Friday, December 26, 2014

BEDFORD FALLS OR POTTERSVILLE?


BEDFORD FALLS OR POTTERSVILLE?
Paul Mirengoff, Powerline

Novelist Anne Morse has written a sequel to Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Her novel is called Bedford Falls.

NRO has posted an interview with Morse. Like the classic film, her novel, she says, reminds us of our obligations to family and community — the “little platoons,” to borrow Edmund Burke’s phrase.

The Morse interview reminds me that nine years ago, I wrote a Weekly Standard column called “Bedford Falls or Pottersville? What kind of a country you think you live in can affect your eagerness to defend it.”

Since we’re in the midst of the “It’s a Wonderful Life” season, I thought I would republish the piece:

In his end-of-the-year column, Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne included this message from an irate conservative reader: “Most liberals and some Democrats hate this president and will do anything to bring him down, including siding with terrorists against the president.” Noting that the same sentiment was expressed in different forms by many readers, Dionne lamented that “when big chunks of the country begin to view their political adversaries as something close to traitors, we have arrived at a very dangerous time.”
But is it baseless to suspect that the left-liberal ethos impels some adherents towards ambivalence about the struggle against terrorism? History suggests that the issue is worth investigating. After all, the old American left felt ambivalent–or worse–when it came to the foreign policy struggles of its day. 
Chunks of the left opposed American involvement in the struggle against fascism until Hitler attacked the Soviet Union. And even after becoming disillusioned with Communism, elements of the old left failed to buy into the Cold War.
Many adopted the posture of the influential literary critic Edmund Wilson. As Joseph Epstein has pointed out, Wilson described our conduct towards the Soviet Union as “panicky pugnacity” borne not of our virtue but of “the irrational instinct of an active power organism in the presence of another such organism.”
The “new left” of the 1960s and 1970s rejected such world-weary moral equivalency and rooted openly for Communists. The standard chant of that era’s student left was “Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, NLF is going to win.”
These leftists now have a stake in our society, and neither they nor their children have to worry about being drafted. Moreover, bin Laden and Zarqawi may cut less appealing figures, both personally and ideologically, than Uncle Ho, Chairman Mao, and Fidel Castro.
Thus, there’s no reason to believe that very many leftists root for, or sympathize deeply with, the enemy. But we shouldn’t summarily dismiss the possibility that some leftists today feel ambivalent about the country they once considered criminal and that, always craving sophistication, they may have adopted something like Edmund Wilson’s cynical view of America’s latest conflict.
Consider the statements and actions of some of today’s left-liberals. The most obvious example is Michael Moore. As Michael Barone reminds us, Moore has hailed the Iraqi terrorist insurgents as “Minute Men” who deserve to win, and on his website has called Americans the stupidest people in the world.
By hitting the daily double of anti-Americanism–cheering for the enemy and denigrating his countrymen–Moore became a hero to the left and an ally of liberal Democratic politicians. According to Barone, about half of the Democratic senators attended the Washington premiere of Fahrenheit 9/11, Moore’s popular distillation of his views on the war against terror. And at their national convention, the Democrats honored Moore with a seat next to former president, and kindred spirit, Jimmy Carter.
But it is not just their fondness for Moore that suggests a deep ambivalence about this country on the part of many liberals. Isolated incidents of prisoner abuse caused Senate minority whip Richard Durbin to compare the United States to Hitler’s Germany, Stalin’s Russia, and Pol Pot’s Cambodia. Recent revelations about warrant-less electronic surveillance of calls from foreign al Qaeda operatives to the United States have spurred comparisons to King George III.
Those who perceive America as being one New York Times story away from deserving comparison to some of history’s most odious regimes must believe that the country is teetering on the brink of evil. 
What if one were to take the left’s moral worldview seriously? If the country is on such tenuous moral ground, as they proclaim it to be, then the highest priority–more urgent than dealing with an enemy that successfully attacks us only once every several years–is to make sure that the country doesn’t spiral into something truly evil. 
Thus, while most Americans find it unobjectionable that we use water boarding, or electronic surveillance of calls to the United States, to obtain information about al Qaeda plans, those who consider America morally ambiguous cannot accept such tactics. To do so, the familiar protest goes, makes us too much like the enemy. This incarnation of moral-equivalency-think is as potentially debilitating in the war on terror as Edmund Wilson’s version was during the Cold War.
The other imperative for this crowd–also more urgent than the war on terror–is to move the country away from the brink of evil to higher moral ground. This means enacting the left-liberal agenda–government guaranteed healthcare for all, higher taxes on the rich, gay marriage, and so forth. 
But to advance down that road, Republicans must be vanquished. For some liberals, E.J. Dionne notwithstanding, it follows that they must do nearly anything to bring the Republicans and their president down, and that accomplishing this constitutes a higher priority than combating terrorism.
Many modern liberals seem unable to say what kind of country they live in. Most of the time, they speak as if they inhabit Frank Capra’s Bedford Falls–a dull, nosy, and somewhat puritanical, but basically decent place where George Bailey and the forces of good fight to a stalemate with Mr. Potter and the forces of evil.
Deep down, though, they fear they live in Pottersville, minus the fun. The defense of Bedford Falls, for all of its flaws, would be a top priority; the primacy of defending Pottersville is less apparent.

