The one essential and transformative influence in politics was articulated by Jesus Christ. Before his time, and long after, as his precepts were slowly and gradually introduced into the institutions of the West, there was no concept of limited government, as never before had any state or empire other than that of the Hebrews recognized an overarching, higher authority which limited earthly governance.
But, as Lord Acton pointed out in his great essay, The History of Freedom in Antiquity, "when Christ said,‘Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s,' those words, spoken on His last visit to the Temple, three days before His death, gave to the civil power, under the protection of conscience, a sacredness it had never enjoyed, and bounds it had never acknowledged; and they were the repudiation of absolutism and the inauguration of Freedom. For our Lord not only delivered the precept, but created the force to execute it. To maintain the necessary immunity in one supreme sphere, to reduce all political authority within defined limits, ceased to be an aspiration of patient reasoners [such as the Greeks],and was made the perpetual charge and care of the most energetic institution and the most universal association in the world [the Church]. The new law, the new spirit, the new authority, gave to Liberty a meaning and a value it had not possessed in the philosophy or in the constitution of Greece or Rome, before the knowledge of the Truth that makes us free.”
The limitations and boundaries of the state, previously limitless and onerously exacting, including in the matter of taxation, were articulated in that one phrase: “Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”
From that time on, the war against the all consuming power of the state to take whatever it wished from its citizens, was commenced and has been fought over centuries.
That war continues to this day, and is currently expressed by the revitalization of the Right—not the Left, which sees the state in antique, pre-Christian terms as limitless; in fact, as a god unto itself who attributes to itself the divine attributes of omniscience, omnipresence and omnipotence.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Radical
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world…” William Butler Yeats
“Burn, baby; burn…” Rioters in Watts, CA, 1965
“O Lord, remember what the Edomites did on the day the armies of Babylon captured Jerusalem. ‘Destroy it!’ they yelled. ‘Level it to the ground.’” Psalm 37
There is nothing particularly new about Julius Assange other than his use of internet communication as a means of destruction of the international order and, maybe, the Alexandrian grandiosity of his intent.
Yes, his intent is truly grandiose. By his exhaustive revelations of secret and intimate communications among the world’s national leaders, he has almost single handedly destroyed international diplomacy and upset the intricate and delicate order of the global political enterprise. This is to say nothing of the lives he has jeopardized and the alliances he has either truncated or wholly destroyed.
Why is he doing it?
Because he can. Because he wants to. Just because.
If the above sounds strange, it's good to recall Assange follows in the hallowed footsteps of anarchists throughout the ages, particularly of the last two or more centuries since the French Revolution. The goal is to tear down the existing societal order by any means necessary. The focus of the efforts is resistance to an order considered alien and intrinsically worthy of destruction; the message is action, action, and more action; the attacks are against the entire system of nation states—singly or internationally; and the means of execution are by trans/supranational cells operating subversively and mostly secretly.
He has at his disposal disaffected hackers who are spy worms within the systems, but
Assange also joins countless cadres of anarchists and terrorists who are part of a worldwide effort to bring down the entire global order, but the West is a specially favored target.
Assange has more than empathetic and skilled hackers to assist him. He finds friends and allies among the established far Left, many of whom support or ignore anarchists and terrorists for one chief reason; namely, because the Left has similar goals, but tends to achieve those goals incrementally from within the system. Assange provides both a useful and dramatic diversion at the same time he is a companion in the effort to revolutionize and transform the West according to Leftist doctrines.
That is why you will hear the Left, both in Europe and here in the US, defending Assange. Paul I. Adujie, author of WikiLeaks & Julian Assange, Heroism, Courage, Visionary of Our Time,—the title says it all!--is typical of those on the Left who champion Assange as a hero for revealing the duplicitous nature of the West, which the Left believes richly deserves Lady Godiva public nudity for transgressions real and imagined. Mr. Adujie, along with others who see the West as the Great Satan of the world, now feels vindicated. The West is as rotten to the core as he always believed it to be. Never mind Adujie is feverishly typing away while using the West’s invention of the internet to promote his hero.
For Mr. Adujie, as well as others of Leftist persuasion, Assange serves as a necessary and salutary emetic for the West, which has now been forced to vomit out all its secrets regardless of the consequences to the delicate diplomatic dances which always have to be conducted among nations; regardless of the lives which are now endangered; regardless of the alliances destroyed; regardless of the aid given anarchists and terrorists determined to destroy not only the West, but the entire global community.
Any good the West has ever accomplished or contributed to the world order is of no account, for she can never expiate her sins, as they are unforgiveable and so she must be entirely destroyed.
In the meantime, as noted above, the established Left within academia, the media and Hollywood applauds a fellow revolutionary, as he serves a useful purpose. They know that he, like they, is a true anarchist. Ironically, they may not think he, like them—if he lives long enough—will gradually become part of the system within which they themselves operate.
They may not realize Assange is like a Nikolai Bulganin, brutal and effective in ways they now do not wish to be, but gradually becoming as they now are--comfortably established apparatchiks ensconced within the hallowed halls of their privileged domains.
So they applaud Assange, like other revolutionaries before them and like them—in fact, just like they themselves—not realizing the day will come in which Assange also is seated within the established order, a blind termite who with the likeminded, will continue to gnaw at the foundations in hopes that eventually the whole structure will collapse.
Those Leftists who see present day radicals such as Assange reduced to the level of apparatchiks such as themselves should pause and take account of what may happen if the structure they live in and despise were finally to collapse on their own heads.
But being anarchists serving the god of Destruction, they can never look ahead that far. Like termites, they're too busy chewing on the foundations to take account of the damage to themselves.
It would be the penultimate irony if perhaps one day, like Bill Ayers, Assange were to become a respected professor and counsel to the White House. Perhaps he might even have a song written about him, maybe even a song as glorious as the “Horst Wessel” anthem.
After all, strange things have happened before.
But in the meantime, let's hope and pray that before such happens, others who are dreaming the good dreams, who are repudiating and looking beyond mere anarchy, will act to rebuild the grand but imperiled vision of the West.
“Burn, baby; burn…” Rioters in Watts, CA, 1965
“O Lord, remember what the Edomites did on the day the armies of Babylon captured Jerusalem. ‘Destroy it!’ they yelled. ‘Level it to the ground.’” Psalm 37
There is nothing particularly new about Julius Assange other than his use of internet communication as a means of destruction of the international order and, maybe, the Alexandrian grandiosity of his intent.
Yes, his intent is truly grandiose. By his exhaustive revelations of secret and intimate communications among the world’s national leaders, he has almost single handedly destroyed international diplomacy and upset the intricate and delicate order of the global political enterprise. This is to say nothing of the lives he has jeopardized and the alliances he has either truncated or wholly destroyed.
