Posted on 12/04/2010 5:01:34 AM PST by radioone
In fifty years I have little doubt that we will regard the administration of Barack Obama as the presidency that saved America. No, not in the sense that Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, and all the other media John the Baptists foretold as they proclaimed the coming of our political messiah just over two years ago. Rather, the history of our time will show that it was the radical nature of Obama's dogged devotion to a liberal progressive philosophy far out of the American mainstream that jolted awake a generation of apathetic and passive citizens just in time to save the republic.
Though that apathy has always been inexcusable, it was at least understandable. Our politics had become more theater than substance. In fact, voters reasonably began to view their choices at the ballot box as something akin to picking between airline food and hospital food: bland, insipid, uninspiring.
For all their posturing and crowing, the two parties had largely become mere reflections of one another. Seriously, how different was Bill Clinton's "triangulation" and George W. Bush's "compassionate conservatism?" Candidates of either party who showed convictions contrary to the Washington establishment and challenged that establishment's control were labeled radical, and every attempt was made to marginalize them.
But Barack Obama changed all of that. For the last two years, the President has unleashed the most aggressively left-wing agenda he could muster. When the electorate began a backlash against his revolutionary designs at town halls and tea parties, he ignored them. And when they rejected his ideology by throwing his party out of power by historic proportions in the midterm elections, he pretended not to notice, or that he was misunderstood.
All this makes little sense to those attempting to view Obama's presidency through the conventional prism of political leadership. But Obama is not a conventional politician. He is a radical ideologue. Obama is not a leader. He is a bitter partisan. And as odd as it sounds, that is exactly what this country needed.
It has been generations since Americans have been exposed to a more vivid depiction of the significant differences between the left's and the right's views of this country and its future. The delineation between conservative and liberal had grown hopelessly blurred to a majority of citizens. But Obama and his leftist cabal have been successful not only in demonstrating the frightening vision progressive liberals have of making America into a European-style socialist state, but they have also managed to animate a vast conservative majority that has laid painfully dormant since the mid 1980s.
The distinction is glaring, and even for those who normally avoid politics, impossible to miss.
While Americans watch conservative Republicans like Eric Cantor explain that raising taxes on any citizens in the midst of a recession (particularly those who are being relied upon to invest and expand businesses to create jobs) is foolish, they see President Obama proclaim that "we can't afford" not to raise taxes on a group of citizens he determines are too wealthy.
Besides the glaring proof this offers of the left's obsession with using divisive class warfare to gain power, it also reveals a notable difference in philosophy. While conservatives like Cantor believe money belongs first to the citizen and is confiscated by government, leftists like Obama believe money belongs first to the government. That government then lets select citizens keep some of it...if and only if government "can afford" to be so generous.
Further, when Americans open their newspapers, they are greeted with the wise counsel of Obamabots like Tom Friedman and Paul Krugman. Friedman's recent piece in the New York Times called the Tea Party movement "narrow and uninspired" while touting that, "We need to raise gasoline and carbon taxes to discourage their use and drive the creation of a new clean energy industry." Krugman, meanwhile, laments that the waste of nearly one trillion taxpayer dollars on a government spending bill meant to stimulate a still stagnant economy wasn't enough, and should be followed up with an even bigger second stimulus.
Everywhere they turn, Americans see that the left is offering higher taxes, less freedom, more debt and regulation. They simultaneously see the right offering lower taxes, freer markets and fiscal sanity.
Voters' first opportunity to choose between those two visions occurred in the 2010 midterms. Their preference was unmistakable -- to everyone, that is, except Barack Obama. His recent pronouncement that, "It would be unwise to assume [the voters] prefer one way of thinking over another," reconfirmed that the president and his cohorts have no desire whatsoever to alter course, and instead will spend the next two years butting heads with the newly elected conservative majority. This conflict is sure to make the distinction between the left and the right all the more clear to an engaged American public.
And with a 2012 election cycle that already sees Democrats poised to face even more devastating Congressional losses (they are defending far more Senate seats than Republicans, and could lose upward of 30 House seats due to redistricting), Obama's persistent, unapologetic left-wing crusade is shaping up to be the political equivalent to Pickett's Charge.
In the end, the era of Obama will do more damage to the progressive left than any Republican presidency could have ever done. For that, posterity will owe him a debt of gratitude.
in many ways this is so true, that is if not too late.
Great article!
Reagan.
America needs more saving and desperately needs more Reagans. Palin looks closer than anyone I see on the horizon.
wishful thinking
Thanks for this thread!
Peter Heck is a local radio personality that I listen to daily.
High School teacher, VERY Pro-LIfe, lecturer, TEA Party speaker, and takes his religion quite seriously.
He’s young, but he’s getting better and better every day, and has had several pieces accepted by American Thinker recently.
A linky-dink to his website, if anyone is so inclined to visit...
http://www.peterheck.com/peterheck/main
Thanks for this thread!
Peter Heck is a local radio personality that I listen to daily.
High School teacher, VERY Pro-LIfe, lecturer, TEA Party speaker, and takes his religion quite seriously.
He’s young, but he’s getting better and better every day, and has had several pieces accepted by American Thinker recently.
A linky-dink to his website, if anyone is so inclined to visit...
http://www.peterheck.com/peterheck/main
Thanks for this thread!
Peter Heck is a local radio personality that I listen to daily.
High School teacher, VERY Pro-LIfe, lecturer, TEA Party speaker, and takes his religion quite seriously.
He’s young, but he’s getting better and better every day, and has had several pieces accepted by American Thinker recently.
A linky-dink to his website, if anyone is so inclined to visit...
http://www.peterheck.com/peterheck/main
worth repeating, I guess.
Not long ago H Clinton said “if it moves tax it” I suspect a lot of people gave some thought to that way of thinking and decided it wasn’t what they wanted out of govt
Bingo! We actually owe Zero a HUGH debt of gratitude. Series.
Interesting article. I have one complaint, however. The author falls into the trap of reciting the Left’s language deception strategy by using the phrase “liberal progressive philosophy”. This is cynical codespeak used by the Left when they wish to refer to their socialist agenda in public. If we are ever going to break the Left’s grip on the national political discourse, it is important to refuse to accept such camouflaging leftwing phraseology and speak plainly.
And with a 2012 election cycle that already sees Democrats poised to face even more devastating Congressional losses (they are defending far more Senate seats than Republicans, and could lose upward of 30 House seats due to redistricting), Obama’s persistent, unapologetic left-wing crusade is shaping up to be the political equivalent to Pickett’s Charge.
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Lord, let it be so!
He overlooks the impact of the Foreign effect of our example. There now are Tea Party Movements in England, Israel, Australia and other countries.
Another overlooked element is the connection of citizens in the street telling the “central government” NO on Globalism and Dictatorships. Recent Examples: Iran, Honduras and our Tea Party gatherings. We are in good company.
bump
Gotta kill them there RINOS first.
I disagree. If Margaret Thatcher’s “ratchet effect” is true, and observation seems to confirm that it is, the right never recovers all the ground lost to the left when they hold power. Let’s see if CommieCare actually gets repealed. None of of the left’s other government expansions ever have been.
It may be good for the Republican party as far as winning the next election goes, but that’s a shallow and short-term goal for conservatives.
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