AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

Another chapter in the book of "because okie says so."

You aren't claiming to "not know who Obama is." On the contrary, you claim to know exactly who he is and you litter up the forum with your non-fact brand of rhetoric.

I feel very comfortable with who Obama is, and I've listen and read plenty to come to my conclusion. Your not interested in finding out Obama is just another family man who worked hard to get an education and has a strong sense of civil responsibility, you are only interested in designing an image of Obama that you or someone else will fear.

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Obama: "By the end of the week, he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in Kindergarten."

One problem for the GOP might be that while in a one-party system like Vietnam or China the experience of being purged leads to a period of ideological reflection, in a two-party system like the US many of those purged will do what Webb did: defect to the opposition, depriving the Party of an opportunity for rethinking its ideas.

After 60 yrs, justice is now. In '48 when Truman, though facing sweeping defeat, decreed a robust civil rights plank for the Dem platform and Humphrey intoned that we must, in Lincoln's words, "do the right, as God has given us to know the right," the racists decamped. A body formerly known as the Party of Lincoln gave them succor, crafted a cynical "southern strategy," and perennially prevailed.

This unholy union has now corroded into a mash-up of Old Dixie, prairie gunslingers, anti-tax fetishists, end times Rapturists, militiamen and Millenarians, jingoists and misanthropes, survivalists and cranks, and the odd secessionist witch doctor. Soon there will be a reckoning between the cerebral cons (who've been long content to pal up with vermin) and the wingnut residuum that has found its avatar in Bible Spice.

Meanwhile, the Dems have a nation to rebuild. Pretty that this came to pass through the strivings of an unassuming black American, a legacy of what Truman, Humphrey, and numberless others went to their political graves for. Thanks, God, you’re ok after all.

Former Reagan adviser endorses Obama
Posted: 01:35 PM ET

From CNN's Adam Levy

(CNN) " Former Reagan chief of staff Ken Duberstein told CNN's Fareed Zakaria this week he intends to vote for Democrat Barack Obama on Tuesday.

Top GOP-ers: It’s Bush and Rove’s fault
By CRAIG SHIRLEY & TONY FABRIZIO | 10/31/08 1:56 PM EDT Text Size:

In an Ideas piece, two prominent conservatives say Bush and Rove have wrecked the GOP.”

Last Monday, former Bush White House aide Peter Wehner made a startling statement in an op-ed in The Washington Post. He said that while “the GOP is in bad shape, conservatism is not.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. Conservatism has been badly damaged by Wehner’s former bosses, President Bush and Karl Rove, and others who never understood our movement, who only saw it as a tool to serve the political needs of this administration, never as a framework for governance.

Obama: "By the end of the week, he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in Kindergarten."

You wish Young Jedi.

Who am I bargaining with?

The New Order -- of which you no doubt consider yourself a member?

Please keep counting your chickens before they hatch.

But let’s be frank. Something new is happening in America. It is the imminent arrival of a new liberal moment. History happens, it makes its turns, you hold on for dear life. Life moves.

Esquire, in its first endorsement in seventy-five years, echoes Garry Wills. Yes, something profound is at stake on Tuesday:

Quote:

More than any other recent election, we are voting this year not merely for a president but to overthrow two governments. The one we can see is the one in which constitutional order has been defaced, the national spirit degraded, and the country unrecognizable because so much of the best of itself has been sold off or frittered away. The other one is the far more insidious one, a doppelgänger nation of black prisons, shredded memos, and secret justifications for even more secret crimes. Moreover, the current administration has worked hard not only to immunize itself from the political and legal consequences of the government we can see, but it has also worked within the one we cannot see in order to perpetuate itself...

Quote:

Obama: "By the end of the week, he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in Kindergarten."

No, for forcing the other kids to.

If Obama and his supporters want to share their toys no one will stop them.

President Obama and his family will have all of their toys provided by the government and no one will be asking them to share them.

Ex-president Obama (If he is like every other president before him) will either leave the White House a very wealthy man or become very wealthy in short order. He'll have plenty of toys to spare.

Most of his followers tell us they are more than willing to share their toys, while not acknowledging that Obama has promised them he will not ask them to.

Much is made of the fact that Warren Buffet is willing to pay more in taxes.

Buffet could give up 99% of his toys and he would still have $62 million worth, but is he willing to go that far?

Redistributing the wealth of people who make between $250,000 and $3 million a year, if sustained, will kill, not just hurt, the economy.

These people are already paying a damned lot of taxes, and if they are further bled, at some point they will come to the conclusion that it is not worth working 70 to 80 hour weeks, worrying about the families whose livelihoods depend on them, and having 50% of the population view them as parasites.

Some of my friends and associates have told me that they are seriously considering moving their businesses out of the US, greatly shrinking them, or liquidating them altogether.

You can argue that they are selfish toads that America is better of without, but I know they are not, and, in any case, the people who depend upon them for a living won't think so.

There is a notion among Obama supporters that the "rich" are not contributing their "fair share."

Obviously this depends upon what is your definition of "fair."

If you believe that extra-ordinary talent, excellence, hard work, and willingness to assume risk are not worth extra-ordinary rewards then you are not likely to believe they can ever pay their fair share.

There is also a notion among Obama supporters that all of our problems can be solved if the government has enough money to spend.

So if we need to give the government (The State) more money to solve all of our problems then what better source than the "rich?"

Here's the dilemma

If you don't compel entrepreneurs to remain, they will eventually leave.

If you compel them to remain (and take their money) they will no longer create wealth.

It has been shown time and time again that throwing money at problems doesn't solve them.

We already have the strongest economy in the world, and the only ones that have any chance of overtaking ours (China and India) are capitalist.

And yes Cyclo jealously sucks. Something that you, above many, should learn to appreciate.

Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for President Bush, says he is not looking forward to the Republican post-election conversation.

"Usually, a loss results in a circular firing squad of recrimination and anger " not a healthy discussion of the directions of the future," Gerson says. "And the reality is that we're already beginning to see that right now."