Why is he doing it?
Because he can. Because he wants to. Just because.
If the above sounds strange, it's good to recall Assange follows in the hallowed footsteps of anarchists throughout the ages, particularly of the last two or more centuries since the French Revolution. The goal is to tear down the existing societal order by any means necessary. The focus of the efforts is resistance to an order considered alien and intrinsically worthy of destruction; the message is action, action, and more action; the attacks are against the entire system of nation states—singly or internationally; and the means of execution are by trans/supranational cells operating subversively and mostly secretly.
He has at his disposal disaffected hackers who are spy worms within the systems, but
Assange also joins countless cadres of anarchists and terrorists who are part of a worldwide effort to bring down the entire global order, but the West is a specially favored target.
Assange has more than empathetic and skilled hackers to assist him. He finds friends and allies among the established far Left, many of whom support or ignore anarchists and terrorists for one chief reason; namely, because the Left has similar goals, but tends to achieve those goals incrementally from within the system. Assange provides both a useful and dramatic diversion at the same time he is a companion in the effort to revolutionize and transform the West according to Leftist doctrines.
That is why you will hear the Left, both in Europe and here in the US, defending Assange. Paul I. Adujie, author of WikiLeaks & Julian Assange, Heroism, Courage, Visionary of Our Time,—the title says it all!--is typical of those on the Left who champion Assange as a hero for revealing the duplicitous nature of the West, which the Left believes richly deserves Lady Godiva public nudity for transgressions real and imagined. Mr. Adujie, along with others who see the West as the Great Satan of the world, now feels vindicated. The West is as rotten to the core as he always believed it to be. Never mind Adujie is feverishly typing away while using the West’s invention of the internet to promote his hero.
For Mr. Adujie, as well as others of Leftist persuasion, Assange serves as a necessary and salutary emetic for the West, which has now been forced to vomit out all its secrets regardless of the consequences to the delicate diplomatic dances which always have to be conducted among nations; regardless of the lives which are now endangered; regardless of the alliances destroyed; regardless of the aid given anarchists and terrorists determined to destroy not only the West, but the entire global community.
Any good the West has ever accomplished or contributed to the world order is of no account, for she can never expiate her sins, as they are unforgiveable and so she must be entirely destroyed.
In the meantime, as noted above, the established Left within academia, the media and Hollywood applauds a fellow revolutionary, as he serves a useful purpose. They know that he, like they, is a true anarchist. Ironically, they may not think he, like them—if he lives long enough—will gradually become part of the system within which they themselves operate.
They may not realize Assange is like a Nikolai Bulganin, brutal and effective in ways they now do not wish to be, but gradually becoming as they now are--comfortably established apparatchiks ensconced within the hallowed halls of their privileged domains.
So they applaud Assange, like other revolutionaries before them and like them—in fact, just like they themselves—not realizing the day will come in which Assange also is seated within the established order, a blind termite who with the likeminded, will continue to gnaw at the foundations in hopes that eventually the whole structure will collapse.
Those Leftists who see present day radicals such as Assange reduced to the level of apparatchiks such as themselves should pause and take account of what may happen if the structure they live in and despise were finally to collapse on their own heads.
But being anarchists serving the god of Destruction, they can never look ahead that far. Like termites, they're too busy chewing on the foundations to take account of the damage to themselves.
It would be the penultimate irony if perhaps one day, like Bill Ayers, Assange were to become a respected professor and counsel to the White House. Perhaps he might even have a song written about him, maybe even a song as glorious as the “Horst Wessel” anthem.
After all, strange things have happened before.
But in the meantime, let's hope and pray that before such happens, others who are dreaming the good dreams, who are repudiating and looking beyond mere anarchy, will act to rebuild the grand but imperiled vision of the West.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Public education: More Than a Fiscal Problem
Nearly everybody agrees, even those within the system: Public education is a fiscal mess of epic proportions and a disastrous failure at doing what it is supposed to do--educate children. Fiscal concerns and cultural concerns about public education are inextricable intertwined.
First, the fiscal mess.
Caesar Rodney Institute’s November 8 letter outlining the state’s fiscal problems—the state is now the largest employer in Delaware—noted Delaware’s public school system has 429 school administrators and employees making more than $100,000 a year—a total of more than $42,000,000 per annum. A search on (www.DelawareOnline.com ) reveals that over 282 school employees have, at one time or another, earned over $100,000. (http://php.delawareonline.com/schoolemploy_salaries.php )
But, as the site www.sunshinereview.org states: “Information about Delaware state employees is limited. However, you may find information here about certain teachers who at some point were paid more than $100,000 annually.”
However,the figures on the salaries of teachers are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. They don’t begin to include the growing problem of the unsustainable cost of teachers’ pensions. As Sunshine Review notes, the opacity surrounding information on Delaware’s public employees means complete information is hard to get hold of; but, according to (http://www.scribd.com/doc/29909590/Underfunded-Teacher-Pension-Plans-It%E2%80%99s-Worse-Than-You-Think)59 states face underfunded liabilities, including Delaware. The total liabilities amount to about 332 billion dollars.
As RiShawn Biddle points out in his article “Teacher Pension Bombs,” years of lavish traditional teacher compensation bolstered by bargains struck by state and district politicians and the NEA plus the AFT have made teaching the best-compensated public sector profession.
He adds that overly inflated investment growth models, risky investment of teachers’ pension funds, coupled with loose standards for accounting for risk and rates of return have meant pensions have overstated the actual value of their portfolios while understating their deficits. Bottom line: The pension funds are underfunded and the taxpayer is on the hook.
The point of listing the above facts is that fiscal conservatives would be right in their assumptions that budget reform for public employees, including teachers, is absolutely necessary. For instance, recommendations for consolidation of administrative districts, a hard look at the number of school employees and the compensation offered, plus an assessment of the fiscal sustainability of teachers’ pensions funding are all legitimate and necessary endeavors.
But budgetary reform and numbers crunching will not solve the overarching cultural problems afflicting failing schools; nor will throwing money at schools to solve problems work, as conservatives with a broader base of reforms readily acknowledge.
Fiscal conservatives might insist the problem of public education expenditures can be solved by mere budgetary means. Conservatives who are looking at broader based cultural issues, however, do not look at education as a mere accounting problem. They look at reforming the entire educational structure, which structure they see as absolutely foundational to the entire cultural structure. Such a look necessarily has a moral component; a “should” element that pure fiscal conservatism lacks; or, rather, simply cannot address separately, as the cultural issues are intimately and inseparably interwoven with fiscal issues (a point I’ve made in Part I).
