The Case Against Senator Feingold
Frank Byrne – citizen, www.heartlandmurmurs.com

The people must remain ever vigilant against tyrants masquerading as public servants.
-George Washington

In his entire 18-year Senate career the only substantive legislation to his name, McCain - Feingold campaign finance reform, did not pass constitutional muster.  This assault on the first amendment was based on the ridiculous idea that limiting campaign donations would not limit speech.  For the most part Wisconsinites like the free speech part of the first amendment.  Feingold should be replaced for betraying of his oath to protect and defend the constitution.

                                                                                         

Fundamentals:
A U.S. Representative represents a portion of the population geographically.  A Senator represents the entire State.  One measurement of a Senator‘s effectiveness is the ratio of how many federal dollars sent to Washington are returned to their state. Currently Wisconsin ranks 47th of the 50 states in federal dollars returned.  According to taxfoundation.org the highest rank Wisconsin ever reached under Feingold’s watch is 37th back in 2000.  In all but 3 of his 18 years Wisconsin has been among the top ten biggest saps.  One would have no choice but to conclude this measure is of little priority to our Senator Feingold, or if it is he is painfully ineffective at correcting the trend. 

Education:
As the birthplace of both Kindergarten and Head Start, Wisconsin has a well earned reputation for making education a top priority.  You could never tell that by looking at the Milwaukee Public School system where for years the achievement gap between the 4th and 8th grade minorities has lagged behind the rest of the country and for the last two years ranking 50th of all states.  The high school graduation percentage is somewhere in the 30’s year after year after year.  When a consistently devoted and generous donor sector*, education, is so heavily invested in maintaining the status quo, we learned what to expect from a political careerist Democrat Senator in terms of genuine education reform  - - absolutely nothing - - and we got it.  (*source: opensecrets.org)
   

Credentials:
His Ivy League and Rhodes education is certainly respectable, even though the phrase “shall not be infringed” was apparently beyond his grasp on that campaign finance thing, casting a tinge of doubt on the quality of those degrees.  Seems to me your average Wisconsin native coming out of one our fine state schools could have managed that.  Much of Wisconsin, after all, is still a place where you are just as likely to be judged favorably by the calluses on your hands as by the letters after your name.
 

The company one keeps:



The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.
-Thomas Jefferson

If you were to put Feingold’s resume’, or voting record for that matter, anonymously, in front of a typical Wisconsin voter and ask them to guess whether he was from the Midwest or the Northeast, 10 of 10 would guess the latter.

When it really matters he is a solid lefty voter right along the party line.  Liberal interest group Common Cause, along with more left, self-proclaimed “radical” even, progressive netrootsalliance.org, both gave Feingold a 100% ranking. 

Judging someone by the company they keep, as grandmas the world over are correct to remind us, is fair, and in this case very telling; among other nitrite 100%ers are such liberal luminaries as Socialist Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Emanuel Cleaver of Georgia. Also of note is that by their standards at least, Feingold is further left than Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, and Charles Schumer.

All well and good, and believe me, I have many friends who see this as a positive, but as a reality test, compare the company he keeps legislatively to your version of a typical Wisconsinite. Unless you are a union leader, college professor, or trial lawyer, you get my point.  There is a lot more to being from Wisconsin than maintaining a local address, and being from here doesn’t necessarily make you one of us.

Here are some of Feingold’s rankings by various interest groups, courtesy project vote smart:
 
ACORN 100%
ACLU 100%
NARAL 100%
NAACP 90%
National Education Association A
SEIU 100%
ASCFME 100%
AFL CIO 94%
Alliance for Worker Freedom 0%
National Latino Congress 100% 
National Association of Government Contractors 100%
Business - Industry PAC 0%
Consumer Alliance for Energy Security 0%
Chamber of Commerce 24% lifetime
Military Officers Association 0%
National Association of Manufacturers 8%
Citizens Against Government Waste 40% National Taxpayer Union 23%
National Gun Owners Association F-
National Retail Federation 0%
National Restaurant Association 28%
National Right to Life 0%
English First 0%
American Conservative Union 13%  
National Council of LaRaza 100% 

(source www.votesmart.org)

Busting the maverick myth:
Then there’s the “maverick” canard.  American Heritage Dictionary defines maverick as follows:

NOUN:  One that refuses to abide by the dictates of or resists adherence to a group; a dissenter.
ADJECTIVE:  Being independent in thought and action or exhibiting such independence: maverick politicians; a maverick decision.

