Right-wing culture warriors have been relentlessly attacking people’s personal liberties – running hellish crusades to deny our freedom to vote, to read what we want, to form labor unions, to make our own reproductive decisions… etc.
I am deliriously happy working to elect Democrats here in Lewisburg, PA. I sometimes get a teeny bit unhappy when, as a Democrat, I am called horrible things. But then I know I am not a baby eater, etc. and happiness floods back as I head out to canvass for my neighbor running for the State House!
I read this column of Ross Douthat's the other day and thought it was the most ridiculous, tiresome blather I'd ever seen in what's supposed to be a "serious" newspaper. Mr. Douthat is thought to be an intelligent fellow, and I suppose he is, but his poutiness strikes me as more negative than positive-- talk about unhappy!
I don't see how an intelligent person can believe the nonsense of either the far Right or the far Left. Also both leftist-authoritarian and rightist-authoritarian Governments have been tried . Communism and Fascism. They create hell on earth, except maybe for the 0.1% on top, the high ranking Party members. Near as i can tell , either the exponents of authoritarian ideologies are hoping to be high ranking commissars, ayatollahs, gauleiters etc, or they are insane. One can be insane and still be clever- Hitler being a classic example.
For these reasons, I favor as little government and much individual rights as possible. I saw a meme I like on Quora: when the population has guns, there will be occasional tragedies. When only the Government has guns, there will be genocide." it is true- google "massacres in America" and you will get pages of them. Black people, Indians, Chinese, labor unionists, massacred by the Powers that Be. Not to mention the genocides carried out by the Ottoman Turks, Russian empire, British empire, German empire, USSR, Nazis, and Mao's lunatics. Ideologues Left or Right are damned dangerous and should NOT be allowed anywhere near power.
Mr. Smith-- You are, I believe, totally right about the passionate ones on both left and right ends and the awfulness they engender. Where I don't agree with you is in your libertarian attitude about governments. Like people, there are good ones and bad ones. I'm hanging in there with government of the people, by the people, and for the people (is that the right order?). It's possible, as we've known from past examples. I guess it's inevitable that even good governments can't seem to last very long.
Mr. Douthat is thought to be an intelligent fellow, and I suppose he is, but his poutiness strikes me as more negative than positive-- talk about unhappy!
"You just need to pray about that and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you."
-- just about any Trump-worshiping evangelical Christian
Two years after 9-11, what Pres George W Bush called a "trifecta," as it bailed out his failed presidency, I might have been despondent and probably was for a time. A family photo taken over 40 years earlier snapped me out of it. In 1960 we were a young married couple struggling to get by on meager pay, a 4-year old son and and a toddler to care for. That cold morning our year old son was photographed pointing to something coming out of the oven, glee written all over his face. He was ecstatic.
Hence, a poem in 2003 that I entitled "Life" but might have called it "Happiness."
This seems as good a time and place as any to call attention to a service started by the Brooklyn Public Library and one that my library, the Seattle Public Library, participates in: Books Unbanned. This service provides access to the e-books and audio books in the library to young people (ages 13 to 26) who live anywhere in the U.S. All they have to do is go to the Seattle Public Library website and fill out a simple form. This service is entirely supported by donations. I'm proud to be a donor.
There are -- I hope -- other libraries whose leaders are interested in this service. Its purpose is to help young people "read what you want, discover yourself and form your own opinions." Young people everywhere need our support, especially in places where they feel alone and misunderstood. This is a way to help them.
I've seen the studies supposedly showing that right-wingers are "happier" than lefties and they all come down to the same thing, which Douthat (Ross Douthat? "Serious?" Really??) calls "a refusal of contentment."
That's his "serious" version of "I'm alright, Jack," an expression that translates to "I got mine, so screw you." Put another way, what the studies say is that lefties can't be "happy," i.e., "content," while being aware of the suffering of others.
If abandoning my sense of justice is what it takes to be "happy," to "accept contentment," I don't think that's a type of "happiness" in which I have any interest.
As a footnote, some years ago I wrote a relatively long piece relative to one such study. The link is here:
The "contentment " Douthat speaks of is really an "I got mine and I ain't sharing" mentality that permeates through the ranks of conservative elites like him.
Socrates' group concluded that happiness is "the exercise of vital talents in a setting affording them scope." This means that an effective President, even though she might be grumpy, would be a happy person. An important function of good government would be to provide opportunities to achieve happiness to individuals whose personal ideas of happiness (e.g., running a monster truck or going to every single Taylor Swift concert) have failed them. This means education, jobs and a good social safety net.
