The President & Libya

Republican leadership has universally criticized the president for tardiness in his decision to intervene in Libya and in his subsequent inability to define America's specific mission.

Both failures (they are certainly failures) go hand-in-hand and find their genesis in a single cause: the president does not want to do this.

To describe him as passive before his decision would be technically true (and characteristic of him as chief executive), but only thus.  He was active -- actively going out of his way to wrap his arms around American power and death-grip it from ever being used to influence the course of events.  It was only after lesser powers such as the French and British, followed by the Arab League, had called for intervention before America stood to be the only relevant actor refusing to act.

The president's continued distaste for American participation is manifesting itself still.  Ostentatiously unwilling to do what he has finally done, the president has done the bare minimum a commander-in-chief authorizing the use of force can do.  Orders were given, a statement was made to the American people -- and then nothing.  No subsequent declarations of the ultimate mission or, more specifically, whether coalition forces are simply trying to hem Qaddafi in or actually influence his ouster.

All anyone has really been given are assertions that America is going to "shape the battlefield" and then step back and let other components of the coalition take the lead.

President Obama did not want to be here in the first place and now that he is here he is leaving the impression that he is looking to get America out just as soon as it was in.

The Best of Styles, the Worst of Styles

Dickens' Tale of Two Cities is renowned most for its beginning dichotomy ("It was the best of times, it was the worst of times"). Fortuitously enough, a similar device can be used to evaluate Dickens' manner of prose.

Indeed, it is the best of forms; it is the worst of forms.

Beneficially, his sentences are layered dissections of his subject. Foreign to the present Twitter generation that demands its literary material (and everything else) condensed and microwaveable, the bard of the Victorian Age slow-roasts his prose, dedicating time and ink to every nuance of the matter at hand. Take for example his description of the French peasantry at the time of the Revolution's outbreak, ground into misery and want by the aristocracy. Dickens portrays these poor masses as a

people that had undergone a terrible grinding and regrinding in the mill… The mill which had worked them down, was the mill that grinds young people old; the children had ancient faces and grave voices; and upon them, and upon the grown faces, and ploughed into every furrow of age and coming up afresh, was the sign, Hunger. It was prevalent everywhere. Hunger was pushed out of the tall houses, in the wretched clothing that hung upon poles and lines; Hunger was patched into them with straw and rag and wood and paper; Hunger was repeated in every fragment of the small modicum of firewood that the man sawed off… (Two Cities, 64, NOOKbook)

Dickens goes for sentences, paragraphs and pages more on the same train. The peasants of France were poor and miserable and he does not move on from this point until he has described each and every detail that makes it so.

This advantageously illuminates his subject for the reader in its complete totality while also penetrating it with a microscopic lens, revealing to them every nook and nuance therein. He does everything for the reader. The flow and course of events of the plot are given a firm foundation because he takes the time to illuminate the salient details that cause them. In Two Cities nothing can explain the extremely arbitrary and wanton brutality of the Revolution as well as the meticulous portrait Dickens paints of the equally extreme hunger, oppression and misery that precursors it.

Indeed, Dickens portrays the victims of revolutionary-French society in terms equally as pathetic as he portrays those of pre-revolutionary society. Witness his tragic description of the prisoners of La Force and the contrast between their present (low) and past (high) state:

So strangely clouded were these refinements by the prison manners and gloom, so spectral did they become in the inappropriate squalor and misery through which they were seen, that Charles Darnay seemed to stand in a company of the dead. Ghosts all! the ghost of beauty, the ghost of stateliness, the ghost of elegance, the ghost of pride, the ghost of frivolity, the ghost of wit, the ghost of youth, the ghost of age, all waiting their dismissal from the desolate shore, all turning on him eyes that were changed by the death they had died in coming there. (282)

The mill that had ground the French peasantry into squalor and death had been given new grist, achieving the same result. Extreme circumstances bred extreme circumstances; Dickens masterfully depicts both.

There is a Paris to this London though. In dedicating such copious amounts of prose to totality and dissection, Dickens commits the occasional folly of dedicating copious amounts of prose to minimal expanses of plot. For this I have in mind the third chapter of Book the First in which Dickens digresses into philosophical ruminations about the secrets and mystery that each human life represents to each other. After this he moves on to the Tellson's messenger and his journey after he delivers his message to Mr. Lorry – the relation between the two being that since each human life is a mystery to each other "the messenger on horseback had exactly the same possessions as the King, the first Minister of State, or the richest merchant in London" (47).

This is all well and good but non- germane to the plot of Two Cities. To travel so deeply down this dead-end, and away from the central flow of Dickens' scintillating plot, is as frustrating as it would have been had Shakespeare followed the soothsayer after Caesar's boast that "The Ides of March are come" (Act 3, Scene 1) and not followed Caesar himself, directly documenting the fate that awaited him.

At the very least such lateral movement is ungenerous to all but the most patient, devoted reader who is willing to indulge Dickens' in his reflective flights of fancy.

If he is to be credited for doing everything for his reader, as he must be, Dickens must also then be debited for perhaps doing too much.

No ‘Unity’

In response to President Laurent Gbagbo's refusal to cede power after losing elections in the Ivory Coast, the editors of the Economist warn against the African Union trying to foster a "unity" government to diffuse the crisis. "It is essential that Africa as a whole gets used to the idea that ruling parties bow out when they are rejected at the ballot box. So-called unity governments, installed with the apparently good intention of preventing further chaos after blood has already been shed, are as likely to lead to paralysis and patronage as to creative compromise."

Correct as far as this analysis goes, condoning such government "compromises" proliferates pernicious fruits. Praying on the naiveté and good-intentions of external influences, despots booted from power by the vox populii can cling to that power through the effusion of blood in the full expectation that it will make those influences so desperate to end the carnage that they will permit them to retain at least some semblance of the place in government they have lost any rightful claim to.

The upshot is bad precedent and the inception of a vicious cycle. Seeing that one entity booted from power by plebiscite was able to retain that power through this method, other entities are all the more likely to employ the same method – shedding the blood of their people – when placed in the same predicament.

Additionally, as the Economist begins to hint at, "unity" governments confound representative government in the sense that they terminate in utero the development of the norms and habits an organic society needs to internalize to ultimately become both ordered and free. Giving thugs like Gbagbo a free pass to disregard election results only makes the people of the Ivory Coast and Africa at large accustomed to government by those willing and able to utilize power in the bloody suppression of the masses.

The Wages of Self-Immolating Pretence

The atrocities transpiring in Libya have been permitted to do so through the Obama Administration's pretence that the United States is just another member of the society of nations; no more special or important than any other.

Quite contrary to this affectation, America is and has long been – if not the only, then certainly the major – bulwark of international security. In scores of examples since the end of World War II, America's global reach has been dispositive in influencing events away from economic, social and/or political catastrophe and towards human liberty.

Such a catastrophe is presently escalating in Libya, and despite the unique power to serve the role America has traditionally fulfilled, the administration has instead elected to do nothing. Libyans standing up to the despotism of an insane autocrat are thus subject to the airborne slaughter of his warplanes.

In moments such as these the notion that America is a destabilizing force in the world is demonstrated to be the utter nonsense it always has been.

The United States is the world's lone superpower. Not only is it almost exclusively responsible for underwriting the security of the free world, but it is (still) the last and only hope for mankind's eternal quest for freedom. People already free can rest secure in the preservation of that happy state only in the global involvement of the United States – people yearning for freedom must place their aspirations in the same thing.

As more of these oppressed multitudes fall beneath the sword of Muammar Gadaffi this truth becomes increasingly evident. When the United States shrinks from its role in the world not only does the world become less safe, but the shining flame of liberty becomes dimmer to every desperate life seeking to grasp it.

If the United States has the ability to preserve human life and further its quest for freedom it cannot stand down because of some pathetic and misplaced humility. It must act.

A Future of Growth or Government?

The Left snickers now that while the public favors spending restraint in the abstract it abhors (and will abhor Republican) reductions in the specific. President Obama is staking his re-election on this – that voters will recoil from the GOP and turn back towards him when Congress tries to do something it has not done in generations: pass a budget smaller than the previous one.

That may be. Existential spending cuts may very well cost Republicans (and the republic) another long term of Obama, possibly their House majority.

But that does not change the substantive reality that the ruinous course for us and especially the next generation of Americans is to do what President Obama and the Left propose: nothing. For decades we have indulged ourselves not with our own money but with that of our children and grandchildren. Now we face the upshot of that irresponsibility, that generational theft.

It presents us with a choice. One is to select a future of growth and prosperity, a choice that entails the shared sacrifice of spending cuts and entitlement reform that will permit tax levels to remain low, alter the incentives in the health-care industry to improve its pricing and provision, and free future Americans from what Jefferson once called "the dead hand of the past."

