Taking our medicine
Nice way to give up the ship. I guess rolling over and playing dead is one way to do it. I’d rather have a part in what’s happening then not. Maybe its just me, but I don’t give up so easy.
NY-David
It’s not about rolling over and playing dead. It’s about taking our medicine as a country. Between conservatives not voting, the unpopularity of many members of the last administration, and the personality cult that developed around Obama, the nation… WE… handed over the keys to the government completely to a single party. We found pretty much the only way to circumvent the checks and balances of the republic.
Now it’s time to reap the whirlwind.
It’s the political equivalent of what convinced some of my friends to quit smoking as they barely started… their father caught them and made them smoke the whole pack. “You want to smoke? Smoke ‘em all!”
“You want hopey-change? Take ALL of it!”
The hopey-change cannot be prevented, or potentially even blunted. Pelosi and company will have their way with America… and it is well under way. All the talk of bipartisanship is bullshit. They don’t need Republican participation or agreement, nor have they made more than cursory shows of seeking input from the other side of the aisle. There will be no restraint shown. There really hasn’t been to this point. There’s the “watch this hand… pay no attention to the vote this week on the other issue…” going on for months now. Obama announces that there is an urgency to do something and it is rammed through Congress post haste.
And there is not a thing that conservatives can do about it.
Cap and Trade has now passed the House. It is a shoe-in to pass the Senate. It is coming, and it is going to hurt. It is a tax on everyone, and it cannot but hurt everyone. Everyone got caught up in the Great Illusion of 2008. The left and center got caught up in the hopey-change and the right got caught being persnickety and then by the illusion of futility. Millions failed to vote as a result. Millions in the center decided to “try something new.”
I had a co-worker, Clint, whose personal views are more conservative than not. He is not a politically committed individual. McCain didn’t set his soul on fire, and he had become seduced by the concept that we somehow needed “change.” What kind of change was never solidified in his mind. He had become convinced that some vague change was needed, because an undefined sense of dissatisfaction had been instilled in him.
He couldn’t explain why, or what was so wrong.
He voted for Obama. As he explained, “I just wanted to see what he would do. It couldn’t be that bad, right?”
Right. Reap the whirlwind, Clint.
Clint’s not so happy now. He’s worried about how such things as Cap and Trade are going to affect his household budget. It can’t be good. He’s about to be taxed on his energy usage… his “carbon footprint.” He has no real idea of how this is going to affect him. He just wondered what Obama was going to do. He wonders how the health care “reform” is going to change his family’s health care situation.
It would be one thing if we had a balanced legislature, one that required compromise. We don’t. It would be one thing if it were just an administration. That’s not the extent of it. Everyone got suckered like a massive Ponzi Scheme and now it’s time to reap the whirlwind.
You’re going to reap it sooner or later. The best hope for this country to wake up with a hopey-change hangover in 2010 prior to the next series of Congressional elections is to forget about trying to blunt the whirlwind.
Liberalism is hopelessly idealistic. It has at its root the idea that government is somehow the higher power that can make it all okay. Those on the left cannot be disabused of this, but those in the center who have been seduced have only been temporarily seduced. Once they feel the pain of the increased burden, they will hate it. They just can’t see it coming.
Many are in the center because they basically have no ideology, no values that they can put a finger on that drives their political decisions. They call themselves “independents,” because that sounds reasonable, and many do not make up their minds until the last minute. They do not truly listen to the proposals of a particular candidate, only the impressions they feel. Obama is great about the impressions, and the Democratic Party is great about using simplistic one-liners. “It’s the economy, stupid” was a great example. No matter that it took the Democrats losing Congress in ’94 to moderate the liberalism of Clinton. It’s what saved us from going through all of this fifteen years ago.
But we love to flirt with the idealistic hopey-change. We want to eradicate poverty and take care of everyone. We hate the idea of human suffering, and we wish fervently for “someone” to make it all go away. The government making all human suffering disappear sounds like a great idea. Let’s make life fair through new governmental organizations.
We begin to buy into such blatant lies as, “Health care is a right.”
Well, then, so is food and housing. Doctors spend eight years in school, running up debts and living an austere life for the promise of a life spent in worthwhile causes and with great rewards. Now we announce, as a country, that because of their vocation, the fruits of their labors are the rightful property of the masses. This announcement brings with it a fundamental shift in our reality. A doctor’s time and skills are no longer something that we must provide to ourselves and our families, but something that belongs to us rightly… now we just have to figure out how to take it from the doctors. No matter what anyone says about it not going far, it cannot help but go through to its reasonable conclusion, because of the fundamental shift in ownership. The doctor no longer has the right to sell his service, because it is rightfully ours/. We will let the doctor retain the illusion of selling his services, but inevitably we will have to control it, because it is ours. We took ownership of it when we determined that health care is a right.
