Bruce Bartlett sends this email:
I’ve been thinking lately that conservative elites are reaching a moment similar to that which confronted liberal elites in the late 1960s. At first they saw the rise of SDS, the Black Panthers and other extreme left groups as cannon fodder that could be used to achieve liberal goals. (Norman Podhoretz goes into detail on this point in Breaking Ranks and Tom Wolfe made fools of them.) But one day liberals realized that the extremists couldn’t be controlled and threatened anarchy. I read somewhere that the seminal event was when student radicals threatened to burn the Harvard library. This sort of thing led to the rise of neoconservatism (not the foreign policy variety, but the original one). I think conservative elites today see the teabaggers, birthers and other kooks as cannon fodder for larger conservative goals the same way liberals originally saw student radicals in the 1960s. I think one day soon something like the Harvard library burning is going to make conservatives realize that these people present more of a threat than a tool for advancing conservative goals. I hope it doesn’t involve an assassination or Oklahoma City-type event. But you can’t pour fuel on the fires of peoples’ emotions the way Glenn Beck does on a daily basis without getting an explosion at some point.
Bartlett’s comparison is thought-provoking, but I think fails for the following reasons:
1) The radical left of the 1960s was not “cannon fodder” for liberal elites. On the contrary, liberal elites were the principal target of the radicals. Student radicals hated Clark Kerr and Robert McNamara as much or more than they hated J. Edgar Hoover or Richard Nixon. The Panthers despised the civil rights leadership at least as much as they hated George Wallace. Today’s angry conservative base by contrast directs its rage across the partisan divide.
2) Liberal elites kept a much greater distance from the radicals than conservative elites do. Can you imagine the Sulzberger or Graham family giving a platform to the left-wing equivalent of Glenn Beck, in the way that Rupert Murdoch has done?
3) Both sets of elites feared their militant base. But while liberal elites feared that the student radicals and black radicals would attack them, today’s conservative elites fear that the angry Republican base will withdraw their support from them.
4) Violence was integral to the 1960s left, and especially to the Black Panthers. On the right, so far there’s plenty of paranoia but thankfully nothing remotely like the cult of revolutionary violence that wrecked so many lives in the years 1965-1975.
83 responses so far
1 rbottoms // Sep 2, 2009 at 12:43 pm
I was pleasantly surprised to read the first two conclusions. As I’ve said I will never in my life vote for a Republican, but I am coming o the belief that there some who you can at least work with. My specialty as a writer in the late nineties was covering the militia movement. I scored a big scoop by recording G. Gordon Liddy’s comments about shooting ATF agents in the head and yours truly dropped him in the resulting hot water. So I know a thing or two about the mindset of the birther/militia nuts.
Their violence may not be overt, but that has more to do with them being smart than any lack of will. Neo-nazis have financed their activities with bank robberies and other low level violence for years but it is attributed to street crime rather than terrorist violence.
But every once in a while someone gets sloppy:
There will be an assassination or a larger scale terror attack. But this time it won’t be written off as random violence, personal revenge or the result of a family dispute.
2 Rodak // Sep 2, 2009 at 12:47 pm
I was with Frum, until he got to his fourth point. There have been several assassinations (in addition, of course, to McVeigh) perpetrated by right-wingers in recent years. Moreover, there is nothing comparable to the militia movement on the left, and never really has been, unless you put the Black Panthers in that category. The Weather Underground was very different from a militia movement, and they didn’t assassinate anybody. The only domestic, left-wing assassin that comes to mind is Lee Harvey Oswald. And it’s not all clear to me that Oswald wasn’t a right-wing assassin. Did he shoot Kennedy for launching the Bay of Pigs? Or did he shoot him for calling it off? What violence has been perpetrated from the left to counter-balance the several examples we all know of that came from the right? And who on the left is even threatening violence today, or even yesterday, once the Vietnam period ended?
3 balconesfault // Sep 2, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Today’s angry conservative base by contrast directs its rage across the partisan divide.
I’m not sure if this is a transitory phenomena. At some point, some conservatives are going to start to want to govern again, rather than just blocking Democratic governance with the hope that this will lead the nation back into the arms of the Republican Party. We’ve already seen this with the many Republicans who have accepted appointements in the Obama Administration.
But when Republican elected leaders start realizing they have to work with Dems on some issues in order to best serve their constituents (not perhaps a key to winning Republican Primaries, but a key to winning General Elections) they’re going to start hanging targets on their own backs.
Heck – the secessionists who rallied in front of the Texas Capitol last weekend were already starting to grumble against Texas Govenor Rick Perry, who had kind of fanned them on last spring but was nowhere to be seen now.
4 Cforchange // Sep 2, 2009 at 1:55 pm
“I think one day soon something like the Harvard library burning is going to make conservatives realize that these people present more of a threat than a tool for advancing conservative goals.”
Has everyone put the Pittsburgh Police shootings out of mind? Probably the timing of the trial will be beneficial for those across the aisle. I don’t think trial revelations will be flattering for Mr Beck and we own his brand.
5 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:04 pm
You lost me at “teabaggers.”
6 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:08 pm
The real travesty is that the Black Panthers and Weather Underground and Radical Femnists and Environutter, and Gays and Lesbians, aka New Left Radicals and their apologists control the Democrat Party and have established their Neo Marxist Political Correctness as the public and private zeitgeist in this country.
7 balconesfault // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:17 pm
escapevelocity – you’re a hoot. I’d put you on par with http://patriotboy.blogspot.com/ and http://calvinists4conservatism.wordpress.com/ as pitch perfect parodies of the bubble that extremist right wingers live in.
8 brutus1791 // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:25 pm
“Today’s angry conservative base by contrast directs its rage across the partisan divide.”
-I’m sorry Mr. Frum… but field calls in a Congressional office, a Republican one, and tell me that one again. Go to a Tea Party with the signs saying “Throw Them All Out” and “Screw Politicians” and tell me they only meant the Democrats. I want to let you know that you add to the misconception that these people are “Conservatives” by calling them that when they are libertarian at heart. Much of which Mr. Bartlett *sigh* used to claim to be.
9 VCF // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Escapevelocity — you forgot to use the words Stalinist, Maoist, fascist, communist, bolshevik, Muslim, Kenyan, America-haters, atheists, and domestic terrorists in that sentence. With your insight and clarity I am shocked that more people are not aware of who REALLY controls the Democrat party. When are you getting your own show on Fox?