The other is to do nothing, to sullenly limp towards a future suffocated by a ubiquity of red. Debt levels approaching GDP will necessitate even more exponential growth in government as Uncle Sam has no other recourse but to completely grab onto the billfolds and checkbooks of Americans. The need for such an overweening state will choke out even the faintest hope of economic growth and bring us closer, if not in lockstep, with the stifled economies of Europe. Having stuck our children with the tab, we will have also ungraciously denied them the means to pick it up.

Hoping only for political gains in the next election, this is the option President Obama and his party of unions and special interest payouts have selected. For those who seek another course, "have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it."

Stasis in Wisconsin

Those forces in Wisconsin opposing the governor's budget reducing proposals ought to answer a simple question: why is compensation greater than what those with comparable employment in the private sector receive sancrosanct when the state cannot afford that excessive compensation and it is paid on the backs of Wisconsin taxpayers?

This is simply an exercise in an entitled class of people fighting to preserve their preferential, market-immune sinecures.

Point, Counterpoint

Leadership having been abdicated by the president, House Republicans have indicated that they will include entitlement reforms in their forthcoming budget proposal. Whatever shape these reforms take, Democrats will scream that the GOP is gutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and that unquantifiable suffering by the American people will ensue.

The counter to this is simple: the unquantifiable suffering will only occur should Republicans adopt the Democrats' position of cowardice and inaction. These programs cannot meet their long-term obligations. Left alone massive increases in taxes or austerity cuts will be inevitable. Comprehensive reform as Republicans propose is the only manner through which these entitlements can be made viable into the future. This is plain and simple – the conclusion of the president's own debt commission.

Through sheer inaction, Democrats simply plan to watch the entitlement car drive straight off of the cliff.

Obama, Condemned

Charles Krauthammer pens a devastating condemnation of President Obama's abdication on the debt crisis, managing, in a mere collection of paragraphs, to illuminate the manifold problems with his budget.

If accepted on its own terms, the budget fails to trim discretionary spending in any meaningful sense. The $1.1 trillion in savings it claims to instill would not be enough to balance the budget this year, let alone the federal government's long-term structural deficit.

The preponderance of spending "reduction" it does contain consists mostly in tax increases, abolishing many tax loopholes in the corporate tax-code while leaving the rate itself alone. The actual spending reductions it does contain barely set spending back to the baselines he inherited in 2009. "Classic Obama debt reduction: Add $2 trillion in new taxes, then add another $1 trillion in new spending and, presto, you've got $1 trillion of debt reduction."

All of this ignores the fact that the foundation upon which this budget plan is built are absurdly, shall we say optimistic economic-growth predictions coupled with cheap accounting gimmicks. When these are swept away, as they will be, the president's budgetary proposals would lead to additional federal outlays of nearly $1 trillion per annum.

President Obama's most egregious transgression is not one of commission but omission: he completely ignores the major debt-creating monster – the self-indulgent largesse of current and previous generations that is entitlements. For the federal fiscal house to be put back in order these unsustainable leviathans will need to be reformed or they will utterly fail to meet their obligations.

Cognizant of this, the president has nevertheless refused to do anything. On the single largest challenge that menaces his country at the time he is its president, he has shirked leadership in a cynical political ploy to force the opposition to fill the void – fully intending to attack as soon as they put one toe out on the branch. "A more cynical budget is hard to imagine. This one ignores the looming debt crisis, shifts all responsibility for serious budget-cutting to the Republicans — for which Democrats are ready with a two-year, full-artillery demagogic assault — and sets Obama up perfectly for re-election in 2012."

As a cruel mockery of his newest slogan, President Obama is forfeiting America's future for his own political advantage.

To Demure & Bequeath

Since his State of the Union address the president has been fond of talking about "winning the future" by revving the engine of government to invest in all facets of the country. Such rhetoric willfully ignores the reality that the combination of increased outlays from his first biennium coupled with desperately insolvent entitlements promise a future consumed by debt. Far from "winning the future," further government "investment" akin to what the president is calling for promises to steal the future from present and successive generations.

As our cumulative national debt approaches GDP levels, action – both drastic and immediate – is required.

The president pays some lip service to this but is derelict in deed. Before Congress last month, he refused to acknowledge the issue (and the reason that dozens of new members from the other party were sitting in his audience) and called for billions more in new spending on light-speed rail and other sundries.

His budget, released today, does not cut even half of what Republicans are proposing and does virtually nothing to ameliorate the red ink crisis. As Fred Barnes points out, the president's budget would cut $1.1 trillion over the next decade – a sum that does not even exceed the projected deficit for this year.

President Obama and his apologists came into office fancying him as the next FDR: the long-awaited heir who would create a social welfare system for the twenty-first century. This is clearly the presidency he and they still envision.

It is not the presidency that history, or what Machiavelli called fortuna, has designed for him.

The defining issue of this political generation is debt, the single matter that we cannot shirk without being entirely consumed in a sea of insolvency. For other generations it was slavery and civil war, Nazism or communism. Debt is ours.

The president refuses to either recognize or accept this, and so he demurs, creating a leadership void others will be compelled to fill. Only by that time the problem will be even greater than it is now. As Noemie Emery writes, "The mess he claims he inherited from President George W. Bush (which was made in large part by Obama's friends and his party) will be as nothing compared to the one he'll pass on to his heirs."

A long snake of debt – made of zero after zero – ready to squeeze and suffocate present and future generations: such is the bequest the president will leave for his successors.

Kidnapped Conservatives

It was another harmless day in 8^th grade U.S. History when my teacher dropped the bomb. "Yes Lincoln was the first Republican president, but it is pretty obvious that were he alive today he'd be a Democrat." Dumbfounded, this was my first experience with an odious phenomenon: when a conservative is dead and buried (and has been vindicated by the course of history) the Left engages in a concerted effort to claim him as one of their own and/or use that revision against living, breathing conservatives. As Jonah Goldberg writes, "The only good conservative is a dead conservative… It's just we-the-living who are hateful ogres, troglodytes, and mopers."

Lincoln is the first example of this. The man who declared that the chief "purpose of the Republican party is eminently conservative" and who sought nothing save the restoration of "this government to its original tones…and there to maintain it, looking for no further change" was no liberal (no modern liberal). A believer in free markets, individual liberty and the rule of law, Lincoln would have loathed the large administrative state and social welfare regime Democrats envision today. These initiatives create quasi-permanent subclasses of government dependents and instill a disincentive to labor, the surest means Lincoln envisioned to self-perfection and social advancement. His opposition to slavery was predicated not only in his belief in the natural rights of man but in the knowledge that, as Allen C. Guelzo writes, "allowing one man to own the fruits of another man's labor…discouraged hard work in both."

Lincoln never spoke of leveling down the playing field or "sharing the wealth." Instead "the weights should be lifted from the shoulders of all men" allowing "the humblest man an equal chance to get rich with everybody else."

Lincoln's top hat simply will not fit the head of today's Democratic donkey.

Now it is Ronald Reagan. The man who declared that "government is the problem" as he sought massive reductions in its size and scope was apparently a moderate pragmatist, in sharp contrast to the conservatives of today who are….well, saying and trying to do the exact same thing. Liberals from Andrea Mitchell to Eugene Robinson to TIME have alleged an affinity between Ronald Reagan and the center-left that the world somehow failed to notice since his days as a New Dealer in the Screen Actors' Guild.

Regrettably, liberals who try to pull this stunt ignore two items, one being that pretty much everything he stood for in his public life was (and still is) inimical to the Left's creed. Not only did he come to the White House pursuing aggressive spending cuts (and would leave it lamenting that he had not cut more), but the abolition of entire cabinet-level departments. He sought cuts to Social Security and Medicare (rebuffed by Congress). He exponentially increased defense spending. He cut taxes (and when he had to raise them as part of a compromise with Congressional Democrats he lamented that his heart "wasn't in it"). He was firmly and vocally pro-life. His Justice Department aggressively promoted originalism to counter decades of the judicial left amorphously interpreting the Constitution to mean whatever they wanted it to. In a deliberate departure from détente, he pursued a policy of confrontation with the Soviet Union that could lead to one thing and one thing only: "We win, they lose."

Today's liberals not only ignore all of this in alleging that Reagan was a moderate (or even a liberal), but they also disingenuously ignore the stubborn little reality that they opposed him in all of these things in forms every bit as passionate, ranging-on-hateful as they did George W. Bush. When alive the Left labeled him a "dunce," an "ideologue," a "right-wing extremist," and a "cowboy." At one point Tip O'Neill went so far as to say that there was "evil…in the White House…And that evil is a man who has no care and no concern for the working class of America and the future generations of America." Praising his diplomacy in ending the Cold War now, liberals howled when he labeled the Soviet Union an "evil empire." (To call Reagan himself "evil" was apparently kosher, but damn the man who dared label a regime responsible for the death and oppression of millions in such terms.)

Had there been blogs or cable news the Kos' and Olbermanns would have treated forty every bit as vituperatively as they treated forty-three.

