A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Here is the liberal pundit Bill Press, in a widely circulated quote that offers a good window into the modern liberal mind. He is outraged about Obama’s sinking polls:
I think this says more about the American people than it does about President Obama. I think it just shows once again that the American people are spoiled. Basically, spoiled-- as a people, we are too critical. We are quick to rush to judgment, we are too negative, we are too impatient. Especially impatient. We want it all solved yesterday, and if you don't, I don't care who you are -- get out of the way.
And again, basically spoiled. To the point where it makes me wonder if it's even possible to govern today. I gotta tell you, I don't think Abraham Lincoln -- who certainly didn't get everything right the first time -- could govern today.
Appreciate the progressive themes here:
1) Condescension: We are “spoiled”—meaning the less sophisticated outside of Georgetown cannot appreciate the Obama godhead: apparently near 10% unemployment, apologizing to thugs abroad, a $1.7 trillion annual deficit, socialized medicine and a constant barrage of unhinged advice from cabinet members and appointees (e.g. California farms will blow away, we are a nation of “cowards”, Mao is a hero, Bush was in on 9/11, NASA’s formost mission is to make Muslims feel good, check in with the Dept of Labor, “documented or not”, etc.) should by now have made us less spoiled.
2) Hypocrisy: “we are too negative, we are too impatient. Especially impatient.” I have a suspicion that Press did not object to Nicholson Baker's slightly negative Knopf novel imagining the assassination of George Bush, or the Toronto Film Festival award winning, somewhat critical, “docudrama” of the same theme of killing the president, much less the assorted outbursts of Al Gore (“digital brownshirts”), Jimmy Carter, and Harry Reid. Remember that even the old icon John Glen finally got in on the smearing with his, "It's the old Hitler business." Press should read Thucydides's description of Corcyra to learn of the folly of destroying social institutions when on the outside and then suddenly lamenting their yearned-for absence when on the inside.
3) Historical ignorance: “I gotta tell you, I don't think Abraham Lincoln -- who certainly didn't get everything right the first time -- could govern today.”
Hmmm. Is this the same Lincoln, who, by mid-1864 (after more than 3 years in office), was called a baboon almost daily; whose Sec. of Treasury was scheming for his job and would have to resign; whom Gen. George McClellan was assuring the country was unfit for the Presidency; whom John C. Fremont serially slandered, and who was smeared daily by Horace Greeley, James Gordon Bennet, and Manton Marble of the New York daily newspapers; who was vilified by a growing Copperhead movement; who asked his cabinet to sign resignation letters in expectation of a crushing defeat in November; and who was the object of several foiled and abandonded kidnapping and assassination plots until the final one worked? In truth, what Obama so far has put up with is about a tenth of what Bush went through by 2007, and a hundredth of the abuse that Lincoln endured and overcame.
4) Naïveté: Apparently Obamites thought that 300 million Americans were supposed to give a blank check to this administration, by staying mesmerized by the “this is our moment” and “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for” banalities. This outburst simply highlights the now sudden anger at the once good things like filibusters, and the suddenly good things that used to cause anger like recess appointments; but then we live in an age when Guantanamo is virtually closed and yesterday’s airborne “terrorism” is today’s stepped up necessary targeted assassinations. One wonders not that the left wants it both ways, but that they seem to be shocked that others note that they do.
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Comments :
Jun '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Bill Clinton, as someone I don't remember once said, was the America's first "Black" president. Barack Obama is America's first affirmative action president. To sum Bill Press up we can turn to a quote from Bertold Brecht, "it's time to elect a new people." The only question left is should there be term limits on the people? Mr. Press seems to think there should be.
Jun '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
The only spoiled child here is the federal government. They're the ones spending their allowance before they get it.
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
What's amazing is that we're already here. Press has blasted past the usual "it's the voters' fault" zone (which by my political clock should have lasted until after the midterns) and has gone directly into the latter-days-of-Jimmy-Carter-zone -- "the country is ungovernable and we need to change the Constitution!"
I didn't expect this kind of thing for another year, at least. Wow. They must really be rattled.
Jul '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
None of the liberal pundits seem to actually get what is going on here. We as a nation are not impatient or ignorant. We are instead furious that we were sold a specious bill of goods by a con man.
It is not that we think the problem is that we are not moving quickly enough to progressive utopia. We are dumbfounded that we are being jerked around by a bunch of radicals.
President Obama was elected in large part because he seemed to represent a break from the corrupt and sclerotic Washington Way. Press and the rest just do not seem to understand that we the people are as jilted lovers, scorned, spurned and very, very angry.
