Romney Is No Savior, and That’s the Point
Stop puckering. I know he was about as perfect as the foolish boy-king. But that was the image presented and many people still believe it. If one is to take the left side of our politics, FDR is their once and future king, the one who will come back/be reincarnated to lead the nation to the great future of unbound statism where everything is planned and nothing wasted and people like them get to order the rest of us around for our own good. Obama knows this very well. Hence his evoking FDR in his DNC speech.
I understand this, to an extent. The other side — bless their hearts — has never really got very far away from their eugenics roots. What’s more, they believe human beings can be perfect. You know how if you lie down with dogs you wake up with fleas? Well, they lay down with the USSR and they got this idea of the perfect man that will come around when communism (small or large C, doesn’t matter) allows him to emerge. Cults! What is one to do?
The other side will have their Greek columns (turns out it was perhaps a harbinger of the direction they wanted us to go in, as they’ve saddled us with Greek-sized debt) and their pictures with halos and …
That said, I have to ask — why has our side caught the disease? No? Really? In blog after blog I hear people lamenting that Romney is not a thing like Reagan, that they don’t see anyone in the party who is like Reagan, that what we need is Reagan.
Are you out of your minds?
I will not diminish Reagan. Like many others of my generation, I am one of Reagan’s Children. What he accomplished, when he accomplished it, and how was nothing short of a miracle. He was the man we needed at the hour we needed it.
But don’t go fooling yourself. I was here for the ‘80 election. Back then many conservatives weren’t sure he was what we needed. Even when he was president, many conservatives weren’t sure of this. I remember P.J. O’Rourke — a writer I otherwise admire — calling him “his dumbness” in an essay.
All the same we got lucky with Reagan. He was just what we needed at that time. And I think he gave us the wrong idea that all we need is the right man in the presidency.
Romney wants to be just President. Obama wants to be King/Emperor and in any second term, Caesar/Fuhrer. It should be an easy choice.
Tampa delegates held up “Believe” signs. I call that insulting, patronizing, CREEPY. One term for Mitt and the GOP Politboro.
Fine. The “Believe” signs were dumb. And come 2016, we’ll elect your version of “The One”. But first, we need to get Romney elected in 2012.
Or do you think the “Believe” signs are sufficient reason to vote against a decent pro-American candidate in favor of the nihilistic incompetent currently occupying the White House?
I’m not sure what is supposed to be so creepy about “beleive”. Everybody has a slogan, with obama it was hope and change in 2008, now its forward. the key is their policies, and their view of gov. Obama puts gov first, and expands it at everybody opportunity. Romney puts liberty first.
And of course the signs refer to America: ‘Believe’ in America. Not creepy at all, in context.
He’s definitely no savior. He’s running the stupidest, most out-of-touch campaign I’ve seen since George Herbert Walker Bush. He should be 10 points ahead in this economy – against this President. But his team has no rapid response to Obama’s attacks. They apparently prefer not to attack Obama where he’s vulnerable, on his background, on his basic competence, on his 105 days spent on the golf course.
It is sad to watch. The stakes are very high for America. I fear or America if Obama is re-elected. And Romney’s team is helping to make that happen.
Ha, indeed, what a politician must be these days is a great campaigner. Once he gets into office, all he needs to do is leave us Americans alone. My favorite quote from Reagan (on the campaign trail): “I’m not up here tonight because I’m the guy with all the ideas; I’m here tonight because I think YOU are.” We’re itching to get busy with our ideas, but we need to drag Romney across the finish line to do so.
^^ This ^^
We can save ourselves if government gets out of the way.
Is Romney that man. Sorry I don’t see it. I hope he wins but he is not the man to move government aside.
As Sarah said, expecting Romney (or anyone) to save us is a mistake. Only we can save us. But at least Romney will be helping.
And that is just the point. He is not the man to push government aside. We are those who must do it.
This is the point of the whole article.
No, but if we get a pro-limited government majority in Congress, he *is* the one who will sign any bills they pass that reduce the size and power of government.
No, he won’t do it, the point of the article is that WE will do it. We might have to drag him kicking and screaming, but if we persevere, he’s a decent man, and we can change the course we’re on.
Bingo, we have a winner. Just get the damn gubmint out of our way.
In the UK we dont like Obama but Romney has no charisma/personality and pissed off the uk with his comments about our Olympics.
We would like a leader who takes no shit from the muslims like Reagan did
You have that nailed. Romneys problem is that he thinks all voters actually think, reason, and check facts. He has those votes! He has to start talking the lingo that the drones that get their news at 6pm having a beer and bowl of soup understand. Call this poser out at every turn. Pound him on his failed green jobs, his criminal justice dept, bring up the taboo subjects. Shout about the America hating reverand the family amened, his American terrorist ties, his bowing to islamic kings, his sealed life…………
There is no end to the attacks that are truth based that can be brought against this threat.
Considering romney has the whole msm and academia arrayed against him, and that dem policies have already made almost half the country completely dependent on the gov, romney is doing well to keep as close as he has been. Times are that bad, the dems are just one term away from having a socialist looter majority, when there will be no hope at all. We have to fight with everything we have now, because if obama wins again, the damage might be ireversable.
Romney is 10 points ahead. The polls only show the race close because the media are assuming that the turnout in 2012 is going to be even more favorable for Democrats than 2008. Why are they making such a patently rediculous assumption? To keep the top-line number close so gullible people (ahem) will get discouraged.
The kind of president a country that believes not that we can have a perfect union but are working with a more perfect one; the kind of country sensibly chooses (and keeps working to improve) the better rather than imagining the perfect. This is a really great argument for what has been show to work – and contrasts it with what has been shown (despite the belief that it was “perfect”) not to work repeatedly and in a series of deadly ways. On a morning with a lot of gloomy news it is great to see your column.