Conservatives question the establishment of an education monopoly for several reasons, one of which is that state run educational monopolies are often a herald to encroaching state tyranny. When the entity which controls the minds of children is the state, only what the state wants taught is taught. The State becomes the “nurturing” Parent, not the children’s real parents, while children themselves are deliberately weaned away from parental influence.
Conservatives believe the state monopoly on education has as firm a grip as Standard Oil or Ma Bell ever had, respectively, on oil and telephone service. They believe the monopoly should be broken up by means of alternatives such as charter schools, voucher programs which promote private education, and home schooling.
All alternatives, no matter what individual teacher's putative disagreement with their union, have been steadfastly opposed by the Teachers Union, which correctly discerns and wrongfully opposes any competition.
Secondly, conservatives would like to look at the question of just what our kids are being and should be taught, as they consider the John Dewey progressive model of education not only inadequate, but probably the best means for “dumbing down” children in the name of forced egalitarianism, a concept which, along with politically correct extremism, runs rampant throughout the public school system.
How bad is it out there in America school land?
The great Russell Kirk, in his great work Prospects for Conservatives, gives one of the best and most succinct analyses of the American system of education the reader will ever find:
“A system of education in which respect for the wisdom of our ancestors is deliberately discouraged, and an impossible future of universal beneficence taken for granted; a system in which all the wealth of myth and fable; the symbolic study of human nature, is cast aside as so much rubbish; a system in which religion is treated, at least covertly, as nothing better than exploded superstition, or at best a vague collection of moral observations; a system in which all the splendor of history is discarded in favor of amorphous ‘social studies’; a system in which the imaginative literature of twenty-eight centuries is relegated to a tiny corner of the curriculum, in favor of ‘adjustment’; a system in which the physical sciences are huddled incoherently together, as if they formed a single discipline, and then are taught as a means to power over nature and man, not as a means to wisdom; a system in which the very tools to any sort of apprehension of systematic knowledge, spelling and grammar, mathematics and geography, are despised as boring impediments to ‘socialization’—why, is it possible to conceive of a system better calculated to starve the imagination, discourage the better student and weaken reason…
"Is it any wonder that our educational administrators, to escape from the spectacle of their own failure, turn to purposeless aggrandizement, ’plant,’ doubled and tripled and quadrupled enrollments, larger staffs, larger salaries, tougher athletic teams, as a means of concealing from the public the gigantic fraud they have put upon the nation?” (Italics mine.)
Who could put it better? In fact, since Russell made his observations concerning the starvation of children’s minds and hearts, matters have only worsened.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste, as an ad for an Afro-American university reminds us. Poor parents are not alone in realizing their kids’ minds (and thus their very souls) are being wasted by progressive thinking, or rather, the lack of thinking, as Russell points out. If parents did not realize, even if merely intuitively, that their children’s minds were being wasted, we would not see the pathetic sight of parents’ anguish as charter school positions were being raffled off by lottery, some kids being allowed an “education” while others are assigned to the equivalent of jail—witness the tragic toll at a school like Martin Luther King in Philadelphia, where youngsters are put through metal detectors and frisked, and where half the students can’t even read.
All of the above points out the indivisibility of cultural considerations from fiscal policy and the need for radical reform of our public schools. As Russell notes, “The conservative task must be one of assault and reconstruction, rather than simply one of defense.”
And, to conclude, fiscal conservatives must realize that the preservation of their single conservative domain (as they define it) is in jeopardy, as progressive economic and social issues, which are intrinsically anti-capitalist and anti-free market, will drown fiscal conservatism along with the rest of conservatism if our educational system is not reformed.
In brief, the US educational system, including the Delaware public system, is hatching out cadres of young progressives inimically opposed to the US capitalist and free market system as well s to traditional conservative mores. Fiscal conservatives need not delude themselves into thinking their small preservation will escape absorption and annihilation.
Conservatives cannot avoid the necessity of systematically addressing social issues along with economic issues, and must, as Russell points out, “endeavor to redeem the modern mind” by affirming the entirety of the divine human enterprise, attacking and reforming the seminal bases from which progressivism assaults the entire culture—namely, public education.
First, the fiscal mess.
Caesar Rodney Institute’s November 8 letter outlining the state’s fiscal problems—the state is now the largest employer in Delaware—noted Delaware’s public school system has 429 school administrators and employees making more than $100,000 a year—a total of more than $42,000,000 per annum. A search on (www.DelawareOnline.com ) reveals that over 282 school employees have, at one time or another, earned over $100,000. (http://php.delawareonline.com/schoolemploy_salaries.php )
But, as the site www.sunshinereview.org states: “Information about Delaware state employees is limited. However, you may find information here about certain teachers who at some point were paid more than $100,000 annually.”
However,the figures on the salaries of teachers are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. They don’t begin to include the growing problem of the unsustainable cost of teachers’ pensions. As Sunshine Review notes, the opacity surrounding information on Delaware’s public employees means complete information is hard to get hold of; but, according to (http://www.scribd.com/doc/29909590/Underfunded-Teacher-Pension-Plans-It%E2%80%99s-Worse-Than-You-Think)59 states face underfunded liabilities, including Delaware. The total liabilities amount to about 332 billion dollars.
As RiShawn Biddle points out in his article “Teacher Pension Bombs,” years of lavish traditional teacher compensation bolstered by bargains struck by state and district politicians and the NEA plus the AFT have made teaching the best-compensated public sector profession.
He adds that overly inflated investment growth models, risky investment of teachers’ pension funds, coupled with loose standards for accounting for risk and rates of return have meant pensions have overstated the actual value of their portfolios while understating their deficits. Bottom line: The pension funds are underfunded and the taxpayer is on the hook.
The point of listing the above facts is that fiscal conservatives would be right in their assumptions that budget reform for public employees, including teachers, is absolutely necessary. For instance, recommendations for consolidation of administrative districts, a hard look at the number of school employees and the compensation offered, plus an assessment of the fiscal sustainability of teachers’ pensions funding are all legitimate and necessary endeavors.
But budgetary reform and numbers crunching will not solve the overarching cultural problems afflicting failing schools; nor will throwing money at schools to solve problems work, as conservatives with a broader base of reforms readily acknowledge.
Fiscal conservatives might insist the problem of public education expenditures can be solved by mere budgetary means. Conservatives who are looking at broader based cultural issues, however, do not look at education as a mere accounting problem. They look at reforming the entire educational structure, which structure they see as absolutely foundational to the entire cultural structure. Such a look necessarily has a moral component; a “should” element that pure fiscal conservatism lacks; or, rather, simply cannot address separately, as the cultural issues are intimately and inseparably interwoven with fiscal issues (a point I’ve made in Part I).
