The Right-wing Thinks You Are No Good!

The Right-Wing is Busy Demonizing...  well.. almost everybody!


Right-wingers, conservatives, teabaggers, Republicans, Libertarians:  I'm not sure where one group ends and the next begins, but they seem to have quite a bit in common:  There are very few of us in the United States these days that they like or respect.... except others like themselves.


I thought of this last night after reading some replies at Huffington Post and coming across a few right-wing, conservative blogs while looking for information.  I began to put together a list of all of the groups that these people harshly criticize.  It's really extensive:


1.  Liberals and progressives:  I believe that about 15 to 25% of adults in this fair country consider themselves liberals or progressives.  I won't say much about this; the conservatives and their friends have disliked anybody who considers him/herself liberal or progressive for many years now. 


They feel that the "libs" and the progressives molly coddle criminals, the poor, and the homeless, and take money out of their pockets to support "big government".  Enough said.


If you are a liberal, Progressive, or even a Democrat, the right-wingers and Conservatives don't have any use for you at all, all 40,000,000 of you.  


2.  The unemployed:  First of all, most right-wing bloggers will remark that only the dregs of a company were laid off; that the companies kept the people who were really valuable.  They tell you that if you were "invaluable" to a company, you wouldn't have been let go.  In other words, if you got laid off in the worst recession in 80 years, it's your fault.  


They neglect to consider that many companies or departments were closed down, whole departments were outsourced, and often, the selection of people to be let go was based on office politics, health considerations, age, or other illegal discriminatory factors which are next to impossible for the laid off worker to prove. 


Right now we have 28,560,000 people who are "officially" unemployed, who "want to work", or who are working part-time but want to work full-time.  That doesn't count the number of people who were unemployed sometime in the past couple of years but have managed to return to the labor market.


Apparently the right-wing doesn't like you if you are among those tens of millions.  


A subset of the unemployed , of which the Republicans, teabaggers, and conservatives are particularly dismissive, is:


3.  The long-term unemployed; in particular, the much-maligned 99ers.


I can't even believe some of the venom that is directed against these unfortunate people who have suffered the most in this recession.  Whenever an article highlights the story of someone who is struggling with no job and no unemployment benefits, the right-wing trolls are out in force:


Why doesn't he/she start a business?  Why don't you just walk into the local McDonald's and get a job?  He/she is too fat; he/she should lose weight and then he/she would be hired.  You haven't tried hard enough; anybody who has really been looking would have a job after two years of unemployment.


The baggers and their friends all seem to have a brother-in-law or a neighbor who has milked the system and is just sitting on his/her duff collecting unemployment and not even trying to get a job!  (Would any unemployed person actually bare his/her soul and struggles to a right-winger?  Since the answer is most likely "No", how would the right-wingers know if someone was or wasn't looking for work?)


Many claim to be employers who have offered a job to a long-term unemployed person or a 99er, but the person hasn't taken the job because he/she makes more money on unemployment or won't work for minimum wage.  I don't believe most of these stories.  


The most offensive thing, however, is that these right-wingers insist that there are jobs and anyone who really wants to work can find a job.  I never know what to make of these comments.  Do they really believe this?  We have anywhere between 4 and 8 unemployed people for every available job!  


In any event, if you are among the long-term unemployed, the right-wingers, baggers, and their friends really don't like you at all.  They think you are lazy.        


4.  Public school teachers.  The recent budget fiasco in Wisconsin captured the attention of the nation and made it clear that most on the right have no use for public school teachers and they believe that teachers are not entitled to middle class wages.  Just this week, we've had bagger presidential candidates meeting with home schoolers and trashing public schools and public teachers at those meetings. 


There are a few teachers making close to 100K.  Many retiring teachers make decent pensions because they have worked for years and don't get Social Security.  The right-wingers will pillory any public school teacher who makes this much, even though those cases are usually the exceptions, and teachers make that much if they have decades of experience and at least a Master's degree.  Some believe that teachers should not receive pay increases if they increase their education.


The scorn of the right-wing for public education and teachers focuses on educated, middle class people who actually make a middle class salary and can live a middle class lifestyle , thanks in large part to their unions.    


So public school teachers in the United States, all three million of them, are demeaned and denigrated by the right-wingers and their bagger friends.  


If you are a public school teacher, the right-wing doesn't think very much of you. 


Continued in another entry here.  I'm only half way through, and the numbers of people in this country that the right-wing devalue are starting to mount up.