I don’t know about you, but this story sort of encapsulates everything you need to know about the young conservative ideologues working for the Bush administration, in particular, and for conservative organizations, in general. Namely that not only are these people liars, propagandists and brainwashed incompetents, but that they are also exceedingly ignorant about their own nation’s history:
Appearing on National Public Radio’s light-hearted quiz show “Wait, Wait… Don’t Tell Me!” which aired over the weekend, Perino got into the spirit of things and told a story about herself that she had previously shared only in private: During a White House briefing, a reporter referred to the Cuban missile crisis — and she didn’t know what it was. “I was panicked a bit because I really don’t know about — nothing about the Cuban missile crisis,” said Perino, who at 35 was born about a decade after the 1962 U.S.-Soviet nuclear showdown. “It had to do with Cuba and missiles, I’m pretty sure.”
So she consulted her best source: “I came home and I asked my husband,” she recalled. “I said, ‘Wasn’t that like the Bay of Pigs thing?’ And he said, ‘Oh, Dana.’ ”
It seems they all believe American history jumped straight from World War II to Saint Ronald Reagan the Valiant with only some indeterminate period in between where dirty filthy hippies spit on our troops and Jane Fonda and John Kerry single handedly destroyed our chance to win the Vietnam War.
No wonder they all falsely believe that the Civil War wasn’t fought over the issue of slavery, or that our nation was purposely founded as a Christian Nation (“Christian” magically meaning the same Christianity espoused today by the Rapture ready crowd). Or that evolution is a controversial scientific theory. Or that Africans actually improved their lot in life when they were captured, transported to America packed like sardines in dirty, disease ridden ships and sold into slavery.
I don’t think there is a less informed group of individuals in this country than young conservatives. Or a more brainwashed, unable to think for themselves group of people, for that matter. Part of that has been the failure of our education system to teach critical thinking skills to our young people. Part of that rests on the inability of our school board approved textbooks to relate American history in an objective, impartial manner. And part is the responsibility of a group of well funded, deeply cynical and manipulative conservative activists and who have spent the last 50 years fighting to rewrite those same history books to perpetuate a triumphalist, nationalistic perspective regarding our country’s “unique heritage” of freedom and democracy, while also coercing the media into propagating conservative lies and myths about our past and our present.
Dana Perino is only a representative of an entire generation of “Know nothing” conservatives who believe only what the current GOP talking points and conservative pundits and pseudo intellectuals tell them to believe. People who are in essence, merely angry and hate filled automatons ready to follow any authoritarian leader so long as his conservative bona fides have been sufficiently accepted by the collective wisdom of their elders. Ignorant of history, ignorant of, and often deeply antagonistic toward, science, and certain only in their faith in Jesus Christ, Fox News the “infallibility of the free market” and the evil abilities of godless liberals.
They have had thirty years to insert themselves into prominent positions in our news media, and throughout all levels of our federal, state and local governments. They, and others like them who were not fortunate enough to receive the benefits of the right wing welfare system, but who are dutiful listeners, readers and viewers of the Rush Limbaughs, Michelle Malkins and Bill O’Reillys of the world, are ready made followers for next demagogue who can assert himself in a time of crisis. George Bush was just the prototype. The next right wing Fuhrer to whom they pledge their allegiance will be much, much worse.
George Bush was just the prototype. The next right wing Fuhrer to whom they pledge their allegiance will be much, much worse.
This worries me a lot, actually. Because whenever I hear folks compare Bush to Hitler I know they’re wrong. But comparing Bush to Wilhelm – well, that analogy fits a lot better. And THAT scares the bejeebus out of me. Because you’re right – there are an awful lot of right-wing nuts out their waiting for their next “conservative Saviour” to come down the pike. And a GOP loss at the ballot box next year is going to bring back a lot of the really bad parts of the 90s – like the surge in the right-wing militia/terrorist/cult movements.
