The New Lexicon

I've long held that E.J. Dionne is a sniveling, East Coast liberal who knows little about what the Founders envisioned when they bequeathed us this "republican form of government." Malone Vandam over at New Paltz Journal has been properly outraged by both the escape from realistic responsiveness to the people of the nation evidenced by this week's Senate escapades and this ridiculous item from Dionne:

Progressive, Progressive, Progressive Means Socialist

If you can read that piece and not be activated to get into the battle for what remains of our liberty and Republic then you indeed must be dead to the truth.

Dionne apparently forgets both the recent and the Revolutionary history of his nation when he writes:

The whole system is biased to the right because the Senate itself -- a body in which Wyoming and Utah have as much representation as New York and California -- is tilted in a conservative direction. The 60-vote requirement empowers conservatives even more.

The system was designed precisely to rein the "tyranny of the majority" as manifested by the large states in a pure proportional representation. That's the core rationale for our bi-cameral legislature. The House gives power to the large states and the Senate preserves a balance for the small states to have a voice.

Dionne's ignorance goes still further when he forgets that it is the rules of the legislative body, not the Constitution which establishes that evil 60-vote requirement. If the Senate doesn't like it, they can change it. They did, in fact, change the clouture requirement from 2/3 to 3/5 in the not too distant past. He also forgets that only a decade ago it was his party of "progressives" which was in the minority and effectively using the same rule to block George W. Bush judicial appointments. Sauce for your goose, Mr. Dionne?

Dionne, of course, loves to bandy the names of "progressive" fellow-travelers as in this pithy quote:

To vote against it, Rockefeller said when I caught up with him recently, "you have to be for not covering 30 million people . . . you have to be for denying coverage to people with preexisting conditions . . . you have to be against helping small businesses buy health insurance."

Does he not note that if you are "for not covering 30 million people" then by default you must be for covering 280 million because that is the balance of the American population! Does Dionne not understand that a business (unlike a government entitlement) must make a profit and covering pre-existing conditions at a low premium is a rapid route to bankruptcy. Does Dionne not recognize that forcing small businesses to spend sums of money to comply with federal mandate is not "help" but hindrance? A free-market system will provide all the compulsion a business needs to recognize that gaining and keeping quality workers will require reasonable benefits when the business is able to provide them. Fines and mandates will not pass that test.

The repetitious use of the term "progressive" in Dionne's piece is frighteningly reminiscent of the New Speak of Orwell, isn't it?