Nexus not in Kennedy Assasination

Submitted by Stan Kreis (United States), Nov 22, 2007 at 01:43

The question raised is so important, it demands an answer, but not this one. I have thought about just this question for a long time. What gave rise to the tendency of American intellectuals to go soft on socialism and hard on American values dating before the 1960s? Certainly there existed a certain reaction to the bigotry of the Right and the mythology of hate in America in the rise of the progressive movement.

Certainly there existed a certain reaction to the lack of a distinctly and effectual Rightist ideological counterargument to the rise of Progressivism. Certainly there existed a challenge to the existing regime by way of social relations, specifically embedded in but not exclusive to, for instance, Identity Politics. All these problems, however, existed in the past and did not undo the Democrat Party thereby. I believe it is more worthwhile to look back at and contrast Winston Churchill with the Progressives now. Churchill did not have a problem making the Western way of life superior to other ways of life. He was no relativist and was unabashedly in favor of seeing the West as bound by a duty to bring Western civilization to the other parts of the World. He took up the cause of the Jews because he didn't favor Arab culture, which he perceived to be backward and destructive, in contrast to the Jewish opposite.

Kennedy, and even Scoop Jackson, probably would have agreed to a lesser extent. It is the assendency of this moral relativist point of view which has changed us and damaged the Churchillian counter-argument. We are going through a period of time whereby the relativist point of view is dominant, aggressive and assendent, but I do not think it will last.

At some point, such a period of self-doubt will collapse of its own contradictions with reality. That does not mean the Democrats will return to its roots in Kennedy and Scoop Jackson, or that the United States will hue to a pre-1960s line. Could it be that World prosperity is driving the tolerance and even desire for socialist poltiics among the nation-state populations?

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".