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Conservative Tastes
In Our Bitter World
As our esteemed editor has pointed out, “the condition of our political discourse” today is worse than “rancorous” or “toxic” — it’s nonexistent.
As our esteemed editor, R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr., has recently pointed out, in the course of announcing the death of liberalism, “the condition of our political discourse” today is not just “rancorous” or “toxic” — as so many are wont to complain it is and as, more or less, it always has been — but “worse than that. It is nonexistent.” His prime example is the New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, one of three men to have won Nobel Prizes, the other two being Jimmy Carter and Al Gore, for not being George W. Bush — which would seem to be a greater distinction for President Bush than it is for any of them. Lately, Professor Krugman has been training his sights on Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, whose proposals for eliminating the alarmingly large and seemingly perpetual deficit between federal outgoings and federal incomings the Professor regards with Olympian contempt. The congressman is not just wrong, in his view, but so wrong that he must be either knave or fool to persist in such wrongness. So wrong that he (and those of us who think like him) are not worth the Professor’s arguing or engaging with, or even speaking to over a friendly luncheon repast. So wrong that, having made a spectacle of himself only three months previously by falsely blaming Republican incivility for the mayhem wrought in Tucson, Arizona, by a clearly deranged young man, the Professor was now himself crying “let’s not be civil” to Republicans.
Yet I think it would be a mistake to laugh at this Nobel Prize-winning economist as much as he deserves to be laughed at, since he stands for the broader trend that Mr. Tyrrell was indicating and that shows up more and more frequently not only on the op-ed pages of our major newspapers but wherever political dialogue would once have been expected to be carried on in a seemly and rational fashion: the trend, that is, to treat those with whom we disagree not just as intellectually but as morally befuddled. Thus, to cite just a few random examples, one columnist tells us that “the only possible humane response” to the terrorist prison at Guantanamo is the left-wing obsession with closing it down. Another insists that Robert E. Lee, a man who for more than a century has been much admired by friend and foe alike, “cannot be admired.” A prominent law firm with no scruples about defending terrorists withdraws from the defense of the Defense of Marriage Act for fear of being stigmatized and boycotted by the Puritans of the New Decency who consider marriage as it has been, minimally, understood since pre-historic times as “un-American” and, forsooth, “indefensible.”
Where do these strange and frightening certainties come from? Why do we emulate such rhetorical totalitarians today rather than those who are merely blessed with facility in reasoning or felicity in phrasing? In a handsome tribute to his friend Christopher Hitchens in the Guardian, Martin Amis recently wrote that he “is one of the most terrifying rhetoricians that the world has yet seen. Lenin used to boast that his objective, in debate, was not rebuttal and then refutation: it was the ‘destruction’ of his interlocutor. This isn’t Christopher’s policy — but it is his practice.” Fortunately, the rest of the article does not bear out this bizarre and characteristically hyperbolical compliment. Mr. Hitchens, at least on Mr. Amis’s own showing, turns out only to be a wit — which ought to be plenty enough for anyone engaged as a public controversialist — and not a Lenin after all. Yet Mr. Amis has put his finger on the sort of rhetorical style that is now most prized among our rhetoricians, who may not reduce their opponents to nullity but often act as if they have done so. In their own mind they are triumphant because, in a sense, the debate (such as it is) has taken place only in their own mind in the first place. What they have answered is not their opponents’ actual beliefs but what they have, by paraphrase and analogy, pretended they believe.
In short, reality itself has become multiple and proprietary. It’s now “my reality” or “your reality.” Instead of meaning “what we can agree on” the word has now come to mean “what I think” — since there is presumptively no longer anything, or anything important, that we can agree on. Nowadays, our critics, columnists, and pundits can no longer be content merely to offer us their opinions. They insist on laying down the law. What they think is now what we — at least if we are decent and reasonably intelligent people — must think as well, and not to think as they think is therefore tantamount to classing ourselves with the venal or the idiotic. In effect, they become propagandists for their version of reality, which is like the reality that we all used to share but with the characteristic distortions and distensions of ideology.