This brings to mind another, more accurate, definition:
po·seur:
NOUN:  One who affects a particular attribute, attitude, or identity to impress or influence others.

Wisconsin folks know shinola from that other stuff and, unlike the Oxford preppie; many of us have actually stepped in it once in our lifetime. Feingold’s highly touted maverickocity serves only to bolster his moderate claims, but never, not so amazingly, seem to be of any consequence. Why, it’s almost as if by calculation! 

Feingold never fails to remind us of votes against his party, once the camera time and a TV interviews are lined up, but also never fails to omit the inconvenient fact that his vote had absolutely no bearing on the outcome.  A vote against your caucus takes courage only if it can affect the result, otherwise it’s nothing more than cowardly political posturing, a specialty perfected by Feingold.

The recent Finance law is a perfect case in point.  As soon as there were enough Republican votes to offset his, he voted against it.  Once assured his vote had no bearing on the result he, with Pavlovian predictability, voted to prove himself a maverick, like he always does. It’s the same thing on the Clinton impeachment vote, and last year’s bailout package. 

Seriously, does anyone actually believe Mr. Feingold had the cajones to cast the deciding vote, against his party, on any of these issues?  Please.  They were all free, maverick-imaging votes and utterly devoid of impact. The only time Feingold has the courage to be a maverick is when it’s a done deal. He only does it to placate the gullible when he runs away from the left, pretending to be a moderate, every six years.

Again, as far as it goes, I don’t mind a progressive voting with these folks routinely. It’s what I expect; it’s voting his conscience, and what they do.  What I do mind is insulting his constituency’s intelligence by posing as some kind of moderate come election time.  I only wonder whether his assumption that we are a bunch of rube idiots is more the result of the elite education, or a career in politics.  Either way, it isn’t very Wisconsin like.

The other conundrum is how allegedly brilliant liberals like Feingold who so passionately pursue their leftwing agenda during their term, never formulate a compelling argument to advocate their true governing philosophy to persuade voters.  I guess it’s over our heads, that, or he is smart enough to know it would never sell.    

Abortion:
Sorry, yeah, abortion, this, like all elections since 1973 is about abortion.  As a limited pro-choicer I part company with many conservative allies in this regard. It is, unfortunately, settled law, though questionably established at best, and as such it needs to be dealt with as the political reality it is. Me? Until someone convinces me that government jurisdiction over the collective uteri of the entire female population is not the most egregious example of government intrusion ever I will remain pro-choice, on that conservative principle.

Even though in a strict sense I might side with Russ Feingold on the yes or no part of the abortion issue, we are as far apart on the same side of the spectrum as we can be.  I hold that the first choice in pro-choice should be life, and just as importantly, none of my taxes are used to fund abortion. My gut tells me I am more aligned with the majority of Wisconsin on this issue than Feingold. 

Anyone examining Russ Feingold’s track record on the abortion issue could only conclude his stance is not pro-choice but pro-abortion.  It is so extreme that to call it infanticide light would be fair and accurate.  He has been an ardent supporter of late term abortions, arguably the most heinous and gruesome medical procedure ever devised by mankind, voting against its prohibition 7 times. (source: www.votesmart.org)

But nothing I can describe about Feingold’s extreme position on abortion could be more powerful than his own words from a Senate floor debate on late term abortion.  Read it for yourself:

Sen. Santorum: Will the Senator from Wisconsin yield for a question?

Sen. Feingold: I will.

Sen. Santorum: The Senator from Wisconsin says that this decision should be left up to the mother and the doctor, as if there is absolutely no limit that could be placed on what decision that they make with respect to that. And the Senator from California [Sen. Barbara Boxer] is going up to advise you of what my question is going to be, and I will ask it anyway. And my question is this: that if that baby were delivered breech style and everything was delivered except for the head, and for some reason that that baby's head would slip out -- that the baby was completely delivered -- would it then still be up to the doctor and the mother to decide whether to kill that baby?

Sen. Feingold: I would simply answer your question by saying under the Boxer amendment, the standard of saying it has to be a determination, by a doctor, of health of the mother, is a sufficient standard that would apply to that situation. And that would be an adequate standard.

Sen. Santorum: That doesn't answer the question. Let's assume that this procedure is being performed for the reason that you've stated, and the head is accidentally delivered. Would you allow the doctor to kill the baby?

