TUNING OUT
Re: Philip Klein’s
Time to Get Out the Iron:
My experiences and other anecdotal evidence is that most people
have essentially tuned out Obama and his ilk. He is for all
appearances irrelevant to a majority of the public especially
when he continues to tell “whoppers”about health care. The only
groups that support him en mass are the hard left and, of course,
the Black community with the exception of a very small number of
informed conservative Blacks. This latter point is really sad
since most Black Americans would be horrified if they really
thought about Obama’s hard left agenda. But back to my main
point, I was having lunch this past weekend by myself in a
popular family style restaurant (the clientele is heavily
seniors) and when my lunch was brought I somewhat reluctantly
asked the waitress if she could please turn down the nearby TV
monitor that had Obama delivering his very partisan Labor Day
address. I had never been so bold before, usually not wanting to
offend anyone, but I knew I could not enjoy my lunch and my copy
of TAS if I had to listen to Obama in the background.
Interestingly she did so and no one objected that I know of. But
do we make a serious mistake by assuming Obama is irrelevant and
go about our every day business while he and the hard left go
about the dismantling of our freedoms? Probably, but otherwise we
would have a great deal of indigestion.
— Jack Wheatley
Royal Oak, Michigan
Robert Gibbs wanted Fox to preempt “Dancing with the Stars” for
this?
— Dan Martin
Pittsburgh
GOING TO WASTE
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr.’s
Is Pat Buchanan a Crank?:
Another superb (as always) commentary by RET. I gave up reading
anything by Pat Buchanan ages ago, when he and some other
so-called conservatives (i.e. Paul Craig Roberts) fell off the
conservative truck and landed in a heap of liberal cow manure,
which apparently saturated their pores and led to some sort of
dementia. Perhaps, however, blogger Stephanie is correct in
asserting that Mr. Buchanan has spent too much time hanging with
the derelicts over at PMSNBC, thereby leading to some sort of
intellectual mange.
It’s sad to see a good conservative mind go to waste.
— Jim Bjaloncik
Stow, Ohio
No, he just cannot connect with Jews because he believed through
his religion as a Catholic, that the Jews killed Jesus. The Pope
apologized to the Jews in 1994 for their terrible treatment of
the Jews. Pat still has not got the message, that we all sinned
and need a Savior, desperately.
— Arlene
St. Louis, Missouri
I wasn’t at the event, but have read PJB (as well as others) on
this. It is true the Hitler had, as you say, “limited
geopolitical aims,” especially when compared to the British
Empire. (Or the Soviets)
I don’t however recall that PJB simply credits Churchill’s
response to the complexities of the European situation as simply
or merely excited overreactions.
It is all too clear that Hitler was a racist, but then so was
Churchill. Read Churchill on Gandhi.
Was Hitler a lunatic? Read Ron Rosenbaum’s “Explaining Hitler.”
He was incredibly evil and deluded, for sure.
He was a military incompetent, but nor more so than Churchill.
I don’t think Pat is a crank.
— Robert Christian
Philadelphia
NEW JERSEY-STYLE TALIBAN
Re: George H. Wittman’s
Foreign Policy By Avoidance:
In his third paragraph Mr. Wittman refers to a Taliban-imposed
“protection tax” on U.S. economic projects in Afghanistan, and
says that such payoffs long preceded the Taliban and indeed are
common throughout the less-developed world.
Hmmm. Does that include the construction and “waste management”
industries in Northern New Jersey and the New York metro area?
Just wondering.
— Chuck
PAYING FOR CALM
Re: Stacy Cline’s Money
Business:
“Throughout the less-developed world there are similar payoffs.
That this is hot news for the Obama foreign policy establishment
shows its naïveté.”
Democrats naive? I thought they invented the age-old practice of
zagat, aka extortion. Why would they be surprised to see our
forces in Afghanistan paying zagat to protect infrastructure?
Maybe it’s just the intellectuals in the State Department who are
confused. Here is a quick lesson for them.
Imagine a Democratic senator from a far-away land who, for some
inexplicable reason, is forced from his seat of power. We don’t
have to use our imagination, let’s use Tom Daschle.
Though forced from power, he is still armed with knowledge and
influence that can be exploited for profit. Enter Alston &
Bird. These guys know who is vulnerable and operating in
unfamiliar terrain. Alston & Bird gently persuades them to
pay large fees to have their emissary broker protection.
Insurance outfit United Health is roughly analogous to our armed
forces paying for calm. Zagat!
