Entitlement \-ˈtī-təl-mənt\ n. 3: belief that one is deserving of or entitled to certain privileges.
The word entitlement is popular today, appearing often as the Tea Party and right-wing attempt to refashion its use in our society. There is an existing model for it: the word liberal being successfully redefined to mean socialist several decades ago, apparently to provide the right with an excuse to distance themselves from their roots (remember George H.W. Bush accusing Michael Dukakis of being liberal? I wonder how David Hume would have reacted to that.) However, as I have written in the past, words matter, and we can’t possibly understand the political process if we don’t understand the manipulation occurring behind the scenes.
In April of this year I asked the question, “Is the Right conservative?” I concluded that the right-wing in America resembled the French Jacobins more than any other group; French Rousseau liberals who believed that natural law provided them equality with the aristocracy, a radical notion at the time. Which brings me to the above definition.
The Tea Party meme is about taking back the government, creating a wave of populism, and ejecting the ‘elites’ from power. It’s about electing Christine O’Donnell – a woman with no political experience – to the United States Senate. It’s about replacing knowledge with common sense. While these are all fascinating ideas that have merit, it is important to note that there is nothing conservative about any of them. They represent a radical deflection from current political momentum.
But don’t take my word for it, there are centuries of political theory defining conservatism. Edmund Burke – the father of conservatism – believed that civilized society required classes of people, and that equality only existed in front of God, not within the realm of man. The notion that a common man with an internet connection might feel empowered to influence public policy without gaining the necessary expertise and knowledge was simply radical. Actually, it still is.
So, the next time someone rants about entitlement, point out to them the irony of their position. In American society, it’s pretty hard to avoid the presupposition of entitlement in our arguments. From Manifest Destiny to Christine O’Donnell, Americans have boldly taken what is ‘rightly ours’ in the name of God and freedom and righteousness.
David Frum recently wrote a blog post for CNN regarding the difference between Presidential strategy and tactics that is well worth reading. He mentioned Obama’s vision of a post-racial Presidency, and the use of his tenure as a leader who can reunite the [mainly] two political parties in this country. Many examples of this can be found, including Obama’s 2004 keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention.
But was the strategy dead on arrival? I’m not criticizing the idea’s merit, nor the tactics being deployed to achieve it (that would be for another post.) My concern is whether or not the United States electorate is psychologically capable of entering a post-racial environment.
Obama’s strategy seeks to confront the steadily increasing red/blue distinction by identifying common ground between the parties. This has been successful in the past. However, the old presuppositions are no longer valid. The ascendancy of Fox News and the terror attacks of 9/11 made feasible the utilization of the right-wing authoritarian personality type – driven by fear of the dangerous world, and motivated by self-righteousness. The RWA personality type submits to a designated authority, exhibits aggression toward outside groups, and strongly conforms to [sometimes] arbitrary norms. By employing this group of people as kindling in the political debate, it becomes impossible to achieve governing consensus or compromise in the public sphere (for a wonderful treatment of this subject, complete with survey tools, see Dr. Robert Altemeyer’s recent book, “The Authoritarians.”)
The existence of this mindset precludes cooperation, even if the outcomes are mutually beneficial. As a result, we bear witness to the ideological purge of the GOP, and the rise of Senator Jim DeMint, who has stated that he would rather lose elections than compromise values. With his winner-take-all approach to governing, it is not possible to accept less than everything or grant anything to a future minority. The days of trading chits on the floor of Congress are bygone.
Given the conditions on the ground, Obama’s strategy faces huge resistance. They are conditions that the tactic of effective, prolific legislative accomplishment cannot overcome. And while I want to be hopeful, there are few ways to counteract the attraction to authority that many RWAs experience. The President and Mr. Axelrod would do well to acquaint themselves with Dr. Bob’s research.
With all the media spectacle about the mid-term election horse race, I think the following quote will resonate with most of you.
Thus it happens that whenever those who are hostile have the opportunity to attack they do it like partisans, whilst the others defend lukewarmly, in such wise that the prince is endangered along with them.
Here is an interesting discussion of America’s oil perspective, given by Lisa Margonelli of the New America Foundation. She does an excellent job of highlighting the salient issues raised by petroleum dependence and how that shapes public policy.
I came across this quote today while reading Andrew Bacevich’s new book, Washington Rules.
…committing U.S. units to counterinsurgencies appears to be a very problematic proposition, difficult to conclude before domestic support erodes and costly enough to threaten the well-being of all America’s military forces (and hence the country’s national security), not just those involved in the actual counterinsurgency.
David Howell Petraeus, “The American Military and the Lessons of Vietnam: A Study of Military Influence and the Use of Force in the Post-Vietnam Era” (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University, 1987), p. 305.
