Press' central theme, in his new book, is that conservatism started with Russell Kirk and William F. Buckley Jr., and that it failed to deliver what it promised. In fact, both themes are demonstrably false as follows: The conservative revolution against big gov't started with the American Revolution - a revolution against the big oppressive gov't of England. The next significant piece of our history was the second American Revolution of 1800 wherein Jefferson established that the American Revolution was not only a revolution against the oppressive big government of England but also a revolution against any would-be, anti-freedom, oppressive, Federalist, big governments that might develop in America.
The Jeffersonian view prevailed and became the traditional American view until Communism and the Great Depression conspired to gave rise to the idea that American tradition wasn't working. Only at that point did Kirk and Buckley take up their swords and begin the third American Revolution that largely defeated liberal, socialist, and communist thinking in the U.S., Eastern and Western Europe, USSR, Communist China, and South East Asia.
Press wants you to adumbratively believe that conservatism was a tiny movement in the second half of the 20th Century concerned largely with the tactics of domestic issues and politics, when really it is the embodiment of ineluctable human progress. When Press talks about how conservatism didn't deliver, one can only scratch one's head in bewilderment at such willful blindness. When he gets specific he talks only about domestic issues, from a tactical, political point of view, such as the conservative failure to deliver smaller, balanced budgets. Even in this tiny arena what he fails to say is again infinitely more important than what he does say.
Firstly, Newt Gingrich tried to shut down the gov't rather than allow it to grow and spend more. Secondly, conservatives ended "welfare as we know it " which, despite being the heart and soul of the Great "caring" Society, amounted to a war on blacks that destroyed their families, put more men in prison than college, and gave us hip-hop culture. Thirdly, conservatives proposed a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution that, once and for all, would have transformed and shrunk American government. Fourthly, conservatives always proposed tax cuts to free us from big gov't. Fifthly, even George Bush (the least conservative of conservatives) proposed privatization of Social Security, health care, and education. Had it not been for Democrats, Republicans would have easily won a fourth American Revolution for freedom.
Press' "idea" is that since Republicans failed to deliver the fourth tiny revolution we should abnegate conservatives as hypocritical and incompetent, and permanently replace them with liberal, progressive, socialist types who loath the basic Jeffersonian Republican concept of the American Revolution. It is impossible to describe how irrational that is, but that is what passes for publishable in modern America.
Ted Baiamonte
thedumbdemocrat
The Intellectual Republicans
bje1000@aol.com
312
4.05.2008
Democrats as Natural Born Liars
If your father beat you, and your mother was an alcoholic, and they both were in the the mafia, you'd grow up covering it up; lying about yourself and your family so as to appear normal to the outside world. Such behavior often leads to severe personality distortions that, in an adult, would, among other things, disqualify you from becoming President of the United States. Democrats find themselves in much the same position. They have to lie about their left-wing, America hating past to appear normal and function credibly as adult politicians.
Years ago William Safire dismissed Hillary as a "congenital liar." Hillary proved his point perfectly with her recent lie about landing in Bosnia while under sniper fire. Please note that while there was lots of news coverage about her lie, it failed to point out that, additionally, the lie exposed the fraudulency of her campaign, namely, that she has experience beyond that of a normal First- Lady. What's as interesting as the incredible lie, and what it means, is that by the time of her landing in Bosnia 250,000 Europeans had been killed there because Hillary would not let husband Bill intervene, as he successfully did - eventually, for four years out of fear that such an intervention would distract attention from what she was sure would be her all-important, career building health-care plan back home in America. It's all in the recent Sally Smith biography about Hillary, for those who insist that Democrats are too caring to lie, or to do far worse things.
But, Obama faces an even more severe truth deficit arising out of his very mis-spent youth during which, according his auto-biography, he gravitated toward America hating, "caring," Marxist professors, (not coincidentally, Hillary worked for a communist law firm in law school) and appurtenances thereof. It's not surprising, then, that Obama moved on to appreciate the magniloquent rhetoric of Rev. "God Damn America" Wright" is it? But how do you cover up all that history so you can be President of the United States - that you hate? Simple: you lie, and you keep lying; especially about the war in Iraq since that is the way to get to the promised land on the left of Hillary who, conveniently, was lying to get to the right because she was sure that was the lie necessary for a woman to become Commander- In- Chief.
