There are two articles paired at Instapundit that really do capture the Brexit moment. The first is It’s Time for the Elites to Rise Up Against the Ignorant Masses which is exactly what the article is about and is offered without the slightest sense of irony or humility. Here is the para that captures it all:
The Republican Party, already rife with science-deniers and economic reality-deniers, has thrown itself into the embrace of a man who fabricates realities that ignorant people like to inhabit.
These are the experts: global warmists and Keynesians! Who would trust such expertise? Reading the comments at Instapundit shows the level of distrust with such people. Here are a couple:
It’s funny how they keep harping on Nigel Farage supposedly lying to the British voters in order to win their votes. The nerve of such people! Why, progressives and neofeudalists would never dare do such a thing!
Ted Kennedy, on the 1965 immigration: “The bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. It will not upset the ethnic mix of our society. It will not relax the standards of admission. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs.”
Ted Kennedy, on the 1986 amnesty: “This amnesty will give citizenship to only 1.1 to 1.3 million illegal aliens. We will secure the borders henceforth. We will never again bring forward another amnesty bill like this.”
Yet suddenly Leftists are insisting on truth in advertising laws for politicians. If they want to roll back every left-wing lie of the last six decades they can gladly have a redo on Thursday’s vote.
And then there’s this:
Homogeneous societies are happier. They have much higher social trust and a good deal more willingness and less resentment in looking after their have-nots. Multi cultural societies rob people of a true sense of belonging. The lions share of what is good in life has nothing to do with money and economics. A nation is more than just a souless shopping mall packed with culturally atomized individuals. The elites are indifferent to the cultural destruction they have wrought in their blindered pursuit of a few more pieces of silver and a lot more centralized control. Globalization is a disaster of epic proportions. It can only end in tyranny.
All right. One more:
I *do* believe in reason, expertise, and the lessons of history. However, the “elite” are more wedded to their delusions and power than any of the above. Fer crissake, the people who claim to be “believers” in evolution are now pushing the idea that “male” and “female” are entirely learned! Their learning the “lessons of history” is to ignore the lesson of WWII — when lunatics promise to kill you *BELIEVE THEM*!
And expertise? At what? Fraud, extortion, ginning up hatred? Keeping their hands clean of the violence they incite? At laundering money for their elections through an “education” system that leaves those most in need of an education barely literate and trained to hate?
OK. Another, they are so addictive.
“Science deniers”? Which party thinks “male” and “female” are learned traits and surgically alterable? Which clings to a prediction of ever-rising temperatures despite more than a decade of no change? Which clings to a demonization of CO2 when there simply isn’t any more energy CO2 can “trap”?
There is expertise in how to fix a broken sewer pipe. There is similarly expertise in how to take out an appendix. But expert opinion on social, political and economic issues? I’m afraid that wherever self-interest plays a hand in the decisions of experts, their reliability is not to be trusted. Which is why a democratic process, where the rulers must seek the endorsement of the ruled, remains the only way a modern society should be run.