It was interesting to read today’s columns by conservative David Brooks and liberal Paul Krugman, because each weighed in on comparisons and contrasts between left and right.
Brooks ponders how today’s teabaggers are similar to the radical left of the sixties: “Both movements are built on the assumption that the people are pure and virtuous and that evil is introduced into society by corrupt elites and rotten authority structures.”
Krugman meanwhile draws a line between congressional Republicans and Democrats based on their differing attitudes toward unemployment compensation and estate taxes. Jim Bunning’s recent tantrum is the point of departure, but Arizona’s own John Kyl is the star of the show. His attitude toward the unemployed—“continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work”—is downright Dickensian.
Each columnist makes some pretty astute observations, but each falls slightly short of the bull's-eye. Maybe if each had read the other’s rough draft they might have seen the common denominator.
Sixties radicals and present-day Democrats share an outward-looking point of view. They were, and are, interested in the betterment of society, in helping their fellow citizens. Teabaggers share with congressional Republicans a more inward-looking (dare I say “selfish”?) outlook: they take taxes as a personal affront and are unwilling, or unable, to look beyond their own self-interest toward the possibility of social justice.
As Krugman puts it, “the difference between the two universes isn’t just intellectual, it’s also moral,” and I don’t think either side would dispute it. Barry Goldwater justified voting against the Civil Rights Act by declaring “You can’t legislate morality,” and there’s a smidgen of truth in that. But aren’t all laws a codification of our worldview? And sometimes it’s not so much a question of morality as compassion – a trait that I seem to recall was linked to conservatism not all that long ago.
For one side, it’s people that matter; for the other, it’s money. And I think we should be grateful to Bunning, Kyl & Co. for making that so crystal clear.
Krugman meanwhile draws a line between congressional Republicans and Democrats based on their differing attitudes toward unemployment compensation and estate taxes. Jim Bunning’s recent tantrum is the point of departure, but Arizona’s own John Kyl is the star of the show. His attitude toward the unemployed—“continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work”—is downright Dickensian.
Each columnist makes some pretty astute observations, but each falls slightly short of the bull's-eye. Maybe if each had read the other’s rough draft they might have seen the common denominator.
Sixties radicals and present-day Democrats share an outward-looking point of view. They were, and are, interested in the betterment of society, in helping their fellow citizens. Teabaggers share with congressional Republicans a more inward-looking (dare I say “selfish”?) outlook: they take taxes as a personal affront and are unwilling, or unable, to look beyond their own self-interest toward the possibility of social justice.
As Krugman puts it, “the difference between the two universes isn’t just intellectual, it’s also moral,” and I don’t think either side would dispute it. Barry Goldwater justified voting against the Civil Rights Act by declaring “You can’t legislate morality,” and there’s a smidgen of truth in that. But aren’t all laws a codification of our worldview? And sometimes it’s not so much a question of morality as compassion – a trait that I seem to recall was linked to conservatism not all that long ago.
For one side, it’s people that matter; for the other, it’s money. And I think we should be grateful to Bunning, Kyl & Co. for making that so crystal clear.
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