10 balconesfault // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:39 pm
And ACORN! Where was ACORN in that rant?
11 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Why is the truth, so derided?
Was George Orwell right?
Up is Down, Slavery is Freedom, the Reagan Democrats didnt leave the party to the New Left Radicals?
12 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Here are some more truths for you…
We should be vigilant against Anti Semitism where-ever it rears its ugly head.
Rev. Wright is a great American patriot.
William Ayers, who is that?
13 rbottoms // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:51 pm
The GOP has gone around the bend.
14 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:55 pm
It seems that most of you have been herded into little thought boxes by the Left, charges of McCarthyism, Racism, Sexism, Nativism…..have limited your ability to think clearly and without Politically Correct limitations. In effect the Left has shaped the allowable language and language that is not allowed in order to control the debate and thought. And you people are unwitting dupes, if not outright rubes.
I mean get real, even Camille Paglia can see it.
15 DFL // Sep 2, 2009 at 3:05 pm
Walker Percy wrote about these sorts on the Left and the Right in “Love in the Ruins” back in 1970. Percy wrote about the two warring cultures at the end of the 60s. These rivals have only moved forty years further down history’s road. They still hate each other.
16 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 3:14 pm
People that not only apologized for and defended Communism and the Soviets and Stalinism and the Cultural Revolution, and Castroism, but actively sought to promote them by thwarting US aid to peoples who were targeted by Communists and Soviets….deserve to be reviled.
People that look at the US and Iran or Israel and Arab Muslim Countries and say to themselves, you know those Americans and Jews are Fascist Imperialist Racist Oppressors.
These people deserve to be reviled.
They havent gone away.
17 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 3:22 pm
US Debt Clock
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation. — Vladimir Lenin
18 balconesfault // Sep 2, 2009 at 3:42 pm
Reagan proved deficits don’t matter
- Dick Cheney
19 rbottoms // Sep 2, 2009 at 3:52 pm
Are about as relevant to today’s problems as Tojo and Mussolini.
Feel free to keep fighting the hippies like it’s 1968 and time has stood still. The rest of us are dealing with the world as it exists today.
20 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 4:15 pm
Re: Escapevelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:04 pm (#5) –
“You lost me at “teabaggers.””
Yep. Both Bartlett and Frum are “bags” – and I don’t mean “tea.”
(*SHRUG*)
Again, Escape… even as we engage with each other based on Frum’s post… Frum’s post is more about money ultimately than ideology.
Frum’s all about the hit counts. (*SHRUG*) That’s his focus.
BILL
21 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 4:21 pm
Re: Brutus1791 // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:25 pm (#8) –
(*GRIN*)
Welcome, Brutus!
Funny… (ironic funny that is)… you’re the one whose “handle” is that of a back stabber and Frum is the one who…
Well… I’ll leave it at that. (*WINK*)
Anyway… I’m pretty sure Frum actually knows better concerning the present “populist libertarian fiscally conservative integrity and competence yearning” movement referred to in modern shorthand as “The Tea Party Movement.”
As to Bartlett…
(*SNORT*)
He’s gone half way round the bend. I truly wouldn’t be surprised if we learn within weeks or month that Bartlett is suffering from some sort of brain tumor or other malady.
HEY… AND IF SO… may he live to see a full recovery! (I wish no personal ill towards Bartlett!)
BILL
22 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Re: Escapevelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 2:43 pm (#11) –
“Was George Orwell right?”
Yeah. (*SHRUG*) I’d say things are moving in that direction.
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/09/02/obama%E2%80%99s-classroom-campaign-no-junior-lobbyist-left-behind/
BILL
23 brutus1791 // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:04 pm
He stabbed him from the front, as Caesars eyes welled and he choked the question… “et tu Brute?” No back stabbing here!
24 sinz54 // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:10 pm
It sounds like folks here forgot the riots of the 1960s, all incited by left-wing black militant agitators like Stokely Carmichael and H. Rap Brown, which ended up getting dozens of people killed.
The Detroit riot of 1967 alone killed over 40 and injured over 400. Other black riots swept the nation.
And then there was the Crown Heights riots of 1991, incited by Al Sharpton (now beloved of the Dem Party), in which blacks took to the streets beating up any Jews they could find. A subsequent investigation called it an “anti-Jewish pogrom.”
And then there was the infamous “battle of Seattle,” in 1999, in which the black-uniformed anarchists of the far-left Direct Action Network smashed store windows and vandalized stores that had absolutely nothing to do with the supposed beneficiaries of globalization.
The Left did not engage in much militia action, that is true. But what they did do is seize on any incident, however minor, and stand on street corners inflaming crowds to go riot–or riot themselves, looting and burning stores and cars. Often innocent bystanders were beaten. These far leftists correctly analogized this to guerrilla war, in which the authorities are provoked into a crackdown which only alienates the populace even more.
The Left’s ideological contempt for civil order–when it gets in their way–was displayed again and again. It destroyed white good will that had enabled black civil rights to make progress. It led to “white flight” which destroyed the property tax base of Detroit. It instigated virulent anti-Semitism among inner city blacks.
Finally, the far Left, notably the Communists, sided openly with enemies of America. The Communist Party USA was a front under which active espionage was carried out on behalf of the USSR, including the theft of America’s nuclear weapons secrets. Radical leftists of all stripes cheered when Philip Agee published the names of CIA agents operating in Europe and got two of them assassinated by Soviet agents. (Agee, hero to the Left, is now living in Cuba, where he continues to sing the praises of Castro’s police state.)
As for Lee Harvey Oswald, he was a self-described Marxist, who never expressed any right-wing sympathies to his friends or relatives.
25 balconesfault // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:53 pm
incited by Al Sharpton (now beloved of the Dem Party)
Interestingly, longtime Republican operative Roger Stone seems to love Sharpton much more than any Democrats I know.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0204-09.htm
Stone acknowledged that he “helped Sharpton” in the campaign’s desperate attempt in November and December to reach the $5,000 matching-fund threshold in 20 states. “I collected checks,” he said. “That’s how matching funds is done. I like Al Sharpton. I was helping a friend.”
