Ignorant Racists WhoSucceeded In American Politics
The Triumph of Ignorance [from Red State Rebels]
Posted by Jeffrey St. Clair on October 28th, 2008 | Link
Why Morons Succeed in American Politics
By George Monbiot
How was it allowed to happen? How did politics in the US come to be dominated by people who make a virtue out of ignorance? Was it charity that has permitted mankind’s closest living relative to spend two terms as president? How did Sarah Palin, Dan Quayle and other such gibbering numbskulls get to where they are? How could Republican rallies in 2008 be drowned out by screaming ignoramuses insisting that Barack Obama is a Muslim and a terrorist?(1)
Like most people on this side of the Atlantic I have spent my adult life mystified by American politics. The US has the world’s best universities and attracts the world’s finest minds. It dominates discoveries in science and medicine. Its wealth and power depend on the application of knowledge. Yet, uniquely among the developed nations (with the possible exception of Australia), learning is a grave political disadvantage.
There have been exceptions over the past century: Franklin Roosevelt, Kennedy and Clinton tempered their intellectualism with the common touch and survived; but Adlai Stevenson, Al Gore and John Kerry were successfully tarred by their opponents as members of a cerebral elite (as if this were not a qualification for the presidency). Perhaps the defining moment in the collapse of intelligent politics was Ronald Reagan’s response to Jimmy Carter during the 1980 presidential debate. Carter - stumbling a little, using long words - carefully enumerated the benefits of national health insurance. Reagan smiled and said “there you go again”(2). His own health programme would have appalled most Americans, had he explained it as carefully as Carter had done, but he had found a formula for avoiding tough political issues and making his opponents look like wonks.
2 add your comments:
Typical leftist nonsense.
When you can't defeat the idea, you have to attack the person. This is the same nonsense that claimed the Eisenhower (who won the war in Europe by the way) was a dolt.
When the American people repeated reject liberal "elitism", this is EXACTLY what they are talking about.
Being conservative is not stupid. Having religious beliefs is not a sign that you are less intelligent. It just means you have different ideas. Argue the idea! Show where it is wrong. That is not what liberals do.
What they do is just say you are stupid for your beliefs. Some of the dumbest ideas that have ever come around have come from the so called "intelligentsia". Noam Chomsky has a doctorate as does Ward Churchill (case in point).
Liberals can't win the idea war with conservatives, so they claim that conservatives must be stupid. Conservatives do not think liberals are stupid, just wrong and naive.
This article is a clear example of being very wrong and quite naive. It is a way to reconcile your defeat with reality.
Paul C.
OR conservatives are stupid.
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