After you drink the Kool Aid

October 9, 2006

TNR’s Christopher Orr had an interesting observation today in response to Byron York’s WaPo piece yesterday about the right and the Mark Foley scandal. As York explained, there’s a conservative faction, which York described as the “smell a rat” camp, which actually and inexplicably believes that Dems were involved in the Foley revelations two weeks ago.

As York put it, “Although they didn’t have any solid evidence, some Republicans suspected that Democrats were behind it. The speaker was among them.” Über-activist Paul Weyrich told York, “Hastert believes that with everything in him.” It led Orr to ask:

Can Republicans really have dug so deep into their spider hole of paranoia and entitlement that they can’t even imagine having done anything wrong without it somehow being the fault of Democrats? Or has their own experience in hyping fabricated scandals (see Swift Boats, etc.) led them to believe there’s no other kind?

I’ve long wondered the exact same thing.

Part of me can appreciate obviously, demonstrably dishonest talking points. Conservatives are stuck with a bad set of facts; they can’t just accept defeat; so they come up with a ridiculous defense that lashes out at Democrats with evidence that exists only in their vivid imaginations. In a twisted honor-among-thieves dynamic, the political world accepts and understands blatant defensive lying, because, when presented with no options, it’s what p.r. flacks have to do.

Indeed, everyone tacitly acknowledges that it’s part of the game. A press secretary for a House Dem might run into a counterpart for a House Republican at Union Station, tempted to ask why the GOP issued a blatantly dishonest press release about a given issue. But there’s no point — the Republican press secretary knows it was a lie; the Dem knows it was a lie; the reporters who received it knows it was a lie.

The real trouble begins when ideologues start believing the lies.

It’s one of the things about political discourse with the far-right that I find most frustrating. Ever since I started reading dozens of conservative blogs for one of my other gigs, I’ve been amazed at the extent to which many far-right leaders and observers will “drink the Kool Aid.” The powers that be create dishonest talking points, and instead of just repeating them as part of the DC game, these guys actually embrace them and accept them as practical Gospel.

Indeed, on any given day, peruse some of the more strident right-wing blogs. You’ll find the most hysterical rants about how Dems really do believe the United States should surrender to al Qaeda. We really do actively want illegal immigration to destroy the country. We really do hate capitalism, love treason, and admire terrorists. Read this post, for example. It’s clearly an unhinged rant with no real connection to reality, but read it with a detached perspective — you’ll notice that this isn’t just a Fox-News-like regurgitation of propaganda; it’s an enthusiastic belief that the left is truly evil, based on little more than nonsense.

The right is equally quick to believe the inverse, too. Bush really is saving civilization by “staying the course” in Iraq. All of the nation’s ails really are Clinton’s fault. Torture really is vital to the defense of liberty. And when it comes to Foley, there really is a conspiracy involving Dems, the media, Soros, and gays.

Honestly, I’d feel a lot more comfortable if these guys were lying. It would suggest that they’re morally bankrupt, but at least in touch with reality. The fact that they’re so far gone as to believe their ridiculous talking points is perhaps the most frightening aspect of contemporary conservative thought. It suggests reason simply no longer matters.

Part of me can appreciate obviously, demonstrably dishonest talking points.

Mark Foley (D-Fl)

Sheer genius.

  • The Righties are failing the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. It’s supposed to OPEN your mind.

    Even if the Dems could pull off this Foley “scam”, what would it say about Repubs abilities?

  • What happened to the MSM just not repeating the obvious lies.

    Or at least:

    “Dennis Hastert, Speaker of the House, again today without any real proof, claimed that the release of Internet Messages showing the depravity of Representative Mark Foley, Republican of Florida’s 16th District and the man Speaker Hastert chose to lead the caucus on protecting children from sexual predators, was a conspiracy of the certain Democratic operatives funded by millionaire George Soros timed to do the most harm to the Republicans in the 2006 midterm elections and especially to deny America his services as Speaker of the House in this critical time during the War on Terror. When asked for evidence supporting his claims, Speaker Hastert’s office said ‘What, don’t you just believe us?'”

  • “Even if the Dems could pull off this Foley “scam”, what would it say about Repubs abilities?” – Dale

    What would it say about the Democrats? That they finally decided that saving the Constitutional order in this country is worth getting their hands dirty?

  • Now imagine if the Internet had been around during the Civil Rights movement. Gag.

    Such is the wonder and the horror of the Internet. Any dickhead can use it and any dickhead can agree with whatever the first dickhead has said. There aren’t more of these people, they’re just harder to avoid. But on the whole I think its a good thing:

    1. If Joe Shmoe starts a website about how gay people are causing the downfall of civilization and he’s stupid enough to post his photo, if I should see Mr. Schmoe on the street, I know to give him the finger. Possibly in the eye.

    2. Let’s say a young person begins a blog that is offensive to all rational people. It is so obnoxios it becomes famous (think Ann Coulter). But then that young person grows up decides to run for office. The blog can be used to kill his career before it starts.

