I was listening to Prager's July 9th interview with Theodore Dalrymple on my iPod this morning, and Theo made a point that hit home. When asked if he had any take on why educated, young doctors would have been involved in the attempted bombings in Glasgow and London he suggested that, and I paraphrase, that it takes fairly high intelligence to act so stupidly. That one must possess the talent for abstract thinking in order to rationalize nonsensical notions and acts. 
    Yes! Exactly! For years I've wrestled with the question of how highly intelligent people could so passionately embrace fatally flawed ideologies and isms. Just look to our universities. These are the people our society pay to think, yet the best those intellectuals currently occupying our campuses could come up with has been utter caca -  Illogical tripe unworthy of their supposed brilliance. 
     Dr Dalrymple's theory answers that conundrum nicely. If one can dwell in pure thought unfettered by practicality then one can fall into any number of rabbit holes chasing down answers. In that cerebral underworld the thinker will encounter no pesky realities to hinder the construction of his or her utopian visions. The effect can only be magnified by the near total unanimity today's academic will find among his peers. And it's the talent for abstraction that fuels these mental meanderings. How else to explain the state of today's campuses? How else to explain a functional mind finding merit in a proven loser like socialism? 
     I will, however, go Dr Dalrymple one better. I doubt that very many non-professionals are especially hampered by a lack of the capacity for abstraction. Instead, I feel that any impulse toward abstraction is tempered by a very intimate relationship with the cold, hard realities of life. If you're going to try to sell the amnesty bill to a native born dry wall installer who's had his business cut in half by illegal labor you'd better pack a lunch. You'll be at it a while. Let's see you convince a police officer that the bank robber who just shot him is a victim.
     Fortunately, few can stay aloft forever, and the more honest among them will most likely come to their senses. Take for example the beltway liberals in Virginia who recently found the hordes of illegals occupying expensive homes in their neighborhoods not be be especially good neighbors. Twenty five people in a three bedroom suburban home next to yours are no longer abstractions. Especially if they're urinating in the yard in full view of your ten year old daugther.