A Matter of Time - The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
A Matter of Time
by

WAITING FOR DISILLUSIONMENT
Re: Robert Stacy McCain’s Future Ex-Democrats:

Mr. McCain makes great points. Those that voted for Mr. Wonderful will find it’s a case of too little substance and too much hot air. As a small business owner and employer we find nearly universally that the younger members of our workforce are incredibly ill-informed, undereducated in real world skills, and underperformers in the basics of arithmetic. It might take a person of normal intelligence about 3 minutes with a calculator to determine that the programs being proposed by Washington trolls to be un-fundable without a Clintonesque massive tax increase across the board. Add to that the incredibly short-sighted and disastrous “Bailout” and the tax increase is beyond hope. But then the staffers Mr. Obama is adding are probably already preparing the tax bill. Hide your wallets indeed!
Greg Mercurio
VP Operations, Speck Products
Palo Alto, California

Mr. McCain’s article about the future of disaffected Democrats, along with a strong cup of coffee, woke me up this balmy fall Texas morning. It contained what I supposed to be hope, but failed, however, to lift my heart out of the dump. Banking on disaffected fools who followed the massively deceptive Democratic party, only to wake up too late to convert to conservatism, does nothing to bolster the heart of a mother who is about to send her son back to war for the 9th time. 

The hope for 2010 or 2012 will never materialize, Mr. McCain. Too many were like you, fooled for too long. The United States has embarked down a road where its freedoms will long be gone by 2010. I remember reading (in Sept 2008), about Hugo Chavez being quoted as saying, and I quote directly, “The United States will soon be getting a new constitution written by others.” I remember reading this statement, which he brazenly made on 9/11 of this year and thought, “If folks don’t see that and wake up, then we are lost for sure.”

Now, this morning I read that Russian warships have now arrived in Venezuela. Let the games begin, says Putin, Medvedev, the punk in Iran, and China itself. I am thawing an extra turkey to have ready when they invade and have extra pecans in the freezer to make more of my famous pecan pies. Now, you say I am fatally pessimistic, you bet I am. In fact, the night of the election, when my husband walked into my bedroom to tell me it was all over but the shouting, he said, “I lost my country tonight, the one I fought for.” And I didn’t begin to correct him. 

You all think about 2010. As for me and my family, I am trying to figure out how to build bunkers on our ranches here in Texas and Wyoming. I figure it’s time to give up worrying about the folks waking and seeing a that what they were offered was the call of the Piper who has piped a tune that will lead them down the road of occupation at the hands of others, at the worst, and poverty and real deprivations, on the other.
Bev Gunn
East Texas 

Obama voters will be reluctant to turn on him, because they have invested so much false hope in their leader. Can anyone imagine the gullible and sophomoric Chris Buckley or loathsome Bruce Bartlett turning their backs on their idol? Even after the Muslim terrorists Obama wants to appease renew their war on the US mainland and the economy goes from a short downturn to a deep recession they’ll blame Bush and Republicans. That’s far easier than admitting they were wrong. One can hear the mind numbed robots of the Obamanation chanting “have audacious faith he’ll save us” even as things go from bad to worse.

While windmill farms fail to solve our Democrat inspired economic troubles and the gasoline tax they will raise make the mindless drones of the Northeast, Midwest and Left Coast pay to “save the environment” they’ll defend their messiah, because they’d rather suffer than think. Obama, America’s wannabe Hugo Chavez, is a narcissist and his disciples are looking for a 1930’s European demagogue. This is a dangerous marriage of egotism, ambition and blind faith. Don’t look too quick for them to sour on audacious hope, but do look for calls to shred the Constitution and America’s freedom on behalf of the Kenyan in the White House.
Michael Tomlinson
Camp Habbaniyah, Iraq 

Unfortunately, true as the writer’s premise is, one of Ronald Reagan’s most insightful revelations is also true. The closest thing to eternal life is a government welfare program. 

While many disaffected democrats may well vote for “change” in 2012, our rights will have been permanently diminished. I feel conservative in predicting that our medical care system will have been hijacked; our right to bear arms much infringed; our ability to listen to radio not controlled by the radical left will have been taken away and our practice of our respective religions, save for Islam, will have been further curtailed. Our military will take a huge backwards step and is likely to be perfectly equipped to fight WWI in 2012.

