The Strange Death of Liberal America

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In The Strange Death of Liberal America I referred to our times as The Era of Bad Feelings for reasons that should be obvious to anyone who has lived through the last few years. Politics and a great deal else in our society have been imbued with a nastiness that has made vitriol the stock in trade of everyone from network commentators to bloggers. It is as if discourse and manners have become so degraded that the only way to express outrage is to be as ill-mannered as possible.

When Don Imus uttered his degrading comments about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team, the degree of public outrage provided a ray of hope that perhaps the Era of Bad Feelings might finally be reaching an end. The statement from CBS when they fired Imus went beyond what I had expected. It seemed as though, they too, finally wanted to end the nastiness. In a memo sent to CBS employees announcing Mr. Imus’ dismissal, CBS chief executive, Leslie Moonves said:

This is about a lot more than Imus. As has been widely pointed out, Imus has been visited by presidents, senators, important authors and journalists from across the political spectrum. He has flourished in a culture that permits a certain level of objectionable expression that hurts and demeans a wide range of people. In taking him off the air, I believe we take an important and necessary step not just in solving a unique problem, but in changing that culture, which extends far beyond the walls of our company.

But the statement blew away like a slip of paper caught in the foul winds of the Era of Bad Feelings. In a way Don Imus represented an easy target, a perfect sacrificial lamb, for unlike other purveyors of vitriol, Imus had never been rabidly partisan. He did not make a career out of debasing Democrats and liberals with the venom of a Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter.

Imus took the hit and others who had flourished in what Moonves called “a culture that permits a certain level of objectionable expression that hurts and demeans a wide range of people” walked away largely unscathed. A month before the Imus blow-up, in a March 2 speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Ann Coulter told an audience peppered with reporters:

Oh, and I was going to have a few comments on the other Democratic presidential candidate, John Edwards. But it turns out that you have to go into rehab if you use the word “faggot,” so I’m — so I’m kind of at an impasse, can’t really talk about Edwards. So I think I’ll just conclude here and take your questions.

Media Matters noted that after the remarks nine newspapers dropped Coulter, but the response was relatively mild compared to what Imus would suffer. The Washington Post even managed to get in a not so subtle dig at the New York Times over the incident quoting Adam Nagourney, the Times� chief political correspondent, who defended his initial reluctance to report the remark:

There was a fairly high barrier, in my opinion, to make it worthy of a story, because part of what she’s about is trying to use shock language to entertain her audience and, who knows, maybe to sell books:

Coulter still makes a nice income on the lecture circuit and as a guest commentator where she feeds red meat to Neanderthals who think of themselves as the “base” of the Republican Party. As I pointed out in a post last year, Coulter is as much actress as pundit. Everyone knows her shopworn script consists of dropping bombs like the Edwards explosion.

In such a climate is it any wonder that the obvious distaste that exists between the Bush Administration and its critics continues to escalate. There seems to be a growing Gotterdammerung mentality in the White House that if they go down they will take the country with them.

The buzzword of the 2004 election was “moral values,” but that seems so long ago in the aftermath of Iraq, Katrina, the teetering housing market, $4 gas and the rapidly multiplying scandals that are well on their way to earning this administration the dubious distinction of being the most corrupt since Harding’s Teapot Dome days. Where once the Bush Administration used to evoke the American people with the zeal of Richard Nixon claiming his “silent majority,” the contempt by the White House for the American people, the wishes of the majority and even the rule of law more and more resembles Nixon�s last days.

Once George W. Bush pledged to bring us together, to end the vitriol. These days, the White House behaves like one of those road rage motorists who bullies everyone on the freeway and then flips them off with an upraised middle finger. Every time I see Dick Cheney answer a probing question I half-expect him to do just that. This is, after all, the man who told Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.) to “fuck yourself.” The Washington Post humorously pointed out that the exchange occurred on the day he Senate passed legislation described as the “Defense of Decency Act” by 99 to 1.

Cheney’s recent attacks on critics of the Iraq War, which if the polls are correct include a majority of Americans, have not brought forth any four letter words, but he has used epithets every bit as nasty. This is even though no one still knows what are the administration’s objectives. When will we know we have succeeded in Iraq? In February during a trip to Australia Cheney charged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s opposition to an troop increase would “validate the al-Qaida strategy.” Pelosi may have been shaking her head after that one, since most experts question whether al-Qaida is a major threat in Iraq. But Cheney had to tie the opposition to the one group everyone in America hates, even though his comment was misleading and inflammatory.

