by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
Tribune Media Services<\/p>\n
Juan Williams was just fired from NPR. His sin? He confessed to occasional anxiety when Muslims board airplanes, and then went on to explain why stereotyping is wrong.<\/p>\n
The fate of Williams reminds us that Americans have developed two personas \u2014 one public and politically correct, the other private. Mix the two and big trouble ensues.<\/p>\n
Here are some reminders about what to shut up about.<\/p>\n
Don’t discuss the deficit. Instead, call borrowing “stimulus.” Trillions are not much different from billions. Debt can be paid back with more borrowing and someone else’s higher taxes. Ignore the lessons of Greece and California. To appear noble, call for more unemployment benefits, free medical care and more entitlements. To sound cruel, talk about borrowing to pay for them.<\/p>\n
Keep silent about Social Security and Medicare. If the system is insolvent, it cannot be because we are living longer, retiring earlier, often taking out more than we paid into the pot, abusing disability provisions, or facing an aging and soon-to-be-shrinking population. Instead, rail at fat cats who need to pay more payroll taxes, and at wasteful programs like defense that can be cut to ensure more for the elderly and needy. The checks will always come in time, and “they” will always pay for them.<\/p>\n
Most Americans choose to be called “cowards” by Attorney General Eric Holder rather than accept his invitation to talk about race on his terms. The NAACP has accused the Tea Party of racist views. The anger over high taxes, debt and big government warrants more concern among the Beltway’s black leadership than exploring the causes of inordinately high incidence of crime, incarceration and one-parent homes, and low high school graduation rates. Whatever one’s private views, groupspeak requires that answers are found outside, not inside, the black community \u2014 and demand more programs and more federal money.<\/p>\n
Closing the border is a taboo subject. Also taboo is the phrase “illegal alien.” Speak instead about the need for social justice, not the enforcement of mere laws. Illegal aliens broke no real law when enticed northward by greedy employers. That is why the secretary of labor released a video calling for workers to report employer abuses \u2014 whether the workers are “documented or not.” Passing laws to subvert federal immigration laws, such as “sanctuary city” legislation, is commendable. Passing laws to enforce federal immigration statutes earns a lawsuit, and condemnation by the president of Mexico from the White House lawn. Ask Arizona.<\/p>\n
Don’t get caught up in discussing global warming. If you must go there, employ the term “climate change” so that anything from a tornado to a blizzard can be blamed on man-caused carbon emissions. Instead of citing recent doctored research or the inconsistencies in Al Gore’s advocacy, just mention that Sarah Palin denies climate change.<\/p>\n
Do not, under any circumstances, associate global terrorism with Islam \u2014 despite the countless terrorist operations that have been carried out worldwide by Muslims since Sept. 11, 2001. If Muslims must be mentioned, it should only be in the context that a tiny number, without support and often due to past oppression, commit such terrorism \u2014 earning the furor of the Muslim community at large. Do not end up like Juan Williams of NPR, who was fired for his candid remarks. For insurance, talk ad nauseam about Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing as proof that white male Christians blow things up just as frequently.<\/p>\n
Do not weigh in on gay marriage. Millions of Neanderthals voted to oppose it; a few sophisticated judges ruled to overturn bans on it. If you talk positively about traditional marriage and the special and historical relationship between a man and a woman, that is code for homophobia.<\/p>\n
Lay off the university. It hikes tuition costs higher than the rate of inflation. It exploits part-time teachers while clinging to archaic notions like tenure. It cannot guarantee that its graduates are competent in either basic reading or math \u2014 or that they will even find a job these days. And it shuns true diversity of thought. Yet question its budgets, hiring practices, political tolerance or affirmative action, and one is dubbed anti-intellectual, racist, against the student loan industry, and cold-heartedly against letting someone be all that he can be.<\/p>\n
We do not quite know how Americans will vote next week, in part because citizens fear to talk openly about their concerns and instead employ groupspeak. We suspect that in the privacy of the voting booth, they may prove angrier and more frustrated than we think.<\/p>\n
But why not, when they know that candor and honesty can earn a presidential lecture, a job firing or a lawsuit?<\/p>\n
\u00a92010 Tribune Media Services<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Juan Williams was just fired from NPR. His sin? He confessed to occasional anxiety when Muslims board airplanes, and then went on to explain why stereotyping is wrong.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[504],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-iz","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2368,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-great-american-debt\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":0},"title":"The Great American Debt","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 8, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"We commit suicide by debt addiction, China rakes in IOUs. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online With our national debt at $11 trillion and climbing at a projected rate of $1 to $2 trillion a year, examine the brilliant manner in which Americans justify borrowing much of this money\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "August 2009"","block_context":{"text":"August 2009","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2009\/august-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1691,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/how-could-we-be-so-stupid-let-us-count-the-ways\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":1},"title":"How Could We Be So Stupid? Let Us Count the Ways","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 20, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media We are going to pile up another $3 trillion in national debt in just the first two years of the Obama administration. If the annual deficit should sink below $1.5 trillion, it will be called fiscal sobriety. Why, when we owe $12 trillion, would\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "April 2010"","block_context":{"text":"April 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/april-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2878,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/dr-obama-first-do-no-harm\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":2},"title":"Dr. Obama: First, Do No Harm","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services When it comes to our complex economy, President Barack Obama would do well to heed the physician's ancient commandment to first \"do no harm.\" Instead, Obama's administration has been prescribing all sorts of multibillion-dollar borrowing remedies without any consistent diagnosis of what is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "March 2009"","block_context":{"text":"March 2009","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2009\/march-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":115,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/when-big-deficits-became-good\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":3},"title":"When Big Deficits Became Good","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 16, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services As a senator and presidential candidate, Barack Obama said that he detested budget deficits. In 2006, when the aggregate national debt was almost $8 trillion less than today, he blasted George W. Bush's chronic borrowing and refused to vote for upping the debt\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Debt and Deficits"","block_context":{"text":"Debt and Deficits","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/politics\/debt-and-deficits\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":173,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-kingdom-of-fairness\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":4},"title":"The Kingdom of Fairness","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 12, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services We are still borrowing more than $1 trillion a year. Barack Obama has added more than $5 trillion to the national debt in just his first term alone. Such massive borrowing is unsustainable. Someone somehow at some time has to pay it back.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Debt and Deficits"","block_context":{"text":"Debt and Deficits","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/politics\/debt-and-deficits\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9047,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/in-search-of-fixes-for-a-fossilized-economy\/","url_meta":{"origin":1151,"position":5},"title":"In Search of Fixes for a Fossilized Economy","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 11, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Tribune Media Services The U.S. economy grew at an anemic rate of less than 1 percent in the last quarter of 2015. While the unemployment rate has dipped below 5 percent, the all-important labor force participation rate is at a historic low of just 62.7 percent.\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1151"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1151"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1152,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1151\/revisions\/1152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}