AMERICA’S POLICY OF DENIAL AND HALF-MEASURES

Authored by William Robert Barber

I am 65 years of age; old enough to have fought in the Vietnam War. If I was 85 years old, I could have fought in WWI; if 76, I could have participated in the Korean Conflict. If 99 years of age, WWI and if just a little older, the Spanish-American War. Sadly, the children of those that fought in Vietnam are now killing, dying, maiming, and being maimed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Since its inception, America has engaged in a number of benchmark hostilities; these events coupled set the standard of this nation’s history. Withstanding America’s long and consistent narrative of warlike behavior, it would be wrongheaded to suggest that successive administrations, from different political affiliations that extend as far back as the Spanish-American War, was all war-mongering Philistines, indifferent to utilizing peaceful means to settle conflicting interest.

Instead, I think the world is, has been, and more than likely will always be, a hostile environment. I also believe that peace as commonly defined is a delusion. Factually, peace has not ever existed and does not now exist. To push the denial just a bit further, I do believe that peace, as popularly defined, is unattainable. If one agrees with these hypotheses, then it follows that a foreign policy designed to establish or attain peace is an illusionary goal, unworthy of effort.

Our current policy is immersed in issues of lethal proportion. I deduce that there has never been a more dangerous time for America. Religious zealots of Muslim origin have submitted to a doctrine of holy war against the West and specifically against the Anglo Christian peoples of the world. It is their intent to destroy the Judeo-Christian alliance by either converting or killing them.

This nation has many enemies which would include North Korea, Iran, Syria, and their martial compatriots. These are the very same provocateurs of terrorism that pledge destruction while complimenting such pledges with exemplifying horrific behavior. To negotiate with those that espouses destruction as a means to their end is not only a waste of effort but takes the nation off focus. Just because our state department creates an unsubstantiated assumption that such negotiations are in the interest of peacefulness, does not mean that in real terms such actions will transmute a negative into a positive. Such head-in-the-sand approach to reality is only an acknowledgement of wishful diplomacy which will never substitute artful statecraft.

Our present action and counter-action will not settle our disagreements; at best our efforts only prolong the inevitable. At worst, putting off the inevitable (war) only strengthens the counter parties’ military might and enforces the counter parties’ belief that as part of their diplomatic efforts, America will not utilize military might to achieve a goal. Clearly, the Obama administration will not go to war to preserve or protect America’s interest. As a consequence, any and all efforts are not sufficient of a deterrent to counter North Korea, Iran, or Syria’s intent on executing war-like measures detrimental to this nation’s interest.

The Obama administration did not set a precedent; even Bush would not commit American might as it should have been deployed. America somehow has taken on the presumption that the exercise of power is inherently a limited act. How absolutely absurd; but is that not our policy?

At a minimum, at least since the ending portion of WWII, our administrations, in unison with congress, have tasked our armed forces with missions that they deem necessary while hampering our forces’ ability to wage war.

For example, Eisenhower’s decision to allow the Russians to take Berlin; Roosevelt and Truman’s ineptness at understanding Russian intentions while dealing directly with a brutal dictator — the very same person that signed a treaty with Hitler and participated in the invasion of Poland; Stalin was a rat and still, these two presidents looked away from the obvious. Imagine, America had the strongest navy and army in the world, logistically in place, with the atomic bomb — and within five years after the end of WWII, freedom-loving peoples still lost China to Mao and Eastern Europe to Stalin.

We committed our forces to Korea to stop and impede an invasion from the north. Right there, at that very moment, this nation’s leaders should have known we were in trouble. Stop and impede is not wiping out the root of North Korean aggressiveness. It is instead the equivalent of pushing the bully back rather than smashing him in the nose, gouging out his eyes, and breaking both his arms. Today, because of our faint-hearted unwillingness to destroy North Korean command, control, and political hierarchy, North Korea is a rouge totalitarian nation armed with nuclear weapons.

Eisenhower enabled the CIA to recruit, train, and arm Cuban dissidents; he promised air support for their invasion. Kennedy permitted the invasion to go forward but reneged on air support… the invasion failed. This demonstration of weakness and timidity, this blatant disregard for those lives within the invasion force, bolstered Castro’s image and prestige. Domestically and throughout the world, Castro confirmed that America can be managed and manipulated; it also verified that American resolve is limited. Khrushchev and his politburo were watching.