You are on a roll.
The belief in perfectability is The maker of political horrors, the root of ‘the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.’ if life is perfectable, then what matters a little bloodshed in the prusit of perfection? A single death in service of perfection? A hundred deaths? A war? If one really believes that the future could be perfect, then no cost is too great.
Thank you.
Just a follow-on —
Far too many conservatives today think that because Romney isn’t exactly what they want, they should sit out the election in a fit of pique.
As I have said over and over, the job of undoing the damage done by lefties and progressives is the work of a couple generations. It won’t ever happen in any single election.
What’s required of conservatives is the same approach used by the left to get us into this mess: an unrelenting pressure in all areas of society to undo statism. This force needs to be exerted at all levels from grassroots/tea-party level to national elections.
And this is a battle we’ll be fighting for the rest of our lives.
Romney isn’t exactly what [conservatives] want
Let me interject my current clarifying question here:
How much are you willing to bet that Romney and the Republican Congressional leadership Profiles in Courage are going to drop the annual deficit below a trillion prior to being forced to?
There’s a big difference between “exactly what we want” and “we fear he’s entirely inadequate for the task”. We’ll see how well that fear is grounded, he is a turnaround artist.
As opposed tomobama who will instead stp on the gas, mash the pedal into the floor, and cut the break line. I’m sorry, but you don’t get absolved. If you sit out, you are voting FOR Obama … Period. End. Of. Story.
(Second attempt minus a paragraph, the first hit PJMedia’s spam trap.)
Who said anything about sitting out the election? I’ll be voting for Romney this election … or is that voting against Obama?
My variant of your analogy is that I expect a Romney Administration to hit the fiscal brick wall at 75 mph vs. the 100 Obama’s going at now. And that when the Great Default happens, we’ll be better off with most anyone other than Obama at the helm (heck, even Biden loves his country, even if he’s not very good at it).
Politicans are not “fire and forget” missiles. They need constant guidance and course correction if they are do what we want them to.
There’s an old saying that I wish were as catchy as advertising jingles: “Eternal vigilence is the price of liberty.”
This has never been truer, and we must never, ever forget it.
Especially the “eternal” part.
Indeed … but what’s going to be our leverage against Romney?
Vote in a Democratic Congress in 2014? Vote for the Democrat running against him in 2016? Deprive the Republican party of enough money to win elections?
When we play this game of “anybody but the Democrat” we also lose all our leverage. We can attack a lot of Republican establishment in primaries, e.g. force Dick Lugar to spend more time with his family next year, but at the very top???
…We can attack a lot of Republican establishment in primaries…
That’s the way to do it, from now until forever. Eventually, we’ll push the right people up the chain as far as needed.
As I said, this is a long battle: it took progressives roughly a century to bring the country to this point. I don’t think it’ll take that long to fix it. (Fiscal events will likely force a faster pace.)
But conservatives need to approach this in the same spirit and with the same patient, gritty determination the lefties use. For them, any movement is acceptable so long as it’s leftward.
And we need to exert our pressure in all areas of society: economics, politics, entertainment, media — everything.
Google “long march through the institutions” and “Gramscian damage” and you’ll see what we’ve been dealing with all our lives.
Agreed. We’re told that we need to elect a man with “vision.” The office of President is only that of an executive, one who executes the direction of another. We have been sold a bill of goods that the executive should be the leader.
Not. But we have to be involved enough to have our voice heard.
The 2010 congress was willing to risk a default in the debt limit standoff to force some spending cuts. If we had a president and senate who were willing to work with them, instead of also risking disaster to oppose them, they could cut spending even more. We aren’t going to fix this overnight, but we dont have to. All we really have to do is what Reagan did, just slightly reverse the slope, so spending vs gdp is falling rather than rising as it is now. Reagans change in the spending slope didn’t get us to a balanced budget for 20 yrs, it may take just as long this time. But electing Romney and a repub senate will at least give us a chance to reverse course. One thing is certain, if obama wins, nothing will change for the better, and may change for the worse. If Romney wins we at least have a chance.
Awesomely articulated!
I don’t look to Washington, DC for leadership for I need no leader. All I want is for them to leave me and my family alone.
At the very least to do no harm. Most people are just trying their best to feed their families and keep a roof over their heads. We don’t need lead weights to carry around too and busybodies sticking their noses where they don’t belong.
Wonderful!
But understand that “all you want” has never been achieved in history for very long.
Exactly, except of course obama will not leave you alone. He will tax and regulate you to death until you have nothing left, at which point you become his slave on the gov dole. At least with romney, he appears to have some respect for small business, the real engine of prosperity, and they have some confidence in him.
Well said Sarah. Romney is not our savior but he WILL be far better for the country than the self assuming dictator we now have. Goofy or Donald Duck would be better than what we now have.
We take it one step at a time. First we rid ourselves of the dictator in training, then we again strive to find a “savior”.
This said as an independent. I’m not thrilled over either party right now.
All I expect out of Willard is that he take over the White House, fire a bunch of Rat appointees and dial back some red tape. Economic activity will begin to take off one day after his election. The money and plans are ready to go. Just waiting for the change. Heck we will see an uptick even if Obummer wins because at least folks will know what they are facing for the next four years.
The real problem with this country is psychological, spiritual if you will, in that we just don’t have the ‘want to’ of our grand parents. We are fat and lazy and largely debauched. We don’t rear our kids and we don’t stay married. We are sick and the cure will just about kill us. IF we ever take it.
Wonderful column and very heartening.
A couple of new guys in the White House isn’t going to come close to solving our problems. But it’s a start.
Absolutely agree with you on not merely the idiocy, but the danger, of the “great man” drivel. And the related phenomena (eugenicists on one side, New Soviet Man adherents on the other). And quite frankly, until the religious elements started making some persistent and dire noises pertaining to women’s rights, I was pretty much decided to hold my nose and go red. For the reasons you state.
