"Don't tell me words don't matter"

The current political environment to me seems to have begun after the 2000 election. It has gotten progressively worse with the rise of the Progressive's panic.

That panic is based on the fact that they do not always get their way. Unfortunately they get their way far more than is sustainable for a stable society. Notice how I threw in one of their favorite terms there.

As this millennium has unfolded I find it is increasingly more difficult to discern what I see and hear with any form of common sense.

I know the reason for this. The reason is that the beliefs and values that I learned and believe in are not the bedrock values of my political opposition.

Today's political and societal dysfunction is nothing less than two opposing camps not only seeking a different destination but attempting to reach their destinations using two completely different maps.

One of those contradictory maps is language.

In a 2008 response to Hillary Clinton's criticism of his campaign being built on "just words"  Barack Obama replied with the instantly legendary  "Don't tell me words don't matter" speech.

The fact that the line and the gist of the speech were a rip-off of another black politician, Deval Patrick were pretty much overlooked in the quest to make Obama president by the media and for the media Amen.

 But the line is true, words do matter.

When words or phrases have no meaning or distorted meaning, sincere and honest dialogue and debate are difficult if not impossible.

I recently had an interesting conversation on Twitter with a young progressive woman about abortion. It was very civil discussion right up to the point where she determined that I was not worthy of future debate since I was "a man."  God forbid.

What set her off was when I asked the very simple question,"did you love your child before she was born?" Her response was that "they bonded after birth" and that I was being too "personal."

I did not respond with my belief that murdering the unborn is personal to me. Instead I asked
what pretty much ended the conversation, "did you name your daughter before she was born?"

Progressives especially politicians appeal to people's emotions to garner support for their ideals. Often times the words are just a superficial icing meant to sweeten what is non existent or illogical substance below the surface. After the sugar rush of eating the icing you are left with nothing but the rotten reality of the core ideals.

Progressivism  is like a dish of whipped cream covered rotten strawberries. Kind of like Obamacare.

Another example of this is in the current never ending debate over "gun control." Not being a "gun person" in some ways is like being "a man" in the abortion debate. It allows me the opportunity to sort of look at things a bit more dispassionately than people who are directly affected by the issue.

I think they call that objectivity, but that is one of those "values" not in vogue these days.

The term that gets me in the gun debate is "assault weapon".

Aren't all weapons assault weapons?

weap·on
ˈwepən/
noun
a thing designed or used for inflicting bodily harm or physical damage.

And here is the truly crazy thing about the term, almost anything can and has been used as a weapon. Pick something, nearly anything, and you will find that at some point someone has assaulted someone else using it.

A toothbrush, a chair, a shoe, a pan, a TV, a picture, a rug, a lamp, a book, hell I used to get into trouble for throwing my dirty socks at my sisters.

Which brings us back to the truth. It is not the weapon, it is the assault. Assault is an act not an object. Just as a fetus is a living child not a medical condition.

The sad fact is that abortion is a premeditated assault while an AR-15 is an inanimate object with no conscious power on its own.

This should not even be debatable. This is reality having nothing to do with politics or religion, it is truth.

When truth ceases to be a standard for political debate then where do you go?

In the years leading up to the Civil War proponents of slavery created their own truth. They determined that "nigras" were not eligible to be treated equal, less alone free citizens because they were not intellectually or morally capable of living in society.

Of course this is not true, we know that. Many of those who espoused that doctrine then knew it was not true then. But as the Philosopher Karl Popper observed,

"No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude."

Like the young woman on Twitter, when you are on the irrational side of an argument, your only defense is to take to the offense, usually by being offensive.

To end, what is already too long a diatribe, I can only say I am not offended by the lack of common sense by those on the left. I am however greatly concerned for the future of my country should their distortion of words replace critical thinking as a basis for policy.

My one big hope is actually based in objective reality. Although a cultural war can be won without guns, for a time. It cannot be won without baring children to carry it forward. The progressive left have planted their own seeds to their own destruction.

Murdering your offspring is not productive to a lasting movement, while baring arms wins most arguments.