Posted on 09/29/2010 3:55:47 AM PDT by Scanian
A young client, Jenny, came to see me this week in tears. She was outside her house when suddenly, a speeding Prius hit her cat. The driver slowed down, observed Jenny's horrified eyes, and then hightailed it out of there.
There's good news: the cat survived. But Jenny's belief in the goodness of people -- particularly hybrid-drivers -- did not.
I have my own tales to tell from my week in Berkeley. I was walking gingerly through a crosswalk (I have bad knees) when an impatient driver shot me the bird. His car was graced with a Coexist bumper sticker.
One more: I was meeting a friend at a cafe, and we needed another chair. A man, sitting alone and surfing the net, had his legs strewn on an extra chair. When I asked him nicely to borrow it, he refused. The guy was wearing a Free Tibet t-shirt.
I imagine that all of these people consider themselves noble and righteous. They support aggrieved nations, world unity, and a greener world. Apparently, this absolves them from having to actually be nice people. As long as they talk the talk, they don't have to walk the walk.
This phenomenon is not confined to Berkeley; each day we see the same hypocrisy on full display. Nancy Pelosi prays at mass, magnanimously spreads our (not her) wealth around, all the while cavalierly tarring opponents as Nazis. Obama views himself as gifted while he casually disses the Prime Minister of Israel. And most people on the Left suffer from Palin Derangement Syndrome, which allows for hideous, no-holds-barred utterances toward this good-hearted woman.
The examples are endless. Of course, conservatives can be hypocrites, too. But we on the right don't delude ourselves into believing that our voting patterns allow us to be dirty, rotten scoundrels.
Consequently, the Democratic Party is where we see people considering themselves virtuous while treating other living and breathing humans with utter disregard, if not downright abuse. Decades of moral relativism and secular humanism have transformed the Golden Rule for Progressives into this: I demand that you treat me well, and as long as I champion liberal issues, I'll treat you any damn way I want to.
How can people so easily let themselves off the hook? Is it denial? Yes, but that wouldn't fully explain things. Is it delusion, which means not only denying reality, but creating a completely new reality? Hmm...getting warmer here.
Are we seeing dissociation, where a person disconnects from himself and becomes, temporarily, a different personality? This phenomenon occurs only in the most disturbed. But I wouldn't rule this out among some of the more rabid and unglued.
But I think the best explanation for the behavior of Obama, Pelosi, et al. lay in a conversation that I had with an old flame, Peter, many years ago. We'd been dating for a few months when I was ready to have the conversation. I sat him down and told him I cared a lot about him. Did he see a future between us?
He looked at me as though I were from another galaxy. Then he uttered something that I have never forgotten. He said, "A relationship? I'm not capable of a relationship."
At first I shrugged it off to commitment-phobia. After all, Peter was an ardent progressive -- the first in line for any demonstration. He avidly read books by Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn.
But the more I got to know Peter, the more I realized that his self-appraisal was spot-on. While superficially engaging, there was a hollowness about him, a brokenness, even. He was unable to connect to me, to anyone, in a meaningful way. There just was no there there.
That conversation with Peter, though years ago, has always remained front and center in my mind. It has helped me to understand why some people look fully formed from the outside but are vacant inside.
The Peters of the world may not be withholding love or affection or even simple kindness. They may just be incapable of it. They are missing an essential ingredient to being a good and whole human being, and that is empathy, or putting oneself in another person's shoes.
Perhaps the reasons are genetic. Maybe it has to do with copious pot and alcohol use or overuse of prescription drugs. In places like Berkeley, it may be inbreeding. Mental illness, character defects, bad upbringing -- the culprits are endless.
In the realm of romance, the Peters (the Peter Pans?) are simply frustrating and disappointing. But when the empty shells of the world grab the reins of power, that is another story entirely; it can spell catastrophe.
And that's why we have been watching, spellbound, like my client Jenny, as a disaster movie unfolds before our horrified eyes. And this is why we must propel the intact and unbroken among us into office this November.
Glad you liked the post...Robin is a very valuable FReeper!
I have a liberal friend who used to spout that cold-blooded crap until his 101 year old dad took sick and the family pulled every string imaginable to keep him alive as long as possible.
My buddy doesn’t care to discuss Obamacare, “Dr. Zeke,” or anything related anymore, as you might expect.
Robin is a converted liberal herself. Those titles would have affirmed that Peter was the right stuff in her mind.
Grievance is the foundation of the left. They are basically unhappy and selfish. Most of the people on the Left support causes not to do good, but to punish the rest of us.
Robin’s coming out of the dark post? I couldn’t find anything earlier on FR.
Robin of Berkeley: Extreme Makeover, Conservative Edition
American Thinker ^ | July 08, 2009 | Robin of Berkeley
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2287864/posts
They’re everywhere.
A truck hit my dog not too long ago and the driver just drove away after slowing down a bit (dog had a black smudge and a limp for a couple days but was fine).
A woman ran a stoplight and hit my brother in law, who was riding a bike, breaking his collarbone and snapping the bike frame in half. She drove off, despite witnesses, leaving him for dead. When the police found her, she denied any knowledge and instead questioned whether the witnesses were faking it.
The worst part about feral liberals is that they are quite aggressive, or passive-aggressive. Like the clowns that push kids aside with shopping carts and glare at the grocery store. No understanding of the world outside the delusions in their heads.
Why just yesterday I parked next to a black Prius with a KPFA Radio bumper sticker, and couldn’t help but peek inside as I got out. I wasn’t disappointed, every seat but the driver’s was filled with detritus up to the windows. Clothing, old newspapers and periodicals, food wrappers, hats, and empties. Obviously owned and operated by an “enlightened” being.
It didn’t take long to spot the likely Prius driver in the espresso shop. Middle aged and scowling, a short, fleshy woman whose hair was pulled back and tied without care, wearing dirty white shorts, a shapeless top of some sort, and sandals. She radiated unhappiness and anger.
Sure enough, by the time I got back to my ride she was in the Prius and on her way.
Via con Dios, baby!
A close relative listens to KPFA all the time, so I have heard my fair share of it. All it does is spew hate. I can’t imagine that anyone who thrives on such stuff would be a very balanced person, or have very much respect for other people.
But I forget—KPFA and all of the Pacifica network are filling a vital need for compassionate, humanitarian, and caring radio programming.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.