Sen. Feingold: I am not the person to be answering that question. That is a question that should be answered by a doctor, and by the woman who receives advice from the doctor. And neither I, nor is the Senator from Pennsylvania, truly competent to answer those questions. That is why we should not be making those decisions here on the floor of the Senate.

So there you have it.  Given the opportunity to stand for life and protect a newborn Feingold opted to dodge the question.  That, or in the view of Senator Feingold even a full term human being, for the crime of having accidentally survived a late term abortion, should be denied government protection, or life.  One wonders, does the Senator envision any circumstance in which the government is obligated to protect its citizens, even if it is only a newborn baby, or does it all depend on whatever the biggest campaign donors decide?

I have endeavored here to build case against keeping Senator Feingold as our Senator.  Admittedly I have a right of center point of view.  Even so, I think if you consider the track record honestly you will find ample reasons to show him the door and let someone else go to work on our behalf. Perhaps even more importantly though, I also hope to have shown that while there is no denying Feingold represents Wisconsin, he is a whole world away from being a representative sample of Wisconsin.

Nothing so strongly impels a man to regard the interest of his constituents, as the certainty of returning to the general mass of the people, from whence he was taken, where he must participate in their burdens.
-George Mason

Amen

                                                            IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

— That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
 
— That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
 
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

— Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

 

So much happening so little time to formulate cogent opinions.  Broadly speaking I am mostly pleased with the national debate.  The disinfecting sunshine of information once wholly monopolized by an agendized and complicit media complex is being splashed around with reckless abandon by new professionals and many more amatuers while the traditional press is going the way of the dinosaur. No, it ain't pretty, neat, and tidy, and can be unsettling at times, but neither is democracy, or especially culture.  I guess in Orwellian terms you could say big brother is getting his ass kicked by a milion little brothers and sisters.  Booya to that.

My main reason for posting today is to republish the memorial Day essay which is a fan (both of them) favorite.  It is comparitively snark free.  Next week I will dust off and update the Good Fences Make Good Neighbors essay, as it seems, ahem, timely.  

Have a safe and happy holiday everybody, and if you see a veteran, thank him or her, if for no other reason just to see the surprise on their face. 



Here's Dad at a Memorial Day dedication ceremony in 2000.  He partook in these events every year until 2008 when he died. He was a Veteran.  I miss him, especially this weekend. 

Memorial Day

Frank Byrne

We rode the hilly back roads of beautiful Southwest Wisconsin on that mild spring day.  There were three or four cars and a van, for the guns, ammo, and colors.  By day’s end we will have visited a half dozen or more cemeteries.  I was 9, close to my son’s age now, and the worst of Viet Nam was yet to happen.

For some reason, luck in retrospect, I, of all nine siblings, was left in my Father’s charge that Memorial Day.  As commander of the local VFW he was among the volunteer members assembled to participate in services for nearby cemeteries, driven by largely unnoticed most of the year. 

Today was different though.  Today not only did we stop, but we also remembered, and we made a grand show of it.  We memorialized, with uniforms, with flags, with guns, with taps, with ceremony.  On Memorial Day, one of 365, we make a point of visiting the final resting place of the men and women who died for our country.  Today we say you are not forgotten, and we say we do not take your sacrifice for granted.    

The members ranged in age and included veterans from the worst conflicts of the deadliest century in the history of mankind.  World War 2, the war to end all wars, Korea, the war that changed the definition of war, and Viet Nam, that confused venture that forced our nation to question the validity of war itself, a question persisting today.  The names are those from another time; Ernie, Leo, Guerdon, Myron, Louie.  They were an otherwise typical crew that served in all branches but today were resplendent, smart and sharp, in their uniforms; dark shirts, white ties, helmets, belts, and spats, which were almost as cool as the guns.

The ceremony never varied, a prayer, a sermon, thankfully short, gunfire, taps, and onto the next cemetery.  I never covered my ears for the shooting.  I didn’t want to embarrass Dad by appearing a coward; an act, which my young mind had determined, had absolutely no place in these circumstances.  I thought if the people we are honoring actually gave their lives for our country the least I could do is endure the peal and concussion of three blank rounds.  Besides, I was with the guys in uniform, and I wanted to be like them.

As the morning gave way the heat increased and with it the need for liquid refreshment as provided by whichever VFW club was nearest, seems every town had one back then.  I recall Schlitz Shorties or “Lil Joe’s” being the beverage of choice.  Remember those?  I could think of no better way to spend a holiday than with my Dad and a bunch of gregarious war Vets tousling my hair and buying me all the pop I could drink.