Obama's lie for the army of energetic activists with "Bush Derangement Syndrome," and many main stream Democrats too, was that due to his superior, though inexperienced, judgement he had always been against the war, and accordingly would withdraw the troops immediately. Never mind that there is no obvious connection between the reasons you enter a war and the reasons you leave it many years later. Anyway, here is what Obama has actually said that an encomiastic main stream media will never put together for you:
1) "I opposed this war from the start" (speech August, 2002).
2) "I did oppose the war, yes, but after, when the invasion was finally launched, when I saw Saddam's statue topple and watched Bush atop the USS Abraham Lincoln, a banner behind him saying 'mission accomplished', I began to suspect that I might have been wrong (page 295 Audacity of Hope).
3) "What would I have done [about Iraq]. I don't know" (2004 Democratic Convention) (NY Times July 23, 2004).
4) "There's not much difference between my position and George Bush's position at this stage" (July 26, 2004, Chicago Tribune).
5) "Once we go in, we've committed. We've got to do everything we can to stabilize the country" ( Nov 23, 2003 on Charlie Rose).
6) "We cannot, [before the surge] through putting in more troops or maintaining the pretense that we have, expect that the situation is going to improve" ( Meet the Press 10/22/2006).
7) "The Army is broken" (Time cover story)
8) "Of 85 Senate votes, on 84 of them he voted with Hillary" (Fox News analysis)
9) When Colin Kahl, the day-to-day coordinator of the Obama campaign’s working group on Iraq, recently [4/4/08] said: "the U.S. should aim to transition to a sustainable over-watch posture (of perhaps 60-80,000 forces) by the end of 2010 the Obama campaign laughably responded, "the writings of Mr. Kahl, one of the hundreds of outside advisers [lie] to the campaign, is not representative of Obama's consistent policy position [lie] on the Iraq war.
10) When Geraldine Ferraro said, "if Obama was a white man he would not be in this position," the Obama campaign accused her of racism. Ferraro said she was devastated by the attacks that were widely carried by the MSM. This, strangely, happened after Obama said, in the wake of the Rev. Wright debacle, "we need to have a dialogue on race." and after Obama was quoted in the the Chicago Sun Times as saying, "if I had been one of six new white Senators showing up here in Washington I wouldn't have the book contract or be running for President."
11) When radio host Don Imus was fired for saying, "nappy headed hoes," Obama said, "There is nobody on my staff who would still be working for me if they made any comments like that about anybody of any ethnic group." He was far, far more forgiving of Rev. Wright, who said a whole lot more than Don Imus.
But don't worry about Obama just because of his hatred of America (ok, his Reverend's hatred that Obama just happened to listen to for 20 years along with his wife and kids) or his flirtation with Marxism, or his secretly being the most leftist Senator in America, or even his lying, about, well, everything. Why worry when you can have "hope." Hope for what, you ask? Why, "change," of course. What kind of "change," ? the not easily satisfied ask. Well...."change you can believe in," of course. And if that doesn't satisfy you, you're hopeless.
Ted Baiamonte
bje1000@aol.com
thedumbdemocrat
The Intellectual Republican
t532
Years ago William Safire dismissed Hillary as a "congenital liar." Hillary proved his point perfectly with her recent lie about landing in Bosnia while under sniper fire. Please note that while there was lots of news coverage about her lie, it failed to point out that, additionally, the lie exposed the fraudulency of her campaign, namely, that she has experience beyond that of a normal First- Lady. What's as interesting as the incredible lie, and what it means, is that by the time of her landing in Bosnia 250,000 Europeans had been killed there because Hillary would not let husband Bill intervene, as he successfully did - eventually, for four years out of fear that such an intervention would distract attention from what she was sure would be her all-important, career building health-care plan back home in America. It's all in the recent Sally Smith biography about Hillary, for those who insist that Democrats are too caring to lie, or to do far worse things.