Now, I stand between to poles trying hard–very hard–to foresee which danger (the short term fiscal/structural or the long term cultural/civic) is the more profound.
Let us presume that the extremes of Mommy-Statism will be no more sustainable and deliverable (or generally palatable) than the near-anarchic extreme Libertarian platforms (which possess their own particular brands of unrealistic idealisms about human nature. Yes, they do–just very, very different ones.).
So, if we follow that assumption, we are trusting to the power of the social contract to protect the nature against the extremes of its expression as warned about in both the Federalist Papers and De Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.
So now the choice boils down to effects, not ideologies.
Elect Obama? there is an unacceptable likelihood that the real politick measures of finance, defense, and technology will suffer possibly irreparable damage.
Elect romney? there’s an unacceptable likelihood that a variety of civil liberties will be irreparably damaged and introduce disastrous discontinuities between
a) the assurances vested in the present, equality-oriented interpretation of the Constitution
and
b) their profoundly compromised expression in and enjoyment by the body politic.
The dangers are different but they are both profound. At this point I believe we’re making a lifeboat decision: which constitutes the greater risk to what we cherish as a nation? (the Canadians have an interesting voting option that give them a little more ability to responding to political choices that collectively aren’t worthy of the name. )
I understand that Romney has a steep hill to climb against an incumbent with an oddly high popularity rating. I understand that to alienate the far religious right is probably a campaign move he cannot make even if he wanted to without committing electoral suicide. But unfortunately, there are some basics that want underlining…with lines that can’t be crossed. And the intrusion of religious debate into civil rights issues demands a strong response.
I have to wonder: it would be an all or nothing gamble, but might Romney actually GAIN more than he loses by taking a definitive stand against this trend (started long ago by Nixon’s “reconception” of the Republican party’s support base along traditional, rather than policy, lines)? I know a lot of folks, like me, who are wavering because Romney wavers. And, in particular, on this very crucial issue. Yes, let’s put our hand on the tiller of fiscal responsibility and renewed technological and industrial innovation and strength, but let’s keep it off of people’s bodies. Can Romney say that? Can he win if he does? Can he win if he DOESN’T? I continue to ponder….
I’m puzzled by this creepy reference to the “religious right.” At a time when Islamists are sacking our embassies and killing our ambassadors somebody begins to worry about Christians in the US? The people at the Democrat’s convention demanded Catholic institutions give free birth control and abortions to women, for God’s sake. Freedom to practice your religion? Forget about it. In the US when an artist puts up pictures of a crucifix immersed in urine, some Christians get upset and demand that that artist not get public funding. Make a movie about Mohammad and you get your throat cut in Holland. Islamists go on Jihad and kill three thousand Americans and we make fiery speeches but the Major of New York insists that they should be allowed to build a mosque at ground zero. Let a false rumor that somebody flushed a Koran down a toilet get published and watch the body count rise. Can you tell that I’m getting a little tired about the threat to American freedom, especially the right to kill babies, if Baptists speak up?
So let me get this straight. One candidate is loudly at the top of his lungs proclaiming that he WILL drive the buss over the cliff. Another one “Might waver on doing some things you don’t like” and THAT makes you waver in your vote? Excuse me for being so blunt, but how can you be that STUPID?
Romney should hire you as a speech writer.
Sarah,
You are correct in what you say, except for one very significant point. You say “We’re Americans.” Sadly that is no longer true. Being an American is a state of mind – which you obviously have. But the majority of the citizens of this country are TWANLOC’s, a term coined by Subotai Bahadur of the Belmont Club. Those Who Are No Longer Our Countrymen. Being an American is not a matter of birth or genetics. It’s not “in our blood”, it’s in the minds of those who agree with the principles laid out in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, and who believe in individual freedom and recognize that laissez faire capitalism is the best economic system for free and productive individuals. These ideas have been suppressed or driven out of the minds of the majority by decades of “progressive” education and media.
So the majority, even among those “on the right”, yearn for leadership. They have become sheep who are adrift with no guiding principles. They bleat platitudes that they have had drummed into their ears, and they fear making their own decisions and bearing the consequences. Except that the fear, bleating, and aimlessness are also a decision of sorts – to be blind to reality. And there have been and will continue to be terrible consequences for that blindness. “But that’s too negative”, bleat the sheep. “We’re different! We’re better! We have cell phones and computers and technology and TV! We’re smarter than those people who lived before. It can’t happen to us!”.
I guess we’ll see.
The word that we have to quibble about in “we’re Americans” is not “Americans” but “We.” Those actively campaigning to be official slaves or masters need to be disenfranchised as Americans, for there is nothing about them of the responsible American citizen, and they will abuse our God-given blood-bought rights and privileges with impunity, having no real constant connection to them. The slave acts with too little accountability, the master with too much power for any one man to live peaceably with other free men.
I’m a techie, so let’s be clear about the “internet power grab.”
CISPA – the Cyber Information Sharing Act – would put the intelligence community in charge of securing the internet. House Republican and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chair Mike Rogers drafted that one. Sen. John McCain (R-Arpaiao), a man who gets ulcers if a captured AQ fighter is not mirandized as the troops kick down the door to his goat herding hut, is sponsoring a similar bill in the Senate.
The odious Protect IP Act was drafted by Sen. Leahy (Communist, VT) and had bipartisan senate support. It’s little brother in the House, the even more odious SOPA, was introduced by the ever-insipid Lamar Smith, (R-TX). The Administration strongly opposed both bills.
