A Note On Our Future

[rbaker]

This was sent to me and I am passing it along.


"Amid the jubilation of the Eastern Establishment and the proclamations of redemption for past sins, a defeated minority of Americans, myself among them, is experiencing an altogether different flood of emotions in the aftermath of the peoples verdict. Bewilderment, disbelief, even shame.

When the roar of the masses fades, we are left with a man born to run for the nation’s highest office but ill equipped to hold it. In a mere two months, The White House will be occupied by someone who speaks of hope and building up yet will undoubtedly attempt to tear down the last vestiges of our constitutional government. George Washington’s simple faith, Coolidge’s sincerity, and Regan’s drive to preserve a free people contrast starkly with this demagogue, who degrades reason through petty persuasion.

To him the inalienable rights of man are not life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness but whatever government deems them to be. Nor does his trust reside in the character and ideals of a free people under the faithful eye of a sovereign God. Rather, at his core is an abiding faith in his own ability to transform a nation.

From the coming tyranny few institutions and customs are safe. Freedom of religion and economic liberty are obstacles on the road to a perfect society to be built through judicial decree and executive mandate.

For the philosophical descendants of Kirk, Buckley, and Goldwater, three options remain in the face of this impending calamity: apathy, détente, or confrontation. Apathy is inconceivable as the lives and livelihoods of our fellow citizens and their posterity is at stake. Peaceful coexistence is unjustifiable, as any compromise with evil is bound to result in evil. Compromise with reasonable statesmen of conflicting philosophies is often noble, but concessions to a despot are the first steps toward slavery. Confrontation, then, is the course we must take. The battle is lost, but the war may yet be won."

[Judy Canty]

Oh good grief!

[For-Life]

I swear, so many of you have forgotten the last 8 years.

Edit - I would also love to see what freedoms you think he will take away. You specifically mentioned Freedom of Religion. Want to talk more about that? Or is this just fear talk with absolutely no back up or evidence?

[Judy Canty]

I was plesantly surprised by conservative David Brooks today:



By DAVID BROOKS
Published: November 21, 2008

Jan. 20, 2009, will be a historic day. Barack Obama (Columbia, Harvard Law) will take the oath of office as his wife, Michelle (Princeton, Harvard Law), looks on proudly. Nearby, his foreign policy advisers will stand beaming, including perhaps Hillary Clinton (Wellesley, Yale Law), Jim Steinberg (Harvard, Yale Law) and Susan Rice (Stanford, Oxford D. Phil.).

The domestic policy team will be there, too, including Jason Furman (Harvard, Harvard Ph.D.), Austan Goolsbee (Yale, M.I.T. Ph.D.), Blair Levin (Yale, Yale Law), Peter Orszag (Princeton, London School of Economics Ph.D.) and, of course, the White House Counsel Greg Craig (Harvard, Yale Law).

This truly will be an administration that looks like America, or at least that slice of America that got double 800s on their SATs. Even more than past administrations, this will be a valedictocracy — rule by those who graduate first in their high school classes. If a foreign enemy attacks the United States during the Harvard-Yale game any time over the next four years, we’re screwed.

Already the culture of the Obama administration is coming into focus. Its members are twice as smart as the poor reporters who have to cover them, three times if you include the columnists. They typically served in the Clinton administration and then, like Cincinnatus, retreated to the comforts of private life — that is, if Cincinnatus had worked at Goldman Sachs, Williams & Connolly or the Brookings Institution. So many of them send their kids to Georgetown Day School, the posh leftish private school in D.C., that they’ll be able to hold White House staff meetings in the carpool line.

And yet as much as I want to resent these overeducated Achievatrons (not to mention the incursion of a French-style government dominated by highly trained Enarchs), I find myself tremendously impressed by the Obama transition.

The fact that they can already leak one big appointee per day is testimony to an awful lot of expert staff work. Unlike past Democratic administrations, they are not just handing out jobs to the hacks approved by the favored interest groups. They’re thinking holistically — there’s a nice balance of policy wonks, governors and legislators. They’re also thinking strategically. As Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute notes, it was smart to name Tom Daschle both the head of Health and Human Services and the health czar. Splitting those duties up, as Bill Clinton did, leads to all sorts of conflicts.

Most of all, they are picking Washington insiders. Or to be more precise, they are picking the best of the Washington insiders.

Obama seems to have dispensed with the romantic and failed notion that you need inexperienced “fresh faces” to change things. After all, it was L.B.J. who passed the Civil Rights Act. Moreover, because he is so young, Obama is not bringing along an insular coterie of lifelong aides who depend upon him for their well-being.

As a result, the team he has announced so far is more impressive than any other in recent memory. One may not agree with them on everything or even most things, but a few things are indisputably true.