Hmm, that’s a pretty good analogy (Bush=Kaiser Wilhelm). I had not heard that one before, but it fits–like Wilhelm, Bush is a little too laughable to take seriously. But both prepare the way for someone truly vicious by involving their countries in stupid, losing wars.
What truly amuses me is that most of the new legislation and administrative overstretch makes it possible to ship all of the right-wing ultramontane off to Gitmo by an administration which disagrees with their policies and practices. I can only conclude that the Republicans had persuaded themselves they would continue to control Congress post-2006 because otherwise they would have eliminated most of those laws and regulations. Now they face the prospect of the rebound wave swamping them. Karma’s a bitch.
I am often puzzled by that kind of behavior, too. Unless you are certain of your grip on power — and really, if you’re certain, you’re just wrong — then you should never arrogate to yourself powers that you would not want in the hands of the opposition.
Of course, the drawback to inheriting those powers from the right is that we will be tempted to use them, and should we do so, they will corrupt us. The Founders well understood that despotic powers are a bit like the One Ring in The Lord of the Rings. You can vanquish your enemies with it, but it will devour you from the inside out. As with so many things, we are humane to our enemies not because they deserve it, but because we wish to preserve our own humanity.
That said, just a little revenge wouldn’t hurt us, would it, precioussssss?
Now they face the prospect of the rebound wave swamping them.
Not really, though the footsoldiers (the anti-tax loons coining their own currencies, the militia-men stockpiling fertilizer, the cultists holing up in their compounds, etc.) might think that a Dem government with the kind of power the GOPer government has had will come after them, the reality is that it will never happen.
Not because the Dems are in any way more virtuous or more protective of the Constitution (HA!), but because the “free press” in the US actually works as a check on Dem (or, more accurately, liberal) power expansion. Or at least it has during my lifetime. When a Republican is in power, the press lets outrageous violations of the law slide (see Iran-Contra, among others). When a Dem is in power the press watches him/her like a hawk. Any attempt by a Dem president to use these powers on any American citizen would be quashed by a loud and screeching press driven, ironically, by the right-wing noise machine of the talk radio gasbags and the right-wing blogs. Despite the fact that they all kept their mouths shut – or worse JUSTIFIED – the use of these powers on American citizens by a Republican president.
See, IOKIYAR isn’t just an ironic blogosphere observation – it’s how politics in the post-Reagan era works.
But the footsoldiers WILL be scared by the possibility, which is where the power brokers want them. Because scared footsoldiers do things that scare the norms. And when enough norms get scared, they vote for the Big Daddy who can keep the safe. And that Big Daddy tends to be a conservative.
History continues to be rewritten. It is necessary to maintain control.
has been incompetent from day one. Great writing StevenD. Love your analysis.
Couldn’t have been better said. Thanks for the insight, especially on the know-nothing younger generation of Republicans.
“I was panicked a bit because I really don’t know about.”
On Boston Legal last night I learned something about what American school children don’t know, falling behind all Western industrialized countries with the exception of Mexico. I can’t recall the details but it was totally enlightening to me, concerning the wrongs of our public school system, which have been ignored for the past seven years at least, perhaps longer, by the federal government and the Left Behind nonsense. Wasn’t there one state that refused federal dollars in preference for its own evaluation system?
Ugh. The problems with our schools are legion, starting with the nineteenth century structure of “schooling”. But more to the point, the very programs and innovations that would promote critical thinking (such as the International Baccalaureate) are under attack from the “know-nothings” precisely because critical thought is the opposite of lockstep ideology, which they MUST have.
Disclosure: I am a history teacher. It can be very depressing.
Pilgrim, I feel your pain, but as the parent of an 8th grade student in the suburbs of red hell (Omaha, NE).
My 8th grader understands that most of what she’s asked are “B.S.” questions. (The first of such was “Would you rather be a patriot or a red coat, and why?” OH–RED COAT FOR ME, MA’AM–and one ticket to gitmo, please!)
There is ZERO critical thinking encouraged in the curriculum – and she’s in the High Ability Learner courses. Her high school still offers the IB program, but anything outside of that is just dismal.