Feeling good about themselves
Publication:Waukesha Freeman (Conley); Date:Nov 17, 2011; Section:Opinion; Page Number:8A
Feeling good about themselves
Liberals believe any behavior justified
What was the point of the protest outside Gov. Scott Walker’s home Tuesday night? Let’s think about what the protest organizers were doing.
Tensions are already high. The governor is facing death threats, including those posted on Facebook that were recently publicized.
With that in mind, what were the protest organizers thinking when they led an angry mob to the neighborhood where the governor’s family lives? What were they hoping would be the outcome?
Were they hoping that some act of violence happened? Or did they just want to try to intimidate the Walker family some more? Was the march about scaring women and children in an effort to get what the protesters want?
Because the tactic had all the subtlety of a Ku Klux Klan rally, with vuvuzelas and drums instead of burning crosses.
What were the “neighbors” thinking that helped this mob come near the Walker home by inviting the protesters in?
I can’t imagine doing that to any of my neighbors, whether I liked them or not. If someone said we want to organize a mass protest to intimidate one of my neighbors, I wouldn’t care what the issue was even if the neighbor was a perfect stranger.
Even the mafia in “The Godfather II” knew a line was crossed when someone tried to kill Michael Corleone, “In my home! In my bedroom! Where my wife sleeps … and my children play with their toys.”
But the protesters and the recall organizers feel morally superior enough over the rest of us that their mob-like behavior is somehow justified. I can’t even imagine the self-satisfied smugness that would cause someone to think that intimidating the family of a public figure in their own home is somehow OK.
I did experience some of that self-righteousness myself the other day. I promoted a number of charity events on my website and a local liberal blogger, Lisa Mux, posted a link on Twitter with an apology, “Yes, I’m tweeting something James Wigderson posted. No, I haven’t gone crazy.”
Apparently, I’m in the untouchable caste according to liberal Brahmins.
She followed with, “Yes, & I don’t agree with James Wigderson on much, but he does care about Waukesha.”
Apparently, hard-hearted conservative that I am, it’s surprising that I care about anything. Waukesha must be the exception.
Mux then sent another Twitter remark congratulating herself on how she’s so tolerant. Really.
I don’t mention this just to pick on Mux. I just find her remarks all typical of the selfrighteousness that drives people to march to Walker’s home to demonstrate. Liberals are good, and conservatives are so evil.
We can talk about different causes for the recall. The vain hope by the unions that collective bargaining privileges will be restored. The Democratic Party’s hope that if they get back the state Senate and some friendly judge tosses out redistricting that they will get a better map out of the deal.
But what’s really driving the recall is a sense of entitlement by the liberals. I’m not talking about the class-warfare sense of entitlement. I mean the sense that, because they care and their hearts are somehow pure, they are entitled to make the rest of us accept their version of government.
If the voters let them down, if Fox News and the Koch brothers somehow manipulate the voters into voting for the wrong kind of people, the liberals don’t have to accept the results. They can throw the election results out.
Liberals are just that much better than the evil Republicans. That justifies the recall of Walker even though he has done nothing in office to merit being recalled. That justifies the recall of Republican state senators, even though none of them have done anything to merit being recalled.
It’s what justified the march near the governor’s home, near his wife and kids, in the neighborhood where his kids play and go to school. The protesters do it because they can, and they feel so good about themselves that any behavior is justified.
(James Wigderson is a blogger publishing at http://www.wigderson.com and a Waukesha resident. His column runs Thursdays in The Freeman.)
I was trying to make the point that you’re NOT evil, that you care just as much as I do about Waukesha, that liberals and conservatives DO agree on some things, we’re not all that different from one another. I’m tired of the meanness and bitterness, and was just extending an olive branch, of sorts. I was JOKING about not being crazy, I have a weird sense of humor.
And I WAS NOT part of the protest at Walker’s house, so it’s not fair to group me in with that.
And I don’t like violence, I don’t condone it-towards anyone-ever.
I expect you to challenge my ideas, that’s fine, but to pick on me for being nice to you? Wow. I didn’t see that coming.
Would you like to meet for coffee some time? We can discuss this further.
Yeah, those darn Birkenstock-wearing smelly-hippy Democrats! They should do all their bullying in the Capitol, like the respectable cloth-coat Republicans!
Wow, the density of the generalizations, swipes, and overreactions in this rant is intense. Anything for a column! Is this one of those “But think of the children!” speeches? Oh, yeah – it’s part of the latest tin-foil-hat transmission That Must Be Repeated to fight the recall.
> “Walker… has done nothing in office to merit being recalled.”
Oh really?
Walker campaigned as a moderate, but has governed as a far-right extremist.
- There was nothing in his campaign about outlawing collective bargaining and destroying unions,
- Nothing about defunding education,
- Nothing about defunding BadgerCare,
- Nothing about privatizing all state services,
- Nothing about giving huge tax breaks to corporations while cutting funding on virtually every state program Wisconsinites have come to depend on.
- During his campaign, he gave no warning that he would increase property taxes on seniors and working families by $13.6 million by reducing the Homestead Tax Credit, affecting 247,000 homeowners and renters,
- No warning that he would raise taxes on low-wage workers with children by $56.2 million as a result of cuts to the Earned Income Tax Credit,
- No warning that he would reopen corporate tax loopholes that will cost the state $93.8 million,
- No warning that he would borrow $1.8 billion to fund pet projects and use questionable accounting gimmicks to delay debt payments, which will force the state to pay millions in additional interest,
- No warning that he would cut funding by 42% for the Wisconsin Main Street program, which has helped to create over $1.1 billion in economic development activity across the state and has added 17,900 new jobs,
- No warning that he would award high-paying state jobs to under-qualified family members of big donors,
- No warning that he would replace 39 civil service positions in state agencies with his own partisan political appointees, a blatant power grab.
These are just some of the things Walker has done in office to merit being recalled.
We’re not recalling Scott Walker because he’s a Republican. We’re recalling him because he never would have been elected in the first place if he had made his true colors known when he campaigned. Got it?
I find Mr. Wigderson’s comments on self-righteousness to be deliciously ironic. Maybe he can share his recipe with us for Thanksgiving?
Only 1 thing to add:
I’ve spent some time talking to Lisa. Lisa is really much nicer than the rest of us–as you see she’s invited you to coffee. Knowing her, that was a sincere invite. So I’m sincerely puzzled – why focus on the angel of the lot? Ignorance? Enjoying negative attention? Probably the 2nd.
Walker campaigned as nothing of the sort. He campaigned as a Conservative. If you thought centrist it was only wishful thinking. Were you expecting another Jim Doyle? But don’t get me started!!
You expected him to look at the budget and see that public employees were taking up a quarter of the budget and then concentrate on lowering the cost of heating the capitol?
Get real!
AndrewRogers Reply:
November 24th, 2011 at 6:38 pm
I didn’t say centrist, I said moderate (i.e.-moderate Republican).
So which of the things on my list did he say he was going to do???