President Kennedy is credited with ending the Cuban missile threat — which only existed because we did not invade Cuba!

Laos and Vietnam are other examples of America’s inability to commit to a foreign policy task; at the time, we actually believed that a show of force was enough. How very silly of us. Such harebrained behavior all stems from a canon of foolish naïveté; this American doctrine of naïveté established precedence that is very hard to overcome. After all, our presidents want to be re-elected or revered; elected representatives want the wind at their back; the entire objective is retention of power, therefore the concern is safeguarding political interest. Hence, a guiding rule of the elected applied: Controversy in any form should be avoided.

From a strategic, even tactical prospective, in order to disable the North Vietnamese from invading the South Vietnamese, the United States should have invaded the North. That should have been the minimum requirement for engagement; if congress disapproved of such an invasion then it would be clear that America could not support the South Vietnamese people. But once again the policy half-measure won the argument and 58,000 or so Americans, not to mention many thousands more of Vietnamese, lost their lives because of the bewildering incompetence of the administration(s) and congress(es).

Soon, Iran will have a nuclear weapon and the means to deliver and America is immersed in the utility of the same head-in-the-sand foreign policy; a policy of half-measure and denial. This administration (not unlike the many that preceded Teddy Roosevelt) will not accept the reality of world affairs and as a consequence, there are two distinctive operating dimensions. One is the department-agencies of state and the other real-time reality. Neither seems impaired by the existence of the other.

However, unlike the foreign policy challenges of yesterday, this time the threat has the biological, radiological, chemical, and nuclear weapons to choose from. This particular threat has demonstrated its resolve by killing thousands of innocents (regardless of their sameness of religion); what they want, no sane person or state can give them. There is nothing to negotiate over, no other options are open to the West, except deterrence by any and all means.

But instead of addressing the issue unilaterally and head-on, the Obama administration is contemplating self-invented options where no option exists. Obama will inevitably break with half-measure and just execute a full measure of denial.

Iran will soon have a nuclear weapon; neither Israel nor the United States will act to eliminate this threat to Middle East stability. There will be no embargo or blockade, the UN will accept an Iranian declaration that these weapons are for defensive measures only; Obama and Clinton will submit to the UN acceptance.

Iranian prestige will rise, particularly amongst the hard-line fringe of Islamic militarism. Syria notes the weakness and re-establishes final control of Lebanon. The political-terrorist tactics of Hezbollah and Hamas will be validated; by any and all means the radical elements of Islam will dominate over the moderate. The stage will be set for WWIII…

OBAMA’S UNITED NATIONS AMBITIONS

Authored by William Robert Barber

I do understand that differing opinions are natural; I concede the need for a variety of opinions. I am convinced that in order to achieve the ‘best efforts’ in defining of a problem-solution, differing opinions are indispensable to any prudent discovery. When the topic of discussion is political in nature, divergence of opinions will enable disagreements. Clearly, I comprehend the obviousness of inevitable disagreement; such to and fro are fundamental to the process of logical deduction.

Respective of my previous paragraph, understanding that I am a conservative by thought and action, I was shocked to my core when I heard and then read Obama’s speech at the UN. Emphatically, that speech, literally and in spirit, put me on Mars and Obama on Venus. The President of the United States actuates his behavior like a Harvard professor of political philosophy instead of the leader of the free world. He speaks with the confidence that all of us Americans reside in a protective impenetrable sphere wherein attack by a hostile power is impossible. The basis of Obama’s international policy seems captured in the world as he wishes it was, instead of the world that exists; Russia and China will eat his heart and Iran will settle for the scraps.

I have a hard time accepting the liberal-progressives’ belief that the UN is a viable foreign policy tool. Are Obama and cohorts so naïve, so blatantly innocent and childlike in their Liberal-Progressive belief system that they will actually depend on the UN to facilitate US foreign policy initiatives? Have they no empirical sensibilities?