Nine years later, my only amendment to the column is that, disillusioned by the failed Obama presidency, many more liberals now think they live in Pottersville.

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Cuba No-Gooding



Cuba No-Gooding

Col Mike Walker, USMC (retired)

All,

Recognizing the radical socialist dictatorship in Cuba is not a big deal. After all, we recognized Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany and Josef Stalin's Communist Russia. Hitler, Stalin and Castro. Big whoop!  Maybe the Administration can retroactively recognize Pol Pots' Khmer Rouge regime as well? 

Is this a shameful decision? Yes, but that's reality. 

Will things get better in Cuba? Not a chance. Before the President leaves office, this thing will stink so bad that it will make the Putin "reset" that resulted in the invasions of Crimea and Ukraine look not all that bad.

As for human rights, this United States Marine will not forget nor forgive Castro's butchers. I will neither forget nor forgive what happened to Marine Captain Jeb Seagle. 

Who is Jeb Seagle, you ask? 

It is name you will never hear uttered by the "Hate America First" leftists but it is a name with an important story.

In 1983, as Fidel's minions moved to enslave Grenada and his local puppets ineptly and recklessly grabbed half a dozen American medical students as hostages, a rescue mission was launched and Captain Jeb Seagle was in the thick of it.

Below is part of the story, told in his citation for the Navy Cross, a medal for valor in combat second only to the Medal of Honor:

SEAGLE, JEB F. Captain, U.S. Marine Corps (Reserve) Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 261 (HMM-261), 22nd Marine Amphibious Unit Date of Action: October 25, 1983 Citation: The Navy Cross is presented to Jeb F. Seagle, Captain, U.S. Marine Corps (Reserve), for extraordinary heroism while serving as an AH-IT (TOW) Cobra Attack Helicopter Pilot with Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron TWO HUNDRED SIXTY-ONE (HMM-261), Twenty-Second Marine Amphibious Unit, conducting combat operations on the Island of Grenada on 25 October 1983. While conducting an armed reconnaissance mission in support of ground forces, Captain Seagle's aircraft was hit by multiple anti-aircraft artillery projectiles and forced down behind enemy lines. Having been knocked out by the blast, Captain Seagle regained consciousness after his fellow pilot had flown the aircraft to impact and found that his aircraft was on fire and burning out of control. As Captain Seagle exited the front cockpit of the Cobra, he saw that the other pilot had been critically wounded and remained helplessly trapped in the aircraft. With complete disregard for his own safety, Captain Seagle courageously returned to the aircraft which was now engulfed in flames and pulled him out. As unexpended ordnance began to cook off all around them, Captain Seagle carried the severely wounded pilot well clear of the danger. Now exposed to heavy enemy small arms and machinegun fire and faced with certain death or capture, Captain Seagle ignored the danger and remained to attend the wounds of the injured pilot by wrapping a tourniquet around his severely bleeding arm. Realizing that enemy soldiers were approaching, Captain Seagle fearlessly distracted them away from the helpless pilot and ultimately sacrificed his own life in an effort to buy time for the rescue helicopter to arrive. By his extraordinary courage, uncommon valor, and loyal devotion to duty in the face of danger, Captain Seagle ensured his brother-in-arms was rescued; thereby reflecting great credit upon himself and upholding the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service. 

Here is the tragic rest: Shortly after saving the life of gravely wounded Captain Tim Howard (who subsequently lost arm), Captain Seagle was captured by Cuban soldiers.

Since the mid-1970s when Communist Cuban soldiers began serving in Africa, their savagery became a thing of horror stories. 

Captain Seagle fared no better. Within minutes after his capture, he was dragged down a dirt road, pushed down on his knees and executed by the Cubans.

We are now dubiously reproaching ourselves over the Geneva Convention* edicts regarding the treatment of prisoners but that does not matter south of Florida. There is no such uncertainty in Cuba as that document only has a purpose when it is set afire to light a cigar -- POW rights be damned.

Now we will recognize these bums. So be it. 

The "Hate America First" Club will celebrate but as for this Marine: To hell with the Castro dictatorship.

Semper Fi,
Mike

* News flash: KMZ and his fellow monsters have no legal Geneva Convention rights, those rights are reserved for combatants in war -- not terrorists who intentionally target the innocent for death.

Let a Hundred Coburns Bloom



Let a Hundred Coburns Bloom 
The retiring Oklahoma senator knew how to fix what’s wrong with America.
Mike Brake, NRO

Here in Oklahoma, the news that Senator Tom Coburn will be retiring early from his second term has still not entirely settled in with most folks. For ten years we awoke each day knowing that our state’s voice in Washington would be one of principled reason and absolute integrity.

