More "Best of Facebook Comments"

So, this is from a long (too long) exchange with one of my  Anarcho-Syndicalist friends, triggered by his assertion that Ayn Rand was a sociopath. I've left off his side of the conversation, and made some edits for clarity. At the end of this (if by some miracle you get that far), you should be shaking your head and muttering, "This Gregger guy needs to get a life."

 

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Ayn Rand may be misguided and an idiot, as I believe she is, but she is not a sociopath, and categorizing her as such erodes the credibility of the categorizers and does a disservice to the very cause they would seek to advance. The allegation is not much better in tone than claims that Obama is a socialist -- or for that matter, a Muslim socialist. I don't understand why some lefties seem to think it is necessary to indulge in near-hysterical exaggerations and demonizations to establish their bona fides (or whatever their reasons are).

Frankly, I think they undercut their own agenda by engaging in palpably absurd character assassination (as when some of my lefty friends said that Ted Cruz was guilty of treason. Really? I hope I never live in a regime that treats political disagreement as criminal).

I am pretty much a knee-jerk liberal, but  that doesn't mean I think that all conservatives are driven by greed and rabid self-interest, and are necessarily devoid of principle. We liberals disagree with them and think they misread history and reality and are wrong-headed -- but that is not at all the same thing as regarding them as some kind of evil fiends. I believe there are rational arguments to make on behalf of progressive views; I don't think the progressive agenda is served by making irrational arguments.

Now, I  agree wholeheartedly about the left ceding the framing of issues to the right. I would refer you to "The Political Brain" by Drew Westen. Like him, I believe there are cogent arguments the left can make on gun control, abortion and other issues that politicians shy away from because...well, for a lot of different reasons, including polling and a misguided over-emphasis on the rational rather than the emotional (Westen makes an extensive case, drawing on psychological studies, that emotions play an inescapable role in everyone's decision-making in virtually all contexts, and that that is intrinsically human and appropriate). The right has done a far better job than the left of simplifying their messages and appealing to emotions; I (more or less) share Westen's view that there is nothing wrong with that per se and that the left can and should do the same, and not feel squeamish about strong feelings and emotional disputes.

Where we may disagree is over how to go about changing the political landscape. You cited a likening of words to cannonballs, which suggests to me that you think that if the left just bludgeons the right with superheated rhetoric, the left will smash its way to victory - that if the left just calls enough people it disagrees with "sociopaths" and "evil fiends," the scales will fall from society's collective eyes, or something. I don't hold that view.

Ted Cruz is not an evil fiend. I think he's a disingenuous, calculating,self-serving opportunist,but he also believes in the rule of law (more or less), an independent judiciary (more or less), and the right of the people to elect their own representatives (more or less -- and yes, I know about GOP voter suppression etc., but that is not the same as advocating a monarchy or a military dictatorship, both of which are ideas very much current on the global political spectrum). Neither he nor any other Republican of note that I know of called for the Army to install Mitt Romney in the White House after the last election. Indeed, Ted Cruz himself was not installed in the Senate by the bayonets of the Texas National Guard: He was the overwhelmingly choice of the voters to Texas in a (largely) free and fair election. And many of his views, such as his advocacy of limited government, may be repugnant to me and you,but they certainly do not lack for honorable historical precedent.

Which brings me (finally!) to my point: I think the left -- and for that matter, society and the planet -- would be better served by making forceful, cogent and,when relevant, emotional arguments to persuade voters than by firing rhetorical cannonballs. The cannonballs may pump up the Mother Jones readership, but they don't win elections -- and that, ultimately, is where the power lies (thankfully) in our system. Ted Cruz is not the problem -- he's the symptom; the Texas electorate is the problem. And of course we should fight voter suppression efforts, try to register more voters and especially, get them to vote. Y'know, if the oft-invoked "99 percent" were 99 percent of the electorate, or 75 percent,or even 50.001 percent, we could be living in a truly socialist paradise. The tools and the power are there to be seized.

So I would like to see more of a focus on that than on name-calling. For instance, the Dem just won a narrow victory over a hard-right R for governor of Va. I suppose calling the R a woman-hating fanatic helped (though (a) that's still short of sociopath or evil fiend,and (b) he came damn close). but about 6 percent of the vote went to the Libertarian candidate - who supported reproductive choice and marriage equality. If even half of his voters could be persuaded their interests would be better served by the Democratic Party-- well you can do the math.

If all that makes me an old-fashioned, accommodationist fuddy-duddy,so be it.