Possibly, Obama merely believes that the separation between Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran is nothing more than a grandiose misunderstanding; maybe it is a simple matter of idiom or semantics, some cultural misinterpretation or something to do with George Bush’s legacy. Admittedly, I am mystified by the Obama administration’s intentions… I do ask myself if my conservative prospective is acting as an intellectual blocking mechanism. I cannot see the Obama foreign policy intent or incentive as such policies interface with the United Nations. Is my inability to see the Obama policy as projected by his administration because I am blinded by my own ideological beliefs?

It is a reasonable guideline of prudence to sophisticate the contextual of an argument when the final sum of the argument could effectuate an at-all-cost result. If Obama has his way, Israel is on its own. The United States will not go to its aid if Iran transcends its covert attack on Israel in favor of an overt attack on its territory. Such an attack will surely follow an Israeli military attempt to blow up Iran’s nuclear facilities; hence Israel will not attack. Iran will have the weapon of mass destruction and eventually, by means direct or indirect, Israel will suffer its effect.

Obama’s general political philosophy and political ideology will enable our enemies; America, the once stalwart defender of all international transactions, the shining light of a once mighty contra to Russian interest, will unilaterally cede its power; all of this will come to form because Obama’s Liberal-Progressives believe in the interest of moral righteousness over sensibility.

The UN is a cabal of misfits, a loose confederation of usually disharmonious, self-dealing affiliates, whose only interest – other than the persistent pleadings of contrived contrarian’s posing as nation-states – is the perpetuation of the nonsensical and farce. Obama should feel especially welcomed.

THE FEDS

Authored by William Robert Barber

The federal government, by taking bits & pieces as well as snatching huge swaths of power from what was heretofore the state’s sole and unabridged indisputable authority, has effectively perverted the original meaningfulness of the Constitution of 1787. Interestingly, aside from the post civil war era, the snatching of these rights was affirmed by the very congresspersons sent to the House and Senate to protect and preserve the Constitution. Indeed, the mood of today’s congressional attitude is, more rather than less, to shape the Constitution by the perceived light of today’s priorities and governing adaptation. The Constitution’s original contextual intent is all too ready to be set aside by courts, contrary law, or selected enforcement.

Did the framers of the Constitution foresee that the right of Congress to tax would translate into the power to tax individual citizens on their personal income? Obviously not, otherwise there wouldn’t be any need for an amendment; those who voted for such an amendment to the Constitution did so in violation of the framers’ intent. In fact, the 16th amendment, ratified July 2nd, 1913, was a benchmark of stupendous measure; in fact it was the beginning of the end of our republic.

Although federal dominance of the state’s right started almost from the very beginning of the republic, it wasn’t until the effectual of federal right to tax and distribute that the overpowering of state’s right become a factual. The super-federalization of the nation, crystallized as the lethal adversary of state sovereignty after the civil war. The draconian compliance to socialistic policies established by FDR turned the nation abruptly from the virtues of self-determination and self-reliance to relying on the evergreen assurances and promises of the federal government. Dependence became an entitlement, a right of citizenship, all bowed before the Pharaoh of public works, city owned parks & recreational facilities. Public education administered by the federal government and its cadre of unionized school teachers taught our children the political persuasion most suited to the ideology of liberal and progressive philosophy. In addition to this curriculum of teaching, secularism is a dominant consideration when contesting traditional theologies, except when discussing the teachings of Mohammed. Government salaries rise in proportion to the percentage of government union workers; soon the cost of governing spirals beyond tax revenue. No matter, government gets into the casino business; it hawks lottery tickets and taxes all consumption. The federal government is now so immense, it ignores the very source of its revenue; it does so with lustful disdain for popular recourse, blatant disrespect for its constituency, and arrogant disregard for the spirit of the law.

Slowly, by means ever so clandestine and overt, by the insidious propagation of half-truths, deceptive pronouncements, misdirection, and pseudo-transparency, the federal government marketed their governing dominance over what was once understood as exclusive to the rights of states. It must be noted that, withstanding the entrenchment of FDR’s brand of socialism into the nation’s operating systems, Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, and both Bush administrations, endorsed the precedence by offering the very same. Charging the fare of liberty and freedom, ‘free’ bread, beer, and circus was offered to one and all. The people, after paying their fare, ate, drank, and were entertained.

