One final thought on the marathon C-Span interview.
First, thanks again for all the kind feedback and special thanks to those of you who tried to crowd out the tinfoil-hat callers.
Speaking of those callers, I must say that the more I think about it, the more revealing they were. I haven’t counted or anything, but it seems to me that a plurality of the lefty callers were simply obsessed with race. I suspect that one or two of them were professionally invested in the topic (the guy who plugged FAIR and Media Matters smelled like a seminar caller to me). Regardless, it was fascinating how so many of them simply needed me/conservatives/National Review/Sean Hannity/et al. to be racists. It’s a small example of how so many liberals ground their identities in race and can’t conceive of the idea that their ideological opponents aren’t racists. I hope I showed enough scorn for this nonsense. But I promised the missus I wouldn’t lose my temper with the callers — something I’ve done in the past on C-Span.
I particularly liked the jerk who seemed to think it was a terrible indictment of my character that William F. Buckley and my mother and father were influences on me because they didn’t march for civil rights in the 1960s. As if I should repudiate my parents for this historic crime. As if there was nothing else admirable about WFB. Indeed, as if this is the single criteria justifying admiration.
Funny aside: My mom called me after the interview and chastised me for not mentioning that she did march with King in ’63. She got the afternoon off from the Kennedy White House to do it! So: Nyah-nyah.
Anyway, here’s the video if you’re interested. It’ll be on again this Saturday at 9:00 a.m.
The racism charge is also very convenient for liberals, who imagine that once they brand you as a racist, they are spared the bother of trying to think up anything else to accuse you of.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFor those of us who have unfortunately had to put cotton in our ears where the left is concerned (to maintain our blood pressure and our sanity), a little time listening to C-Span callers is shocking. (Ditto the "highly-educated" callers to Diane Rehm.)
Jonah gracefully parried their whacked-out paranoia and did us proud. IMO, one can listen to callers to virtually any conservative talk radio host for a long time without hearing as much derangement as one can hear in any segment of a program that attracts lots of liberals. Jonah said yesterday that he does not like to "medicalize" the distorted reality and incoherence [my words] of such types, and I've generally agreed with that approach. But darn...a lot of these people are genuinely certifiable.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJonah,
I think the racism charge is also in part a simple (and in many cases, somewhat pathological) way for people to ignore your perspective.
Certainly there are some people who toss around this charge with deliberate slander/libel as a political too to weaken their opponents. However, I think the one who, as you say, "needed" you to be racist are simply looking for an easy way to dismiss your rationailty.
If they can demonize you, they don't have to consider your arguments. If they can't do that, they are faced with having to deal with your challenges to their worldview on the merits, which most of them are equipped to do.
That's why so many on the left hold on to this, no matter how ridiculous the claims, how ineffective the tactic has become because of the the cheapness with which it has been deployed, and regardless of the fact that these false claims of racism take away from the energy and attention that could be given real cases of racism in the public eye.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJonah, I really enjoyed the interview overall and I love, love, love your book and columns. But I thought your response to that caller was too defensive. You seemed to be protesting too much. The fact is WFB was right on most issues but in the 50's and early 60's he was completely wrong on race. Both WFB and the conservative movement as a whole eventually recognized this error and repudiated his early stuff on race. Unlike the Progressives, our side is capable of admitting error. Why not just say that succinctly and move on? When you show scorn towards the caller, it looks like this is a real live issue that still bothers you, still puts you on the defensive. That's a mistake. The real way to dismiss the caller is to treat his attack as the dead issue that it is. Stop taking his bait.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe reason that the hard left seems so preoccupied with race (and they are) is that they have lost on the issues, but do indeed feel that 'demographics is destiny' - to their great potential advantage.
They may be right, at least temporarily (as in California where identity politics has made race, language and ethnicity issues quite toxic; or they can be wrong (as in Texas and Florida, two high-minority states where identity politics is not nearly so toxic, at least not yet).
I have been extremely pessimistic about America's future, based on world-wide attacks based on race, language, religion and even gender; but our recent election has given me great hope. Not only was it based on important issues, but we elected a true melting pot of conservative candidates, and we did it without pandering.
Texas and Florida are great examples for us all.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJonah,
Next time around I hope you make this observation on air. If Richard Rorty could possibly have been onto something, these folks might actually cease to exist if they ever came to the conclusion that you aren't a racist. Should they ever collectively come to such a conclusion, they would just dematerialize in front of our eyes. Then again, Rorty was wrong...but they'd be OBLIGATED to dematerialize.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseUpdated Wikipedia to include this post as a reference.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"...William F. Buckley and my mother and father were influences on me because they didn’t march for civil rights in the 1960s."
