Political Myths

The left is the wold's most effective promoter of myths. The two greatest myths - the Republican Party is the party of racism and fat cats while Democrats are the party of equality and the people. The truth is the polar opposite.

I have blogged before on the fact that the Democratic Party and the far left are the repositories of most of racism and sexism to be found in America today. See here and here. Kevin Jackson, who runs The Black Sphere blog, has blogged recently on how Tiger Woods is now experiencing the "racism of the left" for his serial adultery - more specifically, that he didn't engage in any adluterours relationships with black women. It a double whammy - amoral and racist. This from Mr. Jackson:

There has been much discussion about Tiger’s choice of mistresses, and the fact that none of them were black. I found this laughable at first, thought that people were joking. They were not. So as I pondered the Left’s ability to demagogue race in all circumstances, I concluded that the Left is showcasing their racism yet again. Tiger has been left by the Left; dangling on that flimsy limb, yes, all because none of his mistresses were black. . . .

You can read his entire post here.

As to the second myth, the truth is that in fascist societies, big business does extremely well. And there is little more fascist then our modern day far left - a fact many of our largest companies have recognized and are positioning themselves to take very lucrative advantage. As Jonah Goldberg explains:

. . . The notion that big business is “right wing” has always been more sloppy agitprop than serious analysis. It’s true that historically, big business is against socialism and Communism — and understandably so. Socialism and Communism were once close to synonymous with expropriation of wealth and the nationalization of industry. What businessman or industrialist wouldn’t be against that? But many of those same industrialists saw nothing wrong with cutting deals with statist regimes. For example, the Swope Plan, put forward by Gerard Swope, president of General Electric, laid out the infrastructure for much of the early New Deal.

Yet the debate is always framed as if the choice is between “government intervention” on the one hand and free-market capitalism on the other. From 30,000 feet, that division is fine with me. My objection is the glib and easy association of big business with the free-market guys. (Milton Friedman was no champion of public-private partnerships and industrial policy.)

This identification allows self-described progressive Democrats to run against big business when they are in fact in bed with the fat cats.

For instance, the standard line from the Democrats is that the plutocrats and corporate mustache-twirlers oppose health-care reform because, in President Obama’s words, they “profit financially or politically from the status quo.” That sounds reasonable, and in some cases it is reasonable. But it makes it sound as if Obama is bravely battling “malefactors of great wealth.”

But that’s not really how it works, as Timothy Carney documents in his powerful new book, Obamanomics. In 2008, Obama raked in more donations from the health sector than John McCain and the rest of the Republican field combined. Drug makers gave Obama $3.58 for every dollar they gave McCain. Pfizer gave to Obama at a 4–1 rate, as did the hospital and nursing-home industries. In 2008, the insurance industry gave more money to House Democrats than House Republicans. HMOs give to Democrats over Republicans by a margin of 60 to 40.

So far, the health-care industry has mostly been trying to cut insider deals with the government, not fighting to defend the status quo. Discussions between Big Pharma and the White House have been more like pillow talk than a shouting match.

This pattern is hardly unique to health care. The U.S. Climate Action Partnership, led by GE, includes many other Fortune 500 companies, including Goldman Sachs — the company that has profited mightily from Obama’s brand of hope and change. CAP is an aggressive supporter of the Democrats’ climate-change scheme. Why? Because GE and friends stand to make billions from carbon pricing, thanks largely to investments in technologies that cannot survive in a free market without massive subsidies from Uncle Sam. GE chief Jeffrey Immelt cheerleads big government as “an industry policy champion, a financier, and a key partner.” . . .

As Goldberg goes on to say, the right need to relearn the lesson of defending free markets, as opposed to being "pro-business." But as to the left, their brand "for the people" economics is both, one, corrupt, and two, anything but in the interests of the common man.

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Two Myths Of The Left - Iraq Has Increased Terrorism Worldwide and Made Iran Stronger

We have heard for years the arguments that the American invasion of Iraq has only increased worldwide jihadi recruitment and, as repeated most recently by Obama, that Iran is stronger today because of the "failed policies of Bush and McCain." But a look at both arguments in light of today's situation shows both to be demonstrably false.

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A long favored claim of the left is that the Bush administration's war on terror and its invasion of Iraq has increased jihadi recruitment world wide. Human nature being what it is, that was probably true two years ago. One would expect that those with jihadi sympathies were energized by the 9-11 attack and then responded to bin Laden's calls when the U.S. fought back. Indeed, two years ago, it appeared that they were backing a "winning horse," to use bin Laden's words. But this is not 2006.