In direct proportion to the ever growing omnipotent force of federal authority which was once reserved to the power of states, so is the steady regression of individual rights and freedom.

Now the Obama administration is about to nationalize healthcare and energy and all the while forcing states to comply with a number of federal mandates in order to receive federal funds. Where is that manifested in the Constitution? I fear the very worst; the dragon is not in the cave, the king is not looking for a worthy knight to save the day. The dragon is amidst this nation’s very bastions of power and privilege — He is Barrack Obama.

I DON’T THINK THAT ELEPHANTS CAN FLY

Authored by William Robert Barber

Unless elephants learn to fly or by means other than the Democrats’ pre-recess playbook on ‘the selling of healthcare to the great unwashed’ which heretofore was vested in the now debunked hypothesis that Obama’s hero-protagonist popularity will put down the ‘blue-dogs.’ After all, controlling the conservative wing of the Democratic Party is a Pelosi ‘give-no-quarter’ requirement for the eventual success of her liberal-progressive legislation.

Well, not only were the conservatives within the Democratic Party not swayed to be put down, the draconian persuasion of the liberal-progressive wing back-fired in a manner that not even the great modern day Machiavellian Rahm Emanuel could envision. The great unwashed, with passive outrage, questioned the motivation, legislative integrity, and sensibility of not only a nationalized approach on healthcare; but took the occasion to question all of the federal government’s actions since, and the months leading up to Obama’s inaugural.

There is a prevailing point of view that President Obama’s version of nationalized healthcare will fade into the abyss of compromise. The compromised version will not have any of the material characteristics of the original; nevertheless, Obama will declare victory and move on to other legislative issues in his pursuit of implanting a pro-union expansive government, coupled with higher taxes, all the while, if applicable subordinating governing policy, agencies, departments, and the state school system into a pro-socialist populism that is designed to degenerate and substitute traditional American values for those of the secular progressive.

Of course, it’s not over until the fat lady sings, there is a chance that Obama will not compromise his single-payer vision; presently, the Democrats are huddling. The notables of the liberal progressives are licking their wounds after running right into the people’s double coverage and stubborn disregard. Their liberal progressive offensive might be staggering, but they are far from dead. They know full well that they desperately need a new down field play, or national healthcare will be benched until next season. I expect a surge; a new strategy will appear before September 15, and this time they know the extent of their opposition.

Interestingly, every time the great orator stands to explain healthcare, the proposal’s negatives rise even higher; the populous clearly disagrees with the Obama and Pelosi version of healthcare legislation. For passage, things look bleak, but then, the Democrats are resourceful. Surely they will package a new approach before attempting the political suicide of reconciliation.

If the Democrats insist on a single-payer nationalized approach to healthcare, such an adherence is another example of ideology triumphing over governing sensibility. In the last six months the tax-and-spend Democrats have, by a marathon, out-distanced the spend-what-we-don’t-have Republicans; clearly, the choice for the American voter is the worse of two incompetents. It is obvious, both political parties have strayed off the fairway and into the rough; not sure if they will ever find that little white ball of prudent governess. It seems very unlikely… just as elephants that can fly.

ADVICE OFFERED BY A LEFTIST

Authored by William Robert Barber

At a recent Town Hall gathering Barney Frank delivered a profound communiqué to his constituents: He implicitly suggested that a voter should not trust him or the government. In this specific instance, I am going to take Barney’s advice; after all, he – like Obama – earned a law degree from the bastion of liberal learning, Harvard University. Interestingly, aside from Mr. Frank’s cautionary counsel, both of these attorneys are Democratic elitists. As a consequence, each defiantly believes that on all things material, they know better than their constituents. So let’s all take Barney’s sage advice.

In addition to Mr. Frank’s elitist status he does know how to put on a show; a host extraordinaire, Barney cuts through the audience’s question with vociferous abusive panache. His entertainment is coupled by some pandering, relentless sarcasm, and outright disrespect. Nevertheless, the town hall meeting was great theater; as always, Barney plays the feisty central character in a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta. An operetta wherein he is the producer, writer, cast (naturally all union), and most importantly, he is also the critic.