I remember hoping for war stories and, more telling than I knew at the time, I remember that hope going unfulfilled.  There were no grand tales of heroism, no recounting of life and death scenarios in far off lands, no lurid descriptions of killing the bad guys.  Even more curious was the silence of the younger vets who had just served in Viet Nam.  Surely they couldn’t have forgotten so soon.

As I reflected on that disappointment it occurred to me I was at perfect odds with these old soldiers; I wanted them to remember out loud the stories they were struggling mightily to forget.  I wanted to be enthralled by tales from homegrown versions of Pappy Boyington and Audi Murphy while completely oblivious to the mental scars these stories might have inflicted. These men, the source of my hopes for tales of triumph and victory, were instead perfect profiles in dignity, somberness and sobriety, even with beer.

Wanting first hand glorification of war from the guys who fought them is typical selfishness for a nine-year old.  The contrast to the incomparable unselfishness of those we memorialize this weekend is as vast and profound as can be.     

Their surviving comrades, as in this fondest of childhood memories, will be visiting countless cemeteries across the country this weekend.  Memorial Day is about remembering and every Memorial Day I remember that day.  Like me then, my kids now have little understanding of why I insist on dragging them to Memorial Day services.  Like me know, one day they too will understand why this is not just another excuse for a three-day weekend.

Hopefully they will also come to appreciate the ultimate irony; that the same guys who would most benefit from forgetting wars are in charge of memorializing those who died fighting them.  It’s an American thing.  It’s a veteran thing.

In our continuing endeavor to achieve a war free world, doing so without remembering the price paid would be a travesty.  The least we civilians can do is remember that, and them, on Memorial Day.

 

 

Totally disinterested in her sexual orientation BUT if you ever wanted an example of oratorical fellatio  this should suffice...

Poor Monica Lewinsky, she had the right idea, but took it literally, well that and her career goals weren't high enough...

Arguments about arguments are being dissected in an Interesting debate between Instapunk, who submits this provocative list of things he believes to be obvious.  I wish, because it's a good list and I find nothing there with which I disagree.  The premise however, I can't abide.  I only wish they were that obvious.  

Doc Zero weighs in on item the first: "Corporate taxes are paid by individual taxpayers".  His argument is not that this isn't true but that it isn't obvious.  
 
a snippet:
...it’s important to realize the average voter just doesn’t think about politics or economics in precise terms.  Those who don’t study these matters as professionals, or enthusiasts, find them repellent and dull.  However, they don’t want to come off as uninformed in polite conversation, especially when elections draw near.  They construct a set of attitudes, instead of concrete arguments. 
 
From here the essay evolves into an argument about how and what to argue, which counters Instapunk's introductory assertion that belaboring basic concepts is not the best use of conservative's intellectual firepower.  I side with Doc on that point, although I have a quibble with another point where he says:

Too many essential truths have become “obvious” enough to turn invisible, because nobody thinks about them any longer.

What I think he is saying here is that essential truths are so prevalent they are taken for granted.  I believe they have been taken for granted for so long that they are no longer either prevalent or obvious.  I also believe that too many essential truths have been, are being, sacrificed on the alters of political correctness under the guise of pseudo compassion, though I did not make that point in my comments there.

Speaking of which...
my comment:
Not sure I would agree with Instapunks list as being all that obvious.  Now if he were to quantify his assertion that the list "should" be obvious to "those who think" we might get somewhere.  If they were so obvious would we be in this mess? 

It seems so much of what was assumed to be obvious, that free enterprize and success based on merit is a morally superior economic system for example, no longer gets the institutional reinforcement it once enjoyed, and has been replaced by the counter argument.  Commenters here tend to substantiate that observation in mentioning the gaps in their public education.   Doc Zero's dedication to repopularizing first principles helps fill that gap and I applaud and share it.  The filling of those gaps is the role being filled by the alternative media and it is having a positive affect.  Notice I didn't say it was pretty, quite the contrary.

The success of the left came from a heretofore prolonged monopolistic control of the narrative.  Corporate taxes, aren't on the average voters radar precisely because the left has successfully posited, incorrectly, that corporate taxes do not affect the average consumer. (How they can justify taxing corporations to kingdom come while trying to limit their freedom of expression via political donations is one of myriad left/liberal incoherencies that somehow remain largely unchallenged in the public debate. But that is a whole different issue)  To me, because I think, the incoherency is obvious with a capital O.   

