Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Progressives Don’t Like Poor People. They Just Hate Rich People.
First, my apologies. Like many of my physician colleagues, I’m struggling a bit with burnout. So, hopefully unlike many of my colleagues, I spend my Friday and Saturday nights drinking myself into oblivion. It helps, for a while – it really does. I feel better. Until the next morning. Thank God for bourbon. And coffee. All mostly harmless, except for my esteemed friends on Ricochet. You have to listen to my drunken ruminations. Sorry. Speaking of which:
I find it incredible that anyone can complain about modern medicine’s inefficiencies, complexity, and lack of personal touch – and then that person suggests that things would improve if only the government was more involved. My friends that can say such things without giggling are generally not fools. I don’t get it. Will concierge medicine be outlawed? Now that would help poor inner city lesbian single mothers! How can we make our military more effective? By staffing it with trans-gendered unionized government employees! How can we increase the GDP? By increasing regulations and alternative energy usage! How can we improve our system of higher education? By outlawing independent thought! How can we help unskilled workers enter the labor market? By banning jobs that produce less than $15 per hour!
I could go on and on, given enough bourbon. You probably could, too.
But I find the root motivations of such things endlessly fascinating. Progressives claim to be motivated by concern for the downtrodden and a desire to restore “true American ideals.” But most, if not nearly all, of their policies accomplish to opposite of their stated goals. Are they all stupid? No. So what gives?
I really think that most progressive policies are designed not to help the poor, but to punish the rich, and are based on nothing more idealistic than simple jealousy. They’re designed not to help anyone, but to hurt someone. Someone specific.
I think this is why progressives hate Trump so much. On the other hand, why do they love Kennedys? Mysterious are the ways of progressives.
Studying progressives since the 1960s, I wonder if anyone has a more – ahem – charitable view? Please enlighten me. Perhaps this will all make sense when I achieve an adequate serum concentration of bourbon…
Published in General
I don’t know. Their policies help create new rich, themselves, preserve old rich and expand the numbers of poor, keep them that way, and import more poor and try to keep them that way, so they must love the poor and love being rich. Protecting the old rich is what helps them become rich and prevents the new poor from becoming rich.
A quibble with your title: the Left hates poor people too. That’s the only way to explain their pursuit of policies that damage the poor through dependency and other forms of condescension.
They love humanity and they hate people? It’s that old joke actually correct?
The cause is never the cause; the only cause is the revolution. The flexibility to claim whatever purpose is currently in vogue can be very useful.
Not to disagree, because I don’t think we are saying different things, I might put it another way. Most on the Left have amassed large sums of wealth, so I don’t think it is right to say they hate the rich. They are rich. What they hate is the ability for individuals to rise in the economic stratosphere without their approval. They love power and the best display of power is to act as gate keeper for the upper class. That is why they crave political power. Only through government can they determine who makes it and who doesn’t. If you are making billions selling electric cars off of government subsidies then you are admitted. But if you make millions with no subsidies but use the tax code to keep as much of your earnings as possible in the oil business then you are marked for death.
Less, actually.
Nope. Adequate levels to understand progressives result in assumption of room temperature.
The left loves the poor. If it weren’t for the backs of the poor on which to stand, the left wouldn’t be able to lift Themselves up to look down on Us. Hence, Their policies.
Personally, I believe the progressive war is against God and God’s Kingdom. If God is just and wise and I believe He is . And you hate Him and His precepts. Then your goals would be contrary to God and his Kingdom. You would be about trying to create your own kingdom (Utopia) and creating your own precepts. Since God already used all the Just and Wise precepts. That leave’s you with unjust and unwise precepts. Full steam ahead !
English much?
I get what Yer saying, but, Man, with the fragments and such, I suspect You’ve had as much bourbon as the Dr.
I think Democrats love groups and look down on individuals. Republicans despise groups and love individuals.
That’s why I’m a Republican. :)
I wrote on this:
Thomas Sowell gives a more charitable take on the left’s ideas while still maintaining high levels of empirical rigor.
Listen to the first three minutes and you’ll be hooked.
The fundamental economic idea of the left is that the poor are poor because the rich are rich. There are many semi-left wing economists who know better but the base believes in a zero-sum economic system.
Not quite. The Left loves to use the poor. It’s not the same as loving the poor. At best they are indifferent to them. After seeing the effect of leftist policies on the poor, I’ve reluctantly come to the conclusion that some of the left hate the poor. How else can we explain their callous use of them to advance their political position even as they see the poor suffer under their policies. The best leftists are ignorant, perhaps willfully, of the damage they cause. The worst ones are aware but don’t care.
At best, the Left’s road to hell is paved with good intentions. At worst, it’s paved with contempt.
Actually, it’s worse than that. The Left prefers everyone to be poorer as long as everyone is equally poor. Better to bring everyone down. Margaret Thatcher explains:
Victims and oppressors. Stay thirsty my friend.
Progressives take note.
They don’t see the poor suffer under Their policies. The poor are pawns for Their policies; power. If there were no poor, maybe there wouldn’t be a left.
I’m not so sure they hate the rich so much as they think there shouldn’t be any. Except themselves, of course.
Last October, Fr.George Rutler greatly clarified things, (for me at least) by stating: “In this presidential election, we cannot be indifferent – one side is flawed, but the other is EVIL”.