Now, if Barney Frank was running a for-profit entity instead of an open ended government job, his actions over the last few years would, at the extreme, prompt a criminal investigation or, at the standard, our advisor, Mr. Frank, would be ignominiously fired.

Barney Frank is in his own mind a Paladin legislator; a secular-liberal progressive inspired by his opposition to champion the right of entitlement, regardless of cost or sensibility, from cradle to grave. Considering his self-imposed mission, Barney is, by ideological passion, obligated to realign America as a socialistic state. Barney envisions his role as an enlightened politician amongst a horde of ignorant ignoramuses who do not recognize that he is the way and the light. Withstanding, Barney’s right to form and exploit his political ideology, his years of public service, his belief in his own righteousness; he is in fact, the perfect of the ineffectual, the dysfunctional and chaotic. Barney is a persistent hypocrite, a practitioner of half-truths and disinformation; although a charter member of the Noblesse Oblige, Barney’s political tenure has been purely an ideological endeavor that wholly neglects his obligation to noble service.

Barney is also a choreographer of great political influence. Elected representatives of differing political affiliation have practiced the Barney Frank dance. His dance is a sway timed to the rhythm of disingenuous lyrics. A sampling: That’s not really what I meant, it may sound contradictory but let me assure you, it is not. Yes, I voted for the bill, but not for the reasons expressed, I am against ‘pork’ or paying off special interest via earmarks; but the millions I have added on to the budget (in the dead of night) was vital and critical, I believe in transparency, I am a servant of the people, when I am coached abut town by limo or flown to far off places in a private jet, paid for by taxpayers, I do so in the interest of the people, that’s something that Bush did, and the beat goes on.

Never trust a politician or a government. I say this not in disrespect for either but to insure vigilance; liberty and freedom composite the very ethos of what it means to be an American. Barney’s belief system abates the value of the individual in favor of the collective. His ideology embraces a nation managed by an oligarchy of selected elitist who are politically liberal-progressive, utopian in scope and by means societal, political, and economic dedicated socialist. Barney will trash American traditions of existentialism for his interpretation of the common good; Barney Frank is a dangerous man; regretfully, there are many who drink his brand of poison — one of them being the President of the United States.

OBAMA IS BLEEDING POLITICAL CAPITAL

Authored by William Robert Barber

The Declaration of Independence explicitly stated that: “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,”

After the Revolutionary War the Constitution formalized how the “just powers” of this new government would be implemented. The binding expression within the preamble, “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America,” sets the government’s measure of empowerment.

The originals started their political philosophy with the concept, that man intrinsically had the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and that government was subordinate to the will of the people. The Constitution established that the order of government was “to form a more perfect union;” and within that context government was authorized to promote the general welfare. It is under the heading of general welfare that we the people are wrestling with today’s most contentious issue: Obama Care…

There is a very motivating and politically critical battle raging upon the land: On one side of the contest, under the authority vested in the Constitution noted under “the general welfare,” is the Obama administration. The president is allied with Pelosi’s Democratic insistences on establishing a socialist health-care regime that will undoubtedly expand the size of government, cost the taxpayer’s more than estimated and enable another federal bureaucracy to perform the uniquely government brand of effective inefficiency. This wholly new add-on to the current cost of governing; naturally, comes with unions, the cost of the federal health-care coverage, and the long-tail liability of retirement pensions.

On the other side of the contest, countering “the general welfare” phrase of Obama and Pelosi’s liberals are another phrase of Constitutional empowerment, to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” It does seem blatantly clear that one cannot expand the length and width of government bureaucracy, substantially-plus increase the cost of governing, enhance the federal deficit, and cavalierly invade the heretofore private space of individual citizens; without violating a citizen’s blessing of liberty in the present and into posterity. The conflict is irreconcilable.

In my opinion Obama and company have a much more exalted goal than simply enacting single payer-universal health coverage. I do believe that Obama is a socialist. When compared to the political traditions of this country he is a political radical. He is a politician hell-bent on moving this country’s domestic policy onto the track of governmental dominance. His weaponry includes taxation, regulation, a passive press, a gullible constituency and a gift for sublime rhetorical nonsense.

