Confessions of a Contrarian
I. I am not on the Obama bus
I followed the Obama senatorial campaign and even his early career in Chicago, and confess I was not impressed. I think on any occasion he announces a moral standard it is reactive—not proactive—and we can be sure it serves as cover for something of questionable morality. So when he says he won’t do something, it usually means he already has. Let us count the ways:
a) “Highest ethical standards” are proof we will get Richardson, Geithner, Daschle, Solis, etc. nominated who cannot or do not pay all their taxes—among other things. There will be only praise for, not silence about, tax-cheats and unethical players in Congress like Chris Dodd, John Murtha, or Charles Rangel. To suggest otherwise is to be cynical, sharp, partisan; most on the Left who preach about the Wall-Street/DC nexus and the “big guys” at the trough are silent on this disturbing new big money/Democrat connection.
b) Christian, Sermon-on-the-Mount declarations about forgiveness and ‘moving forward, not backward’ indicate that “Bush did it” is the now the standard throat-clearing before every speech abroad. Suggesting that we do not wish to dredge up the past is assurance that we will try to humiliate lawyers in the Justice Department who years ago gave opinions at a time of national crisis. Do we try federal judges whose opinions we don’t like?
c) Talking about “financial sobriety” and “halving the deficit” guarantee that we will triple the annual deficit, and add more to the national debt in eight years than we did in aggregate since the founding of the republic.
d) Soaring rhetoric about the reset button, a new softness, more listening, a new page, etc. assure us that we will have no moral compass, and treat Venezuela like Columbia, Georgia like Russia, Iran like Iraq—the more we hear of a new morality, the more we know there will be no moral distinctions.
e) The demonized percentile who makes over $250,000 who alone will be taxed—won’t be alone to see new taxes. Confiscate all their cash and you still cannot pay off debts piling up at $1.7 trillion per year. So gas, cigarette, alcohol, taxes will climb and soon even that will not be enough. The more we do not hear that, the more it is coming
f) The more Bush gave us “false choices” and shredded the constitution, the more Obama will adopt FISA, email intercepts, wiretaps, renditions, Bush’s Iraq plan, the same old in Afghanistan, etc. Let us see whether Guantanamo closes within a year: watch especially the reaction to the poor teen-aged Somali pirate and ask yourself whether this administration wishes to repeat that again and again—or whether other countries wish to have their framed, railroaded, tortured, and misunderstood pseudo-terrorists back on the streets of Berlin, Paris, or Cairo. Again, when one on Team Obama trashes Bush the law shredder, then assume that we have already adopted his security protocols.
g) We are postracial, transracial, multicultural, etc. and rightfully so don’t talk about ‘Hussein,’ or one’s ethnic background, etc. But abroad? All that qualification simply means YOU don’t dare do it, but HE does, all the time, everywhere, both to sway world opinion and ever so gently to distance himself from America’s past when convenient : so the first thing on the Latin American summit table is “race.” Arabs are told to be comfortable because of Barack’s names, first and second and third, his Muslim father, his non-traditional background. In other words, anytime anyone in the US is told that racism is lurking its ugly head around every corner, be assured that Obama will broadcast his race and heritage to Europeans, Turks, Arabs, and Latin Americans. The two behaviors are joined at the hip. The warning always follows its antithesis.
How I wish there were an oracle who could foretell our future, a being who could assure that we will have a good future. However, we elected a weak person as president and with the “End Times” approaching, 12/21/2012, maybe it’s time for me to curl up and pray for rain; a poor way to deal with anything.
Professor, however, let’s all pray that we shan’t get a new war thrust upon us as it doesn’t appear our dear leader has the strength to deal with it and I’m too old to do much except protect my wife and cat.
“not on the bus” is the understatement of the millenium.
I’ll tell you what the guy in the White House and his handlers are good at. They are good at dancing right up to the line of outright criminality, and then obfuscating by throwing out half a dozen other stink-bombs to make sure the msm has something to wave their arms and lie about to distract the serfs from the latest broomstick they have shoved up the rectum of decent Americans.
Rush is right.
Obama is all about revenge.
But personally, I’m thinking that he who gets revenge last gets revenge best.
And I don’t think I’m alone.
NOT a confession! This is speaking truth to power!
VDH,
Nowadays, common sense IS contrarianism. In fact, it’s the new counter-culture. You just didn’t realize how radical you had become, how far you’d strayed from the new cultural norms of….stupidity. Case in point — this controversy about torture. A few comments about our atrocious behavior toward KSM and friends:
– I read the arguments about waterboarding at NRO, NYT, Slate etc and I’ll admit I am underwhelmed by it all. This whole debate would be moot if we had sustained another 9/11 attack.
– The comparison to military SERE training was a sop to the DC crowd who had never been in uniform. In fact, much of military training — besides SERE school — involves physical hardship, psychological abuse, risk of injury, sleep deprivation etc. And, of course, conditions in combat are even worse. Just ask the 1.3 million troops we sent to war in order to prevent a KSM copycat attack.
– Waterboarding involves simulated near-drowning. In the mid 80′s when I went through military SCUBA training, near-drowning experiences were not uncommon and were intentionally induced by the instructors to teach you not to panic. This may have been a factor in why it took so many sessions of waterboarding to get KSM to talk. He probably got used to it. Especially since the maximum breath hold time for him was only 40 seconds.
— It should be obvious by now that in 2001 the CIA had no idea how to torture someone. So….what about all those Hollywood movies the past 30 years showing the CIA doing exactly that, or worse? Ruins my whole image of our valiant Clowns-In-Action guys, our counter to the Sword and Shield of the USSR ‘n all. I mean, geez, what a let down to learn that those Ivy League weenies at the real CIA had to ask plebian military SERE instructors for guidance on how to slap around a mass murderer. Go figure.
Well, thanks. I never saw what was so great about Mohammed Ali either.
I thought I was the only weird one because everyone else seemed to think he was so great.
I don’t mind torturing and killing the guilty (though waterboarding 183 times in one month does seem a bit much), it is when we do it to folks who had nothing to do with 9 11 that I start getting a little squeamish.
I don’t believe we waterboarded Timmy McVeigh. I guess he didn’t kill enough Americans.
The fact that pundits and politicians are hypocrites should not come as a surprise.
Otherwise I enjoy Victor’s pieces and books.
I remember Smokin Joe’s son, an honorable man and an incredible defensive back, traded away from the San Francisco 49′ers.
“I do not understand the morality of the Left.”
Usually it is a mistake to accuse the wingnutettes and wingnuts of just plain lyin’, but Rear-Colonel V. D. H. Blimp is really askin’ for it with that little exuberance.
It comes from a militant extremist neocomrade who has only written about 318 factious scribbles on behalf of the AEIdeology and the Party of Big Management in which he was kind enough to offer free psychoanalysis of “the Left.”
Now along drifts Blimp admittin’ in so many words that he didn’t know what he was agitproppin’ about!
Very likely he did not, but one can scarcely discuss the proposition with him when is so patently insincere this time around.
Happy days.
You may also remember that Mohammed Ali avoided military service as a conscientious objector because he claimed to be an Islamic priest. I never cared for Elvis Presley’s music, but at least he served honorably in the US Army.
Seeing as to how you are speaking more truth than the average Joe, maybe we should run you for President. That is NOT meant as a joke!!
Professor:
Another delightful column, thank you.
Don’t you mean ‘dredge up’ for ‘drudge up’? See, I DO read every word!
I am also not on the morbidly-ldeological mobbed-up murtadd Muslim Mussolini-moulded modified Marxist empty galabia’s bus.
And the life-time Bush Family and Republican Party blind spots dwelling permanent poster person for the Peter Principle and for Affirmative Action and inspiration for Jaw-Bone-Joe Biden’s use of “Powellism,” ever had about the same appeal to me as did that other un-and-anti American: Mr Cassius Muhummad Clay Ar-lee. (Whose rehabilitation by Mr G W Bush disturbed me but not nearly as much as did his rehabilitation of the treasonous, recidivist, lying, looting, thieving, mass-murdering, co-serial-rapist gangster basta*d Cli’tons!)
But perhaps Doctor Hanson was referring to the UK’s only actually intelligent and courageous post-war politician, The Right Honourable Brigadier John Enoch Powell MBE?
Now there’s a Powellism whose bus I’ll ride!
Brian Richard Allen
Los Angeles CalifO’ZEROcated 90028
And the Far Abroad
VDH – “Do the Obamians realize that no one is exempt from such cycles of adulation/vituperation?”
Don’t forget that the Obama administration still has the “don’t insult the black guy you filthy racists” card up their slieves once people finally admit to themselves (and start to voice the fact) that they elected a con-artist.
