Right-Of-Center Bloggers Select Their Favorite Columnists - Right Wing News (Conservative News and Views)
What has softened the skulls of the Right Wing of late? Is it that they are expected to follow their fuhrers where'er they may lead, and in the process have, themselves, had to slow their cerebrations to a point where fossilized cryptonazis in the bright autumn of their senescence, boys like Rich Lowry, or anyone named Limbaugh suffice as thought leading?
Thanks to the Right Wing News for sharing the embarrassing results of their very scientific study (shown on the other side of this link.)
Give the list a serious pondering, and ask yourself if you envision yourself as someone who would be impressed by such folk as listed there. And should the answer be a resounding "yea"...you may want to redouble your efforts at trying to understand why you never saw reasons to finish high school, or pay attention in college, were you one of the lucky ones.
Oh sure, there are one or two in the favorite columnist list who actually do think thoughts. Hitch and Brooks come to mind. But Coulter, David Limbaugh, Michael Barone?
Thoughts don't convey any better when yelled, and yet yelling seems to be a favorite mode of speech among the more famous voices of the Reich. What is so wrong with speaking in modulated tones, like they do on NPR, PBS, BBC, or other non-Rightwing sources of information. And what is wrong with information? What is so great about hearing Purchased Opinion day in and day out? If opinion is your gig, why not shoot for unpaid opinion? How do you know paid-for opinion is not just PR? Would Rush Limbaugh give a fair assessment of Gutter Helmet? What are the down sides of this unusual sartorial accessory, and would a good haberdasher recommend wearing one? Certainly not with white tie.
So while the Left and Center have to suffer folks like Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Bruce Springsteen, Bill Moyers, Garrison Keillor, James Joyce, Shakespeare, Rumi, Lao Tse, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and other Princes of Peace, the Right get to skim from the very top of humanity, and find such radiant sources of Eternal Light as Ann Coulter and Rich Lowry? Sure they are cute, but so is a puppy just learning to walk.
I remember when I first became interested in philosophy. I found great delight in finding a philosopher I liked, and then searching for the thinkers THEY liked. And then the ones THEY liked, and on back to God. Never, in a million years, would I end up at William F. Buckley or Charles Krauthammer or George Will -- fine folks though they may be.
Sometimes it is best to look beyond our time and our place, in order to get a view that is not, in some way, influenced, or paid, or purchased by this or that company, group or movement.
The people on this list are too often at odds with time-tested universal wisdoms, and I can only think that it is either because they are unfamiliar with time-tested universal wisdoms, or that they are simply saying basically what they are paid to say.
One cannot impart even a tenth of one's understanding to another man, and only half to another woman, but that does not mean we should not lament the dumbing down, the awful rowing toward ignorance and ignobility.
It does little good to worry about it, and it is probably best that people learn from their own mistakes.
But, if you find that you are one of those who swoon and gush at the opinions of such and such on said list, it would do no harm to ask: Who are their influences? Whom do they find to be worthy of study? And then go to them, if there is a them. Trace them on back. If nothing else, it will free you momentarily from the Drudge.