The debate therefore, should not be about getting liberals to think, as that labyrinth of aforementioned incoherencies has metastasized into a groupthink impenetrable by logic.  So I agree attempts at said penetration are indeed a waste of time and effort.  That said, a strong consistent effort should be aimed at self proclaimed moderates, focusing primarily at getting them to think, period.   The effort spent there, I believe, would be much more fruitful than preaching to the hopelessly nonconvertible.  That effort will facilitate an open debate where truth and logic are allowed as opposed to the fringy lib/left screed where those elements, though never really explained, are foregone conclusions.  Instapunk's final "obviousness" captures it perfectly.   

I've tried reasoning with a liberal.  I've tried reasoning with a brick wall.  The latter makes more sense every time.  You are on the right track Doc, no pun intended, arguing to assuage an attitude is very different than arguing against a set of attitudes.   The open re-examination of first principles, debateable on their own merits, has been an untapped product in the marketplace of ideas for far too long.  I'm not sure Al Gore was counting on this when he invented the internets, but bless his carbon trading billionaire heart for accidently providing the forum.

Keep up the good work.

Looks like it's on me to come up with a list of left/lib incoherencies to throw into the mix.  Could use some reader input on this.....

UPDATE:  No sooner do I make the point that arguing with liberals is pointless than something like this proves it. Liberals Accuse Tea Partiers of Role in Failed Times Square Car Bomb Attack   How can you argue with someone who thinks like this, or more to the previous point, why bother?

PC left untreated will be the death of our society and country.

It has three strains:

Political Correctness
Pseudo Compassion
Political Careerism.

The first is a bludgeon used to impose a synthetic morality, limit free speech, and justify certain behaviors and rules that common sense would not.  The zero tolerance idiocies like schools who would dispel a second grader for pointing a chicken finger and saying “pow” shows how this mushy thinking manifests.  A more serious example might be the legal discrimination enforced through affirmative action somehow ameliorates actual discrimination.  Much, if not all, of this craziness rests upon the concept of …

The second PC, pseudo compassion, facilitates and perpetuates the illusion of a higher moral authority to justify control.  Pseudo compassion is the K-Y lubricant of political intercourse; it’s unseemly result being the domestic policy of good intention and foreign policy of wishful thinking.  Pseudo compassion allows its practitioners to reduce any issue to an emotional rather than rational level. Call it government by guilt.  Empiric, simple arithmetic, let alone actuarial accounting, have absolutely no bearing on the thought processes of the pseudo compassionate.  This is what happens when the 60’s counter culture, whose modes operandi was “IF IT FEELS GOOD, DO IT” are in charge of the house and senate.     

The third are the agents, or to further the metaphor, carriers of the social disease, and the first subject of this three part essay.

I decided to start with political careerists first as a shout out to the Get Out Of Our House folks, who I am meeting this weekend.  Readers in the Black Earth, western Dane County Wisconsin area, are welcome to join host Scott Patchin at his restaurant D.W. Heiney’s Dining and Spirits.  Link for directions on the right.

Political careerism is the single biggest contribution to the regression of this country from a representative republic to a vast self-serving corrupt government spoils system because a crooked system requires, spawns, and enables, crooked operators.  

The framers forewarned about the danger of career politicians:

The people must remain ever vigilant against tyrants masquerading as public servants.
-George Washington

Where annual elections end, there slavery begins … Humility, patience, and moderation, without which every man in power becomes a ravenous beast of prey.
- John Adams

The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.
-Thomas Jefferson

A fondness for power is implanted in most men, and it is natural to abuse it when acquired.
-James Madison

There is an almost knee-jerk tendency by conservatives like me to put the framers on pedestals, but when you ponder the profundity of these sentiments in light of the political scene today it is hard to resist.  At the very least you have to give them credit for prescience.

On the other hand, the light of wisdom they shine is fairly simple, it’s really only the recognition of and accounting for human imperfection, and when you add power those imperfections tend to metastasize.  Their aim, backed by term limits they put into in the constitution, was to prevent a ruling elite and foster a continuous flow of citizen legislators through congress, an endless transfusion of new blood necessary to the good health of government. 

For over 200 years, the decline of the original citizen legislature model is in direct proportion to both the growth of its antithesis, political careerists, and the growth of government.  Today, the only thing ignored faster than their oath of office, as though that gets any thought at all, is that their being there was set up as a temporary arrangement.

