Travellinguist's Musings

Intellectual Bankruptcy of too many conservatives.

So I noticed on Facebook that the Philadelphia Daily New columnist Will Bunch had written an article about Henry Paulson taking a trip to the Reagan library to give a speech even though he'd turned down all other requests for speeches owing to the complete financial meltdown in our system. Well some guy wrote in to basically high-five Bunch but then this Canadian began evoking 1984, the Orwell novel not the Reagan landslide to attack the two men. As the conversation persisted the Canadian began insulting the commentator, not Bunch, the commentator on Bunch's article.
I began to think about how quickly conservatives turn to personal attacks (which isn't to say liberals don't but conservatives are definitely the quickdraws in this America). This guy said Reagan's legacy was easy to explain but he didn't have time, but he did have time to write up insults to the positive commentator. I assume when the financial world is collapsing around you, when your much cherished ideologies go up in smoke there is nothing left but insults. What is funny is that this Reagan-lover is Canadian but clearly not so much a Reagan-lover that he would live in the USA enduringly shaped by the Reagan administration. I guess he might love the idea of Reagan ideology where everyone is on their own and stepping on everyone else they can for their piece of the ever-shrinking pie but when push came to shove he prefers his Canadian government health insurance, his clean Vancouver air and his electorally-responsive Canadian parliamentary system. It's easy to want "economic freedom" when all your needs are satisfied by a responsible government I guess.
Sadly I live in the United States and our government has been terribly irresponsible and so I am busy worrying about making sure the basic needs of my fellow citizens are met before I begin criticizing the ideas of the people actually living in the country where the actual bad policies of the Reagan years are wreaking havoc.
I sometimes wish I could live in Canada knowing my basic needs are always accounted for so that I could rage against the machine that succors me and provides me health care, all the while luxuriously wishing for the system which Reagan wanted in which the machine would not succor me nor minister to my health.
Conservatives have become such petulant children. It is especially funny coming from a Canadian though. I mean conservatives in America have to live with their decisions at least, conservative Canadians get to scream and yell about America's liberalism (which had been a small movement recently) while living in a social democracy and not having to worry if they will have health insurance or unemployment insurance if their economy goes down the tank.
I have seen several McCain supporters mention how they would love to move to Canada now that Obama won. This is a clear indication that they don't understand the reasons for liberals speaking about doing so during the Bush years, nor do they understand what Canada is like (which shouldn't surprise us since many- though clearly not all- conservatives have little clue about what things are like outside our borders). American liberals wanted to go to Canada not because they wanted out of America but because they wanted to go to a country that looked like and represented what they believed. These conservative and McCain lovers should ALL go to Canada for a few year because when they came home they'd probably be much stronger supporter of Obama's policies, since Obama would be right-of-center in Canada, and since they'd get to appreciate the things that Canada does that work for Canadians, which we don't do in the United States for US citizens.

posted by travellinguist @ 9:45 AM