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Sore Winners
Democrats might be magnanimous in victory.
By Mona CharenDemocrats might be magnanimous in victory.
Ken Burns on Meet the Press, November 26, 2012 (NBC)
Post-election season is a time for healing, for putting aside the rancor of a long campaign and rediscovering what unites us. It has not been that way this year.
Prudence, one would think, if not generosity of spirit, should impel Democrats to be magnanimous in victory. Romney did receive about 48 percent of the vote. A little modesty among the winners would seem to be in order.
Instead, the gloating has been extravagant. Worse, liberals have gorged themselves on the same junk food they enjoyed during the campaign and cannot seem to resist under any circumstances slandering their opponents. The smears are so casual and commonplace that we become weary of responding. But we must protest, or someone new to politics may assume that we concede the point.
Appearing on Meet the Press, documentary filmmaker Ken Burns attributed conservative unhappiness with the election to racism. Race is always there in America, Burns opined. Its always something we dont want to talk about. Do you think wed have a secession movement a faddish movement if this president wasnt African-American? Do you think the vitriol that came out of some elements of the Tea Party would have been at the same level had this president not been African-American?
Ken Burns is a fine filmmaker. I met him once, and found him to be engaging and amiable. Its painful to see him descend to this kind of defamation. Some disappointed Republicans are talking secession in Texas and elsewhere. This is proof of racism? Is this the standard of evidence Burns employs for his films?
Secession talk is the overheated emotional venting of the disappointed. It is not the exclusive province of Republicans. In 2004, Jonathan Gurwitz of the Houston Chronicle reminds us, Democratic talking head Lawrence ODonnell suggested that George W. Bushs reelection would provoke a serious discussion of secession over the next 20 years. When a fellow panelist on the TV show in question asked Are you calling for civil war? ODonnell replied You can secede without firing a shot. Bob Beckel was for kicking the southern United States out of the union that year. Really, I think they ought to have their own confederacy. Alec Baldwin, among others, had threatened to leave the country if Bush was reelected.
Sore Winners - Mona Charen - National Review Online