It must be quite embarrassing for some people to realise just how easily they were duped into voting for this guy. It has been clear from day one that he says one thing while doing the opposite – getting away with it only because his followers desperately want to believe what he is saying despite the evidence of their own two eyes (when they allow themselves to actually look that is!!).
Ok, you can forgive people being sucked into the “hopey-change” schtick first time around but what will it say about the savvy and ambition of the US if he gets re-elected?
Barrack may be the President, but he’s acting like a vindictive Detroit City Councilman. That kind of management style is doomed to failure.
And a quick note to Commenters like DougWright: Hanson isn’t writing to depress you or fill you with fear. (That’s what “Sean Hannity’s America” is for) Hanson is outlining these trends in hopes of correcting them. He doesn’t want you to “curl up,” he wants you to vote, to e-mail your congressman, to make a political contribution, to go to the next tea party…
Even if tough times are ahead, I’m sure our wives and cats will be fine.
Smokin’ Joe always had class, and you’re right about Ali. His attitude was born in the South after the Civil War when blacks created a caste system based on whether your people were house or field slaves and your pigmentation – the lighter the better. Ali was a closet racist and that hypocrite, Cosell, proved he was one, as well.
PS If you don’t understand the morality of the Left, that’s because there is none. They’ve been about the ends justifying the means, they don’t know anything else.
Cassius Clay had everything going for him that the mainstream media adored.
He was a loud, boisterous, disrespectful, flamboyant, manipulative heavyweight boxing champion that became a Muslim, changed his name to Muhamned Ali and thereafter let both the media and the politicians do his dirty work of bad mounting America while at the same time damning Christians and Jews for the plight of black people in the United States of America.
From his article I can’t tell if Doctor Hanson is suffering a little bit from the same retro-gressive frustrations of hapless Republican stagnation that ails many of us these days, or that he simply wants to point out the amazing similarities of what is in the Whitehouse today versus what acted like a babbling idiot in the boxing ring yesterday.
Victor, when in doubt about someones honesty, watching what they do instead of what they say is the only way to go. the administrations words are exactly opposite of what they intend to do as you so well point out.
Our country is being run by a bunch of rank amateurs who have evil intentions. The adults in the room are just waiting them out in order to pick up the pieces.
Remember that the idiot, known as Ali…a muslim, got up on that stage to celebrate those who lost their lives on 9/11, and proclaimed:
“Islam…(stutter, head bobbing) is a religion of peace!”
I am reminded of that doctor who said: “this might sting a little bit!”
I know who my enemies are. What worries me are those who I think are my friends…and compatriots.
Fine thoughts doc!
Victor: This country is in deep trouble because the guy at the top will not do his primary job which is to defend the homeland. But it doesn’t surprise me because his homeland is not America, it’s Kenya.
Lately, the new Director of Homeland Security said it wasn’t a crime to come into the USA illegally. We know middle-eastern men are coming through Mexico…with mischief on their mind.
Now the President tells our sworn enemies which technique will or will no longer be used to acquire information…and the technique wasn’t all that bad to begin with.
Still, maybe the CIA should have administered butterflies in the box, put hockey pads on the subjects, and used a little less curry on the veal.
If they would have waterboarded with scotch and water, we might have learned even more.
On a positive note, we may have finally found a cause for impeachment. Aiding and abetting invasion by hostile forces and publicizing defense and intelligence secrets. Where’s Phillip Berg and Jerome Corsi now that we have a real case?
A case for Treason.
I can’t let this go by, I’m sorry.
I too wasn’t a huge fan oif Muhammad Ali. I thought he talked too much and I don’t like pretty boxers because boxing is an ugly sport and ugly men like Frazier, Sonny Liston, and Mike Tyson reflected the uglines of the sport.
Then I saw Ali fight Ken Norton. Norton broke Ali’s jaw in the second round. Ali’s jaw swelled up like a baloon and made a wide-open target for Norton’s punches (and Norton had a good punch). Ali was in incredible pain and his cornermen kept asking him to give it up. By the later rounds Ali’s handlers were practiaclly in tears. But Ali kept answering the bell. He took punches to his broken jaw for ten rounds. After the fight (which was only Ali’s second loss), Ali couldn’t speak to the press because of his broken jaw. That was the day that Ali shut up and proved he was the toughest man in boxing.
I cheered for Frazier the first time the two met. But by the time Ali regained the championship from George Forman, I was a committed Ali fan.
This is not to take anything away from Joe Fraizer. He was a good man and a great boxer. People don’t always remember that when boxing didn’t want Ali to fight Fraizer, it was Frazier that pushed for the big fight in Madsison Square Garden to prove he deserved his championship. Joe Frazier was a class act. Ali respected Frazier and gave him his last big payday by fighting him in Manila. A fight that probably was the single biggest cause of the Parkinson’s that Ali suffers from today.
But to those who never liked Ali because he dared to be a Muslim and he refused to go to Vietnam, even though he would have had an easy time in the army (like Joe Louis did), reflect on the sheer guts of a man who would stand up to a fighter like Ken Norton with a broken jaw and respect him for his incredible inner-strength both in and out of the ring.
I agree about Ali. I think he was basically just a jerk. I have heard people be critical of Joe Frazier for not being willing to forgive Ali. Personally, I think Frazier doesn’t need to forgive Ali until Ali admits that he was wrong to say the things he did.
#7, Are you thinking of Ken Norton’s son, Ken Norton, Jr? The only son of Joe Frazier I can remember having any pro sports experience was Marvis who was a boxer.
As he approaches the 100-day mark of his presidency, Barack Obama’s job approval ratings are higher than those of his most recent predecessors. However, the 44th president is even more distinguished by his strong personal popularity. Fully 73% of Americans – including as many as 46% of Republicans – hold a favorable view of Obama as a person. Fewer people held favorable impressions of George W. Bush (61%) and Bill Clinton (60%) early in their first years.
Obama’s job approval stands at 63%, while 26% disapprove of the way he is handling his job as president. His approval rating is up slightly from March (59%). Opinions about Obama’s performance remain highly partisan. Fully 93% of Democrats approve of the way Obama is handling his job as president, compared with just 30% of Republicans. Independents’ opinions fall in between, with 58% expressing positive views of his performance and 27% negative opinions.
Pew Research previously found a greater partisan gap in Obama’s early job approval ratings than in the ratings of past presidents.
Great as usual but the Ali section is superfluous to the article, if you ask me. Besides, I believe he paid the price for his arrogance.
One remembers Harry Truman, the buck stops here. Now we have his heir, Obama, the buck stops with Eric Holder. Holder will be responsible for the witch trials, not I the great dreamer of great dreams and apologist for America.
The only problem with a VDH article is that I have to spend valuable time after reading it forwarding it onward to everyone I know! Awesome stuff!
I have a feeling there will be yet more added to the list of OMG’isms by the time Carter II is done wreaking havoc. The current march towards investigating Bush administration officials over the “torture” memos is a worrisome one that doesn’t bode well for the future safety and security of this country. I only hope someone close to Carter II has a big enough backbone to whisper in his ear that what goes around comes around and there are MILLIONS of Americans taking notes in the meantime.
Once again, Professor Hanson, you have collapsed the wave function of the Obama tide merely by observing it. This is a great talent and not mere contrarianism.
Also, I agree on Ali, but as time went on I developed more affection for him. When he could no longer avoid punches — I think of one particular bout against Ken Norton, probably the fight where Ali acquired at least half of the damage done to his brain as a fighter — he stood there in the ring and took them like nobody’s business, out of raw determination. It cost him the comfort of his later years, as we can see. But, as Hyman Roth could say with him, “this is the business we have chosen.”
One can, however, as you suggest, draw a direct line from Ali’s narcissistic antics to, for instance, the revolting behavior of John McEnroe, who soiled professional tennis for a generation and has been amply rewarded for it.
Obama and his merry bank of miscreants are the worst thing that has happened to this great country.
I find him hubris, disingenuous, a fraud, liar and traitor to America, our constitution and our freedoms.
The emperor has no clothes. He is a naive fool, as are those who follow him.
Mr. Hanson, thanks for the great article. A few comments:
1. Apparently, at least you gave Obama the benefit of the doubt. I never did, nor was I ever even tempted to “enter his bus”. I researched him thoroughly, and I found very disturbing traits: lies, half-truths, changing his life story for political gains, and more. A drug use history that was obviously downplayed, a very disturbing “father”, but, more importantly, as the saying goes: “tell me with whom you hang out, and I tell you who you are.” Reverend Wright, Axelrod, Bill Ayers, his wife close association with Ms. Dorn, Alinsky’s influence, community organizer. Unfortunately, I sincerely believe that the current president is a liar and a schemer of dubious character.
