Sen. Wellstone, campaign prop
You beat me to it, Sal — I was about to post on the Wellstone funeral, too. This does illustrate the difference between political liberals and the rest of the world. I’m not talking about people who happen to be liberal, but about professional liberals: people who are employed by politicians or unions or government agencies, whose mission in life is to advance liberal causes. The whole event was thoroughly distasteful, though I had a large amount of respect for Senator Wellstone himself.
To them, even death can be politicized, and is worthy of being politicized, because all of life is political, and all justice must be achieved here on earth through politics. So if there is a groundswell of pity for the Wellstone family, the liberal politician thinks, “How can we translate this enthusiasm into votes?” (There are conservatives and Republicans who think this way, but they’re the exceptions.) They see no contradiction in attacking Republicans for “playing politics” when they say that Mondale is a poor choice for senator, and then they turn around and hold a political pep rally at a funeral.
Liberals have a problem with sacralizing the secular. What I mean by that is that they treat contingent, transitory things like politics as if they are the most important things. Therefore, death is just one more thing that can be ordered toward gaining an advantage over one’s political enemies. Want more proof? Look at the rhetoric of people like celebrities, columnists, and professors, who do not have to stand for elections, and see how they are not content to merely disagree with others’ views. You get the sense that they think conservatives and Republicans are not merely horrible wrong, but unrighteous for holding contrary opinions, e.g.: if you want lower taxes, you hate the poor. If you want to govern your own retirement, you want to throw old people into dumpsters. If you’re against abortion, you hate women. If you want to own a gun, you want to hurt kids. And on and on….
Again: I’m not talking about rank-and-file Democrats, just the pros. Please don’t get offended, unless you’re one of the pros, in which case you can get as offended as you want.