Liberal Barbarians

The classical Greek word barbaros means foreigner, and in the eyes of the Greeks and later the Romans, those outside their society and culture were barbaric in the sense of lacking the virtues and sensibilities of civilized people. One such virtue was sophrosune, the Greek ideal of moderation.

Participation in a culture, a society and a nation provides a vantage point. In the classical Greeks' eyes, the barbarians lacked moderation, and so were less civilized than the Greeks were. As the world has become more sophisticated, we have learned that other cultures are not necessarily inferior, and that we can often learn from foreigners. However, it is misguided to confuse open minded recognition of the universality of human reason, effort and imagination, with indifference or lack of loyalty to one's own culture and nation. Loyalty is necessary for the survival of a nation. That is not to say a loyal citizen cannot be critical of his nation, but rather that a loyal citizen would hope that criticism would help the nation.

Inability to grasp the concept of loyalty is barbaric. To the Greeks, it would have been a lack of virtue to say that one hoped that the barbarians would destroy Helos. Today, liberals argue that loyalty is unimportant; that we would have been better off without the American revolution; that there is no such thing as virtue; hence loyalty is unimportant or foolish. Leftists and liberals believe this because they are badly educated barbarians.

Bryan of Hotair carries a CNN video clip obtained via Youtube in which Jack Cafferty, a CNN announcer, indicates that he cannot figure out the difference between the US's providing support to insurgents in Afghanistan during the Russo-Afghan war, and Iran's providing support to insurgents against the United States.

This is an indicator of why dialogue with liberals has become difficult. It is difficult to communicate with barbarians. Liberals like Jack Cafferty are (a) badly educated and (b)disloyal. They are badly educated because part of education involves learning that one's willingness to participate in a nation presupposes commitment and loyalty to that nation. If Cafferty is willing to benefit from the United States, but does not understand, as Socrates did in the Crito, that such benefit requires the virtue of loyalty in return to be viable, then Cafferty has been poorly educated. Cafferty, like today's left liberals in general, is a barbarian.

Cafferty's, CNN's and, in general, liberals' disloyalty is troubling. It heralds the decline of the United States. If such an influential individual as Jack Cafferty doesn't consider loyalty to his nation to be an important virtue, and the public has not protested his presence on CNN, then the nation is in trouble.

I would like to see a serious boycott of CNN by well-educated Americans. The liberal boobs who dominate our universities have created the ethical miasma that permeates media outlets like CNN, and they are to blame for our nation's ethical malaise.