2. I also believe that a series of unfortunate circumstances, something like a perfect storm scenario, allowed for Obama to be elected, kind of “Obama slipped in on us under the door.” Many independents, so-called Reagan Democrats, are now starting to experience the hangover after they voted for him.
3. I like your comparison with Mohammed Ali. I never liked him either. He was an arrogant dude, and a hater of America. My kind of man is George Foreman. Frazier was better too. Obama’s first inkling of his arrogance was that “I won” warning, totally out of place and befitting more an ACORN activist than the president of the US.
4. The damage done and yet to be done to this country by Obama may be irreversible, if we don’t act right now.
It would seem that Obama’s current waffling on treatment of detainees is due to pressure coming from some of the people notable for financing his election, specifically, moveon.org and the Soros people.
To what extent does that crowd (and its still rabid desire to “get” Bush/Cheney) influence policy in our current government ?
Earlier this week, Obama uttered some remarks about interrogation techniques and loss of our “moral compass” (words to that effect), I thought about the moral compass of an individual who has his track record on the abortion vote.
You’d think he’d be suffering a little cognitive dissonance in the moral compass department.
“…opining in juvenile fashion…nonsense to the elite public as something deep and provoking…
“Juvenile?” Is the racist professor calling Cassius Clay/Mohamed Ali a boy? Next thing you know he’ll be suggesting that Obama, who never worked a day in his life, is pissing away our hard-earned tax dollars like a drunken something-other-than-sailor. Gotta watch your language, Prof.
Unfortunately, an academic is the wrong person to describe this bizarre children’s revolution we are living through. A proper portrait of Obama’s America requires a novelist. Hopefully Tom Wolfe will write a sequel to Bonfire of the Vanities and we’ll all get the picture.
The writer used a funny combination of words “I do not understand the morality of the Left.” The very concept is so abstract to the left (in its orgy of “relatives”) as to be meaningless. The real “morality/ethic” of the left is “anything goes” in the drive to destroy competing ideologies.
President Obama (“the White House”): “White House lawyers are refusing to accept the findings of an inter-agency committee that the Uighur Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay are too dangerous to release inside the U.S., according to Pentagon sources familiar with the action.” From JIHAD WATCH by Robert Spencer, available on FRONTPAGEMAG April 23.
I was a young copilot for National Airlines when we were advised one morning that a VIP was about to board the plane. All of the other passengers were already seated and we were wating on this VIP to arrive. I was the cockpit greeter and stood in the cockpit doorway to welcome all aboard. At the very last moment Cassius Clay (Muhamed Ali) arrived and made small talk with me for a moment. Just before he turned to take a first class seat, I noticed in his hand a rolled up bundle of comic books with Superman being the one on top. He was a simple man who listened to a Rev. Wright type figure and we see the outcome. Dejavu?
7. Gaffe Prices writes:
“I remember Smokin Joe’s son, an honorable man and an incredible defensive back, traded away from the San Francisco 49′ers.”
..I may be mistaken, but you might be confusing Frasier and his son with Kennie Norton and his estranged son, Ken Norton Jr, who played for the Niners after a college career at UCLA and who now coaches for (Bo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o) “Just SC”?
Victor Davis Hanson writes: “….and had a quiet nobility about his carriage entirely lacking in the narcissistic Ali, who crafted the pseudo-role as the “uppity” successful black that white closet racists were supposed to fear and loathe.”
Are you entirely sure that Ali “crafted” the role of an “uppity” successful black in a purposeful effort to make whites uncomfortable, or is it possible that you are simply chagrined by the notion of a successful, outspoken black man who apparently in your eyes hasn’t shown the proper respect for the whites who have affored him so much?
It’s fitting that your choice for a black role model would be one who kept his head down and his mouth shut.
Michael,
On LIking Cassius Clay: The ‘world’ likes him. He’s a Black Muslim. 2 + 2 = 4.
I never liked Ali either. He ran counter to ever thing I was taught about sportsmanship. I now have some pity for him. He was used and misled by his allies. He was robbed blind by his Muslim “brothers” and fought for far too long because of it.
Joe Frazier was class and Foreman was just scary.
#35 Pastor of Muppets: Yet more racism talk from the Left? *yawn*
Muppets’ comment: “It’s fitting that your choice for a black role model would be one who kept his head down and his mouth shut.”
The dignified and exeedingly tough Heavyweight Champion of the World, Frazier, whose accomplishment spoke for him, yes, was a better choice than the antic loudmouth who couldn’t stop acting out.
I remember my first days after moving to NYC in the late 70s and getting accustomed to the subway, sensing the frustration of black New Yorkers going about their business, to and from work, when groups of young black men would get on the train and through their acting out seemingly set back the accomplishments of those everyday blacks to establish respect for themselves.
Thomas Sowell, from Harlem, does a stellar job of exposing the sort of sentiments approving Ali’s coarse behavior in the title essay of his Black Rednecks and White Liberals. Highly recommended.
I think I have another example of the “hoped-for” (changey-hopey) being opposite of the reality.
This morning in the mail hubby and I received notification from the Social Security Administration:
“Good news! The economic recovery bill that president obama signed into law in February 2009 provides for a one-time payment of $250 to Social Security and Supplemental Security Income beneficiaries.” Idiots.
Where to begin. Idiots.
1. They think I am stupid enough to say, “Oh, goody. The fraud is giving us $500*. Now I love him.” (*It’s $250 EACH, folks) Idiots.
2. My immediate thought was “Thanks for nothing. You just increased my part of the government debt by $500.” Idiots.
3. Second thought (posed to you good people here): Just for a little more factual perspective, does anyone have the formula for estimate the eventual total interest on our stupid $500? That becomes part of my new debt also.
4. They have no shame because they truly believe that we are all just panting at the welfare trough, beginning for nickel from the boss. Idiots.
And just for a little prevent defense–of course, I’m not going to send it back. I’m going to put it in the cash drawer for the day the ATMs stop issuing funds.
If you and I are the fire department, these idiots are the arsonists. Congress is SUPPOSED to represent us. Unfortunately, they ARE the arsonists. So guess what? Nobody’s representing us.
If Patrick Henry thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see it with representation.
“begging for a nickel from the boss” obviously
MiamaMan at #28 has already, in essence, made my first comment: we knew everything VDH so competently outlines about Obama a year ago (or more).
Obama will continue to do what he does — say one thing and do the opposite — until it stops working for him. I am pretty certain it will take a foreign power, and an international security situation, to put him in a position from which he can’t wriggle through rhetorical cadence centered on “false choices.” His credulous domestic base is, I regret to conclude, too stupid to see through him (like kulaks weeping “If only Stalin KNEW…”). His political cohort, in politics and media, is too invested in him to reset the floodlights, and change the public perspective they labor so diligently to promote.
Pastor of Muppets: you should know more about VDH before lobbing freighted racist nonsense at him, and drawing this tendentious conclusion: “It’s fitting that your choice for a black role model would be one who kept his head down and his mouth shut.”
Actually, I think it’s fitting too — because VDH would choose for a role model a man of ANY race who kept his head down and his mouth, mostly, shut. My sense of him from his writings is that he regards politicized flamboyance as neither manly nor virtuous; and applies this standard to ancient Greeks, modern politicians, soldiers, actors, and boxers alike.
That’s just my take. VDH speaks perfectly well for himself.
Frazier’s son, Marvis, was a heavyweight who was soundly beaten by Larry Holmes, to the point where Holmes asked the ref to step in to protect Marvis from further beating. Holmes seemed to me to be a real gentleman.
#35:
Ah yes, when a liberal doesn’t know what else to say, he resorts to calling others racist.
Ali was a loud-mouthed jerk. There are plenty of successful, outspoken black men and women who manage not to be jerks.
OBAMA IS A FOLLOWER OF THE LEFT
He subscribes to the Utopian thinking of others.
http://greensrealworld.blogspot.com/2009/04/leftist-community-service-drivel.html
In the current state of affairs, humility and morailty have escaped the left. The decline of morality is probably due to an abnormally large investment of faith in Obama.
It is not humble for an individual to apologize for an entire country in front of the World. Will Obama stand before his country and be humbled? Who does Obama consider to be his peers?
In the first 100 days, I have not heard or seen Obama apply his intellect in creative or memorable ways. What is there to be inspired about? Are we to conclude that because Obama and the World understands that the US is not perfect, that we have made progress?
More than ever, the hopes of this nation are placed in the hands of a single individual. We are all burdended with the debt of Obama’s economic decisions. Obama does not seem humbled by the task before him.
Doc I know a lot of people read your brilliant thoughts and insight and immediately want to run you for President. I, however, think you do us and the country much more good as a writer and commentator on the events that are hammering us and hope that you keep up your excellent writing. Even if Janet is keeping tabs on you now.
