Kerby Anderson

A number of columnists and political thinkers have tried to explain why there is so much hate in the public arena. Shelby Steele is a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. He has some profound insights on “Why the Left is Consumed With Hate.” He takes us back to the 1960’s when this country “finally accepted that slavery and segregation were profound moral failings.” So the left put itself in charge of righting this wrong, thus giving it enormous political and cultural power. It also led to the “greatest array of government sponsored social programs in history” that have cost more than $22 trillion. He believes that this amounted to a formula for power that goes something like this: “The greater the menace to the nation’s moral legitimacy, the more power redounded to the left.” Soon they had compiled a laundry list of menaces. Racism was at the top of the list, but any other bigotry ending in “ism” and “phobia” also made the list. This has created a problem for the left. America has made significant progress in racial issues along with progress with many other issues. And that threatens the left “whose existence is threatened by the diminishment of racial oppression.” It must find racism anywhere it can to make itself relevant. The white-on-black shooting in Ferguson, Missouri got lots of media attention and even a comment from the president of the United States. During that same period, “thousands of black-on-black shootings took place in Chicago, hometown of the then-president, yet they inspired very little media coverage and no serious presidential commentary.” Today the left is troubled by its possible obsolescence. There is not enough social menace to service its need for power. Also nagging them is the failure of so many government programs the left proposed. It is easy to see why the left is consumed with hate.