IN THE ABOLITION OF MAN, C. S. Lewis writes that what we call ideologies “all consist of fragments from the Tao” — the word by which he designates the moral tradition of the human race — “itself, arbitrarily wrenched from their context in the whole and then swollen to madness in their isolation, yet still owing to the Tao and to it alone such validity as they possess.” Thus ideologues of the left abstract certain virtues from the catalogue that we have inherited from traditional moral and religious thinking, virtues like compassion and generosity, and make them into the only virtues that matter. Thus does reality transform itself from an enormous, hard to understand and harder to live up to patrimony into a simple program of political action. Thus does it have the proprietary stamp put upon it. This has now become such a common rhetorical phenomenon that even we remaining traditionalists who want to retain as much as possible of what Philip Larkin called “that vast, moth-eaten musical brocade” of Christianity are accused of being ideologues who only wish to impose our version of reality upon our fellow creatures.
The irony of those who denounce our Christian inheritance in the name of some ideology or other is that theirs is even more an appeal to faith than that which they oppose. The faith of our fathers was held onto for a hundred generations in spite of dungeon, fire, and sword; that of their successors rarely outlives the rival theorists and ideologues themselves. And even where it does so, as in the case of Karl Marx, its theories are subject to endless modifications and revisions by the heirs of the prophet who must try to adapt them to changing intellectual fashions. Belief is required in both cases, but it seems to me much more difficult to sustain in the second than in the first.
A further irony is that, as competing realities jostle each other in the marketplace of ideas, the idea of reality itself is devalued. When our public moralists of the op-ed pages confidently announce that theirs is the only way of looking at things, no one takes them seriously except for those who already agree with them and share their outlook on reality. Even they must be dimly aware of the price to be paid for their confident assertions of omniscience. But just as they must close their eyes to inconvenient realities that do not fit their theories, so they must close their eyes to their own loss of credibility outside their ever more tightly described intellectual circles. This is the state of rhetorical affairs that has reduced public debate in the media and among politicians to its current pitiable state, symbolized by the public prominence of Paul Krugman.
But the greatest irony of all may be that people’s awareness of the unreality of contemporary “realities” may lead to a comeback for reality itself, or, as it once was known, nature. As Horace put it: Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque revenit or: you can heave nature out with a pitchfork, and yet she will come back again. That is what the Danish director Susanne Bier shows us happening in her brilliant film, In a Better World. The title represents a toning down of the bitter irony in the Danish Hævnen, which is a double allusion to the ideological utopianism with which the main body of the film plays and which it mercilessly exposes and the Christian doctrine of the afterlife that such utopianism attempts to displace. In the film’s interlinked stories of a compassionate doctor treating the poor in Africa, his son being bullied at school back in Denmark, and another boy who has lost his mother, we encounter again and again Mr. Tyrrell’s moribund liberalism in the form of cant about what in America would be called “the cycle of violence” — and again and again it is shown to be sadly inadequate to the reality that is real and not just what liberal ideologues want to believe. See it if you don’t see anything else this year.
About the Author
James Bowman, our movie and culture critic, is a resident scholar at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He is the author of Honor: A History and Media Madness: The Corruption of Our Political Culture, both published by Encounter Books.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (28) | Leave a comment
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drudge ette obama| 6.28.11 @ 6:19AM
It is standard operating procedure for the personal destruction teams to hit the airwaves and printing presses as soon as someone with a sound conservative idea comes public and is greeted with approval.
Then the Lenin slash and burn begins.
I, too, have seen this scenario repeat itself in the press.
I think it is more the lazy nature of the media mouthpieces who repeat-repeat-repeat verbatim whatever the first source of destruction states.
The source should be identified, then aired out like moldy linens. There is always a source and he plans and designs, then disperses his orders.
What happened to Paul Ryan and Herman Cain last week is now happening to Michelle Bachman. But their ideas can rise above the concerted media assault, so success will rely on persistence.
Gary| 6.28.11 @ 9:07AM
This is a perfect description of one of their favorite tactics. But, as the article states and what life has taught us, reality has a way of continually rising to the top.
Nowadays, reality isn't just something people talk about, it's something people actual feel, and worse, fear. As a friend of mine said, "Everyone is scared sh_ _ less." Why, because there is NO MORE MONEY! The game is over.
Everything some empty-headed liberal croaks about some "critical" program, the response should be, "That's nice, but there is NO MORE MONEY! Your buddies in DC have stolen it all. There is nothing left."
