I can never get enough of Camille Paglia. To be sure, she’s a Dem, and there are a lot of points on which we don’t agree. But as this latest Salon interview indicates (hat tip: Drudge), she’s got many a biting and perceptive apercu, especially about her own party and the politicians it spawns.
Here she is, in top form, about what’s wrong with the Dems:
“The Democrats’ portrayal of Republicans as fat cats out of touch with ordinary Americans just doesn’t fly anymore, and they should drop it. I think the center of the Republican Party really is small-businessmen and very practical people who correctly see that it’s job creation and wealth creation that sustain an economy — not government intervention and government control, that suffocating nanny-state mentality. The Democrats are in some sort of time warp in always proposing a government solution to every problem. It’s like Hillary’s philosophy that it takes a village to raise a child. Well, does it? Or does it take a strong family and not the village?
“What’s broadened the appeal of conservatism in recent years is that Republicans stress individualism — individual effort and personal responsibility. They’re really the liberty party now — I thought my party was! It used to seem as if the Republicans were authoritarians and the Democrats were for free speech and for the freedom to live your own life and pursue happiness. But the Democrats have wandered away from their own foundational principles.
“The Democrats have to start fresh and throw out the entire party superstructure. I was bitterly disappointed after voting for Ralph Nader that he didn’t devote himself to helping build a strong third party in this country. When the American economy was still manufacturing based, the trade unions were viable, and the Democrats stayed close to their working-class roots. But now the Northeastern Democrats, with their fancy law degrees and cocktail parties, have simply become peddlers of condescending bromides about ‘the people.'”
And here she is on The Traveling Clinton Show:
“I used to assume he was campaigning to be the next secretary general of the United Nations, but he’s turning into a compulsive blabbermouth who is compromising his own dignity as a former president. He was unusually young after two terms in office, but no former presidents have tried to hog the spotlight. He acts like he’s the shadow president. This isn’t Great Britain, where the leader of the opposing party is ready to step in if the government falls. It’s a bad precedent, because we wouldn’t want a disgruntled Republican ex-president bouncing around the map bad-mouthing a sitting Democratic president. Why is Clinton undermining the authority of the president when national security is so sensitive?…
“If Hillary is a serious presidential candidate, to have her husband constantly careening around the landscape like an unguided missile and stealing the limelight is disastrous. It may betray his own ambivalence and his desire to return to power. He’s undermining her — if we vote for her, are we going to be stuck with him? How will she be able to govern? Are we going to have co-presidents? It’s probably too late for her to dump him.”
Since Camille can never stop talking, there’s much, much more of this, including wonderful stuff about how the Foley scandal has backfired on its Dem handlers. You won’t agree with it all–she’s pretty hard on our beloved G.W. Bush–but you’ll find all of it provocative. And she’s a major Condi fan, which we really like!