Another 11th hour, born-again Conservative Expatriate talks about the Base that made his entire career possible.
From Frum Forum:
How Palin Taps the GOP’s Economic Fears
...
Now they feel themselves living in a hostile culture, under a president who describes himself as a Christian but never goes to church, and who manages to symbolize both the ascendency of the educated elite and the displacement of native-born whites by non-white immigrants.
In this inhospitable climate, they have had many reasons to feel that the GOP does not speak for them.
They had reason to feel that the GOP did not speak for them during the years leading up to the disaster, when they were told that the Bush economy was “the greatest story never told,” despite the stagnation of their wages.
They had reason to feel that the GOP did not speak for them during the crisis, when Republicans bailed out Wall Street and the big car companies, while leaving distressed homeowners to fend for themselves.
They have reason now to feel that the GOP does not speak for them, as it coalesces around a plan to eliminate their deductions and curtail their Medicare in order to enact a big tax cut for people much higher on the income ladder.
They feel victimized, embittered, deeply mistrustful of every established institution except the military. And they are hungry for a candidate who pungently expresses their victimhood, bitterness and mistrust: Donald Trump? Herman Cain? Michele Bachmann? But of course, nobody does it better than the candidate who has made victimhood her core message: Sarah Palin.
Fuck 'em.
Seriously.
Being an unreconstructed Bushite Conservative, even as he shoots spitballs at their Hive Queen, Frum will continue to backhandedly pander to the wingnut base as long as there is money in it.
And of course there will continue to be money in it as long as his pals keep putting him in front of teevee cameras and driving internet traffic to his site day-in, day-out.
Because for the Profession Conservative Public Intellectual, the concept of restorative justice -- of atoning for your sins and paying your debt to society for the horrific damage you helped to inflict -- is only for gang-bangers and dime-bag dealers.
Only for little people.
Meanwhile, for those of us outside the nostalgia-drunk drum circle of the Professional Conservative Expat crowd, the events of the last few decades look very different.
From where most of us were standing, it sure as shit looked like Liberals were playing "Catcher in the Rye" on the edge of one precipice after another, beseeching these imbeciles not to sign their own death warrants, as they merrily followed Limbaugh, Falwell, Norquist, Reed, Gingrich, Atwater, Bush, Reagan and all the rest of Conservatism's greater and lesser Pied Pipers (including Frum) right on up the gibbet stairs.
Year after year, as we begged them to stop, the Pig People laughed and laughed as they happily took the rope their leaders had spun for them and laced up their own nooses.
Year after year as, we screamed to them to turn around -- to pause and consider where this madness was going -- they loudly called us traitors and drowned out the ugly tide of inconvenient facts rising up against them by Turning Rush Up Louder.
So where were clowns like Frum then?
What were they saying and doing as the Reagan-lovin', Rush-listenin', Fox-watchin' Base obediently cinched the slipknot tight around this nation's neck?
And now?
Well, now it's pretty much too late. Now the Base has stepped right off into space (as predicted, and dragging the rest of us down with them) and cannot understand why it's not fun anymore.
Why they can't breathe anymore.
Why, no matter how violently they kick and gasp, they can't seem to reach anything solid to stand on anymore.
And as everything goes dark, their Conservative executioners continue watch them writhe and struggle, periodically reassuring them that everything will still be OK if they just stay loyal to the Cause, and that any discomfort they may be experiencing is the fault of those damn awful Libertards and thier damned awful Librul Media!
So fuck 'em.
Of course Mr. Frum -- being a Conservative -- is also never going to cop to the fact that the rage and paranoia at the heart of the GOP did not just spring fully-formed from the head of St. Ronald Reagan. These traits were being carefully cultivated, refined and bred into the Base by the Brain Caste of Mr. Frum's Conservative Movement since before he was born. These traits are now fully insulated from any contact with the real world by the Fox News/Hate Radio media machine that Brain Caste of Mr. Frum's Conservative Movement worked very hard and spent billions of dollars to create.
All while those evil Libtards tried to convince them this would all end very badly.
So fuck 'em all.
Seriously.
10 comments:
Your reference to "Catcher" is deep--hopefully it doesn't mean we're doomed to sit by the calliope and weep, or tell our stories from mental institutions, but it's hard to deny that's how it looks. At any rate, I love this blog just as much as I hate David Brooks. Peace.
You know it's a funny thing, but....
All those things that the good Mr. Frum says the GOP did to Americans are precisely the things he wants the northern branch plant division to do to his fellow Canadians.
And now that the TeaParty-tinged, AEI -assisted Conservatives have gained absolute power up here, do not be surprised if you see the good Mr. Frum move back to the Great White North for a few years so that he can run his Mom's old network, the CBC, into the ground while he and his lurk, just beyond the horizon, waiting for the arrival of 2016.
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I used to listen to Rush all the time, I would call myself a commited northern Euro socialist but I liked to debate him. Since he stopped doing the oxy he lost his edge or any sense of humour, now its just Sean Hannity inanity.
Fucken shittebagges.
under a president who describes himself as a Christian but never goes to church
Like Ronald Reagan?
What's the real difference? Black, black, blackity blackblack.
People who are so stupid and easily distracted by shiny objects ("Ignore the destruction of Medicare, look, Bill Ayers!") as to keep voting for their own impoverishment don't get much sympathy for me, except that they're dragging the whole country into the sewer of moral cowardice with them.
When these people look around and scream "Who wrecked this country!?", tell 'em to look in the mirror...
Shorter David Frum: On one hand, the Republican base is realizing that their party has been actively working to destroy them and their way of life for 30 years. On the other, if they switched to the Democrats, they'd have to admit they were wrong, and occasionally talk respectfully to Black and Latino people. So, you know, you can see the difficult spot they're in.
Not a damn thing "conservative" about any of them.
Unless you're talking sperm.
And, if people are so sick of what's happening to them, why not punch the off button on the MSM?
Now that would be worth hearing about.
Thanks, Dg!
These are all very good points but I think it’s important to note that none of these Republican Party “achievements” would have been possible without the critical assistance of the Democratic Party, the other half in this long running kabuki theater by way of the Ratchet Effect...
Fuck 'Em is right. It will be interesting to see how the GOP pulls itself back from the edge. The forward momentum into insanity is going to prove daunting. But, as you say...Fuck 'Em.
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