26 GT // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:58 pm
—”Anyway… I’m pretty sure Frum actually knows better concerning the present “populist libertarian fiscally conservative integrity and competence yearning” movement referred to in modern shorthand as “The Tea Party Movement.” —-
@barker13: LOL! Heh! You lost me at the words “integrity” and “competence.”
[Clearing my throat] See 2000 election, GOP nomination of, Bush, George W.
See also 2008 election, GOP veep nomination of, Palin, Sarah.
But hey, I know, I know…modern conservatism is beautiful and noble just the way it is.
No seriously, please do not change. You’re perfect!
As the teenagers say… like, whatever.
Moving right along back to what I was doing.
Isn’t American politics so brilliant? …
“And as things fell apart/Nobody paid much attention” — Talking Heads. (1988)
27 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Re: Brutus1791 // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:04 pm (#23) –
“He stabbed him from the front, as Caesars eyes welled and he choked the question… “et tu Brute?””
(*RUEFUL YET APPRECIATE LAUGH*)
That’s what I love about you, Brutus – if anyone’s going to correct me and make it stick it’s you!
(*STILL LAUGHING*)
You know what…? (And I SWEAR to God…!!! Cross my heart…!!!) I was actually considering whether to frame the post as I did before I put it up on the board JUST FOR THAT REASON!
(*GRIN*)
In the end… I figured a little “literary license” and “historical blind eye” was warranted just in order to make the point in such a way as to make the shot at Frum “flow.”
(*CHUCKLE*)
Still… you “caught” me out. Score one for you!
(*WINK*)
BILL
28 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:39 pm
Re: GT // Sep 2, 2009 at 5:58 pm (#26) –
“barker13: LOL! Heh! You lost me at the words “integrity” and “competence.””
I’m sure…!
(*HUGE FRIGG’N GRIN*) (*PLAYFUL PUNCH TO THE SHOULDER*)
(Com’on… you left yourself wide open for that one!) (*STILL CHUCKLING*)
“You’re perfect!”
Nope. Just… umm… usually right. (*WINK*)
“As the teenagers say… like, whatever.”
Do they still say that…??? (*SHRUG*)
(Brutus… do they…???)
(*CHUCKLE*)
BILL
29 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:42 pm
Serious comment – just refocus for a second…
(*PAUSE*)
You folks ever notice that regardless of ideology or partisanship MOST OF US (to a greater or lesser extent) accept my premise concerning Frum’s motivations and character…
(*SHRUG*)
BILL
30 rbottoms // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:56 pm
Point being it was forty years ago. Most of the people involved are eligible for Social Security so their anarchic days are over.
If you want to talk to a Marxist who is still around try David Horowitz. I should say former Marxist, but back in the day he was one of the most effective backers of the Black Panthers and other far left activists of the 60’s. I hear he’s on your side these days.
Please, stay fixated on the politics and violence of almost a half century ago, meanwhile those of us who have chose to live in the 21st century will continue to fix what George Bush so badly broke.
31 midcon // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:59 pm
my dear friend barker, yes but…Have you found any other place where where the quaility of discussion and debate is this high? I mean comparatively of course. Most of the other forums are not places for the likes of me at least. And probably not you either. Of course you tend to be more draconian than I, so they might welcome thoughts about military coups and such. So some credit where credit is due – you kinda feel at home here a little? It’s not utopia but it kinda works?
32 midcon // Sep 2, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Speaking of friends Bill, what did you do to Otto? I know you did something, you have that guilty look all over your face!
33 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 9:09 pm
Re: Midcon // Sep 2, 2009 at 7:59 pm (#31) –
“My dear friend barker, yes but…Have you found any other place where where the quality of discussion and debate is this high?”
Actually not – not in the sense of a “popular” site. Heck… that’s why I post here; same with you, right?
HOWEVER…
The quality of discussion is because of US – not Frum… and not even so much Frum’s “contributors.”
Hey… not just “us” in terms of you and me. Heck… not just “us” in terms of ideological soulmates.
Nope. I mean Sinz as much as you and I. I mean Ireign. I mean Brutus. Mike K before he got fed up. Spartacus from the Left. And so on and so forth.
(Hell… while I can be… umm… undiplomatically “direct” with the likes of Balc, Chekote, and Annie, they’re ALL swell posters and I’m GLAD to get their perspective regardless of whether I agree or disagree with them on any particular occasion.)
(Hey… I’m not gonna name every “regular”… but I’ve made it clear who I respect – which is actually most of you – and I’ve also made quite clear my views on the various “contributors” depending in large part upon how willing they are to engage with us and how willing they are to recognize reality even if it’s not in their best interest “winning the debate” wise.)
“Most of the other forums are not places for the likes of me at least. And probably not you either.”
Right you are! (Hey… I made a “punny!”) (*SPOKEN IN FOGHORN LEGHORN VOICE*)
“Of course you tend to be more draconian than I…”
Hell. (*LAUGHING OUT LOUD*) I’m more draconian than Kim Jong Il! (*HUGE FRIGG’N GRIN*)
“So some credit where credit is due…”
More “thanks” than “credit. (*WINK*) And, yes… I do THANK Frum for this site. (*WINK*)
BILL
34 barker13 // Sep 2, 2009 at 9:11 pm
Re: Midcon // Sep 2, 2009 at 8:03 pm (#32) –
“Speaking of friends Bill, what did you do to Otto? I know you did something, you have that guilty look all over your face!”
I sent him over to the UK for medical care!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6127514/Sentenced-to-death-on-the-NHS.html
(*HUGE, HUMONGOUS, BIGGEST EVER FRIGG’N GRIN*)
BILL
35 EscapeVelocity // Sep 2, 2009 at 11:22 pm
Earth to rbottoms, David Horowitz and Ronald Rodash are ultra villified by teh Left for betraying the movement.
That should tell you droves about how stupid your happened 40 years ago remark is. All that means is all those Marxists have marched through the institutions and wreaked havoc, and are now at the pinnacle of those institutions. AKA the Establishment.
Ronald Rodash was denied employment at a university because of his political journey, and his eventually embracing of reality over “revolutionary truth.”
This is the reality of today.
The Sandbagging of Robert “KC” Johnson
By Ronald Radosh
http://hnn.us/articles/1116.html
David Horowitz and Ronald Rodash are exceptional not typical of the Far Left Radical of the 60s.
