Big lies

Similar figures gathered by every reputable polling organization reiterate the same themes. Americans consistently and indeed overwhelmingly support environmental regulation, consumer protection, spending on infrastructure and education, increasing the minimum wage, extending unemployment benefits, providing food stamps, and nearly every other liberal priority and program. (The sole important exception to this rule has been welfare, but most Americans also believe that generous childcare and health benefits should be provided to help welfare recipients enter the workforce.) Substantial majorities support stricter environmental regulation -- precisely the opposite of the anti-Green, conservative minority.

The results of recent elections likewise subvert the idea of a conservative majority. No conservative presidential candidate has won a majority of the popular vote since 1988. The most recent presidential election showed a clear popular majority for the center-left and left-of-center candidates: Al Gore and Ralph Nader. The Green Party candidate devoted much of his campaign to attacking Gore and the Democrats -- but their views on national issues were much closer than either of them was to George W. Bush, the Republican corporate conservative who was ultimately awarded the presidency by partisan Florida bureaucrats and the Supreme Court.

The combined Democratic and Green vote in November 2000 exceeded 51 percent, a numerical victory made even more impressive by the mammoth financial advantage of the Republicans. The Bush campaign outspent Gore and Nader combined by nearly $60 million. (The other conservative in the race, rightist commentator and former Reagan aide Patrick J. Buchanan, squandered almost $40 million to garner less than 0.5 percent of the vote.)

Rush Limbaugh indirectly acknowledged the significance of the Gore plurality by trying to erase it. Having declared that America "is not a liberal country, is nowhere near a liberal country," the talk jock was asked by a rare dissenting caller why more Americans voted for Gore than for Bush. "You know," Rush replied, "I would bet you that if we counted all the absentee ballots in California, I will bet you that George W. Bush won the popular vote." That was only true in the alternate reality of right-wing talk radio.

Now conservatives prefer to forget or dismiss the disputes of 2000; they have declared that the midterm election two years later proved their ideological majority. But when all the votes were counted, the national stalemate in Congress remained nearly the same in 2002 as before -- again, despite enormous spending advantages enjoyed by the GOP, a docile press that has promoted Bush's favorable ratings every day since the terrorist attacks of September 2001, and a political strategy that succeeded in associating the president and his party with the national struggle against foreign enemies. Even so, only the terrible loss of Paul Wellstone -- who was 8 points ahead of his Republican opponent when his plane crashed in northern Minnesota -- allowed the Republicans to win a single-vote majority in the Senate.

The continuing schism between progressive public opinion and conservative political domination is an indictment of the way we conduct and finance our elections. Yet liberals still face a vexing question: If so many Americans endorse progressive ideas, why are so few willing to call themselves liberal? Why is the L-word anathema to politicians, including undeniably liberal Democrats? Why are liberals constantly on the defensive? Why do self-identified conservatives outnumber liberals by 10 or 20 percentage points in national surveys?

Here is one answer. After decades of relentless disinformation from the right, Americans associate the word "liberal" with a series of negative stereotypes: spendthrift, immoral, unpatriotic, "politically correct" and elitist, among others. Right-wing demagoguery has convinced more than a few people that liberals are essentially no different from Communists or terrorists. Without real Communists around in sufficient number to frighten anyone, the right focused and intensified its attack on liberalism in recent years. The effect of this campaign, bolstered by hundreds of millions of dollars from tax-exempt conservative foundations, has been devastating.

Demonizing liberals is a conscious strategy of the Republican right, where such demagoguery is not only a political style but a career path. It's a vicious technique that dates back to Joe McCarthy and the early Nixon, and it hasn't changed much since then. As a conservative media analyst boasted on Fox TV not long ago, their aim is to make Democrat and liberal synonymous with socialist, Communist and Marxist. Republican strategist David Horowitz urges a form of conservative political warfare based on identifying liberal Democrats with left-wing terrorist sympathizers and totalitarians. Ann Coulter is even more simple-minded: "I think it's time to drop the infernal nonsense about liberals being well-intentioned but misguided," she wrote in a 2002 column. "I will say that there is only one thing wrong with liberals: They're no good."