Ronald Reagan was no squishy moderate or liberal, and as Steven F. Hayward writes, those on the Left who now contend otherwise "should be made to explain why they appreciate the virtues of conservatives [especially Reagan] only after they are gone from the scene."

One suspects that, placed on the wrong side of history, they are not so much trying to pull Reagan towards themselves but themselves towards Reagan and away from the fact that he was right and they were wrong. (They are not above scoring cheap political points over conservatives in the here-and-now either.)

If the metaphor above may be strained a little, Reagan's top hat does not fit the heads of liberals today any better than Lincoln's.

Mubarak's Address

Prior to Hosni Mubarak's national address today the masses gathered in Tahrir Square were in high spirits and absorbed in chants tinged with a sense of triumph. Buoyed by reports Mubarak would be announcing his resignation, they also had no other logical conclusion to come to. With what purpose would Mubarak come before his people again unless something in the plans he laid out in his last speech had changed?

No apparent one.

Instead of announcing what everyone planned to hear though, he simply reiterated that he would stay until September, that he was transferring some powers to his vice president, and that he would pursue some constitutional reforms.

Unsurprisingly Egyptians are furious and some sort of violence is expected tomorrow.

One has to wonder what exactly Mubarak was hoping to accomplish. He has long since lost credibility with his countrymen and so nothing he could say short of resignation would placate them. In fact, the only motive that would fit the import of his address today is a desire to see the country he pretends to be the champion of burn, which it quite possibly could now.

The Meaninglessness of ‘Judicial Activism’

Adjectives used pejoratively in the political lexicon tend to lose their original meaning the longer their currency is. After awhile they transform from something specific you disagree with to anything and anyone you disagree with or view negatively. Such became the case with "fascist", "neoconservative" and (liberals would argue) "socialist."

Such has now also become the case with "judicial activist." Used originally by conservatives to pejoratively describe the Warren Court and what they alleged to be its departures from the traditional (and constitutional) role of the judiciary, the moniker has now evolved into the designation both spectral sides employ on judicial acts they do not agree with.

To wit, the ink had barely dried on Judge Vinson's decision invalidating the entirety of last year's health-care reform as unconstitutional before the Obama Administration lashed out at it as a clear case of "judicial activism."

The term has now graduated into the pantheon of its aforementioned predecessors, which is to say it has floated into the realm of utter meaninglessness. No longer applied to a specific type of judicial behavior, and instead used to describe quite disparate ones by disparate sides, to say that an act of the third branch is an example of "judicial activism" is now to say no more than that you disagree with said act.

1099 Repeal

This week the Senate repealed the 1099 provision of the recent health-care law which would have required all businesses to file tax forms each and every time they spent $600 on a single vendor. The extra financial burden this would place on small-business (at a time when we are putatively trying to encourage job growth) is self-evident.

That such an odious example of the federal government's insatiable desire to regulate everything in American life made it into the health-care legislation serves as yet another condemnation of both the legislation itself and the manner in which it was enacted.

Woefully unpopular with the American people, the Democratic super-majorities in control of Congress had to ram through the legislation (through greasing the skids in a manner that defines "corruption") before further scrutiny exposed the bill even more. As a result, final legislation that exceeded a thousand pages in length was shoved through in a matter of days before anyone, including those voting on it, had a chance to actually read and adequately understand what they were voting on.

In consequence, provisions such as this – which no one could rationally vote for after mature deliberation – became the sovereign law of the land.

This state of affairs makes a mockery of President Obama's/Congressional Democrats' claim that the debate over the health-care act is over. The final legislation that was passed and signed was never discussed or debated in any meaningful sense prior to passage, begging the question how anything can be concluded that has never actually begun?

Besides, elected officials are not the ultimate arbiter of what is settled and what is not – the American people are. If you put it in the most charitable terms possible, Americans have deep-abiding reservations about this legislation, especially its most significant provisions. Distinct pluralities to clear majorities favor comprehensive repeal while even more simply 'oppose' the legislation. When you think about it, it is appalling that Democrats forced this 'reform' upon the American public in the dead of night and are now responding to their further objection with a blithe shrug and declaration that the debate is over.

Ultimately the moral of this specific story is that Democrats would have saved themselves time, anguish and embarrassment if they had allowed enough time to scrutinize the entirety of the bill prior to its passage. If you actually read something before acting on it you tend to have an understanding of exactly what it is your acting upon and you are saved from having to repeal something you were the author of a few months prior.

On Affairs in Egypt

The United States has called Hosni Mubarak a friend for thirty years under the postulate that his presidency was the lone bulwark preventing Islamist control of one of the strategically pivotal countries in the region.

Perhaps this was correct. Perhaps it was either Mubarak as he has always been or the Muslim Brotherhood. Perhaps we were never able to utilize Mubarak as a stopgap while simultaneously taking steps to encourage the development of Egyptian civil society – the precondition to a sustainable system of representative government. There are, after all, real limits to the influence of the most powerful superpower the world has ever known.

Regardless, Egypt, the Middle East and the United States are in the moment they are in now because of the choice we made to sustain Mubarak since the assassination of his predecessor. He has always ruled absolutely over his country and by the same means that he repressed violent Islamist elements he repressed any and every viable democratic element.

That combined with the eruption of popular disgust leads to a dynamic where he stands on the precipice of being driven from power, leaving a gaping void in his wake. Because he has spent his time in power quashing democratic development there is no such component that can step in and fill that vacuum when he is gone, leaving the very real and terrifying possibility that the Muslim Brotherhood or whatever name radical Islam calls itself will be able to assume control without challenge. (Mubarak repressed both Islamists and democrats, but as the sword of Mohammed has a head start of a few centuries and so better organization than democracy in the broader Middle East it is exponentially better prepared to seize the opportunity when it presents itself.)

The American decision to prop up Mubarak might have prevented an Islamist takeover of Egypt for thirty years – perhaps this was our only choice, the least-worst choice – but it has left us in a particular vexing bind now. Mubarak's tenure has been a bulwark heretofore but has conversely decimated the one societal element that can permanently prevent the Islamist takeover long feared. Now we are left, seemingly helplessly, watching the one entity (Mubarak) that we needed to prevent another entity (Islamists) from taking control lose power after he has spent decades decimating the only other entity (democracy) that can prevent the second entity (Islamists) from taking power now that his sclerotic regime is crumbling.

All our eggs have been put in one basket and that basket is about to be crushed.

Rewarding Syrian Malfeasance

The Obama Administration appointed Robert Ford to serve as American ambassador to Syria this week, the first time the United States has had such a representative in Damascus since 2005. Answering criticism that this will reward the country for bad behavior, the Washington Times reports that the Administration believes the move will "help persuade the country to change its policies regarding Israel, Lebanon, Iraq and its support for extremist groups."

This rationale is utter nonsense and it exhibits the same ass-backwards understanding of the nature of rogue regimes that led the Clinton and Bush administrations to make their respective nuclear agreements with North Korea.

To wit, sending an ambassador to Syria to cause that regime to change its behavior cannot fail to fail because we have already conceded to them prior to any change in behavior.

If anything the Administration's action will only encourage Damascus to persist in its perfidy. Having garnered a concession without having had to make one themselves, they will take away from this only the knowledge that only the hope of a change in their behavior is required to get carrots, no actual change necessary.

Washington can follow one line of conduct if it wants Syria to desist its antics in the Middle East: make it known to Assad that rewards will be given for positive changes in behavior when, and only when, those changes in behavior actually occur. Until that moment nothing will be forthcoming.
 

A Lease, Nothing More

So that the victors of election night do not commit the folly of misinterpreting their election to be something much more than it really is, it is best to keep in mind that an election is a lease, not a mortgage.

Performance vs. Value

Following either the '02 or '03 MLB season there was a significant debate over whether Alex Rodriguez, then of the Texas Rangers, was the appropriate choice for MVP. His (steroid-inflated) statistics were astounding: forty to fifty home runs, well over one-hundred RBIs, and a healthy .300+ batting average. Offensively he was without a doubt the American League's most proficient player and a Gold Glove shortstop to boot.

These august numbers were nevertheless insufficient to elevate the Texas Rangers out of the AL West cellar in any season of A-Rod's tenure there. Those opposed to designating Rodriguez as AL MVP simply pointed to the name of the award – Most Valuable Player – and argued that the Rangers could have finished in last place with or without his massive production. A value-based award by its very name ought to go to a player whose team succeeded and could not have done so without that player's contributions. Not to a player whose production was rendered superfluous by his team's failure in the standings.

If I remember correctly, A-Rod's gaudy statistics won the day and he was honored at least once in Texas with the MVP award.

The impending announcement of the 2010 Cy Young winner has introduced a very similar argument. C.C. Sabathia of the New York Yankees won the most games in the American League this past season but was surpassed in every other major statistical category by Felix Hernandez, whose win total was held at thirteen by an historically porous offense that failed to score more than one run in over ten of his starts.

