American Thinker, October 26, 2011
If you’re wondering whether I was at Occupy Berkeley on October 15, the answer is no. I didn’t have to attend: every day around here is Occupy Berkeley.
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Robin, well done, but there are altogether to many “capitalists” on the right
that have sold their souls and would sell their mothers as well for more
wealth than they can possibly use and it’s this greed and vice that Jesus
spoke of in his parables “what does it profit a man to gain the world and
yet loose his soul” (it will gain him eternal damnation like the rich man
and Lazarus parable) We have a duty as Christians to use our wealth to
further His kingdom, yes we get to keep some but the intent is always to
give back to Jesus. Pay it forward to the kingdom of God, use your wealth to
store treasure in heaven (souls, converts like yourself). It always amazes me
that Jesus paid for my salvation with His life. WOW what a message
and our Govt./society wants to separate religion and state but they
are totally OK with the unholy alliance of rotten, bent for hell business
and state. Both Dem and Rep.
Another good read with thought provoking insight. Liberalism can be distilled down even further; it encompasses all the seven deadly sins.
Robin,
I know you’re aware that the people who need these things most most often won’t listen. I have a VERY close friend who told me not too long ago “I don’t want to hear ANYTHING ‘Tea Party’.” expressing her hatred for them (very intelligent, black liberal). I’m not sure she understood when I responded in the same manner to a forward from her from the New York Times that I was trying to show her how her response FELT. My mind really isn’t QUITE that closed!
Nevertheless, she concluded we had to avoid anything relating to politics in our communication. A closed door.
Still, we have seen the miracle of dramatically changed lives, which is what we must hope for, act toward, and rely upon: the work of the Holy Spirit, and the Father’s faithfulness in hearing and answering prayer.
God bless!
Paul
Obama is merely the spokesman….the machine that put him in and will put in others is the true problem….How do we know who they are?…They are who they are…the democrats are most accountable, but there are the republicans as well….term limits, (VERY short term limits) is a great start….. government/elected CANNOT be a career, just a good faith “effort/job” to help the country….fer a brief time….work for the people and go BACK HOME!!! to expand the economy…..honest business people can fix this country….IS there any honest business people out there who are willing to do this?….sadly,I think not….the smartest person I have known and also worked for and “fired?” me, could turn this country around in 6 months…run just like his company….feelings would be hurt, but the bottom line at the end of the day is that the company/country would flourish !!! I still love that man even though he fired me or I quit….I’m unsure….but he showed me his vision
I agree. This nation needs some real ‘tough love’ that, as you say, would hurt before healing. But if the debt continues to go unaddressed, the crash will be truly catastrophic and likely bring about widespread anarchy and violence.
Truth hurts whenever we have been living a lie or a fantasy. Denial only forestalls the reckoning.
Just follow the $ and it will lead to that most famous of
bank cartels “The Federal Reserve” Imagine getting to
print TRILLIONS of dollars and then hand it to the big
banks who give it to smaller big banks and every time the
transaction happens they “the reserve” get the interest
for printing and then giving out $ that has come from thin air.
Please read the history of the Fed for yourselves and tell
everyone what you find.
Thanks, Robin, for another great article. You always bring much insight to your readers. I know a lot of people are trying to figure out these “occupiers.” But it was quite easy to see from the beginning that there were too many progressives involved for any good to come from this.
Outsanding. We converts (atheism/Judaism to Christianity, in my case) can be very vocal. Your columns are consistently excellent. We need writers and thinkers like you. Please keep up your mission. Bless you.
Robin, just read through more comments here and re-read your post. On first reading, I must’ve missed that you wrote you are dubious about other liberal people waking up. That was probably some wishful thinking on my part. Keeping in mind the old proverb that “Hope is a good breakfast but a poor supper,” I still feel that what you write, based on your experience, is a source of hope. I forward some of your posts to Democrats in my life. I’ve been getting less argument from them about Obama and some concessions about his mistakes. Maybe they’re being evasive with me. Maybe they’re really doubling down on their positions. Maybe they are ignoring me. Maybe they really are changing. I just don’t know. If I can get some of the more independent minded among them to change, I’ll be happy. We each do what we can. Your essays are one of the best resources I have for them because of your life history. Thank you.
Thanks encouraging, Walt. We do what we can. I do believe it’s all in God’s hands. But by informing people, we may ignite the flame of understanding and awareness.
I think if conservatives offer a dynamic candidate, such as Herman Cain, this may attract some new people, particularly blacks. Herman Cain is a down-to-earth black guy, who says “man” a lot and is funny and cool. These aren’t my priorities . . but his “coolness” would likely attract the MTV generation.
Obama is biracial, was raised by a white family, and was educated in the elite. The academic elite look down on the average person regardless of race. I think Cain is an exciting person who could attract new interest and warm bodies into the conservative movement, particularly those who look to charisma.
Brilliant article. I will definitely be sharing this one!
Robin,
Another excellent post. As to the why of it, I think your observation about the cool factor and 60′s nostalgia are dead on. The “radicals” of today seem to be using a 40 year old playbook, so the whole effect is a sort of a hippie fantasy camp thing; wear black, spout meaningless slogans and cover your face with a bandana. Basically, if it weren’t for the fact that the helicopters woke me the other yesterday morning when the cops were trying to clear the plaza, I would feel sorry for these bozos. As it is, I just hope they go over the SF and set up camp over there.
J.O.B.
Robin
“Because every moment of every day, I am surrounded by people who believe the insanity spewed by the occupants of Occupy.”
Curious as to why you are still in Berkeley? I left NY 15 years ago and have never looked back, found a place where conservatives are the majority and people have a zest for life and are kind to one another down here in Georgia. Take care
on a side note:
” While in your neck of the woods random strangers may comment, “Nice day if it doesn’t rain,” around here the words would be, “Nice day for a revolution.”
They should be careful what they wish for! They would loose in a heart beat we sleep with our God and guns!
Robin, I agree with what others have said about this post of yours, that it is “insightful,” “hopeful,” “perceptive,” “brilliant,” “informative.” I also think it is stirring and authoritative. Your words have the authority of one who has been there, but woke up before it was too late, and your gifted and concise writing is stirring. You are a remarkable and, I think, historical person. You give much hope to those of us who have liberal family and friends, that they too may come to understanding and vote accordingly. Thank you. God bless you.
Hi Robin,
I don’t expect you to publish this comment it is a personal message to you. Though what you do with this message is entirely up to you. Now my children are sound asleep I have had more time to read over and respond to your comment with more time.
I would like to tell you a little about myself. You may not be interested but I feel this will contextualise my situation and views for you. I am a mother of 3 young children. One of my children has autism and we have been fighting for the last three years to access services for him. I live with my husband who works in social care, he works up to 72 hours a week but his pay is relatively low despite holding a degree and having years of experience. He does his job because he genuinely cares about the young people he is helping. Just for the record, he works in the independent sector. I am a trainee primary school teacher. I hold a first class degree in History which I have worked my butt off to achieve. I am not overly young and idealistic.
