Which is weirder: building a flat topped mountain out of mashed potatoes or an actor who until about four years ago was a left wing lunatic but is now writing a rational article for the conservative PJ Media? When your humble correspondent saw the name "Richard Dreyfuss" as the author of an article in PJ Media, he immediately thought it must be a writer with the same name as the actor. However, after scrolling down to the bottom of the story, imagine my surprise upon discovering that it was indeed the actor. Although Dreyfuss did display a refreshing moment of mental clarity last year on Fox News when he spoke out in favor of American Exceptionalism, it could have been written off as just a freak event. Apparently it seems to part of a learning curve.
In his PJ Media article, Dreyfuss starts out arguing for a better informed citizenry, especially the youth. Okay, that could be chalked up to just a standard good citizenship lecture but then Dreyfuss delivered an analysis sure to get him disinvited to many a Hollywood party chock full of liberals:
Western kids are reportedly trying to join ISIS; why? Perhaps because the only spiritual movement being discussed in public, however ugly its ideology, is extremist Islam. Judeo-Christian spirituality seems pallid and disconnected; certainly Americans are no longer learning the secular faith of the Constitution, the musculature of republican democracy, its values of individual worth, its religious tolerance, its embrace of opportunity and merit.
Kids who grow up in a spiritual void may drift to ideological thuggery because we let go of its most powerful enemy, the mobility of mind that comes from Enlightenment values.
Our values are not transmitted genetically; they must be taught. They’re not. We’re asked to make choices between political parties that have ceased all rational intentions to communicate their stand on issues with any clarity. We live in an hypnotic trance of inaction because we aren’t taught how to run the nation, that we as a people are the highest sovereign power, that we can and should hold villains accountable.
Voting doesn’t make you a better citizen, comprehending the issues makes you better. Voting without that makes us all suckers.
Exit question: What are the chances that we might someday see actor George Clooney build a flat topped mountain out of mashed potatoes?
