Parochially Simplistic
Mark Steyn hammers at Barack Obama's "small town" comments and points out the logical inconsistencies of the leftist elitism that wants the US to be more like Europe. Steyn is on a roll.
Where was I? Oh, yes. In my book "America Alone," I note a global survey on optimism: 61 percent of Americans were optimistic about the future, 29 percent of the French, 15 percent of Germans. Take it from a foreigner: In my experience, Americans are the least "bitter" people in the developed world. Secular, gun-free big-government Europe doesn't seem to have done anything for people's happiness. Consider by way of example the words of Keith Reade. He's not an Obama speechwriter, he's a writer for the London Daily Mirror. And the day after the 2004 presidential election he expressed his frustration in an alarmingly Obamaesque way:
"Were I a Kerry voter, though, I'd feel deep anger, not only at them returning Bush to power, but for allowing the outside world to lump us all into the same category of moronic muppets. The self-righteous, gun-totin', military-lovin', sister-marryin', abortion-hatin', gay-loathin', foreigner-despisin', nonpassport ownin' rednecks, who believe God gave America the biggest d*** in the world so it could urinate on the rest of us and make their land 'free and strong.'"
Well, that's certainly why I supported Bush, but I'm not sure it entirely accounts for the other 62,039,073 incontinent rednecks. Reade, though, does usefully enumerate some of the distinctive features that separate America from the rest of the West. "Self-righteous"? If you want a public culture that reeks of indestructible faith in its own righteousness, try Europe – especially when they're talking about America: If you disagree with Eutopian wisdom, you must be an idiot.
Obama and far too many Democrats have bought into this delusion, most thoroughly distilled in Thomas Frank's book "What's The Matter With Kansas?", whose argument is that heartland voters are too dumb (i.e., "moronic muppets") to vote for their own best interests.
Europeans did "vote for their own best interests" – i.e., cradle-to-grave welfare, 35-hour workweeks, six weeks of paid vacation, etc. – and as a result they now face a perfect storm of unsustainable entitlements, economic stagnation and declining human capital that's left them so demographically beholden to unassimilable levels of immigration that they're being remorselessly Islamized with every passing day. We should thank God (forgive the expression) that America's loser gun nuts don't share the same sophisticated rational calculation of "their best interests" as do Thomas Frank, Obama, too many Democrats and the European political establishment.
Steyn argues that America is not more like Europe - thoroughly miserable - because it "clings" to God and guns. The left's insistence that we need to be more like socialized Europe is clueless elitism.
There is quite a lot more, I'd urge readers to click over and read the whole thing.
Other Links to this Post
-
Blue Crab Boulevard » Why Bother? — Monday, 21 April , 2008 @ 3:54 am
By syn, Sunday, 20 April , 2008 @ 8:05 am
Aside from being mugged by reality on 9/11/2001 another reason why I now reject the Collectivist’s elite groupthink I was once held captive inside is my witness to the death of Europe. I don’t go to church, never been to Kansas and live in Urbania however I will defend ‘God, Guns and Cowboys’ for the rest of my living days; these are the only people left standing between Collectivist tyranny (either Islamists or Elitist) and Liberty.
Classical Liberalism died the day JFK was shot dead and I wish certain intellectual snobs would get out of their Ivory Tower once and a while to see why their Collectivist ideals are so tyrannical.
Long live America, and long live God, Guns and Cowboys!
By sam, Monday, 21 April , 2008 @ 12:50 pm
Leave it to Mark Steyn to tell it like it is. I love to read his columns.