I am strongly anti-communism (how can you study history and not be?) and I am not anti-capitalism. However, I am anti-super capitalism. I do not have a problem with rich individuals, but I do have a problem with corporate greed. You say that life isn’t fair and I promise you I am totally aware of that. When I was a child my father was a CEO of a shipping company. I was bought up in a well-off middle class family in a leafy suburb. Then recession hit. My father lost his job and because he was a mature man he found it impossible to find another job of that calibre. However having a strong working ethic he took any job he could get. The work he had to take made him very ill. I watched him suffer for years. He wasn’t lazy, he didn’t expect anything from the state. He worked for over 50 years. Now the fuel companies are placing extortionate prices upon energy he can barely afford to heat his house. He has barely any money just to cover the necessities. If you look at BP’s profits for the last quarter, perhaps you will see why this sickens me. How could I support a system that allows a hard-working man like my father to suffer whilst speculators have become spectacularly rich? I totally support medical professionals being paid a decent wage, but if a surgeon was paid a large amount of money when he was slowly killing his patients I wouldn’t be. That is how I see the bankers, and speculators who have taken our economies into this position.
You speak of God. I assume you are a Christian? Therefore you will be aware of Jesus’ views of the ‘den of thieves’. Do you honestly believe that Jesus would approve of this current situation. Did Jesus not tell the story of the good samaritan? Jesus wanted us to look after eachother. That is what I believe in. Once upon a time a priest said to me, ‘as long as you follow the commandment ‘Love thy neighbour’ you can do no wrong. This is how I try to live my life. Yes, life is not perfect, but shouldn’t we, as members of a global community, try and make life as easy for eachother as possible?
You seem to be under the illusion that those who support the occupiers are all pot-smoking hippies who read Karl Marx and laze around all day. Please allow me to assure you that many of us do not fit that role. Of course there will always be those who behave that way, just as there will always be anarchists and thugs who feel the need to agitate at all protests. But those of us who are simply protesting for what we believe in are often against these types, possibly even more than you as they pervert the message we are trying to convey.
I did not comment on your post to antagonise you. I commented on it because I was surprised by your belief that all of us who support this movement must be mad, delusional marxists. Some of us are educated and hard-working. My dad supports this movement and he holds centre-right political views. If you have my email address I would welcome a response from you. I do not want to have a nasty arguement with you. I always appreciate an exchange of views. Perhaps we could educate each other.
Best wishes,
Lucy
Dear Lucy,
You seem very nice. You also seem duped.
What I find fascinating is that I have more in common with the hard Left out here and elsewhere than liberals and progressives. L and Ps want so much to believe in Obama and Michelle– they’re on your side! The Democrats care so much. . all of those multi-millionaires like Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein and Michael Moore and Obama.
The hard left sees through the BS. The ones out here with whom I have spoken did not vote for Obama; they voted for Nader. They realized that Obama was in bed with bankers and corporations.
Shall we all remember that Obama installed more bankers into his Administration than ever before, such as his Secretary of Treasury?
What is so pathetic is that the occupiers think that the Democrats are their friends and the Republicans their enemies. Most of them on both sides of the aisle are in bed with the globalists and the foreign bankers and the Federal Reserve. No wonder Ron Paul can’t even get a bill passed to AUDIT the Federal Reserve, much less eliminate it. Who is in the Federal Reserve? What do they do with our money? Why do they loan our money to foreign banks? Why do they lose trillions? No one knows. Even the socialist Congressman, Bernie Saunders has been furious at the Federal Reserve chief’s arrogance and secrecy.
They are not part of the Federal Government, despite the name. The unknown Obama wouldn’t have won if he weren’t in their (and Soros) pockets.
The hard left knows this. They are also appalled by Obama’s assaults on civil liberties, such as his ordering an assassination of an American abroad without due process. Many old time leftists, such as Daniel Ellsberg, have protested in writing this President’s assaults on civil liberties. But the liberals and the progressives are duped; they are the true cult believers.
So let’s put this together:
The liberals and progressives support insurrection and occupation, thinking this is going to lead to. . .actually they haven’t thought this far. Some lofty notions about “fairness.”
However, all this insurrection is benefiting: a. Radical Islam, which would love to put Lucy and me in a burqua and do genital mutilation of girl babies. They are winning in Egypt, and now, Libya. The churches in Egypt are being decimated, with Christians at grave risk, and no one seeming to care in the administration,
b. the Globalists, who want widespread insurrection, anarchy. . leading to the downfall of nations, and a global currency, WHICH THEY WILL RUN. A global bank. A one-world government, headed by them. Something demonic, as the Bible (Revelation) prophesies.
As for Jesus, he wasn’t a social revolutionary. He was a revolutionary of the heart. I can’t presume to speak for Jesus. I imagine that he would not like the occupation and the insurrection and the anarchy. Remember, he didn’t start a war. He wasn’t a warrior like David, which is one of the reasons why the Pharisees rejected him and had him crucified. He obediently died on the Cross. He came to save our souls so we wouldn’t die, not to start a revolution. He came to save us from hell, not to create a heaven on this earth.
What would Jesus do? He sure wouldn’t be screaming on the streets of Wall Street and threatening the police. He also didn’t preach utopia nor fairness in this realm. (By the way, he said that if people don’t work, they shouldn’t eat, not exactly Marxist doctrine.) Jesus wasn’t a community organizer, a la Obama/Alinsky/SEIU, despite what the liberal churches may preach.
Lucy, you and your dad and your friends seem fed up and desperate for change. Many conservatives feel the same way. We’re all being screwed by the same people, but it doesn’t have to do with Left and Right.
However, supporting violent revolution and worldwide chaos isn’t the solution. Fighting each other, the police, etc. simply distracts from the real oppressors. It will simply lead to violence and chaos, as history has shown us again and again (The Soviet Union, Cambodia, China, etc.) The globalists would be thrilled, however. Their goal is as few people on earth as possible so they will hold all the money. Demonic indeed.
Wow you go girl good stuff here
I hate that the Christian church has laid down under the
notion that Jesus was not a warrior. In my biblical studies
I’ve found the opposite to be true,He rules supreme, undefeated
(Sarah too) and we just don’t see it on the first read. If you
look at it historically Jesus kicked the butts of both the non believing Jews and the Romans as well but He did it without
conventional warfare. He fought them as principalities not
as people or nations and He told us to do the same but this
modern day church is too caught up in END TIMES garbage
to realize that things are this way because they not only
don’t fight properly they’ve given up entirely and found it easier to blame it all on the last days. I could go on but it’s
easier for me to just say “go read Gary Demar at American
Vision”. Sorry for the church rant Robin I guess it’s too
close to home. God Bless the work He is doing with and in
His nation.
Yes, this is what I have discovered myself after going to many, many churches the last two years. It has been distressful. Ministers are scared to open their mouths, or are very politically correct. If there are churches out there speaking the truth, and I mean the WHOLE truth, and they have sermons online, please someone share them!
