Jun 09 2006
The Frigid Left
I am beginning to see a cold, uncaring deep freeze ascending over the political left in this country and in the West – and it is very disturbing. There were numerous examples of the left’s total insensitivity to the human condition on display yesterday as many panned the news that a seriously brutal thug and been delivered justice at the end of two 500 lb bombs (my posts on the left’s response are here and here).
Zarqawi kidnapped non-combatants and slowly sawed their heads off on TV for PR purposes. He treated people worse than cattle (which might be the only reason PETA-ites would make some noise about him). Anyone who has the Nick Berg beheading seared into their being, like many of us do, would never dismiss the passing of someone like Zarqawi who used death as a media ploy. So how is the left is so callous now? Has their partisan fever burnt out all their humanity?
Reading this item, which was posted by Tom Beyan at RCP Blog, made me realize how much the left has given up just to retain their anger.
Any terrorist attack on Canada is bound to be homegrown, because there is no shadowy but powerful network of international terrorists waging a war against the West.
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There have been terrorist groups in the Arab world for decades, but there never was much of an international Islamist “terrorist network.” Even in Al-Qaeda’s heyday, before the US invasion of Afghanistan effectively beheaded it in 2001, there were only a few hundred core members.
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There isn’t a major terrorist threat; just a little one. The massive overreaction called “the war on terror” is due to the fact that 9/11 hit a very big and powerful country that had the military resources to strike anywhere in the world, and strategic interests that might be advanced by a war or two fought under the cover of a crusade against terrorism. If 9/11 had happened in Canada, it would all have been very different.A kind of 9/11 did happen in Canada. The largest casualty toll of any terrorist attack in the West before 2001 was the 329 people who were killed in the terrorist bombing of Air-India Flight 182, en route from Toronto to London, in 1985.
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The investigation was not very successful, and twenty-one years later most of the culprits have still not been punished. But Sikh terrorism eventually died down even though nobody invaded Punjab, and nobody else got hurt in Canada. Sometimes not doing much is the right thing to do. Not doing too much would have been the right response in 2001, too.
The logic here is clear – they are just dead people. Don’t do anything about the killers and they will stop killing others at some point. Too bad for all those souls who died (and the others who died as things ‘died down’). There is nothing to do about it.
What this is, and everything else I have been reading from the leftward fringes, is a deep and dark uncaring. The left doesn’t cherish life outside those they like and know. The coldness in this logic is stunning. It is like that used in video game killing. Some pawns must die at times and that is that.
Actually, it is that mindset that made us ignore all the warning signs that Al Qaeda was getting bolder and better at each attack. That is the kind of logic that would have left Al Qaeda and Saddam and the Taliban in place to develop ever more clever and destructive forms of attacks. Al Qaeda never seems to satiate their lust for blood. Zarqawi took terrorism to a new media level doing whatever he could to get media attention. So the logic is of course seriously flawed. But there it is.
And sadly, our gullible media always reacted as Al Qaeda wanted by over-emphasizing the attacks and under reporting the successes (which is not balance by any definition. The left doesn’t care who or how many die. The leftward media doesn’t care if people are killed or maimed to feed their news headlines. The liberals in Congress do not care that every call to retreat is a signal to detonate more bombs in more streets. Bush’s determination to see this through is not a call for more death – he is unwavering. But the left’s cries to retreat sure are.
And now we see that the are unimpressed that Zarqawi is dead. As they were unimpressed that Hussein was captured and his raping-killing-torturing-for-fun sons are dead. The left doesn’t care. Why? Is there anything that can distract them from their self absorbtion? Does anything penetrate their cold hard shell – other than airplane crashes of their beloved leaders? The frigid left cares only about the frigid left, an no one else. That is why they joke about killing Bush. That is why they say better Bush dead than Zarqawi, or why someone like Ted Rall had his emotional fit over the death of Pat Tillman, a true hero. They do not care about humanity or human beings. And that simply is not what America is or ever will be. We will never be the Frigid Left.
Addendum: An example of not being in the Frigid Left.
Democrats Call Zarqawi Killing A Stunt…
No respect from the far left. Not that we expected any. Via Washington Times
Some Democrats, breaking ranks from their leadership, today said the death of terrorist leader Abu Musab Zarqawi in Iraq was a stunt to divert attention from an unpopular …
from Stop the Aclu above:
“Some Democrats, breaking ranks from their leadership, today said the death of terrorist leader Abu Musab Zarqawi in Iraq was a stunt to divert attention from an unpopular … ”
The ironic thing about it is that these Democrats ARE NOT breaking ranks, it is the main stream of the Democrats, but mostly the Extremists from the Left Fringe.
But, it’s nothing new for them. They have always been that way, If it had been up to them we would never have been in any war, including the Revolutionary war. When it was very evident that millions were being eliminated in Russia back in the 30’s, when it was evident that the Jews were disappearing in Europe in the late 30’s and early 40’s, according to them it was “those people being killed, it wasn’t our business” let’s stay out of it. That has always been their mentality. Nobody can forget that Joseph Kennedy was one of the most Pacifist in his words and actions. The Japanese were killing people all over Asia prior to WWII, but the pacifists didn’t want the US to get involved and believe it or not, even when Pearl Harbor was bombed, why only 2300 people were killed, that wasn’t worth getting involved in.
