According to conservative, Republican politicians, hosts, pundits, and writers, there is a:
War on Christmas, war on Christianity, war on marriage, war on family values, war on heterosexuals, war on Caucasians, war on men, war on the wealthy, war on gun owners, war on national security, and (of course) a war on capitalism.
This seems to me to fit pretty well with the concept of paranoid ideation which is defined as: an exaggerated, sometimes grandiose, belief or suspicion, usually not of a delusional nature, that one is being harassed, persecuted, or treated unfairly.
It's not like these ideas are difficult to find. We've seen them from Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Allen West, Darrell Issa, Dan Burton, Tom Cotton, Rick Perry, Bob Deuell, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, John Hagee, Ronald Reagan, Mike Huckabee, Herman Cain, John Ashcroft, Lamar Smith, Ted Cruz, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, and Michelle Malkin, Newt Gingritch, Donald Trump, and Reince Priebus.
You can find these ideas on Fox, on conservative and Christian radio, on numerous conservative newspapers and websites like The Wall Street Journal, The Drudge Report, New York Post, WorldNetDaily, Newsmax, Free Republic, The Washington Times, TownHall, Real Clear Politics, National Review, The Heritage Foundation, Newsbusters, The Daily Beast, and Breitbart.
You can certainly find crazy ideas among liberals or Democrats like the notion that president G.W. Bush planned the 9/11 attack, that the HIV virus was created to kill off undesirable groups of people, or that malt liquor has a secret ingredient that causes violent behavior. Sure, these ideas are pretty wacky but looking for them is like looking for truffles; you have to look really hard and dig them up. In contrast, the Republican ideas of persecution seem to be everywhere. And, to be honest, if these are not accepted ideas among Republicans then why are the places that present them so popular and how do the Republican politicians who repeat them get elected?
I have to admit that the idea of a shared personality disorder is somewhat hard to understand. For example, in science fiction terms I could easily imagine a group of people living among aliens, surrounded by alien culture, feeling unsafe and acting a bit paranoid. But, I can't really grasp why people living in their home country with a government in large measure made up of other people with similar ideas would feel so afraid. Yet, I hear the deep down fear talk all the time, even on here. People don't say that Obamacare is a bad idea and will have to fixed, instead, it is the worst possible thing that has happened to the US since the attack on Pearl Harbor. The economy isn't down, no, it's on the verge of collapse. We aren't trying to make the tax code workable for more people, instead we are assaulting the very foundations of capitalism and turning the country into a Socialist Dictatorship. We aren't trying to balance religious freedom, rather we are implementing Sharia law any day now. Where does all this fear and paranoia come from and why has it found such a cozy home in the hearts of conservatives?
War on Christmas, war on Christianity, war on marriage, war on family values, war on heterosexuals, war on Caucasians, war on men, war on the wealthy, war on gun owners, war on national security, and (of course) a war on capitalism.
This seems to me to fit pretty well with the concept of paranoid ideation which is defined as: an exaggerated, sometimes grandiose, belief or suspicion, usually not of a delusional nature, that one is being harassed, persecuted, or treated unfairly.
It's not like these ideas are difficult to find. We've seen them from Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Allen West, Darrell Issa, Dan Burton, Tom Cotton, Rick Perry, Bob Deuell, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, John Hagee, Ronald Reagan, Mike Huckabee, Herman Cain, John Ashcroft, Lamar Smith, Ted Cruz, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, and Michelle Malkin, Newt Gingritch, Donald Trump, and Reince Priebus.
You can find these ideas on Fox, on conservative and Christian radio, on numerous conservative newspapers and websites like The Wall Street Journal, The Drudge Report, New York Post, WorldNetDaily, Newsmax, Free Republic, The Washington Times, TownHall, Real Clear Politics, National Review, The Heritage Foundation, Newsbusters, The Daily Beast, and Breitbart.
You can certainly find crazy ideas among liberals or Democrats like the notion that president G.W. Bush planned the 9/11 attack, that the HIV virus was created to kill off undesirable groups of people, or that malt liquor has a secret ingredient that causes violent behavior. Sure, these ideas are pretty wacky but looking for them is like looking for truffles; you have to look really hard and dig them up. In contrast, the Republican ideas of persecution seem to be everywhere. And, to be honest, if these are not accepted ideas among Republicans then why are the places that present them so popular and how do the Republican politicians who repeat them get elected?
I have to admit that the idea of a shared personality disorder is somewhat hard to understand. For example, in science fiction terms I could easily imagine a group of people living among aliens, surrounded by alien culture, feeling unsafe and acting a bit paranoid. But, I can't really grasp why people living in their home country with a government in large measure made up of other people with similar ideas would feel so afraid. Yet, I hear the deep down fear talk all the time, even on here. People don't say that Obamacare is a bad idea and will have to fixed, instead, it is the worst possible thing that has happened to the US since the attack on Pearl Harbor. The economy isn't down, no, it's on the verge of collapse. We aren't trying to make the tax code workable for more people, instead we are assaulting the very foundations of capitalism and turning the country into a Socialist Dictatorship. We aren't trying to balance religious freedom, rather we are implementing Sharia law any day now. Where does all this fear and paranoia come from and why has it found such a cozy home in the hearts of conservatives?
via JREF Forum http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=270710&goto=newpost
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