Never in my life as a practicing attorney, a newspaper publisher, a Congressman or a news host have I witnessed America's cultural elite become so unglued over any historical event. And most distressing is the fact that these opinion leaders are singling out a group of Americans for no other reason than the God they worship.
To paint all Republican Christians as angry, hate-filled, science-loathing, right wing beasts only helps explain why the Mainstream Media continues to lose market share and why those Democrats who take solice in their bigoted anti-Christian screeds remain out of power for another four years.
It leads me to wonder, can we only be good Americans if we turn our backs on our faith, or become champions of abortion on demand, stem cell research without reservation, and marriage defined in a way that conflicts with the spiritual beliefs of a majority of Americans?
Folks, make sure you watch and support Scarborough Country on MSNBC. He's worth it.
Posted by Tim at November 9, 2004 06:26 AMI'm equally baffled but I think it's even worse than he's stating. The attempt is being made to "paint" everyone who voted for G.W.B. and some of us who voted for him aren't Republican or Christian, let alone "angry, hate-filled, science-loathing....." Some of us are cheery, loving scientists, if you can imagine such a thing.
Posted by: Anne at November 9, 2004 06:49 AMScarborough is an entertainer and an exaggerator, not a serious thinker. His analysis is so over the top here that it smacks of outright lie to me. MSM paints all Republican Christians as "angry, hate-filled, science-loathing, right wing beasts?" What does this mean? Every major newspaper? Every editorial?
Just a few of my favorite high profile editorial writers are David Brooks in the NY Times, George Will at the Washington Post, and Max Boot in the Los Angeles Times. Even us liberals can laugh at Michael Ramirez's smart right-wing editorial cartooning each day in the LA Times. The so-called MSM, elite media. Hmmm...what a bunch of Republican Christian Bush bashers...!!
Scarborough if you can't figure it out is a carny and a huckster. "There's a sucker born every minute" is his motto. His goal is to rile up Republican Christians and get you to watch his show. Get mad at the straw men he sets up! Watch him each night bravely knock them down!!
Posted by: Tom at November 9, 2004 07:44 AMTom
You really miss the point. The mainstream media does believe that conservatives like me are unthinking, uncaring dolts.
I was watching Carol Simpson this morning on a C-Span form on the press. She decried the "fact' the people who voted for Bush don't read, don't understand, don't think. Her evidence - a statistic that showed that only 5% of Americans read books. She assumed they were all noble people, like her or other left side journalists.
My guess is that I've read more books in the last year than she has. I've read a variety - George Soros, Robert Kagan, Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, Alan Dershowitz, Lance Morrow, Stephen Carter, Aquinas, Augistine, Michael Horton, Russell Kirk, Thomas Sowell, Philip Yancey, Ravai Zachariais, Eliot Cohen, Michael Novak, Richard Perle, and others. I also read Holy Writ daily. I also read newspapers.
I've done all that and have come out of it a conservative (I was already a Christian). I did not adopt my views or worldview because I was unthinking or un-critical. I adopted them after thought and reflection. All that is to say that I'm far less ignorant than they give me credit for.
My guess is that's more than Carol Simpson and many in the mainstream media can say.
They're shocked because people like me don't trust them any more. They're shocked because there are many of us who believe they have violated a position of national trust.
Well, all I can say to them is "Physician, heal thyself." Do something worth trusting and we'll trust you. Don't marginalize those you don't understand. It weakens your case/argument. If you really want to talk, come and talk with us instead of flying over. Come and hear us out and we'll hear you out.
Posted by: Phil Dillon at November 9, 2004 08:24 AMWhat is your objective test that MSM thinks you are uncaring, unthinking dolts?
I'm a liberal and I swear all I can read or hear these past couple days is how horrible, immoral, and just downright mean I am.
But my emotional reasoning and anecdotal evidence is different than actually being able to put up a reliable test.
(and by the way, Phil, that sounds like a heckuva good reading list, so I ain't gonna call you unthinking.)
Posted by: Tom at November 9, 2004 01:01 PMTom
How about this from Ellen Goodman:
"The blue candidates will never convert people who believe that homosexuality is a sin, that the fertilized egg is a human being, or that evolution is a scam taught by secular humanists. But among the not-so-red voters are those who believe in legal protection for gay couples, who value a child with diabetes over a frozen embryo in a fertility clinic. They regard poverty as a moral issue and tolerance as an American value. They don't want their country racked by the fundamentalist religious wars we see across the world. And they need to hear the moral framework for these views."
Or how about this from the British press:
"London's Daily Mirror put it in its front page: "How Can 59,054,087 People Be So DUMB?"
Or this from the U.S. msm:
"Slightly more than half of the citizens of this country simply do not care about what those of us in the 'reality-based community' say or believe about anything." Over at Slate, Jane Smiley's analysis was headlined, "The Unteachable Ignorance Of The Red States.''
And there's the aforementioned Carol Simpson.
Well... you've shown you can walk into a room with 1000 people, find four that say the thing you want, and then you claim that 1000 people feel this way.
I'd say you need at least a couple things to start:
-A clearly defined standard of when an article calls a conservative an "unthinking, uncaring dolt."
-An accurate survey, based on good statistical method, of the MSM and how often it has an article meeting the standard.
Ah, but that wouldn't be so easy, and maybe it would get a little boring. It's easier to complain that the green grass is always on the other side of the fence.
Posted by: Tom at November 9, 2004 08:57 PM