Across The Drawbridge And Over The Moat

Authored by William Robert Barber

Within the confines of academia, a laboratory, or in a self-created stage wherein one is the writer, producer, and director, a political ideologue, for purposes of controlled delusion, could – with fashionable flair – create a solution for any problem. However, when the confines are discarded and, one venture beyond the moat and into the hinterland, the effect of controlled delusion gives way to the often non-moral, customarily unforeseeable, usually apathetic reality of dealing with the ever changing constancy of terrain and situation.

Once President Obama (the ever onstage campaigner) passes over the moat he can no longer pretty-speech his way through dealing with the harshness of serious issues and problems. Events and the circumstances of such events force one away from the TelePrompTer and into the real world of contesting, wherein the only outcome is victory or death. Obama faces many problems; of course, he believes they were all brought about by that nasty Bush administration – regardless – someday this president must stand and take responsibility for his own self-creating issues and problems.

The closing of Guantanamo is just one such problem; there are many more. Sometime soon the music will stop and the dancing will end and our president, along with his cadre of helpers, must finally find a chair and make a real-world decision on Guantanamo.

I do find the underlying philosophy of the Obama liberals interestingly delusional; they speak of an America of vintage moral standards – moral standard – that I am totally unfamiliar with. I really do not know where to start but is it not true that we Americans decimated the Indian indigenous to this land before our concept of Manifest Destiny became fact? Did we not purchase the Louisiana territory from France, as well as Alaska from Russia, before congress voted to do so? Did we not take Texas, California, and New Mexico and invaded Mexico under the most egregious of causes? Did this country not illegally lock up and confiscate the assets of Japanese Americans during WWII? Did we not fire-bomb Dresden and drop the atomic bomb on two Japanese cities, overtly killing thousands of innocent civilians? Of course I could go on… but I do wonder where Obama and company finds this moral standard exceptional of America — must be from a comic book.

As to America’s historical behavior — all the world’s historical reference, regardless of country, will document the unspeakable violent actions of humankind’s struggle with their own. In my assessment of America’s history, I conclude that moral standards are a nicety, a nicety that lags behind the one all-important-tangible. A tangible that is an a priori to America’s survival – that irreplaceable tangible being power. America must be and forever maintain a status of the most powerful nation on earth. From such power-moral standards, the Obama interruption of moral authority is allowed to exist.

When Obama and his leftist liberal minions speak of America’s moral authority and that such authority is the strongest of America’s currency – in the world, no less – I do wonder what planet these Obama minions live on. Certainly, it cannot be earth!

The evidence of their reasoning is registered in such declarations as: To paraphrase, enhanced interrogations not only do not work; such undermine the rule of law. They alienate us in the world and serve as a recruiting tool for terrorists and increase the will of our enemies to fight us, while decreasing the will of others to work with us. Does any person charged with the obligation of and to reasonable deduction actually believe that liberal leftist inspired stream of rhetorical nonsense?

I would ask Obama and his minions to render the empirical-plain-fact-evidence of these declarations. Does any one American, charged with the protection of his or her fellow citizens, actually believe that it is better to suffer the loss of thousands of American lives instead of attempting enhanced interrogation to solicit, cajole or (by any means) force a terrorist to spew out where the nuclear, biological, or radiological bomb has been placed? What moral standard does Obama cling to when, because water boarding or any and all means was not tried, hundreds of thousands of Americans have been killed?

The Obama disciples believe that reason and persuasion will eventually change a terrorist from acting like a terrorist; after all, America will apologize, they will understand the righteousness of our ‘change of conviction’, and stop slitting throats, killing innocents in market squares, planting bombs, and hatching plots against general populations, even if the population is of their own faith or tradition. This change of behavior will become a reality as soon as Pelosi becomes a Republican and hell freezes over.

The Obama society of contrarian silliness cannot (maybe do not want to) even stop the criminal breaches of Acorn, much less the actions of a determined terrorist. Obama has left his classroom and crossed over the moat — and reality is a bitch.

“I Did Not Have Sex With That Woman.”