    It’s the equivalent of a Klan rally, only everyone has forgotten their sheets.

  • “‘Hastert believes that with everything in him.'”?
    Wow! Judging from the size of him, that’s an awful lot!

  • Congratulations, CB–you now have a real-world example of “doublethink.” Orwell wasn’t just making the shit up.

    It would really be interesting to know what sort of conditioning it took to get a person to the point where he/she can not only block out reality but accept talking points that contradict themselves every five seconds or are incoherent on their face. Who are the people who have drunk the kool-aid (apart from those who benefit financially and politically)? Who were the agents of their brainwashing? Why were they never exposed to competing points of view?

  • It’s hard for them to believe that there’s no conspiracy because this is how they would have run this. They believe Dem’s did it because it’s what they would have done. They know of, nor can they conceive of any other way….

  • Oh yeah, a classy response to the “Democrats are behind Foleygate” conspiracy theory that seems to be gaining ground in the House:

    “If there’s any evidence that you need that the values in Washington have turned upside down, you could just hear what Jack had to say. Only in Washington, D.C., can you take a group of people in charge of the House and basically have evidence that they’ve been looking the other way while a predator has been . . . going after 15- and 16-year-old pages, [and] they somehow . . . have the audacity to turn that into a political attack against Democrats.”

    [Rep. M. Meehan D-Mass in reply to Rep. J. Kingston R-GA]

    Yep, just keep dropping it back in the GOPs lap. The fringe loons can quack all they want. Rational people find this sort of thing repulsive.

  • I think fundamentalist religion bears a lot of the blame for converting people to dream-up-your-own reality. Once a person has swallowed Genesis as a literally true historical document, they can believe just about anything they want.

    “It’s the equivalent of a Klan rally, only everyone has forgotten their sheets.” That was wonderfully stated. If George Bush and George Felix Allen had had MySpace pages in high school and blogged while they were in college, they would not now be holding office.

  • The correct answer is:

    “So what if we did? You had the same information to start with that you claim we had. You had the ability to throw Foley out of the House, we didn’t. You had an opportunity to run another candidate instead of Foley and you begged him to run. If we have timed the release of additional internet messages which were in the hand of Republican ex-pages to ensure that Foley resigned due to the impending election, than in fact we protected children in the only way we could, and demonstrably when neither the Republican House Leadership or the FBI cared to.

    Democrats both good and competent. Republicans both bad and incompetent.

    End of story.”

  • This is the dark side of faith and optimism.

    There was a famous psychological study of competancy that showed folks who were incompetent refused to question themselves thus not able to correct their incompetence. One of the reasons why was these folks refused to believe that they could be wrong (even though the results showed otherwise.)

    They can’t question themselves as even the mere thought of questioning or doubt would bring their stupid world view collapsing like a house of cards because their mental toughness (if they have it) is brittle. In order to continue protect their brittle mental states they have to invent and believe using faith and optimism. And this is how we get to “Dems did it.”

  • When the Foley scandal hit, I was wondering when the Republicans would start blaming the whole thing on Democrats. It didn’t take the boneheads very long. They are so predictable.

  • Keep it even simpler.
    Hastert and the rest of them welcomed Foley into their party for years after they knew he had a ‘page problem’. They are the ones who had to the chance to kick the jerk out years ago.

  • Heh, notice that “Dr. Sanity” screed you linked to has disabled comments. If you’re not with us, you’re against us, I suppose.

  • Anything to avoid accepting responsibility. In another time and place they would have blamed it on the Jews.

  • Never quite clear on the point of the “Kool-aid” metaphor. Recall that the original folks who drank the Kool-aid, they; died.

  • Krugman has an editorial in the NYT titled, “The Paranoid Style,” that attempts to explain some of the right’s behavior based on how it thinks. I’ve long thought that conservatives are incapable of dealing with the vagaries of the modern world. The more they try to overlay their simplistic thinking upon the world the less it fits, making them paranoid, angry, irrational, delusional and increasingly determined to make it fit. So, we have an escalating maddness among a good portion of the population that isn’t going to go away even if the Dems take over all three branches of govt by 2008.

  • If it’s not bad enough that they actually believe those lies, there’s the strong possibilty they’ll decide to act should the Democrats win control of Congress and the White House. Terry Nichols, Timothy McVeigh, Eric Rudolph and the Montana Freemen were kooks who acted on conservative anti-government, anti-Democratic rhetoric. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a number of “conservative” groups just biding their time before they pull off the next domestic terrorist attack.

  • Yes indeed, this reminds me of a little piece of dog excrement I’ve been trying to scrape off my shoe for the past four years, a looney playground bully, 48-going-on-12-since-he-was-10, who constantly uses the term “demonrats” to describe us. What I find constantly amazing with this drooler is that every time he comes up with a new campaign to “ruin” me and my reputation, it rebounds on him, covers him with the mud he threw at me, turns him into an even bigger public laughing stock than he already is, and yet he continues.

