those lowbrow socon culture warriers like Palin and Santorum, is to go libertarian, and vote for Gary Johnson. Libertarians have sound economics, but dont have all those socon positions that liberals really hate. Of course they never win, and are a bit too far out in some of their beleifs, but these people are so depressed they dont care about winning now anyway. And moving to Johnson is better from our point of view than voting for obama just out of fear of the socons. Libertarianism also has some chic with intelictuals and wont get the scorn in the faculty lounge that a full conservative will. The other advantage to this waypoint is libertarians can talk to regular conservatives without being totally alienated, and can even form cooalitions with them, since they at least agree on economics, and may learn to at least respect conservative socon beleifs, even if they cant yet agree with them. The other good thing is that it is a much shorter step to go from libertarian to tea party, since many tea partiers have libertarian leanings, and once they have made that step, they are ready to vote full repub.