Hi Robin et al,
I appreciate your response. I feel we may have found some common ground. As I have said before, I am not from the US, but I think you will find that whoever is in your government has a global impact and therefore we all watch very closely to see what is happening in your political system. I, personally, have never trusted Obama. I found the hysteria which surrounded him to be rather concerning. His actions since becoming president have largely supported my earlier suspicions. Where I live (Western Europe), Obama would not be considered left wing, but instead centre right. Please note I am not from eastern Europe, we have not experienced communism here. But we have experienced something more akin to socialism. Therefore when we see Americans describing Obama as a socialist, or even a Marxist, it actually make us laugh. The problem for me is that when Bush was in power it caused greater problems for us than Obama has. Therefore for my country Obama is the lesser of two evils. When the republicans blocked Obama raising the debt ceiling it had consequences for European economies. Had a deal not been struck the result would have been disastrous for us. I’m sorry to tell you but the US often appears as an aggressor on the world stage, whether this is justified or not is not for me to say, but Bush certainly made this situation worse. In the global economy a republican government is not necessarily good PR.
On a second point where there is some agreement between our views is over people such as Michael Moore who to me are sensationalists. There is a real argument to be made for the left. I find it disquieting when lefties basically rely on what I deem as PR stunts. I think an important distinction needs to be made between what those on the left think, and what left-wing governments do. My views are often not represented by left wing governments, who to my mind are often neo-liberals and wolves in sheeps clothing. But they are at least nearer to my beliefs and ideals than the right and so with little other options I will continue to vote for them. Personally I would favour splinter political parties formed of the centrist element of both political wings. I feel It would be more representative and would probably result in more common sense policies.
Thirdly, you said ‘We’re all being screwed by the same people, but it doesn’t have to do with Left and Right.’ I agree with you here. But I think this situation will often apply to those who support the occupiers. As I said before, my dad is centre-right but he supports the occupiers, my mum who is as centrist as they come also supports the occupiers. I think this goes beyond politics. The occupy movement over here is almost apolitical. You will find support for it in both the left and right wing press. This is about economics, and only about politics to the extent in which the state can influence corporations. I have my suspicions that all of our governments are actually quite powerless to deal with this situation. People are fed up of becoming increasingly poor whilst large corporations make ever greater profits. This situation affects most of the middle and working classes. They have the right to oppose this. Just as you have the right to oppose them opposing this. I agree with you on your point about violent revolution. You will see this in my previous comment about anarchists. I think violence dilutes a valid point. I have 100% support for none violent protest. I am a pacifist and therefore never condone the use of force. Of course this goes both ways and I feel that the police often act as antagonists. I have witnessed police brutality which was simply ‘provoked’ by people walking and chanting. You might not believe this, you might feel that the police simply defend themselves, but my eyes have told me something very different.
Regarding Jesus, I’m sure the social revolution aspect is simply a matter of interpretation, but you cannot deny that he would be against many of the events which are taking place in banking and corporations. We only need read the teachings from Matthew to understand this. You say that he was a revolutionary of the heart, but surely the heart should follow helping one another, making sure that the poor and the sick do not suffer. Jesus healed the sick and he fed the hungry, that cannot be denied. Last year I had to have cancerous cells removed. Whilst I was going through this situation I spoke to many women online. Many women in the US were suffering, untreated, with cervical cancer because they couldn’t afford to access medical care. I know that the argument for why this is okay is because they have the option to go make money etc. But trust me, through mine and my partner’s work we have met many people who don’t have those options. There are many people who have had poor educations, and poor parenting, who are in terrible situations and who haven’t been given the tools to even understand how to get out of that situation. Regardless of anything else, with the way unemployment figures are soaring globally, many do not even have the chance to find a job. I spoke to one woman. A single mother with 3 children and she was dying because she couldn’t access care. Perhaps this makes me some soft, or naïve, lefty but it broke my heart. I cannot imagine that the teachings of the New Testament would condone allowing that to happen when it is so avoidable. The bible does teach us lessons which convey that exploitation is against the word of God. The story of Moses teaches us that.
Mkgcos0- Please allow that I am not in the US and therefore the situation in my country is not the same as in yours. I did not realise fuel was cheap in the US. Fuel here is extremely expensive, to the extent that the average (not classically poor) person is experiencing fuel poverty. Petrol here is $2.25 per litre. In the last year the cost of domestic fuel was increased by 20%. I do not know what the situation is in America but in w. Europe the result has been disastrous for many families, which is why I used BP and the fuel situation as one example of why I am supporting the occupiers. The occupy movement has spread across the globe. I made this example in order to illustrate that many of us believe in it for reasons other than those provided by Robin in the article.
I think you are being over-simplistic in what you believe is happening with those profits. Their net profits are calculated after reinvestment; otherwise this would be their gross income. Yes, it probably does go into your stock portfolio. Good for you, it’s going into your stock portfolio out of the pockets of those who cannot afford shares because all of their money is going on their utility bills. Your nest egg is made out of taking too much money from the less fortunate. I don’t want to be personal but you referred to yourself hence why I am using the personal pronouns ‘you’ and ‘your’. If I was in that situation, I don’t think my conscience would be that happy. Fuel companies have become so large that they are able to fix the prices amongst themselves. The profit margin shows us that the increasing cost of fuel is not the result of a natural increase in the cost of raw materials. This cost increase has been artificially created by the companies themselves. Therefore, I feel it is only right that average people join together and try to do something about this. This does not happen only in fuel. The cost of food is increasing exponentially. Where I live food prices have increased by about 15%. Many of the superstores, such as Walmart, produce their own food and then state that their producers (i.e. themselves) have increased the cost, therefore they need to increase the price for their customers. Another example of how the average working population is being let down by bug business.
I appreciate your response Robin. It has been very warming to be able to have a conversation with you about this which has managed to be reasonable and well considered. I am a little appalled that some posters have referred to me as being: the devil, a member of the KGB, a cunning provocateur, a useful idiot, a troll, and having a filthy and evil nature (As a Christian, I found that part particularly distressing). But I have a lot of respect for the way you have conducted yourself and I wish you all the best.
Hi, Lucy,
In the 2 years or so that I’ve had this blog, yours has been the only comment from a progressive that has been reasonable. Most of the comments from progressives are threatening to me, try to humiliate and degrade me, call me names, curse at me, etc.
So if a reader made such a comment with reference to you, it is because 99% of the time, those who come to my site from the left are indeed trolls, who say horrible things. Many trolls are being paid by George Soros organizations. Others do this simply because they hate (and I mean hate) conservatives so much that they want to menace, distract, and spread darkness.
Actually, the only other time I can think of a borderline okay comment from someone on the left was also a woman. Probably not a coincidence.
As for your comments, you seem like a level-headed woman who thinks outside the box. It is too bad that you are not an American! (LOL) Our country is terribly divided with people at each other’s throats. I don’t know if you have read about our Federal Reserve, and how it is not federal but has our money. We don’t know what they do with it or who is even in the Federal Reserve. The Founders of our country warned against a central bank. The Fed was pushed by President Woodrow Wilson in the l910′s, when not enough of Congress was around to even vote on it. Many people feel it is the root of our problems.
Alex Jones of infowars.com and prisonplanet.com is a controversial figure. I don’t agree with everything he says. But he believes that there are foreign globalists, richer than sin, who want to destroy the sovereignty of countries and to create a one-world government. To do this, we all have to fight with each other, which is happening on the streets around the world. Obama supports the anarchy. .I wouldn’t be surprised if Obama fashioned himself as Head of the new One-World Government. He did sit at the head of the UN National Security Council, an action never done by a US President and that very well may have been unconstitutional.