Nothing so strongly impels a man to regard the interest of his constituents, as the certainty of returning to the general mass of the people, from whence he was taken, where he must participate in their burdens.
-George Mason

Political careerism is a cancer that overwhelms its host body, the government.  As their numbers increase so does the appetite for power. Power requires control.  Control requires legislation.  Legislation requires enforcement.  Enforcement requires numbers. Numbers grow government. This is a self-perpetuating, self-fueling problem that cannot be fixed internally due to the dearth of political courage therein.

It is becoming more apparent than ever we are approaching the point, at an alarmingly accelerating pace, that the host crumbling of its own weight is inevitable.  Political careerist carriers are either oblivious, incompetent, or too damn busy feathering their own nests to do anything about it. 

The survival of America requires that citizens remove this life threatening malignancy from her body politic. That’s where GOOOH comes in. The exponential increase in communicability afforded by the internet makes this the best opportunity in our lifetime to effect bold profound change on a wholesale level.  This group is seizing that opportunity. 

Hey, I’m a realist and eschew generalizations as a rule.  I understand that saying all members of congress are political careerists is neither fair nor accurate, but the proportion reached and maintained a critical mass during my lifetime starting in the late fifties. It was Ike Eisenhower who warned against the military industrial complex wherein he explained the potential hazards of an unhealthy collaboration between government, business,and special interests. 

The baby boom generation allowed this to happen on our watch.  Only those comfortable as the first generation in U.S. history to leave it in worse shape than we found it should stand aside.  Something has to be done - - by us. I have no intention of abiding this discomfort and shame. No patriot would.

Drastic times call for drastic measures and sometimes the surgical removal of a malignancy requires sacrificing healthy tissue.  We have a saying here in Wisconsin; cream rises.  Here in Wisconsin I honestly hate the idea of losing a rising conservative star like Paul Ryan, but if Russ Feingold goes down with him, it’s a net gain.   Sincerely altruistic citizen legislators like Ryan will find a way to serve, or their fellow citizens will find them. 
(UPDATE:  After hearing Tim Cox explain the process this no longer applies as the GOOOH model pertains exclusively to the House of Representatives.  That said, this would free up Ryan to run for Senate eventually)

Sometimes when considering a renovation you are forced to recognize that everything, all the way to the inside of the outside walls, needs to be removed to salvage the whole structure.  We are at that point. Keep it in perspective, and acknowledge that this may be properly labeled drastic, but is not necessarily radical. 

I am for making of terms annual, and for sending an entire new set every year.
-John Adams 

Now that’s radical!  So remember, the whole concept rests on the foundational instincts of a group of citizen legislators whose character and integrity is so immeasurably superior to the political class of today the only thing they have in common is title.

William F. Buckley famously claimed he would rather be ruled by the first 500 names in the Boston phone book than by the faculty of Harvard.  I’ll update that notion by saying I’d rather be governed by randomaly selected citizens, like a jury pool, than political careerists.   Adherence to such a wild notion might mean you agree with this:

The ordinary affairs of a nation offer little difficulty to a person of any experience.
-Thomas Jefferson

Which sort of reminds me of my favorite heartland axiom:
It’s not that it’s too complicated to fix.  It’s that it’s fixed to look too complicated.

Political careerists are masters at complicating issues to deliberately instill a sense of hopelessness and defeatism in the electorate as a way to posit themselves as our saviors.

Hitch up your britches, adjust your cup, gird your loins, and get ready.  Self-interest compels them to rig the game to insure their own survival. Those in control have neither incentive nor willingness to upset the status quo so the responsibility falls on us. Our only weapons are the rights we still have, speech and assembly being paramount, and most importantly of course, the ballot. 

Fellow patriots, it is time to empty the quiver.

It's either GOOOH, or the status quo.     

 

 

 

One very clear sense I came away with from the recent Tea Party is that we conservatives are pretty sensitive about being called racists.  Judging from reactions all across the country this is a common sentiment. 

The flip side is that we are beginning to recognize that those who fling that mud have as much credibility as the boy who cried wolf.  The danger here is the same as the wolf crier; when an actual case of racism happens we will have been so desensitized by the constant stream of false charges that no one will take genuine allegations seriously.

My Great Aunt Carrie was also my third grade teacher.  She was one of those no nonsense lay teachers at St. Rose Elementary through most of the 60's, 70's, and into the 80"s.