What he was talking about was not the individual candidates but the two parties. As evidence he goes on to describe the work of the party that is, well, EVIL :
Our federal government has intimidated religious orders and churches, challenging religious freedom. The institution of the family has been re-defined, and sexual identity has been Gnosticized to the point of mocking biology. Assisted suicide is spreading, abortions since 1973 have reached a total equal to the population of Italy, and sexually transmitted diseases are at a record high. Objective journalism has died, justice has been corrupted, racial bitterness ruins cities, entertainment is degraded, knowledge of the liberal arts spirals downwards, and authentically Catholic universities have all but vanished. A weak and confused foreign policy has encouraged aggressor nations and terrorism, while metastasized immigration is destroying remnant western cultures, and genocide is slaughtering Christian populations. The cynical promise of economic prosperity is mocked by the lowest rate of labor participation in forty years, an unprecedented number of people on food stamps and welfare assistance, and the largest disparity in wealth in over a century.
Quite a list summed up pretty well – the party of Evil. Call it what it is. For Reagan“The Evil Empire” worked pretty well in ending the USSR.
Lets try it out. Ahem, “Transgendered people how incredibly high rates of suicide, depression and anxiety. The fact that these are so much higher than gays and other sexual minorities seems to suggest transgenderism might be destructive to the happiness of most people.
Serving the military is extremely demanding mentally and suicide rates are depressingly high among veterans. Thusly, to encourage transgenderism is bad as it makes people miserable. And to encourage them to join the military is evil.”
It doesn’t quite work for me. I prefer to argue about the policy rather than the person. Maybe the progressive person is deeply ignorant of everything rather than malicious.
You must distinguish between the leadership and the hapless victims who support them because they have been brainwashed by the media, schools peers. The first time I used the term evil was with the Marcos team and the cronies who helped keep them in power in the Philippines. They simply did not care about the consequences of their grasping extortion of the people. It was the total absence of concern and yet all of them seemed never to stop emoting on how they loved the people. And they may have had positive emotions about some abstraction called the Filipino people, but they did not care a whit that their schemes impoverished many many millions and killed hundreds. The Democratic leadership have every reason to know what the consequences have been of liberal policies and they do not care. Good intentions and ignorance is understandable, but after many decades of predicted results they have doubled down. Their policies enrich themselves and their cronies and harm millions. They know it and they don’t care because it works for them. This is how criminal enterprises work and they are a criminal enterprise. Think of the casual drug user. Is he evil? No but the complex multinational enterprise that brings the drug from the rain forest in Colombia to his nose is evil. It has to be it’s in the nature of the business.
@iwalton
I think you might be underestimating the incredibly unthinking nature of humanity. I think it is entirely people to be elected President of the United States without thinking about your beliefs and to be surrounded by people who never thought about those beliefs.
You and I have had this discussion before about Obama. You described useless elites brilliantly,
I find it completely feasible that the elites you spoke to never critiqued any of their beliefs. Why would it not be so the leadership of the Democratic Party or Jeremy Corbyn.
I won’t argue with that, we can’t know what’s in their heads. I was really making a wise crack in this thread, but not entirely, those who hold positions of power and use the kind of demagoguery we’re talking about know that they are saying things because it benefits them. They’re not just part of a mindless mob like their followers. They work their way up a variety of hierarchies and emerge as leaders because they’re good at what they do, flexible in their beliefs, and skilled at deceit. Like a drug lord by the time they get to the top they’r evil monsters, or only evil monsters who’re also clever get to the top. Democrat leaders egg on and go with the media frenzies even when they are opposite of their beliefs of the near past. They are moderns, there is no such thing as truth. They’re like a the man in the midst of seduction, he really does love that girl at that time. People driven by the emotion and interests of the moment are like that.
No matter how ‘rich’ everybody gets, the poor will be with us always. It is arguable that on a global scale, there are no ‘poor’ in the US, but it is always possible to define poverty to create a ‘poor’ class. Envy is basic and manipulable. Ergo: there will always be a Left.
I know. I’m depressing.
Stay Thirsty My Friends … indeed.
I’m depressed now.
My mind was fragmented from distraction when I made my post. Also, my English is self taught through reading as an adult rather than paying attention in class as a kid. One of my many regrets So when I write, it won’t be as elegant as yours. However I am glad I write well enough for you to understand my point.
English is my weakness . My strengths might amaze you. :)
To be fair, Republican elites seem as feckless and manipulative. Though their beliefs aren’t the problem. To paraphrase William F. Buckley, “The problem with leftism is leftism. To problem with conservatism is Republicans.”
Good point. However.
The purpose of the military is to kill people and break things. That is all. If you are unhelpful in that realm, they don’t need you. The purpose of the military is not to try out whatever Berkeley comes up with this week. This is why I don’t like affirmative action in medical schools. The job is too important. Go ahead and have affirmative action in social worker school or whatever, but not medical school. And for God’s sake, not the military.
The primary arguement I hear supporting the trans-gendered in the military is, “Why not?” My response is, “Why?”
By the way, @henrycastaigne, I forgot to mention that I agree with everything you said. Putting someone with poorly controlled emotional problems into COMBAT is not nice. To them, or to those they are working with. So I’m not arguing, I’m just taking a different angle.