Posted on 08/12/2011 5:55:13 AM PDT by drellberg
The conventional complaint is that the process was ugly. Big deal. You want beauty? Go to a museum. Democratic politics was never meant to be an exercise in aesthetics.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
Very very good.
Concur—very good. Krauthammer rarely disappoints.
I disagree. The jury is still out. We are still on suicidal trajectory. Obama care is still the law of the land. The budget is on autopilot to spend (at least) $9 trillion more over the next 10 years - then explode.
Not sure if there’s anything to crow about, process wise.
The problems you describe are real - and scary - but they are not the result of the process. They are the result of ignorant voters.
It may be phyrric to say that the process is working even if that means the country will destroy itself because there are more ignorant folks in the process than there are enlightened folks - but again - that’s the fault of folks and not the process per se. If we are an ignorant nation, then a valid process will yield those results.
I love Charles and everything he writes is worth reading but this is the trap guys like this fall into after spending too much time in D.C. They get so wrapped up in process they lose track of what the goal is.
The process “works”. Well whoppee ding. Let’s throw a party.
If you don’t judge “the process” by what it produces what the hell criteria DO you use to judge it by?
OK, I clicked, prolly got something on my computer I don’t want, in order to get the popup on the website to disappear and allow me to find out what the most mendacious liberal who pretends to be a conservative is selling.
I sum it up as, “All is well, little people, keep working and paying your taxes so we can keep draining the system”.
Krauthammer gets your attention by calling Obama stupid and lazy for saying “our politics is broke” yesterday, then proceeds to make his point, that the political system is not broken. But if you think about his qualifying statement at the beginning:
“Our political system is working well (I make no such claims for our economy), indeed, precisely as designed” you know the rest is garbage because our crony-capitalist system is now so entertwined with the political system, it is impossible to separate the two.
So, this chattering-class big-government parasite obviously thinks he can keep the worker bees on-task for a couple of more years, with tripe like this, if he can just convince us that we still have a limited government, low tax, free market, individual rights-based system and it is still working.
Problem is, the TEA Party ain’t buyin’ it.
I was taking a bit of a “devil’s advocate” position, which I thought I made clear. But I would submit that the problem isn’t the process, it’s American ignorance.
There is no process ever devised that would work when you have an ignorant electorate. The problem is not the process or the party system — it’s a problem of people. And too many American people are ignorant, lazy, corrupt, etc — and that is simply process-proof.
So it takes longer to set things right than either you or I would want, but the fight will go on and it's whiners like Obama that are complaining that it will go on. Boehner and McConnel are as much a problem as Pelosi and Reid, and if anything, the process brought that clearly to everyone’s attention. It is the TEA party versus big government Republicans and Democrats. That’s perfectly clear now.
OK. So you think Krauthammer is right and the process is working.
Remember, Krauthammer wrote this in response to Obama’s assertion that the process is not working. I think Obama said that because he is afraid the process may work to thwart completion of his goals, first of re-election, which in his view is wholly necessary to accomplish the “change” from limited constitutional government he and his Alinskyite Chicago friends seek.
Limited constitutional government people are afraid the “process” is not working to prevent the “change”, which amonts to overthrow of our constitutional law-based civil society.
You say “It is the TEA party versus big government Republicans and Democrats. That’s perfectly clear now.” That has been perfectly clear since (at least) 1964. And except for a couple of small roadblocks, the big government republicans and democrats have had their way.
Let me address your questions:
“Did you really expect a total victory from one election?”
Of course not. But people like Krauthammer do everything possible to induce a sense that “the process” is working out fine, while we know that to the big government ruling class, 2010 was just a bump in the road to be driven over. And they are very successfully driving over us right now.
“If the “process” were not in place, what would have prevented the Democrats from using the 2008 elections to impose a socialist government and economy more far reaching than they did?”
Nobody is saying there should be no “process in place”.The Democrats always use the “process” to impose socialist government and economy as far reaching as the public will allow without open revolt. And they have been doing this extremely successfully at least since 1912. And they have crossed a line with Obamacare and the trillions in spending, and are in the “process” of digging in with that program and spending as we speak.
“Should the process operate so quickly that every whim of the electorate is enacted the moment the party supporting that whim takes power?”
You mean in the way the Democrats enacted the stimulus and Obamacare? Straw man argument. Nobody is saying it should. But we need to point out that big government liberals like Krauthammer have served and are now serving to lull the citizenry to sleep while the democrats and big government republicans grow leviathan so large we can’t “set things right”.
Do not let the Krauthammers of this country make you think that the process is working out just fine, because if you buy into that, all sense of urgency is lost, and you will fail to use the system we have in place to “set things right”
If you mean that democracy always fails, I agree. That is, if "electorate" is roughly synonymous with universal suffrage.
The founders knew the risks inherent in universal suffrage, and designed a system that did not require it.
I submit that any system of government that uses universal suffrage has a problem, out the door. Self-government is an unnatural human undertaking.
You are correct, and as Dr. K was pointing out - it is intellectually lazy to blame “the system” - as opposed to understanding (as you call it) the “unnatural human undertaking” that is self government.
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