36 Robtr // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:00 am
I have read what both Frum and Bartlett had to say about the current conservative protesters and skimmed the comments and it would seem to me that you people don’t get out much. There have been 100’s of thousands of tea party protest participants with no violence other than that caused by the SEIU (Obama’s group). The people are upset, look at the polls. It didn’t start with Obama, it started with Bush spending money hand over fist to keep democrats voting to approve his war budget. Now Obama is making Bush look like a piker.
It’s amazing that you zombies have to go back to the 60’s to find radical violent leftists. I live in Seattle, you east coasters may not have heard about it but in either 99 or 2000 we had the WTO protests where the protestors trashed downtown Seattle and some people were hurt. Last year or the year before we had war protestors totally shut down Olympia for 3 days and trash the downtown. By trashed I don’t mean the usual hippy garbage, I mean breaking store fronts, looting the businesses and setting them on fire. Last year ELF burned down two separate housing developments and a couple of years ago they broke into a mink farm and let 10,000 minks loose (the animals all died) and set fires to the buildings. This is stuff just off the top of my head in my area. I am sure there are a lot more that you can google, since you seem to think the last left wing violence was in the 60’s it may be educational for you.
As for Bartlett’s ridiculous wondering if the Tea Party Protestors are the New Black Panthers, what are the original Black Panthers going to say about that. You know the ones, just last year they took over a polling station in either Pittsburg or Philadelphia, armed and kept white people from voting. They were arrested and lost in court but the Obama justice department just a couple of weeks ago dropped the charges anyway. Erick Holder is refusing to answer questions about that and is hiding at the present time. Bartlett should maybe clear it with the real Black Panthers before he starts giving a bunch of 50 and 60 year olds their turf.
37 Robtr // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:28 am
I forgot to mention my points to the above as current events seem to be lost on this crowd. They are.
1. We already have Black Panthers
2. We already have plenty of left wing fire starters.
3. If you really are conservatives of some sort, you may want to try and solve the violence in front of you instead of trying to manufacture some.
4 Your handwringing is entertaining though, thanks!
38 ProfNickD // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:34 am
Birthers are far less of a problem than are believers in anthropomorphic global warming — birthers don’t threaten to wreck the economy in the name of superstitious, New Age junk-science.
39 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:47 am
I thought you were telling us how this was all 40 years ago? That capitulating to violent racist thugs has been a spectacular success! Empowering racist thugs as progress, it doesnt get any crazier than that folks….but we are talking about the Democrats controlled and lead by the New Left Radicals.
President Obama’s Justice Department continues to stonewall inquiries about why it dropped a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party.
The episode—which Bartle Bull, a former civil rights lawyer and publisher of the left-wing Village Voice, calls “the most blatant form of voter intimidation I’ve ever seen”—began on Election Day 2008. Mr. Bull and others witnessed two Black Panthers in paramilitary garb at a polling place near downtown Philadelphia. (Some of this behavior is on YouTube.)
One of them, they say, brandished a nightstick at the entrance and pointed it at voters and both made racial threats. Mr. Bull says he heard one yell “You are about to be ruled by the black man, cracker!”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052970203550604574361071968458430.html
40 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:51 am
Will those 2 be given jobs as poll watchers and promotions at ACORN, in 2010. You know to get them off the streets and into the mainsteam.
LOL!
41 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:52 am
Hopeful Changiness!
42 barker13 // Sep 3, 2009 at 7:15 am
Re: Robtr // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:00 am (#36) –
One more time – for Robtr!
(*GRIN*)
Bartlett has suffered some sort of nervous breakdown and Frum has no hesitation in simply making stuff up if he thinks it’ll buttress his case.
(*SHRUG*)
Of COURSE by and large the folks who attend Tea Parties and Town Hall Meetings are the “good guys.”
BILL
43 barker13 // Sep 3, 2009 at 7:17 am
Re: Profnickd // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:34 am (#38) –
(*THUMBS UP*)
BTW… JEEZ – it’s frigg’n COLD out this morning!
(*CHUCKLE*)
BILL
HARRIMAN, NY
44 barker13 // Sep 3, 2009 at 8:01 am
Oh… btw… in contrast to folks like Bartlett and Frum who can’t “get it” or simple won’t “get it”:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204731804574384622002177100.html
QUOTING (EXCERPTING) DR. (SEN.) TOM COBURN –
I spoke with thousands of voters at town-hall meetings this summer. What I gathered from them is that it’s not just the proposed overhaul of health care that has them upset. Many also expressed a sense of betrayal. In spite of their hope for change, it still appears that the government in Washington is run for its own benefit and the benefit of special interests—not for the benefit of the American people. The folks I met with also don’t trust politicians in Washington to address mounting long-term challenges to our economy.
It’s not just the attendees of town-halls meetings in Oklahoma. Voters across the country are telling Washington what’s on their mind, if only more people inside the Beltway would listen. A Rasmussen poll released last month showed that 40% of voters said that cutting the deficit in half by 2012 should be President Barack Obama’s top priority. Only 21% said health-care reform should be his No. 1 priority.
Notwithstanding these polling results, the administration and Congress have responded by trying to win public support on the strength of an argument that’s too clever to be true. They say that the key to saving money is spending money, a lot of money. And they’ve done just that with a $787 billion stimulus program as well as billions in bailouts and proposals to spend vast sums on health-care reform and other things. Their belief seems to be that every government expenditure grows the economy or can be counterbalanced with cost savings.
It’s a confusing argument, and it’s flat wrong, particularly with regard to health care. The Congressional Budget Office has said as much when it stated a few weeks ago that the health-care legislation before Congress fails to restrain costs and instead “significantly expands the federal responsibility for health-care costs.”
…Congress has shown no sign of departing from the status quo. Spending bills continue to grow faster than the rate of inflation as members still earmark funds for special projects for parochial interests. The most recent appropriations bill to pass the Senate, the Agriculture Department bill, included a 15% spending increase over the previous year’s bill, which itself was a 21% spending increase over the preceding year. In today’s economy, such spending increases make Americans realize that the political class isn’t even close to getting it.
Last week, White House Director of the Office of Management and Budget Peter Orszag released a review of the budget that adjusted our long-term deficit up by $2 trillion—more than double the cost of the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001. In his 750 word report, Mr. Orszag cast blame on “previous administrations”—the Bush administration—five times and didn’t once take aim at today’s Congress or the annual orgy of wasteful, duplicative and special-interest spending in which it is now engaging.
