Arrogance and Ignorance

Power Line: Blindly Committed to Defeat

I've been struck on many occasions how arrogance and ignorance go together. There are none so sure than those who are completely wrong. I'm also struck by how often that Democrats manage to get exactly what they claim that they hate nearly right after they get power.

For 8 years they talked about Reagan being a "lightweight", "just lucky", "only about spin" and just in many ways "not engaged". Then they elected Slick Willie who fit all of those to a tee, but was SO out of touch that he was having sex at the office. One can't get much more disengaged in their work that that! The supposed "Reagan Naps" were pretty mild by comparison.

They believe W is the prototype for "arrogance and ignorance", but after reading BOs book and watching him in action, I think they haven't seen much yet. Bush has always been a guy that knows his limits and surrounds himself with help. BO seems to think that he knows everything while he blathers about 10K dead in Kansas from a tornado, visiting 57 states and his uncle liberating Auschwitz. He is sure he "knows it all", only it is pretty clear even while the press is pitching him softballs, that the first term Senator with no leadership experience is just like a first term Senator with no leadership experience that thinks that he knows everything.

A legend in his own mind
Blindly Committed to Defeat

John McCain invited Barack Obama to go with him on a trip to Iraq; Obama's spokesman, Bill Burton, responded dismissively:

"John McCain's proposal is nothing more than a political stunt, and we don't need any more 'Mission Accomplished' banners or walks through Baghdad markets to know that Iraq's leaders have not made the political progress that was the stated purpose of the surge. The American people don't want any more false promises of progress, they deserve a real debate about a war that has overstretched our military, and cost us thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars without making us safer."

Jim Geraghty notes that Obama has been to Iraq once, for two days in 2006. Geraghty makes the legitimate point that Obama seems to be willing to meet with just about anyone in the world except our generals in Iraq:

"And isn't Obama vulnerable to the argument that a man who's pledged to meet unconditionally, one-on-one, face-to-face with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad really ought to meet at least once one-on-one with Gen. David Petraeus?"

Fair enough, but what is most striking to me is the unattractiveness of Obama's reply to McCain. Burton sneeringly suggests that when McCain has gone to Iraq it was merely a "stunt," not a legitimate effort to understand conditions on the ground. And Burton displays the combination of arrogance and ignorance that is the trademark of the Obama campaign, declaring, as an article of faith and contrary to the facts, that the Iraqis are making no political progress. Burton's retort is a naked expression of the blind faith in defeat that has become one of the ugliest features of contemporary liberalism.