THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VII, Issue # 199, September 8, 2005
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
EXPLOITING CINDY SHEEHAN:
STANDARD LIBERAL OPERATING PROCEDURE
By Christopher G. Adamo
ONE COMMON FAILING AMONG CONSERVATIVES: THEIR LACK OF SUFFICIENT CYNICISM TO PROPERLY ASSESS THE
HYPOCRISY, INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY, & DECEITFUL NATURE OF THEIR LIBERAL LEFTIST OPPONENTS -- THE REACTION OF
CONSERVATIVES TO THE ONGOING ANTICS OF ANTI-WAR LIBERAL LEFTIST CINDY SHEEHAN: A CASE IN POINT --
CONSERVATIVES' FAILURE TO UNDERSTAND THAT, TO ADHERENTS OF THE LEFTWING LIBERAL IDEOLOGY & PROMOTERS OF
THE LEFTWING LIBERAL POLITICAL AGENDA, NO SITUATION IS SO TRAGIC OR PERSONAL THAT IT WOULD CONSTRAIN ONE
FROM SHAMELESSLY EXPLOITING THE SITUATION FOR POLITICAL GAIN -- THE NEED FOR CONSERVATIVES TO BE FULLY
CONSCIOUS OF & FOREVER ALERT TO THE STANDARD LIBERAL OPERATING PROCEDURE (SLOP)
FULL STORY:
If Conservatives have one common failing among them, it is their lack of sufficient cynicism to properly assess the nature of
their Liberal opponents. The reaction of Conservatives to the ongoing antics of Cindy Sheehan stands as inarguable proof.
Long before her son’s death, she was an anti-war Liberal. Nothing has changed.
Yet, on occasions too numerous to count, Conservatives have voiced their sympathies for Sheehan, presuming that, as a
loving mother who lost her son in the ongoing Iraq war, she is crying out from emotional pain. Thus they overwhelmingly give
her a pass for the hypocrisy, venom, and outright deceit with which she maintains her place in the limelight. But with each new
outlandish outburst, evidence mounts of something far less noble that motivates her.
A more realistic prospect is that, having become drunk with constant media attention, her persona has mutated into a grotesque
caricature of a grief stricken parent, and is now consumed with her highly inflated perception of her importance to the national
debate.
So enthralled has Cindy Sheehan become with this situation, she now fancies herself a profound orator and foreign policy expert,
offering advice on how to diplomatically alleviate the terrorist threat.
Evidently, her son was merely an avenue to the “bully pulpit.” Sadly, it is not mean-spirited to assume that those on the political
Left can sink to such depths. It has been done before.
During the 1996 Democratic National Convention, Vice-President Al Gore gave a speech that dripped with the same kind of
self-absorbed pretense of virtue that we now see coming from Sheehan. Gore spoke of his sister, who had died from lung cancer
some years prior. In a transparent attempt to make the speech piercing and meaningful (though, being Al Gore, he only succeeded
in making it very tedious), he gratuitously drew out the account of the final moments of her life and its supposedly profound effect
on him. Gore said:
“All I could do was to say back to her with all the gentleness in my heart,
‘I love you.’ And then I knelt by her bed and held her hand. And in a very
short time her breathing became labored and then she breathed her last
breath.”
“And that is why, until I draw my last breath, I will pour my heart and soul
into the cause of protecting our children from the dangers of smoking.”
Touchy stuff to be sure, and, no doubt, many among his emotionally driven audience were moved. Yet, during the intervening years
between his sister’s death and his dramatic recounting of it, an incident had been recorded on videotape that proved to be highly
inconvenient to Gore in his endeavor to maintain his credibility.
In a field of tobacco, standing in front of a bunch of farmers and declaring his solidarity with tobacco growers, Gore proclaimed that
solidarity in the following words: “I've hoed it, I've succored it, and I've harvested it” Thus, Gore is on record manifesting his
unmitigated hyprocrisy
The real truth to be gleaned from Gore’s speech at the Democratic National Convention is that, to people of his Liberal Leftist
political ideology, no situation is so tragic or personal that it would constrain one from shamelessly exploiting the situation for
political gain. In light of this precedent, it is worthwhile to consider the longterm pattern emerging from among Sheehan and her
cohorts on that roadside in Texas.
By her behavior, she completely dispels the myth that somebody can, in such a manner, “support the troops while opposing the
war.”
Yes, it is possible to question the wisdom and legitimacy of present U.S. policy in Iraq without undermining the ongoing efforts
there, if such is indeed the intention of those doing the questioning. But Sheehan’s words do no less than denigrate America’s
entire effort, and therefore inspire the enemy to kill more American soldiers.
Thus, she ensures that many other American mothers are similarly aggrieved as she claims to be. Worse yet, she does not grant
those mothers such latitude for their own grief as many have granted her, Instead, she cruelly demeans them as “brainwashed” for
remaining supportive of the Iraq war, the Republican Party, and President George W. Bush. Still worse, those who killed her son,
and who, by her words, are further motivated to kill more Americans, are, according to Sheehan, “Freedom Fighters.”
The Liberal media is having a great time encouraging Cindy Sheehan to become ever more of a spectacle with each passing day.
But, in the final analysis, they are ultimately not to be blamed. She has shown herself willing to stand on the grave of her own
heroic son and sully it, not from a broken heart, but in service to the ideology of Leftwing Liberalism and to the Leftwing Liberal
political agenda.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Liberals, Statists, Socialists, & Other Leftists
American Politics & Political Competition
Liberalism Versus Conservatism in American Politics
-------------------------
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY & POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES:
COMPETING SYSTEMS OF POLITICAL THOUGHT
Conservatism
Traditional Conservatism: Questions & Answers
Conservatism: Attitudes, Types, & Present Status
Constitutional Conservatism: American & British
Liberalism
Classical Liberalism: Intellectual Foundations
Classical Liberalism: Conservative Liberalism
Manchester Liberalism & Social Darwinism
Modern Social "Liberalism": Statist "Liberalism"
Radical & Totalitarian Ideologies
Radicalism, Utopianism, & Totalitarianism
Christopher G. Adamo is a freelance writer who lives in southeastern Wyoming and works in the field of industrial instrumentation.
He is actively involved in Wyoming's political process, serving as a delegate to successive Wyoming State Republican Conventions
and as a member of the Wyoming State Republican Central Committee. He has assisted Republican candidates for local and state
legislatures and for the United States Congress. His articles, which appear regularly in The Progressive Conservative, U.S.A.,
and on a number of other websites, reflect a major concern with the damage being done to Conservatism and Conservative causes by
the Liberal Leftist faction in the Republican Party as well as by the much larger and more powerful Liberal Leftist faction in the
Democratic Party. During the early and middle 1990s, Adamo was Editor of the Wyoming Christian Coalition's official news organ,
The Wyoming Christian.
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