Rod Dreher

It May Be Crap, But It’s Our Crap

The Uses of Hypocrisy

By Rod Dreher • July 11, 2012, 2:01 PM

Matthew Franck on Mitt Romney’s doubletalk on Obamacare:

In the Romney camp, one must now hold these ideas in one’s head simultaneously: 1) the individual mandate is an “unconstitutional penalty; 2) therefore the Court’s ruling was wrong, and the dissent was correct; 3) but the Court has spoken, and what it says is the “law of the land”; 4) therefore the mandate’s penalty is really a tax; 5) so the president has been responsible for a tax increase; 6) and as for the highly similar situation in Massachusetts under RomneyCare, we’re just not going to talk about it.

Meanwhile, Sonny Bunch on liberals and giving Obama a pass:

Most conservatives don’t actually have a problem with the policies that the president is advocating. What conservatives have a problem with is the way in which liberals treated incredibly difficult issues of national security—Gitmo, GWOT, drones, waterboarding, etc.—as little more than a political cudgel with which to bash someone they didn’t like and then, when their guy was in office, ceased giving a shit.

Hypocrisy in politics is nothing new, of course. But there is something weirdly, madly galling about people arguing that pretending to drown someone who has information about an imminent terrorist attack is a Hague-worthy offense while blowing them the f—k up isn’t that big of a deal.

Posted in Politics. Tagged Barack Obama, hypocrisy, Matthew J. Franck, Mitt Romney, politics, Sonny Bunch.

22 Responses to The Uses of Hypocrisy

Siarlys Jenkins says:

July 11, 2012 at 2:15 pm

Of course I agree on Romney’s hypocrisy. I never had any use for Mitt, and I’m voting for Obama.

On the hypocrisy of liberals, I agree in principle. I have to offer a more nuanced response, because I’m still voting for Obama.

Starting with the easy part: in war, the rules for helpless captives in custody have always been very different from the rules for people who are under arms, actively opposing your forces. Has that become a difficult distinction for conservatives to make?

As for Gitmo: Obama was not elected king of the world, only president of the United States. Congress wouldn’t approve his plan, and he had no authority to move forward in the face of congressional disapproval. It is too his credit that he didn’t try.

Now someone will raise his recent executive order concerning immigration enforcement in the absence of congressional approval of the DREAM Act. The executive order did not make an act a crime, nor make an act proscribed by congress not a crime. It did set priorities for allocating a limited number of personnel and resources assigned to enforcement of laws congress did pass. When all the hard-core criminals and blatant recent adult illegal border- crossers are in custody, then we might split hairs over whether 28 year olds who grew up in America since the age of 2 should be deported.
Tyro says:

July 11, 2012 at 2:37 pm

Well, I think Sonny Bunch is making a disingenuous “both sides do it” argument. It was Obama who banned the use of torture, and it was Obama who attempted to close Gitmo and transfer the prisoners into a secure domestic facility, only to have Congress make it illegal to do so after some crazed demagoguery on their part– in part because few people in congress are willing to admit Bush was wrong or accept their own complicity in that moral mistake. Obama graciously was willing to give them a moral pass on all of that in exchange for closing Gitmo and banning torture, and my big disappointment is that Obama did not retaliate against Congress’s betrayal by prosecuting torturers and the Iraq fraudmakers to the full extend of the law.
Zathras says:

July 11, 2012 at 2:44 pm

“But there is something weirdly, madly galling about people arguing that pretending to drown someone who has information about an imminent terrorist attack is a Hague-worthy offense while blowing them the f—k up isn’t that big of a deal.”

This is utter B.S. The Hague and Geneva conventions have different rules here. It may look inconsistent in a feel-good sense, but it is completely consistent what the laws of war.
Floridan says:

July 11, 2012 at 2:52 pm

Well, I see it has already been said, but it bears repeating — whether it is on the battlefield or on the streets here, there’s a big difference between a felon/terrorist who is armed and dangerous and on the loose, and one that is in custody.