There are those who, as before, make a value-based argument. Sabathia won the most games for a team that made it all the way to the ALCS, this contention goes, and therefore his performance was much more meaningful and valuable to his team than Felix's performance. As opposed to winning more games in the pressure of a pennant race, Felix was simply pitching out the schedule for the second-worst team in baseball.

The rebuttal to this, which I subscribe to, is that the award at issue is not "Most Valuable Pitcher," it is the Cy Young award for the best pitcher in the American League. The honor is entirely performance-based and Felix out-performed Sabathia in every category except wins, the statistic most out of a starting pitcher's direct control. Sabathia did not win more games because he out-pitched Felix, he won more games because the offensive support he received was exponentially better. To designate C.C. Sabathia as the AL's Cy Young would be to give the award not to the player who pitched the best but to the player who pitched for the team with the best offense.

The best pitcher in the American League was Felix Hernandez.

Felix Hernandez is the American League Cy Young.

Regulation's Additional Cost

Undoubtedly it is the case, yet scarcely remarked upon -- except by Adam Smith-- that the more plentiful state regulations are -- and the more invasive they are -- the more incentive there exists for affected parties to find any and all means available to shirk the burdens of those sanctions.

Herein is an additional cost upon the public. Not only are its resources being directly taxed by the arm of the state and its extended reach, but its actual treasury is being drained by the additional costs of enforcing taxation (direct or indirect) that the affected citizenry has increased interest to avoid.

The rule of thumb is simple: the more burdensome a cost-by-regulation is the more those touched by it will try to avoid it and the more the state will then have to expend enforcing it.

The Modern Obelisk

In ancient times the monuments rulers constructed to mark their authority, legacy, and (ultimately) their vanity were actual monuments, notable in some combination for their size, architectural ingenuity, and ornate design. Think of Djedefre's pyramid, Trajan's column, Justinian's Hagia Sophia.

The commensurate constructions of today's rulers are not of such tangible stone, though every bit as large and lasting. The modern obelisks are massive social programs that are just as overwhelming, just as burdensome to the populace upon whose backs they are constructed, and just as permanent. Think in this turn of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal, Lyndon Johnson's Great Society, and now Barack Obama's health-care "reform."

The only real difference between the ancient and modern is that the latter is still taxing the resources of the public--and will be for quite sometime.

Liberalism as Contempt

Necessarily undergirding the policy aspirations of modern liberalism is a disbelief in the competency of people as individuals and in the aggregate to determine, promote and defend their own interests. Attendant to this is the conviction that government must step in and fill the void, accomplishing for people what they cannot accomplish for themselves. Without such benevolent intervention the individual and society are left helplessly at the mercy of larger impersonal forces like corporations, capitalism, poverty, racism, sexism, ignorance and all other manner of evil. Government and government alone must not only stand between these overwhelming forces and the people but gently (yet firmly) guide the people towards their best interests and full potential by adopting policies that will manipulate behavior and actions in a desired direction.

Liberalism and its disciples need not say as much – the sum of their causes and policies declares it for them.

To wit, liberals have long favored "fair lending" standards whereby lending entities would be essentially compelled to provide loans to people of lower incomes that would not otherwise qualify.

They have long been the champion of tighter federal regulation over American business, especially in times of economic anxiety like the present, lest American capitalism run amok and devour the many to the sole advantage of the few.

They have sought to save the environment and, by extension, civilization itself through the comprehensive governmental restriction of carbon emissions and through measures like federal fuel standards and expansive subsidies of "green energies." Breathlessly liberals will tell anyone who will listen (a declining number) that we are on the most extreme precipice of climatic disaster, dire warnings that have often been attended by computer-generated images of American cities halfway underwater.

To the extent the Left favors tax cuts to stimulate the economy it is in the form of tax "credits" that are provided if, and only if, a specific entity performs a governmentally-favored action; i.e. credits to businesses for hiring new employees and to individuals for trading in their old cars in for newer ones or for buying a home. Scarcely if ever does it cross their mind to give tax reductions to individuals and to businesses to do with that money as they see fit.

In the recently enacted health-care "reform," the federal government even goes so far as to mandate that individuals purchase health insurance for themselves.

Of course there is the litany of smaller measures liberals in all levels of government have enacted that further reinforce the image of the state as parent: seat-belt laws, anti-smoking laws, "sin taxes" and the like.

None of these projects in isolation, let alone taken as a whole, conveys a faith in the people to promote their own best interests. Instead the liberalism and liberals that favor and increasingly enact them place the preponderance of their faith – in deed, if not in word – in the dual capacity of the state as protector of the people and as the primary vehicle in manipulating behavior in desired directions. The determination and acquisition of the public good is possible only through a centralized state comprised of enlightened officials, an infinite number of czars and a bloated civil-service corps of over-compensated bureaucrats. The right decisions are not made in America's living rooms or at its kitchen tables but inside Washington's government office buildings.

This condescension has been coupled with an almost sneering contempt often expressed when liberalism's faithful attempt to implement the measures their fundamental views require, especially since the Obama-Reid-Pelosi axis assumed power in January of last year. In the three major initiatives since that time – the economic recovery package, cap-and-trade, and health-care "reform" – the powers that be have sought to enact into law measures nearly- to indisputably-opposed by the American people.

Health-care would be Exhibit A (and B, C, and D). From the very beginning of the debate a distinct and vociferous majority of Americans opposed Congress' and the President's proposals and gave voice to that opposition in town hall meetings, opinion polls, letters to the editor, and Tea Party rallies throughout the country.

Yet instead of being given pause by the boisterous vox populii, Washington's leading liberals doubled-down and forced through legislation on strictly party-line votes made possible by a series of corrupt bargains, most notably the "Louisiana Purchase" and the "Cornhusker Kickback." Previous promises of "the most ethical Congress in history" and a new age of transparency and post-partisanship became faint echoes when the leaders of Congress and the White House decided they would suffer nothing – not even the vocal non-consent of the governed – to slow down an agenda they had yearned for decades to enact.

Such arrogant disregard for popular opinion was compounded by assurances from the White House that Americans would grow less opposed to the reform once it passed. The attitude underlying such a belief was plain: whiny Americans would be given their medicine and, once down, would eventually tire of their tantrum and start to feel better once they realized the government was simply doing what was best for them. The nanny state knows best, in other words. It's the same type of reassurance children have heard from their parents for generations.

That Americans have not desisted in their tantrum post facto as had been assured has only caused the Left to persist in its contempt, with luminaries like Eugene Robinson complaining that Americans are "acting like a bunch of spoiled brats."

As obnoxious as this sneering haughtiness is, it can only be deemed to go hand in hand with the underlying worldview of modern liberalism. Examined logically, why would a political class as we have now bat an eyelash at popular objection to their policies when those policies reflect the conviction that the people are bereft of the ability to thrive without the advanced involvement of government – without, that is, those policies? If the people ultimately knew what was good for them and could attain it the liberal initiatives they object to would not be needed. A view that reduces people to de facto wards of the state has no more problem taking actions that confound the wishes of the people than a parent does making a complaining seven year old eat his broccoli. The dynamic between the two is identical.

Such is the state of modern liberalism that it is inherently an exercise in condescension and contempt. Those who determine the course of government believe exclusively in the government's (i.e. in their own) ability to determine and attain the public good. It is in this sense that we can fully and finally understand Barack Obama's declaration that, "We are the ones we've been waiting for."

The Buckley Calculus

The pertinent question before every political movement is how to best utilize the political process to effect the litany of policies it favors. William F. Buckley had a simple yet effective calculus towards this: the best way to enact conservative policies generally is to nominate and support the most conservative candidate electable in each specific race.

In the recent Republican primary for the U.S. Senate in Delaware the Republican/Tea Party movement failed to do this. The trend from this cycle to oust incumbents who have been amenable to the establishment ethos of Washington on behalf of novices who are inimical to it has been salutary.

Yet denying the nomination to Congressman Castle (undeniably someone amenable to the establishment) and awarding it to Mrs. O'Donnell (someone vociferously inimical to it) was a tactical mistake that threatens to make the Conservative/Tea Party agenda less attainable.

By any objective standard Mike Castle is no conservative; at best he will agree with conservatives half the time -- at best. This is Delaware however, one of the bluest states in the bluest of regions. Mike Castle is the best you can hope to get; he is the most conservative person that the voters of Delaware can be expected to elect to the U.S. Senate -- he is, in other words, the most conservative candidate electable.

The primary objective of conservatives at this time is to repeal the odious health-care bill that Americans cannot stand and that was passed through a series of corrupt bargains. Everything about that "reform" legislation stinks.

Whatever his disparities with conservatives are (and they are certainly many), Mike Castle was and is on record favoring the repeal of that law. For that repeal to be possible it will require at least 60 votes in the U.S. Senate, among other things. If elected as a Republican from Delaware (a Republican from Delaware!) he would have constituted one more vote towards that magic number.

