Those Who Don't Put Childish Things Away

Someone sent me what I guess is supposed to be a spreadsheet that I'm told was concocted by a fanatical Bernie Sanders supporter.   It purports to show corruption in the process.  The thing is so illogically, no, pathologically constructed that I can't begin to fathom what she thinks it is supposed to show.

From what I can gather, she entirely discounts the primaries, including only data from caucuses to come to the conclusion that about two-million of the actual votes that Hillary Clinton is ahead by aren't there and that Bernie Sanders is going to be the real nominee.   Well, wouldn't it be nice if we could come up with the real true figure of our real wealth by considering our income while excluding, you know, expenses.

I am familiar with the woman who did this and I knew she was prone to believing what she wants to believe and to throwing self-indulgent angry tantrums before this but, really, if this is the way they're thinking in Bernie or Bust land, they're even more guilty of fostering irrationality than I'd suspected.

This campaign for the nomination has exposed a lot of why the nominal left has lost in the past.  I was pretty hard on Susan Sarandon the other day - for good reason - but what she said is mild compared to some others are spouting.

I am very far to the left, as far to the left and more so than Bernie Sanders on some issues such as guns, but I've got to tell my fellow leftists that you don't get to have your own facts, you certainly don't get to have your own mathematics.  No matter what Michael Moore says, you don't get to have your own rule of law and legal process.  Moore is another one whose respect is running at a deficit with me.  I have to tell them that a lie isn't as good as the truth even if you can get other people to angrily rant and vent with you by telling them.

As recently as last winter I thought Bernie Sanders was better than this, I still hope to come out of this thinking he's better than some of his more febrile followers.  But I've got to tell you that this is the year that I've come to the conclusion that the reason figures and publications and institutions of the left don't have more influence than they do isn't merely because they're locked out and lied about. A lot of it has to do with the kind of self-deluded, paranoid, self-damaging fantasy that a lot of these people live in.  I will say that a lot of that comes from the supposed big centers of leftism, New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, even.   A lot of it comes from the capitol city of unreality, Hollywood.

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A Response

I am tired of the same people who whine and complain that the only reason everyone in the world doesn't vote for the candidates of the left is because of lies but who are the first ones to flip out when you propose making those same lies have consequences for the media who lie them.   You can't have it both ways.  Either you pretend that lies don't have an effect on peoples' voting behavior as you pretend that pornography has no effect on their sexual conduct or you admit that in order for democracy to live, media has to be prevented from peddling lies with the most audience tested methods for effectively selling lies.   Democracy, government of, by and for, The People is sacrificed on the altar of First Amendment absolutism and there is no group more enthusiastic about that sacrifice than the people who make money out of the media, the liars and their lawyers, foremost among them.

The theory that the truth will naturally triumph over lies by some inherent atavistic force is the biggest of those lies.  It is being disproved in this election, certainly on the Republican side and, I'm afraid, likely to be disproved in the general election ONCE AGAIN.   The history of the power of lying in politics, in public affairs, in business is massive proof that it wins far more often than is safe. This past half century, after the Sullivan decision gave lies the same protected status as the truth has been an experiment in how that theory favors liars and the corporate oligarchs who own the media.

Free speech absolutists of the supposed left are the chumps of the oligarchs and their PR operation. They have sold out The People for some of the worst in entertainment and some of the most over-rated literature in history.    If Ulysses had to go to save democracy, government by an accurately informed public, I have little doubt that an effective majority on the left who have never read the thing through as they mouth reverence for it and pretend to love it would let democracy go.  Frankly, I don't think people who would do that deserve to be taken seriously.   They deserve to be shoved aside and ignored.