The most serious failing of this administration will in the area of energy. Obama will create a carbon credit market which will raise the price of electricity by at least 25%; he will continue to stifle natural gas and oil production in the US and effectively remove coal and nuclear power from the market. This will have two catastrophic effects: it will destroy the electric production, transmission and distribution system that makes the lights go when you flip a switch; and ensure our continued dependence on people who wish us dead for our oil. 

This was an election where third graders were told by one candidate they would have ice cream and candy for lunch everyday and they voted accordingly. Unfortunately the next election will not matter. Just look at history. When Ronald Reagan took office America had at least four useless and disruptive departments: Energy; Education; Energy and Medicare. Did any of them vanish? No and neither will any of the initiatives and new radical left idiocy instituted by Obama.

To survive America must have a third party. One that tackles waste and corruption head on and does away with all of the federal government not set forth in the Constitution.
Jay Molyneaux 

I think you are overstating the civil knowledge of the “new” Democrat voter of 2008. They don’t strike me as wanting to seek out, let along listen to, the truth. They listen to and believe what the MSM tells them they should believe.

Case in point: All the Dems I have talked to believe we have been in a recession for over two years. Even though there are no facts to back that up. They recite the lines and lies they hear from the MSM.
Truckertim

Did anyone have any doubt that it would turn out this way?

Obama chose Joseph Biden as a running mate. This selection did not conjure premonitions of “change.”

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. I saw his cabinet post selections from afar with my blind eye!
Kane
Greenville, South Carolina

LAWLER’S LAMENT
Re: Joseph Lawler’s Civically Illiterate:

Voter ignorance is not only a fact, it’s depressing for those of us who take the time to stay informed. Here in my home state of Connecticut a question was asked of the voters this past election; Question 1 on the ballot: “Shall there be a Constitutional Convention to amend or revise the Constitution of the State?” Here was a golden opportunity for Connecticut voters to take back some power over their government. A government with an entrenched liberal Democrat legislature completely beholden to special interest groups, that could write a book on “A Trillion Ways To Tax The People,” a judicial system that legislates from the bench forcing gay marriage on us and jeopardizing our property rights with the infamous “eminent domain” ruling, a chance to stop our run-away government, a chance that only comes every 22 years — it did not pass! Thanks to huge special interest campaign money from the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, Gay & Lesbian Advocate and Defenders and the like, a majority of voters were lead to believe that a Constitutional Convention was a bad thing to my utter shock and disbelief.

As much as we’d like to think we are educated and know what’s best as a voting public, we are in fact sheep and the “movers and shakers” know very well that they don’t have to fool all of us, just most of us. And controlling the media, our education centers and the courts allows them to do that and more.
John Nelson
Hebron, Connecticut 

Mr. Lawler brings up a good point. If elected officials are the least informed on American Civics, Free Enterprise, etc., one is immediately led to consider Barack Obama’s grasp of these concepts. During his campaign he seemed blithely unaware that cutting capital gains taxes produced more government revenue. He consistently talked about an income tax cut for 95% of Americans; an impossibility unless “tax cut” is completely redefined as a welfare check. He seemed utterly confused at the confusion over his pronouncements, and kept hammering away at a statement that was mathematically impossible. His “spread the wealth” comment to Joe the Plumber evinced a complete lack of awareness of a Free Enterprise system. Indeed, his unscripted comments reflect a vague Marxist/Collectivist bias with little awareness of market economics. His famous gaffe noting that he had visited “57” states was chalked up as simply a gaffe. What if it was far more than that? What if, as George Bush is linguistically challenged (indeed, some of his comments strongly suggest that he is dyslexic), Barack Obama is dysnumeric, numerically challenged? The evidence so far is that he is. He seems to have no grasp of numbers at all. He makes a public statement that he is going to create 2.5 million jobs by 2011, as if it were a daunting challenge that only a heroic effort and great leadership could effect. Yet it is a piddling number, something that routinely happens going from recession to expansion. Does he not get it? This latter statement was chalked up as a “pragmatic” or modest, and reasonable goal, and he is credited with “pragmatism.” Given Obama’s campaign rhetoric, pragmatic, modest, or small goals seem completely out of character for someone whose vision is nothing less than to “heal the planet.” Did he think his job growth number was a world-shaking statement, a goal as lofty as sending a man to the moon? It is not clear. The silence greeting his goal for job growth is deafening.