The currently more or less pending Lieberman cybersecurity bill, which more or less mirrors the Administration proposal, focuses on applying voluntary standards to probably 5% of critical infrastructure – requiring things like nuclear plants, Wall Street, major ports, telecoms – to have strong cybersecurity measures in place, and would offer voluntary participation in cyber threat informmation sharing counsels. Some mixture of DHS and Commerce would be in charge of running those voluntary structures, along with industry counsels. That bill has a decent mix of Republican and Democrat sponsors, but failed to make it out of the Senate, probably because it’s an election year (can’t give the Dems a triumph now, can we?) and because McCain and some of his buddies think that the intel community ought to be securing communications in the U.S. rather than some combination of civilian law enforcement, trade and private sector entities.
So the internet power grab you are talking about here is at best bi-partisan, or perhaps at worst slightly more Republican-led than Democrat-led, and it originates in Congress.
Give credit where it’s due. This Administration is a disaster in a lot of respects, but the internet power grabs, so-called, are by and large Congressionally initiated, with a substantial if not predominantly Republican lean to them. Get your facts straights.
Get your logic straight.
“…perhaps at worst slightly more Republican…”
Then –
“…with a substantial if not predominantly Republican lean…”
You got me there. Poor choice of words clearly eradicates the facts I asserted relating to Republican involvement in efforts to push PIPA and SOPA, and to put the intelligence community in charge of securing the domestic .com internet domain.
Just the same way as a misplaced comma in the Book of Ruth once invalidated Christianity when a printer got sloppy with the typesetting…
The Tea Party movement is a great thing. Unfortunately, it wants to go back to sleep. It hopes for a president who will return their freedom and sustainability for them, then let them get on with their lives.
That can never be. If Mitt Romney scares people into realizing that he will not be their savior (as Reagan wasn’t; Cain and Paul wouldn’t have been), he may well be the best possible candidate.
If that is confusing, let me try again. You WANT a society where political power is widely held among people who do not want to hold political power.
I could not agree more.
It seems to me that America’s founders thought all of this through. They attempted to devise a system of government that would avoid these pitfalls as much as possible. Trust the system not the leader. I’m not sure about Romney but surely Obama does not. He thinks he’s smarter than all those old pale faces.
Can someone clarify the following points raised in the article?
“He’s not going to actively dismantle our way of life, as will the one now in power.”
How has your way of life changed? Please be specific.
“There will be no attacks on freedom of religion,”
Have your religious practices been banned in any way shape or form? (Note: your ability to force your values onto other people is NOT your freedom of religion-quite the opposite in fact.)
“no wild power grabs for the Internet,”
I think this was pretty well summed up by an above commenter. Of course, our current president has vowed to veto SOPA, PIPA and CISPA. Mitt Romney has(as far as I can tell) never said anything about his stance on CISPA.
“no executive orders that violate the laws of the land.”
Specifics?
“He will not hanker for more “flexibility” so he can give more to Putin.”
What does this even mean? Presumably, this is two totally separate subjects included in the same sentence fragment, but conjoined to make some sort of point-but to me it just seems like random talking points.
“And — this is petty but important for how the world sees us — he will neither apologize nor bow to foreign leaders.”
When I was a kid, one of the values I was taught was that if you did something wrong, you apologized to the person you wronged. I once broke a window hitting a baseball in my back yard. I apologized and worked off the damages in the form of chores. This is not an american value-it’s a human value.
There’s a certain hubris attached to the notion of American exceptionalism. You could call it “entitelment”, if you want to be accurate. Being American should make you proud, but it does not make you infallible. When we as a country do something wrong, we SHOULD apologize. As a country, we’ve broken more than our fair share of windows, and sometimes it was justifiable, sometimes it was not. To say that we should never apologize even when we’re clearly in the wrong is a sign of arrogance, not pride. You do not have to be arrogant to be proud-in fact, such arrogance is not a symbol of pride-it’s quite a shameful thing, really.
That all being said, can you cite a specific time and quote for when the president has actually apologized?
SF, nobody is bothering replying to your post because they can tell you are too far gone under the Democratic spell.
For instance, since you don’t recognize Obama’s recent fiat on giving amnesty to a couple million illegal alien felons as a perfect example of “executive orders that violate the laws of the land”, all the readers here realize you are either a Soros drone or a complete idiot. Either way, you are a waste of time.
“And — this is petty but important for how the world sees us — he will neither apologize nor bow to foreign leaders.”
When I was a kid, one of the values I was taught was that if you did something wrong, you apologized to the person you wronged. I once broke a window hitting a baseball in my back yard. I apologized and worked off the damages in the form of chores. This is not an american value-it’s a human value.
There’s a certain hubris attached to the notion of American exceptionalism. You could call it “entitelment”, if you want to be accurate. Being American should make you proud, but it does not make you infallible. When we as a country do something wrong, we SHOULD apologize. As a country, we’ve broken more than our fair share of windows, and sometimes it was justifiable, sometimes it was not. To say that we should never apologize even when we’re clearly in the wrong is a sign of arrogance, not pride. You do not have to be arrogant to be proud-in fact, such arrogance is not a symbol of pride-it’s quite a shameful thing, really.”
Let me explain this to you. As a country, we are the bedrock upon which world stability rests. We are the only nation in the world who has even dared to dream our founding ideals. That we fall short of them occasionally is irrelevant. No other nation has even so dared to guarantee “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”
We are, in fact, an exceptional nation. We have twice saved the world and with it Western Civilization, asking nothing in return. Indeed, every time we have knocked a country down, we have then gone out of our way to rebuild them. We leave every nation we interact with better than we found it.
Only puling cowards go around apologizing to bullies, which is what Obama has done. In fact, this is what his State Department did just yesterday when they apologized to the terrorists in Cairo who climbed the wall of our embassy, tore down and tore up our flag, and then proceeded to Hoist an Al Qaida flag in it’s place.
