The monster in the mirror
Re. the Limbaugh thing.
Who is the enemy? In Limbaugh's view, it's the liberals - the Democrats.
DeLay also said something to this effect at CPAC.
This is the issue: they think that the battle between Republicans and Democrats is a battle to the death between irreconcilable and mutually exclusive causes. Manichaean. Good vs. Evil.
One can point out that we share a reverence for the constitution. As Americans, we actually share fundamental values and most of our political battles involve disagreements over how we define those values, and how we achieve them. But for most of us, politics is in essence a battle about the means of achieving those ends that we as a nation have agreed upon from the beginning - prosperity, liberty, security, justice.
For Limbaugh and his ilk (which includes some, but far fewer, equally strident but much less prominent manichaeans on the left), the opposition is not merely political, but existential. They believe that the political opposition is evilly motivated and bent on the destruction of everything they hold dear.
There's no solution to this - some people love to have a villain to hate and revile; they need one. The manichaean temperament requires an evil opposite. It is a matter of psycholigical necessity.
For a while, the Soviet Union and, more generally, Communism served the purpose. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the manichaeans have been looking for a suitable replacement.
"Liberalism" filled the vacuum.
Who is the enemy? In Limbaugh's view, it's the liberals - the Democrats.
DeLay also said something to this effect at CPAC.
This is the issue: they think that the battle between Republicans and Democrats is a battle to the death between irreconcilable and mutually exclusive causes. Manichaean. Good vs. Evil.
One can point out that we share a reverence for the constitution. As Americans, we actually share fundamental values and most of our political battles involve disagreements over how we define those values, and how we achieve them. But for most of us, politics is in essence a battle about the means of achieving those ends that we as a nation have agreed upon from the beginning - prosperity, liberty, security, justice.
For Limbaugh and his ilk (which includes some, but far fewer, equally strident but much less prominent manichaeans on the left), the opposition is not merely political, but existential. They believe that the political opposition is evilly motivated and bent on the destruction of everything they hold dear.
There's no solution to this - some people love to have a villain to hate and revile; they need one. The manichaean temperament requires an evil opposite. It is a matter of psycholigical necessity.
For a while, the Soviet Union and, more generally, Communism served the purpose. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the manichaeans have been looking for a suitable replacement.
"Liberalism" filled the vacuum.