Jun '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Frank Meyer, one of the early greats of National Review, also wrote about the spoiled child, but had a very different take on it than the liberal Mr. Press. This is from In Defense of Freedom and Related Essays.
“[Modern man] expects redemption to be of easy attainment. Only these facts can explain the spoiled-child syndrome of the urban masses. The scientists have given him the impression that there is nothing he cannot know, and the false propagandists have told him there is nothing he cannot have. . . . The spoiled child has not been made to see the relationship between effort and reward.”
The spoiled child is not the one who questions or demands that government be accountable--rather, he's the child of the nanny state, whose self-esteem has no bounds, and who wants to just get in line for his state-provided goodies.
Jul '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
I was afraid from the beginning that as a people we would fall short and be found unworthy of Obama.
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Patrick makes an important point that many of us overlook, perhaps because we saw through the President from the start: Obama campaigned as a centrist. He advertised himself as a transcendent figure: post-racial, beyond ideology, listening to good ideas from Republican and Democrat alike. He was lying, of course -- Americans won't knowingly vote for Marxism. Now, to paraphrase the President's spiritual mentor, Obama's chickens are coming home . . . to roost.
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
This mindset is quite venerable and should not have surprised anybody - not that somebody shouldn't keep exposing it to educate the new generations over and over.
After the 1953 popular uprising in GDR was brutally dealt with, a party boss (Walter Ulbricht?) declared: "The Government is disappointed in the people" or something to this effect. Unfortunately, I heard a similar sentiment from a veteran Israeli Labor Party bigwig Itzhak Ben Aharon in his TV punditry about the historic Likud election victory in 1977: "This nation does not deserve a better government..."
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Channeling X, greta Ricochet interviewee Tim Pawlenty said today "Americans have sacrificed enough; it’s time for government to sacrifice for a change. When Washington Democrats talk about balancing the budget, they speak gravely about painful choices and sacrifice — but what they mean is tax increases. In other words, we sacrifice so they can spend. Before we ask taxpayers to make “painful choices,” we need to ask the politicians and bureaucrats to make a few first."
Now while Bill Press may be insufferable, that doesn't mean he is original. The whole "America is ungovernable" meme has been around for a while. Perhaps we intemperate rabble are noisy, but not unruly. Perhaps there is an easier answer, one that Press (and THE press) don't want to contemplate...that answer is "America is not ungovernable. Her President has simply not been up to the job."
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Sorry, first lien should have said "Channeling etoiledunord, great Ricochet interviewee..." I shouldn't have had that homebrew IPA before commenting...
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
To paraphrase Press, I think this article says more about Bill Press than it says about the American people.
VDH has been pointing out Obama's blunders as they happen, and the list is way past what anyone but a dyed-in-the-wool leftist could have the patience for at this point. I wonder to what extent Bush's poll numbers, at their lowest, were the result of a "spoiled" electorate...
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Do I detect a note of panic in the controllers of the official narrative?
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
Bravo Dr Hanson.
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
This is old hat. The left has been telling us several things for years and one is that if the right people were put into charge and enough of them Socialisim will work and two that when we are being dragged down the Road to Serfdom we should be grateful for it. And when we aren't then we must be a bunch of knuckle dragging mouth breathers. Again VDH, you are the reason I know I must still study.
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
What amazes me is that the voice that reflects the fundamental common sense of the American people is managing to get itself heard despite the relentless efforts of the MSM to thwart, ignore, distort and lie as the progressives become increasingly more hysterical. The battle is not over of course; but it's inspiring to see this awakening of the American spirit.
Aug '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
tabula rasa: Frank Meyer, one of the early greats of National Review, also wrote about the spoiled child, but had a very different take on it than the liberal Mr. Press. This is from In Defense of Freedom and Related Essays.
“[Modern man] expects redemption to be of easy attainment. Only these facts can explain the spoiled-child syndrome of the urban masses. The scientists have given him the impression that there is nothing he cannot know, and the false propagandists have told him there is nothing he cannot have. . . . The spoiled child has not been made to see the relationship between effort and reward.”
The spoiled child is not the one who questions or demands that government be accountable--rather, he's the child of the nanny state, whose self-esteem has no bounds, and who wants to just get in line for his state-provided goodies. · Jul 14 at 10:07am
I once claimed liberals to be "arrested adolescents." Liberals now remind me of pre-adolescents complaining of the normal, healthy activities of toddlers as "misbehavior," as if to ingratiate themselves with adults whom they imagine to be their peers. Tip: the adults aren't buying it.
May '10
Re: A Window Into the Progressive Mind
VDH, I wish I was in a classroom with you as my professor right now.