A Pox on Both Your Houses

I'm not sure what's more irritating about this article… the author's glib harping on all the worst stereotypes about Republicans, or the fact that he she was able to find so many confirming instances at the recent college Republican convention.

Comments

[Croesus]

Tommy Grand,

That's why so many become enraptured with Ayn Rand or Karl Marx.

[Steve Skutnik]

Didn't the Washington Post run almost exactly the same article yesterday? And if I recall correctly, they got the details of the "inaudible chant" correct as well - "Karl lies, people die" is what I believe they reported it as.
...and now you see why I won't even sit through an ad for a Salon article.

[Anonymous]

You gotta be pretty weird to be young and go 'hey, I want to be a conservative' leftists may be wrong, but its much more understandable -- the kids getting drunk in their hotel room -- I know I've said a few things I've regretted about politics while drunk...

no way republicans will ever take libertarianism -- more likely on the other side frankly --

SPUR

[Russ D]

This is exactly why my father didn't want me to go to college. On his dime, anyway.

[David Weigel]

Reality check: You can drop into any activist rally, anywhere, and find idiots to quote. For evidence, see some of the stories filed in the Weekly Standard, National Review, and various blogs about the winter's anti-war rallies. They looked for dumb people and they found them. Yawn.

My guess is that Salon won't send Goldberg to a Dean rally to find people who think Bush killed Wellstone. Oh, they're there. But it's more fun for them to find 10 young conservative idiots and say - aha! They're all scum! The movement is dying! Only you, dear Salon readers, have your heads screwed on!

[Kevin Carson]

The phenomenon is Frat Boy Republicanism. My first exposure to it was the studio audience of the Mort Downey show. Limbaugh's studio audience was quite similar.

They'll sit through all kinds of quasi-Burkean shit about a compassionate private social order based on voluntary charity, Christian mores, etc. Through the whole thing, they'll nod their heads and try to look edified after every reference to the "cake of custom" or the "unbought grace of life," waiting for their guru to get back to his real function: ridicule of the outsider. When he finally produces the long-awaited audio abortion or ugly feminist joke, they go wild: "You da man, Rush! Woof! Woof! Woof!"

Reminds me of "Billy Jack." You had to sit through endless lectures about the futility of violence from his spirit animal guide, wondering "how much longer do I have to pretend to be inspired by this pacifist shit before Billy takes off his boots and starts breaking people's necks with his feet?"

[hey]

um where i went to school, the republicans were actually all libertarians... yeah there were a few idiots, but the libertarian club and the college reps had the same membership list

its just that college rep conventions are awesome, well funded, and have hot co-eds

libertarian groups looked like slashdot come to life, and instead of kegs, it was a prisoner marathon

sorry, but i like the country club a lot more

[Citizen]

If it's so easy to do the same at a Dean rally, I entreat you to. It'd be fun and we'd all have a laugh.

[Julian Sanchez]

Hey-
Come to D.C. sometime. There are actually some (gasp!) attractive libertarian women at the happy hours.

[sarah]

College kids involved in politics are behaving like giant faggoty retards? I, for one, am shocked.

[Dan]

David Weigel called it correctly -- Salon went shopping for quotes that would make college Republicans look like idiots, and found them. There's no group you can't do that to, college Libertarians very much included.

A good quote demonstrating the author's state of mind: saying that famous Republicans called the college students "the future of the party of Hoover, Nixon and Reagan." Why do I have a feeling that the author, and not Karl Rove, picked those examples? And why not, oh, Abraham Lincoln (the first Republican President) and Teddy Roosevelt? 🙂

[Citizen]

Ugh, that's the future of the Elephant Party?

And since when did the Ultimate Warrior attempt rational thoughts at all, much less sweeping moral and political exhortations?

[tm]

The intro of the article didn't inspire me to pony up cash, or even watch an ad, but I will take this quiet time to tell a tasteless joke that the article did inspire.
Lee Atwater- there was only one good thing that came out of his head...

[joe]

It's the past, present, and future.

[Chad P.]

The NY Times magazine ran basically the same article about a month ago. It's pretty damning these days when your reporting is inferior to/later than the Times.

[brooke]

I keep waiting for young conservatives to find libertarianism, but when I read articles like that one (and also the "Hipublicans" piece from the NYT magazine, May 26) I start to wish they wouldn't. They're so close, but then they end with things like, "Yeah, but I hate black people."

Is the distinction between being fueled by rancor and being fueled by religion even an important one, or is it just a scary sidenote?

[Tommy_Grand]

Kids are so stupid.

[Rick Barton]

Bush is no conservative, not even close. If Gore over saw the same ballooning in the size of government that has transpired under Bush we all, hopfully including most of the folks at that party, would be outraged. There are good conservative Republicans in congress worth fighting for. Bush isn't worth it.

"Gene McDonald, who sold "No Muslims = No Terrorists" bumper stickers..." This, like all racism is the most primitive form of collectivism. I'm disgusted that this "Gene McDonald" has anything at all to do with the Republicans. I would like to tell him so myself.

The good news: At least Bob Barr was there and warning about the administrations threats to civil liberties.

[John dreyer]

I used to be in the CRs. The Washington Event is a big draw if you are an up and coming star in the both the CRs and the Party. I really do not blame her for her view ofthe CRs based on this one event, the most politican like are drawn to it. On the local level the CR chapter I was in drank heaviliy and helped in doing the important but little noticed grunt work for local canidates. I went to DC for the national convention in ..... '98 I believe. I skipped out on almost all of the convention to see Washington. I DID get my picture taken with Oliver North, which at the time was pretty cool. Ahh the memories.

[Plutarck]

Humans overestimate the homogenity of groups to which they do not belond.

I think that about sums it up. Some people do it unknowingly, and some people manipulate this fact intentionally, just as with all things in human behavior.

The danger of instinct, feeling, and automatic behavior is simply that it is so easy to abuse. Anyone with a rather simple understanding of human behavior and psychology, reasonably good diction (or a good memory), and the will or incentive to do so can abuse such things absolutely to the hilt.

It would seem that particular article is an example of either the former or the latter. I cannot with a sufficient degree of reasonable certainty determine which it may be.

[Kevin Carson]

Shit, I hate Lincoln and TR worse than those other guys.