America is facing an economic reckoning because the cornerstone programs of the welfare state—Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security—will soon be bankrupt and will likely require massive tax increases to stay afloat.
Congressional leaders have been using apocalyptic rhetoric about angry “mobs,” “un-American” protestors and “evil-mongers” at town halls because they know that voter concerns about spending may not only derail the “public option” in health-care reform but could turn into a referendum on our real problems—our crushing burden of government and the politicians who defend the status quo. For the sake of future generations, such a referendum couldn’t come soon enough.
(*SHRUG*) (*NOD*)
BILL
45 Are Birthers the Next Balck Panthers? | Be John Galt // Sep 3, 2009 at 8:06 am
[...] Just when you think David Frum and Bruce Bartlett can’t get any nuttier, they sink to a new level. [...]
46 Jeffriesboys // Sep 3, 2009 at 9:03 am
The angry conservatives are angry because the true grassroot conservatives – you remember the ones that work for a living (outside the beltway) and pay taxes and attend church on Sundays and are still social conservatives – you remember those voters, feel that they have been left by the Republican Party. They are constantly being talked down to by so called Neo Cons and told to just sit down and be quiet that those in charge know better and it will all work out. Well, guess what, it isn’t working out. We have been betrayed. Not only were those elected to represent us not hold true on any social conservative values, but have consistently voted for bigger government with more spending. So if you think that the era of Reagan is dead or Conservativism is dead it is only because there are NO CONSERVATIVES out there to represent us.
No, we won’t turn violent, but we are done being silent. I am done being talked down to and right now, Glenn Beck is the ONLY true conservative on TV/Radio that is willing to do his homework and expose the crap this is being thrust upon us by this administration. So, stop talking down to the conservatives, we will come back and we are pissed. I only hope that when we come back that those that are in charge don’t feel any pity on the liberals the the neo-cons that have brought us to the brink of facism.
47 brutus1791 // Sep 3, 2009 at 9:29 am
Barker says: “As the teenagers say… like, whatever.”
Do they still say that…??? (*SHRUG*)
(Brutus… do they…???)
Ouch,… once I work up the strength to get out of my race-car bed I am going to virtually kick your ass
escapevelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:52 am
Hopeful Changiness!
When I heard all of the talk regarding “Hope” I could not help but remember the Athenian response to the Melians in The Peloponnesian War…
” Hope, danger’s comforter, may be indulged in by those who have abundant resources, if not without loss at all events without ruin; but its nature is to be extravagant, and those who go so far as to put their all upon the venture see it in its true colours only when they are ruined; but so long as the discovery would enable them to guard against it, it is never found wanting.”
Regarding the Tea Party protestors. I was in a fairly heated debate with a dear friend and former professor who wrote in a column two weeks ago comparing the mob mentality and the Tea Parties to the populism surrounding Hitler’s ascent to power. Now, I was at that Hagerstown Tea Party that Mr. Knapp decided to use in his self aggrandizing piece, and there were some good old school vets who were just plain worried about HR 3200, and what it would mean for vet benefits.
First of all, there is something to be said about the fact the liberals are slandering the populists (libertarian/Conservatives at the meetings) by comparing them to Weimar and the rise of Hitler. I told my friend that those WWII vets in the crowd would be mighty offended to find that they were being compared to the people they fought and lost friends to. This gets covered and talked about when the LaRouchites do it, but not when Olbermann has been doing it for years. OK, whatever. We are supposed to be the mature and classy ones anyway. At least more is assumed of Conservatives, because when liberals do crazy things its explained away as the modus operandi.
48 PaulKroenke // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:34 am
David, I wonder if your view on Glenn Beck in point 2 isn’t a tad misguided. From a cable news competition perspective, is he not the perfect foil to MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann? Olbermann has been ranting like a complete lunatic for years, and now Beck is on Fox offering a similar, right-wing version of Olbermann’s grandstanding. Both of them are complete nutballs, yet both of them offer lucid observations now and then, and if nothing else, they are both ludicrously entertaining.
At the end of the day, I think we should have enough faith in people’s general intelligence to understand that when the channel changes, viewers of either are going to be more concerned with what’s happening on Family Guy reruns than anything else.
49 balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:56 am
brutus: “First of all, there is something to be said about the fact the liberals are slandering the populists (libertarian/Conservatives at the meetings) by comparing them to Weimar and the rise of Hitler.”
When has this been done?
50 barker13 // Sep 3, 2009 at 11:11 am
Re: Jeffriesboys // Sep 3, 2009 at 9:03 am (#46) –
Dead on, JB! Bulls-eye!
Did you happen to catch Beck yesterday?
(BTW, I DVR Beck and urge everyone else to do so.)
Wow… yesterday’s show was AMAZING…
Re: Paulkroenke // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:34 am (#48) –
Be honest, Paul… HONEST… you don’t watch Beck regularly, do you?
Com’on… it’s only us… be HONEST.
(*SMILE*)
Listen. Those of you who are regulars here – whether you agree or disagree with me more often than not – will if you’re honest admit that I’m an extremely well read and knowledgeable person who habitually provides links and citations to buttress my points.
Nor do I play fast and loose with the truth nor try to manipulate stats or facts in order to “win” debates.
I’m telling you… Beck is probably the brightest more educated (in the sense of doing his homework, reading, researching) “opinion news show/talk show” host out there today.
O’Reilly is a clown compared to Beck and not only does O’Reilly – unlike Beck – TRY not to appear to be a clown… but O’Reilly holds a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard!
Beck is NOT Sean Hannity.
Anyway… I can’t imagine Paul here being “convinced” by this post… but my fellow regulars… (*SHRUG*)… I’m TELLING you!
DVR the guy for a week.
Give him a real shot.
I’m TELLING you… I’m not easily impressed and Beck by and large impresses me.
(*SHRUG*)
BILL
51 brutus1791 // Sep 3, 2009 at 11:30 am
balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:56 am
When has this been done?