I’m glad that you were suspicious of him to begin with. This says to me that you are a person of discernment.
As for Jesus, I imagine he wouldn’t like any of what is going on in the world: the rampant crime in our country (much of it black on white, though few people will talk about it), the vile pornography, the general sense of nihilism and moral relativism and alienation from God). I don’t think he would approve of people with megabucks acting criminal, though I don’t think he would have a problem with people having a lot of money but being ethical about it. He said the love of money was the root of all evil. This can refer to both the rich or the poor.
I honestly think it’s all spiritual warfare. . a fight that begin before time itself.
I’m really sorry that you have been on the receiving end of that sort of outburst. The same has happened to me when I have written about women’s rights. I would never want to treat another person that way. I think the moment someone sinks to that level they’ve automatically lost the debate.
I will endeavour to find out more about the federal reserve, thanks for the tip.
I hope that I have been able to show you another side of the left. Please trust me that there are others on the left with a similar mindset to me and we strongly disapprove of violent and aggressive means. Although I am sure that neither of us is going to change the way we think anytime soon, I believe our exchange has at least proven that there can be common ground found between the two sides and at least we’ve shown that it is possible to disagree rationally.
God bless.
Hi,
I can’t help wondering if we’ve been able to have this civil dialogue because you are not from this country. Here we are at each other’s throats, and I think it’s because of Obama. He is from the divide-and-conquer, agitating, Saul-Alinsky, community organizing part of the left. Sadly, people thought he’d be the great uniter. . but he has been a great divider, one of the biggest (if not the biggest) this country has ever had.
I find it interesting that you have been on the receiving end of hate when writing about women’s rights. This is how I became a conservative — when I saw the unbelievable hate and violence against Hillary Clinton supporters and then Sarah Palin, her family, and her church.
Did you know that Palin’s church was torched with children in it (Palin wasn’t in there and no one was hurt. But the person(s) torched from the entrance way to try to block people’s exit). And this was never reported by the mainstream press. When I saw the misogyny inflicted by Obama supporters (while Obama said nothing), I started researching the history of the left and was horrified at the violence against women (and men too). This is what propelled me to do even more research and become a conservative. There are certainly conservative men who are sexist — but there is NOTHING like the hate and violence I’ve seen from the Left towards women. And the left purports to care about women — hence the hypocrisy. BTW: I’ve written a number of articles on the left’s treatment of women at American Thinker.
Oh, and the same thing happens to conservative blacks by the left . Black conservatives get a “high tech lynching,” as a black Supreme Court Justice put it. They are treated as Uncle Tom’s. This just shows inherent racism.
Herman Cain is running for President. I just read today that a Democratic strategist said that Cain “knows his place.” Just watch for the terrible things that will be said about him because he’s not towing the liberal party line.
Many people in this country are frightened and desperate and that is partly what is fueling the Occupation movement as well as the support for it. But, as I said, I think they are dupes, pawns in this whole globalist scheme to bring us all down to a primitive level, fighting with each other. The problem isn’t the police, the local bank, the left or the right . . it is so much deeper, bigger, richer and more nefarious.
If you’re interested, check out the book, The Shadow Party. It was written a few years ago about how George Soros was planning to “buy” the Democratic Party and use it for his globalist schemes. The book has been prescient, in my mind. He is the one who manipulated the British financial system to try to destroy the pound.
The author is David Horowitz, who was raised by communist parents and was very much a part of the left here in the 60′s, such as the Black Panthers. He left the Left when a female friend of his was killed for knowing too much.
By the way, what also fuels the conservative movement here in the US is that our government acts like some sort of monarchy — full of deception, corruption, and above the law. Many in Congress think they are the masters and we are the serfs. I believe Obama thinks that way, although he’s convinced a lot of people that he’s one of them. Our Congress gets wonderful health insurance and pensions, while they plan Obamacare, substandard health care, which they themselves would never accept. We have millions of illegal aliens in this country who get better health care than citizens. It pits people against each other and creates enormous resentment.
While I’m not thrilled with the corporations, I have many more problems with our government. We can choose not to shop at this store or that. But we are powerless around this country, particularly since so many people think the Democrats here are the good guys.
As I said, I think this is all planned.
much love and blessings to you and your family,
R
PS I’m glad we had this conversation. Thank you for visiting my blog. I just wish that the left and the right could sit down and rationally discuss things and figure out who are the real enemies. As you said, we have a lot in common, most of all a concern for the safety and well being of our loved ones and our country. But there are forces out there who want us yelling at each other and fighting in the streets.
Lucy, with all due respect, you’ve just stated one of our cases. Fuel is relatively cheap. The government taxes on fuel make it expensive. The government takes heat from your father. That is how government works.
BP’s profits did not go into the pockets of a few rich men at the top. They went into my stock portfolio so I can afford heat when I retire, they went into finding and developing more energy resources for the future…including green sources, and they went into building the infrastructure to bring the heat to your father.
Now, you tell me where the portion siphoned off the top by the government went?
Your articles are informative and insightful, but, more importantly, they give me hope. Hope that the black hole that is the power of Berkeley can be overcome and that some people do escape. Oh, by the way, my son is at Berkeley in the “I” school getting his PhD.
I enjoyed the article, as it relayed many things I have long since suspected about the Progressive mindset.
One part that I am hoping Robin will expand upon is *how* he changed his mind and began to look elsewhere. Robin, what made you see the light of day, so to speak?
Really…Robin is not a he, as you’d know if you checked the profile…
, but her calming supportive reasoned tone is also an indicator.
Man get angry…break thing…burn meat ..
.
Haha, touché. I clicked over from AT and for some reason assumed Robin was male. I’m still interested in *her* answer.
Actually, I have written about l50 articles . . and there are several describing my transformation. Just check the American Thinker archives under my name. I’d suggest the very first one: Letter of Amends.. and also one called, “How I became so conservative so fast.”
Thanks for asking.
Thanks, I’ll check them out. My apologies for the faulty assumption;-)
You have left out some of my comments and suggested that they were ‘accusatory and insulting towards’ you, yet at the same time argue that your blog requires an open mind? You seem to be implying that I should not comment on your article because I do not agree with your beliefs? That does not seem to be very open minded. I welcome your right to speak your mind, and I think you’ll find that my post to you was thoughtful and reasonable. I did not insult you. I welcome you posting the comments you state you had to remove for further scrutiny as I hope other people too would see that I posed hypothetical explanations which did not intend to upset you at all. I think the right and left would both be in agreement that freedom of expression is an important right. You are posting on the internet (the global internet: I am not in the US) and therefore you should expect that people will respond to your posts with scrutiny. If you only welcome comments from certain kinds of people perhaps it would be best that you voice them in a less public space?
OMG. . I took l0 minutes out of a busy day to write to you. . to try to reach you and to teach you.
I tried my best to make you understand the nature of this world, so you can be happier! There are roads to happiness (God, gratitude, being happy to be alive) and roads to misery (LIFE IS UNFAIR).