In awarding the nomination to Mrs. O'Donnell though -- someone whose comparative conservatism to Congressman Castle is surpassed only by her comparative un-electability -- Conservative/Tea Party activists in Delaware have put themselves one vote farther away from achieving their foremost objective.

The savvy, if not completely obvious thing to do for the Conservative/Tea Party movement would have been to have nominated the candidate who disagrees with it half the time. In failing to do so they are now highly likely to be stuck with a senator who disagrees with them 99% percent of the time.

An over-developed demand for purity can be counterproductive to the cause -- sometimes the disciples of a cause cannot get out of their own way. Replacing incumbents like Sens. Bennett and Murkowski were not examples of this. Denying the nomination to Congressman Castle was.

Somewhere William F. Buckley is shaking his head.

Weakness’ Invitation

If there is one thing President Obama made clear about his foreign policy when he took office is that it would be the antithesis of his predecessor’s. Convinced that the Bush Administration had gratuitously alienated America’s friends and antagonized our enemies for eight years, the president has pursued a clear policy of multilateral engagement with countries previously hostile to the United States.

The clearest iteration of this is the administration’s relations with the mullahs of Iran. Through a firm commitment to sustained dialogue on an even plane, the Obama administration has hoped to achieve a level of understanding between the two parties that will permit both to realize common interests and that will ultimately diffuse the threat of a nuclear Iran.

To that end, the administration has left no doubt as to their commitment to beginning and preserving dialogue with the mullahs. When thousands of Iranians took to the streets last spring protesting a fixed presidential election, President Obama went out of his way not to say anything that might be construed as sympathetic or supportive of the dissidents. Instead he called for moderation from both sides in diffusing a crisis that threatened to derail bilateral negotiations.

A few weeks later the president presided over a meeting of the UN Security Council and refused to divulge intelligence of a nuclear facility that Iran had been concealing for years. This revelation, as clear a sign as any of the regime’s malfeasance and duplicity, could have created momentum within the Council for stricter international sanctions. Indeed, it was what a handful of America’s allies on the council were calling for. Yet landing such a bombshell would have run the risk of derailing a round of discussions that the American administration had committed to. This was unacceptable to the president, who used the Council meeting instead to express his hopes for a nuclear free world generally while conspicuously ignoring the world’s most imminent nuclear problem specifically.

Unfortunately these painstaking efforts over the past year have all been for naught. Far from stepping back from their nuclear development, Iran has become even more emboldened going forward. Not only have they demurred at the basket of carrots offered to them to ship their nuclear material abroad, but late last year the regime brazenly announced that they were going to build a handful of new nuclear facilities, a massive embarrassment for the United States.

The conclusion brought home from this is that the failure of President Obama’s engagement initiative is as complete as it was predictable from the beginning. In believing that dialogue will lead to the United States and the mullah’s finding common ground, President Obama has assumed that there are interests common to both sides that can enable such a consensus.

This is a fallacy.

The President’s fundamental goal is a nuclear free world and by extension a more peaceful world. Iran’s unyielding interest is nothing of the sort. It is regional domination, which in its specific expression has invariably included the destruction of Israel. The means towards this end is a nuclear arsenal that will allow the Islamic Republic to throw its weight around in the region to an extent that other countries in that sphere cannot match or effectively check.

This obvious cross-purpose has led to a dynamic where the United States engages in dialogue for one purpose and Iran agrees to participate for another, as a play for time. The longer the mullahs can keep the United States (and by extension the international community) occupied in dialogue the more time they have to develop their nuclear program unencumbered. They are using the United States and our misplaced credulity to their own advantage, and given that the Obama administration has done nothing so far to hold Iran accountable for its steady malfeasance the mullahs can also rest assured that their ill-behavior will continue to go on without any negative consequences whatsoever. The message conveyed to them has not been one of American forbearance and equanimity, but of American timidity and spinelessness.

The danger in this weakness should be self-evident. Though the president has the laudable goal of a peaceful, nuclear-free world, the misguided manner in which he has pursued that goal has ironically made it less attainable. By unwittingly allowing the Iranian regime the time they need to culminate their nuclear designs, the future peace of the Middle East has become increasingly jeopardized, for a variety of reasons.

Unnerved by nuclear arms in the hands of Iran’s Shiite theocracy, the Sunni nations in the region will undoubtedly move to protect themselves and reinstate balance in the region by going nuclear. Should this happen American policy will not only have failed to fulfill its goal of reducing nuclear weapons but will have actually resulted in an exponential increase of nuclear arms in one of the world’s most volatile regions.

Additionally, the abject failure of the United States to implement an effective policy to prevent Iran from going nuclear will quite possibly lead to war. Israel, feeling existentially threatened by a regime that has contemplated its extermination and that now has the means to do so, will certainly execute a military strike on the country’s nuclear facilities. That such an act will result in an escalated war between the two countries is a distinct possibility, if not a complete inevitability.

Worst of all, at least from the perspective of the United States, a regime that has remorselessly sponsored terrorism against us and the civilized world will be in a position to provide its clients with the means to perpetrate a level of murder, carnage and terror that we have heretofore only contemplated in our worst nightmares.

These consequences are unacceptable, nay unconscionable. Yet they are precisely the guests America’s deliberate weakness has invited. The president’s policy of engagement has failed as it was condemned to do from the beginning. Going forward his and everyone else’s hopes for world peace and stability demand that his administration dramatically alter course, and that it do so immediately.

Futile engagement without any mechanisms to insure meaningful participation from the Iranian regime must end. The United States should instead begin engaging its allies, who have become increasingly bewildered at the administrations’ fecklessness. These are entities who do share common interests with us (preventing a nuclear Iran) and with whom we can plausibly hope to craft some kind of effective initiatives with. (For all the talk about how diplomacy is needed to find a solution to the crisis with Iran it is diplomacy that has been sorely lacking in and among the civilized world.)

Most importantly though, the mullahs must be disabused of the notion that they can continue to act wantonly without fear of consequence. If we want to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons we must first convince them that we will not only do something to prevent it, but that we will do anything and everything necessary to prevent it. As ugly a reality as this certainly is, the costs of doing what must be done pale in comparison to the costs of persisting in our current approach, which is to effectively acquiesce in Iran going nuclear.

Unless something is done quickly we will come to understand just how true this really is.

The Constitution & Representative Government Confounded

In recent years it has been the argument of the Left that the Constitution is in places indefinite in its meaning and that the courts must therefore assign a meaning where a self-evident one is absent. Along these lines, legal professor Sonja West writes that "eventually the law runs out and it is the justices [of the Supreme Court] who are tasked with filling in the missing parts."

This statement is astounding first and foremost because it confutes the text, framework, and over-arching logic of the Constitution. Where the law "runs out," so to speak, there is an absence of law. To fill that void necessarily constitutes the creation of law, a power expressly provided to the legislative branch by the Constitution in a host of explicit realms and to the states in all others. Article II and the 10^th Amendment are quite clear on this.

The notion that the judiciary is to fill "in the missing parts" (create new law) is anathema to that framework, indeed it is a direct contradiction of it. As declared in the landmark case of Marbury v. Madison, the Constitution clearly iterates that it "is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is" (emphasis added), not to create law. It is the express province of the legislative, states and people to make law and the province of the federal judiciary to say what that law is, not create new law in itself.

Beyond this Professor West's conception of the judiciary's role flies straight into the face of the very idea of representative government. The declaration that it is up to the courts to create new law where there is none simply isn't reconcilable with the idea of a form of government in which laws are made by representatives who are selected by the popular consent of the citizenry. The people create the laws they are governed by through their designated representatives. The United States of America is no longer a government of, by, and for the people if it is not the people themselves, but what Lincoln dubbed "that eminent tribunal" that is "tasked with filling in the missing parts." Such a foreign conception of government flouts the will of the people and transforms them from their own rulers into the subjects of a robed oligarchy.

Waking v. the Witching

Attendant to the all-encompassing shroud of night is the license to serenity and repose. A bedimmed periphery conduces one to focus their gaze inward and reflect upon themselves or upon whatever avocation best attains that salutary relaxation naturally sought after the labors of the day have ended.

More significant than this though is that the coming of vespers intrinsically empowers the individual, for under the shade of night one assumes an authority that the hours of the sun reserves exclusively for itself and the heavens. With the sanction of darkness it is left entirely to the wish and whim of each what radiance, if any, their surroundings appear in. From this perspective the individual is but a vulgar slave during the waking hours and an absolute sovereign during the witching.

Frightfully though if one accepts that humankind is permeated by corruption in its most basic nature, the advanced license of the dark of night can only be understood to necessarily be a sanction to perpetrate that corruption. Why else would the hours of the sun's absence be labeled, among other things, as "the witching hours"? When the sun is shining all is laid bare by the heavens; under the cloak of darkness the depravity of mankind has immunity to do evil and to enshroud that evil as much as it desires.

