Commentary: Why a Liberal Supports Bush's War (Very Moving)

Insight Magazine ^ | 4/10/2003 | Jeffrey Scott Shapiro

[Pearls Before Swine]

I hope we dig out the truth.

Me, too, but I'm not holding my breath. Consider: Illegal registrations, registrations of drunkards and mental incompetents, and immigration scandals (the worst, because they are not reversible). Has GWB shown any inclination to seriously control the borders and control immigration to a legal and assimilable level?

Please understand that I think GWB is FAR preferable to any alternative in sight, but I don't see him (or Ashcroft) getting to the bottom of the many voting irregularities that occurred, or the causes that make future ones likely.

[Wphile]

Do you care? Can you not put party politics aside and support our president in this unified struggle for freedom?

No they cannot. They are incapable of thinking in non partisan terms. Everything to the liberals and the Democrats is about power. Even though they have lost it they refuse to accept it. They Democrats are morally bankrupt.

WAY TO GO W PING!

[Billthedrill]

Most liberals I know who have not given up supporting Saddam in disgust found themselves trapped in that rather anomalous role by two things: hatred (the word is not too strong) of Bush, and a cultural relativism that forced them to take a broad view of Saddam's known violations of human rights until the specifics became undeniable. In addition there is a Vietnam-era antiwar fantasy that has become ingrained in liberal mythology that trended them away from military activity of any sort at any time.

But most of my liberal friends found Saddam simply too repugnant to support for long even against their Republican enemies, and largely because he ran against the grain of other core liberal tenets: feminism, antimilitarism, and a distaste for police states that runs across the American political spectrum. True believers that are still active in the antiwar movement have incorporated serious denial about these things or have desperately clung to a relativism that projects such evils on Bush and the Republicans that Saddam isn't much of a monster by comparison. That, of course, is undergoing shocks to the foundation each time an underground prison opens up or its occupants take the microphone.

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

What a GREAT piece!

[ClancyJ]

You had the wisdom to look at what you had historically believed and realize that the party had changed.

So many just hold to what they knew the party to be as they grew up. Sadly - that party has been taken over by what I believe are socialists.

[ClancyJ]

Thank you for having the wisdom to look at what was actually going on in the Democrats mad scramble for power.

[driftless]

Congratulations on leaving the Dems. Better late than never. My own evolution was a thirty year process starting with reading Solzhenitsyn's Gulag trilogy and finally being pushed over the fence by Clinton. But the Dems are also not the same party they were forty years ago. Until Carter, most Dems prez candidates tried to out-hawk the Republicans. Abortion, Gay rights, and food-nazism weren't even on the table. I firmly believe many Dems, like my parents, still think that their party is the party that looks out for the common man and cares for the underdog. They simply do not understand how far left their party has tilted.

And many more realize it, but don't have the courage of their convictions to change. My 83 year old father is a devout Catholic, pro-life, pro-gun, anti-affirmative action, pro-military (he's an ex-Army drill sergeant), pro-death penalty, and even anti-union. But he votes for Dems every election. I've told him he must think FDR is still the president.

[rocky88]

Great post. I hope someone puts it on DU - love to see THAT reaction!!!

[thepatriot1]

How could you? How could you be so cowardly? How can you portray yourselves as the champions of human rights yet lack the courage to do anything about it?

Awesome!!!!

[TheDon]

I have found the likeness valid as well. Lincoln fought to save the Union, and is best remembered for freeing the slaves. Bush fought to protect the Union, but will likely be best remembered for freeing the Iraqis.

It is unfortunate that the world community takes no interest in freeing people in such nations. North Korea, Syria, Iran, China, Cuba, various African countries, etc. The list is long. But freedom is making progress. May it ever do so.

[Mister Baredog]

Bush fought to protect the Union, but will likely be best remembered for freeing the Iraqis.

The people of Afghanistan might want an honorable mention. And to think BUSH has almost 6 years to go!

[Sam Cree]

"Dems, like my parents, still think that their party is the party that looks out for the common man and cares for the underdog."

Many people certainly do think that way. It is probably worth noting that most liberals explain their sympathy for leftist politics and "social justice" (aka "socialism," IMO) exactly the same way.

They don't quite get the point that when government begins to take responsibility for your life, they also begin to take control of your life. Once government and bureaucracy are able to make arbitrary decisions about the lives of their subjects, which they do in their pursuit of social engineering, the day approaches when government and bureaucracy have unlimited power.

[Paradox]

I can think of no other place more sacred in this country than the temple we call the Lincoln Memorial. I will never forget how I felt as a child when I first gazed up at the marble frame of President Lincoln as he sat silently on his throne. It was a spiritual feeling I had never felt before in my life and it is something that I will never forget.

I had the same feeling while I was there. To see his image, and then read his speech on the wall to his left.. it brought tears to my eyes, I actually cried.

[Paradox]

During political arguments, I found that I couldn't justify my positions, logically. Ever. I can't believe I was ever a liberal. Mostly, I attribute my past liberalism to ignorance. I thought the Democrat party was the party of freedom. What a fool I was.

There are many of us with basically this same story. A Democrat at birth, I was one of those smarmy, pseudointellectual Liberals. I always dismissed the Right as a bunch of mean old Stupid people. I hardly engaged in real debate with any of them, I just ASSUMED they were wrong because, well, they were mean and stupid, as I saw on TV shows and the movies.

Then one day, I engaged a conservative (libertarian actally) in a gun control debate, and, I actually LOST. That is, for once, I tried to use Reason and Logic (I was always a fan of Spock), and I LOST!?

I felt sick, physically ill. Was it the humiliation? Was it the sheer SHOCK of having my world view challenged? I dont know, but that day began my slow metamorphosis.

Sometimes, getting over the cognitive dissonance is an exceedingly difficult thing to do.

[grumple]

grump bump

[Cacique]

Lincoln and W have something in common. They are both Republicans.

[Mo1]

Allow me to respond: How could you? How could you be so cowardly? How can you portray yourselves as the champions of human rights yet lack the courage to do anything about it? Are you so afraid of conflict that you lack the conviction to stand before the world and denounce evil even when it exists in its most pure form? Do you not see the torture and heartbreak of a nation in despair? Do you care? Can you not put party politics aside and support our president in this unified struggle for freedom?

No because they like Commie Dictatorships ..

[LincolnLover]

"That's why so many protesting liberals out on the street are high school and college students. They really don't know any better..."

How true. A little thing called "reality" has a way of opening the eyes of many misguiuded youngsters.

A favorite Churchill quote:

"If you're 20 and conservative, you have no heart. If you're 40 and liberal, you have no head."

[Coop]

Yep! I like that quote, as well as the one that says:

A conservative is simply a liberal who has been mugged!

[Snidely Whiplash]

A favorite Churchill quote:

"If you're 20 and conservative, you have no heart. If you're 40 and liberal, you have no head."

Churchill never said it. It's not clear who did. And in any case, to Churchill, "Liberal" and "Conservative" essentially meant the opposite of what they do to Americans.

Snidely