First, these are open-minded individuals who are persuadable by evidence. Orszag, who will probably be budget director, is trusted by Republicans and Democrats for his honest presentation of the facts.

Second, they are admired professionals. Conservative legal experts have a high regard for the probable attorney general, Eric Holder, despite the business over the Marc Rich pardon.

Third, they are not excessively partisan. Obama signaled that he means to live up to his postpartisan rhetoric by letting Joe Lieberman keep his committee chairmanship.

Fourth, they are not ideological. The economic advisers, Furman and Goolsbee, are moderate and thoughtful Democrats. Hillary Clinton at State is problematic, mostly because nobody has a role for her husband. But, as she has demonstrated in the Senate, her foreign-policy views are hardheaded and pragmatic. (It would be great to see her set of interests complemented by Samantha Power’s set of interests at the U.N.)

Finally, there are many people on this team with practical creativity. Any think tanker can come up with broad doctrines, but it is rare to find people who can give the president a list of concrete steps he can do day by day to advance American interests. Dennis Ross, who advised Obama during the campaign, is the best I’ve ever seen at this, but Rahm Emanuel also has this capacity, as does Craig and legislative liaison Phil Schiliro.

Believe me, I’m trying not to join in the vast, heaving O-phoria now sweeping the coastal haute bourgeoisie. But the personnel decisions have been superb. The events of the past two weeks should be reassuring to anybody who feared that Obama would veer to the left or would suffer self-inflicted wounds because of his inexperience. He’s off to a start that nearly justifies the hype.

[JRS]

RBaker, you passing that on because you believe it... or find it as humorous as I do?

[rinselberg]

We need a picture to go around with that email..



I say give him a chance. We (collectively) ran him up the flagpole. Now let's see who salutes.

[fjpod]

What a terrible piece to pass along. It's unpatriotic to condem the man that Americans just elected through due process. Let's actually let him get something done in the next four years. Maybe, just maybe, something constructive will happen, unlike some of the disasters that have been happening lately.

Let the man do his job. He has certainly proven himself to be a professional and not a clown. The electorate has spoken.

[icare]

Those who have disseminated this vile are the fear mongers.

Control through fear was the mainstay of the Bush administration. Such was the arrogance and conceit of the outgoing regime.

Fond farewell!:cheers:

[Judy Canty]

I'm calling it "fear fatigue". We're all just tired of dire and color-coded warnings, unproven negatives and the like. I normally don't care for David Brooks but this editorial really surprised me.

[hcjilson]

This was sent to me and I am passing it along.


"Amid the jubilation of the Eastern Establishment and the proclamations of redemption for past sins, a defeated minority of Americans, myself among them, is experiencing an altogether different flood of emotions in the aftermath of the peoples verdict. Bewilderment, disbelief, even shame.

Now he knows how I felt after the 2004 election!:D

Why Dick thought it necessary to pass this along is beyond me...but he did none the less.

[For-Life]

Now he knows how I felt after the 2004 election!:D

Why Dick thought it necessary to pass this along is beyond me...but he did none the less.

and at least you knew what to expect, after the previous last four years

[hcjilson]

I know what to expect now.......CHANGE!

[Jacqui]

I know what to expect now.......CHANGE!

Hopefully

[Steve Machol]

In a mere two months, The White House will be occupied by someone who speaks of hope and building up yet will undoubtedly attempt to tear down the last vestiges of our constitutional government.

You don't really believe that nonsense, do you?! Has anyone bothered to notice that Bush has done to the Constitution and Separation of Powers in the last 8 years?

The rantings of the lunatic right would be funny if they also weren't so dangerous. Look at the drastic increase in number of threats against the Obama family when Palin started her 'palling around with terrorists' attacks.

[ksquared]

We need a picture to go around with that email..



I say give him a chance. We (collectively) ran him up the flagpole. Now let's see who salutes.

Kudoos to the Rinselberg for his post.

Hopefully we'll even see some of that change migrate to the Obti-board.

Let's see …. we already have a poster or two acknowledging the intellectual prowess and objectivity of David Brooks. Now granted it was probably only due to the fact that the poster agreed with his op-ed. After all agreeing with something means it must be right or worthy of any attention. But at least it was a start.

Who knows, maybe as we move forward we'll even see an end to the President bashing that has been so prevalent here the last 8 years. Why we spend all this energy complaining about something has always been a mystery to me. Helloooo….. Bush wasn’t running in 2008 and his term actually ends in January 2009. Although a few will be unable to move past this (old habits are hard to break), I personally am a big believer in change.

