Birdnow's Aviary

February 05, 2026

Magnanimity - You First!

Timothy Birdnow

Here is an essay calling for more civility, more "magnanimity in public discourse.

I'm sorry but this essay is myopic and just plain wrong; it fails to understand the differences between Left and Right and paints us all with one broad brush, while ignoring basic human nature.

The author - Stephen M. Klugewicz - finds parity between both sides, arguing it is the internet which has given a voice to the public and it is that public driving the harsh political rhetoric. Horsefeathers! Apparently Mr. Klugewicz didn't live through the Reagan era where so many liberals called Reagan "Hitler" and a madman and said he wanted to blow up the world. He has apparently forgotten the viciousness with which the Left went after the Nixon Administration.

Actually politics has always been a blood sport. Thomas Jefferson was accused of taking liberties with slaves (a huge no-no back then) without any evidence at the time. Alexander Hamilton was so vicious in his criticisms of Aaron Burr, and would not let it go even when Burr turned the other cheek, that eventually Burr had little recourse but to challenge him to a duel. You had all manner of such things in bygone days; Licoln was a mulatto, some said. Chester Arthur was accused of being a child molester. I could go on and on.

But there has always been a rotten core to our political acrimony, and that poisonous core has revolved around Liberalism.

Liberalism in the modern sense was born out of the Enlightenment and their view that God is less important than human beings think. The rise of Humanism saw the deification of Man in the minds of the Liberals, and if Man is inherently good than anyone who resists that deification is therefore evil. It's been the driving force in Western Civilization for a coupe of centuries now.

We always saw this kind of acrimony in a number of places, notably Latin America. It did not touch the United States because of the strong Judeo-Christian ethos that was at the center of American life. The Left has been waging war on that cebter for decades, using such weapons as the Sexual Revolution, Feminism, LGBTQ, racial strife, and a host of other such things to divide us. It has worked and we've now fallen into two distinct camps (with the smaller third camp of Libertarians straddling the fence) but the warring sides are not equal in power or in aggressiveness.. The Left is still the engine - ever on the attack, always pushing, and with control of the media and education they have been wildly successful, marching through and despoiling all of our institutions.

It is axiomatic that in war the aggressor sets the rules of engagement. The Left has always been the aggressor and the right always failed to fight in kid because we did not want to sully ourselves, get our hads dirty. For decades people on our side said "we're better than that" as if that would somehow magically fix everything. It didn't; we kept losing and our society kept moving ever leftward, becoming crazier and breaking down. It has only been since Reagan that we have actually fought back in any but a feckless way; before Reagan the assumption was we shouldn't fight but rather steer into the skid as it were, ride the wave and hope to make it go a little more smoothly. That is the way to be annihilated.

So along comes new technology and suddenly our side can get our message out and what happens? The Left is outed. One of the keys to their power is the hidden nature of their beliefs; they know they are a minority and have to trick the bulk of the populace. But Conservatives were on talk radio, online, and on podcasts and cable t.v. spilling the beans. This enraged them because they had always had it their own way, controlling most television and other media, as well as the Universities and the schools. (BTW my brother has struggled all his career in academia because he has basically been blackballed by the Left and so never was able to get a tenure track position despite having several books published and getting rave reviews from students.) Liberalism cannot stand up in comparison to Conservatism, which is basically an acknowledgement of human nature. Liberalism is wholly unnatural and people know it when it's pointed out.

So it was the Left that started the war. What were we supposed to do about that? We tried turning the other cheek for a hundred years only to have the other side of our faces bitten off by the feral Liberals.

To argue that we need more "magnanimity" is a lovely sentiment worthy of a Miss America contestant, but about as deep. You cannot be magnanimous with a vicious dog; you have to restrain it or put it down.

We are where we are because, for the first time in their memory, the Left sees themselves losing ground as we go after the thigs they have imposed on us. This has always worked for them by their gaining ground one way or another; when they hold power they gain ground politically and when out of power they gain ground socially. But now WE are gaining ground and they are desperately trying to seduce us with just this sort of thinking, that we need to tone it down, we need more "comity", that we shouldn't fight back. They've used THAT trick many times before to shut us up; it's a way of playing on our own decencies.

