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Social Darwinism.

The "left" is unfamiliar with the entire concept of social Darwinism. They don't know it. They can't apply it.

In contrast, the "right" is under such constant media assault that we've culled our own herd. The left has made us stronger by attacking us from every angle. Our weaker candidates are killed off early on, and only our strongest have survived.

The biased news media hurts us in the short term, of course (I'd guess 10 to 15% in the polls), but over the long term it has made us stronger. Vas mich nicht umbrincht, mass mich starker, and all of that. Our weaker politicians like Newt Gingrinch, who had far more vulnerabilities than strengths, are drummed out. Our Packwoods are gone. Our Lott's are no longer in charge of the Senate (for giving a compliment at a freakin' birthday party!).

What remains in our Party are the strongest. President Bush and VP Cheney are so strong that the left has to now manufacture from whole cloth entire "scandals" such as NY Times' columnist Maureen Dowd deliberately misquoting the President in order to smear him.

Quote Senator Kerry verbatim on his "I voted for the $87 Billion before I voted against it," however, and we get tagged as being "mean-spirited," "negative," etc.

So the same process that makes our side stronger (we've now taken the House, the Senate, the Presidency, most state governorships including all of the large states, most state legislatures, etc.) makes our opponent weaker.

Because the news media protects instead of culls its own liberal herd, that herd has grown progressively (heh, or regressively if you must) weaker. An Arkansas governor with a long track record of failing his own state's schools, womanizing, and questionable (that's being charitable) business deals gets such sweet press that he wins the Presidency, only to be so out of his league in the White House that he fails to enact any of his ideological legislation, for instance. A corrupt California governor is so protected by his liberal news media that citizens have to recall him to stop his statewide fiscal disaster, instead of being compelled to resign by non-stop news attacks. The LA Times put 27 more reporters covering allege "groping" claims from unemployed actresses against Davis' Republican challenger than they sent to uncover Bustamante's questionable La Raza affiliations, or on various scandals involving state "grants" to liberal "charities," much less to cover such news as the bribes taken by a French President that could explain his ardent opposition to a war on Iraq.

A Democrat can sexually harass a staffer in New Jersey and be called "noble" for admitting that he's gay instead of a cad for hitting on his staff, betraying his wife, or even called a crook for misusing state funds to entice new lovers. But let a Republican Senator kiss a staffer on the lips, or a conservative Supreme Court nominee give a staffer a can of Coke, and suddenly they are misogynistic sexual harassers in the eyes of the news media.

Can you imagine the news media's collective reaction if a Republican had instead made Senator Kerry's comments about Britain, Italy, Japan, Spain, and Poland being a "coalition of the bribed"?!

It is beyond question that there is a double standard in the media. In the short term, this double standard does indeed work against us by giving several percentage points of popular support over to the Democrats.

In the long term, however, Social Darwinism kicks in. Our leaders are stronger, have better political armor, and maintain more easily defensible political positions. Our weaker politicians are gone. Their weaker politicians, however, are cultivated.

This is epitomized in their selection of Senator Kerry, the most liberal voter in the entire Senate, whose most significant acts of his life were made in the four months that he served in his first job out of college some 3+ decades ago...a man who has taken either both sides of every issue or the most liberal side of every issue, bar none.

Senator Kerry can get away, at least in the press of course, with voting for the Iraq War but then against its funding, but can you imagine what the press would have done if President Bush had been for our National Missile Defense but against its funding?!

So at every turn, the Left gets a free pass for its waffling inconsistency, whereas the Right has to get it correct the first time and stick with that view no matter what.

But Social Darwinism has caused unintended consequences. By coddling the Left via forgiving most every gaffe, the press has cultivated a weaker liberal side. And by attacking the Right from every possible angle at all possible times, the liberal press has made the Right stronger.

It's Social Darwinism. The herd that has been more pampered has grown soft. The herd that has had to fight has grown stronger.

The left is now stuck with mediocre candidates. The right, however, is finally raising up a crop of Titans.

Nice analysis, it is the reality we live in.

Maybe. But the fact that the Dems' schedule for the primaries was so truncated, that it began with the Iowa cuacuses (packed with the most left leaning, anti-war delegates) and then went to NH (also far to the left of the country) rather assured this result.

As usual, your reasoning and conclusions are faultless.

Most of this thesis is crap, IMO.

Rush Limbaugh(talkradio) and the internet. That's the reason the liberal media is so transparent. Nothing else.

Most people would have never heard that Dowd lied in her column. Yes, "lied". If not for Rush, etc., we'd be screwed.

It's comforting to know their power has faded and their reputations are ruined.

This is epitomized in their selection of Senator Kerry, the most liberal voter in the entire Senate, whose most significant acts of his life were made in the four months that he served in his first job out of college some 3+ decades ago...a man who has taken either both sides of every issue or the most liberal side of every issue, bar none.