And all you got out of my very long response was that I AM UNFAIR.
Lucy, you remind me of the way I used to be. Always focused on what is unfair. It is the road to misery, I promise you.
Think every day about what you are grateful for! You will be so much happier. Life is such an amazing blessing, and I thank God every day for another day of life.
goodbye Lucy. . and I wish you much love and blessings in your life,
R
Robin, bless you for your good work here…Lucyb is one of two things…and I’m guessing the latter…
Either a useful idiot who innocently believes all the carp she has been fed by the liberal media and academia, or …
A rather cunning provocateur…cleverly working in enough apparent false innocence and vulnerabilty to engage your “I was once as you are now” sympathies, and undeservedly so.
The tip off to me is trying to lay a guilt trip on you, her last comment that YOU, who pay for and clearly use this blog as your outlet to the world, should somehow feel guilty and take your “rantings” to a less public venue…that takes stones…I doubt that LucyB is a girl…possibly closer in true character to LucyFer, if you’ll pardon the play on the name.
Don’t feed the trolls.
Or perhaps…KaygeeB?
The left are adept at manipulation, and her/his kind of writing takes training and practice.
Thanks for the laugh. Love the last line.
Been an intermittent visitor, always enjoyed your take, will be back more often.
Lucy, lucy, lucy…there you go again.
It’s OH so reasonable to agree that freedom of expression is an important right, ….except when the other party disagrees with your leftist lies…
Leaving out your inappropriate comments is somehow oppressive, but you imply that Robin is undeserving of the right to express her opinions on the Internet…that’s not thoughtful or reasonable on your part…
Okay….I am neither satan, a troll, or cunning.
I do not feel that Robin shouldn’t make this blog. In fact, I thoroughly support her right to disseminate her beliefs. I stated that if she only welcomes replies from those with a similar mindset then the internet is not the best forum as you are bound to receive opposing viewpoints in this medium. My sincere hope was that she would take this to mean that she would be tolerant of opposing viewpoints rather than understand this as an implication that she shouldn’t post. I didn’t mean that at all! It seems I have been misread on this point and that is perhaps my own fault. Speech is very hard to convey through the written word and meaning can often become lost. My apologies if my intended meaning was not clear. Sorry Robin.
I am not trying to be cunning. This is actually the first blog from a right wing perspective that I have commented on. (Other than a complaint to the Daily Mail about an article they wrote about ADHD). Please don’t demonise me. I wrote on here because it is apparent that Robin is an intelligent woman and I believed she would welcome the exchange of ideas and an alternative perspective. My intention was not to be a gadfly.
As for being happy. I am very happy with my life. I have a family I adore which gives me a daily dose of happiness. If you all knew me you’d be surprised how much I differ from the view you have apparently formed of me. I simply came on here to express my political/ economic viewpoint the same as everybody else. I do not understand why when you do it it is great and good but when I do it it is apparently moaning.
I won’t post again as it is clear that I am not wanted here. I honestly wasn’t trolling and I simply wanted to take this last opportunity to defend myself. I have written a personal note to Robin which I hope she will accept in the spirit it was intended.
Robin- if you feel that any of this post is against your rules then please moderate it, but please allow me to defend myself this one time.
Best wishes all. x
First of all Lucy, free speech does not apply to private property, which this site is. The First Amendment says CONGRESS shall make no law restricting speech. Nothing there about what speech people are supposed to allow in their homes, in their businesses, and on their websites.
That said, (and since this is a private site, I have no expectations of being posted), why is it, Robin, that you state at the end of your article that you think there is no hope for others to “wake up”? Surely if an indoctrinated, concrete-thinking bohemian such as yourself could, so could any indoctrinated, concrete-thinking bohemian. Or are you more special than other indoctrinated, concrete-thinking bohemians? And in what way? Which brings up another point, speaking of specialness…why is it, Robin, that you are the only author at AT that gets special treatment with comments? Why do I have to come and register on your site to place comments for articles published at AmericanThinker.com and no other author at AT requires that? Do you have some special business agreement wherein you and you alone are allowed to harvest email addresses for future promotions of maybe an upcoming book of yours? Seems rather …special.
Dear P,
I was surprised by the angry tone of your letter. I’m not quite sure why.
No, I don’t think people are waking up, sadly. I am surrounded by people on the left, and I have family and friends who are more liberal in other parts of the country. No one is willing to even entertain any doubts about Obama and the Democrats. I live with a highly intelligent, well-read man. . and every time politics comes up in the conversation, there is an argument. In another case, I mentioned to a friend something about the Federal Reserve (certainly a nonpartisan topic), and she barely spoke to me for three months.
I hope I’m wrong. But I don’t see it. Why did I wake up and others have not? I don’t know for sure. Part of it may have been that I was mugged and injured in the middle of the day in a not particularly bad part of town. While that was a number of years ago, it certainly made me permanently concerned about the lack of safety for people in liberal areas. I also have been someone who loves to discover truth, even when the truth is painful. Any other reasons have to do with divine intervention.
As for “special” at AT. . that part of your letter feels nasty. I don’t have any book in mind, since I’d have to move to an unknown bunker in the hills of Kentucky to survive such an endeavor. Certainly, I would not have readers rerouted here in order to gain publicity for a book. I am not that kind of a person.
I will simply say that for reasons that I am not at liberty to divulge, I needed to request doing my own moderation. And hence this blog. I imagine that if other writers at AT made the same request, the editor would do the same for them.
Dearest Robin,
I love you, I truly do. You are a gifted human being and you express yourself so poignantly and eloquently. I cherish your articles and look out for them daily. I lift you daily in my prayers and supplications to the Almighty.
However, in defense of P. and Lucy, I believe that it is wrong for you to edit comments and to not post opposing viewpoints, however disgusting and disrespectful. I have had my “tongue cut out” (as I equate such censorship) by a dearest friend in another forum.
The overwhelming majority of your readership, including me, will “have your back”. Let them fly. Let those that oppose you flaunt their filth and their evil natures. Reality must be crystal-clear and not obfuscated by an ideological prism, whether left or right.
I stand as your ideological brother and brethren to most of your respondents but I disagree with censorship of any kind, save for the redacting of blatantly vulgar terminology.
I repeat and remind that I truly love you and I admire your courageous outspokenness.
PMF
Thanks, Philip. However, all blogs have rules, and so does mine. They are the obvious ones as well as: 1. Progressives will be allowed on if their intention is to discuss, not menace, threaten, or cause trouble. Lucy made it on. 2. Comments will be edited if they generally offer something to readership; however, there is something objectionable, e.g. racist, or a personal appraisal, evaluation, or attack on me.
I understand that everyone has their own way of doing things. This is mine, and only after many months of trying various ways of doing moderation.
Isn’t it interesting, though, that we seem to be veering off in discussions about my blog rather than the implosion of the country? This can happen when we “feed the trolls” or progressives, as one reader put it.
