The fact is, liberals like being out of power, at least on an emotional level. They need somewhere to direct their permanent state of outrage. It was always a little odd when protests like, say, Occupy, or Black Lives Matter, railed against The Man, when The Man, was, arguably Barack Obama.
Awkward.
But for liberals, virtue signaling is as important as breathing, and taking to the streets is the quickest way to get a good selfie for your like-minded friends on Facebook and Instagram. Even during the Obama years, this impulse could not be contained. Oddly, Obama even encouraged it, as if the center of power was somewhere else.
And Obama, like any good liberal, liked to vigorously employ the levers of power. But you could tell that the hard, detailed work of governance wasn't particularly fun for him, not like the good ol' days, hanging with Bill Ayers, spreading the word about American imperialism. Saul Alinsky had lots to say about how to burn down power structures, but little to say about what to do when the power structure was yours. It's a confused dog that actually catches the bus.
But now, oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, The Man has a new face:
Let the good times roll! Let's march!
One key reason libs are happier out of power is that they can just fall back on bumper sticker aphorisms...
Co-exist!
Dissent is the Highest Form of Patriotism!
Earth First!
Love Trumps Hate!
No need to flesh out any nuance or policy detail (boring!) when you're chanting at a rally.
But the sad fact is that the Left in America has lost the ability to express itself in any coherent way. They are vacuum-sealed in their insularity, and it's rendered them intellectually inert. It's certainly why they were utterly shocked by the election.
To understand why, let's start with geography:
And then there's the media...
...which skews wildly left. I don't think even libs are trying to argue otherwise anymore. Yes, there's Fox, and the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal (sort of), but everybody else, well, let's just say that 96% of media donations went to Hillary. As a conservative, you can't avoid hearing liberal spin on just about everything. It permeates the air like oxygen. As a liberal, though, it's quite easy to avoid hearing the other side. Simply avoiding Fox and some talk radio gets the job done, for the most part, and you probably dumped your last conservative friend on Facebook a while ago.
And, of course, there are the schools...
I can only assume you've heard about "safe spaces," where students are protected from hearing viewpoints they find upsetting. They're not likely to hear them much, because conservatives at most colleges have learned to keep their mouths shut, lest they have no friends and provoke their professors' ire. Thus, debate is virtually non-existent. I've been told it would be completely impossible to hold a formal debate at Harvard these days on something like a border wall because even if you found students to take the affirmative, protests would shut the whole thing down. Visiting conservative speakers are also routinely shouted down, assuming they make it to campus in the first place.
The only open debates on campus any more are between degrees of progressivism, like the Leninists and Trotskyites of old.
All this results in a progressive movement that's not particularly good at defending itself. If you don't expose your ideas to criticism, you'll have no idea what their weaknesses are, or even their strengths. Which brings me back to...
...the permanent protest.
It's so much easier. No one calls you out in the middle of a march. No one asks for a white paper when you're busy chanting. No one asks you to explain why "dissent is the highest form of patriotism" signs only seem to come out during Republican administrations. No one throws the flag when you use your third Hitler reference of the day.
I'm not, for the record, suggesting liberals are stupid. Many of them are extremely intelligent, and many remain my friends. But where critical thinking and reasoned argument are concerned, they are woefully out of practice, and they do not seem inclined to address the problem. The fact is, if you live in a bubble, forever protected from hard questions, you won't ever be able to answer them when they come.
But, whatever, shut up, man. Gotta go make a sign!
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