Visceral hatred of US Pres. G.W. Bush is endemic among the left. J. Chait expressed it well, and honestly, “I hate Bush … the way he walks … talks … looks. His policies.” Judging from Paul Krugman’s recent essays, PK feels the same.
It’s qualitatively different than partisan Clinton hate. Bill Clinton is a man beloved by radical feminists despite using his power to get sex with women, and perjuring himself in a sex harassment lawsuit. Pro-lifers sure hate Clinton, but balanced budget, welfare reform, and free trade Reps all acknowledged that good stuff happened.
Bush haters seem incapable of saying “it is good that Saddam has been booted out.” Nothing Clinton did was that good. Yet everything Bush does gets ridiculed, questioned, often twisted into a diametrically opposed straw man, and that straw man is then attacked.
Gregg Easterbrook, a popular Leftist writer of TNR (The New Republic), was recently fired from ESPN for claiming, in an anti-violence movie review (against Kill Bill) that his ultimate boss, Disney head M. Eisner, is a money grubbing Jew. For insulting his boss, he deserves to be fired. But many, if not most, University educated people of the world do believe that Jews are money-grubbers – and that money-grubbing is bad. The problem of Jew hate is clearly increasing in Europe, and in many other places of the world. The reasons, like the reasons for Bush hate, seem more to be an accumulation of small things: excessive reaction against mild Jewish racism, the continuing Israel-Palestinian problems where Palestinians are being portrayed as the only victims, and the issue of how bad it is to be successful in business.
Jews, as shown by Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, are guilty of the following kind of racism: they’re willing to do business with goys, but not willing to accept their daughter marrying one of them. In the discussion about who is a Jew, a key answer: if they want their children to specifically marry a Jew, then they are Jews. Of course, the male descendants of Abraham, with his Y chromosome (!), do seem to be an inordinately successful group. This mild exclusion doesn’t excuse the racist anti-Semite Holocaust. But neither should the terrible Shoah blind us to this honest, normal reason for resentment. And anti-racism is a good part of the liberal, humanist tradition. Everybody who opposes racism has to object, at least mildly, against this Jewish separatism.
The Palestinians’ unwillingness to stop their own terrorism, and accept Israel’s right to exist, dooms them to suffer. They ARE victims, but mostly of their own leaders. The Pali leaders need to change, or be changed, before peace can occur. But this problem has been around so long, the Left knows it’s useless to complain about Arafat. “How many Palis have to die, before Arafat is a failure?” This is a question the Left implicitly asks about Bush, but never, ever, Arafat. When Palis die, it’s Israel’s fault, and/or Bush/America. But if Americans die in Iraq, it’s not any terrorist leader’s fault, it’s the fault of … Bush! and/or Israel!!
Israel has suffered enough, and killed enough, to deserve their own state. They have it, and will fight to keep it – while being willing to allow the Palis a state, if the Pali leaders would accept one of two. Pali leaders don’t accept. They can’t win against Israel in a fight, and don’t accept fair terms in their loss, so they choose to try to murder Israelis, and do so, and also die. Stupid choice. The Palis have been stupid for a while now, as anti-Semite Malaysian Mahatir says “not using [their] brain.”
Israel companies (business folk) are also practicing being successful, even without oil – unlike any Arabs w/o oil. Successful meaning they peacefully and honestly make contracts with others to provide goods & services for money; and voluntarily give stuff and get cash. The kind of money-grubbing Leftists hate. I don’t hate money grubbing, since I wouldn’t do my own job if they didn’t pay me.
Neither would almost all Leftists, many making more than US worker avg (about $30k / year?). Yet Leftists hate success, hate money grubbers – people who put money before other, more important causes. Causes like stopping unwanted pregnancies, stopping AIDS, global warming, pollution, land mines, drug abuse, ivory trading, illiteracy in gov’t schools, seal clubbing, logging, gun ownership, women's rights, minority rights, animal rights, and stopping war. (Especially stopping wars against murderers who are friends with France.)
To a big hearted Leftist, the very existence of such a problem, combined with a person who has “too much” money, is proof of uncaring, and hence immoral, money-grubbing evil, er, um, social injustice. Leftist Jew haters don’t like the term evil – it’s too religious.
Who in America has too much money? The rich, the successful, the money-grubbers. And the Left demands Punishment! er, um, justice, social justice. It is a fact that the vast majority of human genocides in the last 100 years have included, in their justifications, explicit calls to rectify some prior injustice. It’s curiously under-discussed that providing justice in any civilization requires force and violence to stop injustices.
Leftists want social justice, a Robin Hood gov’t that takes from the rich and gives to the poor. But punishing the rich is always far more important to Leftist leaders than is helping the poor. Note how few Leftists discuss the great success of Clinton’s (& Rep Congress) welfare reform. Clinton’s welfare reform was a success, but Leftists don’t care about success as much as about punishing the rich. With Bush reducing the punishment, er, taxes, he’s aiding and abetting the evil, er, socially unjust successful.
Leftists are correct that money is not everything, and too many Americans wrongly believe that amount of money equals amount of success. But the Leftists grow this grain of truth into a field of dreams where all poor are mere victims, and glorified; a Leftist calculus where every failure deserves sympathy, support, understanding; where every success implies lying, cheating, exploiting, insensitivity and injustice.
In Bush’s great liberation of Iraq, Leftists instead see lies about reasons, a desire by money grubbers to get oil, lies about imminent threats, a disregard for Iraqi collateral damage, and unjust violation of international law. All extremely debatable, if not clearly false -- yet the Left essentially forbids debate. Did America successfully accomplish its mission of booting Saddam? – yes. Do Leftists like this or hate it? - they hate it.
Leftists hate American success, the culture of McDonalds, fast food & cokes, violent movies and rampant promiscuity (oops, most Leftists like the promiscuity). As Nozik explains in why verbal intellectuals elites hate capitalism, the Left hate American equality and the gross lack of deference most have for such elitist intellectual snobs. And it follows, in a feel good sort of logical way, that if American success is bad, because it exploits so many poor victims, then the victims are morally superior to the implied exploiters.
When America was victimized on 9/11, most Leftists loved America as much as others (though some were quick to blame America instead of terrorists). As America fought back, not content to remain a victim, Leftist critiques increased, and Bush hate gets more emotional. Unsurprisingly, whenever Jews demonstrate their capacity to succeed, Left hatred is inflamed against them, too.
These hates are connected, though not identical. It may well be that merchant success, and hatred against money grubbing merchants, predates anti-Jewish feeling, but both have existed far longer than the current calendar. It’s clear that envy, destructive envy, drives those who hate. Bush hate follows Reagan hate and Nixon hate, and its bastard brother Clinton hate (on the Right). The Left has chosen between support for regime change of a dictator, or hate for the President who leads a successful regime change, & supports successful capitalism. The Left has chosen hate. Bush hate, Jew hate, money grubbing hate. A victory of envy.
