Monday, February 13, 2012

CPAC Lost in a Hyperreal World

Reports from the just completed CPAC conference seem to highlight the depths of the historical amnesia and outright insanity that now reign supreme through too many parts of the conservative movement in America: Salon. Among the highlights were anti-democratic rhetoric, anti-Obama vitriol, anti-tax anthems, anti-Immigrant and anti-Black rabble rousing and a blanket anti-government stance. Really it is yet another reminder of the negative stance the Republican party has taken against everyone except the 1% in America today (and really only the 1% who is white and male if we extrapolate up from the invited White Supremacists and anti-woman-can-control-their-own-body set). It is hard to know what is most troubling about the GOP today, but I thought I would take a shot based on the CPAC highlights.

1. At the top of the list for me is the aforementioned historical amnesia. We have been living in a conservative world for over 30 years now, if we rightfully admit that Clinton continued "neoliberal" policies of limiting government, deregulation and dismantling of the social safety net. While Obama has spent the past four trying to finally confront this legacy of increased income inequality, increased poverty and increased profits and income for the richest Americans, he has been blocked at every corner. So what is the legacy? The neoliberal project has failed at every turn, causing America into economic decline, putting Europe on the precipice of economic ruin and causing untold poverty and heartache in the third world countries that really suffer the brunt of the neoliberal global worldview. The environment is in shambles, workers rights are on the decline, people are starving even in the belly of the beast and our education system is beyond mediocre. Yet we continue to hear that this is the best system available. We hear conservatives say with a straight face that Obama is to blame for our current economic malaise. We continue to hear that Reagan was a great president when many would look at the S&L Crisis, 1987 Wall Street collapse and tax code changes as auguring our current decline. If we do not learn from history, we are bound to repeat it. The GOP seems immune to this type of logic, and assume some socialist said it anyway; even though it was an elitist philosopher who might very well have shared some of their views.

2. The anti-democratic trends in the GOP over the past two decades are troubling to the extreme. Efforts were made to make the presidency essentially extralegal in its immunity to all impunity under Bush and Cheney, congressional rules have been changed to allow them to block almost any action they disagree with, they blocked more judged under Dems than the other way around by far but continue to use that as a rallying cry and they have worked to essentially ransom and buy the media into supporting their perspectives enough of the time. The latest example of this anti-democratic spirit comes from anti-tax renegade Grover Norquist who argued that the next President should actually take a relatively passive role:“We’re not auditioning for someone to tell us what to do,” he declared. “We know what to do. We just need a president who can sign the legislation that the Republican House and Senate pass. … We don’t need someone to think. … We need someone who knows how to hold a pen.”

3. I have often written about the anti-intellectualism at the heart of conservatism and in the middle of that argument stands the fulcrum upon which the conservative movement has built its base: "we don't need someone to think." Political rhetoric has always relied on pushing for emotional over factual appeal, for creating bandwagoning through hatred, for appealing to the common man through false connection and for bending the truth to skew public opinion. Yet the new GOP has become so adept at those strategies they have forgotten to stand for anything at all. The Romney lying is but a symptom of the disease that has infected a party with one idea that seems destined to destroy America if ever fully enacted. One CPAC attendee explained that "Conservatives are more positive because we've got truth on our side." What they are positive about is hard to discern and that truth even more illusory.

4. As I have written on several occasions, lack of empathy on the right has become downright nasty. One CPAC attendee turned to an occupier and said "just because you've failed doesn't mean the system has failed." Yet that occupier has a job and is just protesting the 1% that many at the conference thought were the embodiment of the American dream. This group shows no empathy for the working class or poor, little empathy for even the children of "illegal" immigrants, no sense of solidarity with the middle class losing their jobs or homes, no empathy for women's bodies (many even if they are raped) and, if they are to be believed, little sympathy for the other 99% of Americans (even as many of them fall within that group). Empathy is really the glue that holds a society together, the very fabric of democracy. If we cease caring for others who are different than us, we move toward fascism and unbridled capitalist exploitation. And this seems where the GOP seems destined to take us if they get their way. 

In line with this view, while Romney did squeak out victories in Maine and, surprisingly, in the straw poll at CPAC, Santorum has stormed to a 15 point lead in national polls, meaning the last true conservative standing might hold the mantle for a movement that careens toward a showdown on the future of America. Conservatives have been playing to the worst instincts of Americans for four decades now and one wonders if hatred, anti-government rhetoric, anti-intellectualism and lack of empathy can continue to stir the public toward their ultimate ruin.

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