This is often the most egregious objective shortcoming of Liberals, we empathize, we care, we really do, we really, really do, but we are at a loss as to how we translate all this compassion into anything more effective than the occasional charity gala, self-righteous media vamping, or Bono. Let’s be honest, we know that we aren’t doing anything more than flashing our colors, that accomplishing anything meaningful will take time, will, and effort, but collectively we have the focused moral attention span of a Labrador Retriever at a Frisbee festival. By the time meaningful work needs to be started, we are off looking for the next tragedy du’jour.
Still, at least we aren’t Republicans, right? At least we didn’t use the 300 kidnapped Nigerian girls in a callous and cynical attempt to fuel the politics of hatred. For a lot of the Republican commentariat the tragedy of the missing girls served only as another bludger in their gleeful game of Seven Degrees of Hillary Clinton. Over the last few decades, what once was a profound but navigable distinction in political theory has turned into a spiteful, irrational, hatred for anything Liberals like. The inexorable movement of Liberal politicians toward the center has pushed conservatives to define themselves in the negative, as agents of what they are against. What they are against, of course, is anything that Liberals might be for. As they have moved farther and farther to the right, Republicans have attempted to accommodate the wild-eyed ravings of people who would otherwise have been ever at the very fringe of American politics. So now, if Barak O’Bama comes out in favor of puppies, Fox News has to do an exposé on the Liberal cover-up of the puppy-terrorist pipeline. It is inevitable.
