Whether it was a cynical response to America’s declining faith in the mainstream media or an honest expression of self-awareness, The N.Y. Times recently [July 21] published 8 articles by opinion columnists introduced with the heading: “I was wrong about….”
Columnist Bret Stephens defined as his worst line ever: “If by now you don’t find Donald trump appalling, you’re appalling.” Confessing this valuation to have been grossly simplistic, he now admits there were millions of ambivalent Trump supporters who voted for him only because they were appalled by the policies of the Left. Admitting the Russian collusion narrative to have been an elaborate hoax, he honestly grants the “dripping condescension” of many of his earlier views. I was, he states, a perfect example of the intellectual arrogance that “ordinary” people typically associate with the Left. He does not, I must point out, recant his decidedly negative view of Donald Trump.
While I found Stephen’s article a wonderful example of the sort of Rational as opposed to Ideological perspective that ought to inform the press, he was nevertheless excoriated online by a number of “progressive” commentators as a simple minded traitor. The lesson implicit in their response, it seems to me, is that Not telling the Truth is a fundamental aspect of the Leftist agenda, that simply hurling insults at “conservatives” rather than discussing the legitimacy of their Ideas has ludicrously become a cultural norm. What better illustrates this than Hillary’s denunciation of all Trump supporters as a bunch of “deplorables.”
The seemingly impassable gulf separating the Left from the Right in the Western world is a disturbing reality. I understand there are racists, sexists, homophobes, etc. on the Right who truly warrant the term “deplorable.” But these extremists have literally nothing to do with the views of the multitude of intelligent, rational pundits who represent mainstream “conservatism.” Bret Stephen’s article outraged many on the Left because it entailed an admission of the loathsome tactic that has become their modus operandi, the tactic which is in fact responsible for the rancor that informs most contemporary political discourse. People such as Larry Elder, Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, Megyn Kelly, Dinesh D’Souza, Jordan Peterson, Ezra Levant, etc., etc., etc., are guilty of none of the biases of which they are constantly accused by the Left. That their eminently rational arguments are customarily dismissed by the mainstream as expressions of hatred is precisely why there seems to be little hope for the future. Yet there is hope!
Validating the Enlightenment’s faith in Man’s capacity for Reason, Bill Mahr, certainly no “conservative,” has nevertheless become an excoriating critic of the political Left with its knee-jerk compulsion to define every human disparity as a matter of “oppression.” Elon Musk seems to be moving in the same direction. And now the N.Y. Times has asked 8 of its top writers to apologize for the biases of their past opinions. If this trend continues, it is not “conservatives” who will be the beneficiaries but rather the entire species, a species which, in spite of the postmodern delusions of our “intellectuals,” is actually able to distinguish biased B.S. from Objective Truth.
i.e…….On The Daily Show a few weeks ago, transgender cyclist Veronica Ivy, in discussing “transphobic bigotry,” declared that the physiological differences between the sexes ought not to bar trans-women from athletic competitions against biological females. This brazenly biased dismissal of Objective Reality is the sort of self-serving B.S. which ought not to be tolerated by any intelligent human being!