Four views of America (Left & Right) showing that we’re ripe for realignment

Summary: Understanding our time requires information, which the info superhighway delivers in excess, but also the much rarer perspective. Here are excerpts from four essays by keen observers that reveal much about today’s America. One from the Right, one from the Left, a Liberal, and a Conservative. Each tells us something. Perhaps most important, that Liberals and Conservatives have grown tired and stagnant. So new ideas and leaders Left and Right have begun to emerge, a familiar pattern in US history.

 

Contents

1. Matt Taibbi sees the humor in the far-Right’s rebels.
2. Mark Steyn sees Trump as a strange song in our farcical elections.
3. Heather Patton sneers. She doesn’t look, let alone see.
4. Another observer well-worth reading: P.J. O’Rourke.
5. For More Information.

These deserve to be read in full.

(1) Matt Taibbi sees the humor in the far-Right’s rebels

“The Dumb and the Restless” by Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone, 7 January 2016 — “Ammon Bundy and his band of weeping, self-pitying, gun-toting, wannabe-terrorist metrosexuals are America’s most ridiculous people.”

The opening is fantastic (no spoilers, read the essay). He follows this with some powerful insights.

First of all, when did it become OK for cowboys to cry in public? The coolest thing about the Gary Cooper-Clint Eastwood-James Coburn-Yul Brynner-style cowboys is that they never said a damned thing. They walked slow, asses sore from all that riding, and kept things to a syllable or two if they could manage it: “Whiskey.” “Bath.” “Draw.”

… Every time these people open their mouths, it’s comedy. Earlier this week Bundy gave an interview to CNN in which he tried to play up the “We come in peace” meme they’ve been pushing from the start. Like the “nobody’s wearing camo except the camo I’m wearing” line, “It’s a peaceful protest, except for the rifles which we won’t use unless we have to” is also high comedy, although not a single person in the group seems to realize it.

Bundy seems not to get this, however. He’s convinced that this will all get worked out, as soon as the federal government releases the Hammonds from prison (what is this, a list of demands from Hezbollah?) and hands over a healthy swath of federal land to private ranchers.

… these people are dangerous, but their ridiculousness is a huge part of who they are. … their boundless self-pity, their outrageous sense of entitlement and their slapstick incompetence as rebels and terrorists are absolutely ridiculous. Sure, it may not help, but how can we not laugh?

(2) Mark Steyn sees Trump as a strange song in our farcical elections

“Notes on a Phenomenon” by Mark Steyn, 9 January 2016. It has many interesting observations. Here are a few that I found of interest.

On Tuesday night, my daughter and her friends went down to Claremont, New Hampshire to see Donald Trump in action. … The reserved seating at the front of these events is usually held for the big donors. Trump has no donors, so there are no money guys who’ve paid for access hogging the best seats. Instead, they were taken by folks who’d been backing him the longest.

… He’s very good at this. … {It was} hilarious. … He has a natural comic timing. … I was listening to Obama’s gun-control photo-op at the White House … when he wants to get laughs, he knows how to do it. Trump’s is … looser and more freewheeling. … he doesn’t need writers, and scripted lines; he has a natural instinct for where the comedy lies. … some of the gags can be a little … mean-spirited.

… I think it would help if every member of the pundit class had to attend a Trump rally before cranking out the usual shtick about how he’s tapping into what Jeb called “angst and anger”. Yes, Trump supporters are indignant (and right to be) about the bipartisan cartel’s erasure of the southern border and their preference for unskilled Third World labor over their own citizenry, but “anger” is not the defining quality of a Trump night out. The candidate is clearly having the time of his life, and that’s infectious, which is why his supporters are having a good time, too. Had Mitt campaigned like this, he’d be president. But he had no ability to connect with voters.

… Karl Rove says that campaigning is all about the efficient use of the dwindling amount of time you have … But as a practical matter it’s led to the stilted robotic artificiality of the eternally on-message candidate – which is one of the things that normal people hate about politics. And Trump’s messages are so clear that he doesn’t have to “stay on” them. People get them instantly …

So much presidential politicking is now complete bollocks, as rote and meaningless as English panto or Chinese opera conventions. Trump doesn’t bother with any of that.

… It’s assumed by the GOP establishment that once the field narrows Trump will bump up against his natural ceiling. I think the opposite is true. …

(3) Heather Patton sneers. She doesn’t look, let alone see

“A right winger wraps his mind around Trump” by Heather Patton’s (“Digby”) at her website Hullabloo. Glenn Greenwald called her one of the “leading and most admired commentators” of the “Progressive blogosphere”. She has the full monty of Leftist delusions, that they’re opinion-makers for America. She posts a silly picture of Trump (above), as if these change any minds. She mocks, without even the pretense of understanding the sources of his popularity or why he’s bad (“fascist!”). She prints the full column, ignoring this at its end: “© 2016 Mark Steyn Enterprises (US) Inc. All rights reserved“.

Here is her analysis. She has managed to miss everything that Steyn said. If this is a “leading and admired” standard of vision on the Left, that explains America’s drift to the Right (e.g., clearer vision and thinking in service of their values).

I’ve replicated the whole thing here because you really need to read it. It fully shows the extent to which the right will go to rationalize their attraction to this no-fascist jerk. I give you Mark Steyn:  …

I like how he says “his fans” as if he isn’t so far in the tank he’s grown gills by the end of that endless paean to an undisciplined, shallow, nasty piece of work who is tapping into America’s dark id.  It’s all in good fun folks.  It’s just entertainment. Like Rush and Coulter. Except it’s not.

Essentially he’s saying that everyone’s so screwed now that they no longer even care about democracy, politics or government. Indeed, they don’t even care about themselves or their families. They’re just looking for a good laugh. Nihilism on acid. And if that’s the case, I guess Trump’s their man.

Why am I not laughing?

(4)  Another observer well-worth reading: P.J. O’Rourke

P. J. O’Rourke is the Right’s version of Will Rogers (although not in the same league). I found many of his books insightful and entertaining (the last I read was Parliament of Whores in 1991), humor mixed with trenchant observations. His does not hide his political beliefs, but does not hit the reader with them either.

I recommend reading Parliament. He gives considerable evidence, drawing a conclusion with which I agree. It probably is not what you will expect, but what America needs to hear.

As for his current views, his interview with CNN shows that he represents the out-of-touch old-white-guy GOP. He knows it, too. It’s as if he was auditioning for a part as supporting evidence in Parliament of Whores.

I was born and bred a republican. … I really do hate it with this immigration stuff. … I mean, everybody’s got to support me, soon.”

See some of his old-guy rants at the Daily Beast. Many of his comments are cogent, but they are divorced from the political concerns and passions of today, and lack a framework that applies to our current challenges. He shows why new ideas and new leaders have emerged from the far right, as they have so many times before.

(5) For More Information

If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. See all posts about this election, which might mark the start of a new era in America (for good or ill).

1. From August: The Donald Trump revolution, dismissed as all revolts are in the beginning.
2. Background: Scary lessons for America from pre-revolutionary France.
3. Donald Trump leads us back to the future, to the dark days of US history.
4. Two scary graphs about the rise of Donald. Fear fascism. Act now.
5. Look to the Left to see the force powering Trump and Carson.
6. The numbers about immigration that fuel Trump’s campaign.
7. New York shows how Democrat-run cities & states contribute to the rise of Trump.
8. Good news: we begin to see that we are sliding towards fascism.
9. Next phase of the Trump revolution: rise of the new populism.
10. Important: Trump’s hope: a recession might put him in the White House.
11. The four keys to a possible Trump victory.
12. New survey shows Trump’s support among Democrats.