As I lived through and observed the decade of the Aughts, a decade that will almost certainly go down as one of the worst in American history, I was constantly amazed at the growing inability of conservative Americans to grasp the basic truth of the events that were unfolding around them. I entered that decade as a rock-solid conservative and came out the other side quite more liberal, due mostly to the circumstances of what I saw in that FUBARed decade. As we enter the decade of the teens, it seems that not only has conservative America not faced the harsh realities of recent history, they have eagerly plunged headlong into the embrace of a delusional view of reality.
These are not just minor instances of misunderstanding and analytical missteps, but, rather, a wholesale embrace of cognitive dissonance on a grand scale. They refuse to accept facts and ideas that can be demonstrably shown to be true. The following are by no means an exhaustive listing of all of the areas where the far right, both individually and collectively, choose to live in a fantasy region that denies clear evidence.
- Belief in Evolution
A Gallup poll a few years back showed that among Republicans polled, almost 70% do not believe in biological evolution. In the 2008 Republican presidential debates, three of the Republican candidates for president, Mike Huckabee, Sam Brownback, and Tom Tancredo, all acknowledged that they did not believe in evolution. These are candidates for the highest office in our country and they do not believe in something that is (and has been for a long time) a settled fact among science with multiple, converging lines of evidence to support it.
- Global Warming
Yet another area where conservatives refuse to even acknowledge the overwhelming factual evidence is in the area of global warming. The average temperature of the planet has risen dramatically past the historical levels of the past 650,000 years, and there is pretty solid evidence that it is man-made. There is no doubt or ambiguity among the major, worldwide scientific organizations on this point. It has been measured through a variety of ways. This past summer was the hottest on record and the past decade was also the hottest on record. How many times do you have to get hit in the head with a hammer before you figure out someone is swinging a hammer at your head?
- General Scientific and Academic Distrust
The first two examples demonstrate an overall distrust of science and academia from conservatives that has been fostered by the talking heads on the Right. When one lives in a worldview that is resistant to cold, hard facts, then one has to attack those institutions where facts play an important role in constructing one's worldview. For instance, Glenn Beck, famously said, "There are a lot of universities that are as dangerous with the indoctrination of the children as terrorists are in Iran or North Korea. ... We have been setting up reeducation camps. We call them universities." According to another right-wing pundit, Rush Limbaugh, "The four corners of deceit: government, academia, science and media. Those institutions are now corrupt and exist by virtue of deceit. That's how they promulgate themselves; it is how they prosper." This would be laughable--especially considering that these quotes come from two individuals who don't have a complete college degree between the two of them--if it weren't having such an influence on a large section of the American population. Nature, one of the premier scientific journals, recently published an editorial on the alarming rise in anti-scientific attitudes among those on the Right. It's no coincidence that the leaders of this movement foster a distrust in learning, education, and academic inquiry and that the followers then adopt all manner of positions which have no support in verifiable reality and try to claim that it's all due to a vast, liberal conspiracy.
- Immigration Chicken-Littlery
Far-right conservatives seem to be in a complete tizzy these days over the issue of illegal immigration, and, if you listen to their hype, you would think that our country is on the verge of being ransacked by illegal, migrant thugs and ne'er do wells who are intent on sucking up every last government subsidy while raping, pillaging, and murdering our citizens. Of course, as is the case with this group, the actual truth of the matter couldn't be further from their delusion-based reality. Illegal immigration has actually declined over the last half decade. Violent crime along the border is at all-time lows. If you live in San Diego, CA, Phoenix, AZ, El Paso, TX, or Austin, TX, you live in one of the safest cities in the U.S. I live in one of those cities, El Paso, which has a population of almost 900,000, and at this point in the year we have had three homicides in our city. Those of us here on the border are handling immigration perfectly okay, thank you very much, and we don't need the help of fact-free, right-wingers (from other parts of the country, no less) telling us how to run our cities.
- Obama's Birthplace
An August 2010 CNN poll showed that 41% of Republicans believed that President Obama was either probably or definitely born in another country. 41% is an enormous amount of believers in something that has been refuted by almost every reputable authority available. The Hawaiian State Director of Health has issued a statement verifying that Obama's birth certificate is on file in the state office. And to top it off, both Hawaiian newspapers, the Honolulu Advertiser and the Star Bulletin, ran birth announcements for Barack Obama's birth in August of 1961. Need I say more.