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Skip the talk about conflicting realities. There is only One. Krugman and co. refuse to grow up. So mote it be.The gods of the copybook headings with terror and slaughter return.That is all.
Appleby| 6.28.11 @ 7:20AM
Back in the days before telemetry told the tale, my Daddy the stock car driver said that the first thing you do when you wreck is jump out of the car and start yelling your version of what happened. The first thing people hear is what they are convinced they saw.
Drunken Sailor| 6.28.11 @ 12:07PM
Ahhh the good old "who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes" theory. The Democrats love that one.
Bob K.| 6.28.11 @ 8:56AM
Ignore them.
That is what Reagan did and it reduced their superior blatherings to blitherings.
Lenin is ignored today by those who count. And they were the Russians who lived under his ideas before they walked away from them in 1989.
Gary| 6.28.11 @ 10:17AM
Bob K.,
"Walking away..." Sounds wonderful. How do we walk away from DC in 2011? I think the states will lead the way. When individuals try it they get shot in their living rooms at 3am.
Would I would really to see is several states mount a coordinated response on a specific DC policy. For example, the anti-pat down legislation in TX. Imagine if several states did this simultaneously. Can DC threaten a no-fly zone over several states? I'd like to see them try that.
Bob K.| 6.28.11 @ 10:57AM
Gary,
If you please, I am talking about ignoring these social and political philosophers and the economists who follow them and refusing to get into "intellectual" arguments with them like Bowman and Tyrrell do here. The A.S. is a Journal of Political Opinion, not Political and Economic Philosophy. It is enough to say to them in effect, "You people are idiots. History has proven you to be wrong and you belong on it's ash heaps. This is the way it is done. And these are the people we support." Period.
Stay focused on the message like Reagan did. Change can't come politically until power arrives with it.
Otherwise we will be waiting for 70 years like the Russians did and like them using the inertia of disbelief in the government and refusal to cooperate to bring this whole soul destroying edifice down.
Gary| 6.28.11 @ 11:37AM
Bob K.,
Good point. Someone was accused here for ranting instead of citing facts. I believe ranting is entirely appropriate here, as these wars of competing facts are too often distracting. Bedrock issues are point, not the thousands of accompanying facts swirling around.
As you suggest, here's a strong opinion of mine: The politicians in DC have reduced our liberty to a fraction of what's guaranteed to us and they've stolen all the money. There is NO MORE MONEY.
So, here's my question: What are we going to do about that? Kicking the can is not a valid answer.
As said earlier on this site yesterday, tomorrow is here. It's face-the-music time. We can use our intellect to argue the fine points of that, or we can get emotional about it, get the pitchforks and torches out and run the bastards out of town. Now is the time for extreme anger, not civil debate.
A smart Republican candidate will tap into our pent-up anger. The Democrat/press machine keeps steering us back toward moderation because they know down deep they can not defend themselves against extreme voter anger. They aways back down when faced with it.
henry| 6.28.11 @ 9:02AM
The art of rational debate is lost. The trick is to label your opponent. The most devastating labels are: racist, homophobe, bigot and fundamentalist. There are of course many more, but the use of such an epithet terminates any further debate.
Thus, for instance, in the abortion debate you are either pro life or pro choice. There is no further discussion. Same for evolution, social welfare, gay marriage and so on.
I hope whoever the GOP finally nominates is aware of this tactic and has a workable strategy to deal with it. Logic and facts have no place in this discourse.
PolishKnight| 6.28.11 @ 10:28AM
What's funny, Henry, is that the left regularly engages in those behaviors. They use a homophobic slur to bash Tea Partiers, they bash whites for political gain, they use terms such as "single payer" to describe a marxist agenda in fundamental terms, and finally they refuse to consider free market ideas.
Diana | 6.28.11 @ 9:07AM
What a fantastic read... just wanted to thank you for a thoughtful piece that is solidifying my understanding of today's rhetorical environment.
Von Mises Jr.| 6.28.11 @ 9:07AM
Von Mises "Socialism" explodes the thoeories of Marx that were also indefensible in their day. Inability to calculate, class struggle instead of a world of individuals, caste-like society of past fuedalism, and unexplained progressions could not be defended. So Marx demonized his critics. It is a flawed strategy of "Ad Hominem" attacks to defend an irrational fatalistic philosophy.
