What Does the Van Jones Resignation Mean?

A funny thing happened over the weekend. Around midnight on Saturday one of President Obama's advisors resigned. Most people never heard of Van Jones until his resignation and most are probably a little confused about why he resigned. The official story is that he used a bad word when describing the Republicans and signed a petition. People on the far left, such as Keith Olbermann-watchers, think that he was the victim of a smear campaign by Glen Beck and others on the right. Olbermann posted on the really-far-left Daily KOS, declaring war on Glen Beck.

What really happened was that Glen Beck and others had spent days digging up embarrassing details about Jones's political beliefs. He is very radical.

The liberal reaction is mixed. Alan Colmes insists that Jones gave up his radical ways nearly ten years ago. He ignores the fact that most of the quotes and positions that have been used against Jones were made after 2000. One clip that Beck ran several times was from early this year.

David Sirota at Huffington is upset because someone from the Progressive movement was forced out. He attributes it to racism and worries about the chilling effect that the resignation will have on progressives who want to go into politics.

These people and others on the left are missing the larger point - that Jones's beliefs may be typical of the progressive movement but they are at odds with the typical American voter. Jones spent the 1990s as a radical communist and never moderated his position very far. Someone who flirted with Deep Ecology (these are code words for "most humans must die") was a special adviser to the President on green jobs. Colmes and the others don't see anything unusual about this. They occupy an echo chamber where everyone is a radical.

This has happened before. Many of Obama's friends and associates are radicals. When they are found out then they are pushed away from the President's inner circle but the big question remains - what sort of man associates with so many radicals?