Posted on 10/27/2007 4:59:10 PM PDT by Josh Painter
Fred Thompson is currently under fire for being too "laid-back." His debate performances are said to be "undercaffeinated." A barely discernible pause at the start of one answer was reported by the play-by-play pundits as a "senior moment."
Touted by his promoters as the new Reagan, Thompson has apparently inherited all the old Reagan's flaws. He, too, was famously lethargic, and said to doze off during afternoon briefings: in long cabinet meetings, he was prone to be prone within 10 minutes, etc. President Reagan never denied it: "They say hard work never killed anyone," he remarked, "but I figure, why take the chance?" He did, though, confess during a particularly fraught government crisis to "burning the midday oil." Ronald Reagan succeeded a chief executive who was the very definition of "phony energy," and whose failed presidency remains a monument to the folly of confusing perpetual activity with energy...
So what I look for in a candidate is, first, an absence of phony energy and, second, signs of real energy. I can live with a Fred Thompson "senior moment" compared to most of the alternatives. In that same debate, the more damaging answer came from Mitt Romney in response to an arcane hypothetical about whether bombing Iran required congressional approval. "You sit down with your attorneys," began the former governor. "We're going to let the lawyers sort out what we needed to do and what we didn't need to do." There was no pause. Romney just rushed in to fill the dead air with all the frantic energy of an old-school disc jockey whose traffic jingle has jammed. And, as a consequence, a war-on-terror hawk came over like a Kerryesque legalistic ass-coverer. A "senior moment" to collect his thoughts might have helped.
So I'm well-disposed to the laconic...
(Excerpt) Read more at macleans.ca ...
Just let Fred...be Fred.
He’s said he wouldn’t run a typical campaign.
Frankly, I’m relieved to see he’s his own man,
and doesn’t cow-tow to the media.
Thanks for the ping, and for the memories!
The last thing we need is more "government."
President Clinton was the Lounge-Act-in-Chief.
“Why, then, the new Government takes a bold step; it unites all its forces in order to maintain itself; it smothers opinion, has recourse to arbitrary measures, ridicules its former maxims, declares that it is impossible to conduct the administration except at the risk of being unpopular; in short, it proclaims itself governmental. And it is here that other candidates for popularity are waiting for it. They exhibit the same illusion, pass by the same way, obtain the same success, and are soon swallowed up in the same gulf.”
http://bastiat.org/en/government.html
I should be glad enough, you may be sure, if you had really discovered a beneficent and inexhaustible being, calling itself the Government, which has bread for all mouths, work for all hands, capital for all enterprises, credit for all projects, oil for all wounds, balm for all sufferings, advice for all perplexities, solutions for all doubts, truths for all intellects, diversions for all who want them, milk for infancy, and wine for old age - which can provide for all our wants, satisfy all our curiosity, correct all our errors, repair all our faults, and exempt us henceforth from the necessity for foresight, prudence, judgment, sagacity, experience, order, economy, temperance, and activity.
Thanks for the ping. Thanks for posting. Another OUTSTANDING article by Mark Steyn.
OK, I have a new tagline.
bump
Another magnificent article by Stein.
Why isn’t Steyn yet a citizen? We need more like him. I have been doing my part to get new citizens to vote Republican.
BTTT
Little trivia on the word “laconic” that you will probably like (and may already know).
Laconia — area of the Spartan of “300” fame -— was under attack by Alexander the Great.
Alexander sent in a letter saying “If I enter Sparta with my army, I will kill everyone there and level the city.”
To which the Spartans replied: “If”
The “lazy” response was called “Laconic.”
Carolyn
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
I think Bastiat should be required reading in every school, starting with kindergarten, maybe.
Exactly.
Is there a chart someplace so we can know the exact amount of work required to gain another million votes?
Sure would be helpful if you could post that, you being an expert on the amount needed and all.
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