This seems a valid assessment on her part. She proved she was not on the far fringe of the Cult of Con-servatism.
Like a few other mildly honest and minimally thoughtful Republicans in 2008, she was forced to admit Sarah Palin was "clearly out of her league".
While this realization is admirable coming from a Republican, it is par for the course for liberals and other Americans who were paying attention.
It’s nice to see she still has at least one eye open to the even more radicalized Republican Party candidates this time around.
Ms. Parker recently wrote a column titled “Trump supporters are inoculated against the truth”.
She writes:
“By now it’s obvious that lecturing Donald Trump supporters about why they shouldn’t vote for him only confirms their convictions.
The challenge for people who fear a Trump presidency even more than others covet it comes down to: How do you convince the inconvincible? How do you persuade the proudly un-persuadable?”
The answer of course is, just as you can’t teach someone what they don’t want to know, “You can’t persuade the proudly un-persuadable”.
If we substitute “Republican” for Trump we reveal the frustration that every sane clear thinking person has with the cult of Con-servatives being fed so many lies and so much anger.
Parker continues:
“This was apparent in Nevada when Trump won rural voters who should have belonged to Ted Cruz, based on the all-important public-lands issue. The federal government owns a whopping 84.9 percent of Nevada’s land. Cruz promised he would return the land to the state; Trump said he wouldn’t.
One insider told me that when Cruz researchers showed rural voters news video of the comments, most rejected the video as doctored. They were inoculated to any truth that ran contrary to their beliefs. Data be damned.”
Exactly. Thank you very much.
Unfortunately she’s still seeing reality with only one open eye. What she’s missing is the entire Republican base is “inoculated to any truth that ran contrary to their beliefs. Data be damned.”
Parker then displays one more piece of valuable insight:
“The irony is that this deep distrust of the establishment and the media is the Republican Party’s own handiwork. Its leaders and operatives have been preaching for decades that the government and journalists can’t be trusted.”
Thank you, again.
She brushes ever so briefly upon the elephant in the room. But alas, this was the only time she mentioned the Republican Party as having something to do with their base being “inoculated to any truth that ran contrary to their beliefs. Data be damned.”
It wasn’t Trump who first poured the far Right kool-ade about Marxist Obama’s birth certificate, death panels, government takeover of health care, climate science denial, liberal media, only liberals are racist, and the thousand other lies necessary to dupe Americans into voting for Republicans.
The lies of Republicans led to trillions of dollars added to the national debt, and the needless deaths of thousands of Americans over certifiable lies about Saddam being allied with al-Qaeda and non-existent “Nukular” aluminum tubes.
Their lies were toxic, with deadly real world consequences. So too will the current batch of lies lead to human tragedy if believed by too many Americans.
And there are still many true believers today that are inoculated to any truth that runs contrary to their beliefs. Data be damned.
Parker concludes:
“The tragedy is that, of all those mentioned here, the most untrustworthy and dishonest is Trump. He undeniably lied a few days ago when he said he didn’t know anything about David Duke in what otherwise would have been the easiest disavowal in political history. In fact, Trump specifically mentioned Duke in a 2000 interview that many have heard by now.”
It doesn’t matter, does it? As I’ve noted too many time to count, “Beliefs trump facts” with the cult of the far Right.
Trump knows this. And so do all the other liars of the far Right,
The lesson of fascism's "Big Lie" has been assimilated completely into the propaganda of the Republican Party.
Ironically, and unfortunately, Kathleen Parker is still inoculated against the truth far more than she realizes.
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5 comments:
Inoculated Against the Truth! This sounds like a great title for Hillary's memoirs. And yet millions of Democrats will continue to vote for the truth-challenged crook for president. So which party's voters are truly oblivious to truth and reality, my friend?
Your summation of Trump and those that support him is absolutely accurate Dave. That said, Trump is about as much of a conservative as Hillary is an honest ...welll ...anything.
TP,
I don’t think Trump voters care about how “conservative” he is. They’ve seen countless self-branded “conservatives” before, and feel betrayed by every one of them in some way or another. Once elected they quickly work for re-election and their donor class with the loudest “free speech”, if you know what I mean.
Trump knows what he is doing, and the truth is irrelevant with him. He fuels xenophobic resentment and anger by the usual blaming and demonizing that has been SOP for the GOP for decades.
I share your disappointment that this election is coming down to Trump and Hillary. This indicates massive failure of governing, and disengagement from the people, from both corporatist parties.
Allow me to offer this:
Trump is about as much of a conservative as Hillary is a liberal progressive. Honesty, or dishonesty, aside, the woman is tied to Wall Street, and she shares the neocon tendencies to react militarily to every situation in the Middle East. There’s nothing liberal or progressive about that.
So which party's voters are truly oblivious to truth and reality?
All evidence points to both parties, my friend. This is why I like the honest Independent.
"So which party's voters are truly oblivious to truth and reality? All evidence points to both parties, my friend. This is why I like the honest Independent."
Agreed, my friend!
I agree with you both.
It's a sad commentary about this country, if in fact it comes down to Clinton and Trump as the oligopoly's favorites. I've mentioned before, and I'll suggest it again, that the next president will be the "closer".
It's the bottom of the ninth for America, and we desperately need someone to step up to the plate and take us into extra innings. American history has always come up with capable people able to bring us through our past national crises and, at least, to the threshold of a new beginning. It happened during our inception as a nation, and again during our national civil war, and once again with the great depression/world war. In each instance, our concept of what we are as a nation was threatened by extinction, but we prevailed. Now we face our fourth major crisis.
It won't be Clinton or Trump who save us. We feel, and know in our hearts, this to be true. Maybe the game's finally coming to an end. Maybe we're heading straight into our national nightmare.
JG, I fear you may be right. Time will soon tell.
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