Western Standard - Popping the progressive bubble

00:00:00.000 I want to start with a quote from a fantastic man, P.J. O'Rourke. I loved his work.

00:00:06.140 And this quote really says it well about, he calls it liberalism, I call it progressives.

00:00:11.340 It's similar things.

00:00:12.840 At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child, miserable, as all spoiled children are, 0.99

00:00:18.460 unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic, and useless. 1.00

00:00:22.640 Liberalism is the philosophy of sniveling brats. 0.97

00:00:26.300 Yes, O'Rourke wasn't one for beating around the bush, and he summed it up brilliantly.

00:00:30.200 May he rest in peace.

00:00:31.660 Now, modern progressives live in a self-induced, entitled bubble.

00:00:36.360 They know what they want to see, while refusing to accept any explanation, though, of why they may not be able to have it.

00:00:42.340 Instead of reconsidering a policy when it fails to achieve its objective,

00:00:46.980 progressives scream louder and double down, as if that could change the outcome.

00:00:51.800 Now, what got me going on this one is hearing some elected officials and activists recently calling for rent control.

00:00:57.200 And yes, inflation and higher rents are pressuring many citizens, and we'd all like to find ways to ease that pressure.

00:01:02.340 The problem with rent control, though, is it's been tried dozens of times in dozens of jurisdictions,

00:01:06.840 and it has maintained an impressively consistent 100% failure rate.

00:01:11.760 It only causes shortages in supply as investors and property owners flee the rental market.

00:01:16.880 Undeterred by reality, though, progressives insist on soldiering along and demanding rent control,

00:01:21.740 because this time, just maybe this time, it might work.

00:01:25.520 Sounds a lot like the contemporary supporters of communism.

00:01:28.560 This habit of willful blindness doesn't stop at rent control, of course.

00:01:32.180 That's just a recent and more stark example.

00:01:34.180 Let's look at addiction enablement activists, for example, as they continue to push their ideology of deadly, unintended consequences,

00:01:42.580 despite the catastrophic failure of their policies in every city on the west coast of North America.

00:01:48.640 Supervised consumption sites, decriminalization of hard drugs,

00:01:51.560 and a permissive environment for open drug consumption has caused overdoses to explode in cities.

00:01:57.020 Portland, Oregon saw overdoses more than double under their progressive approach.

00:02:00.300 Not to be outdone, Vancouver legalized hard drugs and is handing out safe supply.

00:02:06.480 The fruit of that effort has led Vancouver to break records in daily recorded overdoses.

00:02:11.180 Still, progressives insist if we just enabled the addicts a little more,

00:02:14.900 if we enabled it a little harder,

00:02:16.800 they'd somehow kick that habit and become functional members of society.

00:02:20.100 Look, addicts need treatment, and they need mental health supports.

00:02:23.000 But they don't need free drugs, and there's no such thing as a safe supply of meth.

00:02:28.240 The addiction epidemic is complicated, and there's many factors attached to it.

00:02:35.240 One factor is the progressive trend of deinstitutionalization over the last few decades.

00:02:40.260 It's a mouthful.

00:02:41.340 Well-meaning but misguided governments closed down mental health facilities

00:02:44.260 and moved towards community living initiatives.

00:02:47.140 Unfortunately, that initiative has led to people with mental health challenges

00:02:50.260 finding themselves either on the streets, in jail, or dead.

00:02:53.520 We don't like the idea of incarcerating people due to their having a mental health issue

00:02:57.240 through no fault of their own.

00:02:58.840 But it doesn't matter what you like or don't like.

00:03:00.940 A reality has to be faced that some people simply have to be kept in a secure environment

00:03:04.620 for their own protection and for the protection of others.

00:03:07.300 Are they maintaining dignity on the streets?

00:03:08.900 That's what they like, saying, we've got to allow their dignity.

00:03:11.440 Really?

00:03:12.080 When they're passed out and having lost bowel control in a bus stop,

00:03:15.300 there's no dignity left anymore, guys.

00:03:16.880 A growing addiction problem, of course, also leads to the growing gang problem

00:03:21.140 as criminals compete to supply the drugs to these addicts.

