The progressive entertainment establishment within the rock music industry was shocked, back in the early 2000s, when groundbreaking guitarist Johnny Ramone came out as Republican. How could a great American rocker, who once celebrated sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll, vote for buttoned-up, conservative GOP squares?
When repeatedly asked by interviewers why he claimed that affiliation, Ramone would explain that it was now the only way to be a radical, a non-conformist, and a troublemaker – in other words, “cool.” Progressives and Democrats had completely taken over his business, demanding every musician, singer, songwriter, producer, agent, manager, etc., toe the ideological line, lest they be blackballed, he said. That left a rebel nowhere else to go but to their enemies.
To flip off the emerging politically correct culture, to offend the ruling establishment, a punk rock icon had to join the Party of Lincoln. The oppression of the left had given him no choice.
I would never compare myself to Johnny Ramone in any fashion, though my progressive friends believe I’m a conservative and attempt to shame me for it. Meanwhile, my conservative friends think I lean progressive and try to ignore it. I very much like it that way, since I never want anyone to believe they know what I’m thinking before I open my mouth or strike a key.
I don’t think in terms of political tribes. If readers will allow me a moment’s pretentiousness, I see the world in terms of freedom and rationalism vs. power and oppression – prisoners and rebels vs. warders and dictators. As the rival parties and their ideological markers jostle for position on a given topic, I follow my instincts rather than their talking points.
That said, the majority of my op-ed work these days leans to the right, and I lay that at the stomping feet of the left. If a journalist’s duty is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable, he or she has no real choice but to assault today’s column of institutional progressives. Their power remains largely unchecked, and an intolerant, unquestioning, and tyrannical arrogance is the clear result. Right on cue, rampaging cancel culture steps in to threaten the social standing and livelihood of anyone questioning the ruling party’s dubious wisdom.
So, I attack the left. Like old Johnny Ramone, I’m stuck with no alternative.
If we turn the clock back a couple of years, you’d fine me hurling fireballs at the castle of a sociopath in the White House. It was the endless days of Trump tossing out diseased decrees from atop his Babylonian throne, and I wrote to oppose the man as a bully and a malignant narcissist. As 2021 limps through its summer months, we find progressive philosophies running US government, much of Europe, most of the media industry, and arguably all of the social media realm. Everyone who claims to value freedom needs to acknowledge the warning sirens as such conspiratorial forces gather.
When the rank clouds of absolute power begin to choke out free thinkers, the disease of absolute corruption can never be far behind. Sadly, most of today’s fourth column – an international press that seems more interested in enabling absolute power for its favorite progressive officials than questioning or limiting it – is too busy celebrating the rise of the imperialist leftists to cover their actions and statements objectively.
If the Trump era was dominated by cold absolutism, modern leftist policies remain dangerously naive and driven entirely by emotional, “first-level” thinking. They’re fueled by the “feel good, do it” nature of their politics. That’s a dangerously seductive energy that leads today’s left to a disturbing absolute conviction that everything they conceive, say, or do is the best, absolutely right, and forever legitimatized.
That’s the sort of aspirational dominance that demands the questioning of authority. It calls for some socially and legally allowable rebellion by a free press always looking to protect the rights and wellbeing of the common people. Tragically, the vast majority of international news outlets are entirely in step with the current progressive march.
Such coverage is not journalism. It’s propaganda. Reporters and news outlets around the globe become willing tools of the state when they cooperate and proliferate the messages of one political pole, while consistently attacking the leaders and tenets of the other. The most dangerous side effect of this slavish media co-opting is that the favored party is free to act without supervision, invited to engage in any sort of corruption with impunity.
The only way to fend off such corruption and to protect the citizenry it harms – regardless of which tribe claims the mountaintop – is to pounce on any half-baked policy directive or pre-approved group-think and expose it as dangerous foolishness. My chosen tool is published mockery. You’re free to choose any weapon that best suits your empty hand.
All politics run in cycles. The right rises to stabilize big business economics and strengthen national defense. When those policies cause social agendas to lag, the left rallies and takes back the reins – imposing regulations on the fat cats and juggling wealth distribution anew. Around and around it goes, as two opposite political powers work to undo the policies of their opposite number more eagerly than they toil to generate accomplishments of their own. The duty of whatever rebel press remains is to keep crosshairs on all the players, not just those with the wrong party affiliation.
I would hope writers of any variety feel a need to put out there what they can support as the truth. It’s the best they can do. Beyond that, I would want those same writers to be socio-political rebels. In my perfect yet imaginary kingdom, they would question all authority and never seek to become a tool of oppression.
It’s becoming increasingly lonely in that kingdom, but let’s hope more voices look to shake up those in power whenever possible. For now, until the right seizes power again and puts the target back on its back, keep taking shots at the left.
All the cool kids are doing it.
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The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
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