In 2013 Frank Furedi complained about “self-styled intellectuals, especially the ones who refer to themselves as ‘liberal',... [pathologizing] their opponents as a mentally and intellectually inferior political species.” I replied to his complaint by writing: “...it is not the ignorance displayed by the likes of Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, and Louis Gohmert that inspires our scornful laughter as much as it is the smug self-righteousness with which they display that ignorance as if it were a virtue. ”
Now we have Donald Trump who tells so many very obvious lies so frequently that it is often difficult to tell when he is insulting our intelligence with another of those lies or merely indulging in an unnecessary display of his own ignorance.
The latest flap over President Trump's ignorant statements came about when Trump “...mused in an interview that the Civil War could have been avoided if only Andrew Jackson had been around to stop it.” As the New York Times pointed out, “Mr.Trump’s comments among several he made about Jackson in an interview broadcast Monday on satellite radio, quickly drew condemnation from his critics and from historians who said they appeared to show the president profoundly misunderstanding American history.”
Ah but historians are intellectuals, and as Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann et al have demonstrated, much to the chagrin of we who think facts matter, a very large part of the electorate is anti-intellectual and unaffected or oblivious to such falsehoods. Furthermore, those voters who are not concerned about the ignorance are far too inclined to shrug off the falsehoods on the grounds that we are all fallible and ignorant about something! I guess it does not occur to those anti-intellectuals that displaying your ignorance by commenting on things you know nothing about is not a bright thing to do or that it will cause others to question your judgment.
All right, I suppose a certain tolerance of ignorance is understandable, particularly for people who feel like they do not have the time to stay informed or to study the things they do not understand. But why are the Trump chumps not offended by falsehoods that are stated in a deliberate effort to deceive them? Why is probity of so little concern to them? Are they so desirous of a strong man who will relieve them of the responsibility of making informed decisions that they will embrace the “alternate facts” of a despot?
A very charitable interpretation of Trump's insistence that preconditions will not cause a denial of coverage under the latest Republican health care bill is that he does not know what the bill actually contains. Unfortunately Trump's minions are repeating the falsehood knowing full well that people with preconditions will be denied coverage in many states because the Republican health care bill lets the states decide that. This means that many Trump chumps will get screwed by the replacement to Obama care, and they will probably blame their congressmen for that rather than Trump! I guess the legal concept of “knew or should have known” does not pertain to a President who creates his own fact free zone!
Now I have to admit that this has become a rant on my part. I am sorry but I cannot help it. The insanity of it all is just too damn frustrating! So consider this my primal scream. It is not something the fact deniers will understand but it is about as basic as I can get.