George Rebane
On the last day of the Democratic Convention we suddenly saw some very un-Democratic displays of military officers on the podium, (borrowed) Old Glories galore, and shouts of ‘USA!, USA!, …’ from the floor. So much in fact that NPR’s Weekend Edition had to do a feature piece on it asking experts what is the meaning of this year’s Democrats coopting traditionally Republican totems. The answer, of course, is beyond simple.
To support the newest National Lie expertly floated by President Obama last Wednesday about how well the economy is doing, the Democrats scuttled back for instructions from their political bible, Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. And there it was, plain as day – when getting caught doing something bad, spout the good stuff from the other side while blaming your bad stuff on them.
A quick example of this is the liberals’ historical distaste for America’s military involvements on foreign shores culminating in their strong tenet that America should not be the world’s sheriff, that America can protect its global interests with generous applications of deft (daft?) diplomacy unsupported by military might. Today after they have decimated our armed forces, Democrats are now the new champions of NATO after Trump brought up the obvious conclusion that our economy and fiscal structure no longer allow us to fund our duties as the global sheriff. We need our allies to fulfill their commitments to funding our mutual defense. Hewing to Alinsky, the Left is now yelping that Trump wants to throw our European allies under the Russian bus.
Ever since serving in Europe, over the years I have heard again and again our German friends explain their undeniable logic – ‘As long as America is willing to bear the lion’s share of our defense burden, why should we? We can use the monies saved for our lavish social programs instead.’ They are bald-faced open about their utterly rational response to our continuing insanity. Now Hillary is strutting her stuff as the new fiscally profligate guarantor of global security, in full confidence that her constituents don’t have the gray matter to parse her words.
So no matter what garlands Hillary drapes on the Obama/Clinton domestic and foreign policies, they cannot hide the rot they have created over the last 7.5 years. America no longer is the great country it was as Trump continues to point out. The rot? America has NEVER been in such global disrespect as it is today – the actions of both ‘friends’ and declared enemies attest to that in every quarter of the globe that is an order of magnitude more dangerous today than when Obama took office. Western civilization has not been under such existential threat since the Ottomans besieged Vienna in 1683.
American society has been purposely fractured by race, ethnicity, and class to guarantee their votes for an ever expanding leviathan. Our public educational system has been compromised or more accurately constructively destroyed. Graduating Johnnies and Jills are no longer competent enough to learn needed job-garnering skills, they know literally nothing of US or world history, and are shunted to debt-ladened college educations valued by no one save some government bureaucracy as the employer of last resort. (Today’s non-STEM baccalaureate is yesterday’s high school diploma.) The only reliable human product produced by the union schools are cadres of politically naïve progressives – most recently the millennials. Very few of them are can understand the complexities of issues, especially those based on technology, science, and/or the demands of basic numeracy.
An example of the most recent swill fed to these people is the state of our economy and fisc. Concepts like debt, deficits, debt service, and their related rates are a total mystery to these voters. Obama and Hillary’s glorious economic progress just received another shot in the shorts from the Dept of Commerce that yesterday revised downward the already dismal GDP growth rates of recent quarters, let alone the paraplegic progress we have made since 2009. (more here)
Here are some particulars that Hillary promises to fix by continuing Obama’s tax and regulate policies that have given new definition to ‘slow growth’. 4Q15 annualized growth was again revised downward to 0.8%, as was 1Q16 to 0.9% and 2Q16 just came in at 1.2%. All this as our economist brain trust predicted a 3% or higher growth for 2016 (later again revised downward to 2.6%). To achieve their first prediction we would need 5% growth rates for 3Q16 and 4Q16, and a 4.1% rate for the downward revised prediction. One wonders what those economists were smoking.
There is no way under heaven this mindlessly mired economy can achieve such growth, and notwithstanding the glorious assessments of Hillary and Obama which issue only from their own fevered brains that worry someone will peek behind the curtain and tell their voters what’s really there. But wait! Donald Trump has already done that and the guy won’t stop talking about making America great again (which hopeful message the Alinsky Left labels as “dark” and foreboding a “Midnight for America”). The possibility of this revelation calls for a colossal shift of the nation’s Mass Mind, at least the part that is vulnerable to such manipulations. And that is exactly what will be attempted between now and November, starting with ‘Look! Traitor Trump is inviting the Russians to hack Hillary’s (existentially) non-existent servers and reveal America’s non-existent (according to Hillary) secrets to the world.’ And with tear-filled eyes the nation is diverted as we gratefully nod in agreement. All is well.
[31jul16 update] Interesting gleanings from the media buzz. The Hillary/Obama lies about our economy’s wonderful condition continue to dominate the lamestream outlets which have no problem still casting Trump’s message of hope – more jobs, lower taxes, fewer regulations, better trade deals, overseas respect, secure borders, vetting immigrants, … – as portending a dark future for the country. Alinsky is tap dancing in his coffin.
To show how badly the lamestream is in the tank for the socialists’ agenda, Pew Research reports that 55% of Fox News viewership is leftwing or left leaning. Of course its audience has to be ‘balanced’, otherwise FN would not have almost 3X viewership compared to its next closest rival. But what that research really shows is that even the country’s liberal wing has a huge and knowledgeable cohort that demands something more balanced, comprehensive, and accurate in its news products, something the major lamestream outlets neither can nor want to deliver. For the most recent example witness the upside down coverage of the two concluded conventions.
And perhaps more direct evidence comes from the Hillary camp. She gave FN’s Sunday News with Chris Wallace her very first post-convention interview today. Here is a woman who knows how to reach out to a large and ideologically comprehensive audience, one into which she must make inroads before the election.
In the opposite corner we have National Propaganda Radio which this morning did another hit piece on Trump re the two candidates’ upcoming security briefings. They dug up a security official who actually believes that, given what he misunderstood or misconstrued Trump to have said about Hillary’s ‘lost emails’, Trump would actually tell state secrets to Putin. This in the face of our current president’s revealed “flexibility” in toadying up to Russia (e.g. the Ukraine invasions), and the indisputable fact that Hillary has already let fly four years of state secrets to Putin and every other bad actor in the world.
What makes any reasonable person believe that as President she will suddenly develop a sense of what is sensitive/classified, and not blab it to whomever when she is then immune to such restrictions? Recall that the US President has the absolute power to determine the security classification of everything, and that includes instant declassification, which comes to her attention. So we have another Alinsky moment, the innocence and guilt of Trump and Hillary re the nation’s security get switched 180 by the lamestream.
[2aug16 update] How can any party, especially its leader, take credit for almost doubling the national debt while delivering such an historically anemic economy, and then crow about it?
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