The Left suffers from Desmondism

-- by Micheal

Listening to left-leaning media, ever since the election, one can still hear their disbelief that their candidate lost. "Inconceivable!" The shock of defeat is quite normal -- for a few days after the event. It's been two months now, and still they can't believe it.

They had their cozy alt-left world, their rose-colored glasses which saw only the good things about their cosmology. They had their leftist academics reassuring them that they were absolutely right.

Turned out, they were wrong after all. The entire nation did not love and approve of them. Their bull had not walked through the nation's china shop without toppling so much as a cup.

The Left's denial of reminded me of Norma Desmond. She is the character (played by Gloria Swanson) in that great 1950 film-noir "Sunset Boulevard." It's a great analogy for the Left today. If you haven't seen the film, here's a quick synopsis to illustrate Desmondism.

Norma Desmond was an over-the-hill silent film star in the age of "talkies". Hollywood had moved on since her glory days. She had not had a role in a film for years. Cloistered in her mansion, she watched private screenings of her old films, rhapsodic about the superiority of the good old days. "We didn't need voices," she scoffed. "We had faces." Desmond dreams of her dramatic return to the silver screen. She is shielded from reality by her butler-driver-exHusband, Max. Even though he's a castoff from Desmond's grace, he protects her by insulating her from reality. She earnestly believes Hollywood adores her and wants her back.

In one poignant scene, the phone rings. It is the office of Cecil B. DeMille, famous director. Desmond is ecstatic. They want her.  The crushing reality, which both Max and her writer shield her from, is that DeMille wanted to use her old car in a film, not her. Poor Desmond slips a bit further into her private world of delusion.

The bittersweet denouement is the scene in which DeMille and everyone on the set realize Desmond's delusion and play along. They let her have her comeback scene, filming her walking slowly down a majestic stairway. Everyone, but Desmond, knows the film will be thrown away. It was only an act of charity.

Listening to The Left, ever since the election, they sound like Norma Desmond. They wallow in their old 'glory days' and disparage the new world as so obviously inferior to 'their' world. The Left still cannot fathom why the nation is not in love with their "faces."

The mainstream media are like Max. They continually shield The Left from the harsh news that their faces are not so very loved.

Rather like the ending of the film, The Left got their slow walk down the majestic staircase, but the film the nation was making was not about them.  They still can't believe it.

---