Conservatives question the establishment of an education monopoly for several reasons, one of which is that state run educational monopolies are often a herald to encroaching state tyranny. When the entity which controls the minds of children is the state, only what the state wants taught is taught. The State becomes the “nurturing” Parent, not the children’s real parents, while children themselves are deliberately weaned away from parental influence.
Conservatives believe the state monopoly on education has as firm a grip as Standard Oil or Ma Bell ever had, respectively, on oil and telephone service. They believe the monopoly should be broken up by means of alternatives such as charter schools, voucher programs which promote private education, and home schooling.
All alternatives, no matter what individual teacher's putative disagreement with their union, have been steadfastly opposed by the Teachers Union, which correctly discerns and wrongfully opposes any competition.
Secondly, conservatives would like to look at the question of just what our kids are being and should be taught, as they consider the John Dewey progressive model of education not only inadequate, but probably the best means for “dumbing down” children in the name of forced egalitarianism, a concept which, along with politically correct extremism, runs rampant throughout the public school system.
How bad is it out there in America school land?
The great Russell Kirk, in his great work Prospects for Conservatives, gives one of the best and most succinct analyses of the American system of education the reader will ever find:
“A system of education in which respect for the wisdom of our ancestors is deliberately discouraged, and an impossible future of universal beneficence taken for granted; a system in which all the wealth of myth and fable; the symbolic study of human nature, is cast aside as so much rubbish; a system in which religion is treated, at least covertly, as nothing better than exploded superstition, or at best a vague collection of moral observations; a system in which all the splendor of history is discarded in favor of amorphous ‘social studies’; a system in which the imaginative literature of twenty-eight centuries is relegated to a tiny corner of the curriculum, in favor of ‘adjustment’; a system in which the physical sciences are huddled incoherently together, as if they formed a single discipline, and then are taught as a means to power over nature and man, not as a means to wisdom; a system in which the very tools to any sort of apprehension of systematic knowledge, spelling and grammar, mathematics and geography, are despised as boring impediments to ‘socialization’—why, is it possible to conceive of a system better calculated to starve the imagination, discourage the better student and weaken reason…
"Is it any wonder that our educational administrators, to escape from the spectacle of their own failure, turn to purposeless aggrandizement, ’plant,’ doubled and tripled and quadrupled enrollments, larger staffs, larger salaries, tougher athletic teams, as a means of concealing from the public the gigantic fraud they have put upon the nation?” (Italics mine.)
Who could put it better? In fact, since Russell made his observations concerning the starvation of children’s minds and hearts, matters have only worsened.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste, as an ad for an Afro-American university reminds us. Poor parents are not alone in realizing their kids’ minds (and thus their very souls) are being wasted by progressive thinking, or rather, the lack of thinking, as Russell points out. If parents did not realize, even if merely intuitively, that their children’s minds were being wasted, we would not see the pathetic sight of parents’ anguish as charter school positions were being raffled off by lottery, some kids being allowed an “education” while others are assigned to the equivalent of jail—witness the tragic toll at a school like Martin Luther King in Philadelphia, where youngsters are put through metal detectors and frisked, and where half the students can’t even read.
All of the above points out the indivisibility of cultural considerations from fiscal policy and the need for radical reform of our public schools. As Russell notes, “The conservative task must be one of assault and reconstruction, rather than simply one of defense.”
And, to conclude, fiscal conservatives must realize that the preservation of their single conservative domain (as they define it) is in jeopardy, as progressive economic and social issues, which are intrinsically anti-capitalist and anti-free market, will drown fiscal conservatism along with the rest of conservatism if our educational system is not reformed.
In brief, the US educational system, including the Delaware public system, is hatching out cadres of young progressives inimically opposed to the US capitalist and free market system as well s to traditional conservative mores. Fiscal conservatives need not delude themselves into thinking their small preservation will escape absorption and annihilation.
Conservatives cannot avoid the necessity of systematically addressing social issues along with economic issues, and must, as Russell points out, “endeavor to redeem the modern mind” by affirming the entirety of the divine human enterprise, attacking and reforming the seminal bases from which progressivism assaults the entire culture—namely, public education.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Wait
"Bombing the railway lines to Auschwitz and other camps would only have achieved a temporary respite for the Jews, and distracted attention and resources from the larger purpose of overthrowing the regime that was killing them."
--Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich at War (New York: Penguin Press, 2009), p. 560Ah, yes. Of course, we saw the point: Larger purposes for a greater good.
We understand.
We agree those “larger purposes” meant attempts to secure justice for the Jews had to be delayed. God forbid we got distracted by the immediacy of saving of innocent lives. After all, we had something bigger in mind.
Of course the Jews had to wait. Wait until they died.
How many times have the voiceless and oppressed heard similar arguments?
Frederick Douglass was told by Lincoln that political exigencies were of more importance than the immediate freeing of slaves. Lincoln was concerned about border states loyalty and feared his higher goal of saving the union would be jeopardized if he freed the slaves at the outset of the Civil War. He later capitulated to Douglass’ and other abolitionists demands, but not until he had reasonable hope of victory. Doubtless the ethics of his decision will be debated for decades to come.
Regardless, slaves had to wait for their freedom.
In a similar manner, women were told for decade after decade their quest for eaulity would have to wait until circumstances were more favorable. Voices of caution counseled incremental and timely steps. Susan B. Anthony heard such voices and drily noted, “Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputations…can never effect a reform.”
In the meantime, however, caution and care were thrown to the wind when other priorities dear to the hearts of those cautious about women’s rights were emphasized. There was infrastructure to be attended to-- railroads that needed to be built to grow the burgeoning economy. Reconstruction demanded the attention of the government. The growth of the United States as an economic power dictated attention to the military. In these matters, all of which generated money and poltical power, caution need not apply.
Butthe enfranchisement of women had to wait.
Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote his famous letter from a Birmingham jail, and included it in his book Why We Can’t Wait. Told by authorities that other matters were more important than ridding the US of the glaring injustice of apartheid; told that interminable, fruitless negotiations should continue, he wrote:
“For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied...We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. “
Precisely.
How many times during our nation’s history have the disenfranchised, the politically impotent been told to wait until more important matters are addressed? How often have “priorities” left the voiceless at the bottom of the pile of more “pressing” concerns? How many times have those at the bottom of the totem pole been told, “We will address your concerns as soon as we”—(fill in the blank.)
For the pragmatists, the long time politicos, those caged in economic apartheid, the utopian idealists who look to the “larger vision,” no time is now or ever will be right for protection of the unborn. After all, the little ones have no votes. They have no voice at all except those who would speak for them. They are helpless.
