Friday, September 7, 2001 - The OPB forum, Seven Days, was heavily stacked to the Left, as usual.  Here, I’ll give you a rundown.  Bill Lunch of OPB (liberal), Stephanie Fowler of OPB (liberal with occasional flashes of common sense), Richard Aguirre of the Salem Statesman-Journal (liberal), David Steves of the Eugene Register Guard (flaming liberal) and David Reinhard of the Oregonian (a compassionate conservative with overly nice manners and a desire to keep his job.)  If we had one of those famous red/blue voter maps of Oregon, all but one of the above would come from the tiny blue spots.  The political views of 90% of the geography would be represented only by Reinhard. 

The panel discussed the next election.  DeFazio’s decision not to run in the statewide race, they said, opens up possibilities for the Dems in the gubernatorial contest. The Republican Party’s “hard right” top players, they said, have not opened up opportunities for more “moderate” (read: Democrats wearing ties) candidates.  This seems to the Seven Days lefties to set up a scenario that might allow a serious liberal access to the Governor’s mansion.    Governor Svetlana may indeed be waiting in our wings. David Steves could barely restrain an expression of ecstasy at that prospect.  Anyway, the labels flowed like Swiss chocolate on an Arizona summer sidewalk.

The interesting thing about all this has to do with definitions, because he who controls the definitions of the terms has won the debate before it begins. 

Thus, the mainstream liberal press – people like Steves, Lunch and Aguirre – have redefined political classifications for a very good reason.  As to their motive for doing it, who knows?  It could be out of their unconscious, natural bias, or as part of an evil plot by the Vast Leftwing Conspiracy of which they are a part.  I believe the former is the case.  They actually believe they are reasonable, accurate, balanced journalists and that the definitions they use accurately describe the views in question.

They’re wrong, of course.

Here’s a key that will help you judge these things.  The foundation, and so the center, of American political belief is the U.S. Constitution, not the Communist Manifesto. 

Let’s take the right to bear arms as an example.  The press says you should not have that right, or that it should be severely limited. They say those (like the NRA) who fight to maintain the 2nd Amendment are “far right,” or “right wing conservatives.”  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  The right to bear arms, like the right to free speech or the right to practice your religion, is a constitutional one.  What could be more centrist than a legal right that applies to every citizen?

It is the conservative who is at the center of the gun debate.  The liberal who wishes to restrict this universal right is to the left of center.   The liberal who wishes to eliminate this universal right is to the far left of center, nearing fascism.  (All he needs to complete the journey to brotherhood with Hitler is government control of private industry and the press, plus the use of the military as an internal political enforcement arm.)

If you don’t yet quite grasp the advantage mislabeling gives liberals, try this.  Imagine that you have a football team that is going to the Super Bowl.  What if you could arrange it so that the penalty for rules violations (like jumping offsides) by the opposing team was twice the yardage of that assessed to your team for the same violations during the game?  Who do you think would win?

It certainly wouldn’t be an example of equal opportunity, now, would it? 

Equal opportunity.  Two very simple words.  What they mean to a conservative (thus, a centrist) is exactly what they say – equal opportunity.  The same rules for everybody.  They don’t mean quotas that favor one person over another, and they don’t mean “guaranteed equal outcome.”  To a conservative, just as with your dictionary, “opportunity” and “outcome” are not synonyms.  Liberals (people who are off center to the left) redefine the meaning of those words.  They use legislation and judicial fiat to stack the deck in favor of one man over the other. 

A conservative believes the rules should apply equally to all citizens. (Same yardage penalties for the same rules violation by both teams.) This is a centrist position. A liberal believes equality before the law may be dismissed to achieve redress. This is a leftist position.  (A rigged game.)

Oregon journalists are predominantly to the left of the political center.  Of the panelists on the Seven Days program here in question, only one, David Reinhard, pays homage to the center – the U.S. Constitution.  So when you watch these programs or read their newspapers, bear in mind that the terminology most of them use is designed to rewrite the rules of the game. When they use terms like liberal, moderate and conservative they are either lying to you, or, more likely, simply misguided fools who don’t know where the center is. 

Most of the panelists on Seven Days don’t know that the U.S. Constitution is the center of American political belief – its very foundation stone.  Thus, they don’t know their left from their right.  (LL)

On American media bias: THE LEFT IN DENIAL
 (If the NY Post story is gone, use this local link.)