Friday, July 29, 2011

Salutin the Ideologue

The definition of an ideologue is "An adherent of an ideology, esp. one who is uncompromising and dogmatic." That certainly describes Toronto Star opiner Rick Salutin, who for many years has been a vocal and opiniated ideologue on/of the left. But go figure--Salutin doesn't see it that way. To him an ideologue is someone on the right--someone like Anders Breivik and the Republicans, say:
The most chilling phrase in the Norwegian horror was the killer’s statement, through his lawyer, that it was “atrocious,” or in another translation “gruesome,” or even just that he was sorry — but it was necessary. I’ve never seen anything that expresses the toxic potential of ideology so eloquently. It’s especially in that note of regret. Rage and hate do terrible deeds but they may falter. An idea that you know with certainty is true can be put into action no matter what your state of mind or feelings. You might even have tears in your eyes as you shoot.
So the Nazis depended on dull-minded bureaucrats to implement their final solution for Jews. They weren’t seething with hate or emotion. It doesn’t matter whether the ideology is religious, anti-religious, left or right. The film clip from The Town that U.S. Republicans in Congress are showing each other to stiffen their resolve about killing off services that people need has the same quality.
So you mean people "killing off" Obama's out-of-control spendaholism/inept handling of the ship of state is essentially the same as a crazed fundamentalist pagan opening fire on a bunch of kids at a summer camp?

And that's not "ideological" (not to mention downright ridiculous)?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I posted this at the Star, but they won't publish it. I also e-mailed it to pRick Salutin:

I think you forgot about the Left Wing murder bureacracy known as the Communist movement. If anyone will kill you for having the wrong opinion, it's the Left.