Balcones… http://thomasalewis.wordpress.com/2009/08/12/demonocracy-in-action/#comments
“We know it works because this drive-by shooting of our democracy has resulted in headlines indicating that Obama’s popularity is declining, that the adminsitration has “lost momentum” in the so-called “debate” over health care, that “people” are afraid and upset about reform. This in a country where all objective measures show clearly that people are deeply upset about the present state of health care and health-care insurance (two different things, by the way: how come nobody makes the distinction in this “debate”?) and want, by a large majority, a single-payer system to replace it.
We also know these tactics of intimidation work because of that small town in Germany I mentioned. When the least capable, most resentful and intellectually challenged of its citizens were shown by political operatives how to dominate town meetings and local political events by shouting down and threatening decent people, they succeeded in delivering their town — which disagreed with them by a large majority — to their party. The National Socialists of Adolf Hitler.”
The writer for this site is a true old-school journalist and old school liberal. I absolutely love talking to him, unlike the apologists for the New Left today. But I called him out on his final paragraph, because “reducto ad Hitlerum” is becoming a bit widespread…
Sincerely,
An A**hole Republican
52 balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 11:43 am
I have to admit – I was heretofore unawares of the writings of Thomas A. Lewis.
53 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:06 pm
People want some Health Care Reform and specifically not a Single Payer System in the Canadian or UK vein.
When you start from complete fantasy, no wonder the world looks so confusing to you.
54 Cforchange // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Los Angeles Times reports: A 65-year-old protester evidently punched a pro-reform man in the face, and the man retaliated by biting off the anti-reformist’s finger.
We’re on our way to crazyland.
55 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 12:45 pm
And one side is well armed.
Here is Obama’s non Senate Confirmed Green Energy Czar on how to take small seemingly inconsequential steps, using subterfuge to hide your true goals, so as to transform this country into a Marxist regime.
Video: Van Jones and “revolution”
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/09/03/video-van-jones-and-revolution/
56 balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Sounds to me that the revolution Jones was talking about in that clip was transforming America from a society where blacks couldn’t ride in the front of the bus, to one where blacks could sit in corporate boardrooms.
But then, I was listening for context, not buzzwords.
I like his testimony before the stimulus hearings. Basically, he lays out three points to a “green revolution”:
1) get back to an economy measured by what we produce, rather than what we consume
2) when investing in the future, don’t just count what we spend … count what we save
3) government phasing in spending will give an opportunity to train those in America who really need jobs to be able to take advantage of the new job creation
Seems like pretty smart stuff. You can throw the “Marxist” label around all you want – if our government is going to be pushing a lot of money out to stimulate the economy, those seem like good metrics to follow.
Now, when I hear him talking about government taking the primary role of developing and building and operating windfarms, solar farms, transmission systems, etc – instead of what is happening, government providing stimulus funds for private businesses to go out and do those things – I’ll be worried about Marxism.
57 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:08 pm
You aparently missed the part about talking about eco-capitalism as just a baby step towards te intitution of Socialism/Communism.
You will be worried about Marxism when you can do nothing to stop it, and are behind the iron curtain. The only question is, will you have anywhere to flee it?
58 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Or will you just realize that the Marxist state is here to stay and try to do your best getting along in it, perhaps working your way up the Party ladder, in government.
LOL!
59 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:24 pm
Congresswoman from Los Angeles praises Castro…
http://www.breitbart.tv/la-congresswoman-praises-cuban-revolution-castros-health-care-system/
She is rational person who the people like, who are great humanitarians…..not fruitloop McCarthyites like Michelle Bachman who is ranting about the Communist threat.
60 balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:25 pm
You aparently missed the part about talking about eco-capitalism as just a baby step towards te intitution of Socialism/Communism.
You’re right – I missed him talking about that. Perhaps you can provide the quotes you’re talking about?
I’m not worried about Marxism because America is not going to accept it. Period. I don’t know any liberals who are real Marxists. I’m sure they are out there, but they have absolutely no clout.
Consider the bank bailout program. The concern voiced last fall was that we needed banks to have the capital to keep making loans, so businesses could make payroll, make investments, people could continue to buy homes and cars, etc.
Had TARP really been Marxist, or even socialist, Congress would have instead have established a federal lending system to provide that money directly to the borrowers, rather than working through the existing financial community. Had the Stimulus Package been communist, we would have seen new Federal Bureaucracies set up to build wind and solar farms on Federal Land in the west, instead of moneys earmarked to incentivize private companies to do so. We wouldn’t be talking today about Government creating a “Public Option” … even one that has the potential to out-compete all the private insurers for most of the market … but about the Federal Government nationalizing the hospital system.
In short, we’re nowhere near being Marxist, and we’re not moving in that direction in any significant way.
61 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Yes, because Communists and Socialists are known for their openess about there agendas.
You cant be that gullable. But then again, many people seem to be.
This is a Peace Rally, not a Popular Front for the Communists and Soviets!
LOL!
I’m not worried about Marxism because America is not going to accept it. Period. —balconesfault
Yes, they wont accept it now, but the indoctrination continues, the work goes on, and the dream shall never die.
The Health Care debate right now is about people not accepting Socialism. Get it. The voiciferous opposition that you call “looney” is the opposition to Socialism. Why are you not supporting it? Do you think that sneering at others opposing Socialism from the sidelines makes you superior. While they do the dirty work, you sneer. If they didnt do the dirty work, then we would have Socialism. Would you then look at everyone and say, what happened, we were supposed to reject Socialism, it could never happen in this country.
Or do you support Socialism? I dont expect a straight answer on this, as Leftwingers are known not to be up front about their desires, using coded language and inuendos (especially American Socialists/Democrats), but never speaking teh word Socialism.
If you hadnt noticed that is exactly what the criticism of TARP has been, and it comes from the likes of Paul “Nobel Prize Winner in Economic” Krugman….no less!
In short, we’re nowhere near being Marxist, and we’re not moving in that direction in any significant way — balconesfault
You seem too well informed to be such a buffoon.
62 balconesfault // Sep 3, 2009 at 3:19 pm
The Health Care debate right now is about people not accepting Socialism. Get it.
Yep. I get that the senior citizens who are showing up to scream that an expanded Federal healthcare system might take money from Medicare are there because they’re not accepting Socialism.
Of course I support limited forms of socialism. That means that when the state of Texas decides it needs to build a new road, or authorize construction of a new electric transmission line, it will use the powers of eminent domain to commandeer people’s property at a price set by the state – because construction of new roads and transmission lines would be if not impossible, prohibitively expensive without the state having this power.
