Do you know anything about Ju-Jitsu? It’s the martial art
developed by Japanese Samurai to aid a lone warrior without his
weapon confronting an armed opponent. When such direct combat seems
suicidal, the technique becomes to use your opponent’s
own weight against him rather than trying to overcome
his with your own diminished force.
Jujutsu developed among the samurai
of feudal Japan as a method for defeating an armed and armored
opponent in which one uses no weapon, or only a short weapon.
Because striking against an armored opponent proved ineffective,
practitioners learned that the most efficient methods for
neutralizing an enemy took the form of pins, joint locks, and
throws. These techniques were developed around the principle of
using an attacker’s energy against him, rather than directly
opposing it. (Wikipedia)
Now before we go any further, I think it’s important for
Republicans to admit how badly outgunned they are by Obama on this
Fiscal Cliff thing. Watching Boehner & Company march to the
precipice is like watching the French aristocracy being led to the
guillotine.
Let’s face it, we are now living in a banana republic. We still
have elections and a democratic system but so do Venezuela and
Argentina. Hugo Chavez was just re-elected in Venezuela with 54
percent of the vote. Obama got 52 percent. Is there a difference?
Does Venezuela have an entrepreneurial class? Certainly, but as far
as the majority and the left-wing press are concerned, they are
Public Enemy #1, ripe for exploitation. As in America they are
outgunned and outvoted by a lumpen mass that worships the Great
Leader and wants him take care of them.
Look at the African-American vote. Almost every black person in
America voted for Obama. In some precincts of Philadelphia was 100
percent. Even black Republicans such as Colin Powell and Charles
Barkley voted for Obama. Why? “It’s a black thing, you wouldn’t
understand.” African-Americans want to see one of their own
succeed. They don’t care if Obama wants to put Republicans in
prison, they’ll vote for him. Blacks only constitute 13 percent of
the electorate but voting as a bloc they have tremendous leverage.
Will Republicans ever be able to make a dent in this by talking
about school choice or black unemployment? Forget about it. That
deadly combination of charismatic leadership and socialist
economics is just too powerful.
Then there’s the wet-your-pants media and the intelligentsia
personified by Chris Matthews. For them the narrative of American
has become the Oppressors versus the Oppressed. Nobody ever made it
on their own in America. They only made it by joining tribes of
fellow blacks, women, Hispanics, minorities, gays, lesbians,
what-have-you, to fight against — who? Why the White Male
Establishment, of course, personified by the Republican Party. Mitt
Romney was by the standard of any other era a remarkable example of
a family man, faithful to his wife, raising a passel of children,
making a success of himself, creating thousands of jobs for others,
giving to charities, performing unknown acts of kindness without
bragging about them. Yet for huge chunks of the population, this
not only didn’t resonate but was genuinely repulsive. Why was he
involved in the War on Women? Why wasn’t one of his children gay?
Where were his two drops of Indian blood?
So the intelligentsia has gone overboard for Obama and is going
to stay that way. Next comes Hillary and the same thing all over
again. And let us not fail to note that while Middle America may be
in the doldrums from all this, the intelligentsia is prospering.
Last week I happened to be in Washington and when I boarded the
Metro was handed a copy of the Express, a giveaway owned
by the Washington Post, which carried the follow
front-page feature:
STRESSED? OVERWORKED? NOT HERE: Washington workers are
happier than you might expect, a Post poll finds.
Now some news that may seem counterintuitive, given the
stereotype of Washingtonians as dull, stressed-out workaholics: We
are happy. We like our jobs. If we work more than 40 hours a week,
we don’t seem to mind. We love our full lives.…
In interviews with a number of these poll respondents, we found
residents of all demographic and geographic stripes determined not
to let their work dominate them. We found people focused on
spending time with their kids, spouses, boats — intent on finding
jobs that are fulfilling and meaningful, yet not overwhelming.…
“People in Washington have jobs and roles that are highly
energizing. These are mission jobs — it’s not like you’re washing
cars. There are lots of smart young people enjoying each other’s
company; that’s as energizing as the job itself,” [says] Jane
Weizman of Towers Watson, a human relations consulting company in
Arlington…
Wait, Money Can Buy Happiness?
Part of Washingtonians’ contentment may stem from the area’s
prosperity. We asked in the Post poll to describe the state of
their personal finances, 68 percent of adults here said excellent
or good. In a nationwide Bloomberg poll, only 27 percent said
excellent or good.
If Republicans were running a regime in which a small contingent
in Washington prospered while the rest of the country wallowed in
despair, would the press fail to take notice? Would this story have
a different spin? Instead, the Express article was
festooned with figures of bureaucrats superimposed with happy
smiling faces.
Republicans are being branded as The Party of The Rich and Big
Business. They are not. They are the party of small business and
non-cosmopolitan Americans not yet enveloped by the web of Big
Government. Big business doesn’t care who is in power. They always
adjust. Look at General Electric. It is prospering on subsidized
windmills while CEO Jeff Immelt heads the President’s Council on
Jobs and Competitiveness. True, such fellow travelers may
ultimately find the Wrath of the People turned against them, but by
that time it’s too late. Sorry, fellas.
People who started small and worked their way up have been the
backbone of American prosperity and what made this country great.
John Boehner is right to go weepy-eyed about life in his father’s
tavern. But that kind of Horatio Alger story has been replace by
the saga of the Oppressed Minority versus The Establishment, which
of course is all those Horatio Algers grown up. Mitt Romney was
actually heckled when he visited the White House the other week.
With the economy poised for another miserable four years,
Republicans are on the verge of becoming the Sinister But Powerful
Minority that bedevils every country led by a Great Leader.
So here’s where the ju-jitsu comes in. Use Obama’s
strength against him. As the President and Congress
approach the Fiscal Cliff, Republicans should back off and say,
“Alright, you’re the President. You won the election.
Go ahead and do whatever you want. Raise
taxes, draw up more plans for big government, print more money,
forget the deficit.”
Rand Paul has suggested such an approach and I agree with him
completely.
Sure the economy will go into another four-year tailspin. Sure
we’ll come to regard 7.5 percent unemployment as an improvement.
But whatever happens, Obama will have to take the
blame. Republicans may think that they’re rescuing
small businesses and protecting job creators by standing tall on
taxes but they are only putting their heads in the noose.
Whatever compromise they are able to wring out of the
President will become the basis for blaming Republicans for the
failures of the next four years.
The President has survived his first four years by blaming
everything on George Bush. Now he is planning to blame the next
four years on Congressional Republicans. The time has come to use
his own heft against him. Let Obama go flying off the Fiscal Cliff
all by himself. He will crash-land and when he does, Republicans
will be left standing on the high ground.
