Home › Blogs › Freedoms Truth's blog ›

ex-Liberal Speaks out on Deprogramming a Liberal

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 21:13

Robin of Berkeley tells us more about "How to Deprogram a Liberal":

So maybe you get now how hard it was, how disorienting and destabilizing and crazy making it was, when I realized about 1 1/2 years ago that I no longer believed in liberalism. ... I walked around in a confused state for weeks. Being a Democrat, a liberal, a far left radical from Berkeley was a big part of my identity. So who the heck was I if I weren't a leftist? ...After weeks of shuffling around like a zombie, it was time to do something about it. The first step, I decided, was deprogramming myself from decades of liberal propaganda. Out went books by Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, Michael Parenti, and various 9/11 conspiracy books. In came Mark Levin, Ben Stein, Ron Paul, and Ayn Rand. .... To my disbelief, the more I listened and read, the more these folks made sense. For instance, at first I couldn't understand why so many conservatives expressed concern about morality issues, like gay marriage. Berkeley is Lesbian Central, and I know many good hearted gay people. But the more I learned, the more I started getting the larger picture; that conservatives were not necessarily impugning the character of gay people, but they were alarmed at the breakdown of traditional values. If the basic structure of society goes, e.g., traditional marriage, religion, patriotism, common language, what remains? If everything becomes fluid, what is there to hold onto? Without any moral structure and traditions, a society descends into anarchy and mob rule, as it is clearly doing today. As I educated myself, I started thinking and rethinking. I'd wake up in the middle of the night with the sudden realization that deeply held beliefs made no sense. Take the anti war stance of the left. Noble and sanctimonious and all that. But how easy it is to sit back and preach peace when you have an army defending you; to rail against the U.S. when you are protected by free speech laws; to demonize Israel, when you've never lived through the murderous pogroms of Tsarist Russia or the Holocaust. How hypocritical to lambast Big Business while you are making money from their stocks in your mutual fund portfolio (that is, until Obama took over). And how ludicrous to admire Chavez, Castro and all things socialist, when the closest experience you've had to standing on a bread line is queuing up for goat cheese/arugula pizza at Whole Foods ...Though exhausted from lack of sleep, I also started waking up. I realized, to my utter incredulity, that conservatives made sense, and that I was one of them. I recalled Mark Twain's quip about his father: When Twain was a teenager, he thought his father was the stupidest man in the world; but when he became a young man in his 20's, his father had many intelligent things to say. Twain couldn't believe how much his father had learned in those years! Like Twain, I grew up and saw the world as it is. Yes it would be nice to save the planet, to eliminate hunger, and to make everyone good and righteous. But humans don't have the power to do that. To walk around, as I did, with utopian images that didn't match reality was to view life through the eyes of a child. An adult understands that civility matters, people need to be held accountable for their behavior, and protecting yourself and your country are moral imperatives.

A lot of Liberals get to become "ex-Liberals" through the simple process of getting hit by reality.

It was once said that "A neo-conservative was a liberal mugged by reality". Neo-conservatism as a movement was prominent in the 1970s and 1980s due to the reality-mugging effects of the failures of 1960s welfare-state liberalism and the challenge of communism and the Soviet Union vs a New Left that was more than willing to concede half the world to communists.

Now we have a new generation of youngsters who were saved from communism by actions of Reagan and saved by the excesses of 1960s welfare system dependency by the actions of Gingrich (Welfare Reform in 1996). Said youngsters dont have that reality innoculation.

Yet.

It begs the question of what 'deprogramming event' will occur to make youngsters shift over to the conservative side.

I suspect the snide liberals on this site will make trollish comments that will presume  that it wont happen ... I'm not sure. Watch out liberals, the conservative  philosophy might rub off even on YOU when you least suspect it. The only  way to make sure you NEVER end up conservative is to NEVER watch/listen or read ANYTHING remotely conservative ... you know, like:

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." - Lord Acton

 

 

5
Your rating: None Average: 5 (2 votes)

Comments

It amazes me that you think this sort nonsense has any

Submitted by NextRightNando on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 21:47.

It amazes me that you think this sort nonsense has any relevance to current political discourse.

Here is a wake-up call for you: CNN Poll from yesterday:

Would (Name of Entity Here)'s Policies Push The Nation In The Right or The Wrong Direction?

  • BARACK OBAMA:
    • 63% Right Direction
    • 35% Wrong Direction
  • DEMOCRATS IN CONGRESS:
    • 57% Right Direction
    • 40% Wrong Direction
  • REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS:
    • 39% Right Direction
    • 57% Wrong Direction

Get it? After the right's decades' long campaign to equate "liberal" with every bad thing you can possibly conjure up, Americans prefer Congressional Democrats to Republicans by 18 points, and the Democratic President by 24 points.

