Lew, Mr. Bauer undoubtedly considers the recent GOP gains to have been his own accomplishment, an affirmation of his bellicose (and quite un-Christian) Kriegeslust—when in fact he was at the head of the parade that destroyed the GOP, betrayed the conservative cause, and left his beloved pro-life movement twisting slowly in the wind as Obama marched in and trampled what was left of individual rights and liberties, having been handed the opportunity on a silver platter by the Christian Bush.
So let’s take inventory: Bauer lashes out at Dr. Paul, the man who was (and is) in fact responsible for building the intellectual and political foundation for the recent respite from Obamanism and Bushism, an historic event for which Bauer can take zero credit — in fact, Bauer and his ilk are indeed responsible for the disastrous damage which he contrives to oppose, which even sober Republican congressmen now admit.
Bauer’s contemptible bitterness has a name. While Schadenfreude represents the delight one takes in the woes of one’s enemy, der Neid — sheer envy — best describes the sullen outrage that one feels in his enemy’s success. Envy describes the seething and destructive hatred on the part of the puny who wish they possessed the goods and accomplishments — physical or moral — of the superior man, even as they realize that they are too lazy and squalid to achieve such virtues themselves. Envy is to be distinguished from jealousy in this: the jealous man sees someone who is in some way superior to himself and allows it to motivate him — to channel and to focus his efforts to excel in like fashion. The envious man, on the other hand, knows that he is too indolent, irresolute, or simply bored ever to work hard enough to excel, but in sheer spite he doesn’t want the better man to excel either. He is full of resentment, pride, and contempt. Alas, the state is his most dependable ally. Of course, these observations do not judge the soul of the envious man; they only analyze objectively that vice’s potentially poisonous ingredients.
Memo to the Christian Bauer: Envy is one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
8:21 am on December 8, 2010
