One thing about getting older: When you see a certain set of symptoms, signs and behaviors, it's something you recognize; you don't get fooled so easily.
As Pamela Druckerman noted in today's NY Times, at 40 when you meet someone extremely charming, you have learned to be cautious instead of dazzled; you've gotten better at spotting narcissism. Rush Limbaugh, Hannitty, Bill O'Reilly, think they share that trait?
In the case of what Thomas Eagen calls (in another lovely piece in the same section of the Times) "the sulfurous talk radio wing that dominates the Republican Party," the new effort to ban gay marriage is simply another manifestation of the paranoid style of American politics which has been with us for generations, as Richard Hofstader pointed out when he was talking about Senator Joseph McCarthy, who sought to create a very scary threat, and then presented himself as the knight on horseback who was prepared to delivers us all from evil.
So it is with the sulfurous right and their "War on Christianity," and the law in Arizona which seeks to carve out an exception to civil rights laws which insist that anyone holding himself out to offer a service to the public must actually be willing to serve the entire public, not just the parts of the public he considers attractive or proper or morally acceptable.
Russ Douthat teases out some of the problems, on both sides of the argument, about these laws as they relate to gay marriage. The man who refuses to take photographs at a gay wedding, to bake a cake for that wedding has refused to serve a category of people, as surely as the owner of the lunch counter or the motel has refused to serve a whole category of people because they are black. All those refusing may have "moral" objections to gay behavior or to Blacks mixing with whites, but those "moral" or even, if you want to call them "religious" and deeply held objections run up against the law of the land, an expression of the will of the majority and they must give way.
But what is really behind all these Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannitty types is the desire to be angry, to find a cause which will make themselves indispensable to its solution. This is the modus operandi of the current Republican Party.
For many Tea Party Republicans it's not just the war against Christianity they are trying to mount their white chargers to ride to the rescue: No, these hero Republicans must also save the nation from those reckless, degenerate Democrats trying to bankrupt the nation with unrestrained spending. So, these same Republicans who are the loudest mouths proclaiming their love of the military find money for Veterans medical care and benefits has to be cut because cutting government spending trumps the cause of the veterans. Only austerity can save us now. Let us self flagellate and stop spending any government money, and we will save the economy and our children's future.
On the other hand, Republicans are perfectly willing to spend money on for profit colleges, because those colleges are A. Not Harvard, which is to say, not elitist and B. Are all about profit, and everyone knows the profit motive is the highest Christian value. Never mind that the median debt of the student who gets his BA from a for profit is $33,000 compared to $18,000 for the non profit college grad. And, as far as the numbers go, it looks as if a degree from Hesser College or Phoenix may not be worth what a degree from the University of New Hampshire or from the University of Michigan may be worth. At least, that's what it looks like from the default rates, which is substantially higher among debtors to the non profit colleges, who claim they could not market their degrees.
Does it not strike anyone that a degree purchased on line may not carry the same weight at a job interview as a degree from the University of California, Berkeley? But the kid from Alton Bay, New Hampshire, who comes from a family of eight, neither parent nor any of her siblings having gone to college, may not understand that her degree from the University of Phoenix may not translate into the return on investment she anticipates, especially if part of the money is approved by her veteran's benefits, which seems to offer official assurance the on line degree is a bone fide ticket to the next step up the ladder.
And here we have the really impolitic question: Does the economic advantage of a college degree derive from the piece of paper, the credential, or from what you learned to qualify and be awarded that paper or from the cachet that piece of paper conveys, as a symbol of your entitlement to a place in a particular American caste?
This is an open question--the value of a college degree. There may be as many answers as there are individuals who hold them.
But there is one answer which is not in dispute. And that is that not all arguments have two equally meritorious sides. The Republican party in the 21st century is not the revolutionary party of Abraham Lincoln; it has become sulfurous collection of saboteurs, intent on destroying the federal government and having a grand old party in Washington, while they do it.
The tactic is easily recognizable: Create a scare, present yourself as the savior and dazzle the masses with your insight, and your revealed truth: The profit motive is always best, and we must only do what our God tells us to do, not what the government tells us to do, because, after all, we are a Christian nation.
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