Do people go overboard? Sure, and it is easier now with instant communications and unrestrained access to spout off in a stupid or mean-spirited way, and frankly with everyone engaged in the struggle we tend to get cranky and boorish, even with those on our own side. I've met with such abusive and critical language from our side too. But that's human nature. And no amount of lecturing about our need to be nicer will change that. Maners and civility are the first thing to go in a time of war, and we've been in a war for a long time now.

This article states:

"Yes, it’s we who can accomplish this, not 500 years of great religious texts authored by theologians of every stripe, not the work of eminent historians and political philosophers, not the accumulated research of renowned scientists. No, it is I, the equal of such men and women, who is fit to pronounce authoritatively on any and all topics… as long as I have a few minutes to do some Google research."

While I agree that many argue from a position of ignorance (A basic Google search will make you a complete ignoramous) but this is elitist in the extreme; only the celebrated may dare speak because they are wise and we are stupid. I would point to the words of Steve Jobs:

"Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. You can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use." This quote encapsulates Jobs' belief in the power of individual creativity and the potential to shape the world around us. It encourages us to embrace our potential and take action to create a better life and a better world."

If Jobs is correct in his populist sentiment - and it is in many ways quite similar to the Christian ethos of the power of the individual who is speaking through the Holy Spirit - then he is equally correct in the value of the individual to create and shape the world around us. Certainly most of what we are told are the thoughts of people no smarter than us who simply have a bigger megaphone, and the media is decidedly dimmer than are we. Why should we keep silent, or tiptoe around the enemies of Mankind and civilization?

On the contrary it is our duty to resist evil. This idea of restraining ourselves is as unchristian and anti-loving as it comes. We are trying to warn people there is immanent peril ahead. You don't simply let yourself be shouted down.

Which is what the Left always does, then when we shout back they cry about the loss of civility in the hopes we will shut up. It works too, which this essay seems to prove.

"And even if I am well-versed on a certain issue or subject or area of history, my interpretation, which differs from others similarly well-versed, may shed more light on my soul than it does on the heart of the matter in question. "

Perhaps, but this assumes that the people we are fighting are in fact honest and just differ in opinion. In most cases when dealing with the Left that is not true at all; they are purposefully twisting facts, distorting evidence, hiding the truth. We cannot sit idly by and let a lie stand.

As to the point about too much "he said, she said" news, that is the fault of the NEWS MEDIA and the 24 hour news cycle; too much time, too little to report. But the media also does not want to really discuss issues; they could find news if they wished. One of the ways the Left slants the news is by what they choose not to report. To not report stories like, say, the Chinese biolab in Las Vegas (which has not been mentioned by most media outlets as of this writing) they have to have something else, and that something else is usually a "gotcha!" story designed to embarrass Republicans and influence people based not on factual stories but on personalities. Everywhere it is about personalities. But what can we do nut respond in kind? THEY set the rules of engagement.

"We need to imitate Socrates, who knew that the beginning of wisdom was to acknowledge that he knew nothing."

I don't know about what Socrates knew or didn't know but I do know they KILLED him in the end. That should be our takea-away from this.

The author calls for magnanimity. Fine quality that, but one first must win the war to be gracious and magnanimous. Magnanimity in the heat of battle is retreat.

Another problem with this essay is it assumes all knowledge is learned and that others may know more than do we. That is not so. Plato certainly thought knowledge was remembered and not learned, and in fact the Founding Fathers believed in Natural Law, that some truths are self-evident. We can say "slaery is wrong" yet it is equally possible to make an argument from the premise slavery is a good thing. I mean, you can argue it benefits society, provides the needs for those who cannot provide them for themselves, restrains the more destructive appetites of the ignorant, provides dignity in work, etc. But it's all an exercise in dishonesty because we KNOW slavery is a bad institution because it dehumanizes the people who are enslaved. The same holds true for these opponents we face online; they can marshal arguments which may even seem to them logical but in the end we know socialism is a terrible idea; we don't need a Ph.D. in economics to tell. We can see it brings poverty. We can see it leads to sloth and ennui. It is a self-evident truth. The Declaration of Independence appealed to self-evident truths.

That said we don't need to be supercilious or mean spirited at all times, but we need to be firm and we need to be authoritative and we need to rage against the dying of the light. I fear the whole point of this essay is to let us go gently into that good night, even if the author isn't aware that is what he is advocating.

That would be fine. They can go first.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 02:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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