Are Dems Finally Starting to Get It?

Commentary by Greg Lewis / TheRant.US
November 15, 2004

It may be possible, in the wake of George W. Bush's convincing win in this year's Presidential election, to begin to isolate some of the characteristics of the "liberal mind" that made it possible for Republicans, not only to win the Presidency, but to increase their majorities by (at least) four seats in the Senate and in the House of Representatives. While Republican initiative and bold strategizing certainly played a significant role in their winning the election decisively, other factors, including what can be described as the cast of the liberal mind, certainly also weighed heavily in determining the election's outcome.

The Left's Response
We might begin to analyze the liberal mind by looking at liberals' responses to their candidate's defeat. Among the dubious indulgences I allowed myself on the day after Election Day was listening for upwards of 20 minutes to an "Air America" (so they choose to call themselves, though they're further from representing what America stands for than a French diplomat) radio talk show co-hosted by Liz Winstead, Chuck D, and Rachel Maddow. While I was listening, word came into their studio that John Kerry had called President Bush to concede the election. By this time, it had become obvious that the remaining 150,000 or so uncounted ballots in Ohio would have to break about 96% Kerry to 4% Bush in order for Kerry to win the state of Ohio, and so the election was effectively lost to the Democrats.

Liz, Rachel, and Chuck expressed their anger at the very idea of Kerry's conceding the election, saying — despite VP candidate John Edwards' insistence, in the face of overwhelming defeat, that "every vote would be counted" — that they thought the Democrats should contest every last vote in every last state in order to bring to light the widespread voter fraud the knew had to have been perpetrated by Republicans, which fraud was the only thing that could possibly have resulted in a Bush victory. Further discussion saw these three stroking liberal America for all the progress "the movement" had made in the past seven months (thus implying that "the struggle" by the left for the hearts and minds of Americans had only begun with the inception of Air America itself) toward toppling imperialist, corporate, war-mongering America. Ho-hum.

But besides the fairly predictable and sophomoric response of the Air America "pundits" (scare quotes reflect my conviction that so amateurish and emotion-driven is what passes for legitimate commentary on Air America that it has a hell of a long way to go before it rises even to the level of punditry), it has become clear that the Democrats are not willing, at this point, to step back and take an honest look at the real reasons they got their collective clock cleaned in this election.

No, the party of the politics of anger — the party whose message was presented by such informed and articulate celebrity spokespeople as Michael Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, Bruce Springsteen, and Al Franken (to mention only a few) — doesn't seem to want to admit that it is seriously out of touch with the values and ideals that a majority of Americans hold dear. Even the fact that 11 states (including Oregon, which consistently and dangerously flirts with adopting a socialist government at the state level) voted overwhelmingly and emphatically to tell the world that to their citizens marriage can only be entered into by a man and a woman seems not to have dented the zeal, utterly religious in its fundamentalist intensity, with which liberals are bound to impose their worldview on the citizens of the United States.

And Speaking of Religious Zeal...
Among the characteristics of the liberal mind is its categorical similarity to what can be called the religious fundamentalist mind. Liberals, like many cult followers and religious fundamentalists, are extremely weak where what I would describe as "reality testing" is concerned. Which is to say that they maintain their convictions even in the face of overwhelming evidence in the real world that their convictions are not producing desirable results.

The Democrats have not done a serious re-examination of either their political message or their tendency to promote abrasive (not to say, anti-American) people to positions of leadership for many years. John Kerry is, of course, a prime example of, in this instance, their choosing a northern liberal to carry the party's hopes. It didn't work with Michael Dukakis, George McGovern, and Fritz Mondale, and it didn't work with John Kerry. Liberals are so out-of-touch with what "red America" (to adopt the nomenclature of current political analysis, which designates by the color red those states — even those counties — which vote Republican) believes that it's almost embarrassing to listen to their gloss on the election vis a vis this subject. In a nutshell, the Democrat Party spokespeople I've heard since the election have continued to imply, if not to insist, that the fault lies with the American people, that they're simply a bit too obtuse and too religious and too uninformed to really grasp the Democrat message. It's not that the message is flawed; it is that the people to whom it is broadcast are flawed. It's the old "pearls before swine" story, only this time it's the so-called "swine" (read "middle Americans") who grasp the true import of the issues at hand. Democrats can continue to cast their "pearls" for all they're worth, we swine are just not ready to appreciate them.

With regard to the aforementioned "reality testing," liberals share an inability to perceive external reality for what it is, and they share this shortcoming with many cult followers. Indeed, it is virtually a requirement of surrendering to cultist thinking that one refuse to acknowledge the validity of what most of us recognize as the real world. It is fashionable today, among the followers of certain highly suspect belief systems, to assert that "the individual 'creates' his or her own reality" and that "the individual's keeping his/her vision of a desired outcome constantly in mind will result in that reality's being manifested in the external world." This is very similar to what the Democrats did in the 2004 election, and it, of course, produces similar predictably disastrous results.

Now, while I have no quarrel with anyone's having a purpose in life and holding in their minds a vision of what they wish to become or accomplish, I do question the validity of any belief system that insists that one should maintain that vision even as it results in an outcome which closely resembles a train wreck. That is pretty much what the Democrats have brought about by trying to push on the American people a version of the American dream that is in fact not much more than an out-or-date, out-of-touch socialist program for the ascension to enormous power over Americans' lives of the Federal Government.

Bottom line: Cult followers have to ignore the fact that the reality of their real-world lives is imploding as they pursue their notion of creating their own personal "realities," and Democrats have to ignore the fact that, in every national election since 1994 they have lost more and more power to Republicans by flogging the same tired and inapplicable message to the American people. Recent reality testing, in the form of a United States election, has shown that, if they wish to thrive, even to survive, Democrats had better come out their my-reality-is-the-only-valid-reality shell and begin to adopt real-world tactics and strategies that actually do deliver their desired outcomes.

Until they do, expect them to continue to scratch their heads with a who-are-those-guys-anyway look on their faces as Republicans, representing the true America, continue to spirit away from them elections and political influence. Until the Dems truly do "get it" and jettison their tired socialist message and the angry "leaders" who insist on perpetuating it, count on more of the same.