Authored by William Robert Barber

Nancy Pelosi has overtly lied to the American people. She said she was not briefed by the CIA as to the “water boarding” of terrorists when indeed she was. The lie is not reconcilable; Pelosi lied and she has nowhere to hide.

But then, the Democrats are in power; therefore, she will “skate”. Pelosi is the perfect example of the electorate’s toleration of outright dishonesty as long as it is derived from a liberal politician.

Power is a corruptive. The natural and singular sway of political power is inevitably directed to the only result possible — corruption. Power is the black hole of politics. The very act of politicking is a presentation by means less than truthful or not so obviously false. A good politician, in our political culture, is one who manages to achieve stated objectives while acting to do so within statutory rules and regulations.

For politicians, ethics as understood and taught within institutions, as well as even the pretense of socially accepted standards of morality, are blasé. The tenets of a politician’s contextual are littered with lying (as long as such lying is not under oath), statements of exaggeration or disinformation (as long as the contrary is not voice or video recorded), scurrilous accusations, negative innuendos, and outright ruthless behavior which fits perfectly within the electorates acceptance of a politician’s prerogative.

Politicians have the aid and assist of their staff of attorneys and well-placed individuals to either cover up their corruptive actions or redirect attention away from such actions. Of course the complicity required for a politician to get away with all of the nonsense is an excellent instance of how power is so corruptive, it infects the politician’s family, friends, staff, and even the media.

Why we citizens accept such unethical, immoral, and unjust behavior is beyond my comprehension. Maybe we have grown accustomed to the cabal of elected officials as the unavoidable status quo, and that striving for a difference is beyond our reach?

The Speaker of the House lied; blatantly and forth rightfully she lied to the American people. Now — what are we going to do about it?

Panem et Circenses

Authored by William Robert Barber

Many years ago, as a child, I believed. My belief was faithful and true; it encompassed the words of the Sisters of Star of the Sea, the few priests that spoke to me before mass or in confession. I also believed in policemen, doctors, most adults, and everything in print; this belief included a profound trust in my government.

When I joined the Marine Corps and was subsequently sent to Vietnam, of course being a Marine if I was ordered to parachute into Hanoi I would obey. However, at the time I did believe that my president and congress knew what they were doing and that they would certainly not sacrifice American blood unless absolutely necessary. I trusted that no commitment of martial forces would be engaged without the determined will of obtaining ultimate victory. After all, what kind of elected official would commit the nation’s youth to combat – another word for death and physical dismemberment – without clearly understanding the meaning and consequence of such commitment?

As I grew up I found that I could no longer believe in words. I find no surety in the words of elected officials nor do I have an assured believe in a person’s competency solely founded on their position of authority. I have learned to be suspicious of all the pretentious manifestations that effectually accompany those in elected office, private enterprise, and religious institutions. Over the years experience has proven to me time after time that one should be extremely wary of attorneys in general and I give no credibility to accountants, certified or not. I have no confidence in congressional competence, especially knowing a large majority of congress members being attorneys. As to college degrees and those possessing same, the passing of exams imposed by colleges, Ivy League or not, no longer impresses me as a gauntlet or stress test for leadership. Indeed, recent experience has me doubting that the elected, appointed, and even the employees of the Republican Party support the ideological virtues of a conservative governing philosophy – and they all (or most of them) attended or graduated from prestigious educational institutions.

I am convinced that the first cause of the elected and the wannabe elected is the retention / acquisition of power. This lust for power by the elected and the wannabe elected is an overriding ethical contradiction. The elected swear a dual fidelity: initially to the nation’s constitution, the other to servicing the interest of the people. Withstanding their oath of allegiance, the only known antidote for this lust of power is term limits; the longer a politician stays in power the more susceptible the office and office holder are to corruptive practice.

Nevertheless, term limits – even when voted into law – is ignored (i.e. Mayor of NYC) or amended to the benefit of the incumbents. The same attitude is taken by some of the elected when it comes to the new buzzword ‘Transparency’: The elect either totally ignore the promise of transparency or purposefully hide the documents of interest within their web site so to disguise ready availability.

I believe that this nation’s most recent former president, along with the last two republican speakers of the house, as well as incompetent senate leadership created the demise of believability and viability in the Republican Party.

