Posted on 09/05/2014 6:39:22 AM PDT by Kaslin
Many people suggest President Obama has checked out. He treats the ever-growing threat of ISIS as an abstraction. Sources from within the administration are now more openly admitting that, for almost a year, intelligence and Pentagon officials have advised the president of the threat. He has chosen to do very little. Last Wednesday, he said we would "shrink" ISIS and make it "a manageable problem" as opposed to eliminate it.
A few weeks ago, I had dinner with a sitting governor and a dear friend of mine. The friend leaned over to the governor and me and said Barack Obama is to America as Clarence the Angel was to George Bailey in "It's a Wonderful Life." Barack Obama is showing the world what it would look like had America never been born. As this friend later wrote, "Unsurprisingly, Bedford Falls is now Pottersville, and it's a terrible place. Unfortunately, we do not get to revert to the tolerable if modest status quo at the end of the lesson: George Bailey will eventually have to shell the town and retake it street by street from Old Man Potter's Spetsnaz."
Consider how far the world has collapsed in the past year. Again, my friend noted, since Labor Day weekend last year the Chinese expanded their air defense identification zone to incorporate the territory of other nations; the Russians annexed Crimea; ISIS rose; the Russians invaded Ukraine; Mosul fell; the Hungarian liberal democracy collapsed into Russian-aligned authoritarianism; a Central American refugee crisis spawned a border and humanitarian crisis in the United States; the Egyptians and Emiratis attacked Libya without telling the United States; Iraqi Christians and the Yazidi are suffering genocide at the hands of ISIS; NATO is scrambling to shore up its eastern-frontier defenses; mainstream anti-Semitism is re-emerging; the Americans are on the verge of yet another war in Iraq; middle America is seeing race riots, etc., etc.
Seventy-five years ago this past Monday, German tanks rolled across the Polish border setting off World War II. Sixty-nine years ago this past Tuesday, World War II ended as the Japanese formally surrendered. In the nearly seven decades since, the West has established a world-wide peace. Though not flawless, we have lived a relatively stable and secure existence. In just the past year, Barack Obama has largely undone seven decades of gains toward peace.
Our peace was balanced on top of two pillars. The first of the two pillars is the idea of peace through strength. Ensuring the American military could go anywhere at any time to strike back against any foe, no matter its size, has caused many to give us pause. In the last 25 years, after the collapse of the Cold War, America has consciously decided to scale back our military. We have handed military actions to FBI agents serving indictments, signaling our growing complacency.
The other pillar is the moral certainty of the West's goodness. We have, since the fall of Nazi Germany and the rise of its kissing cousin the communists, maintained Western values are superior and right and true. Barack Obama does not believe in the goodness and superiority of Western values. He sees former old colonialists trying to preserve their dubious claims on power. What so many for so long took for granted, Barack Obama sees as oppressive and regressive.
Barack Obama is the first American president who, through his upbringing, writings and actions, conveys a deep sense of grievance toward the American experiment. The idea that we are the last best hope for mankind is anathema to him. Barack Obama thinks the world, if the American imperial aggressor would just sit on the sidelines, could work out its problems and would be better off.
In short, the world has descended into chaos these past 365 days because the American president thinks America is to blame for much of the world's ills and has chosen not to check himself out, but to check the United States out of international affairs. The only question now is how many around the world will die because of it.
However, the gay golfer is NOT OUR PROBLEM. Our problem is we have NO TEAM ON THE FIELD.
No PLAN
NO PROGRAM
NO QUARTERBACK
NO COACH
We have sound-bite governors.
Sound-bite Senators
RINO Reps in the majority, but in on the swag and in very safe seats
8 weeks to go to an election we might very well "win" and take control of both Houses.
No one can or will tell me, "What happens then?"
very good insights
If the Pubbies take the senate, and keep the house, all we have to look forward to is Reid’s departure and maybe some minor changes in committe focus and associated political theater. But everything else will remain the same IMO. The Republicans are hopelessly stuck on stupid.
Really?
Do you mean the new GOP Majority leader will not allow the already existing 300+ Republican House bills to be put on the Senate Calendar for a vote?
You don't think a huge pile of different looking popular legislation will go the the dog-eating packer for his veto?
DC's problem is distribution and delivery, with enormous losses in transmission and of course, safety issues.
Historical note: Tom Edison was an SOB who stole as much as he "invented," and a bit of thug besides.
Tesla? Serbia was having some sort of weird science/physics/math renaissance in those days .. which is very strange to contemplate. My present favorite Serb of the era was Milankovitch, whose "Glaciation Cycle" rather neatly encapsulates global climate change, has been rigorously demonstrated, and is accepted by every one from Archaeologists and Astronomers, to Paleontologists, to Geophysicists, Astrophysicists, Zoologists .... i.e. everybody with a brain, with the strange exception of Climatologists, who apparently have no access to scientific instrumentation or data!