As for Gitmo, it’s not the liberals “don’t give a shit” anymore, it’s just that unless the makeup of Congress changes, there’s not much that can be done about it. The situation would be quite different if Republicans were willing to close the facility and Obama were to say that he changed his mind.
Patrick says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:05 pm

Politics is tiresome, and I won’t be voting on anything but local measures this time. Still, hearing that “most conservatives” are upset by liberal hypocrisy is rather galling considering EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON. one the political right carried water for George W. Bush for nearly eight years while he ran up deficits and, oh yeah, began a war and *signed* the Troubled Asset Relief Program. I mean, the guy made Lyndon Johnson look stingy, and *all of the right* not only carried water for the guy for eight years, but had the balls to impugn the patriotism and sanity (remember Bush Derangement Syndrome) of anyone who dare critique the guy.

And I say this as someone who voted for Bob Barr, not Obama, in 2008! I’m not even a man of the left! But I’ll be hanged before I let a Bush voter lecture anyone on carrying water for their guy. Why don’t you guys stuff your mouths with some crow and think about keeping your d— mouth shut lest we go to another war in Iran?
Turmarion says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:08 pm

I’d basically agree, but I want to point out that some of us are not going to vote for either major candidate this fall after having voted for Obama the first time and been burned; and I would like to point out, and give kudos to, Glenn Greenwald, who, while liberal, has scrupulously given Bush and Obama equal hell for the same actions.
Sheldon says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:12 pm

Siarlys Jenkins beat me to it – by Bunch’s logic, torture should be ok, as it is usually preferable to being killed. In fact the moral difference between torturing a prisoner in your possession who has been take off the field of battle vs. killing a potential combatant has been recognized for millennia. In addition, Bunch’s implication that we only tortured “someone who has information about an imminent terrorist attack” is simply wrong. He also neglects to mention one little detail: Several of the prisoners we tortured died as a result.

The fact is Obama ended torture and tried to close Gitmo. Do I think the drone campaign is both morally problematic and a dangerous precedent? I sure do. So were the estimated 200,000 Iraqi civilians killed by Bush during the Iraq war, which used far less targeted means to prevail.

All that said, is Bunch right in his basic point – that liberals have been a lot tougher on Bush’s crossing of the line than they have been on Obama’s? Yes, he is. This is the new polarized political environment we now inhabit. Bunch should write a comparable piece about what the Republican reaction would have been to the ACA if a Republican President had passed it.
Liam says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:25 pm

I know plenty of liberals who complain volubly (not just among themselves but to the White House) about Obama’s capture by the national security establishment. (What we got was Clinton The Sequel (but without any personal drama), as many worried in 2008 but hoped would not be the case.) The same people who also oppose the unconstitutional Libyan intervention and oppose anything of that sort for Syria et cet. ad nauseam.

That said, there was only one Republican of note (not counting the marginal guys) who would have made a difference: Ron Paul. I voted for him in the primary and I know I wasn’t alone.

Mounting an intra-party challenge to a sitting president by pissed-off liberals was not feasible. The last time that was tried was Kennedy against Carter, and even that didn’t work. In fact, it hasn’t worked in either party since 1968 (for the Democrats; since 1912 for the Republicans), so blaming folks for not trying is a lot of hot air.

And there is absolutely no reason to imagine Romney et al. would be one iota better than Obama on any of this, and there is reason to believe they will be even worse.

False equivalency with Obamacare.
sdb says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:28 pm

I’m sorry, but I just don’t see how Romney is a hypocrite on healthcare. Not everything that is appropriate to do at the state level is appropriate to do at the Federal Level. Going through Franck’s list point by point, I don’t see anything to disagree with. It is unconstitutional for Congress to pass a mandate. The SC agreed. But the SC also reinterpreted the mandate as a tax (indeed, the gov’t's lawyers claimed as much). Insofar as the mandate is a tax, it is constitutional. I disagree with the SC’s reinterpretation of what congress said it was doing, but now, for better or worse, it is the law of the land. And now the president is indeed responsible for a huge tax increase (his people argued that it was a tax before the court). So Romney is exactly right in this instance.

