Our media and pundits are useless.
Thought I’d point out a few things about Dinesh D’Souza’s latest for Forbes in which he opines on Obama:
Here is a man who spent his formative years–the first 17 years of his life–off the American mainland, in Hawaii, Indonesia and Pakistan, with multiple subsequent journeys to Africa.
… To his son, the elder [Kenyan] Obama represented a great and noble cause, the cause of anticolonialism.
The American Conservative’s Daniel Larison countered, “… conservative pundits and writers such as D“Souza have been indulging in so much evidence-free, ideological babbling for the last two years that many of them now seem convinced that this babbling is actually extremely serious, insightful commentary.”
Sweet myopia, Larison and everyone else. Haven’t you people learned already to stop and examine what was really said before you knee-jerk react and repel?
For starters, this is pure projection. Dinesh D’Souza himself spent his formative years – the first 17 years of his life – off the American mainland, in India. He arrived here through an international Rotarian program to attend college. Phew, the self-loathing must be strong in this one.
Next, remember the Town Hall meeting before the last presidential election in which McCain placated an audience member with “Obama is not an Arab.” Wait up. Being an Arab is bad? Listen to what comes out of their mouths: Being anti-colonial is bad? Conversely, colonialism is good? Armed with this realization, liberals now challenge conservatives like Gingrich and D’Souza on whether they agree with this notion.
As I have witnessed, unfortunately, a pro-colonial sentiment is very alive and well all across conservative America. For one example, a very prominent area Republican, highly educated in science and history, informed me that Haiti wouldn’t suffer half of its infrastructure problems if it were still under colonial rule. “These people just don’t know how to take care of themselves and there is no accountability structure.” This is the American democracy we ship abroad, folks: not self-determination but external accountability structures.
So, what D’Souza and Gingrich spew before midterms is not necessarily evidence-free babble but the fearless articulation of long-held beliefs. It is great insight not into Obama but the conservative psyche. And I am amazed at how often the media and their experts hit the mother lode and haven’t the first clue what to do with it.
