Pacific Views

A House Divided

Noam Chomsky. Ralph Nader. Joe Lieberman. Eggs at the ready... set... go! Feel better? Good. Now we can talk.

If there's anything history shows, it's that you can follow that phrase with absolutely anything and get people to nod along for at least a second or two. But seriously, a dominant theme of human behavior is that if you're organized, determined, and stick together, humans can accomplish just about anything. Including the utter defeat of a divided, poorly organized, and unprepared opposition.

In our current political situation, those organized, stick-together people would be the conservatives. Which is ironic, because they've ridden to power on a doctrine of 'every man for himself,' while being sensible enough never to practice it. However the 'one for all, and all for one' liberals, who claim to believe that social good can be accomplished by everyone helping each other, have refused time and again to help each other.

Get Over It

Take the 2000 election. Many of the Democrats who've taken the conservative advice to 'get over it' have only applied that advice to Republicans. Yes, they say, the election was stolen. Nader did it.

I don't have an online reference for that sentiment, though I'm sure there are loads. In fact, I heard this complaint in person at the headquarters of the WA state Democratic party. Two people worried about winning the next election, still ticked off about the last one, and focusing their wrath on the heretic instead of the infidel.

What do I think about Nader? Formerly great consumer advocate, I'm not voting for him on any upcoming tickets, and I'm bored silly of the whole thing. When Bush Sr. lost to Clinton, Republicans didn't spend the Clinton years fulminating about that no-good-sumbitch Ross Perot. They pulled together a guiding rationale, a unified movement that included the Perotistas, and a media megaphone that can take on all comers.

The problem with attacking Nader personally is that, as with any political debate, to attack someone's candidate can feel like an attack on them personally. Why do we identify so much with people we've never met? Take things said about them as though they were a direct reflection on ourselves? Who knows, but all of us are prone to it.

In a highly ideal driven movement like the Greens, any given Green you meet has a better than average chance of taking a sweeping judgement about Nader and the Green party as a personal attack. And who benefits from that, in the end? I'd like to get those people to join up and add more voices for change from within, and it won't happen as long as they feel like they're being personally blamed for Bush.

Maybe Democrats don't relate because if you criticize the Democratic party, or a particular Democrat, odds are you're more likely to get a 'you and me both.' That's not very productive either. But more on that in a minute.

The often purely emotional argument on the topic can be summed up as follows: "Nader is a Republican Shill vs. He's The Best Public Servant Ever."

You Hate America

A certain class of otherwise, and sometimes eminently, sensible liberal leaning person responds indirectly to the America hating charge by pouncing on perennial whipping boy Noam Chomsky. We can't hate America, they seem to be suggesting, because we've criticized him more than you have. Or someone like him, and it doesn't really matter who.

At this point, the liberal making the argument has lost. Not because Chomsky is right, but because the implied criticism has been accepted. It isn't enough that a leftist critique of US policy simply be wrong, or just disagreed with on merits, and set aside if so. In fact, a near ritual denunciation is required. The manner and context accept the deeper criticism that leftist critique amounts to hating America, and further, that such arguments made by any leftist speak for all of us as a default state.

Name a conservative that spends as much vitriol on other conservative authors and academics as many moderate liberals spend on Chomsky. There may be a handful, if you were to look. But with liberals, it's probably easier to count the people who don't reflexively bash 'radical leftists' before any conservative even gets a chance to start in.

None of us have to apologize for Chomsky. He isn't leading a guerilla movement to subvert the country by force, nor has he used legalistic chicanery to cram an agenda down our throats. He's never purported to be infallible, the head of our party, or required reading for those who don't like him. He probably isn't your employee, related to you, or your personal chum. Most Americans barely know who he is.

Anyone agressively asking for your opinion on the matter doesn't actually care about the answer, or the issues, anyway. They just want to sidetrack you into a pointless theological debate. "Chomsky is the Devil vs. His Lips to God's Ears."

Not A Real Liberal

I've been guilty of this one myself. And in the current presidential candidate crop, Joe Lieberman is the guy progressives love to hate. But as the infamous SelectSmart points out, Lieberman isn't actually a Republican. This may come as a shock to some of us, but there it is.

There are things I disagree with him about, but you know, still better in just about every way than Bush. I've said many times before that if he won the nomination, I wouldn't vote for him. But thinking more about the subject, I take it back, I was wrong. I tender a full and utter retraction.

I hope he doesn't win the primary. I'll work to give someone else that edge, but when push comes to shove, I'm voting for The Democrat. Whoever that person is will get my help, my contributions, my vote. And, because it's me, an earful of my complaints when I disagree and loads of unasked for opinions on the issues. As flawed as I think he is, he'll still be beholden to more groups I like than any Republican.

Unless a liberal gets caught doing something actually illegal, or blatantly hurtful, I guess they're okay by me.

Monty Python Reruns

I didn't come around to my liberal views for the fun of bashing the insufficiently pure of ideology. It wasn't so I could join a club where I liked everybody personally, presuming such a thing exists. But I've occasionally got sidetracked into the pointless entertainment that it provides, because you know, human beings are endlessly perverse.

The Liberal movement, while correctly reviling Joe McCarthy, seems to have internalized him. And I never expected that. But nobody expects the Liberal Inquisition.

"Right. You're in. Listen. The only people we hate more than the Romans are the [***]ing Judean People's Front. ...And the Judean Popular People's Front. ...And the People's Front of Judea."

"...We're the People's Front of Judea!" - Life of Brian, by Monty Python

Theological Debates

These arguments, for each of which I've chosen what I consider the most representative example, are theology in the end. The positions become articles of faith, and people have fun repeating them with the likeminded, and shouting them at the opposition.

These aren't the strategies that our opposition employs in their dealings with each other. They scratch each other's backs, and they save their knives for us. They don't write long apologias for Pat Buchanan, Jerry Falwell, Michael Savage, or Pat Robertson. Whatever their personal opinions, they don't insult their faithful, or shun their help.

I mean, do you believe that the WSJ editorial staff *really likes* Pat Robertson? It strains credulity.

The conservatives haven't lost sight of the big picture. They haven't lost sight of what they're trying to accomplish. And they haven't forgotten who they're supposed to be fighting. Have we?

Note: This is an expanded and much polished version of my comments in response to this post at Brad DeLong's site.