VICTORY’S MASQUERADE – PART I

I have taken this week to consider all that I have seen in the passing of the health care bill. I watched what we called “debate” on C-SPAN, I listened to pundits on both sides of  the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (P.L. 111-148), and paid attention to the speeches eager to find glimpses of political reason.

Now that it is law, I hope Americans discovered what I did:

1.) Victory in this case had nothing to do with party affiliations. The G.O.P. was clearly on the losing side. That does not imply the wrong side, mind you, but they were the obvious minority. The Left’s opposition were not the Republicans. They had been rendered politically impotent. The meaningful party of "no" was comprised of Democrats. The opposing voices were members of their own party and the vast majority of America’s citizens who did not want the all-encompassing scope of this bill to become law. The popping of the champagne corks proclaiming victory came at the cost of—and in the faces of—their own party members and the voting constituency they swore an oath to represent. Let the reader beware.

2.) Opposition is irrelevant. It became quite clear that political reason and political integrity was abandoned for expediency. Circumventing convention and due process to pass a bill at any cost has proven that those in power will do whatever it takes to achieve their agenda. Their oath to uphold the constitution meant—and means—nothing. If there was a way around doing things conventionally, it was (and will) be exploited. Let the reader beware.

3.) The legislative branch is being neutered. Once a person or a government body walks down the path of compromise, driving them down that road becomes easier and easier until it becomes commonplace. The House and Senate have taken the walk on the dark side, stretching the purpose of reconciliation beyond its intent to appease the president. They circumvented the system, the checks and balances, and threw their reputations under the bus. This will not be the last time. Expect the White House to crack the whip more, forcing Pelosi and Reid onto that road again and again, until Neutered Street intersects with Irrelevancy Avenue. Patriots beware.

Political Reason will pick up with PART II, so check back soon.

MORE OF THE SAME CHANGE

During the 2008 campaign, the charge routinely levelled against the Republican ticket was that a vote for McCain-Palin was a vote for 4-more years of failed Bush policies.

Let’s see if we can identify a few of those dreaded policies which had to be avoided:

1. "Out-of-control" deficit spending
2. That dreaded Patriot Act that infringed on American privacy
3. Too many secret meetings and back-room deals conducted behind closed doors
4. Unilateral decision-making that negatively affected our allies
5. Excessive use of Executive Orders
6. Holding enemy combatants in a Guantanamo prison (instead of a mainland prison)
7. An Oval Office that acted in spite of the will of the populace
8. Escalating war efforts in Afghanistan
9. A chief executive who used the process of reconciliation to get its way
10. A president who spent his time on everything BUT jobs
11. A president who avoided press conferences
12. And others

What was the political reason for avoiding John Sidney McCain, again? Now that President Barak Hussein Obama has been in office, aren’t we glad we avoided more-of-the-same for all that “hope and change?”

NOW WE KNOW: THE PRESIDENT IS ANTI-SEMITIC

Let me make sure I understand this. Since the president's inauguration the hue and cry has been that those who speak out against the policies of Barak Obama are racists. This argument is an attempt to emotionally hamstring and silence opposing views. No one wants to be accused of being a racists.

As a child of the 60’s, I remember all too well the violence that held our country in a chokehold. I witnessed it firsthand. I have also seen those tensions relegated to the history books as Caucasians have, on the whole, moved beyond racist attitudes.

But let us hold onto that thought for a moment; that to oppose President Obama is to proclaim one’s racist ways. There is a political reason to prop up such propaganda, but for those out there who hold fast to this dogma, let us see how it stands up to scrutiny.

This week the international press reported over and over again how Barak Obama deeply humiliated Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. The issue? Israel’s construction of homes in a largely Arab section of her capital city, Jerusalem.

Given the premise that to oppose a national leader’s policies constitutes racism, must it therefore follow that President Obama is an anti-Semite? Clearly he opposes Netanyahu’s position on Jewish settlements. Further, by demanding that these settlements cease, Barak Obama insists on racial segregation: keeping peoples apart rather than bringing them together in community—a throwback to failed American policy over the last two centuries.

To add further injury to insult, our commander-in-chief refused to dine with Jews, Benjamin Netanyau and his staff. How else could this rude behavior be interpreted other than as anti-Semitic?

Following the established pattern, that opposition to a national leader is a clear and present indication of racism, then I guess we must also confess that the president of the United States is guilty of anti-Semitism.

The shoe is now firmly on the other foot and it feels quite uncomfortable.

I did not make these racist rules, the Left did. I did not start the folderal that to oppose a leader’s policies is equal to being a racist. I am however, applying the same political reason they have promoted, which of course, demonstrates no reason at all.

So let us be done with this once and for all! Those who speak out against the policies of Barak Obama or the Democrats are not racists lashing out from a place of emotional desperation. To falsely accuse fellow Americans of such behavior only casts a dark cloud on those who profess such shallow nonsense.

WHAT WE HAVE BECOME

I received this note from a friend of mine this week, and share it now with you.—J. H.

“In my youth, there were groups of passionate protestors who believed that their national leaders were taking America down the wrong path. They feared that the federal government had taken their rights away, was becoming too powerful, and was flat out ignoring what the people wanted. They went to rallies, they shouted to the rooftops, and even though they were ridiculed by the leaders and the media, they ultimately brought about political change.

“Today, those protesters are in Congress and the White House. They are making sweetheart deals above our heads, they belittle those who disagree with them, and they ignore those who protest. CNN says 56% of Americans believe the government has become so powerful, it is an immediate threat to our rights and freedoms.

“I guess we become what we fear. And I fear what we have become.”

—A. Bartmess