The State of Political Discourse Explained

Early placard pointing to the presumed superiority of the Democrat view.

Must of us have learned by now that responding to the left can be a tiresome exercise. We still do it, but are at times perplexed at the difficulty of getting through. This may come down to the left simply holding a markedly different world view, which results in their taking up strategies that are not always exactly cricket:

The giveaway in the Left's attitude to party politics is its refusal to accept that alternative points of view to its own are precisely that: alternative points of view.
Because there is only right and wrong, their opponents are not different, they are wrong. And because they cannot be that wrong innocently, they must be malevolent. So it ceases even to be a matter of right and wrong, but rather of good and evil. Hence the unmistakably evangelical flavour of so much Leftist dogma, even as it pours righteous scorn on what it considers the unreasoning scriptural ethics of the Right.

In truth it is Leftism that is based on doctrine, faith and revelation, whereas Conservatism is founded in practice, experience, and compromise. As I never tire of saying, to the comprehension of just about nobody and the willing endorsement of fewer still, it is Leftism that is religious, and Conservatism that is Darwinian.

Most conservatives do not view the Left as evil, merely misguided. They do not hate them. (I do, but I am anomalous.) The Left, however, passionately hate their opposition and - while constantly accusing them of divisiveness and aggression, a tactic known and loved by millions (at least six million, anyway) as 'the old Hitler one-two' - would like nothing better than to have them permanently out of the way. Then they can get on with the serious business of turning the free world into an Orwellian hellhole sewer, without having to stop every so often to make sure all the news outlets are singing in tune whenever an inconvenient Sarah Palin or Ann Coulter put their head up over the barbed wire.

The Venereable Bede is famous for his piercing observations on our cultural confusion. The supporting of the leftist view point by "scientific" research whose conclusions come first and whose data comes second has become a daily event, commonly practiced in the global warming argument and now moving mainstream to a broad realm of leftist positions. Read Bedes whole piece on the matter here.