- "Christian" America
Sarah Palin has been on the stump recently suggesting that America is a "Christian" nation that apparently should be governing from Biblical mandate. Even a cursory glance at the beliefs of our Founders and the documents they created to govern our nation should convince anyone that this nation was not intended to be based in Christianity or any other religion for that matter. God is never mentioned once in the Constitution. Seems like a significant oversight for a country that is supposed to be founded on the Christian religion. Article VI, paragraph 3 contains the "No Religious Test" clause of the Constitution that states that we will not give religious tests "as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." Again, a big slip for people who expected our nation to be governed by "Christian" leaders. I mean, wouldn't a clause like that allow in leaders who might be Muslim, or Hindu, or, God forbid, atheist? Let's let Thomas Jefferson answer that:
"[When] the [Virginia] bill for establishing religious freedom... was finally passed,... a singular proposition proved that its protection of opinion was meant to be universal. Where the preamble declares that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the word 'Jesus Christ,' so that it should read 'a departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion.' The insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend within the mantle of its protection the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and [Muslim], the [Hindu] and infidel of every denomination."
Notice, he said that religious freedom was meant to be "universal" and the committee rejected inserting the words "Jesus Christ" into the legislation so that all religions would be welcomed within the "mantle of its protection." He even explicitly states the other religions just so there's no ambiguity. Again, sort of odd for a group of people who intended for the nation to be explicitly "Christian." If there's any doubt left on this issue, let's look at the wording of the Treaty of Tripoliauthored and signed under John Adams's presidency after the outbreak of hostilities between the U.S. and the Islamic nations of the Barbary Coast:
"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of [Muslims],—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any [Islamic] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."
For men who supposedly founded our nation to be a "Christian" one, they really seemed to go out of their way to give the impression that that was not the case. Don't you think they could have included provisions in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights that would have clarified that this country is supposed to be Christian if that's what they had intended?
These are just a few of the factually-verifiable falsehoods that a significant portion of those on the Right believe and advocate. While I could continue making a list of these as long as my leg, I will let these suffice. And this doesn't even include the numerous statements and positions by individual conservatives that defy belief. Take, for instance, Mississippi governor Haley Barbour's assertion that he attended a racially integrated high school and college in Mississippi during the mid-60s, and that Southern segregation was already a thing of the past by that time. Really, governor?! The Supreme Court had to order Mississippi to desegregate their schools in 1969 and it didn't actually take place until 1970. I grew up in Mississippi, and I still recall even as a small child in the early '70s going to the old town theater on the town square to watch movies. At that time, African-Americans still sat in the balcony area while whites sat on the ground floor level. So the idea that Mississippi integration was a thing of the past already in the mid-60s is either a complete fabrication on Barbour's part or a severe delusion. This denial of reality in the face of facts seems to be part and parcel of the far-right, conservative worldview and, in this case, comes from a major leader of the party who has a likely chance as the party's presidential nominee in the future.
Now, on the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, it seems that fear, prejudice, and/or bigotry seem to be blinding a large portion of the American right to an acceptance of basic facts. I know that some will respond that not all conservatives and Republicans are Limbaugh and Beck shills or ignore the facts on a great portion of the issues. There are the Lincoln Chafees, Colin Powells, and Chuck Hagels out there who still conform to some modicum of rational thought and if you fall into that category, this article is not directed at you. But a frighteningly large group of conservatives do not want to engage at any rational level, and that group seems, at least from my armchair, to be gaining a significant amount of control over the conservative movement as a whole. If that is the case, I fear for what lies ahead in our country. I fear that unthinking radicals, who know what they believe (facts be damned), will be less tolerant to positions that they disagree with. I fear that these same radicals will be less willing to sit down, reason, and compromise on issues that are crucial for our country's well being right now. I fear that these radicals have no intent to anaylze facts and reach conclusions that are based therein. I fear that these radicals will only be intent on resorting to the last refuge of irrational thought which is to intimidate and bully those with which they disagree. I fear that they will, if they gain power, ultimately use that power to do exactly what the radical terrorists of Al Qaeda wanted to accomplish when they attacked us on 9/11, to bring down the liberal, democratic principles that our country was founded upon and turn this country into totalitarian state that no longer provides a beacon of hope and liberty to the rest of the world, but, instead, shows forth the utter, abysmal failure of the democratic experiment.