Kermit the frog,
You are aware of how trite and naive you sound when you pull out your worn race card, yes? Stop taking yourself so seriously. Experience the world a little more. Read more, especially books from opposing viewpoints. Get away from your herd for a spell. Take the road less travelled, and you may be surprised where you end up.
“Leon Sphinx”? What the…?
Bravo! Brilliance of thought and expression.
35. Pastor of Muppets
You obviously don’t know much about the Professor.
I thought it was fun to hear that George Forman has many sons and named all of them George. There could have been 10 of them. Isn’t that a riot?
Also, who puts sandwiches in those sandwich toasters anyway? Anybody?
Yeah, look at ALI now…
The boxing talk in this discussion seems to be reflective of the blindness for whats important that many people have when making decisions in who they support.
Ali is one of the greatest boxers ever and no one can question his ability or toughness, but his lifes behavior as a man shows he is pretty much a failure.
All of President Obama’s petty vindictive need for revenge will come around & end up biting him where it hurts. His incompetence, arrogance, & ignorance is a lethal combination in which his administration will crumble as he attempts to subvert the United States Constitution.
It continues to go from bad to worse. The President is self centered. He sees himself as someone who by himself can correct all the evils of the world. He has no hesitation in placing blame on his predecessor or on those who held positions of authority in his predecessor’s administration for what he describes as failures. Whatever popularity he really had is being squandered. He will find that he himself will become the object of hostility as well, because he is human and humans are capable of error, though I suspect he thinks otherwise of himself. Unfortunately he, at the same time, has placed the people of the United States at great risk.
Offtopic: folks, strange that I don’t hear anything about the Miss California story here on PajamasMedia, because the saner, conservative-leaning (small) part of the European media over here is full of outrage about the story.
Can’t you start doing something for her? Many right-thinking Europeans would like to help her but you Americans need to start it, of course, you know the situation and the possibilities and the circumstances much better than us.
What I have in mind is a collection on PayPal for making a beauty queen crown for her out of precious metals, that she originally deserved, if it was not for this PC bullshit. Plus a small ceremony to actually crown her. A hundred thousand bucks at most, it doesn’t need to be really expensive, just a gesture. There definitely are ten thousand people in the world who would donate $10 each both out of justice & compassion for a woman unjustly wronged, and also as a defiant gesture against PC-madness.
I would be not only glad to contribute, I would be PROUD to contribute.
Start it folks, and we’ll contribute and participate.
Proreason,
It’s not just Limbaugh who agrees. I haven’t heard his show lately, but I’ll bet he’s seen the following article from Spengler at Asia Times
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/front_page/jb26aa01.html
” The demonized percentile who makes over $250,000 who alone will be taxed…”
Anyone who believes this is an idiot. Remember, Obama’s primary objective is to destroy the middle class in America!
First, the over $250K earners will be taxed and, as that rate rachets up, the limit will creep down, first, through back doors definitional changes and than by, “Sorry, we inherited things we didn’t know about and need more cash!”
The big change will come when, instead of income, the thieves start taxing assets and, to start, only certain kinds of assets. Thus, lawyers, hollywood types, athletes and union fat cats will be exempt but those who own stock, mineral rights, small businesses will get it, first at a very low rate, 1% or 2% of assessed valuation.
Always remember, Obama’s objective is to destroy the middle class!
Do you guys know who was the first celebrity Black Muslim? Not remembered because he converted long after his acting career was over. It was the Buckwheat character from Spanky’s “Our Gang.” Changed his name to Kareem-a-Wheat.”
Barack Obama does not speak for me. In fact, I am embarrassed to even acknowledge that he is the leader of this nation. He acts as if HE is embarrased to acknowledge that he is the leader of the United States. It makes me shudder to think that the American people could have elected him. Yes, I understand the impact that the failing economy had on the prospects of the Republican candidates, and yes, I think that the McCain campaign was largely inept, but I am depressed at the blindness that voters had to Obama’s insincerity. VDH has exposed this duplicity in our current President, and the tragedy that it is for the country. One wonders whether it will be possible to undo the damage that will be done to our society during the next four years.
http://thomas.loc.gov/home/c111query.html (then type in HR 40)
I recall reading JFK’s “Profile in Courage” and being comforted by our history of selecting presidents who generally were the right person and the right time. That is why I am so discomforted by Obama. The country faces many serious problems and Obama is absolutely the wrong person for our time (if there ever is one).
Dr. Hanson,
Thank you for another wonderful piece.
However, if you’ll forgive this English/boxing nerd, I believe you meant to write Leon Spinks, not Sphinx, in section III.
If you recall, Leon Sphinx, whose career ended some time before Mr. Spinks ever entered the ring, fought a close contest with Oedipus “The Complex” Rex wherein “The Sphinx” employed the now-infamous “Riddle-A-Dope” strategy. Rex, however, proved to be a bit quicker than folks thought and came away with the KO. I think Rex went on to a life of fame and luxury…or incest and eye stabbing – sorry, my early boxing history’s a bit hazy.
Anyway, keep up the great work, sir.
p.s. “The Devil & Sonny Liston” by Nick Tosches is a fascinating story about a truly tragic figure – and a fighter who should have made a meal out of a young Cassius Clay.
I was against Bush and vehemently against the Iraq invasion but I disliked Obama from the start. He reminded me of those kiss-ass, butt-snorkeling guys at work who impress the boss and move up quickly. How do you spell O-P-P-O-R-T-U-N-I-S-T?
“though waterboarding 183 times in one month does seem a bit much”
Apparently, if water was poured on KSM for two seconds, then stopped for three seconds, then poured for two more, then stopped for five seconds, then poured for three more seconds, it counted as “waterboarding three times”. It’s not 183 separate sessions of waterboarding, but 183 distinct periods of time during which water was applied during the sessions.
VDH-another great article. “I do not understand the morality of the Left.” Such the understatement of the century. It’s OK to give an MD permission to make the decision on whether the exterminate a live-birth late term abortion. However do NOT pour water over the men who’se only purpose in this life is to kill all Americans. They were born expressly for that purpose. I wonder if it’s torture for those families in Afghanistan wondering if a drone is going to hit their house tonight? This man better not go there on this ‘torture’ thing. Hasn’t he been arrogant, dismissive and yes even divisive enough? ‘wink wink’
“”"”"”who generally were the right person and the right time”"”"”"
Captain America. Obama IS the right person for the right time. He is the President the country deserves because of the disproportionately high number of shallow, ignorant people bereft of self-restraint, self-respect and self-reliance. The slow but unstopped journey to bigger and bigger government, the dangerous drift into house-of-cards financial and economic gimmicks, and the increasing influence of radical/progressive non-government entities in the lives of ordinary Americans and American institutions has led to this.
H.L. Mencken’s words about “getting the government we deserve” have never been more true.
Dr. Hansen, I have written to you for years and never have we disagreed as you seem to echo my frustration in many areas but, Sir, I am afraid that “the day of the Elves is over”. I will attend the tea parties, e-mail my representatives in a polite manner but the people who think like us are now few and with little influence. Even those at the tea parties were painfully uninformed but sincere in that they knew what was happening was just not right and they had no voice. Keep on using yours as you represent many. Thanks
Essential vdh
The discussions here remind me of arguments over the placement of the deck chairs on the Titanic.
The destruction of the Democratic Republic of America is at stake for heavens sake.
Western Culture and it’s advancement of Individual Freedoms, rights and responsibilities is being assaulted with a force and propaganda that will destroy it if not stopped.
If we don’t get it by now we never will. Wake up and see what is happening around you.
Prosecutions of the previous political leaders is now being openly discussed by BHO’s illiterate functionaries.
The MSM and their idiots underwrite this “witch hunt” to destroy political opposition.
This is done by the MSM as if it was a perfectly normal thing to do in America and justifying it with a convoluted rationalism that should make any one with an ounce of sense cringe.
Janet “Nappy”, the HLS CZAR, with a partial brain posts warning about American Soldiers returning and becoming dangerous.
Literally saying that any group that dissents and disagrees with BHO reactionaries can become politically dangerous per Nappy CZAR of the HLS.
Understand this. BHO and how he thinks and acts along with his functionaries and “friends” is a direct result of over 60 years of subversion in America by subversive and anti American Communist/Socialist party members.
Extensive recruiting of the Americans that were susceptible to Utopian ideas from communist agents , primarily hair brained, light weight,and lazy academics, went on extensively starting even before the 1940′s.
A true historical understanding and release of information on what went on during the “communist witch” hunts of the 1940s and 50s’ shows that the extent of the communist inroads into America’s weak minded and treasonous population was worse than even thought.