Fiscal conservatives tell us that until economic matters are addressed and solved, abortion must be placed on the back burner. And what happened during the last forty years since Roe vs. Wade when times of prosperity returned after recession?
Still the issue of abortion had to wait.
P
ragmatists, politicos and utopians all have their reasons for delay as well. They have been busied themselves with more important matters.
In the meantime, over 50 million lives have been lost and still the carnage continues
Still the answer is, “wait.”
The September 5th discovery of 35 late term infants who were aborted by a doctor at an Elkton clinic and thrown in a freezer has provoked little sustained outrage.
“Wait,” some counsel. This matter can be addressed later. We need to deal with the foundational reasons for abortion first. We need to look at the larger picture.
In a similar manner, the grainy photos of Jews being shot and dumped unceremoniously into a ditch were disregarded for the sake of more pressing military and political concerns.
“Wait,” was the counsel. There’s a war to be won first. There are broader issues at stake.
The time for waiting is over. There is a war going on against the unborn.
Our nation is in the midst of a war for the definition of our culture at large, a war that crosses many fronts. As that cultural war is fought for the survival of our nation, it must be also be fought on many fronts, not the least of which is moral and ethical. In fact, it is not too much to state that unless the gross moral distortions of the national character are not addressed with immediacy, the rest of the national health—including economic health--is vitiated beyond restoration, for the health of a nation depends on its attitudes toward the helpless, the innocent, the victims—those regarded as sheer refuse of society.
As people like Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Martin Luther King, among thousands of other less noted voices, some now silent and others now just being heard, when a nation loses its moral compass, and that compass is not readjusted to the due North of life, liberty and justice for all, then that nation is on its way to disintegration.
Those who seek to refocus and to change the direction of our country should recognize the necessity of fighting on many fronts, including justice for the unborn, in order to achieve restoration and vitality to our beloved nation.
--Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich at War (New York: Penguin Press, 2009), p. 560Ah, yes. Of course, we saw the point: Larger purposes for a greater good.
We understand.
We agree those “larger purposes” meant attempts to secure justice for the Jews had to be delayed. God forbid we got distracted by the immediacy of saving of innocent lives. After all, we had something bigger in mind.
Of course the Jews had to wait. Wait until they died.
How many times have the voiceless and oppressed heard similar arguments?
Frederick Douglass was told by Lincoln that political exigencies were of more importance than the immediate freeing of slaves. Lincoln was concerned about border states loyalty and feared his higher goal of saving the union would be jeopardized if he freed the slaves at the outset of the Civil War. He later capitulated to Douglass’ and other abolitionists demands, but not until he had reasonable hope of victory. Doubtless the ethics of his decision will be debated for decades to come.
Regardless, slaves had to wait for their freedom.
In a similar manner, women were told for decade after decade their quest for eaulity would have to wait until circumstances were more favorable. Voices of caution counseled incremental and timely steps. Susan B. Anthony heard such voices and drily noted, “Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputations…can never effect a reform.”
In the meantime, however, caution and care were thrown to the wind when other priorities dear to the hearts of those cautious about women’s rights were emphasized. There was infrastructure to be attended to-- railroads that needed to be built to grow the burgeoning economy. Reconstruction demanded the attention of the government. The growth of the United States as an economic power dictated attention to the military. In these matters, all of which generated money and poltical power, caution need not apply.
Butthe enfranchisement of women had to wait.
Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote his famous letter from a Birmingham jail, and included it in his book Why We Can’t Wait. Told by authorities that other matters were more important than ridding the US of the glaring injustice of apartheid; told that interminable, fruitless negotiations should continue, he wrote:
“For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied...We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. “
Precisely.
How many times during our nation’s history have the disenfranchised, the politically impotent been told to wait until more important matters are addressed? How often have “priorities” left the voiceless at the bottom of the pile of more “pressing” concerns? How many times have those at the bottom of the totem pole been told, “We will address your concerns as soon as we”—(fill in the blank.)
For the pragmatists, the long time politicos, those caged in economic apartheid, the utopian idealists who look to the “larger vision,” no time is now or ever will be right for protection of the unborn. After all, the little ones have no votes. They have no voice at all except those who would speak for them. They are helpless.
Fiscal conservatives tell us that until economic matters are addressed and solved, abortion must be placed on the back burner. And what happened during the last forty years since Roe vs. Wade when times of prosperity returned after recession?
Still the issue of abortion had to wait.
P
ragmatists, politicos and utopians all have their reasons for delay as well. They have been busied themselves with more important matters.
In the meantime, over 50 million lives have been lost and still the carnage continues
Still the answer is, “wait.”
The September 5th discovery of 35 late term infants who were aborted by a doctor at an Elkton clinic and thrown in a freezer has provoked little sustained outrage.
“Wait,” some counsel. This matter can be addressed later. We need to deal with the foundational reasons for abortion first. We need to look at the larger picture.
In a similar manner, the grainy photos of Jews being shot and dumped unceremoniously into a ditch were disregarded for the sake of more pressing military and political concerns.
“Wait,” was the counsel. There’s a war to be won first. There are broader issues at stake.
The time for waiting is over. There is a war going on against the unborn.
Our nation is in the midst of a war for the definition of our culture at large, a war that crosses many fronts. As that cultural war is fought for the survival of our nation, it must be also be fought on many fronts, not the least of which is moral and ethical. In fact, it is not too much to state that unless the gross moral distortions of the national character are not addressed with immediacy, the rest of the national health—including economic health--is vitiated beyond restoration, for the health of a nation depends on its attitudes toward the helpless, the innocent, the victims—those regarded as sheer refuse of society.
As people like Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Martin Luther King, among thousands of other less noted voices, some now silent and others now just being heard, when a nation loses its moral compass, and that compass is not readjusted to the due North of life, liberty and justice for all, then that nation is on its way to disintegration.
Those who seek to refocus and to change the direction of our country should recognize the necessity of fighting on many fronts, including justice for the unborn, in order to achieve restoration and vitality to our beloved nation.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Unity
Members of both political parties love the idea of unity, but find it elusive, even within membership ranks. Personality differences, ideological tension, sense of priorities create dissension most often resolved by the application of power and money, the application of which is most often expressed as “pragmatism.”
But power and money, always chief armaments of any political party, ultimately fail to achieve unity. That is because a unified party can only be established among people of identical or nearly identical beliefs.
Whether the unity based on ideals holds individuals’ loyalty and attention depends on the comprehensiveness and depth of the party’s foundational bases.
Over the last ten decades or so, the cultural hegemony of the Judeo/Christian ethic was gradually eroded by the progressive vision birthed during the nineteenth century. The erosion of the former cultural hegemony has meant the major institutions of the West, including those within the US, have been absorbed by progressivism.
