Category: Politics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWZHTJsR4Bc

Look, I didn’t like Palin either but I have a hard time believing that she didn’t know Africa was a continent. This is particularly vicious against Palin.

The civil war among conservatives will be between an enraged rump of die-hard knotheads and a disparate group of reformers. The knotheads believe that Obama’s victory came thanks to the treason of some conservative intellectual elites and McCain’s failure to be more like Reagan, whatever that means 20 years after the Gipper left the White House. Sarah Palin is the standard-bearer for the talk-radio faction within knotheadism, and Mitt Romney will emerge as the GOP establishment’s last stand.

Rod Dreher
Columnist & online editorial page editor –Dallas Morning News

Dreher is supposed to be some kind of Republican guru but the fact that he can say that which is in bold indicates how messed up the Republican party is. The Democratic Party is now 75 years past Franklin Roosevelt and yet it knows what Rooseveltian policies means 75 yeas after Roosevelt left the White House. Indeed, the election of Barak Obama finds a man who will try to re-Roosevelt the American electorate.

How can a Republican guru not know what Reagan means 20 years after he’s left the White House? McCain’s failure in not being enough like Reagan means that McCain was more like Bush 41 & 43 in that McCain was a Big Government welfare / warfare moderate. McCain was not like Reagan because McCain did not believe government was the problem. McCain was not like Reagan because Reagan would never have voted for the government to bail out the mortgage industry to the tune of 2.3 trillion dollars. McCain was not like Reagan because Reagan never would have supported legislation attacking the 1st amendment as McCain did.

The fact that Republican guru’s like Dreher can’t figure out the Reagan means genuine pro free-market, genuine liberty and genuine disgust of big government means the Republican party will be continue to wander in the wasteland until they figure it out.

In light of the election results I think there are some things that we need to be realistic about.

1.) First, the pollsters were not correct. Except for the IBD-Tipp poll which called the final total at 2.9% the pollsters were overwhelmingly wrong. Remember that the RCP average ended with a 7.4% spread between Obama and McCain. Without all the votes fully counted the spread between McCain and Obama stands at 3%. (edit Morning 05 November — Looks like it ended up 52%-47%)

2.) I think we have to admit that the country may stay as left as it went tonight for quite some time. I say this for three reasons.

(a.) Hispanics voted overwhelmingly for Obama and Democrats. This is significant because given the amnesty for illegal aliens that Democrats will shove through this will anchor the country in its newly minted left tilt as more and more Hispanics will become voting citizens.

(b.) We must remember that one way FDR established 36 years of overwhelming Democratic control (1932-1968) was to make large enough constituencies beholden to the Federal government through his and (its) sundry socialist give away programs. Obama and the Democrats will certainly try to recreate that kind of program and that kind of legislation that will, in effect, create financial incentive for people to vote Democrat.

(c.) Look for a resurgence of Unions and unionism. Unions have traditionally been Democratic voting constituencies and the talk of creating laws that will make it substantially easier to unionize will build a Democratic constituency in the middle class.

The implication of all this is that the Republican party will have to move left in order to avoid oblivion. The movement of the Republican party to the left will be similar to Republican dime store new dealism that arose in the context of the success of the New Deal.

3.) We need to realize that though Obama won convincingly in electoral terms that we can not call this a landslide due the tightness of the popular vote. This is important in order to deflect the inevitable mandate language that we are bound to hear.

4.) The neo-cons destroyed the Republican party. Their influence in the Bush administration produced the compassionate conservatism that grew the size of the state in ways that Lyndon Johnson could have only dreamed of. Their influence in the Bush administration set America on Empire building that alienated millions of Americans.

5.) A silver lining in this may be that Obama will bear the guilt for the serious economic downturn that is 6 months to a year out. The downturn will be sooner and more intense if he insists on pursuing protectionist policies combined with policies of tax increases that burden small businesses.

6.) Obama and the Democrats will not rule from the center. This Democratic President elect and the Democratic leadership in the US House and Senate may be as far left as Henry Wallace and Alger Hiss were in the Roosevelt administration. There is already talk of censoring the radio airwaves, creating a Federalized police force, cutting defense spending by 25%, serious cap and trade policies that will have the effect of wealth flowing out of America to the rest of the world, and a clear pursuit of wealth redistribution here in the states.

7.) The Democratic party will pursue globalism. Look for the Democrats to become very cozy with the United Nations.

8.)With a overwhelming Democratic victory the National Education Association as well as all unions will be greatly empowered again. Look for legislation that will make homeschooling more difficult.

