‘Tis the Season

NeoCondi and Political Fundamentalism

One of the conservatives’ chief traits was on display yesterday when NeoCondi dismissed the ISG’s recommendation that she talk to Syria and Iran. She said she wouldn’t talk to them because:

she did not want to trade away Lebanese sovereignty to Syria or allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon as a price for peace in Iraq, the Post reported.

Apparently, she’d already held both sets of talks in her head and was such a lousy negotiator that she woke up pushed to the wall, clutching her teddy bear and crying “No, no!”

Imagine. We have a Sec of State who has to have it explained to her that having “talks” means you, like, you know, talk. They try to get as much from you as they can, you try to get as much from them as you can, and you wind up, like, meeting somewhere in the middle – you know, compromising.

But that’s not how NeoCondi does things, no. She decides in advance what they’re going to say and then rejects it. Neocons don’t talk. They give orders. They “decide” things, preferably with as little exposure to contrary ideas as possible. Contrary ideas are “negative”, show “weakness”, and distract you from the pre-conceived goal.

Neo-conservatives  think “talking” is a waste of time. They know the truth, so what’s the point? They’re authoritarians and like to give orders rather than “discuss” (another weenie-word). They’re bi-polar – there are no grays for conservatives. Everything is still in black-and-white, like old movies.

• If you’re not “good” as I define it, you must be “evil”.
• If you’re not with me, you’re against me. (see, Bush)
• Stealing an office pencil is the same as murder because they’re both against the law.

And, of course, they hate listening to people who disagree with them. They have a felt-type of knowing. They know something because it feels right to them so therefore it must be true. They hate being suibjected to people with different opinions but they hate being exposed to facts that question their “knowing” even more.

This impatience or inability to cope with nuance and facts not contained in their subconscious “knowing”, even in its simplest forms, makes them extremely dangerous if they’re allowed beyond the confines of their neatly-ordered bubble-world, whichever one that might be (all conservatives have them). They’re in denial about all complexity no matter how minor. They are the people who take a trip to France or Germany and constantly complain that “nobody speaks English”. They are the people who just don’t understand why the poor don’t get off their asses and get rich like them or why the Iraqis just won’t “step up to the plate” and take this mess off our hands.

But it needs must be clearly understood that their rigid inflexibility never applies to themselves. Inside their bubble, morality applied to their lives and decisions is forever elastic, stretching to accommodate the most venal of actions and thoughts. It is a sin and a crime for someone else to steal a pencil but they are allowed to commit murder if it furthers their interests. Then the rationalizations flow like bourbon and branch water.

Conservatives are the kind of people who shouldn’t be allowed out of the house without a minder to explain everything to them. They are astoundingly ignorant about life outside the bubble. Put NeoCondi on the world stage and she’s clueless – and helpless. She can pass along Emperor George’s dictums but she isn’t allowed to negotiate because a) she doesn’t know what it means, b) she already knows what everybody’s going to say, and c) she’d have to listen to people who have a different view and that would be painful.

Old-style moderate conservatism wasn’t quite that bone-headed. Bob Michel, James Baker, Henry Hyde before the impeachment – they were all willing to talk, all willing to compromise if they had to. But to King George and NeoCondi “compromise” is a dirty word. They are political fundamentalists. Their truth is the only Truth and they’re going to ram it down out throats if it takes another millenium. That’s strength. That’s commitment. That’s “purpose”.

That’s hubris, arrogance, and elitism taken to its outer fringe. Gawd he’p us, we got 2 more years of this insanity before our parole hearing comes up.