Only a fool thinks the world would be better with a weak America. If this nation falls, Western Civilization falls behind it and the resulting dark age will make the fall of Rome look like a garden party bun fight. Are you such a fool Sirrah? Are you such a coward?
I think you’re misunderestimating what people are pining for in a new Reagan. They’re not pining for a great leader; they’re pining for someone who can carry 49 states with the press firing rotten tomatoes at him. That, and somebody who doesn’t care who gets the credit.
That, and we’re also pining for another Republican candidate that can be called “the great communicator” the way Reagan was: someone who can stand up in front of a hostile media environment and clearly articulate the conservative principles that made this country great, and can still restore it to greatness if only our government would live by them. No Republican candidate since Reagan has been nearly as good at that as he was.
To Ms Hoyt: One correction. It was not “a straggle of heirs” who followed Sebastien, rather, it was one heir, Henrique, an elderly cardinal. Then came Phillip II of Spain (I of Portugal).
To SF: “Have your religious practices been banned in any way shape or form? (Note: your ability to force your values onto other people is NOT your freedom of religion-quite the opposite in fact.)”
This is a dishonest statement. My declining to buy you a car does not amount to denying you the right to drive. And that is exactly what the claim “force your values onto other people” comes to. It is a claim that, in not providing, that which it is against our consciences to provide, we are acting aggressively toward others. I repeatedly attack my fellow conservatives for loose use of the word “lie”. But here, even I must say, you are a liar.
George,
I’m presuming by the context that your argument is in regards to mandatory contraception coverage from a forced health plan, even for a religious institution that does not believe in contraception.
Right now, the ACA(Obamacare, or Romneycare if you live in MA) is the law of the land. It mandates a threshhold of coverage, which includes access to contraceptives. The argument is that as an employer, they need to purchase an insurance plan that covers this. It does not take into account whether it’s a belief system or not.
The separation of church and state doctrine establishes that federal law supercedes religious belief. Therefore, religious practices that violate a law (with few exceptions) cannot be protected. This is necessary so that all illegal activity is not considered “religious freedom”. For example, an organization cannot have a meth lab and consider it protected under the rubric of religious freedom, no matter what holy texts they produce to justify it.
The flap over this is that a business that happens to be for a religious organization does not want to abide by a portion of federal law because they feel it precludes their beliefs. The appropriate analogy to this would be if the same institution decided that they believed it a requirement that their employees were to work around dangerous chemicals, but were forbidden from wearing appropriate safety gear. Or perhaps if a religious organization opened a restaurant, but were forbidden from maintaining certain sanitary practices. The laws in place in either of the above analogies are intended to protect the employees in the former example and the public in the latter. So federal law overrules the belief system.
Does it equate to infringing on one’s religious beliefs? No. It is a regulation of a business, not a religious institution. At no point is the religious institution forced to abandon their beliefs and practices-so long as it does not deprive the individual of their federally protected rights.
You overstate your case. While not a Catholic myself, as I understand their objection, they’re opposed to being forced to pay for contraceptive coverage because that violates their beliefs. There is an active push for abortion services as well (see: DNC Convention last week). Should Catholics and others who oppose abortion be forced to pay for that as well? Should Baptists be requied to buy alcohol? Are there any limits on government requiring religious adherents to purchase items that go against their beliefs?
The First Amendment (which has the force of law) contains a religion clause states that the government can not establish a religion (as in the case of the Church of England) nor can it restrict the free exercise of religion. That has the force of law. “Separation of church and state” isn’t in the Constitution but it is a guiding principle based on the establishment clause.
Federal law is not a la carte. You can’t simply say “I’ll follow the laws/pay the taxes as I please”.
I don’t have children, but my taxes pay for public schools. I have never had a fire at my house, but I still pay for fire department services. I only use 4 roads to get to work, but I pay taxes that support all of them. I believe we shouldn’t be spending so much money on defense, but I still pay my taxes knowing full well that’s where it goes.
Just because a law is passed, it doesn’t mean it’s constitutional. The first amendment reads:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
The first part is the establishment clause and the second is the free exercise clause. The government can not establish a religion nor can it prohibit free exercise of religion. As you mentioned before, there are some limits but even many of them allow exceptions. For example, you don’t stand much chance to saying that your religion requires the use of narcotics unless you belong to certain Native American tribes who get to use peyote. The military draft is the law but some religious sects were made exempt even in wartime, as were people who claimed conscientious objector status. The law makes exceptions for religion quite often.
The free exercise clause of the First Amendment is law. It limits the government’s ability to create laws that go against religious beliefs. Your not having children but being forced to pay taxes for schools isn’t an infringement of religious beliefs nor is your taxes to go to roads. The Constitution treats religion differently. Get over it. The government can not legally force observant Jews or Moslems to buy and eat pork. It can not legally force Baptists and others who oppose alcohol consumption to buy and drink booze. Forcing Catholics to pay for birth control and abortion is no different. Just because it’s in a law doesn’t make it right.
“Separation of church and state” isn’t mentioned in the Constitution except as an application of the establishment clause.
LarryJ,
Looks like the thread’s deep enough to have to reply to this root, sorry if that makes the formatting odd.
If you take my other examples-such as applying workplace laws, they are secular, but they still apply, because they protect the individual(employee) over the organization(religion). OSHA does not care if your religion requires you to wear special headgear in a construction zone-your employer needs to provide you a helmet-it does not matter if the owner insists that all employees should wear a yarmulke, a hijab, a turban or a propeller beanie. The point of ACA is very similar-to ensure that employees of all companies(minus certain exemptions) have a modicum level of expectation of health care treatment from their employers. I disagree with employment based healhtcare on it’s face, but that’s a whole other subject.
