President Obama and Columnist Rich Lowry Inadvertently Proved the Merit of Op Ed Writer Kathleen Parker’s Observation that — “Dumbness permeates every aspect of our lives”

18 July 2012

Theme — intelligence misused is still stupidity

To get to that, we have to prepare the ground:

First comes Kathleen Parker’s published observation about national dumbness.

Second is proof of Parker’s observation — in the form of silly statements, about the same issue, from President Obama and opinion writer Rich Lowry.

Yesterday, Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker wrote about cultural stupidity

She said:

Dumbness permeates every aspect of our lives, including, dangerously, our media.

I would go further

We are mired in a gluey morass of unrelenting, inescapable, nation-drowning, culture characterizing stupidity.

Laughably, President Obama and columnist Rich Lowry proved Parker’s “dumbness” point — on essentially the same news day

The statistical odds of this happening by chance are low.

Given that both men exhibited the same level of cloying mindlessness that Ms. Parker held to light, I think they both can credit themselves with proving her point.

The President exhibited his customary lack of intellectual integrity, while making a speech aimed at garnering support for raising taxes on people with money

The fact that he did this on astute political purpose makes Parker’s “dumb culture” point.

If we were smarter, we would not let him, or any prominent person, get away with the following nonsense:

“If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that,” Obama said Friday, referring to the government-funded tools that entrepreneurs have at their disposal.

Here’s the entire quote:

If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”

“Pete, what’s the problem with what the President said? We’re all connected.”

The President’s statement lacks even the most trivial of absolutely critical “Truth” nuances.

Sure, we all depend on each other. And government infrastructure does lend invaluable assistance to many.

BUT — there is indeed something different about successful entrepreneurs and business builders. And the difference is not always just luck, though chance plays a bigger role than most of them (and us) want to admit.

Intentionally avoiding the multi-faceted prongs of an accurate discussion about entrepreneurs, rich people, economics, society, and taxes, President Obama was simply demagoguing.

The President’s lack of intellectual integrity:

(i) deprived the public of an opportunity to think about Reality in a more revealing way,

(ii) encouraged the continued reign of national stupidity,

and

(iii) invited his political opponents to reply in equally dim-witted kind.

For a man of the President’s intelligence and political skill to do this — and to think that it is intellectually and ethically acceptable — reflects on the all-embracing qualities of the toilet into which American culture has fallen.

Proof One to Kathleen Parker.

Not to be outdone in the Dumbness Marathon, Republican columnist Rich Lowry put his own lack of honestly used brain on display in response to the President’s absurdities

National Review’s Rich Lowry rightfully seized on the idiocies in the President’s integrity-lacking statements:

For that most American figure of the self-made man, exemplified most famously by Benjamin Franklin and Abraham Lincoln, President Obama wants to substitute the figure of the guy who happened to get lucky while not paying his fair share in taxes.

What a dreary and pinched view of human endeavor. What a telling insight into his animating philosophy.

[T]he hallmark of the man of extraordinary accomplishment isn’t simply work. Some of us may work as hard as Steve Jobs. Few of us are as single-minded, risk-taking, shrewd, or visionary. Millions of us could work twelve-hour days for years yet never come up with the idea for the iPad, let alone successfully manufacture and market it.

To redefine Steve Jobs as the product of the (necessary and unremarkable) infrastructure and government services around him is to devalue human creativity.

Unfortunately, Mr. Lowry was (apparently) so infuriated with the President that he wound up abandoning critical thinking in favor of dangling a non sequitur — which depends on emotion, rather than reason, to make its implied “anti-tax” point:

Without the liberty and rule of law that characterize America, entrepreneurship would indeed be impossible. Any successful American who is not a patriot is a rank ingrate.

But the president believes that among the highest expressions of patriotism are a 39.6 percent top individual tax rate and a 25 percent capital-gains rate.

There are few phrases that President Obama likes less than “on your own.” He considers it a lie when people think they’ve made it on their own, and he thinks that the most damning thing that can be said about the Republican vision is that it will leave people on their own.

For him, “we’re in this together,” and the inspiring institution embodying that togetherness is none other than the Internal Revenue Service.

“Pete, what’s wrong with what Rich Lowry said? He provided the numbers.”

What is wrong with Mr. Lowry’s conclusion is that it is just as emotion-dependent, and as intellectually unnuanced, as the President’s foolish statements.

Lowry makes no reasoned argument against raising taxes on rich entrepreneurs (or anyone else), other than the implied one that they are special.

He also makes no attempt to show what the majority of successful entrepreneurs actually pay in taxes, given the “loopholes” that dominate the system.

In other words, Mr. Lowry, exactly like the President, completely distorted the realities of the American situation, so as to make political gains at Truth’s expense.

As a result, Mr. Lowry:

(i) deprived the public of an opportunity to think about Reality in a more revealing way,

(ii) encouraged the continued reign of national stupidity,

and

(iii) invited his political opponents to reply in equally dim-witted kind.

Proof Two to Ms. Parker.

The moral? — Intelligent dumb-behinds magnify to America’s stupidity burden

Kathleen Parker is correct:

Dumbness permeates every aspect of our lives, including, dangerously, our media.

Were the American media more professionally motivated and intellectually astute, they would call these prominent manipulators on their distortions at every turn.

But that seems to be too much to hope for. Conflict between foaming butt-heads is so much more fun for we slightly evolved apes to watch.

Am I too cynical?

Probably not, given the history of the last three decades.

The 2012 election is not going to change our sewage-like course.

PeteFree.com

President Obama and Columnist Rich Lowry Inadvertently Proved the Merit of Op Ed Writer Kathleen Parker’s Observation that — “Dumbness permeates every aspect of our lives”