After reading some of the diaries today, the dichotomy between Bush's "Ownership Society" and the rise of ultra conservativism in this country was something that intrigued me. Society at large seems to be both lazy and idealistic. There is a desire for society to hold values that people on the whole are unwilling to enforce.
I have observed over the past 20 years a near complete abdication of moral responsibility on the part of ourselves and our children. When we find our children acting in questionable ways, we need someone to blame. Obviously it is the Liberals who are at fault, never minding the overly permissive environment in which children are growing up today is wholly of our own invention. We look to the extreme right wing to correct a society whose problems are a reflection of what is wrong with us. Blaming the phantom Liberals is much easier than taking personal responsibility for what we feel is a world out of control.
Making society the scapegoat for our own lack of ability or unwillingness to take the moral high ground on issues facing us today has become a way of life. I would not presume to be the first or even the last voice on moral authority. But far too many individuals fail to meet even their own standards for morality and look to the society that results for fault. It's the age old, "the devil made me do it" argument. We wage war against the devil (liberalism) to avoid personal responsibility. This is a society seeking a means by which to relinquish ownership of itself, giving itself over to the extreme right, who make empty promises of giving them the world they want without a need change or take ownership of the behaviours which generated it.
