A Mighty Wind

Give yourself to the dark side...

In this screed, by William Arkin of The Washington Post, we get to see, in all its glory, the naked and unvarnished hate of the Anti-American left and The Elite Media Monoculture. Nowadays they are pretty much one and the same thing. It is getting more and more difficult to tell the difference between the rantings you might find at "The Daily Kos" and what you will be treated to from a "mainstream" American newspaper such as the Post. What we can surmise from this is that The Angry Left either feels safe enough to let their hate be seen clearly for what it is, or they are no longer capable of controlling themselves and putting up a false front that would make them appear more reasonable. Personally I'm inclined to think it is the latter.

The subject of Arkin's post is his view of the people in the military, and particularly those overseas in Iraq. He leaves us no doubt about the contempt in which he holds those who are defending his freedom with their own lives. And by implication he tells us what he thinks about all the rest of us.

So, we pay the soldiers a decent wage, take care of their families, provide them with housing and medical care and vast social support systems and ship obscene amenities into the war zone for them, we support them in every possible way, and their attitude is that we should in addition roll over and play dead, defer to the military and the generals and let them fight their war, and give up our rights and responsibilities to speak up because they are above society?

I can imagine some post-9/11 moment, when the American people say enough already with the wars against terrorism and those in the national security establishment feel these same frustrations. In my little parable, those in leadership positions shake their heads that the people don't get it, that they don't understand that the threat from terrorism, while difficult to defeat, demands commitment and sacrifice and is very real because it is so shadowy, that the very survival of the United States is at stake. Those Hoover's and Nixon's will use these kids in uniform as their soldiers. If I weren't the United States, I'd say the story end with a military coup where those in the know, and those with fire in their bellies, save the nation from the people.

But it is the United States and instead this NBC report is just an ugly reminder of the price we pay for a mercenary - oops sorry, volunteer - force that thinks it is doing the dirty work.

It should be pointed out that the proper definition of a mercenary is one who is paid to fight for a country which is not his own. A soldier for hire who sells himself to the highest bidder. The use of this term by The Angry Left is actually quite revealing. For members of this fifth column don't really consider themselves to be Americans in any traditional sense of the word. Indeed, they will often go to great lengths to proclaim that they are "citizens of the world" rather than Americans. They distance themselves from the ideas and values which are commonly understood to be at the base of the American experiment in freedom, individual rights and private property.

Thus, from their point of view, our soldiers are fighting for a country not their own. The Angry Left see themselves as in a foreign land which they are desperately trying to change according to their utopian schemes. They wish America to be something very different than what it was originally intended to be. And most Americans, at some level, still see it in its more traditional terms. But The Angry Left sees it as the enemy, and so American soldiers who are fighting to defend the original ideas of freedom and liberty over seas are also seen as the enemy. How could they not be when their actions prevent the hate filled left from achieving their dreams of a socialist America?

And so we get this sort of malevolent exposition from a member of the Dinosaur Media that shows the snarling fangs hiding behind the false front of "tolerance" and "moderation" that are so often claimed as the real soul of the left. But the facade is rapidly crumbling and no amount of remedial repair can keep it from showing through.