Communists were trying to destroy America by internal subversion.
These ideas hang on in the illiterate and weak minded who abdicate individual responsibility and yet need to be taken care of.
The same old tired ideas are reborn again and again within every weak kneed, intellectually challenged American that is looking for something for nothing.
Affirmative action and hate indoctrination on American racism being the most successful byproduct of this subversion.
Racism did go on in America but America alone sacrificed over 500,000 dead in a civil war in part about stopping slavery.—
Slavery still exists in Africa and in most parts of North Africa—Blacks run those Klepto slave owning Governments?
BHO is not smart enough to recognize the “Lie” buried in his indoctrination and brain washing about a “bad” America and “American Racism”.
Or if not the above belief in a lie, BHO is almost smart enough to think that power can be grabbed and sustained by these ideas out of the communist methods play book .
Either way he is too smart but not quite smart enough.
In the context of the state of the World’s racism America alone stood against Racism and gave her blood for Freedom in a Civil War.
Racism in the world today is primarily by blacks on Blacks based on Tribes or religion centered in the North Africa part of the world. Racism was never lifted in Africa. Black Africans who are slave holders see no problem with it.
The academic armchair utopian ideals and ideas buried in the perfumed scorpion of communism are so important to the Anti Americans that destroying those that disagree with them seems perfectly OK.
Are we not on the path to that reality?
Is this OK for America? Does anyone agree with this.
Apparently, for those who are fed daily by the MSM’s trivial dribble it is OK. Most do no even understand what they are listening to.
Even the talking heads do not understand what they are reading off the prompters.
The mirror on the wall tells them everything they want to know about the world and themselves.
However long it takes the MSM to fail it is to long. Is there a market for idiots with teeth and hair.
Should anyone think this is alarmist and “right wing reactionary” BS remember that armed and violent revolution was perfectly OK to the Communists, even if it killed their own countries private property owning population.
We are seeing the froth of similar bad seeds coming from the BHO functionaries.
Political prosecutions on the table for previous Republican office holders.
Identifying Military and ex Military as potential extremists, with others who disagree on abortion and gay marriages.
Creating in America an internal mandatory “labor force” or community action force along military lines– to “counter” the military?
For what other reasons can restrictions on individual freedoms would hair brained revolutionary thoughts like this emerge other than through fear that maybe they, the BHO “Change Army” and radical left wing reactionaries could overplay their hand.
They want to begin to lay the propaganda down now to ease the way to the final outcome of the destruction of America.
Begin disarming America with propaganda before awareness and growing concerns could stop it.
Where will the BHO prosecutions stop? Does any one think this question should not be asked?
During the cold war when communism still had a mask of success, Country’s that stressed Individual responsibility and private property ownership were destroyed by revolutions. South America was a hotbed for this—it still is.
Individuals that owned private property must be destroyed. The value of private property must be destroyed.
The Communist/Socialist Regime must own it all and must dole it out.
World domination was their goal until they destroyed themselves.
Now a bunch of tin horn wannabe Overlords are playing their hands on the world stage due to a weak and indesivive BHO who is one of them.
But not yet sure that America will go along. A large percentage of the population has not let themselves be brainwashed and are not yet dependent.
His current political oscillations about trashing the constitution by assuming power that he does not have without congressional approval show his doubt about pulling a sleeping tigers tail.
BHO is not sure like all scavengers. He is not sure that the real America is dead. At least dead enough to be cut like a carcuss and be divided up into Fiefdoms run by CZARS.
Does the utopian “academic” Communism work? Results show for a while it does, but just long enough to destroy millions of lives.
Are we deaf and dumb enough to let that happen as it has happened in other countries. Maybe.
Look at the beginning. Starting with the useful but dumb and intellectually lazy academics allowing communist party infiltration of their world with Utopian feel good languages.
These ideas and ideal utopian constructs left no room for the progress of individuals and human freedoms.
In other words Western Culture was smothered and the light went out on human progress until complete failure and resurrection occurred.
In America the Subversion was only able to grow in the fertile soil of Lazy Academics that did not understand a more competitive human nature.
A human individual with variations of wants,needs and ability that helped everyone and themselves with out government “control”.
Civilization in America leaped ahead.
This under cover in the dark Anti American subversion fed the Unions organizing along communist ideals, it fed a process of indoctrination within a school system being fed by individuals and teachers. All looking to the unions and ideals instilled in them by subversive PC utopian ideas.
Ideas that are a replay of communist ideas that are not even recognized by those now in power creating the problems.
The BHO functionaries are being driven by a view of the world that is nothing more than the fossilized remains of communism and it does not even work. What a joke.
Will we be laughing in the end?
Most folks do not know this but when Ali was stripped of his title, Joe Frazier gave him money to live on. Ali denigrating Frazier as some kind of Uncle Tom was the depths of ingratitude.
Northern Light,
Ali showed some heart against Norton but that was just one fight. If you want to see real perseverance, watch tapes of the Gatti-Ward fights.
You missed one… well not really, because it came out a couple hours after you posted, but it proves your point.
“LOS ANGELES —Government lawyers are expected to ask a federal judge to impose a five-year sentence on the owner of a marijuana dispensary, less than one month after Attorney General Eric H. Holder announced that federal authorities would not prosecute medical marijuana shop owners if they complied with local and state laws.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/us/24pot.html?_r=1&hp
We won’t prosecute, except when we prosecute.
Northern Light:
I’m sorry, I can’t let your protest go. First, as a health science professional, perhaps you could give me a link to the research that shows that one boxing match, more or less a professional career’s worth, is causative of Parkinson’s syndrome. I missed that one. Secondly, as a boxer, perhaps the butt kicking that Norton dealt Ali in not only that first fight but all three of his bouts with Muhammad might have landed him a decision in his favor, yes? Ali wins a bad decision but to you this just proves how superior he was. Or how about Ali’s bouts with Ron Lyle, Ernie Shavers or Jimmy Young just to name a few, all of which Ali clearly lost, but won extremely smelly decisions regardless. I agree with pretty much all of Prof Hanson’s observations, but will add a couple of my own as an ex-boxer. You somehow have the temerity and gall to refer to a great champion like Frazier as an “ugly man” and reflective of the “ugliness of the sport of boxing”. This to me says that you not only think cheap ad homimen insult is somehow “analysis”, you know absolutely nothing of boxing. A boxer uses whatever skills and attributes God has given him, as Prof Hanson has noted. It would be silly for a short guy with short arms like Frazier to “stick and move”, as he’d be slaughtered in doing so. When faced with a taller, rangier opponent the effective counter is to bob and weave, close the distance and take the fight to the inside, which Frazier was a master in doing. His left hook was legendary, rendering the great light heavyweight champion Bob Foster unconscious with a single blow, for example. Frazier punished Ali mercilessly in their first and third fights, which were both for the heavyweight title. In their second fight, a non-title bout, referee Carlos Padilla curiously allowed Ali to continually hold Frazier behind the head, a blatant foul. Ali was allowed to do this by referees in many fights, I believe because he was a media darling as Prof Hanson has intimated. He was also allowed to both hold and hit at the same time, which is a double foul. Never forced to fight cleanly, he won a number of bad decisions against stronger opponents he was ill-equipped to handle at the time in his career that he faced them. Not to dispute Ali’s greatness, he was in his prime a great boxer and the first really big heavyweight to move and box like fighters in the lighter divisions. I’m just “telling it like it is” to quote Cosell. Funny thing is, when Ali held fighters like Frazier, it was supposedly great ring generalship and Frazier was held out to be a primitive for forcing the fight inside on the ‘Fancy Dan’ boxer. (The same bogus criticism would be later leveled at Roberto Duran for his tactics against Ray Leonard) Years after Ali retired another fighter emerged who became a media darling—Mike Tyson. Before his descent and fall from grace Tyson could do no wrong according to the pundits. When he employed the same basic fighting style against taller boxers that Frazier had used in his day against Ali, the same critics who called Frazier primitive called Tyson a great fighter. When taller fighters attempted to tie him up as Ali did to Frazier and Foreman, instead of being praised for ‘ring generalship’ they were criticized for dirty tactics. Same tactics, different fighters. Kind of like Obama’s continual pass for using any and all tactics the Bush administration used to fight our enemies, while Bush was criticized mercilessly. Game, set and match to Hanson.
67.JackMarcotte
Thank you for taking to time to list all those things. I agree completely with your first two paragraphs for starters. I feel like the conservative writers (and most of the readers) are at a very slow pace of mental recognition, peering at the smoke, saying, “Y’know, I think there IS a fire there. What do you think?” We had better speed this thing up or it won’t matter.