"Didn't march for civil rights" is a strange euphemism for Buckley's position on race...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'll disagree, mildly, with Richard, in that I think a great deal of the left's focus on race is less calculated. The left is obsessed with its own sense of moral superiority, and the easiest cloth with which to polish their collective halo is race. "Some of my best friends are..." is the mantra of this group. Witness the "Your parents didn't march..." criticism, the unspoken corollary is "mine did...".
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere is nothing more fundamental to the Left in America than establishing that Republicans and conservatives are racist. Americans of all races are by and large ideologically moderate to conservative. They're patriotic, don't trust government, wish to make and keep as much money as possible, and value their families above all else. That's 70-80% of the population.
So how does the Left stay even remotely "in the game" politically? They've managed to convince the vast majority of blacks, Latinos and Asians that Republicans are racist, and conservatism is just a code word for racism. Because of that, most of them vote down the line Democrat without further consideration of the issues.
Together with white liberals, that's enough of a coalition to put the Democratic base in the 40-45% percent range. Then all they need is a charismatic figure such as a Clinton or Obama to put them over the top.
If and when this Big Lie is ever exposed, that will be the end of the Left as a viable political movement in America. If blacks, Latinos and Asians voted their beliefs instead of their race, they would vote no differently than white Americans -- that is to say, 60-70% Republican/conservative. The Democratic base would be down to 25-30% instead of 40-45%. Thus, the extreme need to continually reinforce this point.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere is nothing more fundamental to the Left in America than establishing that Republicans and conservatives are racist. Americans of all races are by and large ideologically moderate to conservative. They're patriotic, don't trust government, wish to make and keep as much money as possible, and value their families above all else. That's 70-80% of the population.
So how does the Left stay even remotely "in the game" politically? They've managed to convince the vast majority of blacks, Latinos and Asians that Republicans are racist, and conservatism is just a code word for racism. Because of that, most of them vote down the line Democrat without further consideration of the issues.
Together with white liberals, that's enough of a coalition to put the Democratic base in the 40-45% percent range. Then all they need is a charismatic figure such as a Clinton or Obama to put them over the top.
If and when this Big Lie is ever exposed, that will be the end of the Left as a viable political movement in America. If blacks, Latinos and Asians voted their beliefs instead of their race, they would vote no differently than white Americans -- that is to say, 60-70% Republican/conservative. The Democratic base would be down to 25-30% instead of 40-45%. Thus, the extreme need to continually reinforce this point.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRichard,
You write that the reason that the Left race-baits is 'because they have lost on the issues.'
That is certainly one way of looking at it, but I think it is only a view that can be held from the Right (where you reside, as do I).
From *their* point of view, they argue non-issue based points like racism, greed, etc to try and point out to themselves, and us, why the Right can be so 'obviously wrong' on everything. They believe that rather than having lost on all the issues, that the answers to those issues are so self-evident and correctly IDed on the Left that the only way we can hold the ideas we have is through a prism of some sort of character defect. The Right is a group to be psychoanalyzed, not argued with. "Nice Doggy" until you can find a stick, etc.
My interactions with my Lefty friends are not characterized by them sheepishly trying to find a way to avoid the "obvious" fact that they're on the wrong side of an argument. It's spent with them disbelieving that I could EVER think of things the way I do. Mockery and condescension are the rule of the day. They'd call me uneducated, but they can't (PhD), so they call me misinformed or a cherry picker of anecdata (multiple anecdotes taken as evidence/data).
Anyway, we can confidently proclaim that they've lost on all the issues, but *THEY* don't see it that way.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDHC 1971 and rleisenman make awfully good points. The last (in more ways than one) college reunion I attended (Cornell '64, in 2004) turned into a blatant Kerry moonbat rally. No disagreement or dissent was expected or recognized - 'morally unimaginable', I suppose.
I do feel, however, that the left has indeed lost on most of the current issues with the American people, though they may not know it yet. They seem to cling to some mystical notion of historical inevitability which just happens to fit their prejudices.
Rather touching, in a way. Except when they knowingly play the race card.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI will say, I thought the moderator did a pretty good job: "ok tony, we get the point: Mr. Goldberg?" Those "filibusters," as one caller put it, get pretty obnoxious! For those who haven't seen it, watch. Great interview.
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