When I was growing up, the motto on the editorial page of my hometown paper was that famous quote of Voltaire’s: “I disagree with what you say but will defend to the death your right to say it.”
Anyone out there today willing to go balls-to-the-wall for a dissenting point of view? Didn’t think so.
We’ve turned into a nation of shouters, whiners and complainers. When someone starts spouting a point of view that we don’t like, we start the no-nodding and the condescending smirking, and we don’t even let the spouter finish a sentence before we inform him he is a repulsive dumb ass.
So much for civil discourse or “free, robust and wide-open” debate. John Milton and John Locke would shit their philosophical pants if they cruised deep cable and saw Keith Olbermann off on one of his operatic rants, or if they happened on Bill Maher jumping down the throat of someone who dared to disagree with him. If they saw the jabbering heads exploding with rage and cross talk that turned hours of digitized signals into gibberish, they would run for the next available time machine.
So here comes Bernard Goldberg with .com/books/slobbering.html">A Slobbering Love Affair (Regnery, $25.95), which will never reach the audience that could most benefit from it. As with Bias, his earlier best-seller, Goldberg makes some strong points – and does so very entertainingly. But many will condemn the book without cracking the cover or even glancing at Goldberg’s arguments.
This article appears in Feb 25 – Mar 3, 2009.