A lot of Liberals get to become "ex-Liberals" through the simple process of getting hit by reality.

I guess you missed the recent poll that showed that Republicans had declined in every single demographic category except for the elderly. Seems to me that a lot more Conservatives have become "Ex-Conservatives". Childish blather like you are putting on display here is no doubt part of the reason why.

Keep smoking that pollaganda crack

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 22:36.

It amazes me you think anyone cares about your trollish 'childish blather'. I certainly dont.  You havent even read the linked article and you post something that has nothing to do with the referenced article.

Obviously, there are millions of Americans not yet mugged by the reality of how bad Obama is on national security, the economy and the maintainence of our culture and civilization. Obviously, you are one of them. Do  yourself a favor and get educated and informed before spouting off your hubristic nonsense.

And a crap poll of 'adults' with no internals is as worthless as tissue paper. My poll of brilliant informed patriots has:

Would (Name of Entity Here)'s Policies Push The Nation In The Right or The Wrong Direction?

  • BARACK OBAMA:
    • 0% Right Direction
    • 100% Wrong Direction
  • DEMOCRATS IN CONGRESS:
    • 0% Right Direction
    • 100% Wrong Direction

 

As if

Submitted by NextRightNando on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 23:12.

As if you'd be able to find something in the internals of that poll that demonstrate that in fact people are very happy, pleased and excited about the great things that the Republican Party is currently offering.

No internals on this one either - but then again, they aren't really necessary, are they?

Real Polls Show Even-Divided Political Environment

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 23:23.

There's crappy pollaganda 'adult' polls and theres real voter ID polls, like these. Real Polls Show a more Even-Divided Political Environment:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/...

Democrats began the year holding a six- or seven-point lead over the GOP for the first several weeks of 2009. That began to slip in early February, and the Republicans actually took a two-point lead for a single week in the middle of March. Since then, the results have ranged from dead even to a four-point lead for the Democrats until the GOP regained the lead.

Men favor the GOP 44% to 35%, while women favor the Democrats by the exact same margin.

Voters not affiliated with either party favor the GOP by a 38% to 22% margin.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/22741.html

Nevada poll is showing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) very, very vulnerable back home. The Las Vegas Review-Journal/Mason-Dixon poll found that 45 percent of Nevada voters would “definitely” vote against Reid next year — with only 30 percent saying they want to see him return to office

http://www.gallup.com/poll/15370/Party-Affiliation.aspx

The numbers:

Party affiliation. Republicans 32%. Democrats 32%.

Leaning: Republicans 45%. Democrats 45%.

A year ago, the Democrats enjoyed double-digit leads in both categories.

 

 

 

You can cherry pick your polls

Submitted by NextRightNando on Thu, 05/21/2009 - 23:31.

Interesting - first you say polls are rubbish and then your cherry pick a few to support the viewpoint you want to support.

I would enjoy seeing you explain away this one.

Leave Freedoms Truth alone.

Submitted by molotov on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 08:50.

Leave Freedoms Truth alone. It is quite clear he has access to some of the highest grade marijuana money can buy.

Wait a second....

Submitted by DissentFromDayO... on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 08:51.

....you're not really citing a CNN poll as evidence are you?

Why yes; yes you are.

Can we say moron? YES WE CAN!

rofl

 

 

Standing athwart history and yelling stop is futile...

Submitted by mlindroo on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 02:39.

Conservatives like to believe that their ideology is "reality based" (like, creationism or global warming denial in some cases) and that their ranks are growing. In fact, opinion polls during the past 40 years suggests the number of self-described conservatives is constant. But overall, there is no question that the United States keeps turning more social liberal and "statist" with each passing year. Particularly if you look at the wide picture, e.g. comparing the size of the welfare state in 1909 to that of 2009. The U.S. might still not be Western Europe (although some claim the differences are vastly overblown, e.g. See "A narrower Atlantic" http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10746 ) but there is no question the socialists who lamented the "American Exceptionalism" of 1906 would be pleasantly surprised by even the America of the GW Bush years.

As long as the current standards of living can be maintained, I see now reason whatsoever to believe that conservatives will be able to actually shrink the size of government or turn back the clock on e.g. racial and sexual equality. Even Reagan himself was unable to do this. The best you can do is to slow down progress a bit.

If you guys want to see a return to 19th century morality and the pre-New Deal libertarian ethos, then your only hope is the total collapse of modern society.

Globaloney Nonsense alert

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 08:47.

 

Liberalism causes poverty and social degeneration. The liberals get more 'recruits' because in the past generation they have taken over the schools and indoctrinated the youth.  And example is the nonsense over global warming.

"global warming denial"

Please define what you mean and prove to us that its wrong. In fact, the very term is a misnomer and is NOT reality based.