With all the bogus controversy surrounding the Park51 Community Center in lower Manhattan (also know as the Ground-Zero Mosque), the right-wing has boxed themselves into a corner. How does “common sense” dictate that Muslims should relocate their place of worship, but gun zealots get to carry cop-killing bullets? If the test is just a matter of diffusing trouble, then we should hold the NRA to the same standard.
There sure are a lot of people using the word freedom these days. I hadn’t noticed, but apparently I’m living under the yoke of tyranny, which is probably a big surprise to the Burmese people. Anyway, I had an interesting conversation a while back with a dear friend over a bottle of wine. We are both great dog lovers, so I put the following question to her:
Who is more free: the dog running loose in a fenced yard, or the dog walking the neighborhood on a leash with his owner?
Now, the dog in the backyard has freedom of movement, and he can lay in the shade, or lay in the sun, without having to worry about the desires of someone else. To make a finer point, he can lay all day, as opposed to walking briskly and getting tired. If he wants to chase squirrels, so be it. He has the freedom to do many things, but one thing he can’t ever do is leave the yard. So, in a sense, he is a prisoner.
The dog on the leash has another set of issues. She is confined to a small area surrounding her owner. She must obey commands, and is expected to maintain a steady pace over a long distance. She cannot decide to lay down in the sunshine (although mine tries to.) Her leash is a shackle which restricts her movement. Of course, unlike her counterpart, she gets to experience life beyond the fence. In the course of her walk, she can meet and play with other dogs, and smell things that dogs smell. People will call her cute, and pet her, which makes her happy. She sees a much larger world than the dog in the yard.
There is [sadly] a third scenario. The feral dog lives in the city park, or a vacant lot. He has no concerns about fences or learning manners. He never yields to the command, “stay.” In a true libertarian sense, he is unencumbered by societal concerns and responsibilities. Unfortunately, his life is not only hard but very short. As we all know, if feral dogs aren’t rehabilitated at a young age, they die quickly.
So, what is your idea of freedom? Every form requires some kind of sacrifice. That is the point we so often overlook when we’re painting our protest signs and complaining about taxes. If we want to enjoy the benefits of living in an organized society, then we have to do our part to keep it organized. The alternative is the feral dog.
Last night, Sarah Palin got to do her TV dress-up on Fox News. Her comments about Barack Obama somehow made me think of the great line in Mel Brooks’ “The History of the World, Pt. 1“:
We’ve flattened their fingers,
we’ve branded their buns.
Nothing is working,
SEND IN THE NUNS!
I got called a liberal yesterday. Again. And, as you might expect, it was pejorative. These things don’t matter much to me; the names are usually hurled at the losing end of an argument, but there is something important we all need to consider about contemporary political debate.
Let’s start with the definition, since this post is going to focus on the use of words, and how their meanings can change. My Compact Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition (1989) defines liberal in a number of ways. The relevant ones include:
Favourable to constitutional changes and legal or administrative reforms tending in the direction of freedom or democracy;
Free from narrow prejudice; open-minded, candid.
Judging from these statements, liberalism seems like a pretty positive philosophy. It was thought of in that way when, during the Enlightenment, political philosophers such as John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Jefferson conceived of returning liberty to individuals and limiting the power of monarchs. It is ironic that today, many of the ‘conservatives’ in America who claim dominion over the Founding Fathers refuse to recognize their liberal heritage.
Instead, Americans on the political left run from the word. George H.W. Bush – Bush I – used the term against Michael Dukakis in the 1988 presidential campaign, but I think it already had a negative connotation by then. Since that time, it has attracted so much detritus that Democrats are trying to replace it with the word ‘progressive’. While that may be a more accurate descriptor, it is nevertheless a response to civic ignorance.
Recently Timothy Ferris wrote an excellent piece on The Huffington Post entitled, “Conservative Is Not Opposite Liberal.” He makes the excellent point that, given our definition above, great conservative thinkers like Edmund Burke and John Adams were certainly liberal. That indeed, the opposite of liberal is not conservative, it is authoritarian. Since liberals tend to favor reforms that grant freedom, then the opposite would certainly remove freedoms. The question then becomes, what are liberals afraid of?
The American Right has been very effective creating memes since the days of Bush I and Lee Atwater. It is unabashedly visible today, with talk of ‘death panels’ in the Affordable Healthcare Reform for America Act, ‘bank bailouts’ in the financial reform bill, and socialism despite a quite different reality. Sadly, it demonstrates that the American electorate is sensitive to these marketing messages, regardless of their relationship to facts ‘on the ground’. That diverges greatly from the ultimate goal of incrementally improving society through science and reason as Jefferson had envisioned. Applying a skeptical eye to these messages is essential to returning the American electorate to a civil, intellectual debate.
