Verbatim John Hinderaker, from a Power Line post titled "Why Is This Election Close?":
I am afraid the problem in this year's race is economic self-interest: we are perilously close to the point where 50% of our population cares more about the money it gets (or expects to get) from government than about the well-being of the nation as a whole. Throw in a few confused students, pro-abortion fanatics, etc., and you have a Democratic majority.Shorter Hinderaker:
Hey, American people, we think you're a bunch of leeches, bomb-throwers, and morons. Vote for us!The mask is really off here: If you look forward to getting Social Security and Medicare benefits, or unemployment benefits if you lose your job, or Pell grants if you want to go to college, you're contemptible. You're not American. Sink-or-swim is the American way.
This is exactly what liberalism has been accused of being since the days of Nixon: overreliant on big theories, condescending toward ordinary Americans who are skeptical of those theories. We can debate how much liberals ever really lived up to that stereotype, but the right sure sems to be living up to it now, and really might embrace it wholeheartedly if Romney loses.
7 comments:
The interesting thing here is, to me, the distinction drawn by the likes of Hinderaker et al. between a modest measure of economic safety net for those of us who in fact make up the vast majority of the population, on the one hand, and "the well-being of the nation as a whole", on the other. It's yet another example of the right's worshiping - or pretending to worship - an abstraction ("the nation as a whole", or as another rightist cultural wing once put it, "das Reich") at the expense of the very individuals and families who, in the aggregate, ARE the concrete, flesh-and-blood substance of the nation under discussion.
Heinie-licker should talk to people like me.
I'm 54, and I've worked since I was 14.
At first, part-time, doing some odds and ends in retail, like inventory.
Then, when I was 15, I worked 3 summers, full-time, at the machine shop my Father was a foreman at. And then, after I broke my collarbone in a HS wrestling match, ruining my Senior Baseball season, I found a job at Sears, where I stayed, mostly part-time, though occasionally full-time (like in the summers), through College.
After graduating from college, the longest I was ever out of work was for almost a month, back in 1991.
I NEVER collected a singe unemployment check in my life until a little over 2 years ago - and that's only because I can't tend bar anymore because of my leg, or be a bouncer, or waiter, or any of the other gig's I had in between corporate jobs.
I've BEEN ready, willing, and able to work.
I even took a part-time job for minimum wage at a K-Mart, working in customer service 3 years ago - but I couldn't stand for long periods of time, so I had to quit after less than a week.
I've applied for hundreds and hundreds of jobs over the last few years, with NO interest - companies just don't seem interested in hiring us 50+ year-olds, even if we have years and years of business experience.
So, what am I supposed to do, Mr. Heinie-licker?
Ask my dead Father, and 80 year-old, SS depedent Mother, for a loan to start a business?
I'm now waiting for the first Welfare - sorry, TEMPORARY ASSISTANCE - check in my families history.
And I do feel bad about that.
But it's not for lack of effort at finding a job.
And besides, I'm been paying INTO the system for over 40 years, so I'm not embarrassed.
People like Mr. Heinie N. Sphincter-licker should be ashamed of lumping people into categories.
Why, if a Liberal did that, he/she might think ALL Conservatives are unempathetic racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, and/or homophic, assholes.
Oh, wait...
And in Hind-Raker's world the several Walton heirs having as much wealth as the bottom 40% of the population (as an example) has nothing to do w/ anything.
For a bootlick like Hinderaker, the various Waltons and Kochs having all the money/power IS a sign of a healthy nation.
In what way do Republicans demonstrate that they care for "the nation as a whole"? I don't even know what he could possibly be referring to. The fundamental belief of every Republican is that he pays too much in taxes. That's what makes him a Republican. It's an ethos of undiluted selfishness and individualism. Typically, they're proud of that. There is zero basis for a Republican attempting to claim the public good as a cornerstone belief. It flies in the face of everything they do and say.
First time the rat bastard has ever told the truth - "we think you're all a bunch of idiots."
Of course, considering the population of bare-footed Ambien, Prozac, Viagra and crotch-shots on CNN/Fox Kool-Aid drinkers out there, he's not that far off the mark.
And yet your Grandma may buy this.
She may know full well the Republicans want to cut her Social Security and Medicare along with food stamps, Medicaid, CHIP, Obamacare, and all the rest.
And when you call her on it she will shrug and say, "Well, it's for the good of the country."
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