The process of absorption by progressive thought has affected political parties, dividing camps of thought into two major and conflicting political philosophies: progressive and conservative. While the Democratic Party has been taken over almost without exception by leftist progressivism, particularly as regards the current administration, the Republican Party is in the midst of a titanic struggle for its ideological soul.
Progressives and conservatives are fighting for the ideological/philosophical heart of the Party.
Generally speaking, however, the fight is not defined as a battle between progressivism and conservatism. It is most often defined by the terms “moderate” and “conservative.” “Moderates,” who are actually progressives at heart, proclaim themselves reasonable pragmatists who are interested only in fiscal conservatism.
Conservatives, on the other hand, do not see the ideological pie as easily sliced and are interested in a broader agenda which addresses the marked deterioration of Western culture, including but not confined to the political culture.
In addition to their concerns over government’s fiscal responsibility, conservatives are pro-life, strict interpreters and upholders of the constitution, interested in retaining national identity and sovereignty, anti-statist and strong advocates for individual freedoms.
In other words, conservatives are interested in the reform of the entire culture; and for Republican conservatives, that reform starts with the political culture.
Particularly germane to this essay, conservatives do not see economics as divisible from other issues. However, moderates/progressives do see economics/fiscal conservatism as divisible from what are broadly (and I believe mistakenly termed) “social” issues.
How did economic issues become conceived as separable from the cloth of culture at large? What is the reasoning behind the idea that fiscal conservatism is separable from the rest of conservative beliefs?
I believe fiscal conservatives have at the heart of their beliefs in the separateness of economics from the rest of culture an irrational belief that economics is an objective science based on mathematics and statistics and therefore not subject to value judgments. For them, the measure of society and mankind is material.
Therefore, the reasoning goes, it is possible to apply objectively the science of economics to politics without concern for the value judgments and the moral freight “social” issues inevitably bring with them. As we shall see in another essay regarding the test case of public education, such an assumption is wrong.
But first, what is the reasoning behind the idea that fiscal conservatism is separable from social/cultural issues?
Those who follow the philosophy of science will know that the effort to find a formula to reconcile the seemingly contradictory theories of quantum mechanics and general relativity has at the heart of the efforts to reconcile, a Theory of Everything; that is, a formula the explicates and links together all known physical phenomena. The formula is then supposed to have predictive power to explain any particular phenomenon.
Forgotten in the impulse to explicate the entirety of the universe in mathematical terms is Kant’s admonition in his Third Critique that higher (“pure”) mathematics, while capable of much seduction, elegance and beauty, may not bear any particular resemblance to reality.
In brief, there are many other facets to be considered in the interpretation of the complexities and meaning of the universe. A mathematical formula may not contain the universe nor serve as a total explicatory device.
What does the above mean concerning for “fiscal conservatism?”
It means, among other things, that the mathematics and statistics attendant to economics do not define or “objectify” economics; which, after all, is a human activity and which is fraught with moral judgments.
It means that the economic measure of humanity (economics being defined as an “objective” science with universal applicability to human history and culture) is an insufficient and truncated means of measure.
It also means that the mere material, economic measure of humanity, when applied universally, creates destruction of society, as has often been noted by historians who have observed the results of communism, which used as its measure the sole factors of economics; that is, humans as purely material being measured by economics. Thus, each person is assigned a particular economic value, which in progressive/socialist/communist terms means equal distribution of wealth since equality is defined as equal material possessions.
But the presumed objectivity and certainty of economics gives, as it has given to socialists and communists, a wedge whereby value judgments contrary to political conservatism may be inserted into the political structure. In other words, supposedly objective economic issues become the proverbial nose of the camel in the tent. The real but most often unstated purpose of “fiscal conservatives” is to get the whole camel in the tent in order to obtain control of the rest of the conservative agenda, substituting progressive values for conservative values.
The above is the reason why conservatives must resist the idea that economics is a thread separable from the rest of the societal fabric; that it alone is the objectifying measure of humankind and human culture. On the contrary, every economic decision, every facet of fiscal responsibility carries with it a value judgment. The only question remaining, then, is whose value judgment will infrom economic policy; whose value judgment will prevail?
For the conservative, the value judgments undergirding economic policies are the same value judgments which are the foundational beliefs of conservatives, most of whom believe those values were most ably articulated by the founders of this nation.
Part II: Delaware’s Public Schools as a case example of the impossibility of separating out fiscal conservatism and value judgments based on conservative political philosophy.
But power and money, always chief armaments of any political party, ultimately fail to achieve unity. That is because a unified party can only be established among people of identical or nearly identical beliefs.
Whether the unity based on ideals holds individuals’ loyalty and attention depends on the comprehensiveness and depth of the party’s foundational bases.
Over the last ten decades or so, the cultural hegemony of the Judeo/Christian ethic was gradually eroded by the progressive vision birthed during the nineteenth century. The erosion of the former cultural hegemony has meant the major institutions of the West, including those within the US, have been absorbed by progressivism.
The process of absorption by progressive thought has affected political parties, dividing camps of thought into two major and conflicting political philosophies: progressive and conservative. While the Democratic Party has been taken over almost without exception by leftist progressivism, particularly as regards the current administration, the Republican Party is in the midst of a titanic struggle for its ideological soul.
Progressives and conservatives are fighting for the ideological/philosophical heart of the Party.
Generally speaking, however, the fight is not defined as a battle between progressivism and conservatism. It is most often defined by the terms “moderate” and “conservative.” “Moderates,” who are actually progressives at heart, proclaim themselves reasonable pragmatists who are interested only in fiscal conservatism.
Conservatives, on the other hand, do not see the ideological pie as easily sliced and are interested in a broader agenda which addresses the marked deterioration of Western culture, including but not confined to the political culture.
In addition to their concerns over government’s fiscal responsibility, conservatives are pro-life, strict interpreters and upholders of the constitution, interested in retaining national identity and sovereignty, anti-statist and strong advocates for individual freedoms.
In other words, conservatives are interested in the reform of the entire culture; and for Republican conservatives, that reform starts with the political culture.
Particularly germane to this essay, conservatives do not see economics as divisible from other issues. However, moderates/progressives do see economics/fiscal conservatism as divisible from what are broadly (and I believe mistakenly termed) “social” issues.
How did economic issues become conceived as separable from the cloth of culture at large? What is the reasoning behind the idea that fiscal conservatism is separable from the rest of conservative beliefs?
I believe fiscal conservatives have at the heart of their beliefs in the separateness of economics from the rest of culture an irrational belief that economics is an objective science based on mathematics and statistics and therefore not subject to value judgments. For them, the measure of society and mankind is material.