— Dan Martin
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvnia
Ms. Cline in her humorous allusion, “Government can give, and it
can also take away,” offers greater truth than the collective of
The One’s rhetorical greatest hits. Of course, Ms. Cline is
ironically replacing the term Lord with that of government, but
in many minds, including explicit denial of God by the Left,
government has sincerely replaced God.
When the absolutes of God are replaced with the relativistic
morality and situational ethics of government, man can (and does)
make up the rules as he goes along. Abortion, no matter what
trimester, is no longer a question of morality but of unfettered
rights (and none of those pesky responsibilities). When the
kleptocracratic government chooses to run up huge deficits and
spend money to buy off the populace, consideration of the rights
of present or future citizens need not be given: the
administration needs to be kept in power, and buying votes is
simply the way things are done. (Many a Caesar spent opulently on
bread and circuses; they believed they were accountable to
neither man nor God.) Decisions by the Federal Coordinating
Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research (“Death Panels”)
as to what is “best” for the elderly who are no longer productive
enough, become acceptable with simple (if not despicable) logic:
“Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not
invidious discrimination; every person lives through different
life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds
receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now
was previously 25 years.” The are not the words of just any man
on the street, but a doctor, and not just any doctor, but Dr.
Ezekiel Emanuel, President Obama’s choice for Health Care Czar.
As long as man’s wisdom supersedes God’s word, the outcome will
be disastrous.
Certainly the Left is guilty of marginalizing and denying God,
but the Right is not without fault. As Ms. Cline points out,
“Where there is gain to be had, people will find a way to gain
it.” The problem with capitalism is the capitalists who cannot
see anything but gain and loss. The cause of capitalism gained
greatly by the words of Ayn Rand and her Objectivism, but Rand
purposely denies a higher power and higher calling. When
government (as an entity) acts in its own self-interest, putting
aside all God given morality and responsibilities, the people
become servants to the state. By what reason or moral does one
rail against government if it serves one’s personal interests?
Without God, the answer is silence. Capitalism, unchecked and
unbalanced by a higher purpose, is also a danger to our forming a
more perfect union.
Taking a teleological view, man is best served when we pay unto
Caesar that which is his and also pay unto God His portion.
— I.M. Kessel
P.J. O’Rourke said it best:
“As long as buying and selling are controlled by law, the first
things bought and sold will be the lawmakers.”
— Martin Owens
Sacramento, California
OLD PRODUCT, NEW PACKAGE
Re: Quin Hillyer’s
Alabama
Byrne-ing:
We now know how Mr. Byrne stands on education. Where does he
stand on other issues? Right to life? Cutting taxes? The Second
Amendment?
It has been my experience that “New South” equals “Old Liberalism
In A New Package.”
— Michael Skaggs
Murray, Kentucky
HATE SQUAD
Re: Matthew Vadum’s
Obama’s Plan to Desecrate 9/11:
What unbelievable un-American and divisive rhetoric! Who does
Matthew Vadum think he is? The one and only framer of the meaning
of patriotism? We’re a nation, not a group of thugs who demonize
our neighbors when we disagree. I’m no flaming LIBRUL, but I’ll
most likely become one after reading his garbage. Would Matthew
Vadum prefer a day of “Hate” to one of good will? I guess he’s
entitled to his opinion, but his writing smells of vicious
name-calling. Keep writing, Matthew maybe the more Americans will
be recruited to your “Hate Squad.”
— Jim Ginch
THE STEPFORD PRESIDENT
Re: Peter Ferrara’s
All the President’s Nuts:
Obama … Obama … Obama. Hmmmmm. Oh wait a minute. Isn’t that
the humble young man who always denies credit for his silently
appointed czars’ left-of-left proposed plans…to upgrade the
unions, take over big industries, free the naughty people who
planned and executed an attack on the United States? Is that the
guy who spread all the credit for his un-stimulating
economy-saving plan among some dozen Democrat leaders who
promptly refused to read whatever it was they had written? If the
news media would only reveal his picture once in a while, I would
have recognized him in a minute; and if that same dependable news
media would only publish his speeches once in a while, I would
have been better prepared. But yes, now I’ll know him when I see
him at the next Town Hall meeting. Yes indeed. The first Stepford
president. Yeah, now I know. Now I know.
— Nancy Murphy
DIMINISHING APPLAUSE
The curtain falls
With no curtain calls.
It’s time to get out the hook.
The part’s been played.
He’s overstayed.
His downfall is by the book.
The adage is true.
There is nothing new.
He’s predictable to the core.
He has never heard
The admonishing word,
“Always leave them wanting more.”
As the makeup comes off,
As the bright lights dim,
Some may have trouble
Remembering him.
— Mimi Evans Winship
