Nosce hostem! Know thine enemy!” This was the battle cry of Iowa Rep. Steve King at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
“Now who are we up against?” he continued. “I want to define that enemy. They are liberals, they are progressives . . . Che Guevarians . . . Castroites . . . socialists . . . Gramsciites, ring anybody’s bell?”
I shifted in my seat as I kept listening: “. . . Trotskyites, Maoists, Stalinists, Leninists, Marxists . . .”
Oh God, I thought. This thing has gotten ugly.
From the late ’40s to the late ’50s, a little known senator from Wisconsin named Joseph McCarthy conducted a zealous crusade to purge the United States of any traces of communism. With little proof and many untruths, McCarthy went on to severely disrupt the domestic politics of the time, resulting in nothing more than an increased sense of paranoia throughout the nation.
Besides the staunchly anti-Commie rhetoric, there are other similarities between the two. King is a congressman from Iowa’s fifth district &- an area of the country that could just as well disappear without any of us noticing. Like McCarthy before him, King understands that while your seat in Washington may not say much, the louder you scream, the better your chance of being heard. More importantly, both know how to play the blame game.
It seems as if every time Americans are faced with a serious dilemma, we immediately begin sharpening our knives and gritting our teeth, looking at each other for a scapegoat.
McCarthyism aside, take the fervor of delusional patriotism that gripped America following 9/11. The towers went down, the national psyche was shocked and instead of collectively rehabilitating our wounded nation, the American citizenry sought explanation in the ridiculous: The 9/11 Truth Movement gained speed amongst idiot liberals, and media demagogues like Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck became the pied-pipers of dim-witted conservatives.
All the while, as the intramural catfight continued, we complacently allowed our government to wage war on the wrong country over weapons we had given them. Oops!
Things aren’t too different today. There’s an uneasiness in American society &- the War on Terror continues almost a decade later and the financial crisis of late 2008 has dissipated to every aspect of life. With an unemployment rate pushing double digits, Middle America is desperate for an answer.
Listening to King at CPAC, I tried to follow his logic. He told his audience he wanted less state spending, more free market capitalism and more restrictions on everyone’s common enemy, Wall Street.
But the audience didn’t realize the snake was eating its tail. A freer market meant a stronger Wall Street, a stronger Wall Street would only lead to another Great Recession and, in turn, fewer jobs &- why didn’t these people understand?
It was a mischievously brilliant political play: The politicians had harnessed the fear and desperation of Middle America, turned it against them and converted it to votes. The same helpless masses that were in need of a social net had been spun so violently around for so long they were now stumbling around, punch drunk, on the verge of puking on themselves.
King went on to denounce global warming. “For the first time in the history of keeping records, there is snowfall on the ground in all 50 states,” he proudly proclaimed. I jerked back and frowned. Seriously, dude? In all 50 states? Even Hawaii?
It was at this point in the speech that I felt like going over to Iowa’s 5th district to fart on King’s pillow. But I was stopped by the sudden realization that these people actually believed this crap.
McCarthy used to employ a tactic known as the “multiple lie” with which he would spout an accusation so long and riddled with falsehoods that it was impossible for anyone to completely identify all its fallacies. For King, however, one lie was enough. I realized I was witnessing a breed of politic void of rational logic fueled by faith. It was a truly terrifying prospect &- the idea of a governing body and its people that had willingly disavowed science.
During the era of communist paranoia, one of McCarthy’s unwitting victims was Secretary of State Dean Acheson. Born of wealthy parents and having attended Yale and Harvard Universities, Acheson came under even more criticism for ignoring the needs of the average American. Recounting the experience in his memoirs, Acheson described the experience as “The Attack of the Primitives.”
And perhaps he’s right. American politics has begun to resemble a no-holds-barred, “roid-fueled cage match between chimps and trainers more than a logical system of governance. With nothing in their hands but a mess, panicked citizens are thumping their chests and screaming, looking in any direction to fling their feces. Perhaps we really are witnessing the devolution of the American public.