 

 

Oh, that's an easy question to answer

Submitted by mlindroo on Sat, 05/23/2009 - 14:01.

> Liberalism causes poverty and social degeneration.

 

If your theory were correct, we would expect the entire West to be much worse off now in terms of economic poverty than a century ago. There is zero evidence for it. On the contrary, the scope and extent of the welfare state has constantly grown along with the economy! Unlike you, I do not regard government spending on e.g. social programs as the antithesis or even nemesis of capitalism. These are balancing forces in society.

----

"Social degeneration" is a bit harder to quantify, I guess. Maybe you have the African-American underclass in mind perhaps? Do you perhaps think this particular segment of the U.S. population was better off back in the 1940s before the advent of Brown vs. Board of Education, the Civil Rights Act, Affirmative Action, The Great Society?

---

Concerning man-made global warming, the overwhelming majority of experts of the subject are convinced it is real. That is good enough for me. I do think global warming sceptics are on firmer ground when they question the usefulness of the proposed countermeasures, though.

 

MARCU$

 

Cause versus effect - in economics and climate

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Sat, 05/23/2009 - 21:47.

Dangit, had a brilliant detailed response on your points that took much time and deleted accidently! Cliff notes version:

1. Economic cause and effect- freedom caused prosperity in western world; prosperity allowed more generous welfare state. Compare with USSR and eastern europe, china until past  10-15 years. Correlation and causation are 2 different things!

2. "social degeneration" the issues are family-breakup related, see Bill bennett's "index of cultural indicators" etc.

3. Climate/ CO2/ global warming

The issues isn't "Is it real?" (yes, CO2 is a GHG) the issue is  "what is the quantitative impact of CO2 on temps? What is the actual temperature trendlines?" The Gore/Hansen 'alarmists' take IPCC scenarios and emphasize worst-case high-end models - doubling CO2 might increase by 4C.  Skeptics like Roy Spencer PhD, and Prof Richard Lindzen of MIT are basically saying the IPCC models are flawed and climate sensitivity is less than the models. They show how clouds are a negative feedback not positive like in the IPCC models. Well guess what? Temperature trends agree with them, not the IPCC models. Total warming of only 0.4C in 60years, no warming in past 12 years, no ocean heat addition in over 5 years. And sometimes the fearmongers let slip an admission or two:

http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2004/04/14/observations-not-...

For more on this see:

http://www.climatedepot.com/

http://www.climateaudit.org/

http://wattsupwiththat.com/

 

 

Cause versus effect (economics)

Submitted by mlindroo on Sun, 05/24/2009 - 09:27.

1a. Economic cause and effect- freedom caused prosperity in western world; prosperity allowed more generous welfare state.

 

Precisely.... Now, note that the current hybrid capitalist/social democratic system has been stable in the U.S., Canada, Western Europe since the end of WW II. We have seen a spectacular rise in the overall standard of living *despite* piling on many new cradle-to-grave benefits. Now, militant marxists and extremist libertarian free marketers claimed (from radically opposite points of view, of course) that it could not be done, that the result would be social chaos. 

---

At this point you will probably say that prosperity in the U.S. and elsewhere in the West is solely due to the private sector and that we would have been much better off without New Deal etc.. I don't believe it: the average American employee today is much healthier, better educated, and lives longer than before the social reforms of the 1930s and 1960s. Obviously, capitalist employers have greatly benefitted from advances in education and health care coverage, and the market for goods and services is much greater too.  

 

[1b] Compare with USSR and eastern europe, china until past  10-15 years. Correlation and causation are 2 different things!

 

And in my previous post I was going to ask you whether you think "liberalism" is just another name for "communism"...guess there is no need for that anymore:)

I don't see how the failure of marxist command economies has much relevance to the undeniable success of liberal social-democratic policies in e.g. the post-New Deal United States.. *OF COURSE* you need capitalism and a sufficiently strong economy before you can afford to implement a Western type cradle-to-grave welfare system.!!! You cannot transfer the Swedish model to Zimbabwe: you have to start with the economy.  We have seen this time and time again in the Third World.

 

2. "social degeneration" the issues are family-breakup related, see Bill bennett's "index of cultural indicators" etc.

 

Well, see point 1a above. So there are more out-of-wedlock births, divorces than before the 1960s in the U.S. as well as in the western world in general... That's unfortunate, but this is (in a way) what one would expect since rising standards of living and increased gender equality means women can afford to get divorced if they want to.  And other trends are not so bad, e.g. (IIRC) there is less violent crime and fewer abortions in America now.