(Also, if a law passes a SCOTUS challenge, it is technically considered constitutional-even if they are wildly unpopular)
If you assume that the government has no limits, then of course it can infringe on people’s religious views with impunity. If you believe the Constitution actually means what it says (and not just what the Supreme Court says), then the matter is reversed. Just because something is a law (even if the Supreme Court allows it), it doesn’t mean it’s right. The Catholic Church is suing the federal government over being forced to provide contraceptive coverage. According to this article, the Christian-owned Hobby Lobby retail chain is also suing on the same grounds. We’ll see how it turns out.
My company generally wants us to wear neckties but knows that would be unsafe for our machine shop personnel. They’re required to wear the appropriate clothing for a machine shop. If someone had a religious faith requiring them to wear clothing that would be dangerous in a machine shop, odds are they wouldn’t want to work in one (or live very long if they did). It’s one thing to say you can’t wear a piece of clothing. It’s a far different matter to say that you have to pay for something that directly opposes someone’s religious views such as Hobby Lobby being required to pay for the Morning After Pill (which they see as a form of abortion and therefore murder).
1. The claim that, because you are an employer, you have not rights of conscience (which is what you are saying) flat contradicts your assertion that people have “rights”. There is certainly no such provision in the US constitution.
2. “The separation of church and state doctrine establishes that federal law supercedes religious belief.” Another contradiction. If church and state are separate, then the one does not supercede the other. The 1st Amendment explicitly stats this. Your assertion is openly dishonest.
3. Your 3rd paragraph is a red herring. The appropriate question is “which regulations are, and which are not, possible for the state to impose?”. Your position is possible only if you assume that there is no limit to what the state may dictate. But then, this contradicts your previous assertion, decrying “forc[ing] your values onto other people”. For that is what this law does (in fact, all laws do). It is rank hypocrisy to to deny to others the right to seek laws doing, essentially, what you want laws to do, only in a different direction.
4. It is a lie, simply, to assert that regulating a religious institution, because it is also a business, is not regulating a religious institution. There was a time when Americans were forbidden to vote, not “as Americans”, but as blacks.
But like all Stalinists, you are too dishonest to try to dispute. There is no hope for a mind so rotten as yours.
Goodbye.
The flip side of this is when Obambus tries to blame anything and everything on Bush.
Thanks, Sarah! An excellent article.
Off topic, but I notice that the media, when it mentions it at all, is trying to spin the murder of our Ambassador to Libya, and the attacks on our embassies, as being the fault of an anti-Mohammed movie made in California.
Nope.
Libya and Egypt were just celebrating 9/11. To paraphrase Hillary, “We came, we saw, our ambassador died!” (Though, I suspect, State Department policy is actually run by Mrs. Huma Weiner. Her Moslem Brotherhood family must be so proud of her!)
How’s that Arab Spring working out for everybody?
Basically, what Egypt and Libya are doing, is waving an extended middle-finger at us, and guffawing “Haw, Haw, whatcha gonna do, Dhimmis? Happy 9/11, suckahs!” Though, I have no doubt, there will now be demands that we turn over everybody who had anything to do with the Mo movie that (supposedly) set off the current riots, to Islamic “Justice.” Mrs. Weiner will certainly be pushing for that.
I do hope everybody here realizes that attacking a country’s embassy, and murdering its ambassador, is an act of war?
Our government is guffawing at us, right along with Islam; our government is at war with us, too.
“We came, we saw, Americans got killed. What’s that, you say, Mrs. Weiner? ‘Just keep saying what a wonderful religion Islam is, and nobody gets hurt!’”
No, we are not out of our minds to wish for a Ronald Reagan to deal with our present problems; and yes, we do realize that Romney is far, far better than Obama.
It’s said that “the perfect is the enemy of the good.” Romney isn’t perfect, but then neither is anyone else. If someone complains that Romney isn’t the perfect conservative and refuse to vote for him, then they’re being a fool. However imperfect Romney may be, he’s likely to be a damned sight better than Obama. With Romney, we stand a chance to get some of what we want. With Obama, we’re guaranteed to get nothing that we want.
In 1976 the president of the college republicans at my college told me that if Reagan were to beat Ford and win the nomination, he would not vote for him in the Fall. I have been wary of the idiocy of party republicans ever since.
In Democrat theology:
Woodrow Wilson is Abraham
Franklin Roosevelt is Moses
John F. Kennedy is Jesus Christ
and
Barack Obama is the Second Coming of Christ.
No, he’s Mohammad.
A very good essay. I sure hope you’re right. But America has lost its way at the moment. I’m doubtful Mitt will win. If not, we’re in big trouble.
Awesome – I’ve been saying this same kind of thing for years. I can’t get over the people who want a savior, not a president (and that goes for both parties). Don’t they see how that diminishes the people?
Hey Sarah, since you seem to have an ever-widening audience, maybe you can get some of these Republicans who are making Romney ads to notice that the issue is our children and grandchildren – Democrats are fiscal child abusers. Repubs/pacs need to focus on this with “Daisy” type ads that will tap into people’s emotions as well as their brains.
Dems get this. Repubs don’t.
It is nowhere near that simple. The liberals have the LSM totally in their corner. If Romney attacks Obama in the way you suggest he’s immediately condemned and denounced as a “racist” plus unpatriotic. Want a example? Just yesterday Romney strongly criticized Obama’s stupidity regarding what happened in Libya. The LSM reaction? Angry hysteria calling Mitt “unfit” to be president. Romney has a complicated task to accomplish if he is to get elected.
I call them “economic pedophiles”. They’re screwing our children’s futures to buy votes for their benefit today.
Don’t mince words. Romney doesn’t have to use those words but a Super PAC could.
They’re economic pederasts, because they’re screwing them up the hoohoo while making them feel “special”.
Well written and very accurate article Sarah.
“Instead what they left us is a system of co-equal balancing branches of government in which the executive is supposed to be only one and just as fallible and human as the rest.”