I am strongly suspicious that we have someone who is more dysnumeric, leading the nation in the worst financial crisis in a hundred years, than George Bush is dyslexic (Take George Bush’s rhetoric and compare it to Obama’s, and then consider the opposite in terms of numbers). He appears economically illiterate as well. Wall Street also seems to be convinced of my fears. Wait until we get the details on his cap-and-trade proposals. I think they will be stunningly impossible, as they already sound, unless someone reworks them completely. Obama has no idea of the potential economic impact of those proposals (a complete collapse of the American economy), and seems blithely unaware and unconcerned, a sort of Alfred E. Newman position. But then, that seems to be the main characteristic of the American electorate, so it’s a good fit. Blithe ignorance. Bliss personified. America has the leader it deserves. Hopefully, the Forest Gump version of American exceptionalism will hold during an Obama administration, and it will all work out in the end, regardless. So far it always has. As they say, God protects idiots, and the United States of America. God help us again.
Kent Lyon
College Station, Texas

Joseph Lawler laments — “How is democracy to succeed?” — and rightfully so. The best example of where our nation is heading can be found in the UK. There, society has passed the tipping point where a majority of voting citizens rely on government benefits and vote accordingly. Pulling back from the precipice will require statesmen of the highest caliber who, sadly, are in short supply right now. The end of freedom in America is just around the corner. The masses of ignorant and indolent voters will barely notice its passing.
Peter R. McGrath

ADD TO THE PILE
Re: David N. Bass’s The GOP Pile On:

This article confirms what I have been saying for the last two years. Conservatives of all stripes need to leave the Republican Party to the East Coast and D.C. elites and form a third party. The Republicans will continue to mouth conservative platitudes prior to their election campaigns and abandon them as soon as the election is over. 

I would also ask what type of party would select a political hack like John McCain as their standard bearer. I know “he’s a war hero.” Well I served in Vietnam with the First Air Cavalry Division and I don’t believe a person’s military service gives them an automatic pass on the issues. John McCain is a liberal with a liberal voting record on all the issues that matter to conservative.
Paul Martell

I think we lost because we nominated an old, left leaning Republican who stated no message beyond “I was a POW.” He may have had more and better ideas than BObama, as he herked and jerked across the stage screaming I will fight for you!, but they were very difficult to discern. Besides, Democrats fight, Republicans govern and we do it well if we have good Conservative leaders who stand by their principles.
 
Evangelicals had nothing to do with his loss, except for the fact that many probably refused to vote for the old codger and Republicans do not win without them. McCain was not the one. He was too old and too far left.
Judy Beumler
Louisville, Kentucky

HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF
Re: Christopher Holland’s letter (under “Doomsday Curses”) in Reader Mail’s Scurvy Knaves:

Christopher Holland wrote a diabolically whimsical letter about the diabolically whimsical economic policies of Gordon Brown.

Here’s the very latest example: a 45% tax on the “very rich” (anyone earning more than £150,000 a year) to support Brown’s “anti-recession emergency package.”

The full story can be found in any of the online British papers.

Sound familiar? Same cavalier dismissal of the lessons of history? Same tragic lack of understanding of how an economy recovers?

Same result?
A. C. Santore

WHERE? CERTAINLY NOT CAMPUSES
Re: Jay D. Homnick’s Non Campus Mentis:

I am very concerned about this issue of liberalism on college campuses. As a graduate student at a major university (and a proud bitterly clinging conservative), I am appalled at the amount of hard earned money that parents dump in the tank for their beloved kids to be indoctrinated at these places. We need to fight this liberalism like every inch of beach at Iwo Jima like Marines with flamethrowers.  

Where is the accountability that these faculties and boards have to the taxpayers who fund their high salaries? Where are the parents who cough up these tuition dollars only to see them spent on socializing their lovely child with values that were not taught in their living room?
Theodore Croy

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