Building Straw Men

If you’ve read any of my blog posts, you know I’m a Democrat.  Once upon a time, I was a Republican.  Then I watched Sean Hannity . . . once.  Hannity is returning to Atlanta next week for the Atlanta Tea Party, a hokey attempt at rallying the right behind the notion that the Democrats are to blame for the current economic crisis and that the government under Barack O’Bama has become too big, too expensive, too expansive and too  . . . well, too everything the right purports to oppose.

One of my resolutions for 2009 was to stop publicly blaming George Bush for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and stop publicly blaming the Republicans for perpetuating an era of irresponsibility, negligence and partisanship during the Bush years.  I still blame Bush and the bunch on the right, but I resolved to stop writing and talking about the failures of the previous administration.  I resolved to move ahead.  I wish the talking heads on the right would follow suit.

The mouthpieces of the right – Hannity, Coulter, Limbaugh, Palin, FOXNews, O’Reilly – engage in the “straw man fallacy.”  Rather than debate the issues, the popular pundits on the right use terms like “socialist,” “godless,” “unpatriotic,” “far left” to describe Democrats and Barack O’Bama.  Accusing O’Bama of being a socialist manufactures a debate about socialism, not a necessary conversation about the proposed policies or programs that are required to clean up the mess created over the last eight years.  The straw man (socialism) is easier to knock down than the real issues. 

Another straw man is the accusation that O’Bama is unpatriotic or un-American for taking responsibility for the global economic crisis.  Those who claim the President of the United States is unpatriotic manufacture a debate about patriotism, not the fact that the world is dependent upon a healthy American economy.  We in the United States cannot have our cake and eat it too.  We cannot take credit for global economic prosperity and pretend that we are not responsible for the global economic recession. 

In our role as the lone superpower, it is our responsibility to maintain both peace and prosperity in the world.  As the lone superpower, our responsibility is to spread democracy and freedom by setting an example, not by forcing our hand.  As the lone superpower, it is our right to maintain economic and political stability in the world so as to ensure our own security at home.  And as the lone superpower, it is our responsibility to own up to the problems we helped create and honestly build a community of nations that respects the leadership role the United States.

Calling O’Bama a “socialist,” or claiming that all Democrats are “far left radicals,” does nothing to further the conversation about ending the economic crisis or strengthening  America’s standing in the world. 

Comments

[Jim Mc Mahon]

As usual Joel, right on target. Hannity is such a fake it makes me sick just to watch him for 10 secs.