She's entitled to her banal sputtering, of course. She's even entitled to make millions of dollars by polluting the airwaves and bookshelves with mindless diatribes. What is long overdue, however, is a response commensurate with these right-wing attacks. What is needed, more than ever, is an answer to conservative propaganda that holds the right accountable for its lies and hypocrisy.

The right prefers to demonize liberals and set up fights with "politically correct" straw men rather than debate with real progressives. (That is why, for example, the bully boys and girls of the right-wing media almost never confront a labor leader on television; such a debate would instantly destroy the stereotype of the liberal "elitist.") Stereotypes and caricatures are the most important kind of message delivered by the conservative media. By "defining" and discrediting their opponents, they can substitute invective for argument and images for facts. The technique is unscrupulous and almost foolproof. It's the big lie, repeated and repeated until the truth is obliterated and the lie is legitimated.

Whether the right-wingers who create and disseminate this vicious propaganda actually believe it is unimportant, although I suspect that the smarter conservatives know very well when they are lying. What matters is that their lies have spread unchallenged by facts for so many years.

Are liberals unpatriotic, a favorite conservative canard? No. The record of loyalty (and military service) among liberals equals that of conservatives. Do liberals despise the work ethic? No. Liberals defend the interests of working Americans against the fake populism of corporate conservatism. Don't liberals always tax and spend the economy into ruin? No. The numbers prove that liberal Democrats have been the most competent, fiscally trustworthy stewards of the economy for the past seven decades. Aren't liberals determined to restrict freedom in the name of political correctness? No. In fact, liberals have been the most consistent defenders of the Bill of Rights for the past century. Is "liberal" a synonym for "immoral"? No. Liberals do preach less about "family values," but they're just as likely as conservatives to honor those values.

To debunk conservative mythology about liberals is inevitably unflattering to the right. As might be expected, the most vocal liars often turn out to be hypocrites as well. Comparisons that involve patriotism and morality, for example, are incomplete without examining some unpleasant facts about certain prominent individuals. But conservatives have been making ugly accusations about their adversaries for a long time, without hesitation or regret. If they don't enjoy hearing the truth about themselves for a change, I offer no apologies. They've asked for it many times over.

This book confronts the biggest lies deployed by conservatives against liberals, progressives, and Democrats. Its purpose is not to defend every liberal position or politician. (It also isn't intended to disprove every right-wing myth, some of which are so widely disbelieved as to be irrelevant -- such as the Bush administration's insistence that its goals include cleaner air and water.) It doesn't suggest a conspiracy against liberals, or argue that Democrats haven't brought any of their problems on themselves. And it shouldn't be taken as a blanket indictment of Republicans or conservatives.

That last point is of special importance to me. The spiteful, malignant discourse that became so common during the Clinton era has done lasting damage to democratic participation and civility in our political system. Although as a matter of literary convenience I frequently refer to conservatives and Republicans, I certainly don't believe that every conservative or every Republican is responsible for the offenses discussed in these pages.

Unlike Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter, I also don't believe that my political adversaries are uniformly "no good," or un-American, or greedy, or bigoted, or stupid. I shouldn't have to say this, but I know from personal experience that generosity, compassion, and wisdom cross all partisan and ideological boundaries. I married into a family that includes Republican conservatives who happen to be among the finest people I have ever known. My wife's grandfather is an unrepentant right-winger who likes to tweak me with editorials from the New York Post and Internet jokes about dumb Democrats. He is also a true patriot and a gentleman who has treated me with kindness from the first day we met, despite my obnoxious opinions. I would much prefer an atmosphere that encourages friendship rather than hatred among Americans, regardless of ideology and party.

Unfortunately, I don't think there's much chance of that happy outcome until liberals learn to hit back hard. The classic American hero is the underdog who wins respect by fighting back against a bully. Sometimes the bully just limps away to nurse his wounds. Sometimes the bully wises up and mends his ways. Occasionally, the underdog and the bully become best friends.

But the underdog who dares to fight back is always better off.

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