I have also tried to engage liberal family, in-laws, friends and acquaintances in rational, factual discussions about their liberal faith, and these are “educated” individuals with what passes for intellectual backgrounds…to a person they have been unable to explain their position on a rational, factual basis and resort to ad hominem attacks or worse, personal insults against my parents (and parentage), who are as conservative as the sky is blue…they fall back on the “Everybody knows…” Everybody knows Bush’s war in Iraq was illegal…Everybody knows the earth is suffering from Man made global warming…Everybody knows that the whole world will love and forgive America’s many sins if we elect Obama…Everybody knows that healthcare is a basic human right and should be administered by the Government,…because everybody knows that the free marketplace is failing and only technocrat liberals can administer and perfect our flawed Constitutional Republic, we only have to suspend the elections long enough to give them time to work their magic… Magical, wishful, immature, “they” know best what we need kind of thinking…I keep on explaining, but like you I don’t see them coming around…not yet, anyway.
It is not anger, it is mistrust. I do not trust PUMAs teaching others about Conservatism, especially in the current political environment where even die-hard leftists are turning on Obama, hoping their Hillary will now run. I have read many of your posts at AT, as I like to read all that AT offers, and I have seen where you have equated Hillary to a victim and juxtaposed her to Sarah, as if they suffered equally and are deserving of equal sympathy. I have seen others ask you if you’d vote for Hillary if she were to run and how you never answered them. I have seen it here on this blog where you dodged that question by saying you’d get back to the person…. So let’s just say I am wary of you and your motives, your penchant for convenient anecdotes, your emotional vs. critical thinking, and for your basking in the cult of personality you have created.
No.
I wouldn’t vote for Hillary again, that is. I have educated myself about the Clinton’s and find them appalling.
You don’t have to trust me. You don’t have to do anything. However, I don’t appreciate your accusatory tone: the sarcastic “special” term; now the “cult of personality.”
If I developed a cult of personality, I would be on Fox. .. would have gotten a huge advance to write a book, etc. Instead I put myself at risk by writing, anonymously, and for free. If that is cultish to you, well you don’t have to read me. There are plenty of other writers out there who might be more your cup of tea.
I’m seriously trying to figure out what would be wrong with an unknown bunker in the hills of Kentucky.
I have been a keen reader of AT for about a year – this is a remarkable distillation of the cancer that is close to killing our beautiful country. I do hope you are wrong about the probability of a turnaround, and I am scared to death that BO will in fact prevail again.
What I can’t imagine is why liberal/progressive/intelligent people think that some socialist/communist/dictator sort of goverment or “world” would be better than what we have with capitalism. There is no such thing as equal fairness for everyone. There is always someone going to make more or be more than you are. In our world now that happens when we have a desire to achieve and are motivated to be successful. Just wanting to lay around get the same “stuff” has never been a path to the good things. Sounds more like Greece.
I’m tired of being thought of as stupid because I’m conservative and believe in one God. I believe in America and believe America is great nation. We have always tried to help other people. All we have gotten for that is hate all over the world. It amazes me.
Dear Friend,
I completely agree with your viewpoint but with one exception: Your use of the word “capitalism”. That term was coined by Karl Marx himself and it is a pejorative. All of us should refrain from participating in this lie.
Our system of economy should properly be referred to as a “free market economy” or, as columnist extraordinaire Selwyn Duke describes and defines it: a “natural economy”.
Life is inherently unfair. I cannot hit a golf bar as far as Tiger Woods. I can sing well (and I have been paid handsome sums for it) but I cannot sing like Luciano Pavarotti. I cannot innovate like Steve Jobs. I cannot run an enterprise like Mark Zuckerman. However, I am equal to them in the eyes of He who set in place the means by which I was created and I may or may not be more superior than them in my obedience to and my efforts to glorify He who designed the means by which I was created.
May God bless you, dear friend. I am grateful for your participation in this dialog and I am grateful that you empathize with Robin’s readership.
Phillip,
You are absolutely correct. We need to quit using that term and I am as guilty as anyone. I probably need to put a posty-note on my monitor.
Thank you.
This article, I think, will interest a few here. I am no expert at tipping points, but I can see some of this applies to Robin’s op. “…Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have found that when just 10 percent of the population holds an unshakable belief, their belief will always be adopted by the majority of the society….”
http://www.jpost.com/Health/Article.aspx?id=231190
Scientists Discover Tipping Point for the Spread of Ideas July 27, 2011 by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Thank you, Robin. I’ve been following your ops since the first one at AT. I really appreciate your candor.
I agree with you that the WON has the masses in a deep hypnotic trace. Obama is a magician and now they are ready to drink his Cool Aid. The Won and Nancy Peloci are inciting civil disobediance in cities and this has never happened before in American politics. This is an outrage. A reporter for the New York Times (her name was Natalie, maybe a Bolshevik) was giving speaches to the protestors and exiting them even more. The citizens of New York do not deserve this. Their children are being harrased, their porches vandalized, and busineses driven into bankrupcy. These riots may turn violent and helpless New York women will get raped in the alleys. These Marxist Union thugs have not concisence, morals, mercy, or pity.
When I was in college in the 1970′s these marxist thugs occupied the student union building, destroyed the bathrooms, and caused millions dollars of damages to tax payer property. One night they surrounded a poor campus police man and beat him to a pulp.
Obama is using OWS to promote class warfare and to fire up his Democrat voter base.
We elected a community organizer and this is what he does best. Democrats should be ashamed of themselves. Where are the Trumans, the JFK, and Scoop Jacksons?
I was a Democrat once and I will never vote for a Democrat again.
That was a brilliant article.
Great article Robin, I have a couple of comments.
This sense of alienation from God and country compels many people to look to political movements for their raison d’etre . Being leftists offers the lost souls a sense of belonging and identity.
I think this explains a lot to me. Even when I attended college classes in the Bay Area barefoot and wearing a pony tail I still was not disconnected with the spiritual world around me. I may have been participating in a fad, but I never accepted the fad as a substitute for life. I’ve never understood why people did that sort of thing before. Seeing it in your article here made it click for me.
Scores of studies show the same thing: that today’s youth are more narcissistic than ever before. While previous generations of the l8 to 24-year-old crowd prioritized family and meaning, today’s young want six figures and they want it now. They have been raised to feel special and entitled,
I work in a field where I see this every day. Every day I have to explain to co-workers that “They” don’t think like “Us”. I don’t think this will go away. I see it as the product of having their self esteem protected above all else. Nobody ever told them no and it shocks them when it finally happens. This aspect of your article cannot be over emphasized.
around here the words would be, “Nice day for a revolution.”
LOL, what are they going to do? I and my friends are the ones with all of the guns. Are they going to whine until they get their way? Oh wait…yes that is exactly what they are doing! If you couple this comment with my comment above, realize, they really do believe if they whine enough they will get what they want. It’s always worked for them in the past.
Of course, the Bay Area in the 60s was besieged by drug overdoses, rapes, the gangster Black Panthers, and radical terrorist bombings.
They also didn’t bath or shave.
Robin, a couple of my comments above may sound flippant, but, this article was powerful and explained a lot to me. My comments were made in concert with the ideas you are expressing and what they evoked in me. Thank you.
This sense of alienation from God and country compels many people to look to political movements for their raison d’etre . Being leftists offers the lost souls a sense of belonging and identity.