Therefore, the reasoning goes, it is possible to apply objectively the science of economics to politics without concern for the value judgments and the moral freight “social” issues inevitably bring with them. As we shall see in another essay regarding the test case of public education, such an assumption is wrong.
But first, what is the reasoning behind the idea that fiscal conservatism is separable from social/cultural issues?
Those who follow the philosophy of science will know that the effort to find a formula to reconcile the seemingly contradictory theories of quantum mechanics and general relativity has at the heart of the efforts to reconcile, a Theory of Everything; that is, a formula the explicates and links together all known physical phenomena. The formula is then supposed to have predictive power to explain any particular phenomenon.
Forgotten in the impulse to explicate the entirety of the universe in mathematical terms is Kant’s admonition in his Third Critique that higher (“pure”) mathematics, while capable of much seduction, elegance and beauty, may not bear any particular resemblance to reality.
In brief, there are many other facets to be considered in the interpretation of the complexities and meaning of the universe. A mathematical formula may not contain the universe nor serve as a total explicatory device.
What does the above mean concerning for “fiscal conservatism?”
It means, among other things, that the mathematics and statistics attendant to economics do not define or “objectify” economics; which, after all, is a human activity and which is fraught with moral judgments.
It means that the economic measure of humanity (economics being defined as an “objective” science with universal applicability to human history and culture) is an insufficient and truncated means of measure.
It also means that the mere material, economic measure of humanity, when applied universally, creates destruction of society, as has often been noted by historians who have observed the results of communism, which used as its measure the sole factors of economics; that is, humans as purely material being measured by economics. Thus, each person is assigned a particular economic value, which in progressive/socialist/communist terms means equal distribution of wealth since equality is defined as equal material possessions.
But the presumed objectivity and certainty of economics gives, as it has given to socialists and communists, a wedge whereby value judgments contrary to political conservatism may be inserted into the political structure. In other words, supposedly objective economic issues become the proverbial nose of the camel in the tent. The real but most often unstated purpose of “fiscal conservatives” is to get the whole camel in the tent in order to obtain control of the rest of the conservative agenda, substituting progressive values for conservative values.
The above is the reason why conservatives must resist the idea that economics is a thread separable from the rest of the societal fabric; that it alone is the objectifying measure of humankind and human culture. On the contrary, every economic decision, every facet of fiscal responsibility carries with it a value judgment. The only question remaining, then, is whose value judgment will infrom economic policy; whose value judgment will prevail?
For the conservative, the value judgments undergirding economic policies are the same value judgments which are the foundational beliefs of conservatives, most of whom believe those values were most ably articulated by the founders of this nation.
Part II: Delaware’s Public Schools as a case example of the impossibility of separating out fiscal conservatism and value judgments based on conservative political philosophy.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Carnage
There is one chief reason behind the stunning losses of GOP candidates for offices in Delaware: The GOP establishment.
For years the moderate/liberal leaders of the party have welcomed money and votes from conservatives, asking them to hold their noses and vote for the party’s anointed candidates while promising conservatives their time would come if they were just patient and went along with the plan.
That time came.
But when the party leadership was called on to support conservatives, with a few notable exceptions such as Governor Pete DuPont, the moderate/liberal establishment made deliberate choices to sit out the election, go over to the Democrats’ camp, or actively sabotage the campaigns of the conservatives running for national and state offices.
Whether it was Tom Ross actively excoriating Christine O’Donnell as not being worthy of the office of dog catcher or whether it was the passive aggression of quietly withdrawing support from Glen Urquhart and other conservative candidates, the message was the same:
“We’d rather go down with the Titanic than send out life boats to save conservatives. Let them swim in the icy waters by themselves.”
Conservatives will wait until doomsday before they stop hearing the excuses of why the establishment wouldn’t support them--the candidates were personally flawed, they were inexperienced, they didn’t have the knowledge of how things really work, they were naïve, they were rash, they said silly things—and on and on.
But every Republican candidate would have been flawed. Human weaknesses and failures had little or nothing to do with the rejection of the GOP slate of candidates by party leaders and hangers on.
The main reason the slate of conservative candidates were not supported was that they were, well, conservative.
For decades Republican leadership has had a chummy relationship with the Democrats that has gone beyond mere collegiality and “reaching across the aisles." The reasons for the intense cooperation have most often been presented in terms of pragmatism and “reality;” but the truth of the matter is that by and large, Delaware Republican leadership has bought into liberal ideology, carving out only one consequential conservative domain: fiscal conservatism. Social issues have been and are still regarded as entirely superfluous. Reduction of the size of government, tackling the teacher's union and other important issues were not meaningfully addressed.
The result, as we have seen, has been absolute carnage.
The Republican Party in Delaware is now destroyed, mainly because the establishment
refused to embrace the conservative movement as exemplified by Tea Party movement and its legitimate concerns. Those who thought they held the reins of power entirely missed the conservative tide that swept through nearly every other state in the union.
Going forward, things look grim for the Delaware GOP, as conservatives have learned a bitter lesson and probably will move on without the party. They might well choose to leave the Republican establishment in their chosen seats—the deck chairs on the Titanic.
The Delaware GOP has been sunk because of its leadership’s pride and false sense of power, its delusional belief in its effectiveness. To use another historical metaphor, the current leaders have become like China’s last emperor—ruler of Forbidden City, surrounded by a sycophantic retinue and deluded as to the revolution going outside their walled compound.
As for the conservatives of Delaware? The Tea Partiers, the 9/12 patriots, the Rail Splitters, devout Catholics and evangelicals and other reformers who want a return to small government and constitutional principles—they will move on regardless, for their passion for reform of our great nation remains.
Delaware's conservatives will regroup and continue their efforts, looking toward the election of 2012.
For as these 2010 elections have shown, the blue tide is turning red.
For years the moderate/liberal leaders of the party have welcomed money and votes from conservatives, asking them to hold their noses and vote for the party’s anointed candidates while promising conservatives their time would come if they were just patient and went along with the plan.
That time came.
But when the party leadership was called on to support conservatives, with a few notable exceptions such as Governor Pete DuPont, the moderate/liberal establishment made deliberate choices to sit out the election, go over to the Democrats’ camp, or actively sabotage the campaigns of the conservatives running for national and state offices.
Whether it was Tom Ross actively excoriating Christine O’Donnell as not being worthy of the office of dog catcher or whether it was the passive aggression of quietly withdrawing support from Glen Urquhart and other conservative candidates, the message was the same:
“We’d rather go down with the Titanic than send out life boats to save conservatives. Let them swim in the icy waters by themselves.”
