I can’t help but notice that even among the progressives in our culture, there is an awful lot of myopia and tunnel vision going on. I think that’s unfortunate.
We invented blinders specifically to induce tunnel vision, as it is sometimes useful to limit the vision of draft animals to the path immediately ahead. People are different though. While it is sometimes of value to narrow our focus, it is important that we maintain an awareness of the broader view. Bad things happen when we fail to keep the big picture in mind.
Democratic Senators who voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq, out of fear that not doing so would make them appear to be weak on national security, should by now have learned a valuable lesson about the danger of acting out of a too limited point of view. When you reduce a complex reality to its simplest terms, you had better be damned sure to get those terms right.
(more below the fold...)
I’ve received a lot of criticism lately by a loud and sometimes obnoxious minority here at dkos. I’ve been accused of being an intellectual lightweight, of not thinking my positions through, of being overly emotional, and of resorting to visual communication (gasp!).
I may not be dripping with intellectual snobbery (like many of my critics) but I am a thoughtful, intelligent person who fully respects genuine intellectual achievement and honest intellectual discourse. And while I may not be a towering genius, I’m no dummy, and the same cannot be said of many of those who hurl their haughty invective my way.
As for not thinking through my positions, I don’t deny having the odd half-baked idea, but they are in the minority I would argue. And speaking of half-baked ideas and not thinking things through, many of those who so accuse me are the same ones who think it would be best to let Bushco off the hook for their abominable crimes for base political reasons. That’s actually pretty damned funny...once you’ve thought it through.
As for emotion, since when have human beings not been emotional creatures? And what is this disdain that some have developed for anything that relates to our emotions? To me that is reminiscent of the male chauvinists who for so long dismissed women as ‘emotional’ creatures, as if that meant they were worthless or inferior. To me human emotion is sublime and an endearing aspect of our being, not something worthy of ridicule and disdain.
Which brings us to visual communication. It is my view that people are predominantly visually oriented creatures, and there is plenty of science to back that up. It only stands to reason. If you can see, your primary way of perceiving and interacting with the world is visual. That’s why visual communication is so damned effective - and so damned powerful. So after thinking this particular criticism though, and while it is unlike me to pat myself on the back, the only conclusion I can come to is that for some petty-minded few who are entirely incapable of communicating visually, it must provoke something akin to envy, jealousy, or just plain old resentment when somebody is so damned good at it. :-)
A lot of the criticism I’ve received is because of my adamant view that we have a solemn duty to bring the Bushco criminals to justice. Despite the overwhelming number of people who agree with me (75% in my poll and 95% in two buhdydharma polls), those who don’t have been a veritable tempest in a teapot. Ironically, these are many of the same folks who accuse me of not thinking things through and of being an intellectual lightweight.
These geniuses have engaged in such pseudo-intellectual hyperventilation and mental masturbatory contortions as to have justified (to themselves at least) the outrageous notion that there is anything redeeming in the idea that we should just forget the crimes against humanity that have been perpetrated in all of our names and allow Bush and company to remain in power for another two years, and then walk away scot-free.
Kos has even stated that it should be sufficient that Bush will go down in history as the worst President ever. With all due respect kos, that is mighty cold comfort to those who have been tortured, bombed, maimed, raped, or had loved ones sacrificed or murdered because of Bush and his gang of bloodthirsty thugs. And while you find my anger tiresome, I see it as the only appropriate response to the vicious mugging and brutal rape of our country, our countrymen, and a goodly portion of the rest of the world.
The main premise of the anti-impeachment argument it seems is that it would hurt our chances of having a Democrat elected President in ’08. I don’t believe that for a minute. I believe it would guarantee it. The Repubs would turn on Bush as the evidence mounted just as they did on Nixon, and people who have never voted would come pouring out of the woodworks to thank us for ending the madness. But if we don’t end it, we will be perpetuating it. If we set the precedent that a President can get away with such madness, buckle your seatbelts boys and girls; we’re going to be in for one hell of a ride.
There is a certain self-proclaimed lawyer around these parts (he may or may not be a lawyer, I don’t care) who trolls all of my diaries, constantly gives me grief, and shames anyone who dares to recommend my work. He is brimming over with self-importance and claims to have a PhD in a leading pseudo-science, and judging by his commentary, is himself a pseudo-intellectual of the highest order. He’s big on the ‘it would be utter foolishness to impeach Bush and Cheney’ bandwagon, such as it is. He incessantly berates me for being an anti-intellectual and for knowing nothing about politics or the law. He is an overbearing, pompous ass who has apparently been marinating in his own hubris for decades, and he seems to think he’s the only person on earth who knows any damned thing. I can only shake my head and wonder how he ever got such a fat head so far up such an inconvenient orifice. It is his considered opinion that only an ignorant dolt like me could possibly think impeachment is a good idea.
If it makes you feel big to spit on me, go right ahead. Don’t take it from a fool like me that impeachment is a good idea, take it from former congresswoman, former Brooklyn district attorney, former member of the House Judiciary Committee who helped draft articles of impeachment against Nixon in 1974, Elizabeth Holtzman, author of The Impeachment of George W. Bush: A Practical Guide for Concerned Citizens.
President Bush should be impeached because he has committed high crimes and misdemeanors, as set forth in our Constitution, and because his abuses of power are so serious, and so subvert our democracy and so threaten it, that action has to be taken to preserve our democracy and hand it down to future generations intact.
Source
She seems to agree pretty strongly with me, and her credentials are pretty solid, though she may not be a big enough intellectual snob for some of you.
History is calling us to do our duty, and as Jerome in Paris points out, the whole world is watching.
So for those of you who would give Bushco a pass, let me suggest that this may be one that you have just not thought through.