As General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker noted in their recent Congressional testimony, both believe that the defeat of al Qaeda in Iraq and the successful rejection of al Qaeda by the Sunni Awakening Movements are playing a signficant role in discrediting jihadism world-wide. While its impossible to verify that with the certainty of a Pew poll, the downward trajectory of jihadi attacks world wide strongly supports their argument. This from Reuters:

A study released on Wednesday reports a decline in fatal attacks of terrorism worldwide and says U.S. think-tank data showing sharp increases were distorted due to the inclusion of killings in Iraq.

"Even if the Iraq 'terrorism' data are included, there has still been a substantial decline in the global terrorism toll," said the 2007 Human Security Brief, an annual report funded by the governments of Canada, Norway, Switzerland, Sweden and Britain.

For example, global terrorism fatalities declined by 40 percent between July and September 2007, driven by a 55 percent decline in the "terrorism" death toll in Iraq after the so-called surge of new U.S. troops and a cease-fire by the Shi'ite militant Mehdi Army, the brief said. . . .

Read the entire article.

The second myth of the left is that Iran has been made stronger by the Bush administration's prosecution of the war on terror. That was Obama's message a few days ago. Certainly, as things stood in December, 2006, that was correct. Iran indirectly benefited from having the U.S. remove two implacable enemies, Saddam Hussein in Iraq and the Taliban in Afghanistan, from its borders. Further, Iran had deeply invested in support for its creations, the Mahdi Army of Sadr and the Badr Brigades of SICI. As Michael Ledeen explained in an article written during the dark days of 2006, Iran was on the cusp of "Lebanizing" Iraq as the U.S. withdrew.

But then something happened on the way to the mosque. The President rolled the dice with the surge and all has been changed - Iran's incredibly bloody proxy war in Iraq has been exposed, the SICI changed its loyalties from Iran to Iraq's traditionalist Grand Ayatollah, Ali Sistani, and now Sadr's militia has been decimated. With the fall of both Basra and Sadr City, Iran's proxy is left without a base.

The greatest threat to Iran today comes from a democratic Iraq on its border that honors the traditional Shia practice of quietism - i.e., maintaining a wall between mosque and state, to put it in American terms. Iran is a deeply troubled country of 60 million people held under the rule of a medieval theocracy by ever greater repression. The theocracy itself is illegitimate when looked at in terms of a millenium of apolitical Shia tradition - a tradition shredded in 1979 by Ayatollah Khomeini and his velyat-e-faqi, a new philosophy justifying and requiring theocratic rule. And indeed, the most popular religious figure in both Iraq and Iran is now Grand Ayatolah Ali Sistani, an adherent to the quietist school. This is deeply problematic for Iran. As Reuel Marc Gerecht explained recently:

Although conscious of the fleeting loyalty of Iraqi Shiites who once took refuge in Iran from the wrath of Saddam Hussein and are now blessed with ever-larger Iraqi oil revenues, Tehran probably didn't anticipate how quickly Shiite sentiment in Iraq could change. The Iranians didn't see the rapid rise of the Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, who has become the most popular ayatollah in Iran as well as the most powerful cleric in Iraq. Iranian and Iraqi clerical ties are old, complicated, intensely personal, and often quite affectionate--all of which now plays powerfully against the Iranian ruling elite's cynical politics in Mesopotamia.

It is a very good bet that Sistani and other prominent Iraqi clerics have remonstrated vociferously with their Iranian interlocutors in Qom against Iranian-fed violence among Iraqi Shiites. We can see the Iranian side of this in former president Mohammad Khatami's accusing [Iran's Supreme Guide] Khamenei virtually by name of spilling Shiite blood in Iraq and turning Iran's Islamic revolutionary message into a call for violence and upheaval beyond its borders. Khatami's recent speech at Gilan University is an astonishing sermon from a man not known for boldness.

Read the entire article. Since 2003, Iran has won tactical victories in both Gaza and, just days ago, Lebanon. But in Iraq, the theocracy of Iran is facing a mortal threat to its legitimacy and an enticing example of democracy to its deeply troubled populace that, not a decade ago, appeared on the edge of a counter-revolution. Obama's claim that Iran is stronger now could not be more false. Indeed, unless the U.S. leaves Iraq and allows the Iranians to resume their Lebanization of Iraq - something that would happen if troops are withdrawn too soon, as General Petraeus noted days ago in written testimony to the Senate - Iran's theocracy is far more threatened by their peaceful neighbor than by Saddam Hussein or the Taliban. Obama and the left need to find new arguments. The decision to invade Iraq may yet achieve its initial promises of reducing terrorism and provide a dangerous example of a Muslim democracy both in the heart of the Middle East and on the border of Iran.

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