I VOTED FOR Ronald Reagan.
I almost never missed an episode of Firing Line, and I didn't watch for any other reason than to cheer on William F. Buckley Jr.
So, the other day, I was musing over what exactly happened to me, to turn me into a self-proclaimed liberal.
The answer, as near as I can see, is nothing—or at least, very little.
My political views have changed only by degrees, and many of them have remained the same.
The big change is in the world of political rhetoric—a change in what labels like "liberal" and "conservative" have come to mean, and in who's doing the talking for the right and for the left.
The example which came across my desk while I was musing about this was another of those right-wing emails.
I'm not going to bother to do an extensive analysis this time around, but I'll quote just enough to give you a sense of why it affected me the way it did:
Government control through taxation in the guise of Health Care "Reform"
One of the surprises we'll find come next year, is what follows - - a little "surprise" that 99% of us had no idea was included in the "new and improved" health care legislation . . .. the dupes, er, dopes, who backed this administration will be astonished!
Starting in 2011, (next year folks), your W-2 tax form sent by your employer will be increased to show the value of whatever health insurance you are given by the company. It does not matter if that's a private concern or governmental body of some sort. If you're retired? So what; your gross will go up by the amount of insurance you get.
You will be required to pay taxes on a large sum of money that you have never seen. Take your tax form you just finished and see what $15,000 or $20,000 additional gross does to your tax debt. That's what you'll pay next year. For many, it also puts you into a new higher bracket so it's even worse.
What can I say?
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Lie #1: The tax this email talks about doesn't begin "next year"—it begins in 2018.
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Lie #2: It isn't paid by you, the taxpayer—it's paid by the insurance company.
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Lie #3: It isn't on the entire amount of the health care premiums—it's only on the amount over $27,500. So it only affects the most expensive, "Cadillac", plans, and only the top few dollars of those.
So if your health plan costs $28,000 per year, your insurance company—not you—will be taxed on just the $500 difference. -
Lie #4: Your gross, for tax purposes, will not go up "$15,000 or $20,000—it will not go up at all.
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Lie #5: You won't, therefore, be pushed into a higher tax bracket—since your gross, and your net, will not be affected.
This post isn't about health care, or taxes, so I'll stop there.
The important point is that an old-fashioned conservative—whether a man-in-the-street conservative or an intellectual, think-tank, conservative—would never have written this email.
The person who wrote it knew the truth.
And didn't care.
The last lines of the email say it all:
Why am I sending you this? The same reason I hope you forward this to every single person in your address book.
People have the right to know the truth because an election is coming in November.
Aside from the shameless claim about a "right to know the truth" when the author is spreading bald faced lies, these two lines are very instructive.
The intelligentsia of the right wing has been taken over by people who only care about winning elections and influencing policy—in many cases there's no clear line between them and the lobbyists they represent.
And so there are only four kinds of conservatives left:
Next: Four kinds of conservatives...
