As a local cop, I quickly learned a powerful truism, “there are two sides to every story and somewhere in the middle is the truth.” When sussing out the real world events leading to the volcanic eruption of violence between family members, a careful examination of physical evidence, and thoughtful listening to both parties usually leads to the truth.
The magic exists in allowing for analysis — thought. Within the context of a “he said, she said” battle royale, with frying pans flying thick within the fray and squabble of domestic dispute, you can understand the important balance between the forensic (bruises, scrapes, and bumps), and the nuance the parties themselves reveal within their stories. If a cop were to perform ideologically, thought, experience, and the amalgam of both — judgement — would become mere artifacts pulverized under bulldozing dogma and injustice.
An ideological perspective looks like this: Social justice demands I prioritize the female narrative, despite logical explanation or even the overwhelming presence of physical evidence. Robotically, the facts get compressed to fit the ideological mold. But, if you apply a principle, like “there are two sides to every story…” then the miracle of analysis is possible. Usually, the truth shakes out, and justice prevails.
For the ideological, justice isn’t a factor. Equity (in the jurisprudential sense, not the social) has no part to play. It’s far too difficult to implement justice or equity. Better to just crush everyone who presents a challenge into the same, cramped pigeon hole.
Politically speaking, truth usually lurks within the coiling mists of narrative. The application of justice is ephemeral and often slippery. It only materializes in the alchemist solution of equal parts fact, and the astringent of procedure. This isn’t easy, taking the time to plod through rigorously, getting things right, categorizing, quantifying properly, corroborating disparate sources, then taking stock of the parts as they relate to the whole. It requires the expenditure of mental energy, and the fortitude and honesty to pursue the narrative facts to the logical end. That is a very rare activity in this age of the common man.
It’s just so much easier to sloganeer, like a good statist. Abolish! Disband! DeSantis stands funny! Trump is a dictator! It’s all about the fight! You get it.
I’ve answered more domestic violence calls than I can count, and the results were rarely the same. The truth surfaced, evading the desperate clutching of self-interest, with one or both parties helplessly telling on themselves as they cooled from the heat and adrenaline of domestic combat. Often, the back seat of my patrol car held both parties, handcuffed and sullen.
Like domestic combatants, the right has devolved into internecine warfare, ramping up the friendly fire barrages like never before — at least that’s how it feels. Right wing domestic dispute isn’t anything new. We seem to enjoy snatching failure out of the jaws of success, primarily by abusing our own. What’s new is the adoption of ideology as a conservative modality.
Historically, conservatism prided itself on its strict adherence to the application of principle across the spectrum of political inquiry. Leading conservatives were known to be genteel, academic in manner, and characterized by a consistent comity, especially when engaged in the tumultuous marketplace of ideas. The two great exemplars were William F. Buckley, Jr. and Rush Limbaugh. Both men were supremely adept at fashioning humor into a razor sharp rapier, disarming any and all with a deft riposte in response to some clumsy, vulgar flèche from boorish left-wing Stalinists.
Today, the boorish are our own. They’ve multiplied within the dark, humid folds of X, Instagram, and Facebook and have oozed from a corpulent and blistered social media corpus, drowning in the bile of the ideological. Erudition and eloquence has been replaced by shock jock profanity and click-bait politics. Opposing viewpoints aren’t subjected to analysis, just deluged in a sludge of ridicule.
If a personality’s only response to challenge is a stream of scatalogical references, they’ve lost before they've begun. The conservative podcasting space is a petri dish full of toxic molds, a perfectly insulated growth medium for ideological spores which multiply energetically in the perpetual twilight.
Here’s an easy litmus test: if your favorite podcaster, radio host, or social media guru is characterized by profanity, fills their social media streams with expletives, and responds to challengers with variations on the fornication theme, you’re listening to a bottom feeder. A steady diet of that toxin, and in short order you’ll soon lose the capacity to spell your own name. And another thing, Rush Limbaugh was the paragon of the happy warrior — the secret to his success. The angry podcaster is the antithesis of this, and an embarrassment to the legacy of Rush Limbaugh and the cause he so passionately championed.
Recently, the always amicable and eminently rational James Woods lamented on X (formerly Twitter), “Maybe you all should stop attacking Ron DeSantis with ridiculous accusations about his stance and his shoes and the rest of the nonsense…We all know Trump will most certainly be our Republican nominee…Why are you all participating in the Democrats’ dirty tricks playbook? If we don’t pull together as a party and defeat the socialist jihad of the left, this nation is done. Wake up.”
Woods is running directly against the grain of the ideological. He’s saying what the right desperately needs to hear at this critical moment. The principles that should bind us together also hold us accountable. There has always been room for disagreement on the right — that’s a very healthy thing. But, what will destroy us, and our nation, is continuing down the same path the left has trod, carrying on their shoulders a golden calf deaf to all reason, blind to truth, and mute to dialogue.