Petronius| 6.28.11 @ 9:11AM
Skip the talk about conflicting realities. There is only One. Krugman and co. refuse to grow up. So mote it be.
The gods of the copybook headings with terror and slaughter return.
That is all.
Occam's Tool| 6.28.11 @ 1:22PM
Indeed, the Gods of The Copybook headings---note the birthrates in Europe. Kipling was, as usual, correct.
Jim| 6.28.11 @ 9:18AM
But aren't you doing just what you decry? Aren't you engaging your would-be interlocutors on the level of morality, claiming they are deluded, dismissive, proud, and close-minded? By implication you likened them to rhetorical little Lenins.
I think you are right, but I don't think that the moral indictment of interlocutors is a failure of communication. You're doing it right now.
I agree that many like Krugman pretend to debate when in truth they are propagandists. Alas. But just because a pundit accuses someone of immorality does not in any way mean they are failing to debate or communicate with you.
You should accuse even your best friends of moral failures for their betterment, shouldn't you. The Victorian moral agnosticism that praises kings who take concubines...that is the facsimile of healthy public discourse. And it is the short road from there to here.
And yes, I think you lack a virtue on this score, maybe two. But so what? That is always implied when you disagree with someone, right? It is always implied that someone is imprudent and/or ignorant when you disagree with them. Isn't prudence part of one's moral content?
Anthony| 6.28.11 @ 9:33AM
Krugman, Gore, RFK Jr., and many of the other acolytes of insane leftism, cannot engage in raional discussions, let alone debates, because it would expose them for the complete frauds that they are.
Hence, Gore will not debate any reputable scientist about the hoax of AGW, nor will he even allow the media at any of his talks.
Yes, so secure are these leftists, as long as the narrative is never allowed to be challenged, hence the great "non existent discourse", as stated by RET.
Krugman, Gore, RFK Jr., et al, can only operate in the hermetically sealed world of their fellow lefty travelers and will seldom venture out of it for fear of actually having to face reality.
I'll never forget the look on Krugman's face when he actually sat down with O'Reilly some years ago; his discomfort was such that he looked medicated, which he probably was.
The LSM operate in the same fashion and cover for their fellow frauds. They talk to each other, confirm each others cookie cutter beliefs and comments of the day, to insure the narrative is never challenged, and those who do engage in such challenges are pilloried and demeaned. Rush is great at highlighting this, with great humor.
The entire leftist establishment rests on this fragil arrangement, which is why leftism is indeed a mental disorder. One crack, and it all falls apart.
Occam's Tool| 6.28.11 @ 1:30PM
What I love is taking people out of their area of expertise and expecting their brilliance to shine in many fields. For some it does (Jefferson), but they are the rarities.
Krugman's area is patterns of international trade and distribution of wealth. Nice. But it makes him no expert on military interventions. I can stabilize psychotics so severe that they are walking naked in sub zero weather in Minnesota in Winter within 72 hours. But I am NOT the guy to discuss your house's plumbing with. The difference between Krugman and myself is that I KNOW the limits of my knowledge.
Paul insists on making a fool of himself over and over.
Anthony| 6.28.11 @ 2:18PM
.... you missed a few Occam's..... there are a number of psychotics still roaming the earth in dire need of drug stabilization.
Come to think of it, I like the idea of you having them walk naked in sub zero Minn weather.
I see a noble quest in your future, for the sake of America.
We'll do our part and bury the bodies after the thaw.
Dave L| 6.28.11 @ 11:13AM
When we fix other people and/or their opinions, we end up getting ourselves at least a little smudged, and this is preaching to the choir, but the question is, who is the fool, and what is the right response?:
"As snow in summer, and as rain in harvest, so honor is not seemly for a fool. As the bird by wandering, as the swallow by flying, so the curse causeless shall not come.
"A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool's back. Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit.
"He that sends a message by the hand of a fool cuts off the feet, and drinks damage. The legs of the lame are not equal: so is a parable in the mouth of fools. As a thorn goes up into the hand of a drunkard, so is a parable in the mouth of fools.