I favor the state building those roads, instead of waiting for private companies to see a need and build (and toll) them.
I favor the government collecting taxes from me to make sure that there is an system out there providing education to children regardless of their families economic ability to pay for it.
I favor them doing the same to make sure that a fire truck can show up to put out the fire for a home that pays $1200 a year in property taxes, even if that’s only 1/10th of my property tax bill. And I’m fine with them collecting taxes for police too, even if the police have to spend a lot more time policing the side of town with far lower property values than my neighborhood.
The City of Austin has a publicly owned water treatment and distribution system, public wastewater treatment plants, and a publicly owned utility that owns and operates power plants and the electric grid in town.
I’m fine with the National Parks System, with the Texas Parks system, and with our local parks, all providing places for people to recreate on public lands.
I’m in favor of all those things. And they’re all forms of limited socialism.
Tell me what you’d like to do away with, Mr. Anti-Socialism in all forms.
63 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 5:19 pm
You know, you can have socialism without government.
You can have universal health care….just form the Socialism Association for whatever…like Health Care….then open membership. To those according to their need from those according to their ability. Then you can collect money from well to do Socialists and redistribute it among the needy.
That way, you can have your socialism, and others that dont want to participate in that form of Socialism arent bothered by it, and are happy to have you enjoy your Socialist Utopia.
You can even break this up on an issue by issue basis. That way everyone gets the level of Socialism that they think appropriate….and we dont have to have pitched battles about it.
How does that sound?
64 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 5:20 pm
Liberty and Socialism for all!
65 EscapeVelocity // Sep 3, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Breaking news,
Obama’s Communist Green Czar is a 9/11 Truther.
66 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 6:48 am
How does that sound?
Before I answer your question – you answer mine:
Tell me what you’d like to do away with.
And of course – if you’re really an anti-socialism purist – the answer is “all of the above”.
67 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 7:11 am
Obama’s Communist Green Czar is a 9/11 Truther.
While it was stupid of Jones to sign a truther petition … does it have anything to do with working for green jobs – and has Jones done or said anything in his current position to indicate he is communist, or racist, or tyrant, or a conspiracy theorist?
And hell – Jones himself admits it was stupid: “As for the petition [9/11 statement] that was circulated today, I do not agree with this statement and it certainly does not reflect my views now or ever.”
I look forward to the same level of candor from everyone who accused Bill Clinton of killing everyone from Ron Brown to Vincent Foster … from those who still insist that Obama is a closet Muslim born in Kenya … and from those who have implied that the intent of health care reform is to target and strip Republicans of healthcare.
If we started having everyone backing away from the crazy, that would be a plus.
68 barker13 // Sep 4, 2009 at 8:35 am
Re: Balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 7:11 am (#67) –
“While it was stupid of Jones to sign a truther petition…”
(*SNORT*)
Umm… thanks for that… er… recognition.
Balc. I forget exactly how you classify yourself on the partisan political/ideological spectrum, but if I were Bill Frigg’n Clinton (or David Axelrod if you’d prefer) I’d be SCREAMING at Obama to clean out the skeletons in his administration and FIRE each and every hardcore Leftist.
You want “pragmatism…” (*SHRUG*) That’s my “pragmatic” advice.
BILL
69 PaulKroenke // Sep 4, 2009 at 9:47 am
barker-
No, I do not watch Beck regularly, but I do like him. He’s on at an hour that I’m just not home and, while I have a DVR, it’s not on my HDTV, so I don’t really use it much. The vast amount of Beck’s info that I see comes on youtube clips, which I know from when I do catch his show isn’t even close to the half of it. I’m aware he tempers his more extreme views with very good level-headedness. I still view him as the right’s answer to Olbermann, though, in the respect that he’s essentially unassailable, since he gets so over the top sometimes and doesn’t give a damn that anybody thinks he’s crazy for it. It’s very effective, in my opinion. Olbermann does the same for the left, though I would personally put Beck in higher esteem because he’s not a vicious blowhard like Keith is. In either case though, I have been pretty vocal in arguing that a guy like Beck is necessary, particularly for a moderate like Mr. Frum here. You can’t reach the middle without a competing extreme voice.
70 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 10:52 am
I’d be SCREAMING at Obama to clean out the skeletons in his administration and FIRE each and every hardcore Leftist.
Right – because no doubt you thought that the Bush administration should have fired all the hardcore right wingers?
That might have been problematic, though, given that a substantial portion of the Bush Admin political appointees had their jobs thanks to recommendations or vetting done by the Heritage Foundation.
The problem with your proposal is that it would quickly be a moving bar. Centrists in the Obama Administration are considered hardcore Leftists by the extreme right. And you have the attitude shown by some like Escapevelocity elsewhere on this board, that the right wing has to constantly attack the Obama Administration on every thing for political purposes, no matter what that does to the governance of the country over the next 3+ years.
In other words, short of just keeping on Bush Administration appointees, there’s no way for them to “clean out the skeletons”, because belief in government providing basic services for people, and collecting taxes in order to provide them, is a “skeleton” to many.
71 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 11:21 am
I have been pretty vocal in arguing that a guy like Beck is necessary, particularly for a moderate like Mr. Frum here. You can’t reach the middle without a competing extreme voice. –Paul Kroenske
This is absolutely correct Paul. Without a competing screaming, implied threat of violence, real disturbance of the peace, actively agitating large group to counter the Left’s, all you do is cede ground to them, and then you have people like Frum moving toward the newly established center, which has and continues to shift to the Left.
Now while I really dont like doing that…..its really way past anyones control. The Left is what it is, and the 60s happened, and they have been very effective with their Astroturfed agitators, at terrifying businesses, governments, and institutions into appeasing them, to avoid unpleasantness. These entities must feel that the answer is not appeasement in order to avoid unpleasantness of screeming angry people disturbing your customers or citizens, or workers, etc……because their are other screeming angry people that will take up the banner if you appease them.
Its common sense.
72 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 11:30 am
Now in this environment, then the Center Right has room to work compromises. Instead of having weak positions to start negotiations from….and thus the ever farther concessions to and ratcheting to the Left, they now have strong negotiating positions, or at least equal to the Leftists or Center Left.