I think if we don’t push back, and HARD, with a nonstop push and overwhelming public actions starting now and culminating with a wipe-out of the left in the 2010 elections, we may have lost the country. By 2012, we will no longer have the weapons to fight back.
For those who may think that’s an over-reaction, how would it look any different today in the country if in fact it DID have to get “that much worse” to be dangerous?
What part of a lion climbing up your face and ripping your ears off with his claws don’t you understand? Take a mental “still shot” of where we are today, compared with 12 months ago. Choose your pose: political actions? financial systems? economic realities? criminal processes against the previous administration? smiling at dictators while they are laughing at us?
Isn’t there a huge difference? Don’t you see it?
How much worse does it have to get before you are truly alarmed?
If those of us who are alarmed turn out to be wrong, that would be wonderful. If it turns out we are right, and you’re still “waiting for some final evidence”… well, see you in the gulag. (Unless you don’t plan to EVER fight back)
Our Constitution was designed SPECIFICALLY to prevent someone from doing exactly what this ESL fraud is doing. The reason it’s not stopping him is because our elected officials are not using the Constitution as their reference point, even as they are beginning to complain about his abuses (e.g., Sen. Robert Byrd).
It doesn’t help to KNOW the building is burning if the guys with the fire hoses refuse to pick them up.
Maybe we need to start impeaching our Congressmen and woman one at a time, just start taking them down.
Frustrating. Very frustrating.
The body politic had better start believing what they’re seeing. You’re the frog and the water is getting hotter…..and hotter.. and hotter….What’ll it take?
Sorry, way too long a post….but I’m just really underlining what Jack said.
#21 and 34. you are both right, it was Ken Norton Jr.
Oh well, at least I didn’t ask Ali to stand up and take a bow, as Dick Biden would’ve!
another false premise from metastor of puppetrolls: Joe Frazier did not keep his mouth shut, as you would have him do.
you are a filthy racist, metastor, as is your ilk, the worst of the worst.
Ali was a wind up puppet for leftist histrionics, hyperbole, and leftist racism.
as I said, the worst of the worst. of the soul-killer bagman party, from Nitty’s Alinsky Chicago. Little changed at all, since then.
here’s looking at you kid stuff, and calling your straw man bluff.
once more again. another straw man false premise by metastor of race baiting “social justice” puppetrolls: Joe Frazier did not keep his mouth shut, as you would’ve had him do. (Damned Semantics…)
#56 Miklos….The drive-by media covered the Miss California story for a couple of days in the USA and it is already old news. I think she will do well in certain circles without our help.
If Perez Hilton continues with his hate-filled tirades he will most likely become more famous than Rosie O’Donnell is in our sick and demented world.
It would appear that the USA is no longer a center-right country. Hopefully I am wrong, but the only other explanation is that no one is paying attention.
#60- “Spanky” Mcfarlin and ‘buckwheat’ were close, lifelong friends. I know, both lived nearby.
Jack Marcotte: Amen, brother. You’re hyperventilating, but I been there, too, with that same business.
This…
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=915448763957391352&hl=en
…is a 25 year old interview with former KGB operator Yuri Bezmenov. It’s a little long and clunky, but there’s a vital moment where Bezmenov describes the methods used by KGB to “demoralize” a society. Bezmenov hastens to add that he means both senses of “demoralize” — breaking morale and destroying morality. It’s a good watch for anyone unfamiliar with how serious the KGB agitprop attack on American society was.
And no question that the Soviet ghost haunts the world, with a special attraction to American universities. Obama is a product of the worst of all that: the rotten postmodern Gramscian cultural Marxism from Columbia, the Alinsky training, the saturated conceits of Harvard Law, and then the “black liberation theology,” the rottenest Marxist nonsense ever concocted.
Michael Croy: Ali was certainly a skilled boxer. I did often wonder if he got special privileges in the ring though. I didn’t find the rope-a-dope win over Foreman all that laudatory, but probably legit. The bout I referred to in an earlier comment, against Norton, it wasn’t the broken jaw fight. This one was later and Norton hit him at will — at will — and Ali’s eyes glazed over and I swear that he became like a zombie. Norton punched him and punched him and punched him, or at least so it seemed. Ali got the decision. I think the theory was that Norton had failed to take the championship away from Ali (Now I’m not even sure if it was a championship fight).
To my mind, Ali’s brains got scrambled, finally, in that fight, and if that’s not a big part of the cause of the effect seen in him as he aged I would find it very strange indeed.
63:
JFK didn’t write “Profile in Courage”, Theodore Sorenson did. At last it appears BHO wrote most of his tripe.
Profiles is Courage
Someone mentioned Buckwheat. I think Louis Armstrong was the first African American to become everybody’s friend.
‘Is there a market for idiots with teeth and hair.’ – I don’t get it.
Jack Marcotte,
You think many here are blind to the realities of our times. Well so do I but might I direct YOU to another plane of thought. For the whole world to go mad at the same time is nothing new (happens every 6 or 7 decades it seems) and it is not possible that it is just collective freakyness. It is directed/orchestrated and it is not of human origin. The spirit world exists and there is a prince of this world. He has several lords under him as well. This time round however the balance may have shifted just too far. The warriors on the side of good are few and tired. This could indeed be the big one.
84. Ron Kean
I believe it is a reference to the MSM on air “personalities”,
like the communist on HLN, Jane Velez-Mitchell, who used Earth Day to declare white people the new face of crime in America,
and what type of work would be available to them once the MSM’s crash and burn.
In her case, she might get background work in film as a “crack whore”. And, if that doesn’t work out, she could probably get work as a “crack whore”.
Hey, Ali ! Could you hold this can of unstirred paint for me?
“It is not humble for an individual to apologize for an entire country in front of the World. Will Obama stand before his country and be humbled? Who does Obama consider to be his peers?”
Obama stands before his country and lectures, for the most part.
How we need to become better. How we need to be and do what he wants us to.
As Michelle said, “Barack Obama will require you to work . . . That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. . . . Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.”
He apologizes for us to other countries, then lectures us on what he considers our shortcomings. He thinks he’s better than the rest of us, and thinks most people in other countries are better, too. Naturally he would apologize to them!
In short, he’s trying out for King of the World. If he should ever achieve that goal, though, he would lecture to all. Because Obama doesn’t consider himself to have any peers – he’s above everyone.
You gotta’ laugh. Obama goes trolling for torture facilitators and catches Nancy Pelosi. She pleads ignorance about CIA waterboarding though she was briefed extensively about the practice in 2002. Never said boo about it while she was on the Intelligence Committee. Now claims she didn’t think it was gonna’ be used. That smacks of the excuse given by the Dems who voted for the Iraq War authorization after they saw the political fallout. Unlike everyone else in the country, they apparently didn’t think Bush would use it.
Seriously, how does the radical Left stand their own hypocrites in Congress?
I agree about Ali, and I love George Foreman, and he is my favorite boxer. I like when he announces the fights, because he is a Texan, and he sounds like one. Ali changed his religion to stay out of the war, and everyone knows the legacy of his racist temperament, and his Muslim background, everyone except our kids.
My daughter come home from Junior school one day and said “Mom I won Vice President of my class today”, and she went on to go right into her little speech she made on stage to her school. She said something along the lines “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, I’m the greatest, so vote for me”. I did not know if I wanted to laugh or cry, because as she reenacted her little speech she did a little dance. I did not know if I wanted to cry or laugh.
I liked your article, and I listen to things on TV or read articles and I cannot understand what is happening. Today I read a news web-site that was about the Plan B pill now being available to 17 year old girls without their parents consent. As I read the article about this today on a news web-site I thought of “Ideological Demoralization” and an old interview that one of your posters put up about this, and I am convinced it has happen to our country. I watched it quite a few times, and I am convinced that half (only half) of our country are brain washed communists.
The person that is talking about his Presidents polls for today, well they are run by communists, and of course they will show a communist view. I do not trust any polls. They are probably polled on AOL or Google and most of the browsers are run by communists. I never get polled. Do you?
Which part of torture don’t you understand? The “illegal” part or the “immoral” part?
The fact that an article about Barack Obama has become a attack/defend a long-over-the- hill-boxer argument proves my point Dr. Hanson. It was superfluous to your argument and is a distraction rather than a clarification. Well done, otherwise.
I feel helpless in this fight to regain our conutry! All my liberal friends still worship the One. The koolaid must have done permanent damage to their brains.
Our country is heading down the tubes forever and I can do is watch it happen. All is lost!
As Michelle said, “Barack Obama will require you to work . . . That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. . . . Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.”
I don’t have divisions, much as ‘shelle and Barack like to harp on divisions.
