House of Eratosthenes

Kerry Is anyone keeping track of all these generalities, and while we’re at it, all the unsubstantiated characterizations? Republicans are morons, the Christian Right runs everything, Republicans are drowning in scandal, white men are angry, troops in Iraq are a bunch of dimwits…Cheney is unscrupulous and Bush is a putz.

I remember a generation ago that a “liberal” was someone who was fighting a Good Fight against generalizations. It started out with an intellectual combat waged against half-assed unthinking statements like “black people are lazy” — the liberal would be there to say, hey, there’s lazy & hard-working white people, there’s lazy & hard-working black people, you shouldn’t be stereotyping. The liberal was right. No matter what your personal experience was, somewhere a black guy was working his ass off…somewhere else, a white guy was being lazier than any black guy you’d ever seen. Individuals are individuals, classes are classes, the two are different.

Liberals got so militant about this, that even sensible generalizations based on empirical observations, or cause-and-effect, were off-limits. “Obese people seem to buy food in large quantities,” would have gotten you a censure from our liberals…even as they indignantly noted our egghead scientists might be saying that very thing, and not enough people were paying attention to the egghead scientists. You might say our liberals, outwardly dedicated to everyone being equal, simultaneously crusaded for generalizations to be enjoyed only by our academic elites. Wage-slaves were not to indulge in this. So there’s some irony — your caste determined your license to think in certain ways. Elites could generalize, commoners could not.

Then things got even funnier and more ironic. Telling people what to think, is always easier than telling people how to think, and the liberal movement took the path of least resistance. Liberals made it known were were not allowed to have such thoughts in our heads. They effectively said, we will discipline you if you’re caught thinking Chinese people run laundromats, or Mexicans drive big old cars with messed-up suspension systems, or that women are shrill gold-diggers…and you know what? We don’t give a damn anymore if it’s stereotyping, or an honest observation of an individual. Sure enough, within a decade a man could be divorced, with his ex-wife taking everything all his material possessions because she never had a job in her life and didn’t want one…and he could state, factually, “I just got divorced and my ex-wife took all my material possessions, because she’s never had a job in her life and she doesn’t want one” — and a liberal would be right there, waggling the liberal finger in his face, tut-tutting him into obedient silence.

So there’s some more irony. Generalizations no longer had anything to do with it.

And now, as Obi-Wan Kenobi might say, our liberals have become exactly what they swore to oppose. It’s all about telling the masses what to think about this class of person or that class of person. In fact, if the stereotypes aren’t disseminated far and wide, and too many of us keep in mind that individuals are individuals and classes are classes, our liberals just aren’t happy. To simply make an observation that some Euro-centric white men (who aren’t Democrats) might have honest motives and might work hard — just some — is to create a state of war, in which the liberal must have the last word.

Senator Kerry says his line about the troops was a “botched joke” that was aimed at the White House, not at the troops. “The White House’s attempt to distort my true statement is a remarkable testament to their abject failure in making America safe…It’s a stunning statement about their willingness to reduce anything in America to raw politics.” You know, if I predicted this little exchange a year ago, it would have been clumsy political satire. Kerry says…aw hell, let’s just try to go beyond factual history and venture into outlandish, unprecedented theory — difficult as that is. Kerry says the troops in Iraq are disease-infested, raping, ignorant brutes who set dogs on fire for fun. President Bush says “that’s not fair and you owe the troops an apology” and Kerry replies…”The White House’s attempt to distort my true statement is a remarkable blah blah blah…reduce anything in America to raw politics.”

That’s a pretty poor excuse for satire, but it’s the best I can manage and that’s my point. Satire is supposed to go above and beyond the plane of reality — and that has become prohibitively difficult in the Senator’s case. He has arrived at his zenith. He can say anything…about anyone…in any context he chooses…and once called on it, he’ll accuse the accuser. He has pushed it to such outlandish extremes that you can’t even poke fun at it anymore.

So let’s take a look at what he said, although by doing so, we’re clearly excusing ourselves from Kerry’s intended audience since he doesn’t want anyone examining anything. Kerry says the White House is attempting to distort his true statement which was a “botched joke” directed at President Bush and his “failed policies.” Okay. What he said…was…

You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and do your homework, and make an effort to be smart, uh, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq. [emphasis mine]

My point is…and I’m sure others have made the same point somewhere by now, perhaps more concisely…there’s no distortion present and none required. If you don’t make an effort to be smart, you get stuck in Iraq. So those guys “stuck in Iraq” did not make the effort to be smart.

It’s what he said.

It wasn’t taken out of context. Go on, do a Google for anything you care to Google — not hard now! — and sift through the avalanche of news about Kerry’s “botched joke” here. Try to find a way he was unfairly taken out of context. Just try it.

As the Boston Herald pointed out, not only is Kerry guilty of the kind of generalization our liberals used to fight with every fiber of their being…his implications are not even factually sustainable. It’s simplemindedness and bigotry…presented to us in as pure and as acrid a form as we’ve ever seen such things.

You know, I’m just sure the pressure of campaigning the last week before the election is incredible. But it’s part of the job, and for Sen. Kerry to get in trouble over this, is just plain fair. He spoke from the heart. Central to the real platform of the Democratic party, is an axiom that our troops serving in Iraq are, not dedicated professionals trying to do a job, but just a bunch of simple-minded dolts. I see a lot of Democrats and other left-wingers getting all huffy-puffy when someone makes that observation about what they think, but I don’t see a lot of them directly contesting it. Getting huffy-puffy is where the argument starts, and where it ends.

Liberals got so militant about this, that even sensible generalizations based on empirical observations, or cause-and-effect, were off-limits.

And that’s just about the time I defected from the Left, say around 1980. Or so. And only occasionally looked back!

I like the new look, Morgan. Someday I may even leave Blogger, too.
- Buck | 11/02/2006 @ 16:41

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Drowning In GeneralitiesWednesday, November 1st, 2006

Drowning In Generalities
Wednesday, November 1st, 2006