Always Right, Never Wrong 0

Driftglass often points out that many rightwing pundits are consistently wrong about everything, often contradicting what they have said in the past without blinking and without ever admitting or apologizing for error.

For example, think of the ones who thought total surveillance was the cat’s meow and the bee’s knees when the Bushies did it and that getting a list of phone calls (you know, like police departments supposedly do on television shows several times a night) is a detestable and abominable crime against nature when the Obama Justice Department did it*?

At Psychology Today Blogs, Guy Winch offers some reasons why some folks are incapable to admitting or apologizing for error. I think some of them might apply to David Brooks, Charles Krauthammer, Cal Thomas, Bill Kristol, and their fellows who are always right and never wrong, regardless of what they said yesterday. A nugget:

For non-apologists, saying ‘I’m sorry’ carries psychological ramifications that run far deeper than the words themselves imply as it elicits fundamental fears (either conscious or unconscious) they desperately attempt to avoid:

1. Admissions of wrong doing are incredibly threatening for non-apologists because they have trouble separating their actions from their character. If they did something bad, they must be bad people; if they were neglectful, they must be fundamentally selfish and uncaring; if they were wrong, they must be ignorant or stupid, etc… Therefore, apologies represent a major threat to their basic sense of identity and self-esteem.

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*No, I can’t say I agree with the subpoena (a warrant, which must meet a higher standard of cause, should be required for such actions), but that’s not my point. Plus, unlike the Bushies, they did actually get a bleepin’ subpoena.