In the obscurity of the shadows the witches doth rein.

Under this principle it becomes self-evident why the Judeo-Christian tradition has so often equated God with light in its teachings. Under the guise of darkness human evil is empowered and so the evils of the temporal easily become equated with darkness. By the light that is God that darkness is extinguished and the way to salvation is illuminated.

Evil is darkness, God is the light and the light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it.

The Premise of Christ & Eternal Sin

In Mark 3:28-29, Jesus declares that "all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemies against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin."

Martin Luther elaborates upon this, asserting that, "Whoever despairs in his sin or relies on good works sins against the Holy Spirit and against grace."

Theologically this coheres perfectly with what is written in John 3:16-19, the cornerstone article of scripture to the Christian Faith:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment…

The import of this is clear: Christ was sent from God for the sole purpose of saving mankind. Whoever believes in Christ is saved – they will not perish but have eternal life. That Christ was sent to save necessarily implies that Christ was needed to save mankind and that therefore only through believing in Christ as one's savior is grace and salvation possible. According to the Christian faith, to deny this is to deny the entire point of Christ and is therefore to deny Christ himself.

One does this when they believe that they can do for themselves – save themselves through their own works – what Christ was sent to do and what, a fortiori, Christ was needed to do. Through such an individual commission one elevates their self above Christ, declaring through their beliefs if not through their words that they can save themselves by their own deeds, no Christ needed. After all, one who holds in their conscience that they can save themselves by themselves necessarily denies that they need a savior and, ergo, simultaneously declares that Christ is not their savior. The only purpose for which Christ was sent is thus refuted and so Christ himself is thus refuted. Once this is done scripture is absolutely clear: he that "has not believed in the name of the only Son of God" is condemned.

What else could be the "eternal sin"? Christianity holds nothing else if it does not hold that to accept Christ – and to not deny Christ – each individual must accept that the only thing they can do is to accede to the reality that there is nothing they can do. It must be done – and is done – through the sacrificial grace of Christ.

Review: A Short History of Byzantium

A Short History of Byzantium by John Julius Norwich

The deep and comprehensive knowledge Norwich has of Byzantium -- borne out in the three volume history he has written on the topic -- is only confirmed with this abridgement. If one is looking for a comprehensive yet brief history of the world's longest standing Christian empire this book is ideal.

With that said, I experienced a considerable level of frustration while reading this. In order to condense three volumes into one Norwich had to sacrifice much of his own personal analysis of the history being covered for the history itself. The upshot is an often dry and unyielding catalogue of names, dates and geographic locations buttressed by a sentence or -- at most -- a paragraph of Norwich's provocative commentary. For this reason I can hardly wait to delve into the complete three volume version. Norwich's deep understanding of Byzantium adds a considerable level of gravity to his opinions and to his ultimate assessment of the Byzantines.

Review: Lost to the West

Lost to the West by Lars Brownworth

Brownworth at least proves the thesis of this brief history: the Byzantine Empire did, in fact, hold the line for the West for nearly a millennium. Not only did it preserve the classics of Greece and Rome lost to the West in the centuries that elapsed between the fall of Rome and the Renaissance, but it also – just as, if not more, importantly – managed to prevent the soldiers of Mohammed from swarming west and devouring a fractured, sub-developed Europe. "The great walls of Constantine's city…delayed the Muslim advance into Europe for eight hundred years," Brownworth points out, "allowing the West the time it needed to develop" (p. 302).

This is all that can be fairly said for it though. The annals of Byzantium offer very little distinct from the late Western Roman Empire. Both were plagued by ceaseless cycles of political, economic and social instability. With an admittedly fair share of exceptions, an individual would usurp the crown of the basileus, murder/blind/tonsure him and any other potential rivals, and then, sooner or later, suffer the indignity of a similar fate himself.

Beyond that which it preserved from the Ancient Greeks and Romans it is a struggle to come up with anything distinctive of the Byzantines' that would serve to guide and inspire posterity. When the minds of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment looked back it was to the Classical Age, not to the Byzantines, that they found something worthy.

The Byzantines' contribution was to ensure that the fruits of the Classical Age were still there. Byzantium essentially served as a bridge between that epoch and the modern one to which we today are a part. Without them not only would our earliest heritage have been (in keeping with the spirit of this history's title) completely lost to us but the West itself would have fallen beneath the conquering sword of Islam.

No Byzantium, no Western Civilization.

The Spending Freeze

One thing lost in all the reaction to news that President Obama will propose a spending freeze tomorrow night is the real question whether he will do anything meaningful to see it enacted. His modus operandi to date has been to allow congressional leaders complete autonomy in formulating and passing their favored legislation. Pelosi, Reid and others in the Democratic leadership have been the ones doing the work on the "stimulus," cap and trade, and now health care while the president has sat on the sideline doing little more than giving speeches and campaigning around the country on their behalf.

Why then is anyone to actually believe that President Obama will stand up to Congressional Democratic leaders and pressure them to enact and follow something that is inimical to their perpetual rush to expand the size, scope and reach of the federal government?

Given his record, there is absolutely no reason to believe this. Quite to the contrary, the only realistic expectation is that the spending freeze will be a nice proposal met with ringing applause that will be immediately forgotten as soon as he gets into his limousine and rides his motorcade back to the White House.

The president simply has no will or desire to compel liberals in Congress to do something they do not want to do. He never has.

Liberal vs. Conservative Populism

President Obama's response to the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United last week helpfully illuminates the distinction between the brands of populism practiced by the Left and Right. (Actually you could even say it illuminates the fundamental difference between Liberal and Conservative in how they view the relationship between citizen and government.)

The President:

With its ruling today, the Supreme Court has given a green light to a new stampede of special interest money in our politics.  It is a major victory for big oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans.  This ruling gives the special interests and their lobbyists even more power in Washington--while undermining the influence of average Americans who make small contributions to support their preferred candidates.  That's why I am instructing my Administration to get to work immediately with Congress on this issue.  We are going to talk with bipartisan Congressional leaders to develop a forceful response to this decision.  The public interest requires nothing less.

Liberal populism (like its conservative counterpart) decries the vulnerability of the people and finds the necessary remedy (unlike its conservative counterpart) in government action to protect the people from predators such as big business, insurance companies, poverty, etc. It is expressed in a way that envisions individuals and society as intrinsically and at all times vulnerable and thus forever in need of protection from a paternal government. Without government intervention and regulation society is left to the mercy of nefarious and usually faceless forces, with individual's being constantly exploited and their "positive liberty" denied.

This explains President Obama's negative reaction to the Court's decision. Without the federal government limiting the ability of corporations and other powerful interests to buy ad time in the media around election time, the votes of the people will be compromised by big money. This is the same rationale that underwrites so many hallmarks of contemporary government such as the minimum wage, affirmative action, seat-belt laws, and the proposed individual mandate in health care. Government is indispensably necessary to protect the individual in everything.

Conservative populism is the opposite. While its expression also bemoans the vulnerability of the people it sees the source of that vulnerability to be an extravagant and overweening government. This is the ascendant form of populism in America today, built upon resistance to a federal government that is spending billions upon billions of borrowed dollars and that is trying to force through a radical health-care bill that will dramatically alter the relationship between citizen and government. Adding to this popular ire is the fact that Congress is formulating this "reform" on a strictly partisan basis behind closed doors and that congressional leaders are using special favors and buyoffs directed to swing congressmen and senators to pass it on strictly party-line votes.

As is the case here, conservative populism is a reaction against a distant, over-bearing government out of touch with the people. It is the large and ever-growing Tea Party movement, a mass antagonist to the exact same paternal government – the nanny state – that liberals believe is necessary to protect the people. The major thing conservative populism believes that individuals and society must be protected from is government itself, especially a government that seeks to inject itself into every facet of individual and civic life.

This is what Ronald Reagan succinctly expressed when he declared in the previous era of ascendant conservative populism that "government isn't the solution to the problem, it is the problem."

This is the clear distinction between liberal and conservative populism. The former believes the people need protection from their government in everything. The latter simply believes the people need protection from their own government.

Listen to Yourselves

Democrats in Washington have sought to demonstrate their bona fides with regular Americans over the past year (as they have simultaneously showed contempt for them in their health-care drive) through railing against the greed and avarice of the nation's banks. Trying to capitalize on Americans' increasing economic frustration, such luminaries of our country's ruling party as President Barack Obama and Rep. Barney Frank have suggested new taxes on the banks in light of news that more bonuses will be enriching the pockets of many a banking executive.

In the historical pantheon of political demagoguery this iteration is fairly feeble. What it does demonstrate though is the cognitive dissonance that has plagued Washington Democrats in almost all of their ventures since they assumed complete power one year ago. It should not take the critical thinking skills of much more than a high school freshman to figure out that what is being inveighed against implicitly condemns what is being proposed.