I’ve thought about this for a day or so now and the depth keeps yawning before me no matter how deep I plumb. In the late Sixties and early Seventies, I had a draft card, I wore a pony tail, I wore army surplus clothes with peace buttons, I went barefoot; but I did it as a fad. I did that while my dominant personality formed and matured. (Robin, you’ll have to help me with the technical terms.) Once my own self developed I moved on with life, put myself through school and entered society as a competitive contributing member. Since then while I’ve participated in other fads, I’ve always had my dominant self as a guide morally, ethically, and spiritually. I could always enter into or leave a fad without submerging and losing myself. And that is the vehicle from which I viewed and judged the rest of the world.
A lot of those San Francisco Bay Area people from that era never developed a dominant personality. They allowed the fad to become them. Many still have the pony tail, albeit thin and grey now. They have no dominant self through which to view and judge the world. More disturbing they find judgment abhorrent; which would have to be a rule of that sort of self because judgment might become self critical.
Keeping in mind that many of those people are very bright, they would want others to see the brilliance of their existence just as passionately as do I. So, they proselytize their vision of the world and define the elite thinkers of the world as those who can most successfully articulate their world/fad/self. Hence Obama need not be successful at life, merely articulate about the fad; to make the/their story more appealing.
Then I see where the darkness comes. There are those who see that life as a fad as I do. Yet, they know if they can define and mobilize that fad, then they can control society with that fad. They are malignant and most of the people who now sit on Wall Street are unformed dupes of that malignancy.
I’ve long known about the malignancy. I’m an independent thinking white male living in the San Francisco Bay Area, how could I miss it? If you don’t join them, then you are an enemy to be abused. What I didn’t understand, Robin, until this article was why the masses herded under the whip of that malignancy.
Last night I went Trap shooting with fifty or so men women and children all out socializing and shooting shotguns at clay targets. We had a fire to keep warm in the night and shared food. This weekend I’ll golf with a group of men who are less conservative. In the near future I will do a mix of things with a mix of people and within each thing I participate I will take my dominant personality, myself, and interact on whatever level it is necessary to be contributing, polite and gracious as myself without demanding that my surrounding conform to me.
The people we are discussing never formed a self and therefore have no self to take, so they have to take their fad with them wherever they go. They would have to force the men and women on the gun range to hold their group view of guns or be non-contributing and uncomfortable. On the Golf Course they could not allow someone in the foursome to smoke a cigar while having a beer at the turn.
Robin, am I seeing this correctly do you think?
Robin, I’m sorry this is long, but it is a big idea and it has affected my thinking, so I wanted to tell you. I’m thinking now how it must have been for you. The shock of the attack on you changed your whole world. Like King Richard calling, “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!” You’re world view came to an abrupt change with no one there to offer you a horse. I was allowed to learn that lesson over several years. It must have been an experience to have it crash in upon you. Glad you made it through to hang out with us. Next, we just have to get you to understand the bunker is really not such a bad place.
Well said and thoughtful. I imagine you are talking about the real self versus the false self. Many people (think Obama) never develop a real, true self, but live life with a facade, a public image. There’s no there there.
For many on the left, their identity is progressivism. It’s fascinating living here because people will slip it in almost every conversation! I was talking to a random stranger after someone acted rudely to both of us, and she said something about George W. Bush, that it started after him. I said, “The current president isn’t any better,” and walked away to her forever shock. Take away the progressivism, the belief in utopia, Marx, Che, Mao. . and there is nothing.
When I had to start shedding my beliefs a few years ago, I became depressed and felt lost. Part of it was grieving the old self. I hadn’t found anything yet to take its place, so it was scary. But fortunately God stepped in! Also, I had had a few life circumstances where I was forced to let go of old identities, so I was aware of what was going on.
For some people, it’s too threatening and destabilizing to change. . and so they won’t.
Dear Robin, I am glad your back to writing articles again, you were missed!
This is the BEST explanation I’ve read on this mess we are in, created by and fostered by this administration headed by “BO.” Who I believe to be the Marxist/Alinsky Manchurian Candidate.
Blessings dear Robin, e
I find your article a little disingenous. You have made many points about why you believe they think what they think, but you have offered little explanation for why they are actually wrong. If I came to the conclusion that the moon was a satellite in the sky, because it looks like a Sky dish, that wouldn’t make my initial conclusion incorrect. It would simply be the path to which I came to that conclusion which was misplaced.
Perhaps you have misunderstood the occupiers. You feel that they are there because they want to bring about a marxist utopia? Can I please assume this is simple hyperbole? Perhaps they simply want a more egalitarian society. I don’t think they are even asking for a completely equal society; just more equal than it is at present. You may feel that is naive, but why so? Why should it be that there are super, super rich whilst many are increasingly being plunged into poverty? Why is that naive? Yes, there has alwys been a gap between rich and poor, but never in history has it been as large (and still growing) as it is now? Why can’t this trend be bucked, even just a little?
[Edited]
Dear Lucy,
First, let me explain to you the rules of my blog, since you are new.
I do not publish progressives who have the intention to cause trouble, that is, to distract, to agitate. Progressives are agitating on the streets. They will not agitate on my blog. So if you simply want to argue with me, with a closed mind, then I’m not interested.
So far I have not found a progressive willing to listen to anything my readers and I say.
I have edited out the last sections of your comment because they were person toward me, and accusatory.
I will simply say the following:
1. Life isn’t “fair.” That is what I discovered as I grew up. You will likely do the same as you get older. Some people get cancer. Some people get rich. Some people get run over by a car. Some people get a Mercedes. Some people find the love of their lives and live happily within them for 60 years until one of them dies. Some people divorce and spend their lives alone.
Some of us find the joy of being loved by a perfect, merciful God. Some of us live vacant lives craving for things and money on this realm. Lucy, perfection exists only in God.
God created this realm exactly as He wanted to. Humans angrily agitating and ranting that it is not fair is a misunderstanding of how this world works. Only God is perfect, we are not. Trouble brings us closer to God, to a sense of humility.
A neurosurgeon makes a lot of money. To me that is fair. My cousin works 80 hours a week as a CPÅ and makes a lot of money. This is fair. Steve Jobs died rich. . he worked hard, he invented something amazing. . this is fair.
Oprah came from poverty to riches. . this is fair. Same with Herman Cain.
I have chosen not to work a zillion hours a week in a field that makes a ton of money. I chose this. I do not have a lot of money. This is fair.
The people agitating on Wall Street, Oakland, etc. do not have a lot of money because they have way too much time to spend lying on the grass, yelling diatribes, smoking pot. . and going part-time to school to learn about Marxism. They don’t have much money, and this is fair.
A dude somewhere else is smoking crack and fathering a bunch of kids. . he doesn’t have much money. That is fair.
We all make choices — over what we eat. If we overeat, we may get fat. If we do drugs, we may get stupid. If we work our butts off, we may get a lot of money.
But you know what else, Lucy. Money isn’t everything. Or Smart Phones, and computers.
The happiest people are ones that live within their means, take time to smell the roses, go to church, and are devoted to their families.