Oh, wait, I’m developing a division…yes, a very serious division between me & the constantly in my face crowd of pontificators in DC (when they’re there, Barack burned up 9000 gallons of jet fuel traveling around on Earf Day and millions and millions of our dollars taking bunches of people on his recent Apology Tours…)
Yes, my first genuine Grade A division.
89.TLM
“Seriously, how does the radical left stand their own hypocrites in Congress? ”
This joke is for you, because I agree…
LITTLE GIRL ON A PLANE
A U.S. Congressman was seated next to a little girl on the airplane when the Congressman turned to her and said, ‘Let’s talk. I’ve heard that flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger.’
The little girl, who had just opened her book, closed it slowly and said to the stranger, ‘What would you like to talk about?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said the stranger. ‘How about the banking crisis?’ and he smiles.
OK, ‘she said. ‘That could be an interesting and timely topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff-grass-. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?’
The Congressman, visibly surprised by the little girl’s intelligence, thinks about it and says, ‘Hmmm, I have no idea.’
To which the little girl replies, ‘Do you really feel qualified to discuss banking when you don’t know shit?’
Our entire government is like something out of a twilight zone episode. Rod Serling could not have come up with a better episode than what we are witnessing today. Obama and his minions are like characters out of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest or Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. This morning I asked my 11 year old daughter to pinch me to see if I was not dreaming. She then told me that nothing lasts for ever. I hope she is right.
I think the “teeth and hair” comment refers to the inordinate big shiny whiteness of news anchors’ teeth–as well as the big, shiny hair.
In other words, the talking heads aren’t much more than that.
In terms of Obama, It’s about like watching a perpetual loop of “Being There” starring Peter Sellars. BHO stays just vapid enough within all that supposedly “insightful” rhetoric to remain a blank screen on which whatever “hope” or “change” the deluded populist masses wish to project there seems true to them. The pseudo-therapeutic language of the Left is his forte. Trouble is, we don’t have pseudo-problems to solve. As far as Ali goes, he was a talented fighter in a racially-charged era. I’m always disappointed when public figures use their fame and talent as a platform for bitter, retribution-tinged activism–particularly with race. I don’t think it helps anybody, and it takes all the grace and sense of achievement out of the sport or endeavor
they champion. It also helps put another chip on the shoulder of some anonymous, angry kid who sure doesn’t need another one– but will call it “pride.” P.S. Enough with the Timothy McVeigh/AlQuaida comparisons.
Does anyone out there honestly think they are equivalent?????
Lenin said: “To us, the lie is sacred.”
The first time I heard and saw Bill Clinton speak, I thought,”just look at this guy,can’t you tell what he is?” 90% of the World told me I was nuts. The next morning at work I overheard a co-worker, a 70 year-old navy vet on the phone. He had seen the same speech and had turned it off wanting”to throw up”. And I was only 36! The price we paid around the world for him…I won’t get into. And then I saw BO the first time. Five times worse. Horrified. I’m 16 years older and the world says I’m worse the nuts. That tingle up Chris Matthews’ leg…the Boomer elite is gone. Game over. Tilt.
Thank you VDH. Still civil here. One wouldn’t want to be overly alarmist. Would one be characterized as a conspiracy theorist by predicting that pretty soon, you’ll be too broke to protest…and arrested if you do?
I’ll sum up the Democrats – the President, his Cabinet, the Senate and the House as TRAITOROUS, TYRANANICAL THIEVES. BTW, none of them has taken a reduction in pay or benefits. They all just voted themselves a $17,000 raise in salary and a $93,000 increase in their non-audited petty cash. Each.
I believe that if we had unwittingly voted into office the Chicago Mob, instead of the Chicago Machine, we surely be better off. At least the Mob’d secure the border (excepting their contraband), they’d clean out rival gang competition, and every country who’d ever threatened US would be sh*tting their pants 24/7/365. We have the ultimate in “made men”. IE, the Mob wouldn’t be intent on destroying our nation – bad for biz.
If we ever vote these criminals out, will prison be too lenient? Naturally, they’ll object increasingly forcefully to any such attempts. Will we be suicidally conflicted, allowing them to run for re-election? C’mon.
So, it’s time for the serious to decide what the US must look like on the other side. Think about the unwinding…______, sweat and tears. Also consider your fate, should you be on the losing side. It’ll be epic.
We need to inform the Left of what we intend, if we ever again gain the majority.
Spell out their sentences upfront. Otherwise, they have nothing to fear.
We see a State Gov’nor using the NG for crowd control at the Boston marathon (because the unionized police would have cost too much overtime), while other State Govs will not use the NG to protect our borders from drug and human smuggling, gang warfare and potentially worse.
Today, the House majority announced oops. That tax break for 95% of Americans. Well, forget it. The Gov’t needs the money. What’s the plan Stan?
TV@17 said: Our country is being run by a bunch of rank amateurs who have evil intentions.
Rank? Yes. Amateurs? No. They’re looking pretty effective to me at accomplishing their evil intent. So, lose the amateur stuff. It’s misleading.
I do not understand morality
There, I fixed your opening sentence for you.
Painless:
“Which part of torture don’t you understand?”
Mostly just the definition part, particularly as applied to what we did to KSM. Waterboarding as practiced by Pinochet’s minions or the Japanese in WWII qualifies as torture. I don’t think the CIA waterboarding protocol necessarily does. Of course, a group of liberal lawyers get to decide this for us now (retrospectively), so we’ll be better informed citizens of the world in the future. We’ll definitely know what the CIA should do after the next 9/11 happens.
Even if you assume the CIA practice was legal, it could still be construed as immoral. But, you know, our moral high ground has been steadily eroded these past few months, what with all the bad press our president has been shoving down our throats. So I might be a little inured now to the idea that guys like Putin, Chavez, Castro et al think we are an immoral people.
#74, Michael Cory. That was the best rebuttal to anything I’ve ever posted here. KO!
#72 fred suggs. I found some rounds on Yotube. Incredible. Thank You.
I’m with you, Dr. Hanson. I was never impressed by Obama, either. All style, no substance. Now that he is President, we see the results of this vacuum: Presidency by Tele-PrompTer. The leftist hordes who savaged Bush because of his poor speaking ability have elected a president who can’t speak a coherent sentence unless he is reading it from a screen. Very, very impressive.
#92Fragmentalitarian: Then you can blame/credit me: I [#7] was the first to bring it up. (and still got it wrong)
I assert, that sports analogies do have their place: it outed a knee-jerk racism charge from a too-eager troll, at the very least [just like 'the good ol' days']
You’ll meet some diverse/disparate characters/actors on this bus, most, but not all, from the euromarxist/protection racket/extortion/bribery/organised crime syndicate that is Chicago/D.C.
Such as that saw/yarn about Sonny Liston taking a fall on pain of death because the Mafeeeyah bet on the 7 to 1 ‘underdog’ Clay, twice.
The meaning of the godfather movies is that everything they did to corrupt our system for their purposes involving ‘the business they had chosen’ only served to empower the now compromised euro/marxist objective: check your Frank Nitty/Alinsky connections for further elucidation and edification;
and this is true, whether Coppola or Puzo grasp this or not.
They were more worried about its negative reflection on the Sicilian extended family in general and at large. But they needn’t have worried so much: A single Frank Capra makes up for any/all of this, and both, especially Coppola, should have dedicated their lives and careers to accomplishing all, or at least some of what Frank Capra accomplished.
But, apparently, the Ali’s on the scene poisoned the well.
I mentioned, in the previous post, an analogy between Olympian gymnast Keri Strug’s amazing accomplishment, and the high stakes gamboling on the ridiculous and the ludicrous, that our leadership Peloski/Reid/0bama are frittering with. Perhaps you can blame/credit me for that as well.
Some, never got on this bus, but others who did now want to get off at the next possible stop. But the bus keeps rolling, and the wheels keep turning, and who knows who will be next, to be thrown under those wheels, and get ‘whacked’
Professor Hanson:
Those of us who have turned to you over the past three election cycles do ot perceive you as “contrarian” but rather a beacon of sanity in a world going mad.
I am surprised to learn that you followed Obama’s path as far back as his election to the Illinois State Senate. Was it not evident then that he was a follower of Saul Alinsky, a Community Organizer in the black wards? Can there really be any doubt in your mind as to the degree of his commitment to doctrinaire socialism – his obsession with it?
Do conservatives never ask themselves: “How can it be possible that an obscure Chicago Machine product, with no record of competence or legislative ability, could be vaulted, in a campaign that worked hard to hide his past, into the Presidency of the world’s greatest nation?
The truth is that this president is not a Democrat politician with strong leftward bias. He as a bred- in- the -bone, Red-diaper, William Ayers class . Alinsky disciple SOCIALIST, pretending to be bipartisan. He has NO agenda other than to, with all possible haste, CHANGE our nation into a Socialist Republic.
