Liberals Want Military Rule of U.S. and Conservatives Hate Democracy

I can't believe you, Arianna Huffington. How dare you con me into blogging for your crazy militaristic propaganda-producing website?

Wait, what? The Huffington Post isn't a crazy militaristic propaganda-producing website? Well, you could've fooled Mark Steyn, everyone's favorite right-wing Canadian columnist. In a recent post over at The National Review, Steyn wrote:

The Huffington Post is now calling for military usurpation of civil authority and has volunteered General Peter Pace for the Musharraf/Pinochet/Master Sergeant Sam Doe role.

Steyn was referring to Martin Lewis' column calling for General Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to relieve President Bush of his military role as commander-in-chief. Lewis made clear in response to a commenter that his column was a satirical jab at President Bush's horrible mismanagement of the Iraq War. I can't blame Steyn for missing that the piece was satire; we often struggle with dry British humor like Lewis' on this side of the Atlantic. But Steyn's assertion that both the Huffington Post and "the American left" support Lewis' proposal is preposterous.

As Ben Regenspan, a blogger at Campus Progress with a knack for finding free crabcakes, points out:

"The obvious problem here is that everyone and their mother writes for Huffington Post...and that it's generally silly, even in the context of a joke, to argue that one opinion columnist represents a given media outlet (much less "the American left") as a whole."

Reminding us that Steyn called Vietnamese "gooks" on The Rush Limbaugh Show last year, Regenspan continues:

"One might as well argue that all right-wingers are "gook"-spouting Canadian paranoids who genuinely fear a radical Islamic takeover of the West in the coming years and think it prudent to bomb Iran as soon as possible."

Or that all right-wingers believe "Democracy is clearly an enemy of not just truth, but duty and justice, which makes it the worst form of government," and that President Bush should "empty Iraq of Arabs and repopulate the country with Americans," which would enable him "to wield military power to become the first permanent president of America." I know, these sound bites sound too juicy to be true, but as Sam Boyd writes at The American Prospect's blog, they're so for real.

Steyn's shot at the Huffington Post doesn't really bother me. HuffPo is a site with a bunch of liberal political columnists and he's a conservative political columnist, so he's naturally going to player-hate, just as I might be a bit overeager to criticize the National Review or Bill O'Reilly might want to group DailyKos in the same category as Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. What's worrisome are Steyn's attempts to turn the mainstream media into a speakerbox for the right by crying "liberal bias" where it does not exist. Steyn has labeled Associated Press reporters "either dupes at best or actually semi-treasonous in colluding with the enemy in demoralizing America on the home front." The media has certainly been "duped" at times -- buying the Bush administration's false justification for hastily marching to war in Iraq seems as good an example as any -- but not by some socialist freedom-hating strawman Steyn and other conservative commentators love to use in their baseless assaults on the left. Then again, I guess facts don't matter much to a guy who has repeatedly claimed that Osama bin Laden "will remain dead."

Comments

[mr. d.]

Mark Steyn? Who is Mark Steyn? I guarantee you that if you asked 100 Canadians that question you wouldn't find 10 who knew the answer. It's a good thing for him that Americans are paying attentin or he wouldn't exist at all instead of just in the US of A.

[larry278]

The GOP & the Democrats are doing the circular firing squad thing right now to avoid having most politicians shooting themselves in the foot. The GOP has the bulk of the active circular firing squads due to the antics of the unfortunate Sen Craig. The public will be given its wish to see a few politicians shoot themselves in the foot while having a foot in the mouth. Mitt Romney can be expected to emulate & go beyond his father's saying that he was brain washed. That will put Mitt out of the running despite having a great deal of money for the campaign. Other politicians will also shoot themselves in the foot to liven up this over crowded, marathon campaign.

[factanonverba]

I am not sure Martin Lewis' post was satire. My read was that he was serious and quite diligent in his undertaking. I responded to it twice disagreeing with his views vehemently. But I am most impressed with the time and care Mr. Lewis took to reply the comments posted by the users. Indeed, he responded to both of mine.

The sad fact is that the right lives in a world that has no basis in reality. They invent, misrepresent and adhere to grand lies to achieve their aims. And they misrepresented Mr. Lewis' post. Evermore, I am confused as to what these aims actually are. The right is simply beyond my comprehension. Their world simply does not exist. I do not even believe that if they were allowed to perfectly construct their world view that it could ever be born for it is so filled on inherent contradictions that such a structure could never stand on its own. It is a house of cards.

[totalliberal]

The greatest problem with the left is that they have not come to terms with the fact that right-wing-nuts just make shit up and are never called on it.

[woodsywizz]

"A lemming facing the abyss." That's rich. I'm going to quote you - extensively, as "Jack Monroe". Thanks! How felicitous!

[JackMonroe]

Look, if you were a republican and/or conservative (these days, with all these outings, most republicans prefer the simple label of conservative) columnist and George W. Bush was your president would you have any appreciation, let alone awareness, of political satire?

No. You would have cut yourself loose from reality and laughing matters four or five years ago. You'd be sitting alone in the dark worrying about what happens if Hilary Clinton becomes president. What she might do with the Constitution the Bush Gang has torn asunder.

This is how bad it is: whoever gets the GOP nomination will be pro-choice, pro-gun control, and pro-gay marriage or, at the least, someone who used to be for those things not too far in the distant pass - and while they were sober - before they did the high dive flip flop into the shallow end of the pool.

You're this guy Mark Steyn and it ain't funny no more. The republicans have managed to get and keep the worst gang of political morons into office for eight years and they, in the process of losing a war that Dubya's father had already won, are bringing the party to an end. Worse, a woman might for the first time take the White House, and not just any woman, the Clinton woman.

Obviously there's nothing funny about this. Especially if you're a lemming facing the abyss...

[alkamm]

Trouble with this rosie scenario is that the GOP is likely to win the next election because the Democrats also no how to do belly flops into empty pools, or off cliffs in their own private lemming waves.

We are more likely to vote for a Mormon rather than a Clinton. To use a stock market term, perfectly befitting lemmings, herds, or even bears, there is likely going to be a flight to value, and a rich Mormon who knows how to get a health care system overhauled (Hillary didn't) might just waltz away from the cliff and laugh at the idealists who thought Hillary was electable.

Edwards can beat Mitt. Hands down. He worked his way up without a powerful Mormon heirarchy and funding apparatus. He can think on his feet, and speak eloquently in favor of all of us, and unite us into something more than the lemmings we want to be.

[oldpotsmuggler]

Whenever we finally do get sick enough, or smart enough to have our next Constitutional Convention the right wing is going to have some guys like this representing it. They will inevitably say the things they truly believe and the process of trying to create a more intelligent governmental structure, and the restoration of the maximum number of original freedoms will be made that much easier. Speaking stupid shit to rightwing dumbshits in one thing, but saying those same things to the country as a whole is only going to gain them the derision that they so richly deserve.

[alkamm]

Maybe we won't need a Constitutional Convention if we change the tax code, which many conservatives would accept if done right. Do a value added tax on goods and services and the working man is relatively freed from taxes. We need to use rightwing rhetoric against them. By making manufacturers and traders pay a fair portion of their profits to pay for their sins of omission or commision (starvation wages, no health care, poor pension plans) we could do a lot to make our governmente more intelligent and regain a lot more freedom.