Right Wing = Dumb?

Most of the Democrats that I know are what I call "John F. Kennedy" or "Paul Wellstone" Democrats. They believe in individual rights and social justice. They believe that in an activist government that keeps the little guy from getting shafted by the big guy.

In fact, a Democratic float in a parade that I attended yesterday had a sign: "I'm for the little fellers, not the Rockefellers." That's a quote from Paul Wellstone.

However, while the left-wing is often quick to analyze what is ailing my Republican party (it's the tea partiers! no, no, it's the social conservatives!), I've seen very little dialogue on the left about a massive problem being experienced in the Democratic party.

The party has been infiltrated by elitist intellectuals who simply frame politics as the smart people in the Democrat party against the dummies in the Republican party.

Maureen Dowd goes "all in" with this theme in today's New York Times column, "Egghead and Blockheads." As a practical activist, I can't help but wonder how insulting thousands of middle-class voters helps the cause, but Dowd and her ilk don't need to worry about that--only the folks on the phone bank trying to win votes have to deal with that rhetoric.

In making her case, Dowd actually makes a couple of points easily challenged by blockheads like me.

Point one:

"Perry told the students, “God uses broken people to reach a broken world.” What does that even mean?"

Um, Maureen, anyone who attends church regularly understands the meaning of that phrase. Maybe you need to ask a blockhead neighbor on that one.

Point two:

"So we’re choosing between the overintellectualized professor and blockheads boasting about their vacuity?"

But, Maureen, as this columnist points out, some people measure "dumb" or "smart" by outcome. So it's getting harder to make the point that our intelligent President understands job and income growth.

Maybe folks like Dowd are getting more shrill as defeat looks plausible in 2012. Some liberal groups have been going after Mitt Romney in hopes of getting the more beatable nominee. That's a time-honor political practice (remember Rush Limbaugh's "operation chaos?"). But some liberal groups are thinking about backing off because they believe an Obama defeat is inevitable--and they may want the "lesser of two evils." For them, that's Romney.