The Reality-Based Community

What the right wing loves to mock as “politically correct speech” is simply the application of the principle that groups of people, especially those whose social status is marginal, should not be referred to by demeaning names. Sarah Palin, for example, the mother of a developmentally disabled child, objects to the use of “retarded” as an insult. (At least, she objects to it when Rahm Emmanuel does it.) And she’s right to do so. Whether she also objects to “illegitimate” or the older “bastard” as ways of referring to the grandson born to her unmarried daughter is not, so far as I know, on the record, but if she does object she has some work to do with some of her fellow wingnuts. She seems to have no problem calling children brought to this country, through no fault of their own, before they were old enough to speak “illegal aliens.”

The entirely praiseworthy effort to be polite is not without its ironies, all relating to what J.K. Galbraith called the Iron Law of Euphemism. Even a neutral-sounding label will soon become pejorative if attached to an unpleasant reality or a despised group. Recall that the Hoover Administration introduced “temporary depression of economic activity” as a less-scary substitute for “crash” or “panic.”

In the case of developmental disability, the clinical terms “idiot,” “moron,” and “cretin” were introduced in the 19th Century to replace the demeaning ordinary-language “natural fool” or “dummy” (which latter served also to label those whose hearing impairment made it hard for them to learn to speak). Later, physicians who didn’t want to tell parents that their children were “idiots” started to tell them that those children were “slow learners,” or, more fomally, “educationally retarded.” It took some years for “RE-tard” to gather its insulting potency.

If Rahmbo had called an idea “idiotic” or “moronic,” (or, for that matter, “lame” or “crazy”) no one would have thought twice about it.

As my teacher Mark Moore likes to say, a good democratic citizen should be reluctant to give offense and slow to take offense.

A few talented Americans—Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover come to mind—retain the ability to surprise and repel even after you suspect that every awful fact about them is publicly known. Rush Limbaugh deserves mention within that distinguished group.

Limbaugh has made a career out of offering thinly-veiled attacks on racial and religious minorities, women, LGBT people, and many others. I suppose I should not be surprised that he adds the intellectually disabled to the list of people and groups he regularly insults. When he says, “There’s Going to Be a Retard Summit at the White House,” it is not the first time he has disparaged the idea that people don’t care to be called derogatory names that carry insulting connotations.

There is still something striking in his tone-deafness towards this specific group of Americans living with serious cognitive disabilities who have endured so much mistreatment and stereotyping, and whose advancement has been strongly supported by tens of millions of good people across the political spectrum in both political parties.

Perhaps the most novel element is watching Sarah Palin trying to explain away her transparent partisan hypocrisy in distinguishing her mild criticism of Limbaugh’s scripted comment to millions of people from her over-the-top attacks on Rahm Emanuel based on a far less offensive (though inappropriate) hyperbolic comment about political colleagues made in private. Palin is not alone in this hypocrisy.

The most depressing aspect of this story is not Limbaugh’s latest specific verbal outrage, but the fact that so many otherwise good people continue to identify with him among the general public and among conservatives in Washington. The man (along with Glenn Beck and others in the right-wing talk radio circuit) is a jackass and a lout. He deserves to be called out, not by some liberal University of Chicago professor, but by fellow conservatives. This isn’t news, but the silence is deafening.

The massive budget deficits that Barack Obama inherited – the predictable, and predicted, consequence of Bush Administration profligacy and the Great Recession – have been likened to a flood of red ink.  Now the President is trying to control the flood by cutting wasteful programs, and Sen. Shelby has responded to the elimination of two of his favorite pieces of pork by shutting down the confirmation process for all Presidential nominees.

Maybe Shelby can’t tell the difference between a flood of red ink and a Crimson Tide?

Update “Crimson Tide” has lost out as the label for this scandal. It’s now officially the “Shelby Shakedown.”

… that Toyota put so much effort and meanness into its efforts to keep its American plants union-free.  Otherwise, it might have run into quality problems.

No, what follows isn’t from  a DNC or Move-On press release.  It’s from a news story in the Wall Street Journal:

Republicans are stepping up their campaign to win donations from Wall Street, trying to capitalize on an increasing sense of regret among executives at big financial institutions for backing Democrats in 2008.

In discussions with Wall Street executives, Republicans are striving to make the case that they are banks’ best hope of preventing President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats from cracking down on Wall Street.

GOP strategists hope to benefit from the reaction to the White House’s populist rhetoric and proposals, which range from sharp critiques of bonuses to a tax on big Wall Street banks, caps on executive pay and curbs on business practices deemed too risky.

[snip]

Last week, House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio made a pitch to Democratic contributor James Dimon, the chairman and chief executive of J.P. Morgan, over drinks at a Capitol Hill restaurant, according to people familiar with the matter.

Mr. Boehner told Mr. Dimon congressional Republicans had stood up to Mr. Obama’s efforts to curb pay and impose new regulations.

The attack ads sorta write themselves, don’t they?

Fiscal conservative n. phr. Supporter of wasteful government spending.

At Sallie Mae, lobbyists for the firm are focusing on senators regarded as fiscal conservatives.

– NYT story on resistance to ending the student loan rip-off, saving taxpayers $80B over 10 years.