    His most recent trick this past week, after hearing I had been given an early diagnosis of prostate cancer, was to spend what had to be a couple hours in PhotoShop, making a “photograph” of my gravestone” “Thomas M. Cleaver – Dead At Last!” and then putting a link to it in posts he made at several different internet discussion groups – the end result was that people (even those who are not fans or friends) were so offended by this that the people who control those discussion boards banned him and blocked his further participation, and he was publicly denounced by several people who are actual opponents of me.

    However, I have learned that while he will now slink off back to the swamp to crawl back under the rock where he exists (“live” would be too high on the scale for him), that there will be sometime in the future, about the time I have the thought “gee, maybe he’s gone for good this time,” that he will reappear. It’s down to knowing that – like a monster in one of the screenplays I’ve written – the only way he’ll really be gone is when someone drives a stake through his heart.

    The operative word when thinking of this guy is that he gives a new and entirely original definition to the term “pathetic.” And “pathetic” is the word that best describes the rest of these stewballs. They really are a lower form of life.

  • I checked out your Dr. Sanity link. The girl sure does carry on, I have to say that for her. I also read her article on the Intellectual and Moral Bankruptcy of the Left. What’s incredible to me, and her rantings are a classic example of it, are how so many wingnuts ascribe so many of their own shortcomings to their political opponents. I swear, sometimes it seems like they’re holding up a mirror. Anti-intellectualism a fault of the left? Please! It’s like Bush’s up is down Healthy Forests and Clear Skies initiatives, a black is white view of reality that has wingnuts doing such absurd projection as to make one’s head swim. You cannot talk to these people—and that’s the sad thing about today’s political climate. I agree wholeheartedly with N. Wells in #11: fundie religion has a lot to do with it. Once you willfully abandon reason and logic, then the sky’s the limit.

  • CB, I was with you to a point, but here is where I got stuck:

    “But there’s no point — the Republican press secretary knows it was a lie; the Dem knows it was a lie; the reporters who received it knows it was a lie.

    The real trouble begins when ideologues start believing the lies.”

    For me, the real trouble begins when the “reporters who. . . knows it was a lie” nonetheless files a story that gets past the editor and the MSM newspaper runs the story as if it were true. For John and Jane Public, who have busy lives and read the morning news before heading out to a busy day, this is now the truth. Even though everyone inside this Beltway daisy chain knows it to be a lie.

    This is a huge problem which we know happens. The basic source material that has long provided a common nucleaus of facts to the electorate has now been so tarnished that it serves little or no purpose. That has immeasurable consequences for a democracy based on an informed citizenry.

  • This is a clear case of projection. The corrupt and amoral feeling imaginary bugs crawling all over them, sure the enemy will do to them what they’ve been doing. But the Dems are too innocent (read that as dumb) to pull off any concerted attack as evidenced by their fecklessness lo these many years. Imagine their surprise when the Rethugs do it again come election time and Diebold themselves into retaining power. Yes, they will do ANYTHING, including rig our elections to stay in power. And the Dems will look on in wide-eyed wonder and contemplate moving farther to the right.

  • I can believe the religion angle to it: one of my students interned at the Cato Institute and was astounded at how much religion pervaded everything. All the prayers and prayer meetings. I do agree that a person who can accept the Bible as truth is prepared to accept anything, so religion seems very plausible.

    But I’m skeptical that this can account for the brainwashing of the Inner Party. The GOP puts on the airs of wanting a theocracy, but we know better. The theocracy serves the GOP, not the other way around. The GOP exists solely for the sake of power, as CB noted elsewhere–I have a hunch that this in itself is sufficient to account for the doublethink. After all, O’Brien in 1984 was areligious. But he loved power, and was highly disciplined about doing what was needed to keep it. Maybe the desire for power creates its own mentality?

  • Maybe the desire for power creates its own mentality?

    To paraphrase an old statement about art, the Republicans use blogs/newspaper punditry/TV appearances not as a mirror to reflect reality, but as a hammer to shape it.

    Whether it’s true is irrelevant. If it helps the “team,” they’ll say it.

  • Just wait until it gets revealed that the Democrats used their secret time-travel technology to send an operative back in time to molest Foley as a child, and program him to get elected to Congress and chase pages. I’m sure they used the same technology to go back in time and implant the memories of all those people who remember revealing Foley’s problem to the leadership years ago. It would be just like the Democrats to only use time travel for making Republicans look bad and not to defend our country.

    I think, if you’re going to give up on any semblance of reality, the least you ought to do is be creative.

  • ***Read this post, for example.***

    Oh, you are so lucky I wasn’t drinking anything when I clicked that link, CB. So-oooooooooooooo lucky. All it took was one look at the mugshot of that Santy “thing”—and I started thinking to myself—“blast it all, there really IS a Hell, and YOU told me to go there.”

    rofl….

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