Conservatives will wait until doomsday before they stop hearing the excuses of why the establishment wouldn’t support them--the candidates were personally flawed, they were inexperienced, they didn’t have the knowledge of how things really work, they were naïve, they were rash, they said silly things—and on and on.
But every Republican candidate would have been flawed. Human weaknesses and failures had little or nothing to do with the rejection of the GOP slate of candidates by party leaders and hangers on.
The main reason the slate of conservative candidates were not supported was that they were, well, conservative.
For decades Republican leadership has had a chummy relationship with the Democrats that has gone beyond mere collegiality and “reaching across the aisles." The reasons for the intense cooperation have most often been presented in terms of pragmatism and “reality;” but the truth of the matter is that by and large, Delaware Republican leadership has bought into liberal ideology, carving out only one consequential conservative domain: fiscal conservatism. Social issues have been and are still regarded as entirely superfluous. Reduction of the size of government, tackling the teacher's union and other important issues were not meaningfully addressed.
The result, as we have seen, has been absolute carnage.
The Republican Party in Delaware is now destroyed, mainly because the establishment
refused to embrace the conservative movement as exemplified by Tea Party movement and its legitimate concerns. Those who thought they held the reins of power entirely missed the conservative tide that swept through nearly every other state in the union.
Going forward, things look grim for the Delaware GOP, as conservatives have learned a bitter lesson and probably will move on without the party. They might well choose to leave the Republican establishment in their chosen seats—the deck chairs on the Titanic.
The Delaware GOP has been sunk because of its leadership’s pride and false sense of power, its delusional belief in its effectiveness. To use another historical metaphor, the current leaders have become like China’s last emperor—ruler of Forbidden City, surrounded by a sycophantic retinue and deluded as to the revolution going outside their walled compound.
As for the conservatives of Delaware? The Tea Partiers, the 9/12 patriots, the Rail Splitters, devout Catholics and evangelicals and other reformers who want a return to small government and constitutional principles—they will move on regardless, for their passion for reform of our great nation remains.
Delaware's conservatives will regroup and continue their efforts, looking toward the election of 2012.
For as these 2010 elections have shown, the blue tide is turning red.
Monday, November 1, 2010
2010: What's at stake
While the economy, taxes and other economic issues justifiably occupy the minds of all Americans going to the voters’ booth tomorrow, there is much more at stake than those immediate and legitimate concerns.
The truth of the matter is that the character; indeed, the very existence of our nation is at stake.
If the Left prevails, it will not be just socialism that prevails. The continued dismantling of American defense and her sovereign status as a nation and super power will relentlessly proceed. America will be in danger of disappearing.
Why?
America is in danger because the Left is committed to the leveling of American hegemony and the forced rehabilitation of her nature.
In foreign affairs, the US is to be consigned to a “one among many” status in a global governmental system dominated by world organizations such as the UN, the IMF, and the World Court.
America is to be humbled, her sovereignty taken away and her affairs conducted by global deliberative bodies intent on redistributing her great wealth. At one time such a plan was called the International Communist movement, but nowadays, the plan goes by softer appellations such as establishing a “global village.” Nonetheless, the intent is the same.
Domestically, the plan is to complete the dismantling of the federal system, making the states mere provincial appendages dependent on and administering the will of an all powerful federal government run by an elite cabal. Federal, state and legislative bodies will continue to be relegated to futility as an ever increasing bureaucracy will accomplish through myriad decrees and regulations what elected officials once were responsible for.
We get more than a hint of what an unelected bureaucracy can accomplish without being responsible to the American public by the ways in which it already advances the Left’s agenda, be it through the 159 new agencies established by Obamacare or by carbon emissions regulations imposed by the EPA.
This is to say nothing of the countless directives, rules and regulations directed against personal freedoms.
The point is that unless action is taken now, both state and federal elective bodies will become even more irrelevant because of an all powerful and all pervasive bureaucracy, possibly even attaining the status of the Roman senate under Caligula.
While the progressives plan to “radically transform” (destroy) America probably will not be entirely vitiated, the 2010 election offers voters a last chance to say “Stop!” It offers the opportunity to stem the tide, build the dam against the flood and to gather forces to reverse the flow starting in 2010 and moving forward in 2012.
What must happen nationally must also happen state by state. The issues of national and state sovereignty are inextricably intertwined and are as serious on the state level as they are on the national level. For in all cases, personal freedom, true representative government, and the existence of government as defined and limited by constitutional principles is at stake.
This election, every American interested in the return of America to its roots must get out and vote as if their lives depend on it.
Because they do.
The truth of the matter is that the character; indeed, the very existence of our nation is at stake.
If the Left prevails, it will not be just socialism that prevails. The continued dismantling of American defense and her sovereign status as a nation and super power will relentlessly proceed. America will be in danger of disappearing.
Why?
America is in danger because the Left is committed to the leveling of American hegemony and the forced rehabilitation of her nature.
In foreign affairs, the US is to be consigned to a “one among many” status in a global governmental system dominated by world organizations such as the UN, the IMF, and the World Court.
America is to be humbled, her sovereignty taken away and her affairs conducted by global deliberative bodies intent on redistributing her great wealth. At one time such a plan was called the International Communist movement, but nowadays, the plan goes by softer appellations such as establishing a “global village.” Nonetheless, the intent is the same.
Domestically, the plan is to complete the dismantling of the federal system, making the states mere provincial appendages dependent on and administering the will of an all powerful federal government run by an elite cabal. Federal, state and legislative bodies will continue to be relegated to futility as an ever increasing bureaucracy will accomplish through myriad decrees and regulations what elected officials once were responsible for.
We get more than a hint of what an unelected bureaucracy can accomplish without being responsible to the American public by the ways in which it already advances the Left’s agenda, be it through the 159 new agencies established by Obamacare or by carbon emissions regulations imposed by the EPA.
This is to say nothing of the countless directives, rules and regulations directed against personal freedoms.
The point is that unless action is taken now, both state and federal elective bodies will become even more irrelevant because of an all powerful and all pervasive bureaucracy, possibly even attaining the status of the Roman senate under Caligula.
While the progressives plan to “radically transform” (destroy) America probably will not be entirely vitiated, the 2010 election offers voters a last chance to say “Stop!” It offers the opportunity to stem the tide, build the dam against the flood and to gather forces to reverse the flow starting in 2010 and moving forward in 2012.
What must happen nationally must also happen state by state. The issues of national and state sovereignty are inextricably intertwined and are as serious on the state level as they are on the national level. For in all cases, personal freedom, true representative government, and the existence of government as defined and limited by constitutional principles is at stake.
This election, every American interested in the return of America to its roots must get out and vote as if their lives depend on it.
Because they do.
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