Unlike some of the nuns Aunt Carrie never relied on corporal discipline, because she could cut you down to size with a sharp verbal jab a hell of a lot quicker and more effectively than the time it took to wrap knuckles.  I still remember her comment on profanity, not that I ever used any at that age, but it was classic, something along the lines of "the use of a bad word just shows you are too stupid to use the right word".    

I'm developing a similar sense about discussing race with Democrats, to paraphrase; calling someone a racist just shows you are too stupid to argue.  I swear in watching the recent "dialogue" about tea party folk that, if continued on its present trajectory, we are approaching the point where leftists will equate racist and constitutionalist. 

What else can you conclude when a conversation on health care goes something like this:
Me: I just don't see how mandating the purchase of a service meets constitutional muster.
Liberal friend: I just don't think you like the idea of a black man in the White House. 

WTF?  As if I would find socializing health care acceptable if John Edwards proposed it?  How does that make any sense?  Bad ideas are colorblind.  Like the sign at the Tea Party said, "it's not the color of his skin, it's the content of his policies".

There is absolutely no question the racist smear is the oldest, most overused, misapplied, and war weary smear the left uses against conservatives.  This in spite of the fact the great emancipator Abraham Lincoln, Republican, you know, the party founded on ending slavery, Jim Crow laws were originated by Democrats, and all those civil rights laws in the 60's would never have passed without Republican votes.  Details, whatever.

So the only question is not whether they hurl racist smears or not but why.  Taranto of the Wall Street Journal offers up as good an explanation as any I've seen.  Basically, they have to as a matter of political survival.  

the meat:
The political left claims to love racial diversity, but it bitterly opposes such diversity on the political right. This is an obvious matter of political self-interest: Since 1964, blacks have voted overwhelmingly Democratic. If Republicans were able to attract black votes, the result would be catastrophic for the Democratic Party. Even in 2008, the Democrats' best presidential year since '64, if the black vote had been evenly split between the parties (and holding the nonblack vote constant), Barack Obama would have gotten about 48% of the vote and John McCain would be president.  

the potatoes:
The election of Barack Obama made nonsense of the idea that America remains a racist country and thereby necessitated an intensifying of attacks on the opposition as racist.

 By all means do read the whole thing. or if you are more into video, and can stand Bill O'Reilley, go here 

He cites a column by one Charles Blow of the New York Times who took it on himself, as a black columnist, to visit an actual Tea Party, the one in Dallas.  Predictably enough he belittled the organizers for such blatant manipulation and forced diversity as well as black and other minority participants, calling the whole thing a minstrel show.  Ah that famous liberal tolerance.

Blow is quoted enough in Taranto's piece for you to get the full flavor (and I won't sully this blog with a link to the NYT). 

But for dessert I am happy to share what Alphonzo Rachel, one of the aforementioned Tea Party black participants, response:  click here  Zo   go see this. 

The folks at the podium said 14,000.  The radio reports said 4,000.  I'm not a very good judge of crowd size but my guess would be more toward the podium estimates.

Didn't want to miss out on a little history so I vetured west to the state capitol to see what all the fuss is about.  The event in words and pictures...




                                                                                                                                                            Popular sentiments throughout...




First Place: Photoshop Catagory



Always good to quote a framer, even if he was a right-wing extremist ....





One speaker, an African American gentleman no less, pointed out this sign and said one is a Republican the other a Democrat.  Ouch, that's gotta hurt.




                                                                                                                             Another popular sentiment....




                                                    No shortage of good humor or creativity



                                                                                Oh sure, easy to say if you're white! Haters!

An interesting observation and a increasingly blurry distinction.  I mean it's never been much of a stretch to say the mob uses the government as a business model, or is it the other way around?  



Someone will have to explain the reference here.  Not getting it.  I gather it is a quote from Scarface?  Anyone? 

And the one I would have made had I the time or talent..... paraphrasing ML King
"It's not the color of his skin, it's the content of his policies"  Brilliant.

I had the joy of attending a house concert last weekend.  What a wonderful, intimate event.  The only thing better than the combination of good friends and good music is when your good friends play good music.  So, in a departure from my usual screediness please indulge this review, support the arts, and should you share my sentiment, the artist...

 If you want, listen to this while you read:  Brother Can You Spare A Dime - Live



Singer songwriter guitarist Clay Riness said his goal with his "Covered Up" concert was to surprise.  His aim, he said, was to have his audience shaking their heads and saying “I never would have pegged him for that song”.  Surprise is typically induced by either fright or delight.  Frightful it was most certainly not, yet to call this concert delightful would be an understatement. Inspired is the word that comes to mind. 