Senator Kerry can get away, at least in the press of course, with voting for the Iraq War but then against its funding, but can you imagine what the press would have done if President Bush had been for our National Missile Defense but against its funding?!

So at every turn, the Left gets a free pass for its waffling inconsistency, whereas the Right has to get it correct the first time and stick with that view no matter what. But Social Darwinism has caused unintended consequences. By coddling the Left via forgiving most every gaffe, the press has cultivated a weaker liberal side. And by attacking the Right from every possible angle at all possible times, the liberal press has made the Right stronger.

Most definitely. I think it important to add that polls are of limited utility this time around. The ham-fistedness of the Kerry camp in trying to stifle the ad and attack the Swifties was so blatant that they in fact could not have done more to legitimize the issue. People instinctively despise bullies. James Carville's crazed raving at John O'Neill, Lanny Davis's oily disingenuousness and the threatening letters to TV stations only serve to substantiate the charges made.

Over the past decade in a thousand ways both large and small (with the Clinton follies the foremost example) the democrats have become associated with elitism, corruption and dare I say it, just plain hatred. Again, this is just my opinion, but the 2002 off-year election debacle bears this out. I remember that autumn thinking that surely one does not have to be a conservative to see that democrats live by and for power (the country's safety and prosperity be damned), associate themselves with all manner of unsavory people and practices and believe in nothing but "their monopoly on goodness."

Last year it was the Wellstone rally that served duty as the last straw. The best that can be said for the tightly-scripted convention was that it did not turn into a disaster, but the same, moss-backed populist rhetoric that failed to work for Al Gore is not going to do any better for the Two Johns. Kerry will be wheeled into November on a gurney and I don't care how pretty Edwards is, no ticket can be improved by the addition of a slick ambulance-chaser. This latest eruption of democrat sleaze in NJ is just beginning to bubble and spit and the more the MM tries to sit on it the more suspicions they will raise.

This is simply too deep and quiet a phenomenon to be measureable by polling. I am convinced that even people who furiously defend Kerry and the dems at cocktail parties and by the water cooler will doing otherwise in the privacy of the voting booth. Anyone with sense knows that these are dangerous times and that pulling the lever for the dems will not magically bring back the gay nineties.

I thoroughly enjoyed absorbing your analysis. What struck me was your reference to unintended consequences; liberal programs usually have grim unintended consequences. Fro example, liberal welfare and housing programs decimated the black family. Liberal sexual mores produced a VD epidemic (and aided in the destruction of the black family). Most of the time, liberal unintended consequences generate more liberal causes that cause more suffering and so more liberal causes. In this case, as you illustrated, the liberal unintended consequence has injured the liberal party-press industrial complex, perhaps mortally. Yours is an interesting insight.

Very astute analysis.

My first FReeper contribution. Hope not to disappoint.

The whole 2004 election needs to be put into the context of the historical crossroads at which we lie. The RATS have been backed into a corner. If W retakes the white house, then he will be in a position to get credit for 1) a rebounding economy, 2) an Iraq that is NOT the quagmire the MSM claims it to be, 3) other successful foreign policy initiatives such as regime change in Iran (is it REALLY a coincidence that we now have troops in Iraq AND Afghanistan), 4) being the first president to not just pay lip service to resolving the Middle East question, 5) leading the way to TRUE tax reform, etc.

When he wins, history will have the opportunity to look upon his transcendent legacy - a point that the RATS, no doubt, fully appreciate. They will face the prospect of being out of power for a generation, a prospect that has caused them to go nuclear in this election.

Fortunately for us, that is why they will eventually lose. Their vision is on their own power and their own legacy, as shown to us by the Clintonistas. Our vision is for the future of the American Dream. But because they are not bound by the rules of civility, we can expect it to get much uglier before we see daylight November 3rd.

They are now in the predicament of having to reap what they have sown. They're stuck with the Frenchurian Candidate as a result of a lack of vision (or driving by the hood of their car, as I like to say). He was the DEFAULT candidate that looked better than Dean at the time. Now, 6 months later, they realize that they've been hustled, but know its too late to pull back. (I don't think the country would tolerate a Lautenberg/Toricelli type switcheroo like the folks in New Jersey did)

So don't expect any favors from the MSM. Don't expect any cogent explanations about Kerry's schizophrenic past. Don't expect any civil discourse on the fact that the RATS are willing to sacrifice the national security of this country in order to try to garner political points.

We truly are a nation at war. The problem is our side is fighting for the lives of our country. The RATS have joined the enemy in fighting US.

what an excellent piece

What an incisive,thought-provoking commentary.

I commend you!

WoW! Great post! Makes one proud to be a Freeper!!