Posted on 01/30/2007 11:48:24 AM PST by presidio9
After the State Of The Union speech a few days ago, a muttering chorus of media critics told us endlessly that Bush was irrelevant, a loser, out of touch, even pitiful. NPR actually had Merle Haggard, the Okie from Muskogee, claim that the state of the nation had never been worse. And suddenly it hit me. The media is staging a coup against Mr. Bush, just the way they did against LBJ and Nixon and tried to do against Reagan. They cannot impeach Bush because only Congress can do that. But the media is doing what it can to basically oust Mr. Bush while still leaving him lifting weights in the White House. Look, Merle Haggard is a great singer. But he knows nothing of what's up in America right now.
The truth is that we are in a huge economic boom. We are coming off a mammoth real estate explosion that put the most Americans in history in their own homes. We have totally full employment. After decades of stagnation, real wages are rising. The nation is wealthier than it has ever been (although this is very unevenly distributed). Most important of all, there has not been one major or even minor successful terrorist incident against the U.S. homeland in over five years. Bush may not have done it by himself, but he had something to do with it.
True, we are mired in a war without end, costing us far too many great young and old Americans and too many limbs and wrecked families and vastly too much money. But we all know we're getting out soon.
It was a huge mistake, but I'd like to see a President who did not make immense mistakes. What about Vietnam? What about Korea?
True, the rich often get away with murder in the executive suite. Bush is partly to blame, but all politicians cater to the rich. What America's high degree thieves suck out of the system is nauseating and I fight it constantly, but that's life.
Let's be honest. Let's admit that Bush has presided over a lot of success in addition to some serious failures.
But no one elected the media to anything. In the TV studios and newsrooms, there is a lynch mob at work. Let's see it for what it is. Mr. Bush is the only President we have, and, with all his faults, I trust him a lot more than I trust the unelected princes and princesses of the newsroom.
Wrong tense....The media HAS BEEN STAGING a coup albeit a failed one for the last 6 years.
Every time he talked about the WOT or Iraq he has always stated this. Probably so much that many ignored it as a mere cliche when it wasn't meant as such.
"Haggard went Hollywood long ago. Sadly.
And he was never from Muskogee."
***
Ah, but does he "take a lotta pride in who he is"?
Redding?
There, fixed it for you. These United States were not defending the borders of this nation in Korea or Vietnam. The same as Iraq. Spreading democracy is not nor was it ever intended to be the business of this nation.
Then where would we have fought the terrorist if we left in 03?
"This paragraph is very troubling coming from Ben Stein."
It's quickly becoming conventional wisdom.
We've been rolled
This is the typical liberal roll technique " I think we can all agree that..." Unfortunately, Ben has been rolled. When you agree with that opening premise you lost the debate before it began.
Merle's probably been smoking Willie's bus exhaust.
Or willie's little smokie.
a one party media lynch mob
I have to disagree with the premise (that Ben Stein is a reliable conservative)if not with your conclusion. He's always been wary of supply side "ideology" and I suspect much of that wariness boils down to Stein's zero-sum vision of the world, shared by the likes of James Webb and John Edwards, rather than his own considerable economic knowledge.
He's also very eloquent, and that along with the fact that he (Stein) is not a "reliable conservative" is why CBS features him as regular contributer alongside Nancy Giles on "Sunday Morning". One hundred and eighty degrees from solidly conservative, Stein is in fact a mushy moderate who (for example) sees the military primarily as an economically victimized special interest group rather than as heroes who have volunteered; conversely, he sees the rich in America, including himself, as parasites who "don't deserve" the Bush tax cuts. Ben Stein is a conservative on some issues (if a self-loathing one), no doubt--- far from a reliable one.
Ben Stein is saying the Iraq war is a "huge mistake" (and other "politically correct" nonsense) because he wants to continue receiving income from publishing his tripe. He's just another media prostitute. Freeing 25 million people in Iraq (plus another 25 million in Afghanistan) was not a "mistake". Going after the terrorists where they live was not a "mistake". Removing Saddam Hussein from his dictatorship and hanging him was not a "mistake". The current efforts of our troops, to defeat terrorism, is not a "mistake". If it were up to the media and Democrats, SH would still be in power commiting mass murder and torture, and providing training grounds and weapons for terrorists. If it were up to the media and the Democrats, the USSR and the Cold War (mutually assured nuclear destruction) would still exist. If it were up to the media and Democrats, the United States would lose the war on terrorism and wait for the next 9/11, or several of them. Just one more 9/11 would put the country in an economic recession from which it would not recover for years. Just one nuclear device or biological weapon in NYC might kill hundreds of thousands of Americans and contaminate our largest city, or cities. Writer-Prostitute Ben Stein, the media prostitutes in general, and the Democrat-Socialist Party are out of touch with reality.
You're entitled to your opinion. Sitting around doing nothing while the neighborhood deteriorates around you never was and never will be a smart strategy.
Good hyperbole. Has nothing to do with the argument but that's about all you have isn't it?
Today is FDR's 125th birthday. I doubt they are honoring his memory in Warsaw.
Why? For stating the obvious? I voted for Dubya 4 (count 'em, 4 times), and had I not already been retired would have given my right arm to be in one of those tanks roaring towards Baghdad.
But guess what?
We screwed it up. And now its too late to 'fix' it. Had we left Saddam in place, we could have gone lighter with bombing and special ops against al Quaeda elsewhere.
Now we've wound up destabilizing the entire area and strenthened Iran's hand - do you really think they are afraid that we'll start another war because of their nuke program? They sure don't act like it, do they? Because they know that America has run out of will during its segue into Iraq.
Now, are the Iraqis better off today? (Ask me if I care.) Economically, for sure. Do they feel safer? Who the hell knows? Would you feel safe with two dozen different sectarian militias running around killing people?
I will not eat HEAP crow by saying this:
"Sometimes those 'stability first and foremost', and screw what kind of regimes they have" crowd is NOT always wrong.
Put simply, if you're gonna invade barbarian nations, you better do it 'Roman style' and lay waste to everything. If you intend to play by modern 'enlightened western' rules, you'd better stay out.
I know one thing - whoever succeed's Dubya will have a lot LESS of a free hand to deal with our enemies abroad than had we left Iraq the hell alone, and continued our 'Afghan strategy' wherever needed.
Now you will excuse me. My mouth is so full of feathers I think I'll go throw up.
We sure have.
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