Think about it: if America's banks and bank executives are really as greedy and immune to the broader public interest as those at the highest levels of elected government say they are, then why in the world would you tax them? A greedy entity concerned solely with its own profit will not absorb the increased costs incurred by these taxes. They will not pay an extra dime.

Instead the increased costs will be passed down to the bottom of the chain, in the form of increased fees on regular Americans. This is true of any increased costs, whether through direct taxation or regulation, that Washington has and will try to levy on the higher institutions of the American economy. It is the American consumer most affected, not the fat cat sitting in a leather chair with a Christmas bonus in his pocket.

Should the president and Rep. Frank have their way, the long arm of the government will simply reach deeper into the pockets of all Americans, albeit in an indirect way.

Affordability, Not Access

Of all the flaws present in the president's and Congressional Democrats' approach to health-care reform, one of the more fundamental ones is the avenue through which they have approached it, which has been as a matter of access. Constantly citing the millions of Americans currently without health insurance, they propose decreasing that number through a "public option" in which the federal government will provide health-insurance and/or through an individual mandate that will compel Americans to buy a specific kind of policy or pay a fine.

The problem with addressing access in this direct manner is that it will lead to a myriad of problems like government rationing, higher insurance premiums, exacerbation of an already exploding national debt and, most worrisome, diminished individual freedom.

President Obama and Congressional Democrats ought to alter course. Instead of trying to remedy the problem of access to health-care through the federal government they should attack health care's growing un-affordability. The advantage of doing this is that it will reduce the costs of health-insurance for those who already have it while also indirectly addressing the problem of accessibility. The reason for this is that cheaper health-insurance is health-insurance that is open to a greater number of Americans.

Two obvious solutions stand out.

One is to strike down the legal restriction that prevents individuals from buying health insurance policies across state lines. Doing so will give relief to people who live in states with high insurance premiums by empowering them to shop across the nation for more affordable alternatives. This will also create an increased atmosphere of competition that will in turn exert downward pressure on medical insurance costs everywhere.

The second solution is to enact long overdue tort reform. Putting an end to outrageous rewards in medical malpractice cases will immediately begin to decrease the price of insurance and medical care by simultaneously decreasing the liability insurance that physicians are being forced to pay under the present system. Right now doctors are either priced out of their practice or are compelled to pass their liability costs on to everyone else through higher fees.

The advantage of these two reforms is that neither will require exponential increases in federal spending or the creation of dozens of new governmental boards, commissions, and bureaucracies. What they will do is lower the costs of health-insurance and thus make it available to the millions of Americans who cannot currently afford it.

Accordingly, if giving every American access to health insurance is the national and moral imperative Washington Democrats declare that it is than they must waste no time in adopting these reforms. The reality presented by their current proposals – which all amount to a stunning increase in the size and reach of the federal government – promise only to make health-care more accessible in theory, not in actuality.

Only by attacking the rising costs of medical care will the president and Congress accomplish what they have set out to do and make quality, affordable health-care accessible to all Americans.

A Failed Speech, Support Him Nonetheless

As a wartime speech from a commander-in-chief, President Obama's iteration last week left much to be desired. Devoid of any bold assertion of national purpose or emphasized resolve to achieve victory (what one would tend to expect from an address in that genre), President Obama's remarks were instead a contradicting blend of added commitment to our mission in Afghanistan mixed with a determination to get out of the country sooner rather than later.

Because of this confusion the president's speech likely did very little good for the Afghani government, the Afghani people and the members of our coalition whose support we need for success in Afghanistan. It quite possibly did a great deal of bad.

Concerned that President Obama's failure to make a timely decision reflected a wavering American, the fears of these entities were most likely un-assuaged by the President's discussion and reiteration of exit ramps and timetables. Agonizingly excessive specificity about how and when you plan to leave is a poor way to convince someone you are there to stay.

It is upon this basis that President Obama's speech must be considered a failure. As important to the mission's success as 30,000 more troops is, of almost equal value is convincing friend and foe alike that we are there until the job is done. If the Afghani national and regional governments are not convinced we are there to stay they will look in other directions for their political security, possibly getting into bed with entities unfriendly to us. If the Afghani populace is not convinced we are there to stay they are extremely unlikely to provide us with the personal intelligence that is vital to rooting out and destroying al-Qaeda and Taliban elements, justifiably fearing that if they help us and we leave they and their families will suffer retribution at the hands of the people they squealed on.

Neither can we expect any kind of real commitment from our NATO allies when we fail to categorically make one ourselves.

What's more, if al Qaeda and Taliban fighters are left to make no other conclusion than American resolve is strong and we will fight until the mission is accomplished they will be deprived of all hope, their only avenue towards victory cut off. If convinced of the opposite though they will be ever more emboldened to redouble their efforts and make as much hell for us as they possibly can, knowing that each blow might be the one that convinces America to go home. In the process they will be able to capitalize on the fears and uncertainties outlined above, which will make America's predicament all but impossible.

This straightforward reality is something that the president is either unable to understand or unwilling to acknowledge. Instead of dwelling on the time and manner of our leaving he would have done much better to have granted General McChrystal's request and simply declared that he was doing so to insure that the mission he, President Obama, laid out not so long ago had the resources necessary to succeed. He should have left it at that.

Even if firmly committed to the planned exit ramps and timetables, no discernible purpose is achieved by advertising and emphasizing them. Quite the opposite, for in all truth there is a much greater likelihood that we will be able to meet the president's ramps and timetables if our enemies don't know that all they have to do is wait us out until then.

President Obama's speech before the cadets of West Point failed by the simple fact that it made the goal it announced harder to achieve. On that front the damage has been done. All that those who are dedicated to American victory in Afghanistan can do going forward is to support the decision itself, support the president and our commanders as they execute their mission, and then hold the president to account if and when he wavers before success has been achieved. Above all, a wavering commander-in-chief must be continually made aware that in steadfastness he has unflinching support.

Horse Before the Cart, Mr. President

As part of its enduring attempt to explain the absurd amount of time being taken by the president to decide on Gen. McChrystal's request, the administration has expressed uncertainty over whether the Karzai government "can reform itself enough to make success feasible."

Framing consideration in this manner stands the reality of the issue on its head. Military success in Afghanistan does not depend upon the viability of the country's government, the viability of the country's government depends upon military success.

For evidence of this one can point directly to the surge in Iraq. If the Bush administration had approached the issue in the same way the Obama administration has, America would have never sent 20,000 more American soldiers there and we would have lost a war. No serious person can deny that (though many will never admit it). The Maliki government was a cesspool of sectarian incompetence that had little will or ability to challenge Shiite militias or to encourage Sunni participation in the country's political process.

But instead of using this as a reason not to increase America's national investment in Iraq, the president understood that for any semblance of political progress to be achieved Iraq had to be militarily pacified first. Only with physical security could the civil society necessary for real democratic government develop.

President Bush was right. The surge convinced Sunnis that America was there to stay and thus encouraged them to assist us in defeating al Qaeda, creating the Anbar Awakening. Additionally, with al Qaeda eliminated there was no more justification for the Shiite militias and thus more pressure was exerted on the Maliki government to crack down on them, which they belatedly did. Ever since we have seen slow but steady political progress, the most recent example being passage of an elections bill by the Iraqi parliament.

The lesson from Iraq is clear: military success is the precondition for political success.

As much as they may be loathe to, the Obama administration needs to do as its predecessor did and grant the requested troop levels necessary for military and political success in Afghanistan, and they need to do so now while success is still possible.

Decide, Mr. President

That President Obama's failure to answer General McChrystal's urgent request for 50,000 more troops has become inexcusable begins to go without saying. Leaving America's mission in limbo (especially the especially the men and women tasked with executing it) for such an absurd expanse of time approximates acute dereliction, a fault aggravated by the fact that he now finds himself incapable of deciding whether he is going to fulfill or nix a strategy he announced less than six months ago.

What the president seems loathe to fathom is that such a prolonged string of deliberation is not occurring within a vacuum. With each passing day of fatal indecision the members of our coalition grow more confused and the elements we are fighting become more emboldened to redouble their efforts against a foe that they can only determine is on the ropes. In this kind of purgatory life is being made much more dangerous and deadly for our people in uniform.

The president must understand that deliberation, especially in circumstances such as these, can only go on for so long. There is no more excuse for indecision. Serving as commander-in-chief is inherently an act in making momentous decisions which cannot be shirked without devastating consequences. Not even Barack Obama can change that.

Voting "Present" is the stuff of senators, not presidents.

The president must act and he must do so now.

McDonnell’s Triumph

There is one central item that Bob McDonnell accomplished which allowed him to win such a lopsided victory last night: He avoided the trap that many Republicans had fallen into in previous cycles by having a narrative of specificity and not abstraction. If you watched the Republican presidential primary debates in the previous cycle you could not help but notice each of the candidates trying to one-up each other in references to Ronald Reagan and his brand of conservatism. (If you had tried to play a drinking game with "Reagan" as the trigger-word, you would have succumbed to alcohol poisoning within five minutes.) Substantively, the discussion never went beyond this, leaving Republicans unable to speak to voters who were not (and never really are) interested in questions of abstract political thought but who have specific concerns about specific issues.

