Matt Yglesias

Conservatives: Everyone is Anti-American

Jonathan Allen reports for CQ that conservative legislators are seeing anti-American plots everywhere these days:

House Democrats, a Los Angeles Superior Court official and Columbia University are among the entities Republican lawmakers have described as “anti-American,” “anti-American power” or “anti-American military” on the House floor in the current Congress.

Amid a backlash against Republicans who have challenged their colleagues’ loyalty to America or Americans on the campaign trail, a review of the Congressional Record reveals that similar rhetoric has been in use in the House chamber, as well.

In particular, the term “anti-American” has been hurled freely in floor debates by a pair of junior GOP stalwarts, Reps. Virginia Foxx and Ted Poe .

Poe stops short of calling colleagues anti-American, reserving that for institutions and individuals outside of Congress, but Foxx has angered Democrats by aiming the epithet at them.

The question, to me, is if Barack Obama wins and Democrats expand their majorities in the House and the Senate, does that show that America itself has become anti-American?

The Annals of Spin

Rep. Michelle Bachman introduces us to the subtelties of universal quantification:

Despite the way the blogs and the Democratic Party are spinning it, I never called all liberals anti-American, I never questioned Barack Obama’s patriotism, and I never asked for some House Un-American Activities Committee witch hunt into my colleagues in Congress.

Her precise words:

MATTHEWS: So you think Barack Obama may have anti-American views?

BACHMANN: Absolutely. I’m very concerned that he may have anti-American views.

So, indeed, she left open the possibility that some liberals, though not Obama, may not be anti-American. Similarly, rather than ask for a House Un-American Activities Committee witch hunt into my colleagues in Congress what she asked for was a media investigation into whether her congressional colleagues’ anti-American views.

In Defense of Country First

Jim Henley doesn’t like McCain’s slogan:

Oh by the way: “Country First” is a fascist idea. There ought to be a fairly large number of people, things and groups that are more important to you than your “country.”

In his defense, whether or not there ought to be a bunch of things that are more important to me than my country, I think it makes a lot of sense for me to want a President who’ll put country first. You wouldn’t want top government officials to, for example, still from the public treasury and give the money to their kids. Or hand out undeserved contracts to ner-do-well siblings.