An otherwise trustful reader may be rightfully suspect about my objectivity regarding Clay since we’ve been friends for over thirty years.  But the coin of a long-term friendship has two sides, avid supporter and honest critic. In other words, the loyalty of a true friend dictates that if I thought the concert sucked I would have to tell him.  Even though I haven’t seen Clay perform publicly for years I was confident that conversation would not have to take place -– mostly.

The pre concert promo teased ballads and tunes from Americana’s legendary elite, Charlie Pool, Jimmy Webb, Jerry Jeff Walker, and Yip Harburg (Brother Can You Spare A Dime?) to name a few, so, no surprises there.  Neil Diamond’s Solitary Man may have raised an eyebrow or two, but given his career body of work, and much of it acoustic, it offered only feint surprise.  This audience was peppered with more than a few musicians, and many folkophiles. So the challenge commenced.

Pulling cuts from side B 45’s and obscure albums Riness treated the intimate gathering to an amazingly diverse repertoire, all interlaced with the stories behind the songs and artists and how they influenced his musical self-education and songwriting, the latter of which is an impressive body of work in it’s own right. 

(here are his 3 latest recordings:  Best Of Four  Little Windows  Little Black Dress )

Singing someone else’s songs is standard fare and pretty straightforward so, of course, this is not what the purist Riness had in mind.  The theme was songs that influenced Riness; but the real beauty of this concert was his influence on the songs. We witnessed an artistic interpretation true to the spirit of the original but with just a hint of Clayness.  In every case it was pronounced yet subtle, fresh yet respectful.  Technically and spiritually Riness treated these tunes as if they were his own - - and for that afternoon, they were.

It takes a good deal of confidence to reinterpret classic material, but a bucket load of talent to actually make them better.  This listener was moved from tears of laughter to tears of sadness in a matter of minutes as Riness shared his version of Avril Lavinge’s 2003 pop hit Complicated and then transitioned right into the Stephan Foster folk classic Hard Times.  

Yeah, you read it right, Avril Lavigne, yes that Avril Lavigne, the pop flavor of the month sometime after Brittany but before Miley.  And that surprise thing - - mission accomplished. Oh yeah.   

It takes imagination to even conceive of a transition like that let alone pull it off. Riness sort of laughed it off quipping, “there you go, two pop hits two centuries apart.” More than just another folk singer doing cover tunes the audience was shown how, in the hands of a master, how a song begins evolving from a pop hit to Americana. 

Riness is a Heartland treasure, great American and good friend. Check out his Weary Wolf blog to the right. 

related links

Yip Harburg
Jerry Jeff Walker Official Home Page
www.jimmywebb.com 
Stephen Foster - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia    

 

 

 

The tried and true method employed when the left would rather an issue either die down or go away is to change the subject.  The aftermath of the Obamacare debacle foisted on an unwilling population was dealt with in typical big D Democrat fashion, triumphalism, lack of decorum, and talking smack.  The dudes got all kinds of style but no kind of class.

Now rather than carping about how violence was visited on our constitution we are supposed get all concerned by a bunch of rednecks in a double-wide.  Really?  I for one hope those yahoos get all the punishment dealt to William Ayres who actually took violence on police beyond the planning stage.  People died, privileged Billy went to grad school.

I am not one to agitate for violence but had these jerks, Obama and Democrats not the rednecks, pulled a stunt like this in an earlier period the reaction would have been more along these lines ..

.

So all this pseudo concern over the "heightened rhetoric" means nothing beyond how it successfully diverts attention away from the reason people are so pissed off in the first place.  When you can't win the argument on it's merits demonize opponents and change the subject.  Classic lefty tactics. 

That said, should a random brick find it's way through any Democrats campaign office window it's not as though the reaction is disproportionate to the reason behind the toss - - call it the physics of politics.  Just consider it the natural gag reflex of when you jam a piece of socialist shit down capitalist peoples throat and deal with it.  And please, spare me the righteous indignation.  (I, after all, live in the district where GOP get-out-the-vote vans tires were slashed by the son of the victorious congresswoman, so around these parts a flying brick ain't that big of a deal, so long as you are not white and are Democrat)

In the end what I find most intriguing about the negative reaction to this constitutional assault is it's restraint - - so far.  The shelf life of a brick is pretty much infinite however.