----

Anyway, these "cultural indicators" seem to be more related to "culture" than ideology. Most would agree that Sweden is more left-wing than the U.S.. Marriage and religion are also considered more important in the U.S. whereas in Sweden cohabitation is more common. So one would naturally expect American families to be more stable, but this does not seem to be the case according to a fascinating study that I saw last month. The author claims that an American child is more likely to experience the breakup of his parents' relationship before he/she reaches the age of 18 than in *ANY* other Western country! Swedish parents (even including those who are not formally married) are less likely to split up. So obviously the country's leftist social liberal system cannot be the reason... The author of the study suspects the high "turnover" in the U.S. can be attributed to a) the social importance of marriage in American as a sign that 'you have made it' in personal life,  b) a strong emphasis on individual rights.

---

I will give another example: teenage pregancies.  The Dutch are perhaps more liberal on social issues than any other country in Western Europe. They have explicit sex ed in schools, free access to condoms and everything. So Bill Bennett  would naturally expect the Dutch to have a really bad "Bristol Palin" problem. Actually, the U.S. has a higher number of teenage pregnancies and abortions per capita. Does this mean I can now gleefully denounce the naivety of "abstinence only" Bible thumping conservatives, particularly since "Blue" states usually have fewer teenage pregancies too? No ... Britain is much more like the Netherlands when it comes to [sex] education, yet their problems  are as bad as those of the U.S..!

----

There are countless contradictory facts and figures like this. My conclusion is that "culture" [cultural tradition] tends to  drive ideology and religion rather than the other way around.  E.g.  it would be very easy for me to say the Middle East is so f*cked up because of Islam, but I actually think the religion is more a product of local tradition and customs. To transform a place such as Iraq, one probably needs to start with raising standards of living and establishing the rule of law as opposed to giving them "democracy" or Swedish welfare.

 

MARCU$ 

 

You have been assimilated ....

Submitted by DissentFromDayO... on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 08:55.

..... and you do not even know it.

Progressives and liberals = today's useful idiots

(Did your marxist, tenured, never-did-anything-in-their-pathetic-lives professors teach you where "useful idiots" comes from?)

Here is a good poll from CNN

Submitted by Lonestar Bill on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 09:54.

Fifty-five percent of people questioned in the poll say they have an unfavorable opinion of the former vice president. Thirty-seven percent say they have a favorable opinion of Cheney, up eight points from January when he left office.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/05/21/cnn-poll-favorable-opinion-of-dick-cheney-on-the-rise/

Dick Cheney up 8 points and George Buss up 6 points (to 41%)

But . . .how can that be . .  .they're just a couple of WAR CRIMINALS!  LOL

Of course, Obama makes them look more solid everyday.

Right track/wrong track

Submitted by NextRightNando on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 10:07.

Look at the Pollster.com Right Track/Wrong Track numbers. In the dying days of the Bush Administration, "Right Track" = 10%. Yes, that's right - 10%. Heckuva job. It is now 44.7%. Are you familiar with concept of a trend line?

Americans could not be happier about the fact that the Republicans are out of power.

That's easy

Submitted by Freedoms Truth on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 12:37.

In 2008, we conservatives saw two non-conservatives running and a Democrat-run Congress = 'wrong track".

All the Lefties and Libs saw Bush and called it  'wrong track'.

Now the Obama kool-aid drinkers are on the 'right track' bandwagon. It takes real stiff koolaid to think that, We have lost 4 million jobs since Obama was elected, and just passed a bill that would comprehensively destroy hundreds of thousands of more jobs.

Now here is the bizarre part: We had under 5% unemployment and a growing economy, but the media talking people into a state of depression kept the wrong track numbers higher than now.

Are we really better off now than we we were in 2006???

I understand that Bush and Cheney's trendlines are going up

Submitted by Lonestar Bill on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 10:17.

Obviously you do  not understand trendlines. I was saying that they are trending up. You are going back to a specific point in the line (actualy a different line, but close enough where you are concerned) and pointed to it as a final score.

 

without the entire democratic party

Submitted by Maleficent on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 10:37.

in full campaign mode, I'd expect them to be going up. Plus, the republicans are probably luring back some of the right-leaning indies.

wait... you're proud of this guy becoming a republican?

Submitted by Maleficent on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 10:22.

wow, the republicans truly are the fearful ones.

Anyone who thinks that everything that Ron Paul says makes a ton of sense is... obviously a follower, a sheep.

As for me, I like austrian economics. Would you like to talk about the causes of the current Global Depression?

Polls, polls, polls

Submitted by chemjeff on Fri, 05/22/2009 - 12:07.

I don't understand this infatuation with polls.  Who cares if you are on "the winning side"?  Do you think you get a special prize if you agree with the majority?  Seriously, if a poll came out suggesting Americans favored executing the rich and confiscating their wealth, would you say we ought to do that?

That is one thing I admire about George Bush.  He was willing to stand up for doing what he thought was right, even if it was unpopular.  Any of you who have been in a situation where you faced enormous peer pressure to just go along with the crowd, even if it was contrary to your values, would understand this.