Bill Maher at the Huffington Post:
Or take the health care debate we're presently having: members of Congress have recessed now so they can go home and "listen to their constituents." An urge they should resist because their constituents don't know anything. At a recent town-hall meeting in South Carolina, a man stood up and told his Congressman to "keep your government hands off my Medicare," which is kind of like driving cross country to protest highways.
I'm the bad guy for saying it's a stupid country, yet polls show that a majority of Americans cannot name a single branch of government, or explain what the Bill of Rights is….
Nearly half of Americans don't know that states have two senators and more than half can't name their congressman. And among Republican governors, only 30% got their wife's name right on the first try.
Sarah Palin says she would never apologize for America. Even though a Gallup poll says 18% of Americans think the sun revolves around the earth. No, they're not stupid. They're interplanetary mavericks….
People bitch and moan about taxes and spending, but they have no idea what their government spends money on. The average voter thinks foreign aid consumes 24% of our federal budget. It's actually less than 1%….
And I haven't even brought up America's religious beliefs. But here's one fun fact you can take away: did you know only about half of Americans are aware that Judaism is an older religion than Christianity? That's right, half of America looks at books called the Old Testament and the New Testament and cannot figure out which one came first.
And these are the idiots we want to weigh in on the minutia of health care policy?
Very funny. If only it were not true.
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Most of you are completely missing the point. Maher’s argument isn’t that some small band of elites should completely run the Government, nor is it that he’s smarter than everyone else. Rather, it is that if you are a passionate constituent who is going to throw a wrench in the process, you should have some idea of what you are talking about. Hence, his argument about Americans being woefully ignorant about the most basic of facts is absolutely a salient point. If you are a chemistry teacher who doesn’t need, or care to have, a sound knowledge of Government and politics do to your job, that’s all well and good. But then don’t try and dictate policy on issues where you have no expertise.
Would you let a passionate, yet ultimately ignorant person devoid of any knowledge of math or science, determine which scientific theories and laws hold weight? Of course not, it’s absurd. Why on earth would it be any different for health-care policy?
In a democracy, everyone certainly is allowed to express their viewpoint. Maher is simply saying that if you don’t know anything about the actual topic, maybe it makes sense to keep your mouth shut. I tend to agree.
“Would you let a passionate, yet ultimately ignorant person devoid of any knowledge of math or science, determine which scientific theories and laws hold weight? Of course not, it’s absurd. Why on earth would it be any different for health-care policy?”
Rex, public choice theory. It may be greatly in your interest to make 1+1=3 but in math that’s a hard sell. What is salient here is interest not intelligence. Obama and his crew want to save the government money by expanding medicare which is the policy equivalent of 1+1=3. Specifically, Obama has not been arguing for reasoned debate, he was pushing for a bill.
No doubt. America is a nation of morons.
Clearly, the answer is to entrust the entire 15-trillion-dollar economy to 536 people in DC who don’t even read the bills they vote on. I can’t see any possible problem with this.
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