When I hear the term ‘liberal’ used as a pejorative, I am confident in my presumption that the speaker is unaware of the history of political philosophy in the West. Which is a shame, because the American Right has strayed far from what was considered conservative. You know you have a problem when it’s important to characterize the philosophy as ‘paleo-conservative’ or ‘neo-conservative’, especially when movement icons like Russell Kirk and Barry Goldwater became disenfranchised from the contemporary ideology. I have already argued that the current Tea Party movement, and mouthpieces like Glenn Beck, bear much more resemblance to the French Jacobins than anything conservative. But the memes put forth by the marketing machine take hold, and the GOP propaganda operation that is Fox News has tremendous sway over those who do not question, and that bodes poorly for the future of honest debate in American politics.
I found myself on YouTube the other day, viewing the new RNC web ad, which assumes their audience has a mental age of about 8. So far, the leadership of the Republican Party has yet to approach an issue with maturity, and I couldn’t help but post a comment to the page, asking if anyone didn’t feel offended by the aforesaid assumption. My question was: “I’m stunned by how many people can be swayed by this kind of trash, even in the face of the Arizona legislation, the GOP refusing to work on financial reform, and the plain lack of substance to many of the falsehoods being circulated. Do you really believe Michelle Bachmann when she talks about internment camps? Do you believe Sarah Palin when she threatens you with ‘Death Panels’? When does their credibility suffer?”
The response was swift. I was told that all would be made clear if I read the “Founding Documents” and stopped drinking Kool-Aid (no offense to the KraftFoods Corporation.) As justification for their paranoia, I was referred to FDR’s internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. It was asserted that the Department of Labor – responsible for the census – gave Roosevelt the information he needed to find people. Now we have to worry about Obama, because anyone who disagrees with the need for healthcare reform should be shipped off to central Nevada and be placed in holding pens.
Of course, I pointed out that there have been six decennial censuses since 1942, so why freak out now? Because our freedom is threatened: the government owns 96% of home mortgages, it has taken over student loans, and will force everyone to buy health insurance. After a couple of back-and-forths, this is how the argument lined up:
The new Arizona “Papers, Please” law is okay even though it presumes you are breaking the law;
Warrantless wiretapping is okay because it made us safe;
Holding Jose Padilla (a U.S. citizen) without charge for years was okay because he was obviously a terrorist;
But insuring (not owning) home mortgage securities so that banks will offer them at lower interest rates is tyranny.
These assertions seem nonsensical; they certainly don’t adhere to a consistent policy platform. How is this possible? Back in the 1980s, a Canadian psychologist named Bob Altemeyer did ground-breaking research to find an answer. Altemeyer studies authoritarianism, and has identified the ‘right-wing authoritarian’ (RWA) personality type.
Briefly, since this information rightly occupies multiple volumes, the RWA is characterized as being submissive to [proper] authority, or following established authorities without question; will aggressively support their established authority, even to the point of violence; can be described as conventional and reject moral relativism; separate into homogenous groups and hold prejudices against minorities; tend to lack skepticism and rely on information provided by their authorities; construct a moral standard and reject everything outside of it; and view the world as a dangerous place, with society on the brink of destruction. There is more, but I think the point is made. An RWA personality is capable of accepting an authority like the Bush Administration violating Constitutional tenets while claiming that last year’s stimulus package is ‘big government’, because Glenn Beck told them so.
Which brings us to the end of this post. Altemeyer would define figures like Beck, Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney as social dominators, those who score high on a Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) scale. While RWAs tend to be submissive by nature, SDOs are in control. They believe in a social Darwinism, will discriminate against minority groups, identify threats everywhere in the world, and are Machiavellian (sorry for the disrespect, Niccolo) in their approach to enemies. Interestingly, while they use morality as a talking point, their own behavior demonstrates little of it. If the RWAs are the wind, then SDOs are the sail.
There’s much more, so I’d like to just cite a couple of books, in case you want to keep going (I’m off for a tasty falafel sandwich.) While much of our media makes the Tea Party movement out to be something significant in contemporary politics, I see it differently: it is an incoherent fringe that has always existed, but is now being prodded by a major political party that’s out of power and willing to play hardball. Which was the point of my question on YouTube: if directly confronted with shameless manipulation by the Republican Party, the RWAs will happily lap up their milk and proceed as directed.
“Conservatives Without Conscience,” John W. Dean, Penguin Books, 2007
“The Authoritarians,” Bob Altemeyer, Self-Published, 2007
“The Authoritarian Specter,” Bob Altemeyer, Harvard University Press, 1996