I’d respect the Occupiers if they used their time to tutor children, become a Big Brother or Sister, volunteer in a food kitchen. But as much as you may admire the Occupiers, perhaps be one of them. . I’m sorry to tell you that it’s all about greed. Gimme gimme. I want what you have. I want it now, without doing anything about it. It’s entitlement. It’s not attractive. And it’s not holy.
Great answer Robin
Seriously jib, before scrolling down past you reply, I was going to post the exact same thing.
I’ll go a bit further, though.
Almost perfect answer, Robin.
I wish I had the gift of words such as this.
Thank you
“This sense of alienation from God and country compels many people to look to political movements for their raison d’etre.”
There problem is not alienation from God nor country. It is from the self. They do not know who they are and rather than find out how to discover that, they search elsewhere. Once one knows who he is at his core, the rest takes care of itself. This is my experience. Both God and country are distractions from the real issue here.
The full article was an excellent analysis of the mass lunacy of the left. Kudos again for saying it so well! You’ve come to mind a few times, as these ‘Occupy’ protests have spun up. What has been in the news, has been an everyday event for you in Berkeley and for others in towns and cities like it. Be well.
‘daz
Really interesting, great article. I’v always wondered what on earth goes on in the heads of these protesters. I’ve actually tried to talk to some of them and even when simply asking them what they want, I only ever got angry bumper sticker responses about what they hated… still don’t know what they want, in fact, I’m not sure they do either. Your article sheds some light, great job.
OWS seems to be the result of “Disappointment and Status Quo” in the delusions of Obama Groupies who drank the “Hope and Change” Kool-Aid. These people, who follow their heart instead of their head, are now having their hissy-fit over the disaster that the Obama presidency has turned out to be, however, they can’t come to deal with the reality that he and his policies have been the cause of it. The OWS has no defined objective or goals because it is the product of childish acting out, however, the danger lies in the opportunistic manipulation of these useful idiots by the usual sources of funding and support of socialist causes: the municipal unions, George Soros entities, academics, empty-headed celebrities, the mainstream media and community organizers.
Great article Robin!
I appreciate the insight you give us about the Progluddites in our midst; it’s difficult to exist in their world, and I wonder sometimes how they manage the conflict between reality and what they believe.
I just have one bit of argument with you on a point, that where you say: Human beings know instinctively that there is both good and evil in the world. But the moral relativism inherent in liberal education tells people that everyone is good. When people are robbed of the knowledge of good and evil, they will create scapegoats.
I am of the mind that conservatives/libertarians believe that people are basically good, but capable of doing evil. Conversely, liberals believe that people are basically evil but capable of doing good if guided correctly, and thus must be controlled. Patently, liberals think that conservatives are evil (they shout it from the streets daily), so that does not square with your intimation about moral relativism. I think moral relativism teaches instead the Rousseauan concept of a blank slate (one is neither good nor evil upon birth), that everyone has the potential of becoming good, if taught (indoctrinated) correctly. This latter also assumes the definition of “good” being that which is most desirable to Society, not the individual. Therefore, someone not indoctrinated, someone who acts individually, is by definition evil, and must be cast out of the body politic as an undesirable. There is no potential for forgiveness or coming back to the fold, as it were, and so must be “managed” much as Che, Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, and others have done.
The moral relativism to which you refer is not an ignorance of good and evil, but situational ethics, whereby the good or evil of an action or person is judged solely on the pragmatic, immediate consequence. Stealing from a corporation is okay if Society stands to gain, but stealing a fellow traveler’s Mac laptop is not okay because it impedes the revolution. Situational ethics, with its ignorance of absolute good and evil, allows them to parse each action – using a tool devised by evil corporations is not evil in itself, it is using the enemy’s weapons against them. This ad hoc decision-making process requires liberals to convene committees and meetings frequently so as to arrive at the proper action for a given situation; they have no firm ground on which to stand and say unequivocally – this is good or bad – unless it is prescribed by superiors through a consensus. How awful to live that way!
Delusion: The radicals misunderstand the nature of reality. They believe that life should be fair, that hierarchy and differences among people shouldn’t exist. It is a form of delusion to embrace utopia and perfection in this human realm.
This is the root cause, mass misunderstanding due to mass miseducation. Which leaves us with the collective choice between 3 natures of reality: 1) Judeo-Christian–to serve God and love one another, 2) Islamic–to submit to Allah or become dhimmis, or 3) Socialism/Communism–a Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch, life in North Korea, and mob rule of OWS.
We are now in the thick of the clash of civilizations.
Very perceptive article, my epiphany arrived much earlier than yours during the Carter Administration. As a Vietnam veteran I was somewhat indoctrinated by the left when I went to college on the GI Bill. I knew deep down in my gut that what was being promoted by the left was pure garbage, but like you said they were cool. People have to have core values, when you know what is right and reasonable you certainly know what is wrong and evil, my Christian faith taught me that a long time ago. Thank you Robin, I hope we can keep spreading the word, you are one of my ‘heroes’!
Amen. Good Article, thanks!
robin,
once again you’ve put together an insightful article. (anatomy of occupation)
as a retired counselor and pt therapist, i had to the same thoughts about what has brought many of these folks to “occupy”, in particular – search for significance, a desire to replicate the 60′s which they all heard about from their teachers, cool factor and generation me. they will be and are being used by those creating the protests.
always look for your pieces. glad you make the time for writing.
Robin. Your article distills this dark cloud of left-wing lunacy into its bare essentials.
JT Rolla
I am always interested in what you have to say. This was no exception, due to your analysis of leftist behavior. I marvel that you escaped the asylum and I would ask how it happened, but I know from reading your previous AT postings. Still, this makes me wonder further how to rescue those who are so entrenched and so very, very wrong. I realize that with Leftist/Statist leaders are in it for the $$ and power, but why, why do so many “sheeple” exist for their enrichment. I simply do not get it. Thanks again for your insight and God keep you safe there in Hell’s outpost.
Robin, I have followed you since you first appeared on AT, and I have loved and identified with so many of your articles. I am 51 and for my first 37 years, I was a liberal democrat. This piece may be your most important one yet. People who have never been on “the other side” don’t realize how that thinking engulfs you. I thought I was progressive, and intelligent, I thought the conservatives were knuckle dragging behind the times, old fashioned, fools. The thing that still terrifies me about it all is this; I thought I KNEW! I was so sure of myself. I was completely deluded. I have mixed emotions about the left now. They scare me to death, and yet I feel so sorry for them and especially their children, who never seemed to have a chance, being indocrinated from birth. I too fear that most of them will never wake up, or if they do, it may be long after it’s too late. To see so many people being duped and played like they are is to truly see Satan at work. We need to pray for another “great awakening” in this country and in this world. It truly saddens me to see so many people marching in lock-step right off the cliff
…Hey Robin I notice on your homepage,the beautifull picture of the man walking
…down the tree lined lane…Further up a patch of sunlight is visible…Then as the
…road continues on, it turns LEFT and then goes DARK…
Great article! It explains so much about liberals and how they operate.
I’m also praying that the White House will see a new, conservative occupant in 2012.
Even Paula Dean doesn’t have this many recipes for hash and rehash.