And I am very sorry to burst another bubble but…

Presidents don’t get to do everything they want. Everything that happens is a compromise. Every decision has consequences, good and bad. If you have ever worked on a national committee or ran a successful company (or even a marriage) you would know this to be true. Complaining gets you what? Resentment when things don’t go according to your plan and unrealistic expectations when things seemingly do.

Plus consider this, if things don’t work out with President Obama in charge you can always go back to blaming it on Bush. Just like had McCain been elected we could have blamed it on the racist attitudes of those bigoted white folk. But in the meantime, let’s move forward. Which reminds me of something I read once..

Do what you want, but for me and my house…….

[MarcE]

"we are left with a man born to run for the nation’s highest office but ill equipped to hold it. In a mere two months, The White House will be occupied by someone who speaks of hope and building up yet will undoubtedly attempt to tear down the last vestiges of our constitutional government. George Washington’s simple faith, Coolidge’s sincerity, and Regan’s drive to preserve a free people contrast starkly with this demagogue, who degrades reason through petty persuasion.

To him the inalienable rights of man are not life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness but whatever government deems them to be. Nor does his trust reside in the character and ideals of a free people under the faithful eye of a sovereign God. Rather, at his core is an abiding faith in his own ability to transform a nation.

From the coming tyranny few institutions and customs are safe. Freedom of religion and economic liberty are obstacles on the road to a perfect society to be built through judicial decree and executive mandate.

"

This was dated November 2000, right? Wow, it was right on! Especially the part about degrading reason, and taking away freedoms through executive mandate.

As a registered Republician and a conservative thinker, I am appalled at what G.W. Bush has done to this country and the office of the president.

[rbaker]

I neither endorsed nor opposed this message. I did find its points very clearly stated and I passed it along to elicit some response and perhaps some intelligent discussion.

Please do not kill the messenger.
.

[hcjilson]

If you can't stand the heat,standing in the kitchen is a bad idea. No one is killing the messenger, just wondering why anyone felt the message needed to be delivered......intelligent discussion notwithstanding. Perhaps it was delivered to heat things up?? In any event. a statement like this; "From the coming tyranny " made by someone who may or may not be aware of 2 of the three accepted definitions of the word, without benefit of seeing the new President on the job one day, stretches it's author's creditability. At least he or she knew there were 2 n's in tyranny.

[JRS]

I think the following link may provide the source - 2nd page.

http://www.franciscan.edu/imagebase/...roub111308.pdf

[rbaker]

I think the following link may provide the source - 2nd page.

www.franciscan.edu/imagebase/campuslife/troub/troub111308.pdf

Thanks for the original source. I received it from a professor at the College of the Holy Cross. Them Jesuits have been known to read Franciscan literature.

[Steve Machol]

I studied with the Jesuits for 3 years. If they ever read Franciscan literature, it was just for laughs. ;)

[DragonLensmanWV]

Glad to see the Conservatives are taking their loss so badly. Problem is this cretinous thinking is rampant. Somehow they think that their own elitist intellectualism in forecasting doom makes them oh so much smarter when all it does is reinforce their own mental inadequacy.
I think what their plot is to forecast doom (somehow that makes them feel superior I guess) and unrest, THEN when Obama takes office they'll rise up in traitorous dissent, fulfilling their own prediction, then trying to blame it on others. Like the cowards they are.

I think you posted that there because you truly believe every single word of it. I hope you don't.

[For-Life]

I heard Mike Hucklebee talking about how his party failed citizens with the spend, spend, spend. He said that they have to move back to smarter fiscal balance. I agree 100% (the Dems have to too).

Only thing is that the GOP is fighting to removing sponsorship limits for funding parties and candidates. I have a hard time believing that as long as special interest groups, organizations, individuals and businesses can donate whatever they want, that there will be continued corrupt spending.

[Spexvet]

I'd just like to continue the sentiment of the first post and declare that the next repubican that is elected to any position will bring about the end of civilization as we know it. My reasons, curiously enough, are exactly those expressed in the first post. Sorry, I can't say that and keep a straight face - just kidding.

[Grubendol]

Are you aware of the constitional deconstruction that has happened over the past 7 years?

Or the fact that This “ill prepared” man was a professor of Constitutional Law? A student of US history and constitutional history? A man who probably knows more about the Constitution than Alberto Gonzalez could ever dream of?

Or the fact that he passed up an offered position as a clerk in the US Supreme Court so that he could “community organize” on the South Side of Chicago?


Good Grief. Some of the best presidents this country has ever had have had no “Administrative” experience.

Washington
Lincoln
Jefferson
Madison
Kennedy
Eisenhower
Truman

And you could argue on both sides (depending on your point of view) that the worst presidents over the last 100 years have been those with governing experience (Gov. Clinton, Gov. Reagan, Gov. Bush)