What Romney did in MA was done at the state level – afaik the MA constitution doesn’t place the same restrictions on the state legislature that the US constitution places on congress. Indeed, there are a lot of state laws that make sense at the state level that would be wrong to apply at the federal level. This is Federalism in a nutshell. Why must we have a one-size fits all health care system in the US? Why can’t each state experiment with different approaches (single payer, voucher, tax credit, mandates, etc…)?
Jake Lukas says:

July 11, 2012 at 3:47 pm

When I logged onto this website and saw the headline to this and the previous blog post, my first thought was, “Two articles on Mitt Romney in a row?”
Monterey says:

July 11, 2012 at 5:10 pm

“Most conservatives don’t actually have a problem with the policies that the president is advocating.”

Heck yah, we care. It was the largest tax increase on Americans ever, in effect. That’s a problem. Throwing gasoline on the fire of an already-weak economy.
Neil says:

July 11, 2012 at 5:54 pm

Romney is a hypocrite on healthcare for endorsing the MA model as something that SHOULD be taken national prior to the plan being adopted by Obama, and then railing against the plan therefter.
Jim says:

July 11, 2012 at 6:20 pm

When Romney was so smugly conceding that the Supreme Court was the final word on the subject, some real reporter should have asked him if he felt that way about Roe v. Wade, too. He has no principles, only present positions. I don’t trust him.
TTT says:

July 11, 2012 at 6:28 pm

Killing soldiers is an acceptable part of war; torturing prisoners isn’t. And while killing people can stop a future terrorist attack, torturing them (ie waterboarding) has never yielded accurate and actionable information in a way that could be distinguished from lies with practicable speed. From both a moral and utilitarian perspective, Obama’s tactics are still less completely awful. That’s the best I can say about it.
Liam says:

July 11, 2012 at 7:12 pm

“. From both a moral and utilitarian perspective, Obama’s tactics are still less completely awful. That’s the best I can say about it.”

+1
MH - Secular Misanthropist says:

July 11, 2012 at 7:44 pm

Hypocrisy is one of the depressing things about politics. It causes me to like the Democrats as opposition when the Republicans are in power. But when the Democrats are in power, I like the Republicans as opposition.

In the end I like divided government because it seems like the only way to keep both parties in check.
JonF says:

July 11, 2012 at 9:24 pm

Re: It was the largest tax increase on Americans ever, in effect.

This claim is quite frankly BS of a gold-plated, high-stilts walking variety. The tax increases in the ACA are fairly moderate. The tax increases passed by Ronald Reagan (yes, St Ronald the Cutter increased taxes!), George HW Bush and Bill Clinton were all larger in magnitude. It’s this kind of bare-faced, nose-growing, easily debunked but still uttered lie that has rendered the right beyond contempt with me.
Siarlys Jenkins says:

July 12, 2012 at 1:47 am

I just have to ask Turmarion…

…how HAVE you been burned?
Beyng says:

July 12, 2012 at 9:01 am

Siarlys:

Perhaps because Obama has kowtowed to (nay, rewarded) the financial establishment–you know, the one that destroyed the economy in the first place–buttressed the securitarian policies of his predecessor, initiated a deeply regressive healthcare/taxation policy that bears no resemblance to what actual progressives would call meaningful reform, pursued a ludicrously inflationary economic platform, extended our foreign military/imperial commitments, escalated an undeclared drone assassination campaign, exploded (rather than tempered) the debt and deficit, occluded his regime’s transparency thus breaching one of his most appealing campaign promises…and I could go on (really, I could). All this while the economy continues to stagnate in a cesspool of unemployment and inflation.

When I think of effective progressives who have held high office in America in recent decades, I think of folks like Russ Feingold. Folks like Feingold have been repeatedly ignored and trampled upon by this Administration. I can very easily see how Turmarion might consider himself burned. For that matter, I’m sure Obama himself isn’t so dense as not to consider this possibility, but he chose to clone most of his policies after those of his immediate predecessor, so he can lie in his own bed.