Recognize this truth and everything he is doing falls in place. Cotton up to Eurpean socialist and commmunist Caribbean countries to make the statement “Don’t worry. We’re brothers”, Manipulate the press, and attack those who criticize as enemies as the state. Calculatedly reduce our defence forces and gut our intelligence branches. Stack your Administration with dedicated socialist in every key position.
There is nothing subtle about it. His Number One priority is entrench doctrinaire socialism on this nation and rewrite our Constitution as quickly as possible, so that it will be impossible to reverse. This is the sole concern of his entire cabal of Alinsky Rule of Radical followers. Our traditional politics and ethics are of no concern to them. They do it out of their Patriotic conviction that the world is destined to be a one party socialist union.
That it sounds so outrageous that decent people think it is looney is just part of the reason they believe they can get away with it.
Continue to speak out – JUST BE BLUNTER – AND LOUDER.
The Japanese did not engage in waterboarding. They engaged in water tortures and atrocities of brutality and murder against POW’s but also against anyone under their iron fisted and sadistic grip. So 150,000 Phillipines were slaughtered by conventional weapons, bullets and machete.
Shame on McCain for presenting this so out of context.
NO Japanese defendant was charged, tried, and found guilty on the charge of water boarding alone.
OBAMA’S “ENGAGEMENT” MYTHOLOGY
Apparently being friends with Hugo Chavez is not making America more popular in Pakistan or Iran.
http://greensrealworld.blogspot.com/2009/04/diplomacy-myths-left-likes-to-tell.html
“quesnay says:
Our entire government is like something out of a twilight zone episode.”
I agree, I have followed politics since the mid 1960′s and have seen some truly awful presidents like Jimmy Carter. But never has it been so obvious that a president is doomed to falure than Barack Obama. And that goes for his democrat minions in congress too.
Torture. Looking today at the Berga grave photos from WWII depicting the truly criminal treatment of American soldier prisoners by the Nazi’s: forced marches, slave labor, broken teeth beatings, and murder. Contrasted to the “distressful” but controlled waterboarding of presumed killers who were never really harmed….one could grow bitter at the contrast.
One could laugh contemptuously at the preening elites who pride themselves on their uncommon moral sensitivity and integrity, their virtuous insight. All the while, ironically, they morally emasculate the one nation that has continued to assert itself in pursuit of others’ welfare.
The two Berga prison commandants, btw, were tried and imprisoned after the War. A relative short time later the Americans released them both. However, one was eventually hung by the Russians. Significant I suppose.
While Sen. Leahy, the ACLU, and many dems look for navel lint and fiddle with the stupid politics of what is, relatively, an insignificant issue, the edges of our Rome smolder ever more.
Dr. Hanson, another masterful column. Thank goodness you haven’t taken leave of your senses and intellect.
Halleluah! Someone finally agrees with me on Cassius Clay/Mohammed Ali, the man for whom we can thank all of the trash-talking, cheap, grand-standing behavior now endemic in individual and team sports alike. I saw all of his fights in the 1970s, including those with Norton, Foreman, Frazier, and others. There’s no question Ali was a great fighter, but he benefitted from biased judges, who allowed him to commit breeches of the rules they woud tolerate in no other fighter, a sort of “Jordan Rules” for boxing. Ali was good for business, so the business was good to him.
“Smoking Joe” Frazier was my idea of a real fighter, a man who could take anything you could dish out, and come back for more. I also greatly respect George Foreman, whose heavyweight title at age 45 is a legendary feat for the record books. He is an all-round class act, too, a gentleman and a humanitarian, and a good businessman.
To criticize Ali for being a loudmouthed ingrate and all-round pain in the posterior, is not racist; it is simply longing for Henrey Aaron versus Barry Bonds. BOnds may have passed Aaron’s HR record (with the help of PEDs of course) but I will never regard him as the HR “king” of baseball. The same is true of Ali, whose greatness in the ring cannot compensate for his boorishness and lack of class out of it.
91. Painless
Maybe you believe that there are ‘COEXIST’ bumper stickers in the Hezbulla gift shop and the owner is doing a brisk business.
Maybe you believe that we wait in lines and go through check points at the airport because of Christians and Vets.
For all we know, the interrogations may have saved your life.
why, why didn’t we get a Foreman-Ali rematch? In the United States with competent trainers, I would bet on George.
Painful@91
Which part of torture don’t you understand? The “illegal” part or the “immoral” part?
The Law can be changed at any time to suit the circumstances. Much worse treatment (including execution by firing squad and hanging) has been used by the US in the past, for good reason.
As to the morality involved in defending yourself, if you don’t understand that “survival is not a moral issue,” then you are too stupid to survive, you are in the way and your loss to the gene pool would be a good thing.
“Which part of torture don’t you understand?”
The part where my two years old daughter and myself were in terrorist cross-sights.
The high-toned morality of the Dems/Liberals is so compromised by their own moral corruption it reminds us that “legality” is always relative to circumstances and “interpretation”. Those standing firm on some point of law today were tax cheating, virtual bribe taking, mired in prior knowledge of events, etc. yesterday.
When those poor innocents jumped screaming from the Twin Towers, said a desperate, pathetic goodbye by cell phone to loved ones, they also created a set of circumstances through which to see “legality”. The death of 3,000 and undoubtedly more is easily worth some water up the nose for 3 strongly presumed killers.
Pretense and hypocrisy are disgusting when they ignore the rights of the innocent but already dead and those who might die.
As for the “slippery slope” of compromise…that’s where humanity has lived since the beginning…learning to live their successfully and justly is the struggle fo great nations like our own.
It is interesting that today no one here would think of torturing Germans, Japanese or even Vietnamese and those folks I don’t think would want to torture any of us. A few decades ago few Americans would think twice about killing German, Japanese or North Vietnamese men woman or children in any way possible. Go back a few more decades and the only good Indian was a dead Indian. I wonder how many Muslims we will need to kill to convince both sides to change their minds about killing each other.
How many Wounded Knee, My Lai, Dresden and Fire Bombings will we need to commit to win this one?
TLM (#4) wrote, “Nowadays, common sense IS contrarianism. In fact, it’s the new counter-culture. You just didn’t realize how radical you had become, how far you’d strayed from the new cultural norms of….stupidity.”
Masterfully said, bravo! Perhaps there’s something there – a germ of an idea around which to sell a new conservatism in time for the 2010 elections and 2012…
Joseph:
What a smooth transition you make from “torturing” to killing. Waterboarding KSM hardly equates to MY Lai.
BTW, a “few decades ago few Americans would think twice about killing German, Japanese or North Vietnamese men woman or children…”, and at the time, the obverse was true as well. That’s usually how these sentiments come about.
Wherever you learned to think this way, remember, like the bumper sticker says:
QUESTION AUTHORITY (especially when it is totalitarian)
As of today, the analogies to organised crime have reached critical mass, and will be yawned at and dismissed by Obama apologists as an unacceptable exaggeration.
We’ve reached the level where a more precise definition of these actions is that of the robber barons of old. And it brings up the kind of class warfare the constitutes the cap and trade, excuse me stock and trade of democrat party identity politics.
Ironic that Arlen Spector defects one day following what constititues an impeachable offence.
Spectors first duty as a new democrat should be to call for Obamas impeachment, based on this fly by at 1000 feet in NYC, and the subsequent denials, the buck passing, also Obama claiming he didn’t learn about it any sooner than the press did.
what did he know and when did he know it? Nothing regarding Air force One happens outside the purview and permission of the president. Ever. At all. Period, end of story.
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the – Web Reconnaissance for 04/28/2009 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.
118. Joseph
Of course we know that Germans gassed millions, Japanese cut off Chinese heads for practice, and the North Vietnamese were brutal. But we weren’t. Of course there was collateral damage but our soldiers have never been as intentionlly amoral as other people. You may be angry that Truman used the bomb. That’s war. If you think waterboarding compares to all the other methods, I think you’re mistaken.
I would hope we could get past slavery and the Indians. But if anyone wants to flagellate himself or my country for long, I think that’s wrong.
As far as radical (or moderate) Islam…I think they think it’s them or us.
Find one and talk to him.
123. Ron
Ron you are right we aren’t in anyway in the same league as those folks (Nazi Germany or the murderous Japanese). My point badly expressed is that none of those folks are seen as enemies any more. My question is how do we get from a struggle to the death that we had with them then to the friendship we enjoy today with radical (or moderate) Islam?
There are Muslim dead in our military cemeteries. The most decorated unit of WWII was the 442 Infantry Regiment made up of Japanese Americans. To paint all Muslims as irredeemable is incorrect I hope.
My other point also badly expressed is that we too sometimes do evil in the name of good.