The young people I meet who are actively involved working on issues that are important to them, such as climate change, human rights, and more, seem much happier, grounded and full of more home than the conservative youth I meet. Most of the conservative youth are doing just what their parents are doing: complaining, without any effort to be involved in change or fixing things they are complaining about.
This is another example of the right's all out attack on everyone and everything in America. They will not be "happy" until they have stripped Americans of ALL their rights and freedoms and "pursuit of happiness". It all part of their overall strategy. They will not be "happy" until they have stripped every American of their Freedom, Health, Wealth, Safety and Happiness!! Do NOT buy their Bullshit!
So now they want to tell me what to think and what makes me happy … guess that is a lot easier than actually governing, building or doing otherwise useful, productive jobs.
But I thought everybody KNEW that we liberals were all a bunch of miserable, evil, godless, atheistic, Al Queda-supporting, anti-American, anti-business, anti-capitalist, anti-gun, anti-Israeli, anti-Second Amendment, anti-Tea Party, anything goes, Ayn Rand-hating, Biden-supporting, business-hating, Christian-persecuting, conservative-baiting, Department of Education-supporting, doesn’t support the military or the troops or the war, economy-wrecking, environmentalist whacko, everything is relative, EVILutionist, existentialist, feminazi, free enterprise hating, fundie-hating, gay marriage-supporting, global warming-supporting, hippie love, homersheckshural, Humvee-hating, if it feels good do it, illegal immigrants coddling, insurgency-supporting, Iran-coddling, Jesus-hating, mark of the beast, Muslim terrorist-supporting, National Education Association–supporting, Obamacare-creating, one world government supporting, pro-abortion, pro-Biden, pro-book, pro-breastfeeding in public, pro-European Union, pro-government schools, pro-increasing the minimum wage, pro-literacy, pro-Palestinian, pro-regulation, pro-science, pro-teaching about homersheckshurality as a normal lifestyle, pro-teaching evolution, pro-union, Republican Party-bashing, secular humanist, sodomy “pride”, tax and spend, treehugger, Trilateralist, Trump-hating, U.N. supporting, U.S. sovereignty and exceptionalism-rejecting, wants the terrorists to win the War on Terror, wants to force Americans to accept socialized medicine and condoms and age appropriate sex education in our school and Lord knows what all, Antifa, Black Lives Matter, Communist, DEMONcratic, far-left, far-right, Fascist, Islamofascist, leftist, LIEberal, Leninist, Marxist, Maoist, Nazi, neo-Confederate, Pacifist, reactionary, revolutionist, Socialist, Stalinist, Trotskyite, Angela Merkel-loving, body-piercing, government-expanding, holistic-wacko, Hollywood-loving, Kum Bah Yah-singing, latte-drinking, neurotic, New York Times-reading, perverted, pierced-nose, sushi-eating, tax-hiking, tofu-chomping, vegan, Volvo-driving, weenie, left-wing freak show SOCIALIST COMMIE PINKOS who HATE AMERICA and HATE OUR FREEDOMS and WANT BIG BROTHER TO DICTATE EVERY ASPECT OF OUR LIVES!
TRUE CHRISTIANS UNITE!™
GOD'S LAW IS CLEAR -- THE PENALTY SEVERE!!
YOU DON’T BREAK GOD’S LAWS — GOD’S LAWS BREAK YOU!!!
MAGA yesterday! MAGA today!! MAGA forevermore!!!!
Now, if you're a conservative, doesn't that make you feel like you've got the love of Jesus, love of Jesus down in your heart?
Obviously, a "life of perpetual unhappiness" is the whole point. It is called "the pursuit of happiness", not "the catching of happiness" or "the achievement of happiness." Blame it on the founding fathers.
Everyone has an opinion including NYtimes editorial writers.It's an opinion not the truth.We need to distinguish fact from opinion...that's what adults do.
I am deliriously happy working to elect Democrats here in Lewisburg, PA. I sometimes get a teeny bit unhappy when, as a Democrat, I am called horrible things. But then I know I am not a baby eater, etc. and happiness floods back as I head out to canvass for my neighbor running for the State House!
I read this column of Ross Douthat's the other day and thought it was the most ridiculous, tiresome blather I'd ever seen in what's supposed to be a "serious" newspaper. Mr. Douthat is thought to be an intelligent fellow, and I suppose he is, but his poutiness strikes me as more negative than positive-- talk about unhappy!
