What's the Matter With Thomas Frank?

Oh, I know, it's that he's a condescending leftist prick:

Just as the financial crisis has created toxic assets and "zombie" financial institutions, so has it transformed conservatism into a movement of the living dead. Its partisans cling to a now-toxic portfolio of discredited notions, rhetoric, gestures and strategies. They lumber comically on, their only goal being to obstruct efforts to save the economy from catastrophe.

Yeah, Tom, that's our only goal. It's not like we're trying to arrest the slide of our country into a Euro-style socialism. Or that we have ideological problems with plans to hike taxes during a recession. Nope, we're just obstructionist assholes, opposing Obama's massive spending just for the hell of it.

Later in his column, he attends a "Chicago Tea Party" in D.C. and is absolutely horrified to find a lot of angry people in attendance:

I got out of there quick. This was no place to find the changed, chastened conservatism that all the pundits are looking for.

All the pundits, yourself included, are morons. You were maybe expecting the people there to hold hands and sing? Maybe a stirring chorus of Kumbaya?  Sorry to disappoint you, dumbass, but people are angry about what's happening to this country.  But conservatives are supposed to be "chastened," whatever that means.

Oh, wait, I know what he means.  Something along the lines of "Grab your ankles."  No thanks.

Update: I should also note that when someone like Thomas Frank seems to think that there should be some sort of "chastened" conservative movement (in other words, abandoning our principles and shuffling ever further toward the mushy center-left) that should be a huge Red Flag, telling us to run the hell in the other direction.

Posted by: Sean M. at 08:13 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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