alternative hippopotamus

I tend to spend more time than most lefty bloggers looking at the right-wing blogs. The reason I do this is to educate myself on arguments, turns of phrase, cliches, etc., that the right uses. I am particularly wary of charged language, how it may be used to denegrate religious or racial groups, or how it may be used to justify the stratification of social-economic class. Or, how it may be used to slander those of us who call ourselves progressives.

Does the left also use charged language? It does, but my general observation is that it does so less frequently, and it does so with an ethic that says that language must serve truth.

I’d call that a mainstream lefty value: honesty. I know that the pundits tell us that the word “value” is reserved for the right, but I just don’t buy into that philosophy. I know what I value, and I intend to stand up for those values.

The motivation for this comes from a blog post I’ve seen on Blogs for Bush. Here’s the quote:

In the comments which don’t make it to the blog, we get a strong sense of the left which wishes we here at B4B would just shut up - it isn’t just that they disagree with us, but that they are personally wounded that we exist at all. It just bothers them no end - it seems to distrurb their whole leftwing universe that there is any such thing as a pro-Bush voice out there. Especially irksome, I’ll bet, is the fact that we have no sponsors - oh, a few buy ads (and, if you want, please buy them - the blog costs money, and neither Matt nor I are surnamed “Kennedy” or “Rockefeller” or “Pelosi” or any of the other filthy rich, white liberal names out there), but we here just do this because we believe in the cause. We do it out of love - and that just makes some of our leftwing critics even more mad.

I should mention that came from a post entitled: “Why the American Left Loves Castro”. Now, if there are folks that read this blog that love Castro, I hope you let me know. I don’t love Castro, and I’ll guess that you don’t him either. As far as I know, the American left despises any form of totalitarianism. When we see trends in our own society that go this direction, we’ll let our disdain for totalitarianism be heard. As far as Castro goes, it would be nice if Cuban cigars were legal. Also Cuban cuisine is excellent. Our Mexican restaurants in DC occasionally have Cuban dishes, and they’re mighty tasty. Cuban culture? A big Si. Castro? If he’s cooking that night, sure, otherwise I’m not interested.

Now, back to the main points of this post. Is this lefty blogger mad that there’s a pro-Bush blog? Not at all. Perplexed, Si, but not mad. If anything, and here I’ll speak for the entire left half of the blogosphere, if you still like Bush, then you’re not paying attention. You can just go down the list: foreign affairs, domestic affairs, global warming, dependence on oil, the poor, the rich. Oops, the rich, my bad. If you’re all about the plutocracy, then yes, I do see why you might still like Bush.

Okay, so explain this: how come the Blogs for Bush folks rant on the wealthy in the Democratic Party? Again, here’s what they say:

Especially irksome, I’ll bet, is the fact that we have no sponsors - oh, a few buy ads (and, if you want, please buy them - the blog costs money, and neither Matt nor I are surnamed “Kennedy” or “Rockefeller” or “Pelosi” or any of the other filthy rich, white liberal names out there)

Do the wealthy in the Republican party also bother them? Folks that are named Cheney, Bush, Frist, Rumsfeld, Norquist, Rove, and all of the other filthy rich, white Republican names out there? Or, is it just wealthy Democrats that bother them?

It’s also important to note that Blogs for Bush is very different from other blogs on the right. Unlike Instapundit, Powerline, NRO, or Malkin, there’s a way that readers can comment on a post. That’s democratic, and not something anyone I know wants to see “shut up.”