A Review Of Peter Schweizer’s Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy

There is nothing that fills a liberal media with quite as much glee as finding out that a prominent conservative has done something hypocritical. But, the media has never seemed to have much of an interest in investigating the hypocrisy of liberals.

Enter Peter Schweizer’s new book, Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy.

Schweizer did a little research into the lives of Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, Al Franken, Ted Kennedy, Hillary Clinton, Ralph Nader, Nancy Pelosi, George Soros, Barbra Streisand, Gloria Steinem, and Cornel West and — what do you know — it seems that none of them are living up to their liberal principles they espouse in public.

For example, it’s fascinating to note that some of the same liberals who agitate for Affirmative Action and constantly call Republicans racists live in lily white neighborhoods and don’t hire black Americans for prominent positions on their films and projects. It’s also worth noting that some libs who promote unions non-stop have also blocked unionization in their own companies.

Furthermore, Schweizer’s book brings to light an interesting question: is liberal hypocrisy different than conservative hypocrisy? In many cases, the answer to that question is, “yes.”

After all hypocritical conservatives usually believe in setting high standards and then hurt themselves and their families when they fall short of their own ideals. On the other hand, liberals often improve the quality of their lives and enrich themselves by living at odds with left-wing philosophy that they espouse to the world. That might seem to be an indicator that conservative ideals are superior to those that liberals hold dear.

In any case, the book was a great read, gets a big thumbs up, and here’s a little overview of the book, from the conclusion, to give you an idea of what it’s like:

Al Franken, Michael Moore, and Barbra Streisand are not racists because they hire few (or no) blacks. They are simply hiring the most qualified individuals available at that particular time for the job. Nancy Pelosi doesn’t despise working people just because she eschews labor unions in the business that her family owns. She is simply trying to run those businesses efficiently and effectively. Ted Kennedy doesn’t care less about the environment because he’s in the oil business. He sees a business opportunity that is profitable and takes advantage of it. Hillary Clinton, Kennedy, Soros, Streisand, and the others are not greedy and selfish simply because they try to avoid paying more in taxes. They (or in the Kennedys’ case, their forebears) worked hard for their wealth and are trying to preserve it for their children. Gloria Steinem is not anti-woman just because she got married. She fell in love and found someone she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. All these individuals are simply making private decisions that are in their own best interests.

The real question is not why they live the way they do, but why they continue to espouse ideas that so badly contradict their behavior. Why can’t they stop affixing sinister labels — racist, greedy, polluter — to people who are doing the exact same thing they are, only without the hypocrisy?

…Experience has taught these individuals that their ideas just don’t work. When it comes to the fundamentals — the things that matter the most in their lives — they suddenly forget about affirmative action, environmentalism, progressive taxation, and antiglobalist hostility. They really don’t respect their own ideas and have privately concluded, whether they admit it to themselves or not, that liberalism as practiced today does not offer them a road map to happiness. Soak the rich, but don’t soak me. Protect the environment, but let me drive my hummer and water my lawn. Workers of the world, unite! But running a union shop is just too complicated and difficult. Hire more blacks to fight racism, but let me hire my own people based on ability, not race. Romance and marriage are a form of patriarchal oppression, but I still want wine and roses and a powerful man to sweep me off my feet.

The simply fact is that those in the vanguard of the liberal-left have found their own ideas to be ultimately self-defeating, self-destructive, and unworkable.

Rating: A: recommended reading

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