I don't see how an intelligent person can believe the nonsense of either the far Right or the far Left. Also both leftist-authoritarian and rightist-authoritarian Governments have been tried . Communism and Fascism. They create hell on earth, except maybe for the 0.1% on top, the high ranking Party members. Near as i can tell , either the exponents of authoritarian ideologies are hoping to be high ranking commissars, ayatollahs, gauleiters etc, or they are insane. One can be insane and still be clever- Hitler being a classic example.
For these reasons, I favor as little government and much individual rights as possible. I saw a meme I like on Quora: when the population has guns, there will be occasional tragedies. When only the Government has guns, there will be genocide." it is true- google "massacres in America" and you will get pages of them. Black people, Indians, Chinese, labor unionists, massacred by the Powers that Be. Not to mention the genocides carried out by the Ottoman Turks, Russian empire, British empire, German empire, USSR, Nazis, and Mao's lunatics. Ideologues Left or Right are damned dangerous and should NOT be allowed anywhere near power.
Mr. Smith-- You are, I believe, totally right about the passionate ones on both left and right ends and the awfulness they engender. Where I don't agree with you is in your libertarian attitude about governments. Like people, there are good ones and bad ones. I'm hanging in there with government of the people, by the people, and for the people (is that the right order?). It's possible, as we've known from past examples. I guess it's inevitable that even good governments can't seem to last very long.
Mr. Douthat is thought to be an intelligent fellow, and I suppose he is, but his poutiness strikes me as more negative than positive-- talk about unhappy!
"You just need to pray about that and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you."
-- just about any Trump-worshiping evangelical Christian
Two years after 9-11, what Pres George W Bush called a "trifecta," as it bailed out his failed presidency, I might have been despondent and probably was for a time. A family photo taken over 40 years earlier snapped me out of it. In 1960 we were a young married couple struggling to get by on meager pay, a 4-year old son and and a toddler to care for. That cold morning our year old son was photographed pointing to something coming out of the oven, glee written all over his face. He was ecstatic.
Hence, a poem in 2003 that I entitled "Life" but might have called it "Happiness."
Life isn't a beach.
It isn't a peach.
It isn't a warm, cuddly puppy.
Life isn't a kitten
Nor a poem one has written.
It isn't an "O" so surprised guppy.
Life's not unsticky wickets,
Winning lottery tickets,
Nor even a Chinese made trisquette.
Here down below --
For those in the know --
Life is a hot buttered biscuit.
This seems as good a time and place as any to call attention to a service started by the Brooklyn Public Library and one that my library, the Seattle Public Library, participates in: Books Unbanned. This service provides access to the e-books and audio books in the library to young people (ages 13 to 26) who live anywhere in the U.S. All they have to do is go to the Seattle Public Library website and fill out a simple form. This service is entirely supported by donations. I'm proud to be a donor.
There are -- I hope -- other libraries whose leaders are interested in this service. Its purpose is to help young people "read what you want, discover yourself and form your own opinions." Young people everywhere need our support, especially in places where they feel alone and misunderstood. This is a way to help them.
I've seen the studies supposedly showing that right-wingers are "happier" than lefties and they all come down to the same thing, which Douthat (Ross Douthat? "Serious?" Really??) calls "a refusal of contentment."
That's his "serious" version of "I'm alright, Jack," an expression that translates to "I got mine, so screw you." Put another way, what the studies say is that lefties can't be "happy," i.e., "content," while being aware of the suffering of others.
If abandoning my sense of justice is what it takes to be "happy," to "accept contentment," I don't think that's a type of "happiness" in which I have any interest.
As a footnote, some years ago I wrote a relatively long piece relative to one such study. The link is here:
https://whoviating.blogspot.com/2010/11/are-you-happy-now.html
The "contentment " Douthat speaks of is really an "I got mine and I ain't sharing" mentality that permeates through the ranks of conservative elites like him.
Then how come the socialist Scandinavian countries are found to be the happiest countries in the world and the US is #35 and heading down?
Socrates' group concluded that happiness is "the exercise of vital talents in a setting affording them scope." This means that an effective President, even though she might be grumpy, would be a happy person. An important function of good government would be to provide opportunities to achieve happiness to individuals whose personal ideas of happiness (e.g., running a monster truck or going to every single Taylor Swift concert) have failed them. This means education, jobs and a good social safety net.
