Conor Rogers, Editor
Ideology: Moderate Republican | Writing from: Washington, DC
Glenn Beck’s CPAC keynote address made few departures from what one might expect in keynote address to a gathering of the nation’s conservatives, yet some elements of the speech that drew the loudest applause had nothing to do with politics or conservatism at all.
Beck railed against a culture – our culture – in which “every kid gets a medal” and where “teachers don’t use red ink anymore.” He criticized little leagues where “everybody wins” and schools that are afraid to tell students that they’ve failed or done something wrong.
Beck, as sensationalist and emotional as he may be, has a point – and he speaks from experience. The former alcoholic-turned-TV-millionaire credited all his success (his radio show, book deals and TV program) to the fact that he was one day, decades ago, allowed to fail. He was proven wrong by his own actions, and he remains thankful that there was nothing in place to allow him to “fall easily.” He credits all his successes to the fact he was allowed, even blessed, to fall hard, because all that was left to do was pick himself up and get to work.
Beck is by no means a rich kid with a safety net who screwed up and got helped by Dad. He went back and forth to college over the years as he could afford it on his own dime and educated himself. In a quote that drew rousing cheers from the room, he stated “I couldn’t afford college – but I never asked ‘how come he gets to go and I don’t?’ I educated myself, and I’m proud of that.”
The keynote address touched on something that’s completely missing from media investigations as to where the Tea Party came from, or what conservatives are so angry about. The media and punditry have come up with a few answers, namely that Americans are angry at big government, swayed by things like “death panels,” or simply just mad at the unemployment rate. But Beck’s speech – and its rousing CPAC reception – proves that there is more to the growing conservative outrage.
People aren’t angry at a government trying to get bigger, they are angry at a government trying to help them. They are angry at a government that’s telling them that “you can’t do this on your own – you need Washington to help you.” They are angry at a government that they see as punishing success in order to provide some sort of national safety net.
Perhaps this is something uniquely American, or at the very least an intrinsic part of how conservatives view America: people make it on their own in America as if to say, “I don’t need your help, Government.” As Glenn Beck put it, “[the government] is trying to take away your right to struggle.”
This, in its simplest form, is the source of the current divide between conservatives and liberals. Conservatives have proclaimed a right to struggle, a right to hard work, a right to proprietorship, and the right to be self-made. Liberals by and large have sought to alleviate that same struggle, in essence creating the notion that citizens have a right to be free from struggle.
In the mind of a conservative, this all ties in together with a fourth grader who gets a check minus instead of a failing grade. When kids fail and get an “E+” or gets to re-take the test, they haven’t learned what it means to fail, so they don’t learn how to succeed. For those in the Tea Party movement, it was bad enough when teachers told their kids that failing wasn’t so bad, and the school gave medals to everyone for showing up with cleats on – but now the government wants to tell banks that fail that they get a piece of the nation’s collective success? Conservatives are fighting for this “right to fail” because when failure is eliminated, so is a drive to recover and succeed.
As the great-grandson of an Irish immigrant who mailed back his Depression-era welfare checks with the word “SHAME!” written across, perhaps I’m partial to Beck’s argument, but then again, as the same great-grandson who grew up in the suburbs of the very same New York City in which my relatives struggled and fought through the Depression, maybe I’m living proof that Beck’s got a point.
You are grossly oversimplifying the interplay between individualism and the current political atmosphere. Don’t color me surprised, however. I’d expect nothing less from someone who is regurgitating a Glenn Beck speech.
If we are to believe people like Beck who cast an aspersion of rugged individualism upon America, how do we account for the advent of the Populist in the 1890s? How do you explain the popularity of Teddy Roosevelt’s “Square Deal?” If a “uniquely American” aversion to government is at the heart of our current political climate, then how in the hell did Franklin Roosevelt become the longest serving President in American history? I could go on and on and on but I think you get my point.
America is an exceptional nation. Our exceptionalism, however, is not the product of the type of liberal tradition that you outline. Instead, we derrive our exceptionalism from the way in which this liberal tradition coexists with an equally strong progressive tradition. Say what you want about your grandfather, but I know that as another descendant of Irish immigrants, I would not be where I am today if it wasn’t for the New Deal.
In the middle of an argument about health care reform, an elderly conservative relative of mine commented that she “wanted government to stay away from her medicare.” I think this paradoxical capacity to demonize government while readily embracing government assistance perfectly captures the unique (or “exceptional”) coexistence of these two traditions.
No Tyler, I’m not oversimplifying this, Glenn Beck is. I’m not sure what it is about some of you on the left but I can’t quote Palin, Beck or O’Rielly without being accused of “regurgitating.”
-Read it carefully, I was examining and drawing a conclusion about tea partiers.
-Your final story about the woman and medicare actually does more to explain my point about the sentiment among conservatives…I was explaining the tea party anger, not advancing it.
*Populist Movement in the 1890s
The “coexistence” you cite as a virtue is actually an open wound that never heals. The Emma Goldmans of American, and the Ida Tarbells never cease putting private individuals and public institutions on the defensive, and changing the values and the rules. Glenn Beck is to be commended for educating an unsuspecting public to the dangers and intoxicating allure of “progressives.” They needs stakes in their hearts. Nine times.
Thanks to you guys who went to CPAC for reporting on it. We in the provinces only hear about it through third parties.
Don’t worry about it, Connor. People like Tyler are just grasping at straws.
Tyler- Your anecdote about “keeping the governemtn out of medicare” has been related by many others. i’ve heard it from stephanopoulus (sp) , frank rich, chris matthews and other liberal spouting heads. maybe it did really happen to you, but its becoming a bit of an urban legend.
and you’re wrong about American exceptionalism. It comes from the fact that anyone can succeed here with hard work and luck. i know we are not supposed to say it anymore but there is no country on earth as attractive to people with big dreams, no country is as fair in its treatment of all races and sexes and colors and religions. no matter what the other countries advertise and the newspapers and tv sell. northern europe is incredibly bigoted and biased in terms of financial success, asean countires are outright supporters of racial inequality, africa is brutal to foreigners, etc….etc. NOWHERE will you find the exceptional character of individualism, yes the rugged kind, blended with self determination and justice. The new deal of fdr is an aberration in american history. we still can’t swallow it 60 years on. he was wrong, we don’t have the right to freedom from fear. the governmet can’t provide that for eveyone without bankrupting itself. fear of failure is what drives people who try again and again. the only failure is not trying again. if you are proud of the fact that your grandparents needed the new deal to remain here i can see why your a liberal. government perpetuated entitlements are choking us. this most recent expansion of government could very well be the last straw. eventually you run out of other people’s money but before you do, promising it to voters is a good way to get elected even four times in a row
Yes, Yoda, right on. The feds are bankrupt, but they run the printing press. The states are bankrupt, as are the cities, and everybody’s expected to come to heel for ‘stimulus”. The plates can’t keep spinning. It’s been set up this way by a corrupt government establishment that buys votes with other people’s money.
Our money. And they skim.