"As he that binds a stone in a sling, so is he that gives honor to a fool. The great God that formed all things both rewards the fool, and rewards transgressors. As a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool returns to his folly."
Albert| 6.28.11 @ 11:30AM
That the leftists in power would create for themselves an esoteric "reality" and impose it on the rest of society by the arrogance of their rote rhetoric, is hardly surprising. The self styled "elites" of power have always lived in the esoterica of their own minds, with scant regard for what really happens in the World.
I remember reading the Venerable Bede in college, who in one passage wrote of a particular person being elected Consul in Rome. This was 250 years after Odoacer deposed Romulus Agustulus and formally ended the Western Roman Empire. Roman Patricians apparently didn't get the memo, and depsite the City being repeatedly sacked, and formal Imperial government deposed, the old Republican forms and offices kept going, with noble families vying for election to high office. That such officers had little real power was irrelevant. What was important TO THEM, was the prestige of high office brought to the elected official and his family, while all around them Roman society and economics were in shambles. In like manner, Krugman et.al. just spout off their musings without regard to empirical findings or objective facts, while the policies of their heroes in government degrade society and economic prosperity. All that is important to such people is self, ego, prestige, and the recognition and confirmation of others within the pseudo-intellectual confines of their esoteric little world.
David T| 6.28.11 @ 11:44AM
In our postmodern world, truth is "relative" and subjective. When there are no agreed-upon values or standards, power becomes the final arbiter of what's "right."
CalMark| 6.28.11 @ 12:40PM
For decades, Republicans have apologized profusely, or at least cowered defensively, when some vicious liberal hack (but I repeat myself) savages them for insufficient faithfulness to the ideals of Father Stalin. The GOP also enables Leninist brutality by chiding "both sides" when the liberals are so egregiously vicious that not even their most faithful media sycophants can cover it up.
If only Republican more politicians resembled Limbaugh and Palin, who know what they believe, and stand up for it without apologizing. Instead, most of them channel John McCain, fawning on the enemy while apologizing for--often condemning--people on their side of the aisle.
Liberals are mindless, unprincipled zealots; giving them a pass for bad behavior, as opposed to a sane person, has far worse, longer-lasting consequences. They've been getting that pass since Hoover and his pathetic "me too [for leftism]" Republicans. No wonder discourse is dead: Republicans have been happily condemning conservatives while allowing hateful leftist zealots run amok for more than 80 years.
TrueBlue| 6.28.11 @ 4:16PM
Unfortunately the people that keep voting those Repubs into office are just as at fault.
CalMark| 6.28.11 @ 4:23PM
Very true.
The problem is it's very hard to throw out these spineless incumbents, and the GOP (unlike the Democrats, who welcome new, young "unconnected" members) are set up purposely to keep the Old Boys in power and repel new blood.
Hopefully the Tea Party movement will continue to make inroads into ending the careers of the "go along to get along" Republicans.
Bob K.| 6.28.11 @ 6:28PM
If it doesn't work this time around then next time the Tea Party will become a 3rd Party.
weddingdresses | 6.29.11 @ 5:26AM
It is standard operating procedure for the personal destruction teams to hit the airwaves and printing presses as soon as someone with a sound conservative idea comes public and is greeted with approval.
Kent Clizbe | 6.30.11 @ 1:29PM
Mr. Bowman,
You've nearly stumbled upon the truth behind the Politically Correct-Progressive point of view.
The anti-American, anti-capitalist, anti-normal attitude and belief system that is the basis of American PC-Progressives' political platform is a direct result of a covert influence campaign directed by Lenin.
The mastermind of the implementation of Lenin's operation was Willi Muenzenberg, a German genius of influence and propaganda.
Muenzenberg's operation targeted American academia and eduction, Hollywood and the media. The American covert influence agents he recruited inserted the "payload" that grew to become PC-Progressivism.
My new book, "Willing Accomplices: How KGB covert influence agents created Political Correctness, Obama's hate-America-first political platform, and destroyed America" provides full details. I include counter-intelligence investigation and analysis of one covert agent in each of the above-mentioned domains.
I'd be happy to send you a review copy.
Kent Clizbe
www.willingaccomplices.com
kent@kentclizbe.com