Bob McDonnell went beyond this. Avoiding fruitless reiteration of how he was a Ronald Reagan Republican or dwelling on his general conservative principles, the Governor-elect used those principles to adopt specific policy proposals that directly addressed Virginians' specific concerns on quality of life issues such as taxes and transportation. In so doing he won by twenty points in a state that had given President Obama a five point margin of victory only one year ago.

If Republicans want to garner the support of the independent voters who ultimately decide elections as McDonnell has done in Virginia than they must do the exact same thing. Stop talking about your fundamental conservative principles and use them; use them to craft specific policy proposals that directly address voters' very specific concerns and talk exclusively about them. Do that and you can win, especially when the party in power is only doubling voter anxiety with their hell-bent effort to enact a radical agenda.

Review: THE FOUNDING FATHERS, RECONSIDERED

The Founding Fathers, Reconsidered R.B. Bernstein

The title implies some new or unique interpretation of the founding fathers and their legacy. This it really was not. The author adopted a typical approach and pitted two extreme schools of interpreting the founders -- godlike reverence against complete disgust/dismissal -- and proposed a middle way between them at the beginning. As the book progressed, Mr. Bernstein essentially summarized the way Americans have understood and received the founders throughout our history. This was fine as far as it went, but the book mostly failed to add anything new or unique to the historical conversation regarding that class of distinguished personages.

His discussion towards the end of the book on the debate over original intent as a mode of jurisprudence was especially unsatisfying. He accurately conveyed the criticism of that school but neglected to examine or explain the response to that criticism, especially the fact that many of those who support "original intent" do not actually support it -- they support a school of "original meaning." To those who describe themselves as such -- the most prominent of which is Justice Antonin Scalia -- this distinction constitutes a significant difference.

The one interesting segment was toward the beginning, where Mr. Bernstein went into an interesting and illuminating discussion of the history of early American constitutionalism. For those interested in the roots of our Constitution, which has stood the test of time, this portion is a worthy read.

For those unfamiliar with the historical reaction to the founding fathers this book would be a solid, brief summary of that subject. For those already familiar with the topic and looking for some unique or new way of understanding the founders this book could be bypassed.

The Iranian Presidential Election

You have to wonder what the mullahocracy of Iran was thinking in fixing the presidential elections of last week in such an egregiously blatant manner. Without question the incumbent shares their values perfectly, but what interest of theirs does that really promote? They are the ones who run the country, not the president. So then why sacrifice so much for so little in return? Standing idle while the "reformist" candidate got elected would have only advanced the mullahs' development of a nuclear arsenal. It would have encouraged President Obama – a person overly credulous with dictators and despots – to engage in some vain diplomatic effort (the same kind that has been a failure for years now) meant to prevent them from developing nuclear weapons.

Instead, they forced in the incumbent and inflamed simmering popular discontent while simulatenously providing the international community with a greater awareness of their true nature as a regime. Going forward that community will be less willing to engage the regime and its puppet president (or one would hope) which at the very least does not help advance their program of nuclear development.

Essentially, what the mullahs have done is to decline the opportunity to lead the world along a futile path of diplomacy (which advances the mullahs' interests) a little while longer and have instead stirred up a hornet's nest for no appreciable gain. We can only hope that at some point the United States et al can now find some way to stop such a clueless enemy which has – in all truth – been playing us and our friends for fools.

Review: POST-CAPTAIN (AUBREY-MATURIN #2)

Post-Captain by Patrick O'Brian

A little bit of a step-down from Master and Commander. Far too little ink spent on tales of adventure on the sea by Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin and too much spent on unending love triangles between them and hapless women on land. The latter half of the novel did improve in this regard though and its conclusion (after the soap opera was resolved) left me eager to read the next installment of the series.

Ponce de Leon Obama

Given that peace between the Israelis and Palestinians has been the equivalent of the fountain of youth for American presidents for the past two decades (it is that which is desperately sought but never found) it comes as no surprise that the current president has committed himself to the same venture. But what he will soon realize is that the same impediment that thwarted the efforts of his predecessors will do the same to him. It is something which is out of his control, something that even the most finely crafted, sonorously delivered, and heartfelt speech cannot remedy. It is the simple fact that the powers that be in the Palestinian territories still do not stipulate to the one inescapable precondition for peace: acceptance of Israel's right to exist. President Obama and anyone else can try as they may, but without such a stipulation from the Palestinians no two-state solution and no meaningful peace can be realized.

Nothing can overcome this obstacle, including efforts to pressure the Israelis into more concessions. They have made their fair share of such since the failed Oslo Accords and have received little in return. At this point the onus is upon the Palestinian political leadership and people. Peace between Israeli and Palestinian will occur only when the latter is sincerely willing to accept a state situated side-by-side with the former, abandoning forever the effort to push Israel into the sea. It seems self-evident that two sides cannot co-exist peacefully when one side does not recognize the right of the other to exist in the first-place.

Review: Strong Poison

Strong Poison by Dorothy L. Sayers

In this installment it is not necessarily the mystery that grips or holds the reader, but once again the singularly enjoyable experience of observing Lord Wimsey, especially within the new wrinkle of his determination to rescue the damsel from the gallows and win her hand in marriage. Another great and enjoyable read.

When Junior Came Home

As one only a couple of months away from graduating from college and entering the tumultuous world of adulthood I have begun to develop a growing awareness of the reality of aging. Sooner than I would ever prefer I will leave the inviting cocoon I have previously spent my life within, the shelter where I have enjoyed the ease of having my needs provided for by loving parents, the lack of too much responsibility, and the infinite expanse of my dreams and the possible. My childhood is nearly gone, sinking away like the last grains of sand in an hourglass.
 

This awareness isn't comforting. Dreams unchallenged are now to be responsibilities incapable of being avoided. It's time to be a man, on my own and for the first time responsible for the provision of my own well-being. That means finding and maintaining a job, paying the rent and bills, buying food, buying a car and all of the other tedious necessities of adulthood.
 

I don't presume to speak for others of my generation but if I had to guess I would believe they are feeling something of the same sense of unease. If we could turn back time – go back home and have everything provided for, live without care, dream unchallenged – we would. But alas we can't; we must press forward – both determined and hopeful – and make our way in an uncertain world replete with turmoil and uncertainty.
 

Nevertheless it has been said that life is full of little consolations, and mine is the return of Ken Griffey, Jr. I am no different from any Northwest male around my age. We grew up spending our summer nights at home or in the Kingdome, often with our fathers, waiting for each at bat, each new opportunity to witness that sweet upper-cut swing send another unfortunate baseball deep into the red seats of right field. We would cheer when the Kid would then drop his bat, walk a few steps down the first base line gazing at his unique work of art, and then easily jog around the bases to home plate, always too cool to so much as crack a smile or to give any indication that hitting moon-shots over outfield fences was anything other than what he was born to do. And then, whether there was light out enough to or not, we would run out into our back yards and do it all ourselves – turn our hat backwards, straighten ourselves into that stiff batting stance that only Junior has, and pretend we were doing the same thing.
 

Those days were childhood, they were happiness. On that awful day that he left, when most of our hearts were broken for the first time, we began the process of growing up. The Kid was gone and our boyhoods would slowly go with him. Since that one catalyzing moment we've learned many lessons and have done a lot of maturing. We've graduated from high school, taken up summer and part time jobs, entered the permanent work force or gone to college. Some of those dreams we still have, but a great many more have flown away forever. We approach full adulthood at the same time we confront reality in all of its starkness.
 

But at least Griffey is back. Sure it won't be as it was before. Since his absence he's done as much growing as we have. He's battled injury and seen his skills slowly taken away from him by that over-bearing tax man, Time. He's no longer a gazelle in centerfield but a fragile leftfielder or designated-hitter who will inevitably get a few days off each week to rest his aging and surgically-reconstructed body. Back when Griffey was "the Kid" we expected nothing less than fifty home-runs each year; now we'll be elated with twenty-five.
 

But he's still back. He's back to don the 24 once more, back to remind all of us in the Northwest of the glories of a time past, and hopefully back to create new glories still.

To all of us who were kids when he was "the Kid," he's back to console us with warm memories of a time now completely gone. And as we are exposed to that first realization of aging, of losing youth to the ceaseless passage of time, he's back to teach us one more lesson about growing up. No matter how old we get – no matter how far we are removed from the homes of our childhood and the warm protection of our parents – we will always be young and we will always be able to come home through the fond memories of our youth. They are there now and always shall be, ready to be summoned when life gets too stressful and existence too dull. Regardless of our age it is through our memories that we shall always be young.

Welcome home, Junior, and thanks for bringing us back with you.