YES! The Founding documents fully expect that our leaders will not be perfect and should never be placed in the kind of power that would require a leader to be perfect. The Founders did believe in “public virtue” whereby a leader would serve in a certain degree of humility and would be mindful of making choices that would be best *for* *the* *nation* instead of best for certain constituencies. Hence the increasing disgust with cronyism and spoils for special constituencies.
There is today a vocal political movement that calls for our leaders to again do what is best for the nation instead of only what is best for certain constituencies. May the public virtue that the Tea Party is attempting to grow allow us to be renewed as the people who own the government and who simply employ our elected officials for a brief time as servants or every citizen, not just a few.
Let’s be candid about our electoral motivations. We don’t go to the polls every four years to elect a president. Not any more, at least. We go to the polls to anoint a king.
The president’s authority still falls short of that of an absolute monarch. Nor, if questioned on the matter, would most Americans advocate giving it to him. Yet it is great: greater than ever before entrusted to a single man. We can’t help but be aware of it — including those of us who deplore the fact and are desperate to see the powers of the presidency sharply curtailed. So when we throw our support behind a presidential candidate, we can’t help but hope that he’ll prove to be a Solomon or an Aragorn: a paragon of justice, courage, and virtue, worthy of more than obedience out of fear…worthy of something approaching veneration.
Knowing our fallibility, we yearn to believe that our rulers are wiser than we. Knowing how quickly we quail before danger and hardship, we yearn to believe that our rulers are braver than we. Knowing the frailty of our consciences, we yearn to believe that our rulers are stouter against temptation than we. Knowing how very difficult it is to restrain a president, we yearn to believe that the man we seek to raise to that post is of kingly character: that is, character virtuous enough, noble enough, and firm enough to entrust with the powers of a king.
And inevitably, he proves to be less.
You (and we) have been propagandized into this cult view of the imperial presidency by two or three generations of Democrat historians worshipping at the shrine of Saint FDR.
Some of them even worked in his administration or in one of the alphabet agencies he created to undermine the Constitution.
To put it mildly, that’s not how the presidency was viewed before Wilson.
The whole imperial presidency is largely an artifact of Wilson and the cadre of administrators and bureaucrats he assembled around his administration. Most of the younger Wilsonites went on to rinse and repeat when FDR got in.
And guess what? When the 1960s rolled around, the foot soldiers of FDR reappear, this time as senior advisors, to coach Kennedy and Johnson.
It’s that kind of autopilot programming that needs to be broken.
There must be an atavistic yearning for the Return of the King, he who will usher in a Golden Age (England and France each had a couple of lucky monarchs like that). Alas, our presidents are only given 4 or 8 years and then are put out to pasture, successful or not.
After being a Republican for 25 years, I left and joined the reality-based community last year. Mitt is just weird, I don’t know how anyone can be planning to vote for him. How many American families don’t have a single veteran in 5 generations? Well, the Romneys are one of those families. In fact, there are only ten or so children of congresspersons serving in harms way right now. Yet, Prince Harry is flying Apaches in ‘Stan as we speak. How many are yearning for the Return of the King? Maybe Canada will take the blue states as additional Provinces. That way, the red states can see how well they fare without those federal subsidies (the dark truth behind the “red state model” of child poverty, bigotry, and politico-economic illiteracy) while the blue states will renegotiate the 1814 Treaty of Ghent.
Even Reagan would agree with you. Certainly that’s what the founders intended. This idolatry has got to stop, we’re hiring someone, not crowning them!
Reagan showed us the way; we must all be Ronald Reagan ourselves.
Romney/Ryan wont save us, and fix everything, nor should they. But at least they may stop doing further damage, like obama is doing constantly. We dont need a gov in DC to make everything right, we just need one to stop making things wrong, and then the natural recuperative power of the free market will set things right. But lets not kid ourselves, I have been following politics since the 60′s, and I never remember a time, or a president, that has taken this country so close to disaster as obama has. Bush was not great, but Obama is a complete disaster, despite slick willies glowing testimonial.
I’M NOT VOTING FOR ROMNEY. I’m voting AGAINST Obama. And that leaves … well … Romney. He’s got a better chance of getting Obama out of office than the libertarians, the only other party with even a hint of credibility. Even if he does increase government’s extent and intrusion, it will still look like small government compared to what I’m sure Obama will do. So, even if you’re not satisfied with Romney, even if you refuse to vote at all, you’ll get another four years of Obama and four more years of worse economy, back-breaking deficit spending, criminal behavior by government agencies and lies.
He governs best who governs least. Thus the question is which is the lesser of two governors? For Obama the answer to any question appears to be “more government.” With Romney it seems there might be at least some portion of American life that doesn’t require federal regulation. But if you think a “Great Man” is the solution it is likely you don’t properly understand the problem.
“The more corrupt the state, the more it legislates.” — Tacitus, 1st Cent BC
I’m not voting for Romney; I’m voting against Obama. This administration has to be the most corrupt, most self-serving, most dishonest group of FAKES in the history of this great nation. I want them out.
As for Romney/Ryan, enjoy my vote…because until the GOP pulls its head out of its fourth-point-of-contact and grows a backbone, this will be THE LAST vote you get from me.
The more politicians keeps bloating this country, I’m finding myself becoming more and more Libertarian as the years roll by.