This is how you stop Leftism creep. It allows the Center Right to quit running the Left in order to find “New Majorities.”
It opens up space for the Center Right to win compromises instead of always having compromise a one way street to the Left. We can see that in the Public Option being stripped from the Health Care Reform package right now.
Bottom line. It works. And when you are at ideological war with the New Left Radicals and Assorted other Far Leftists that now dominate the Democrat Party, you cant afford not to adopt tactics that work.
Would we have defeated the Nazis if we had kept on fighting the last war like the French? No we needed to learn from the Nazis effective tactics to win. Does that make us as bad as teh Nazis. Of course it doesnt. We didnt chose war, they did, and we have to react effectively to preserve our freedom, liberty and way of life. Its that simple.
73 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 11:39 am
The problem with your proposal is that it would quickly be a moving bar. Centrists in the Obama Administration are considered hardcore Leftists by the extreme right. And you have the attitude shown by some like Escapevelocity elsewhere on this board, that the right wing has to constantly attack the Obama Administration on every thing for political purposes, no matter what that does to the governance of the country over the next 3+ years. — balconesfault
You are correct, that is why we now are too the point where Van Jones is considered a mainstream Leftist, because of a moving bar.
Your problem seems to be that you think that the Conservatives should compromise, and you may also think that the Leftists should compromise with Republican Adminstrations as well, so that the US can have a semblence of good governance. However the far Revolutionary, Radical, True Believers in Global Fearmongering Climate Dissaster Cults, Anti Capitalists, etc….arent going to let up for one second bro. And you need to realize what that means. It means that compromise will always come from the Right and thuse we will continue to move towards the Left, forever and ever until Troksky is seen as a heritic to the regime. Get it? Comprende?
74 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 11:46 am
It means that compromise will always come from the Right and thuse we will continue to move towards the Left, forever and ever until Troksky is seen as a heritic to the regime. Get it? Comprende?
Uh – no. I’m increasingly coming to the conclusion that you’re completely irrational on this subject.
I’d still like to find out which of the “socialist” institutions I asked you about earlier – public condemnation of property under eminent domain to build critical infrastructure … public roads and highways … fire departments … the public school system … federal, state, and local parks … public libraries … public universities – you are willing to do away with in order to stamp out any vestige of socialism.
Then we can talk about appropriate compromises, once we’ve established what you consider illegitimate roles of government.
75 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 11:56 am
balconesfault,
I would like to know where the Democrats and Left think is the level of Socialism that they would be happy with, and not push for more statist control, confiscation of private property, etc
They should put out a policy statement that says this is what we want to create. This is our “Constitution.”
That is the real question.
76 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Of course, I know the answer to that question, just as well as you do. The answer is that they will never stop, every policy proposal, new program, nationalisation of industry, will never be enough. There will always be more to do, and the next goal of nationalization, regulation, controlling wrong thinking, etc.
Its an exorable push with the ultimate goal of the Totalitarian Socialist State, Utopian Visions.
77 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Well, clearly the left … as you define it, since only people on the left favor any forms of limited Socialism … are in favor of public condemnation of property under eminent domain to build critical infrastructure … public roads and highways … fire departments … the public school system … federal, state, and local parks … public libraries … public universities.
I don’t know any influential people on the left who favor Government ownership of all property and enterprise, which is why it is inaccurate and ignorant to use the label “socialist” for Democratic leadership, much less “Marxist”.
If favoring limited socialism makes one a socialist, then let’s start identifying who in America is NOT a socialist. It’s going to be a much easier to handle list.
78 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 12:32 pm
I don’t know any influential people on the left who favor Government ownership of all property and enterprise — balconesfault
So if someone thinks that individuals should be able to own the clothes on their backs but nothing else, then they arent Marxists? Is that your position?
The US Constitution itself provides for Limited Socialism. The right of the Federal Government to levy taxes to pay for national defense.
However the US Constitution is a document that everyone can look at and agree or disagree with….and their are mechanisms to change it.
What is the Democrats Constitution? What limits are included in the Democrats Constitution on State power and authority? Are there any? Is just “we dont agree with the US Constitution will ignore it and “re-interpret” it as we see fit” change we can believe in?
If you would like to lift limits on government power, and the people are behind you, then the process for amending the Constitution are clearly laid out….and should be no problem with the support of the people. You can even ditch the who Constitution and write a new one…but that requires telling people what you are about, and not a nebulous emphemeral cloud of hopeful changiness, round and round she goes where she stops nobody knows!
Camille Paglia comments on this same phenomenon, here.
Obama’s healthcare horror
http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/2009/08/12/town_halls/index.html
79 EscapeVelocity // Sep 4, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Racists in the Democrat Party
“Let’s have President Obama lead an honest discussion about the “No Whites Allowed” sign on Jackson’s home pictured above (and please do note that Jackson is an official Democrat Party and Obama campaign poll watcher, as well as an elected member of Philadelphia’s 14th Ward Democratic Committee).”
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/08/02/the-new-black-panther-partys-teachable-moments-on-race/
80 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 1:15 pm
So if someone thinks that individuals should be able to own the clothes on their backs but nothing else, then they arent Marxists? Is that your position?
Nope – in a classical Marxist sense, “property” means those things that represent the means of production. Land. Factories. Not your clothes.
What is the Democrats Constitution? What limits are included in the Democrats Constitution on State power and authority? Are there any? Is just “we dont agree with the US Constitution will ignore it and “re-interpret” it as we see fit” change we can believe in?
Democrats have the same Constitution as the Republicans, best I can tell. The whole “ignore and re-interpret” thing is usually just playing the refs … though there certainly were some serious “ignore” things going on during the last Administration in the name of national security.
Hell, I’ve been having an argument with Ireign here over whether or not a Federal Mandate that individuals purchase insurance from the private sector would be constitutional. I don’t believe it is. I also don’t believe that it would be constitutional for the Federal Government to require me to pay money into a federally administered private investment account.
81 balconesfault // Sep 4, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Jackson’s sign is indeed reprehensible, particularly for someone who wants to play a role in the political process. I’m not sure the context that Obama should publicly bring it up – he only commented on the Gates incident when a reporter thought it more important to ask at his press conference than another question on how the Federal Government intends to expand its role in the massive portion of our economy dedicated to healthcare – but if he’s asked about it I certainly hopes he will be very critical of it.
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