Who is this great leader who will convert the hapless Pubbies into political warriors and lead them on to great victories?
Practically any Republican that takes Reid's place. What do you think they'll do...keep blocking House bills?
It’s the theme of Dinesh D’Souza’s ‘2016.’ Too few saw that movie, much less took it to heart. We are now helplessly watching it unfold before our eyes.
I was expecting a more specific response. Exactly who might this be? You just can’t say “anybody”.
It has to be someone with legislative prowess, outstanding leadership, and commanding fortitude who will champion effective immigration controls, force significant reductions in government spending, rollback the growth of artibrary and excessive regulations by executive agencies, demand accountability in government, limit the growing violations of our privacy, promote a national enegy policy that strengthens this country, etc. The list is long and it will take extraordinary leadership to move us in the right direction, and at the same time position the party so that it has a chance to win the presidency in 2016. “Practically any Republican” is not an answer.
Yes I can, because it's true, and I don't think you get to make the rules.
The main caveat is McConnell said he would bring back the 60 vote rule. In light of today's Constitutional crisis, that's practically treasonous.
Otherwise, given a majority, all the GOP Leader would have to do is run House Bills through the Senate.
Its not a matter of making rules and you don’t have a monoploy on what’s true. Out of all the GOP senators you have yet to name one that would be an effective leader.
For far too long Republicans have had a very high threshold for failure. They rarely, if ever, play to really win. My point and that made by Kenny Bunk (and you obviously disagree with us which is OK) is that Pubbies have no real leadership so I ask where this essential resource will come from? Nothing great gets accomplished without it.
You seem to think that good things will just happen because Republicans are in “control”. And you suggest that McConnell will bring back the 60 vote rule so that sounds like you expect him to remain majority leader. If so, this will be the weak leading the weak. I’d much rather see the strong leading (and energizing) the weak. They will have to face a president who has no respect for the congress and increasingly wants to rule by decree. Make no mistake, we are heading directly toward a significant constitutional crisis. And we need real leadership to fight that war.
Just my opinion. We can agree to disagee.
Any semi-lucid GOP warm-body that would allow votes and not go back to the 60-vote rule is leader enough. You don't need General Patton for this, and you won't get Ted Cruz or Mike Lee.
The House, however, is where you could use some leadership.
He said as much.
that sounds like you expect him to remain majority leader. If so, this will be the weak leading the weak.
I hope that doesn't happen, but I also hope Cruz and others kick up such a fuss that anyone but McConnell, Graham or McCain gets the top spot.
That's where leadership comes into play.
I say POTENTIAL upsides because the 'Pubs will have to have the guts to use their majority power, and that, as we all know, is very, very problematic. But if we don't win control we'll never know. And my fear is that could still happen, given the recent track record of 'Pub candidates for Senate blowing what otherwise would have been slam-dunk wins (remember Akin and Mourdock, no more of that crap!).
Non-Democrats have been totally prestidigitated away from the main event by focusing on this Obama-Ass-Klown. He means nothing. He is a distraction. "Look over here, so you won't see what we are doing over there." Besides, we are not going to run against him, we are going to run against his Team Obama successors.
We have no control over the Democrats. IMNVHO, at least the Marxist racist SOBs deliver exactly what they promise: economic chgaos and the ruination of the Republic. We need to work on the sorry bunch'o;crap that is OUR team, whatever that is. "Non-Democrats?"
And it ain't like we got a lot'o'time.
We cannot save this Republic with only inchoate rage at the gay golfer. We need Anger Management. We need the Program
The Plan
Leadership.
KINDA LIKE THE DALLAS COWBOYS................
RB, your metaphor on the money! Like them, we even have a gay guy on the "Practice Squad."
You don’t need General Patton for this
************
While any Republican would be an improvement over Reid and his gang of thieves, I think we need to set the bar a lot higher. If you set a low bar, you always get low results.
Obama and the Dems are no pushover; we need serious leadership to fight them, their media attack dogs and the coalition of sympathizers/enablers in the educational establishment, the legal community, Hollywood, and the unions. More recently, they seem to have the Chamber of Commerce in their corner on the immigration issue. The point is we have a very formidable, disciplined and well funded adversary. IMO we do need to set a high bar for leadership and find a Patton or someone of that caliber to lead the fight. Its going to be a bloody political war and only the strong will prevail.
As you are no doubt aware, the stakes are very high. In fact, the very future of the Reppublic is at stake. We have to win this and that will take the best, most capable, and committed people we can find.
Regards.
Well, an adequate conservative guy in the Senate would be sufficient HOWEVER...
I do think we need a “General Patton” as Speaker of the House.
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