I was browsing around the Salon.com website today and came across an interview with right wing strategist Richard Viguerie in which he said:
(W)e're going to focus on the conservative agenda, which is to reduce government. I don't know if we're going to abolish the [new Medicare] prescription drug benefit, but we'd like to. It's just an expansion of government. When government grows, individual liberties are reduced. We'd like to see oil and gas exploration increased in the continental United States. We want a constitutional amendment on marriage. We want the culture of life expanded -- that was one of the big issues that this election was fought over.
OK, let's take that in slow motion. They're going to R E D U C E G O V E R N M E N T ..... they're going to abolish the (pathetically useless) prescription drug benefit for seniors because W H E N G O V E R N M E N T G R O W S I N D I V I D U A L L I B E R T I E S A R E R E D U C E D. In the next breath, they say they are going to amend the US Constitution to restrict the civil liberties of gay people.
I keep remembering a line I heard on an old West Wing episode... the right wants to make government smaller... until it's just small enough to fit into our bedrooms.
I have to admit that launching a fundamentalist crusade to take over the country demonstrates a stunning lack of grounding in the laws and history of this nation, so lack of consistency on the part of the Xian right doesn't exactly surprise me. But I've rarely seen such a massive internal contradiction right in one single paragraph before.
Frankly, I just don't know where I am right now. I am still fighting impulses to move to ... Holland? Still angry with the "Christian" right, and yet still remembering the genuinely good and caring people I met in the South who would classify themselves as such.
I guess I'll flip back and forth for a while before figuring out where I fit and where I go from here to help change the course of this country.
Tell you one thing, though: I am not accepting the Monday-morning quarterbacking from people like David Brooks, who say we progressives are closed-minded because we don't understand the "Christian" right and blame them for this. (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/06/opinion/06brooks.html)
As a progressive, I am perfectly willing to live and let live. If they want to believe God created the world in seven days, fine. But I am not willing to host their cockamamie views and bigotries in the public sector. We must have separation of church and state.
No matter what: We have our work cut out for us.
Posted by: Gina | 06 November 2004 at 05:48 PM
Here's what happened:
http://www.well.com/~smendler/graphics/feedbackloop.gif
So simple, isn't it?
Posted by: Gina | 07 November 2004 at 07:44 PM
The problem is we're trying to fight faith with logic. It's never worked before and it'll never work with most people.
Travis
Posted by: Travis | 09 November 2004 at 04:37 PM
Yeah, Travis, you're exactly right. I was just reading something over on dKos about that very subject... based on a book I'm about to start reading tonight about the language differences between the left and the right, and how it's getting us in trouble. Well, it's as much about our world views as language, I guess.
The thread is here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/9/10519/0967
I'm sure I'll have more to say when I've read the book....
Posted by: Christie | 09 November 2004 at 04:55 PM
I heard Viguerie this morning on NPR, gleefully ticking off the things he says will now happen to put the country "back on track." First, judicial appointments that "won't legislate" (translation: will legislate *our* way), followed by end of Roe v. Wade, no gay marriage, drilling in ANWAR "to reduce our dependence on foreign oil" (hey, how about reducing our dependence on oil, period?), etc., etc., etc.
Next up on my reading list: "What's the Matter With Kansas?" which explores how people in the red states consistently vote against their own self-interests.
Posted by: gina | 10 November 2004 at 08:25 AM