Liberals expose themselves (and it's a good thing)

By A.J. DiCintio

Americans who consider themselves Tea Party "members" or who find themselves in agreement with the Tea Party message have involved themselves in public affairs because they are genuinely concerned about the country's direction, especially (but not exclusively) with respect to the economic madness exhibited by the federal government.

However, in addition to its basic purpose, the Tea Party has provided the nation a great, if indirect, service because in reacting to the movement, liberals have exposed themselves in all their ugly pretentiousness.

For proof, there is no better place to turn than "The Very Angry Tea Party" (NYT), a piece in which J.M. Bernstein, University Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the New School for Social Research, offers not a single, sensible, honest thought but does manage to expose himself as the quintessential liberal.

In truth, the professor's title says it all regarding the essay's supercilious, anti-intellectual quality because the entire piece simply repeats ad nauseam the decrepit liberal meme that mocks and denounces middle class citizens as contemptible hypocrites, half of whom are angry buffoons, the other half angry sociopathic maniacs.

The following words and phrases ought to give readers more than a feel for Bernstein's perverse vision of tens of millions of decent, hard-working Americans who live by the rules.

Seething anger, enraged, libertarian mob, hysterical incriminations, fantasy of destruction, atmospheric violences [sic], nihilistic rage . . .

Now, certain insufferable radio commercials all too well employ the propaganda technique of repetition; but Bernstein's essay makes repetition pikers of them as it obnoxiously, pretentiously, and relentlessly attempts to make the case that Tea Party Americans are devoid of even a smidgen of rational thought or justifiable emotion and therefore deserve to be regarded as a dangerous, delusional, disconnected, diabolically mad "mob."

In fact, the professor is so deeply dedicated to the proposition that Tea Party adherents are suffocated by an "incubus of rage" which destroys intellectuality that he claims he can't figure out "where [the mob's] politics ends and metaphysics begins."

What does Bernstein believe has caused these idea-bereft Americans to roll themselves into nothing more than a fiery, frightening ball of rage?

He argues that recent economic events have "undermined the deeply held fiction of individual autonomy and self-sufficiency that are intrinsic parts of Americans' collective self-understanding."

And the destruction of that myth, he says, has caused Tea Party Americans to come face to face with the truth of "the absolute dependence [emphasis his] of us all on government action," a reality so distressing that they have reacted to it with a raging, totally meaningless anger.

What perfectly stupid liberal nonsense!

The professor first creates a straw man that depicts Tea Party Americans as so extremely libertarian they can be called anarchists.

Then, he "reasons" that having had their libertarian myth shattered, they behave like "jilted lovers [who are] furious that . . . 'government' has . . . made clear that they are dependent and limited beings."

That is why the professor gives Tea Party Americans not a bit of intellectual credit for their protestations over bailouts given to casinos that call themselves banks, rapacious Wall Street firms, bungling corporations, greedy unions, and foolish people who took out mortgages far beyond their financial means.

That is why he denies that intellectuality has anything to do with their warnings about an immoral, "generational theft" spending and borrowing intended to make America "look like" Greece, Spain, or worse.

Now, given the fact that Tea Party Americans aren't anarchists and that the problems they are bringing to light are real, I suspect it is the Professor as Representative of All Liberals whose reason is choked off by anger.

Moreover, I suspect that in true liberal fashion, his extremist anger is directed at "We the [Ordinary] People," whose Middle Class Values and adherence to the principles of Jeffersonian Democracy preclude obsessing and gushing over the Marxist/Hegelian notion of humanity's "absolute dependence . . . on government. . ."

("absolute dependence" — How deliriously orgasmic it is when liberals imagine liberal politicians, liberal judges, and liberal bureaucrats telling "us all" how to live our lives, even down to how many milligrams of protein, carbohydrate, and fat we may ingest and milliliters of carbon dioxide we may exhale each day!)

Finally, I ditch the "suspect" to say "I know" anger, pride, and the love of power have obliterated reason when I consider that the professor fails to place the Tea Party protestors in the tradition of Henry David Thoreau, the great proponent of individualism whose love of raw nature as well as bricklaying, carpentry, and gardening always kept his feet planted firmly in the ground of common sense.

No Pollyanna about the realities of human nature, the Concord resident who strove daily to live in harmony with the true spirit of his town had this to say about humanity's eternal duty regarding government:

But, to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

Of course, the "distinguished" professor refuses to see anything of Thoreau in Tea Party protestors, preferring, instead, to demean them as "not just disturbing, but frightening, in [their] anger."

In that anti-intellectual refusal, he places himself squarely in the company of leftists who regard the Constitution's "We the People" as an angry, ignorant, slobbish mob — the centralized-power loving ideologues represented in America by the nation's three most important liberal politicians:

Barack Obama — The President of the United States superciliously and hurtfully singled out "small town" folks who "get bitter [and therefore] cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them."

Nancy Pelosi — The Speaker of the House viciously condemned Tea Party Americans as "AstroTurf" frauds who carry "swastikas" to meetings.

Harry Reid — The Majority Leader of the Senate maliciously slimed Tea Party Americans as "evil-mongers" who spread "lies, innuendo, and rumor."

However, as mentioned at the outset, this vile invective is, ironically, a very good thing; for in spewing it, liberals enrich the nation by exposing themselves in all their naked, obnoxious, elitist, ugly, power loving arrogance.

© A.J. DiCintio