Many ‘commenters’ have repeatedly forewarned that November 2012 is the most important election in our lifetimes. I would suggest that it’s unquestionably the most important election in American history. Granted that Obama has tortured the American economy, and rendered it into a semi-comatose state with the imposition of his economically debilitating Socialist policies; but, it’s Obama’s destructive forays into the Foreign Policy sphere that represents an even greater threat to our National Security. Obama has oft stated his intention to ZERO out America’s nuclear arsenal; i.e. unilateral disarmament. (More aptly characterized as unilateral National suicide.) This while our principal adversaries from Russia -to- the CHICOM -to- the North Koreans -to- Iran are feverishly taking every possible step to modernize their own nuclear arsenals. Recall that Obama was only able to secure Senate concurrence for his latest SALT negotiations by giving assurances that he would aggressively pursue the modernization of our residual nuclear components. Like all other Obama commitments, the modernization effort has been unceremoniously scraped. Circumstances that are compounded by Obama’s systematic curtailment of our Nation’s Anti-Ballistic-Missile (ABM) defense structure. Although many, including Obama, consider Iran to be more of a nuisance than a material threat, consider the near-term capability of Iran to launch an EMP device over our East Coast that would incapacitate our most essential Governmental communications nets. Iran’s latest stated determination to deploy its Naval assets off of our Nation’s shores was not without purposeful intention. Unequivocally, the unilateral scrapping of America’s TRIAD, the arsenal that has anchored American security for decades, would be the most despicably irresponsible act ever committed by an American president. Envision a nuclear void United States under intimidation by a substantial nuclear power, e.g. North Korea, governed by a fanatical/militaristic regime to whom human life is of no consequence. All in sync with Obama’s life-long coveted dream to pare America down to size. To that end, Obama will pursue EVERY recourse to ensure the implementation of ‘Sequestration’ so as to cripple Our Nation’s Defense establishment. Beyond any rational counter-argument, Obama represents a
‘Clear-And-Present-Danger’ to the National Security interests of the United States. Greg Neubeck
Obama may be Caligula, but I may venture to say that Romney is Nero. Obama has taken the country from a precarious point and shoved it down the hill towards the cliff. Romney, a man of no convictions who has a record of flip-flops so long McCain wouldn’t touch him with a ten foot pollster.
Nero was an ineffectual person who had no clue how to rule an empire and no morality, and I submit that perhaps Romney could be our Nero. Granted Obama has further placed this country in a bad situation through lack of leadership, but Romney with his own flip-flop on now supporting parts of Obamacare, after denouncing them, but not before writing the blueprints for them, as Nero was intellectually and morally weak, Romney’s downfall that could lead to our own burning of Rome would be for the fact Romney has no convictions (one could argue spinelessness is a lack of morality and courage) and therefore would leave this country equally leaderless as under Obama.
I content that Gary Johnson would be a far better man. Is he “THE” man to lead America out of this sink hole? Perhaps. Is any one man destined to help America? I don’t believe so, but Johnson certainly has the brass ones to have convictions, a record to back him up, and a plan and vision to restore the economy and civil liberties and rights. Romney and Obama promise to fix the economy, but offer no plans. Gary Johnson has a track record during his two terms as governor (more executive experience than Romney and Obama combined) turning that Democratically run cesspit of bad budgets called New Mexico around, getting New Mexico out of a $1 billion deficit ditch (not a small feat for a state with an average population at the time of 1.8M), building up a $1 billion surplus, cutting taxes 14 times, reducing the size of state government by 10% through attrition, and balancing the budget all eight years. Not only that, Johnson has a backbone enough of a backbone to say no and veto 750 bills while governor (only two overturned).
Did Romney balance the budget all his 4 years? Did he cut taxes and fees or raise them? Did government grow or shrink under his governorship? And he left Massachusetts with the second highest debt per resident in the nation. Not to mention, his 1.5% job growth rating is anemic compared to the 11.6% job growth rate under Johnson.
So perhaps we should be looking for a candidate other than what the Republic has offered up. There is little choice when both the Democrats and Republicans offer us is stale and rotten meat. Perhaps as voters we should look to something other than the same old solutions the two parties have offered up, the same two solution who have gotten us into the mess and offer no real plant to get us out.
That is blasphemy to Ron Paul worshippers! How dare you, Sarah! The only man that can save America!
No one election is gonna save us. We have a lot of work to do to take back our institutions, roll back decades of Leftwing jurisprudence, educate the future generations, and re-stock the bureacracies with non-leftist radicals.
As Mr. Romney said (paraphrase) Mr Obama promised to stem the rising tides in the oceans. I just want to help you and your family.
Who has the God complex? It certainly isn’t Mr. Romney.
Romney seems like a low key nice man to me. I am tired of all the nitpicking about the candidates. I was glad Romney expressed his feelings about the attacks in the middle east; I wish Obama would just have some feelings. Politicians have allowed their handlers to have too much control over their lives.
The so-called foreign policy of the obamites is terrible. He does not represent the average citizen. I don’t mind spending a little money helping people who have gone through an earthquake or tsunami(sp?) America has always helped those in need and should be proud of that effort. I prefer some child getting clean water to drink to some smart-aleck kid getting funds to go to college when he hasn’t even learned to read.
“And we knew there would be challenges and there would be issues and there would be problems. And then if you even got the nomination, we knew how difficult it is. But I asked him one question. And this is why we decided to run. I said, ‘Mitt, can you save America?’ And his answer was ‘yes.’” — Ann Romney at a campaign event in New Hampshire early this year.
I would suggest that it’s the Republicans who have a savior complex, not President Obama.
Yes. I admit it. You are right. I remember the comic book dreaminess of my fellow workers on my last job as everyone I worked with, and I mean everyone, backed Obama and some literally cursed me that I did not. My only answer was “no one man is going to save our country.” It’s amazing how many believed he would be our deliverer? But here we are again with the same overwhelming glazed over looks in people’s eyes. When will they click their ruby-red slippers together and realize the presidential OZ isn’t where the power and truth are and the wizard there doesn’t have anything more in his bag of tricks. I for one think the only help would be to take the power back from the biggest and most monopolizing business in America, the Federal Government, and give it back to the states, (and give the presidential office only the minimum granted in the Constitution).