The young people I meet who are actively involved working on issues that are important to them, such as climate change, human rights, and more, seem much happier, grounded and full of more home than the conservative youth I meet. Most of the conservative youth are doing just what their parents are doing: complaining, without any effort to be involved in change or fixing things they are complaining about.
This is another example of the right's all out attack on everyone and everything in America. They will not be "happy" until they have stripped Americans of ALL their rights and freedoms and "pursuit of happiness". It all part of their overall strategy. They will not be "happy" until they have stripped every American of their Freedom, Health, Wealth, Safety and Happiness!! Do NOT buy their Bullshit!
Sort of true of both big parties, i think. One is basically Fascist and the other is much too Mao-ist for my taste.
It comes down to Democratic Freedom or Republican Fascism.
So now they want to tell me what to think and what makes me happy … guess that is a lot easier than actually governing, building or doing otherwise useful, productive jobs.
But I thought everybody KNEW that we liberals were all a bunch of miserable, evil, godless, atheistic, Al Queda-supporting, anti-American, anti-business, anti-capitalist, anti-gun, anti-Israeli, anti-Second Amendment, anti-Tea Party, anything goes, Ayn Rand-hating, Biden-supporting, business-hating, Christian-persecuting, conservative-baiting, Department of Education-supporting, doesn’t support the military or the troops or the war, economy-wrecking, environmentalist whacko, everything is relative, EVILutionist, existentialist, feminazi, free enterprise hating, fundie-hating, gay marriage-supporting, global warming-supporting, hippie love, homersheckshural, Humvee-hating, if it feels good do it, illegal immigrants coddling, insurgency-supporting, Iran-coddling, Jesus-hating, mark of the beast, Muslim terrorist-supporting, National Education Association–supporting, Obamacare-creating, one world government supporting, pro-abortion, pro-Biden, pro-book, pro-breastfeeding in public, pro-European Union, pro-government schools, pro-increasing the minimum wage, pro-literacy, pro-Palestinian, pro-regulation, pro-science, pro-teaching about homersheckshurality as a normal lifestyle, pro-teaching evolution, pro-union, Republican Party-bashing, secular humanist, sodomy “pride”, tax and spend, treehugger, Trilateralist, Trump-hating, U.N. supporting, U.S. sovereignty and exceptionalism-rejecting, wants the terrorists to win the War on Terror, wants to force Americans to accept socialized medicine and condoms and age appropriate sex education in our school and Lord knows what all, Antifa, Black Lives Matter, Communist, DEMONcratic, far-left, far-right, Fascist, Islamofascist, leftist, LIEberal, Leninist, Marxist, Maoist, Nazi, neo-Confederate, Pacifist, reactionary, revolutionist, Socialist, Stalinist, Trotskyite, Angela Merkel-loving, body-piercing, government-expanding, holistic-wacko, Hollywood-loving, Kum Bah Yah-singing, latte-drinking, neurotic, New York Times-reading, perverted, pierced-nose, sushi-eating, tax-hiking, tofu-chomping, vegan, Volvo-driving, weenie, left-wing freak show SOCIALIST COMMIE PINKOS who HATE AMERICA and HATE OUR FREEDOMS and WANT BIG BROTHER TO DICTATE EVERY ASPECT OF OUR LIVES!
TRUE CHRISTIANS UNITE!™
GOD'S LAW IS CLEAR -- THE PENALTY SEVERE!!
YOU DON’T BREAK GOD’S LAWS — GOD’S LAWS BREAK YOU!!!
MAGA yesterday! MAGA today!! MAGA forevermore!!!!
Now, if you're a conservative, doesn't that make you feel like you've got the love of Jesus, love of Jesus down in your heart?
/scathing_snarkasm
very clever! And not at all insane. I suspect that Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson would approve.
Whew! That was a lot to read in one breath! I managed . . . barely. Thanks, I think, for the list.
I was a couple of lines in before I realized the list was alphabetized.
You forgot baby eating and satan worshipping.
We better agree with conservatives or get labeled as one of the above
Obviously, a "life of perpetual unhappiness" is the whole point. It is called "the pursuit of happiness", not "the catching of happiness" or "the achievement of happiness." Blame it on the founding fathers.
or maybe the bossa nova.
That's such a good thought! And point!
Exactly!
Everyone has an opinion including NYtimes editorial writers.It's an opinion not the truth.We need to distinguish fact from opinion...that's what adults do.
Male conservatives, in general, have a need to satisfy their personal egos no matter the subject. Example Donald Trump. Dave Peacefull