Cheney has continued to impugn those who dare question what the administration is up to in Iraq. In an April 16 interview on CBS Face the Nation Cheney said:

Well, I think it’s important they know where we stand. And the fact of the matter is I do believe that the positions that the Democratic leaders have taken and–to a large extent now are irresponsible.

When reminded by Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer that a majority of Americans favor the Democrat�s position, Cheney responded with an answer that had echoes of Richard Nixon:

Well, you can also get a majority who, I think, would prefer to have us win, and the–there’s a fundamental debate going on here in terms of whether or not our objective in–in Iraq is to, quote, withdraw, or whether our objective in Iraq is to complete the mission.

A day after Cheney spoke came the shootings at Virginia Tech, one of those national tragedies that in the past have brought the nation together in a common outpouring of grief. Instead the vitriol began even as the family and friends of the victims awaited the autopsies of the dead. The blogosphere has pretty much run that one into the ground so I will leave it you and your search engine to dig up the dirt.

As the Democrats rewrote and passed their Iraq withdrawal bill, the Republicans increased the vitriol. Leading the pack, as always, was none other than Dick Cheney. On Tuesday, during a routine trip to Capitol Hill Cheney went out of his way to lash out at the Democrats. According to the Washington Post Cheney charged:

Some Democratic leaders seem to believe that blind opposition to the new strategy in Iraq is good politics…Senator Reid himself has said that the war in Iraq will bring his party more seats in the next election…It is cynical to declare that the war is lost because you believe it gives you political advantage.

Cheney’s singling out of Reid is what made the attack cross over the line of the usual partisan sparring, for it intentionally singled out a member of the Democratic leadership and by doing so blamed Reid personally for the actions of the Democrats. His attack on Reid did not stop there, he continued:

What’s most troubling about Senator Reid’s comments yesterday is his defeatism, and the timetable legislation that he is now pursuing would guarantee defeat. Maybe it is a political calculation.

That Cheney chose to attack Reid is extremely unusual. I am trying to remember the last time a sitting Vice President of the United States engaged in a personal attack on the leadership of the opposing party. The question is why would Cheney do this?

One answer is that it stems from his view of the world. Cheney at heart is an autocrat who believes leaders should control their subordinates and, by implication, their delegations with an iron fist. He seems to imply that Reid should crack the whip on the Democrats and force them to draft an acceptable bill.

This is a White House that believes it is right and takes dissent personally. Dissent is not only not wrong but not permissible. To allow dissent is equivalent to letting someone personally attack you and not respond by decking them. In short, George Bush and Dick Cheney see themselves as the personification of this country and its people, a view that at its heart is profoundly undemocratic.

It reaction to this, it has been fashionable in many blogs to quote James Madison:

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.

However, I could find no source for this quote, so there is some question whether Madison ever said it. Perhaps more relevant is a speech Madison gave during the Constitutional Convention where he openly worried about executive power during war time:

In time of actual war, great discretionary powers are constantly given to the Executive Magistrate. Constant apprehension of War, has the same tendency to render the head too large for the body. A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty.

With the Iraq War and the comments of Dick Cheney the head has become too large for the body. This “overgrown” executive results in a personification of every issue. In turn, opposition is personified. The personal nature of Cheney’s attack unfortunately has become all too common during the Era of Bad Feelings. It has long been the stock-in-trade of the Raucous Right of talk radio hosts who tend to personalize an issue and then follow with a string of epithets.

The growing opposition to the Iraq War by the American people is attributed to “defeatists” who have convinced the American people to “throw in the towel.” If people like Reid would only shut up the American people would come to their senses and see the wisdom of its leaders.

The common thread running through this vitriol lies in their contempt for the average American and a refusal to accept reality. There is a dark side of our times that feeds those who believe anyone who thinks differently is “irresponsible,” and deserves to be told to “fuck yourself.” The widespread culture Moonves evoked lives on the feeling that anyone not sharing its hardline beliefs is not entitled to be treated with manners and decency. That the Vice President of the United States should be part of this culture shows the moral bankruptcy of this administration. He shares this trait with playground bullies and road rage perpetrators who both believe they can get away with whatever they want because their targets are somehow defective, even subhuman.

Despite the continued nastiness, the image in my mind the past few weeks is of the Virginia Tech students holding candles. In their memorial service and the candlelight vigils held across the country people seemed to sense something had gone terribly wrong, that we need a return to decency and mutual respect.

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