Which I failed to note in the Constitution, by the way. Liberals claim that it falls under the “right to life” part of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” in the Declaration of Independence, and that it falls under the “Provide for the general welfare” part of the responsibilities of government in the Constitution. I vehemently disagree with those assertions.
I have been out-voted. Some of those votes were from committed leftists, and many were from the center who has no idea what kind of Pandora’s box they have opened… and the conservatives who failed to vote at all. Let them feel it. Let them taste the government they have tacitly asked for. Let them have it.
I am convinced that most of us won’t like it. I know that I won’t. I don’t want to be part of a beehive. I do not admire the ants as a model for human society. I do not yearn for the government to solve all of my problems and to make life fair. I do not view the government as a beneficent Higher Power. Once they taste what they have sown, they won’t like it, either. It is the best chance that in 2010 Congress will be taken away from the Pelosians and some semblance of balance will be restored. The more we delay the inevitable, the greater the chances that by 2010 we won’t be suffering enough. It’s not about giving up the ship. It’s about realism. It’s about letting people taste what they have asked for. Like Clint, I don’t think that they really understand what they have done.
Posted on June 27th, 2009 by Andy Wahl
Filed under: Congressional branch, Energy Policy, Executive Branch
The politicians don’t even read the bills before they pass them, it’s ridiculous, it’s greedy, it’s wrong. Politicians don’t care what they pass because IT DOESN’T AFFECT THEM!!!! They don’t pay their own electricity, they get top of the line healthcare, they get a pension big enough to make most Americans jealous. So it is us, the people they “supposedly” work for that get the shaft! Good going America…you screwed the pooch letting OB1 into office. You NEVER, NEVER, EVER give one party carte blanche over the country. Enjoy what you have sown, and expect to get TOLD by those who were smart enough NOT to vote for the hype.
I voted for the best dog in the hunt, which isn’t saying much. Your theme of take your medicine or smoke the whole pack doesn’t cut it for me. My theme is basically to muddle through and make the best of it. If McCain had won, I would be doing this as well.
We need major changes in our health care system. there is no cheap alternative, especially for someone not working, or working part time.
We need to change our energy policy. During hurricaines Katrina and Rita, a lot of our refining facilities were taken offline. This caused more of the price increases then crude availability. Even if we attempt the “drill now” philosphophy, the refining infrastrucrture is still just as vulnerabile. If you can’t handle the words “Global Warming”, perhps “energy security might strike your fancy. Still a problem with fossil fuel consumption.
So take your pick. You may decide to put your head in the sand and wait for the next election. I choose to muddle through, throw it to the wall and see what sticks. I’ll let you know how it goes.
NY-David
Filling Americans minds with the falsehoods of global warming is not helping, it is bogus, thousands of scientists have come out against it. Drill here drill now is not a quick fix, but we have known since Carter was in office that we needed our own oil, and we have screwed the pooch since. Other alternatives, fine, as long as you use nuclear too, and you drill here and now.
The only people who stand to gain from theis cap and trade hoopla are the democratic morons. Pelosi has 50k-100k tied up in green investments. Markey has 51k-115k tied up in solar energy, which he would gain millions on if the bill passes. Gore has much of his money tied up in a company that would offer software for companies to track their carbon footprint. It’s easy for slow Al to say he will give up his paycheck when he gets 200k per speaking gig, and would stand to gain billions over the cap and trade investments.
OB1 is the absolute worst POTUS we have ever had. He is pushing for bills to pass that haven’t even been read, he is a liar, and he is weak. You find that attractive in a leader, so be it…I prefer to be on the side of someone who would have cut the spending off, and audited the politicians spendy bs. This country is going downhill, and the proof is in the pudding. You have no control, the government isn’t listening to you any more than they are listening to republicans. You keep on going with the flow, the only thing that will stick is the bs they sell.
Wow. Now I know how the party of “no” got its name. Perhaps you put your money under a matress. I choose to put it into something people could use. Its how capitalism works. Some of them are solar-related and horror among horrors, we may make a few dollars along the way. I’d like to know what investment Markey has $100k in that will make him millions. I want in!!
As for reading legislation, are you just becoming aware that they should be read and that not reading it isn’t an excuse? This has always been the case and you and I can hold them to it. Much better then putting one’s head in the sand and waiting a few years, in my mind.
NY-David