Contrary Brin: How liberals hand victory to the neocons
David Brin has another one his amusingly (or sadly, I’m not sure which) accurate post posts on The Worst Habit of Liberalism… Handing Karl Rove Every Advantage, and how to reverse these lemming-like instincts that hand victory to the neocons.
— begin quote ———
“For 14 years and more, Rove & allies have bent all efforts toward maintaining a Big Tent coalition, uniting a melange of contradictory groups. With the sole aim of achieving and holding actual political power, they managed to wed together:
- Xenophobic-isolationists… and interventionist-adventurers.
- Free-marketers… and big government contract-parasites.
- Lifestyle libertarians… with bedroom-voyeur fundamentalists.
- Deficit hawks… and spendthrift pork barrel hogs.
- Snooty Straussian neocon eggheads…and proudly anti-intellectual know-nothings.
- Small business owners… with megacorp monopolists.
- Nativist border worriers… and exploiters of cheap, undocumented labor…
… and so on.
A great… nay incredible… morass of contradictions! How on Earth did they manage that? There is one simple answer. By getting every last one of these forces to call themselves “conservative.”
This Big Tent is THE SALIENT FACT about the neocon success story. Because they could never have achieved any power at all, without it…
Above all, the Rovean Big Tent policy has held to one utterly pragmatic principle, implicit in every word spouted from Hannity and O’Reilly and the entire machine.
“If you hold EVEN ONE “conservative” opinion, that makes you a conservative.”
In contrast, the reflex among liberals has been quite the opposite.
“If you fail to support EVEN ONE standard “liberal” opinion, that makes you a conservative.”
Yes, yes. I can well imagine bile igniting behind the eyes of some who just read that. If you are a “standard liberal” you may deem what I said (above) to be insulting. Indeed, did my saying it cause me to be instantly dismissed as… well… a conservative?
Won’t you try this little mental experiment yourself? Start by listing a dozen or so “standard liberal positions.” For example you expect a liberal to:
- oppose the Iraq War
- welcome immigrants
- support the undiluted right to abortion
- oppose Arctic or offshore drilling
- oppose nuclear power
- oppose tax cuts
- support gay marriage
… and so on.
If you don’t like my list, write one of your own! Make your own list of positions you deem important. I’ll wait.
Now try this. Imagine a person who holds all of the correct views except one. Suppose - on just that one issue - a person strongly takes the opposite view. Not quietly, but openly, and vigorously.
Now picture how that person would be received in most liberal gatherings. What name would they be called? If you are honest, you can immediately see my point.”
— end quote —–
