Posted on 06/24/2012 8:13:48 PM PDT by Kaslin
From the Wow That's a Stretch Department: New York Times columnist Charles Blow has taken the story of a grandma being bullied by children on a school bus in upstate New York and found another metaphor for Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and conservatives in general.
"Those boys are us, or at least too many of us: America at its ugliest. It is that part of society that sees the weak and vulnerable as worthy of derision and animus," with the "us" being the conservatives. "This kind of behavior is not isolated to children and school buses and suburban communities. It stretches to the upper reaches of society — our politics and our pulpits and our public squares."
Whether it is a Republican debate audience booing a gay soldier or Rush Limbaugh’s vicious attack on a female Georgetown law student or Newt Gingrich’s salvos at the poor, bullying has become boilerplate. Hiss and taunt. Tease and intimidate. Target your enemies and torture them mercilessly. Maintain primacy through predation.
Mr. Blow thinks the conservatives are in Bullying Mode because they're losing and getting increasingly insecure:
A Gallup poll released Thursday found that a record number of people (54 percent) say that they would be willing to vote for an atheist for president, and 1. a Gallup poll last month found that more people support same-sex marriage than oppose it.
These dramatic shifts are upending the majority-minority paradigm and are making many people uneasy.
The Republican-Democratic divide is increasingly becoming an all-white/multicultural divide, a male/female divide, and a more religious/less religious divide — the formers the traditional power classes, and the latters the emerging ones.
This has led to some increasingly unseemly attacks at traditionally marginalized groups, even as — and possibly particularly because — they grow more powerful.
Women are under attack. Hispanics are under attack. Minority voting rights are under attack. The poor are under attack. Unsurprisingly, those doing the attacking in every case are from the right.
Seldom is power freely passed and painlessly surrendered, particularly when the traditionally powerful see the realignment as an existential threat.
The bullying on that bus was awful, but so is the bullying in our politics. Those boys were trying to exert power over a person placed there to rein them in. But bullying is always about power — projecting more than you have in order to accrue more than your share.
Sounds like the frightened, insecure part of American society.
Naturally, they loved this rhetorical tactic at the Daily Kos blog. The diarist "Xaxnar" picked up where Blow left off on the bullying theme, and hilariously claimed that the liberal establishment gave Occupy Wall Street "tepid" support:
The Republicans have been perfecting their media machine and their messaging for decades. They win by mobilizing their troops and demoralizing their targets. Turn on FOX, Rush, Beck, Hannity, etc. etc. You'll hear a constant stream of taunting, lies, insults, and false victimhood. You'll hear any opposing voices that manage to break through momentarily instantly shouted down and cut off. They have incorporated bullying into their DNA - and they're not afraid to use it.
Contrast that with the tepid support for Occupy Wall Street from the establishment that should have been on its side. Damn few Democratic politicians turned out to support it; the party distanced itself from what was and is a genuine spontaneous uprising against the bullying ordinary people experience every day, the bullying that is the driving engine of Wall Street and conservatives. The Tea Party enjoyed the backing of billionaires funding them in the shadows and pointing them at targets. Occupy Wall Street was actively suppressed by the forces of Homeland Security and the rest of the police state apparatus put together by the bullies who ran the country (badly) up until 2008. And yet this suppression has come with covert support from the highest levels of the administration. Who is playing who here?
Isn’t Michelle O the one going around saying American kids are too fat? The Dems are the ones banning foods because kids are too fat. The lib comedians are the ones making jokes about Americans being fat. Pfft.
Has the President called her to see if she is ok?
Isnt Michelle O the one going around saying American kids are too fat? The Dems are the ones banning foods because kids are too fat. The lib comedians are the ones making jokes about Americans being fat. Pfft.
____________________________________________________________
You’ve NAILED it!
Charles Blow, eh? You really CAN’T make this stuff up, can you?
One thought that flickers through MY little six-volt mind is: “Ya’ know, it’s one thing to have been stuck with a name like that through no fault of one’s own. But to then go out of one’s way to put that name up for ridicule by attaching it to half-a$$ed, teeth-itchingly stupid displays of non-logic like Chuckie Blow did in this article, leaves me agog with amazement!”
In traditional Bolshies fashion the left transfers its world view onto its enemies. Conservatives have nothing but the best wishes for the weak of society, but, find it beneath contempt that one group has to be robbed in order to secure the support of the vulnerable.
But what do I know compared to Charles Blow?
Target your enemies and torture them mercilessly. Maintain primacy through predation. ........................................Yeah he’s correct, he should know, it worked for them on Palin.
Homosexuals are the masters of projection.
You really think 1% is republican?
Maher and Letterman. Go to Hell, NYT.
Is he admitting that Democrats/Socialists/Communists are weak and vulnerable? Sounds like a tacit admission that Beck is right in his latest book.
These people are delusional!
“Women are under attack. Hispanics are under attack. Minority voting rights are under attack. The poor are under attack. Unsurprisingly, those doing the attacking in every case are from the right.”
Gee, Charlie, exaggerate much? I guess this is how you must justify your token position there at the Slimes.
I’d bet dollars to donuts that the parents of those kids weren’t fans of Rush or Newt. That’s the kind of behavior produced by liberal parenting.
Neither Rush nor Newt are in a position to call anyone fat.
And even if they were, they would not do it.
Rush wouldn’t for sure, he’s a gracious guy.
Don’t think Newt would either.
And, conservatives are per capita the most privately charitable people on the planet.
Conservatives don’t want to extend the gummit dole without limit. They have no criticism for charity and for equal treatment in commerce (which does not guarantee equal outcome). All liberals can see is their big centralized control structure being threatened. They are blind to any virtue of what would take its place.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.