H. L. Mencken apparently never quite said that “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.” He said lots of similar things, however, and I like to think he would have been proud of being the sort of chap to whom people attributed such astringent mots.
He would also, I feel sure, regard the theater surrounding the Kamala Harris-Tim Walz campaign as a test case of the proposition.
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The left’s fondness for autocratic regimes is well chronicled. Seminal works such as Friedrich Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” (and a briefer indictment, “The Intellectuals and Socialism”) analyzed totalitarianism’s appeal to Western elites, while George Orwell’s “1984” captured the dystopian reality of the mass surveillance state.
Yet despite these (and numerous other) compelling indictments, the progressive movement’s fascination with central control has been an undeniable calling card for generations. Simply put, our academic, political, entertainment and cultural leadership regularly falls in love with the latest iteration of socialism — Soviet gulags, Cambodian killing fields, Cuban prisons and Chinese reeducation camps notwithstanding. A common refrain: the next autocratic regime’s assault on personal freedom will be more benign … just trust us.
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Los Angeles-based psychiatrist Dr. Mark McDonald said “America’s schools are broken” beyond repair and have now become “dangerous” centers of leftist indoctrination – a problem parents must solve by changing their lifestyles, if necessary, to save their children.
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It is hard to know which is more frightening: the Australian radicalism about COVID-19, the Austrian effort to coerce its citizens, or the attitudes of American Democrats who regard extreme sanctions as reasonable behavior toward the supposedly bad people who don’t get vaccinated or wear masks.
Let’s consider each one.
In Australia, the government felt so threatened by the best tennis player in the world that it intervened decisively to block him from entering the country and competing in the Australian Open.
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The red state/blue state dichotomy is not simple.
Nowhere is that more apparent than Tennessee where—despite having one of the most conservative electorates in the country—the leadership has been passive at best in responding to the wishes of their supporters during these days of great crisis.
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