Faith maintenance

It turns out Dan Riehl is as adept at reading words as situations:

I should apologize and confess to having previously torn off a quick, mostly hyperbolic and silly rant in response to this by Michael Gerson. I read through it, but right over my name, as well. So, I didn’t think Mr. Gerson was genuinely interested in what bloggers might actually think until now. h/t Newsbusters.

Translation:

Until someone else pointed out that he’d quoted me, I didn’t think he was interested in what people like me have to say.

That’s a remarkable confession when you think about it, and says quite a bit about the current state of conservative blogs: everyone assumes they know what everyone else is thinking, so they stop reading what they actually write but continue to attack each other anyway. As far as I can gather—it’s rather confusing—it seems like the purity test of the week is not whether conservatives will be pragmatic and advocate voting for Christine O’Donnell, but whether they will hold their tongue or speak their piece about her obvious flaws as a candidate while doing so. Were I a fiscal conservative, I’d be bothered by the disconnect between her life and her professed ideals to the point of questioning whether the latter were nothing more than lip service; but as I am, for the most part, just chuffed that the Republicans of Delaware selected an unelectable candidate, I don’t feel the need to weigh in.

Not even on the Donalde’s latest self-deflating argument, because I’m increasingly convinced that he’s engaged in some sort of performance art. No actual human, much less a teacher, could consider this an invitation to debate, or respond to its inevitable (and quite reasonable) rejection by issuing the following complaint:

There’s a word for this: Anti-intellectualism. And that stance marinates in a devilish sauce of hard left-wing hubris and deceit. It’s further soaked in hatred, for to hate one’s enemies is to categorize them as beyond the pale of reason and civilization.

The worst thing about this cooking show? The Donalde spent all night writing the script. So my choices are “sad, sad little man” or “brilliant performance artist,” and because I want to maintain my faith in humanity, I’m going with the latter.

Comments

[Bjkeefe]

Thanks for noticing the Donald's performance on my blog. It was pretty entertaining, wasn't it?