As I’ve said in the past, this was and remains the Republicans’ race to lose. Too bad they selected someone like Romney as their challenger.
Franklin Evans says:

July 12, 2012 at 9:03 am

Siarlys, I might ask the same question of Turmarion, but instead I’m going to engage in some shameless self-backpatting.

I have never been burned by a candidate for whom I voted who later behaved politically and/or legislatively in contradiction to his campaign rhetoric. Maybe I just have thicker skin, that’s a point I’d have to concede; maybe, growing up on the inside (as it were) of a local chapter of the League of Women Voters opened my eyes at a much earlier age (as in, before I was old enough to vote); maybe I’m just less invested in any candidate at all.

Whatever the reason, American politics is rife with just that very thing, with examples going back to our very first elections more than two centuries ago. I would ask, respectfully if with an admitted cynicism, how anyone can possibly be surprised at this?

I propose a (new) standard for our politicians. Let them rant and lecture during the campaign, but judge their “performance” in office using an extension of the “you can’t please all the people all the time” cliche.

Pass and implement effective legislation that succeeds in producing the most contentment amongst the people. It’s my tongue-in-cheek view of the consensus method of decision making: I believe the best result of a consensus is that it makes the most number of people the least unhappy.

Why do we have corruption? I believe it’s because those in power recognize that their getting there and staying there is dependent on making the right subset of people happy. That subset is most often those who expect to profit — quid pro quo — from their support of those in power while they were candidates. I also completely agree with a modified view of power and corruption, first seen by me in the writing of Frank Herbert: It’s not so much that power corrupts, it’s much more that power attracts the corruptable. Shrug.
AnotherBeliever says:

July 14, 2012 at 12:26 am

Sheldon, I must differ with you on one point. Most of the 200,000 civilians killed in Iraq were killed by suicide bombs and IEDs and incoming mortars fired by terrorists. The ones we killed, were largely killed by soldiers on the ground, who are still arguably better able to sort between combatant and non-combatant on the fly. It’s a matter of distance. 100 meters versus 10,000 meters. Admittedly, in the end, dead is dead. Which is why war is best avoided, overall.

As far as torturing your prisoners – it’s beyond the pale. Yes, there is a Law of Land Warfare, as ludicrous as it sounds. As long as your enemy is fighting you, fair’s fair. Fight back. But when your enemy lays down his arms,or you forcibly take them from him, his life is now your responsibility. If at all possible, you must provide for his safety.
Siarlys Jenkins says:

July 14, 2012 at 10:18 pm

Beyng, we have more in common than I had guessed from your previous comments. Feingold was my senator, and the ONLY Democrat on the ballot for whom I was actually inspired to get out and knock on doors. I don’t think he understood the political atmosphere in 2010, or he would have run a very different campaign (the one I would have designed for him). I haven’t forgotten that he almost voted NO on the health care reform bill, because it didn’t do enough.

I’m still glad some reform bill passed, but arguably, it was a classic horse produced by a committee, and it was awfully easy to attack for real flaws (as well as fantasized nonsense) by forces who opposed ANY bill at all.

As for the banks, yes, Obama should never have taken on the likes of Summers and Geithner. He should have added to the TARP already initiated by G.W. Bush that anything the taxpayers had to save, because it was too big to fail, would be broken into pieces small enough they COULD be allowed to fail in the future. Dodd/Frank was a grotesque hybrid of overdue reforms and capitulation to the financial industry.

I suspect, as I’ve said at greater length before, that he felt pressure to show how mature and un-radical and non-socialist he was, and this was a pressure he should have laughed off instead of bowing to it.

All that acknowledged, Romney will openly and proudly do what Obama tip-toed around, and do much worse besides. What the Republicans need is a candidate like Thomas Dewey, or George Romney, but such men (and like minded women) are not tolerated in the party any more.