00:03:23.980 Now, those gangs often go to war and we see spikes in shootings in city centers

00:03:27.800 and progressives love to demand simple solutions to complex problems as usual.

00:03:31.900 Rather than dealing with the complicated and sticky issues of often ethnic-based gangs

00:03:35.720 and illegally imported handguns,

00:03:37.820 they demand the illegalization and seizure of firearms from law-abiding citizens, hunters, such.

00:03:43.380 There's no evidence such seizures will make anybody feel safer.

00:03:45.580 But progressives aren't bound by evidence, only impulses and knee-jerk reactions.

00:03:50.680 Likewise, as we see the cost of living skyrocketing,

00:03:53.200 progressives are accusing food producers and retailers of greed and gouging,

00:03:57.300 despite readily available data indicating narrow profit margins in those industries.

00:04:01.860 Meanwhile, progressives refuse to accept the impact government actions

00:04:04.920 such as carbon taxes or chemical fertilizer bans might have on food production costs.

00:04:09.900 Cognitive dissonance can get expensive, guys.

00:04:12.100 The protests and even eco-terrorism against petrochemical production in Canada

00:04:17.380 continue to expand as progressives continue with an ongoing tantrum against petrochemicals.

00:04:22.260 They refuse to accept the reality that we don't have a feasible alternative to it yet.

00:04:27.100 Intransitantly digging in their heels,

00:04:28.580 they demand we transition out of oil and gas,

00:04:31.020 but can't explain what we'll be transitioning into.

00:04:33.220 Germany learned this lesson the hard way rather recently,

00:04:36.020 and they've gone back to burning coal,

00:04:37.900 but our local progressives have planted their fingers in their ears whenever that's mentioned.

00:04:41.780 Like most in Cal State children,

00:04:43.760 progressives scream loudest when their demands are blunted.

00:04:46.340 It's like a kid who gets denied ice cream.

00:04:48.580 Just listen to them if somebody dares to point out that

00:04:50.280 no matter how hard one might wish it,

00:04:52.480 no matter how hard you try,

00:04:53.700 no matter how hard you screw your eyes shut and scream it,

00:04:56.920 you can't change a boy into a girl or a girl into a boy.

00:04:59.980 People can make every effort to transition,

00:05:02.520 and I have no problem with respecting how they want to identify.

00:05:05.400 I refuse to indulge in claims contrary to biological reality, though,

00:05:08.900 and that's what progressives are asking us to do now.

00:05:11.660 Conservatives aren't heartless, though that's what we're often accused of.

00:05:14.420 We're bound by reality, even when the reality stinks.

00:05:17.860 It doesn't matter if a policy feels good,

00:05:20.220 and it doesn't matter how good the intentions are behind it.

00:05:22.260 If a policy doesn't work, it needs to be abandoned.

00:05:25.100 Conservatives aren't this way because we don't care. 0.94

00:05:27.040 It's quite the opposite.

00:05:27.820 We care enough to set aside our sentiment,

00:05:30.680 even when it feels bad,

00:05:31.660 in order to find solutions to problems that actually work.

00:05:34.580 If we didn't care,

00:05:35.920 we just let ourselves sink into the fuzzy world of delusion

00:05:38.900 enjoyed by modern progressives.

00:05:40.560 Canadian Shooting Sports Association,

00:05:42.520 without the CSSA,

00:05:43.800 our gun rights would have been taken long, long ago.

00:05:47.100 These guys are on the front lines,

00:05:48.840 helping to draft smart and intelligent firearms,

00:05:52.300 regulations and legislation in Canada,

00:05:54.320 and more importantly, educating the public

00:05:56.840 about how we keep guns out of the hands of the wrong people.

00:06:00.080 If you become a member,

00:06:00.980 it's absolutely worth every penny.

00:06:05.020 You can become a Western Standard member

00:06:06.700 for just $10 a month,

00:06:08.080 or $99 a year for unlimited access.

00:06:10.600 This is the Sn göz. 1.00

00:06:13.220 .

00:06:13.420 .

00:06:13.520 .

00:06:16.440 .

00:06:16.460 .

00:06:17.400 .

00:06:20.220 .

00:06:20.260 .

Western Standard - April 03, 2023

Popping the progressive bubble

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript