MCMINNVILLE, Ore. (BP)–Why is it when liberals triumph in an election — any election — the people have spoken and the democratic experiment is said to have worked? However, when conservatives win an election — any election — the cry is that the “radical right” has taken over and somehow democracy has been hijacked.
To hear most liberals tell it, a conservative has never won an election — he or she somehow stole it or managed to deceive the voters. I will admit to grave disappointment when “my” candidate loses — and living in the liberal La-La Land of Oregon, I am constantly disappointed.
I was perplexed and disheartened when Bill Clinton was elected — both times. However, not once did the thought ever enter my mind that liberals had spiked the American electorate’s punch bowl. My disappointment was profound because I wondered what the election of a man so lacking in character indicated about the moral temperature of the United States.
In the most recent election, the candidate I supported for governor in the Beaver State lost a very close election. I never felt anger or attempted to blame any “left-wing” conspiracy. (You never hear the mainstream media even suggest such a thing). Rather, I took solace in the fact that the margin of defeat was so narrow. In my mind, there is hope that the voters in Oregon are growing weary of almost two decades of liberal dominance in the statehouse. Who knows, perhaps in four years a conservative can “hijack the election” and “take over” the governor’s office. If Bill Clinton can twice be elected president and Jimmy Carter can win the Nobel Peace Prize, anything is possible.
“The predominant liberal emotion is indignation,” writes Dinesh D’Souza in his book “Letters to a Young Conservative.” The Rishwain Research Scholar at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University goes on to observe, “Liberals are always ‘shocked and appalled’ by something.” One need only to stop, look and listen after an election in which liberals lose to see he is right.
In a recent rant on his program that airs on the Public Broadcasting System, Bill Moyers threw an apoplectic fit concerning the results of the most recent election. The PBS icon did a great Chicken Little impersonation declaring that Republicans are going to ram a “right-wing agenda” down the throats of helpless Americans. “George W. Bush believes he now has a mandate,” asserted Moyers, and as a result pregnant women will be forced to birth unwanted babies, the poor will be looted and the environment will be destroyed — and the Republican-controlled House and Senate will accomplish all of this before lunch!
In Moyers’ liberal world, someone or something must be to blame. Surely the people could not have spoken in this last election. So how does he explain the liberal loss? Money. Yes indeed, money. It seems that those repugnant Republicans raised more money than the Democrats (How dare they!), and thus were able to deceive the gullible American public with deceptive advertising. The people were duped! It is grounds for a re-vote!
Not to be outdone by Moyers, soon to be minority leader of the House, Tom Daschle went on the stump blaming — of all things — talk radio in general, and Rush Limbaugh in particular, for the recent liberal meltdown. In an interview, Daschle said, “If we’re going to try to break through as Democrats, we have to have the same edge as Republicans.” That “edge,” in Daschle’s mind is talk radio.
He went on to suggest that the “shrill edge” of Limbaugh and his “wannabes” have even placed he and other leaders in peril. “When I was accused of being an obstructionist, there was a corresponding and very significant increase in the number of issues that my family and I had to deal with….” I am sorry, Mr. Daschle, I have trouble believing that simply being called an obstructionist — which, by the way, you are — increased death threats on you and your family.
Liberals simply cannot admit that they lost in the last election. In their left-leaning way of looking at things, conservatives manipulated the masses with money and mind control via talk radio Svengalis. Liberals have the right to assert whatever they want concerning any election. As Hubert Humphrey once observed, “The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously.” And right now, it seems many are simply not taking liberals very seriously.
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Boggs is pastor of Valley Baptist Church, McMinnville, Ore.
