Video: The Altruism in "Spreading the Wealth" and the Demise of the American Ideal as seen by Tocqueville.

No wonder people are conflicted.  It's that approach-avoid conflict.  This video explains it all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j3_Ki6R3z0&feature=player_embedded

(H/T http://agangershome.blogspot.com/ )

The opposition ridicules Conservatives as having some sort of  a cognitive dissonance, "being angry at something they cannot put their finger on".  While that is not exactly an indicator of inferiority, the conservatives are chided as being "low-information" voters - a euphemism for being ignorant and stupid.

There is indeed an uneasiness because things cannot be painted in stark colors where evil is dark and menacing and good is the underdog struggling against all odds.  In fact, how many times have the liberals and their friends in the media tried to turn the tables around albeit falsely attacking the Tea Partiers as racists and the Pope as a pedophile.  Yet the man on the street feels that something just doesn't sit right;  that there's something going on - something insidious.  And that sense of the people may not be far off from the reality of the slow demise of the American ideal as foreseen by Alexis de Tocqueville (cfr. Democracy in America).  Michael Ledeen recently wrote, de Tocqueville knew that "we will not be bludgeoned into submission; we will be seduced."  

Tocqueville foresaw the collapse of American democracy as the end result of two parallel developments that ultimately render us meekly subservient to an enlarged bureaucratic power: the corruption of our character, and the emergence of a vast welfare state that manages all the details of our lives.

Just as the Austrians placed the red carpet to usher the Nazis to rule over them, we have voted the Democrats to fix our financial mess despite their words that hint on Totalitarianism.  We didn't care as long as we get that quick fix away from Enron, the mortgage collapse and recession - no matter what the cost.  That is how our character is corrupted - when we sold the soul of the American ideal.

The whirlwind continues as liberals with neither honor nor dignity use tactics e.g. the Alinsky method to obfuscate, mislead, misinform, confuse, ridicule and confound their opponents.  There is no honest dialogue where both parties seek the truth and the solution to problems.  There is only a contest, a debate, a moot court where the opponent is put down for points.

So, the common people are indeed confused because they hear the administration and law makers talk in a sincere tone, feigning compassion and good will, while making laws and policies that take away  freedoms as a small price to pay.