Comment of the Day...

It's been said before, but far from being progressive, as they fancy themselves, the left is actually quite regressive. A lot of them still live in the age of heroes (in the original Greek sense).

Our current age, with its parliaments, corporations, and sitcoms, has no more heroes in the old sense, and no heroic movements. And globalization is turning the world into what Hitler condemned Britain as: a nation of shopkeepers.

So the left is counter-enlightenment (romantic and irrational), and are always grabbing for the next great counter-revolution: communist, socialist, multiculturalistic, Islamic, green. As long as the new revolution is opposed to the dominant liberal rationalism, and it's got a compelling, heroic back-story, they'll fall for it.

Likewise they appreciate their heroes on a romantic basis. Lenin, Stalin, Che, Castro, Saddam, and Chavez have all been or are currently adored by the left. You can criticize this from a rational perspective, but it won't do any good, since the appeal is irrational. The hero is invested with the lefts hopes and dreams, and not a little myth.

- Brian O'Connell, commenting on a Tim Blair thread