It is an interesting phenomenon that the response of the left half of our political spectrum to criticism and argument is often to try to shut it down. Thus President Obama in his Sept. 9 speech to a joint session of Congress told us to stop bickering as if principled objections to major changes in public policy were just childish obstinacy and chastised his critics for telling lies employing scare tactics and playing games. Unlike his predecessor he sought to use the prestige of his office to shut criticism down.
Now no one likes criticism very much and most politicians would prefer to have their colleagues and constituents meekly and gratefully agree with them on pretty much everything. And yes Rep. Joe Wilson did seem to have broken the rules and standards of decorum of the House (though not of the British House of Commons) when he shouted You lie! in the middle of Obamas speech.
But none of this justifies the charges passed off as cool-headed analysis that Obamas critics are motivated by racism. There are plenty of non-racist reasons to oppose (or to support) the Democrats health care proposals.
I would submit that the presidents call for an end to bickering and the charges of racism by some of his supporters are the natural reflex of people who are not used to hearing people disagree with them and who are determined to shut them up.
This comes naturally to liberals educated in our great colleges and universities so many of which have speech codes whose primary aim is to prevent the expression of certain conservative ideas and which are commonly deployed for that purpose. (For examples see the Website of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education which defends students of all political stripes.) Once the haven of free inquiry and expression academia has become a swamp of stifling political correctness.
Similarly the mainstream media -- the old-line broadcast networks The New York Times etc. -- present a politically correct picture of the world. The result is that liberals can live in a cocoon an America in which seldom is heard a discouraging word. Conservatives in contrast find themselves constantly pummeled with liberal criticism on campus in news media and in Hollywood TV and movies. They dont like it but theyve gotten used to it. Liberals arent used to it and increasingly try to stamp it out.
Mainstream media try to help. In the past few weeks we have seen textbook examples of how MSM have ignored news stories that reflected badly on the administration for which it has such warm feelings. It ignored the videos in which the White House green jobs czar proclaimed himself a communist and the truther petition he signed charging that George W. Bush may have allowed the Sept. 11 attacks.
It ignored the videos released on Andrew Breitbarts biggovernment.com showing ACORN employees offering to help a supposed pimp and prostitute evade taxes and employ 13- to 15-year-old prostitutes. It downplayed last springs Tea Parties -- locally organized demonstrations against big government that attracted about a million people nationwide -- and downplayed the Tea Party throng at the Capitol and on the Mall Sept. 12.
Actually mainstream media are doing their friends in the Obama administration and the Democratic Party no favors at least in the long run. Obama comes from one-party Chicago and the House Democrats nine top leadership members and committee chairmen come from districts that voted on average 73 percent for Obama last fall. They need help in understanding the larger country they are seeking to govern where nearly half voted the other way. Instead they get the impression they can dismiss critics as racist or Nazis or as indulging in (as Sen. Harry Reid said) evil-mongering.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has warned us that theres a danger that intense rhetoric can provoke violence and no decent person wants to see harm come to our president or other leaders. But its interesting that the two most violent incidents at this summers town hall meetings came when a union thug beat up a 65-year-old black conservative in Missouri and when a liberal protester bit off part of a mans finger in California.
These incidents dont justify a conclusion that all liberals are violent. But they are more evidence that American liberals unused to hearing dissent have an impulse to shut it down.
Michael Barone is a senior writer with U.S. News & World Report and the principal co-author of The Almanac of American Politics published by National Journal every two years. He is also author of Our Country: The Shaping of America from Roosevelt to Reagan The New Americans: How the Melting Pot Can Work Again the just-released Hard America Soft America: Competition vs. Coddling and the Competition for the Nations Future.
It is an interesting phenomenon that the response of the left half of our political spectrum to criticism and argument is often to try to shut it down. Thus President Obama in his Sept. 9 speech to a joint session of Congress told us to stop bickering as if principled objections to major changes in public policy were just childish obstinacy and chastised his critics for telling lies employing scare tactics and playing games. Unlike his predecessor he sought to use the prestige of his office to shut criticism down.
Now no one likes criticism very much and most politicians would prefer to have their colleagues and constituents meekly and gratefully agree with them on pretty much everything. And yes Rep. Joe Wilson did seem to have broken the rules and standards of decorum of the House (though not of the British House of Commons) when he shouted You lie! in the middle of Obamas speech.
But none of this justifies the charges passed off as cool-headed analysis that Obamas critics are motivated by racism. There are plenty of non-racist reasons to oppose (or to support) the Democrats health care proposals.
I would submit that the presidents call for an end to bickering and the charges of racism by some of his supporters are the natural reflex of people who are not used to hearing people disagree with them and who are determined to shut them up.
This comes naturally to liberals educated in our great colleges and universities so many of which have speech codes whose primary aim is to prevent the expression of certain conservative ideas and which are commonly deployed for that purpose. (For examples see the Website of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education which defends students of all political stripes.) Once the haven of free inquiry and expression academia has become a swamp of stifling political correctness.
Similarly the mainstream media -- the old-line broadcast networks The New York Times etc. -- present a politically correct picture of the world. The result is that liberals can live in a cocoon an America in which seldom is heard a discouraging word. Conservatives in contrast find themselves constantly pummeled with liberal criticism on campus in news media and in Hollywood TV and movies. They dont like it but theyve gotten used to it. Liberals arent used to it and increasingly try to stamp it out.
Mainstream media try to help. In the past few weeks we have seen textbook examples of how MSM have ignored news stories that reflected badly on the administration for which it has such warm feelings. It ignored the videos in which the White House green jobs czar proclaimed himself a communist and the truther petition he signed charging that George W. Bush may have allowed the Sept. 11 attacks.
It ignored the videos released on Andrew Breitbarts biggovernment.com showing ACORN employees offering to help a supposed pimp and prostitute evade taxes and employ 13- to 15-year-old prostitutes. It downplayed last springs Tea Parties -- locally organized demonstrations against big government that attracted about a million people nationwide -- and downplayed the Tea Party throng at the Capitol and on the Mall Sept. 12.
Actually mainstream media are doing their friends in the Obama administration and the Democratic Party no favors at least in the long run. Obama comes from one-party Chicago and the House Democrats nine top leadership members and committee chairmen come from districts that voted on average 73 percent for Obama last fall. They need help in understanding the larger country they are seeking to govern where nearly half voted the other way. Instead they get the impression they can dismiss critics as racist or Nazis or as indulging in (as Sen. Harry Reid said) evil-mongering.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has warned us that theres a danger that intense rhetoric can provoke violence and no decent person wants to see harm come to our president or other leaders. But its interesting that the two most violent incidents at this summers town hall meetings came when a union thug beat up a 65-year-old black conservative in Missouri and when a liberal protester bit off part of a mans finger in California.
These incidents dont justify a conclusion that all liberals are violent. But they are more evidence that American liberals unused to hearing dissent have an impulse to shut it down.
Michael Barone is a senior writer with U.S. News & World Report and the principal co-author of The Almanac of American Politics published by National Journal every two years. He is also author of Our Country: The Shaping of America from Roosevelt to Reagan The New Americans: How the Melting Pot Can Work Again the just-released Hard America Soft America: Competition vs. Coddling and the Competition for the Nations Future.