It’s not that our other senator, Jim Inhofe, or our House members, like Tom Cole and Frank Lucas, are lacking. They are all solid conservatives, as is former congressman James Lankford, whom we elected in November to replace Coburn in the Senate. But as conservatives across the nation have recognized for years, there’s only one Tom Coburn.

Which raises the question: What would America look like if the United States Senate had contained 100 Tom Coburns for the past decade?

Well, none of them would be running for president. One of the most endearing things about Senator Coburn was and is his total lack of personal ambition. From his first election to the House in the GOP sweep of 1994 until the day he announced his retirement, he’s been about one thing: service.

A hundred Coburns, or even 51, would have long since passed a balanced-budget amendment and enforced it. The pork flowing out of Washington would have dried up years ago. The deficit, which mushroomed to some $16 trillion under the first Obama administration, would be closer to $10 trillion and falling.

Canadian oil would already be flowing south through the Keystone pipeline. That, coupled with more sensible federal regulatory policies, would probably have dropped gasoline prices to around a dollar a gallon. We could have told the OPEC thugs to go pound sand.

A Coburn Senate would have sustained and even expanded needed defense spending. And any report on the CIA’s work in the War on Terror would have said “Thank you!”
Taxes? They’d almost certainly be lower and much simpler. We might even have achieved that eternal dream of most Americans, a tax return on a postcard.
Russia would be less belligerent. Vladimir Putin would know not to mess with a strong and confident America, and so would the other bad actors, from North Korea to Iran. Yes, presidents set foreign policy, but a Coburn Senate would have added some spine to even a weak-kneed Obama administration.

The federal judiciary would be much more inclined to make rulings based on law and constitutional principle. It is unlikely that we’d have a “wise Latina” grinding liberal ideological axes.

A Senate of Coburn clones would waste a lot less time on resolutions designating Thursday as Earle T. Woonsocket Day and spend more time debating the issues that matter. The dead air on C-SPAN would be filled with substantive debates, with minimal grandstanding. Imagine what it was like for some senators to follow Tom Coburn on the floor for the past decade!

In short, a Coburn Senate for the past ten years would have made us a stronger, safer, more prosperous people.

I have been privileged to know Tom Coburn casually and to respect him entirely since he first blossomed as a new congressman two decades ago. When he was still undecided about seeking a second Senate term in 2010, I stood in line at a political function to tell him what everyone else there was clamoring to say: “We need you in Washington!”

Alas, we won’t have him there in 2015. Oklahoma, the Senate, and the nation will be poorer for his absence, as we were and are richer for his ennobling service.


Mike Brake is a longtime journalist, writer, and editor in Oklahoma. He was a speechwriter for Governor Frank Keating.

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

“White Privilege” and the Destruction of the Democratic Majority


“White Privilege” and the Destruction of the Democratic Majority
Col Mike walker, USMC (retired)
All,

Not all that long ago, the Democratic Party looked to have cobbled together a near permanent majority coalition (“near” as bad governance will do in anyone). 

Not so anymore.

Today there is not a single Democratic Senator, Governor or Democratically controlled legislature from Texas to North Carolina, the fastest growing region in the United States.

The respected and likeable two-term Democratic Senator from Louisiana just became the latest candidate to get shellacked in the 2014 Mid-Term Elections.

Why?

Like the Republican Party that shifted right with the rise of the Tea Party in 2009, the Democrats are now shifting further left as seen in Elizabethan populism but perhaps best captured by the destructive extremism known as “White Privilege,” a reckless position held to not by truth but by a religious-like belief that is impervious to reason. 

The result is middle class flight from the Democrat establishment the likes of which has never been witnessed.

To understand just how out of touch the "Party of special interests" has become, read the 1995 editorial by former-Democratic Senator Jim Webb:


The Bill Clinton-Jim Webb mainstream wing of the Democratic Party is on life support and too many Democrat Party elites are more than willing to pull the plug.

Happy Holidays,
Mike

A Denver Doofus Political Dance

A reasonable kind of guy... education, a whole industry based on hate...

Col. Mike Walker, USMC (retired)
All,

Professor Charles Angeletti of Denver’s Metropolitan State University forced his class to take a “satirical” pledge demeaning the United States.


“Satirical” implies a sense of tolerant humor. Yeah Right. OK, Charlie, here’s a similar little chuckle:

I refuse to pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America but only to the left-wing “Hate America First” ideology for which it really stands and what needs to be one statist authoritarian Nation under anti-religious know-it-all elites, endlessly divisible, with politically correct group-think and tolerance for all. *
*Except white males or individuals who believe that America has done right by them or anyone else – ever – and (in the immortal words of Professor Gruber), especially ignorant and too stupid to understand YOU!”
 
Can anyone imagine the Good Professor using that “satirical” version of the Pledge? 

Of course not! 

His "pledge" is not intended to be funny and thought provoking; it was done to shock and insult with the goal of proselyting his students.

Regards,
White Male Mike