Mainstream Pundits Join the War on Stupid
Arguably, few blogs have garnered more criticism – simply for their name – than my blog, Smart v. Stupid. The usual gripe is that it is arrogant to name and shame stupid (even though anyone who read the blog would know we criticize
stupid ideas not stupid people. (People, we feel a little sorry for. But that doesn’t mean we want to take their advice on public policy.)
Whether calling health reform “socialized medicine,” blaming unionized workers for the failures of management, arguing that faith ideology should be taught in science classes, or blaming poor people for a sour economy, the use of stupidity in politics is epidemic. In each case the claim is made simply to demonize, distance or distract. The socialists, trade unionists, godless heathens and lazy leeches are something different from you and dangerous to you. Or so the ruse goes.
No recent example better embodies the use of stupidity than Rick Tyler, a Gingrich surrogate who sought to defend his candidate’s racist comments by repeating over and over that black people should vote for Republicans because “democrats abort their babies.” Whatever you think of democrats, you’d be hard pressed to give an example of them rounding up black women for abortions. Yet Tyler thought this was a good response to whether Gingrich was pandering to South Carolina racists.
The substantive question – is the candidate racist – is obscured by the ridiculous assertion – democrats murder babies. See how it works?
To some degree, we only have ourselves to blame. During the 1960s we began to believe that every person had value and this later morphed into a willingness to let people believe that their superstitious, wild-assed guess had the same relevance as well-reasoned analysis. And modern journalism – until recently – presented opposing views as equal; even if one was factual and one was entirely made up. Then Ronald Reagan told uneducated people they were actually smarter than college grads. “Intellectually elite” – something every World War II vet hoped his son or daughter would be – became a pejorative.
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