9.) There will be absolutely no advance on any pro-life issues for the next four years. Obama is more pro-murder then any candidate that could have been elected. Indeed, look for pro-life issues to suffer significant losses.

It is possible that what we have witnessed this evening is a political realignment that may not change for a generation. The last realignment of this nature was in 1968 with the election of Richard Nixon and which rose to its nadir in the Reagan years.

I am not without hope this evening but I am very saddened. I believe resistance will be difficult and may even have consequences that are not pleasant to consider.

God is sovereign.

The American worker has produced more per person at any time, but it hasn’t been shared, and that’s the problem because we have been guided by a republican administration who believes in this simplistic notion that people who have wealth are entitled to keep it and they have an antipathy towards the means of redistributing wealth.”

Jim Moran — US Congressman
Democrat — 8th District of Virginia

“The very same people who don’t want the Fairness Doctrine (Government censorship of radio airwaves) want the Federal Communications Commission to limit pornography on the air. I am for that… But you can’t say government hands off in one area to a commercial enterprise but you are allowed to intervene in another. That’s not consistent.”

Senator Chuck Shumer
Democrat — New York

Yeah, I understood Lane’s original post just fine – it was about trusting in God’s sovereignty in the midst of the possible election of a man who had led an “evil” career. But he also warns, if the “other guy” is elected (the one he does not criticize!), not to think that “God won.”

Look, I understand part of what it means to campaign is to demonize your opponent. I understand that Obama is probably not quite as wicked as he is being made out to be. Still, I would say “evil” is an appropriate adjective to describe Obama’s career. I mean, “evil” has no meaning if we cannot use it to describe his opposition to the “Infant Born Alive Act.” Any, pooh, poohing of Obama’s career as being evil requires the person pooh poohing to step back and take a deep breath in order to examine whether or not he would call anything “evil.”

Okay, let’s do call a spade a spade – you’re calling a man being evil because his policies are different than yours. Comparing those who stand “idly by” and allow Obama to be elected to those who stood “idly by” while Hitler rose to power is a perfect example of silly verbal pyrotechnics.

Says who? You? Who are you that I should be mindful of your analysis?

It is not verbal pyrotechnics in the slightest to call a spade a ruddy shovel. Here is a man whose policies included creating a national police force (KGB anyone?) includes bankrupting the industry that creates 80% of our wealth (extreme tree hugger enviornmentalist) includes Marxist liquor in its 100% proof form. Quite to the contrary I would say that the man is silly who calls warnings about such a man “silly verbal pyrotechnics.”

I think my response stands.

Sorry, just not seeing it.

This is not about being nice or sweet. It’s about being Christian and honest.Explain exactly how socialism (the economic system) is related to the text of the Bible. Where are these admonitions against state involvement in national economies?

Anybody for “Thou Shalt Not Steal.” Also there is the problem is Socialistic systems of the State seeking to seize God’s sovereignty. (Oh, I am dearly going to love this if this turns into a debate on whether or not socialism is biblical.)

Might I suggest you give “Idols for destruction” a read. Particularly bone up on the subject of ressentiment that it covers.

And, exactly which “other anti-Christian” positions does he hold? I have heard nothing about him prohibiting Christian services, printing of bibles, sacraments, the ordaining of ministers and missionaries, or even removing tax-exempt status for goodness sake!

How many anti-Christian positions are enough in order for him to be evil?

Please, do you really think that somebody campaigning for President leads with his chin? It is amazing enough that the socialistic things he believes have come out as much as they have. Still, mark my word, if Obama is elected with a majority Democrat House and Senate you can look for the kind of Hate speech laws that Canada has now. Such laws will effect speech from American pulpits.

Since there is no doubt that we will “lose our freedoms” as you say, I have to ask – which of your freedoms did you lose under Clinton?

Clinton never had a Democratic super-majorities in the House and Senate.

No one is advocating “doing nothing” – but of course that begs the question – where do you get the idea that there is some special Christian duty in this election that people might be shirking?

Oh, could it be something like opposing those who vote against Infants born alive?

God wins – no matter whom He chooses to be elected.

Yes and God won when Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Lenin came to power. And your point is…?

Like Jason Stellman, I really have no horse in this race, but I am very, very alarmed at what elections do to Christians in my own tradition. So much talk about “supporting evil” and “rights” – it’s all worldly thinking folks – it just is

Say’s you. Some of us believe that evil really can incarnate itself in the flesh and blood world we live in. Some of us know ourselves to well, and what we are capable of when given to much unbridled power and so don’t want that same power given to people who have shown themselves to be evil.