Yes, it has always been their position that, sooner or later they would get everybody killed that they wanted killed then the rest of us would be all right. But that point, in fact, will never come. They actually have to be shown, by killing them, that a civilized world can’t exist that way. Even today, even though I hope we don’t have to get in more wars, something needs to be done in Darfur. There people are being killed simply because of who they are and they are “in the way” , but we’re leaving it up to the UN and, of course, they aren’t doing a damn thing about it.
Indeed, the attitude you are speaking of is nothing new. It is the objectification and dehumanization of those with whom one disagrees into an “other” who must be eliminated in order for the triumph of socialism. The leftist, but not Marxist, philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell, was horrified by this. In his Unpopular Essays, Russell recounts his meeting with Lenin which chilled him to the core – he describes Lenin as chortling when talking about killing kulaks. And the usual leftist favorite you can’t make an omlette without breaking eggs. The phenomenon was also discussed in James Burnham’s unfortunately neglected essay The Suicide of the West in which he describes the left/liberal mentality that only liberals are fully human. Unfortunately, the phenomenon is not confined to the left, as the various fascist movements similarly objectified the jews and the communists.
he describes Lenin as chortling when talking about killing kulaks. And the usual leftist favorite you can’t make an omlette without breaking eggs.
Ahhh yes, it’s the humanists, leftists that only kill to eliminate the lesser advantaged, the ones that disagree with them, the ones that are standing in the way of Liberals, the only ones “that really care” about others.
The conservatives on the otherhand tend to go to war to stop the objectives of those humanist,leftist Liberals.
From orig post
“I am beginning to see a cold, uncaring deep freeze ascending over the political left in this country and in the West – and it is very disturbing.”
I forgot to point out that the year this occurred was somewhere around 1969 (don’t recall the year just the specific event)
That great Liberal newsman, whom was still in the closet at the time, Walter Cronkite, announced to the world that we were losing the Viet Nam war and from that point on, the whole damn media have done everything they could to make America the cause of all evil. and some way or other it is all on the shoulders of Republican Presidents, the Democrat Presidents that have managed to slip into office, usually without 50% of the vote somehow were not quite able to get everything straightened back out before the evil Republicans got back in.
And that folks is when it all started.
I loved the reporters questions about giving Z medical attention or did American forces “just let him die.” Of course they tried to save him once they found him alive, he is a treasure trove of high value intel. My only slim regret that Z is dead is that our guys didn’t get a chance to ask him gently about AQ operations.
Worth reading:
We ALL got that SOB
Worth reading:
We ALL got that SOB
Left by crosspatch on June 9th, 2006
Fantastic, I wish all Americans felt that way. Unfortunately some Americans hate America and are sorry we got him, after all he was such a nice guy, sawing off heads and all, May he spend life in hell hanging by his cajones.
I for one am glad that bastard is dead. The far left cares about ideas, not people. To them terrorism is just something the Bushies thought up to scare the stupid people, the same way communism was used to scare the stupid people.
Sometimes I wonder if this is a sort of defence mechanism. Go after Zarqawi you might die, go after Bush you might get Susan Sarandon to play you in a movie.
As long as they see the current War on Terrorism as more harmful to the Republicans than the Democrats, then they will continue their War on the War on Terrorism.
Excellent insights in this piece, A.J. You’ve hit on a factor that puts some long-puzzling ‘disconnects’ into perspective for me.
I’ve used an analogy for years to roughly define a difference between equally “well-meaning” liberals and conservatives: “A concerned and caring liberal, seeing someone in need, will immediately get up a petition or start a movement to persuade government to set up a new agency to address whatever the needy person and others like him/her are in need of.
An equally concerned and caring conservative, seeing someone in need, will immediately get him or her a meal, a little cash, help them find work/shelter, donate and/or solicit usable clothing, furnishings, and odds & ends from other friends and neighbors.”
It’s a generalization, but I still think it’s valid as far as it goes. You’ve clarified a central piece I had completely overlooked: Essential motivation, which in the first instance of leading a mini-crusade for a government solution is basically self-aggrandizement, where the needy person/cause is merely a means to the end.
Motivation in the second instance, personal involvement to address the actual, immediate need of that one (at a time) needy person, is altruistic. There is, of course, still self-gratification for the giver, but it’s in the satisfaction of helping someone, rather than in gaining credit or recognition for “helping” someone.
Am I making sense?
What I took away from what you said, MerryJ1 was that a concerned liberal is prepared to expend great amounts of energy and resources to get someone else to address the problem. The concerned conservative is prepared to expend great amounts of energy and resources to help the person address the problem themself using already available resources.
Yes, as far as that goes, but what I missed was the “why?” My basic assumption had always been that both liberal and conservative were acting out of compassion, just using different approaches to address the same problem.
Something AJ said brought a different dimension into the picture and that is, the approaches are different because the motives are different. The liberal approach is not about the problem, it’s about the liberal. It’s about garnering recognition for their compassion, the needy person or cause being just incidental, a vehicle to take them to their parade.
Roundup Redux…
Another day, another roundup.More doubts about Haditha, mostly based on an article I linked a few days ago. Clarice sees the media treating ……
Spot on MERRYJ1! You have defined the liberal mindset exactly right. That is why they appear so frigid as far as life goes. Their entire motivation is to promote themselves. The more you look at all of their (Dems in Congress) words and actions, you see that as a defining theme.