This loss of believability and viability started during Bush’s first term wherein the administration’s spending on off-budget earmarks, their continuum of doling out the people’s currency violated the ideals of conservative governing. The Republicans controlled congress, inhaled the corruptive elixir of power, and wandered into the hinterland of self-dilution. It was this behavior, coupled with particularly Bush’s inability to communicate the Republican brand of governing ideology to the American people or to aggressively counter an effective response to the Democratic Party’s vicious and  often scurrilous accusations that led to the outcome of the last two elections, leaving the Republicans defeated.

The Democratic Party’s carefully orchestrated campaign of misinformation, disinformation, and outright distortion prompted and implemented by leftist-liberal politicians of rank, particularly the personal assaults on the president’s virtue and character, caused a continuum of disbelieve and disenchantment with everything Bush-related.

In addition, the president’s inability to astutely discern the exactness of the economic crisis caused confusion, disappointment, and a loss of fidelity for Bush and his political party. The president lacked the wherewithal to explain the banking/Wall Street crisis; enunciating the need for congress to appropriate billions was his only response while at that time his immediate critical imperative should have been to put in plain words - with meaningful, comprehensible specificity - the measure of the economic calamity. Instead, he fronted his Secretary of the Treasury who gave a statement as to the disbursement of the appropriated funds  - only to do something entirely different.

Although the president and his party do host a fine lunch and dinner, I would not bet a ham sandwich on anything they say. The party’s lack of credibility, a poor performance by McCain (the moderate), Bush’s inability to comprehend the gravity of the political consequences of his policies – all such injections of Republican stupid gave life to the political left-of-liberal Obama-rise within the Democratic Party.

Naturally I have serious believability issues with the current administration; I am perplexed as to the how and why any elected official could endorse the political, economic, financial, and foreign policies of this president. The answer is possibly as simple as it is blatant: The secular socialist wing of the Democratic Party has taken control of America; their interest is plain: consolidate, enforce, and enlarge the responsibilities of government by financing larger governmental obligations.

Panem et circenses – and the people will vote, once more, in favor of the giver…

Our Government’s Contagious Virus

Bill Barber

A step beyond Kool-Aid

Authored by William Robert Barber

For the last four months, leaders of the federal government have been infected by a deadly contagious virus; this strain of virus infects the analysis sector of an elected representative’s brain.  The most noted symptom of this malaise is a dysfunction of the mind wherein, the infected person acts as if dumbfounded. Apparently, the process of effectual thinking is what this virus affects.  The virus eats these particular brain cells until the heretofore sensible, logical, and prudent elected representative, once infected, is now rendered foolish, illogical, reckless, and irrational.

The most recent actions of our elected representatives have all the initial characteristics of the virus.  Fits of confusion, befuddlement, and panic are notable signs.   How could the Bush administration, lead by treasury secretary Paulson and a more than willing Democratic-Republican congress, put billions of taxpayer monies at risk without sufficient due diligence?  And yet they did exactly that, surprisingly without too much resistance from the people, press, or leaders of the House or Senate.  Clearly, the virus is widespread.

Obama has followed the Bush tradition with a stimulus bill full of giveaways; the bill has passed in record time without anyone reading the contents, much less discussing or debating its merits.  Now this kind of conduct is an explicit symptom of the virus.

During the last election the democrats loved the concept of an economic calamity; the story fit perfectly into their electoral campaign’s agenda.  The republican candidate was lost in never-never land, therein he never missed an opportunity to misdiagnose the realities of the economic indicators nor the electorate’s concerns.

I am beginning to believe that this virus is fatal.  The Obama faithful insist on following the economic ideology of spending more of the people’s money on health-care, education, public works, and the new energy alternative.  Keep in mind that so far no specifics, only a panoramic descriptive of how wonderful the world will be once this new economy is in place, have been provided.

In time, I assume the virus will have eaten all the brain cells, causing our elected representatives to be diagnosed brain-dead.  Well, at least by the time this happens the behavior will be even more obvious:  The representatives will pass critical legislation without even reading the contents, all the while in lock-step, cheering on their Obama.  If this should happen, well, then the virus has completed its function and nothing can be done for the people that the infected represented.