But, Obama faces an even more severe truth deficit arising out of his very mis-spent youth during which, according his auto-biography, he gravitated toward America hating, "caring," Marxist professors, (not coincidentally, Hillary worked for a communist law firm in law school) and appurtenances thereof. It's not surprising, then, that Obama moved on to appreciate the magniloquent rhetoric of Rev. "God Damn America" Wright" is it? But how do you cover up all that history so you can be President of the United States - that you hate? Simple: you lie, and you keep lying; especially about the war in Iraq since that is the way to get to the promised land on the left of Hillary who, conveniently, was lying to get to the right because she was sure that was the lie necessary for a woman to become Commander- In- Chief.
Obama's lie for the army of energetic activists with "Bush Derangement Syndrome," and many main stream Democrats too, was that due to his superior, though inexperienced, judgement he had always been against the war, and accordingly would withdraw the troops immediately. Never mind that there is no obvious connection between the reasons you enter a war and the reasons you leave it many years later. Anyway, here is what Obama has actually said that an encomiastic main stream media will never put together for you:
1) "I opposed this war from the start" (speech August, 2002).
2) "I did oppose the war, yes, but after, when the invasion was finally launched, when I saw Saddam's statue topple and watched Bush atop the USS Abraham Lincoln, a banner behind him saying 'mission accomplished', I began to suspect that I might have been wrong (page 295 Audacity of Hope).
3) "What would I have done [about Iraq]. I don't know" (2004 Democratic Convention) (NY Times July 23, 2004).
4) "There's not much difference between my position and George Bush's position at this stage" (July 26, 2004, Chicago Tribune).
5) "Once we go in, we've committed. We've got to do everything we can to stabilize the country" ( Nov 23, 2003 on Charlie Rose).
6) "We cannot, [before the surge] through putting in more troops or maintaining the pretense that we have, expect that the situation is going to improve" ( Meet the Press 10/22/2006).
7) "The Army is broken" (Time cover story)
8) "Of 85 Senate votes, on 84 of them he voted with Hillary" (Fox News analysis)
9) When Colin Kahl, the day-to-day coordinator of the Obama campaign’s working group on Iraq, recently [4/4/08] said: "the U.S. should aim to transition to a sustainable over-watch posture (of perhaps 60-80,000 forces) by the end of 2010 the Obama campaign laughably responded, "the writings of Mr. Kahl, one of the hundreds of outside advisers [lie] to the campaign, is not representative of Obama's consistent policy position [lie] on the Iraq war.
10) When Geraldine Ferraro said, "if Obama was a white man he would not be in this position," the Obama campaign accused her of racism. Ferraro said she was devastated by the attacks that were widely carried by the MSM. This, strangely, happened after Obama said, in the wake of the Rev. Wright debacle, "we need to have a dialogue on race." and after Obama was quoted in the the Chicago Sun Times as saying, "if I had been one of six new white Senators showing up here in Washington I wouldn't have the book contract or be running for President."
11) When radio host Don Imus was fired for saying, "nappy headed hoes," Obama said, "There is nobody on my staff who would still be working for me if they made any comments like that about anybody of any ethnic group." He was far, far more forgiving of Rev. Wright, who said a whole lot more than Don Imus.
But don't worry about Obama just because of his hatred of America (ok, his Reverend's hatred that Obama just happened to listen to for 20 years along with his wife and kids) or his flirtation with Marxism, or his secretly being the most leftist Senator in America, or even his lying, about, well, everything. Why worry when you can have "hope." Hope for what, you ask? Why, "change," of course. What kind of "change," ? the not easily satisfied ask. Well...."change you can believe in," of course. And if that doesn't satisfy you, you're hopeless.
Ted Baiamonte
bje1000@aol.com
thedumbdemocrat
The Intellectual Republican
t532
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