Author Archives: Ron Lipsman

Obama the Warrior

The title is, at first glance, ludicrous. Our post-modern President trots around the globe bowing to our enemies, pledging to disarm, sundering our alliances, denigrating the country he heads and humiliating the leaders of our (former) closest allies. He eviscerates our arsenal, dismantles our intelligence capabilities and willfully ignores the most blatant threats to the United States. To speak of him as a warrior is the height of absurdity.

Yet, in some sense, he actually is a warrior – not in any military context, but rather in the classic parlance of the progressive movement. He is an aggressive, motivated and dedicated soldier in the battle to remake America into a collectivist, social welfare state. He struggles mightily to undermine the Constitution, destroy free market capitalism, subvert traditional culture and weaken the sovereign nature of the American republic. In this struggle, he belittles his opponents, pursues his objectives relentlessly and engages in elaborate feints and misdirection to confuse and demoralize the opposition. Sounds like a warrior to me…except that the field of engagement is the political arena instead of a military battlefield. The weapons are words, money, favors and the media, not guns and missiles. Physical courage does not enter the equation; it is replaced by idealistic conviction, single-minded devotion to cause and stubborn unwillingness to entertain the thought that one might be wrong.

The idea that the foot soldier in the progressive movement is engaged in a war is completely consistent with the mode set for the movement by its earliest proponents. This is discussed brilliantly in Jonah Goldberg’s 2007 book Liberal Fascism. Goldberg argues that modern liberalism (i.e., the progressive movement) draws its inspiration from classic fascist principles:

The core value of original fascism…was its imposition of war values on society…The chief appeal of war to social planning isn’t conquest or death but mobilization. Free societies are disorganized. People do their own thing, more or less, and that can be downright inconvenient if you’re trying to plan the entire economy from a boardroom somewhere. War brings conformity and unity of purpose. The ordinary rules of behavior are mothballed. You can get things done: build roads, hospitals, houses. Domestic populations and institutions are required to ‘do their part.’


Many progressives probably would have preferred a different organizing principle, which is why William James spoke of the moral equivalent of war. He wanted all the benefits – Dewey’s ‘social possibilities’ of war – without the costs. Hence, in recent times, the left has looked to everything from environmentalism and global warming to public health and ‘diversity’ as war equivalents to cajole the public into expert-driven unity….’Martial virtues,’ James famously wrote, ‘must be the enduring cement’ of American society: ‘intrepidity, contempt of softness, surrender of private interest, obedience to command must still remain the rock upon which states are built.’

Obama and his fellow progressives who are running the country have established the fields of battle in their war to remake America. Moreover, they discuss those fields in military terms, replete with all the implications for national calamity, extensive casualties and lost opportunities that are normally associated with the winds of war. To wit:

·       Global Warming. According to the progressives, the Earth is in danger, the threat is imminent and unimpeded capitalism is the source of the crisis. They use war metaphors constantly when proposing their socialistic policies for ‘winning this war.’

·       Deficits and Debt. Progressives legitimately assert that the threat to the nation from runaway deficits is grave – even existential – and that enormous sacrifice will be required to win this war. What they fail to mention is that their policies caused – and continue to exacerbate – the threat.

·       Healthcare. Despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of Americans are satisfied with their health care, progressives seize on (and inflate) the relatively small number without adequate access as a beachhead in their war to convert the US to socialized medicine. They cite health care’s enormous costs without acknowledging that their programs (Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, employer-based coverage caused by FDR’s wage controls, and now Obamacare) are the principal drivers of the astronomical costs.

·       Welfare. LBJ declared that war 45 years ago. The poverty rate is roughly the same now as it was then, despite the progressive generals at HHS and HUD who have been prosecuting the ‘war against poverty’ all the while.

Nevertheless, to label Obama a warrior is indeed truly ridiculous, and here is why. For more than half a century the greatest leaders of the progressive movement were indeed warriors. I am thinking of Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, FDR and LBJ. Teddy was the greatest warrior of them all. His physical courage is legendary. His exploits in the Spanish-American War bear testimony to that. Wilson might not have had the physical courage of Teddy, but he savored the idea of American participation in The Great War. Against tremendous opposition in the country, he cajoled the nation to enter the war, whereupon he converted the society to a heightened war footing and appointed generals who prosecuted the war assiduously. FDR did likewise in the Second World War.
Neither Wilson nor FDR exhibited the personal manifestations of a warrior like Teddy, but in the mold of military leaders throughout history, they led their people purposefully, forcefully and resolutely into war. Finally, the same is true of LBJ – up to a point. He was itching to fight the Communists in Southeast Asia and, like his heroes, he steered the country into war. But unlike his heroes, he botched its execution and presided over defeat instead of victory. In so doing, he converted the progressive movement to pacifism. Oh, progressives might drop a bomb (Serbia) or lob a missile (Sudan) here and there, but the idea of America participating in – much less instigating – a real war became anathema to them.
Obama is from that cloth. In his pacifism and reluctance to commit American troops to battle, he is no different from Carter or Clinton, Mondale or McGovern. One might argue though: what about Iraq? Afghanistan? If he could, Obama would withdraw from those conflicts instantly. However, he inherited them and he knows that he would risk serious political capital by a precipitous withdrawal – especially if it resulted in a military defeat. To his disgrace, he has announced to the enemy his dates for withdrawal in the near future. For him, these conflicts are distractions from the domestic ‘wars’ that he wishes to fight. More pointedly, he refuses to engage the enemies that truly threaten America: Iran, North Korea, nations harboring Muslim terrorists, or the Chinese.
Obama prefers appeasement to confrontation. He prefers despots like Chavez or Castro to democrats like Netanyahu. Unwilling to project strength, he believes that obsequiousness and understanding will reverse the intent of America’s enemies. Some warrior!
To Obama, America is a failed state that has no moral right to fight other states – no matter how evil or how much they might threaten American interests. Besides, it is very difficult to strike a military pose when one is constantly bowing.
This post (with minor edits) appeared as an article in The American Thinker; see

Heroes — Then and Now

America has experienced the painful downfall of one of its favorite heroes of the last decade — Tiger Woods. I have nothing new to add on l’affaire Tiger; rather I would like to focus on the general nature of the American hero — past and present. I will argue that the nature of the beast has indeed changed over the last half century. Then I will describe the key feature of the change, identify the main culprit responsible for the change and conclude with a speculation on what the change says about American society.

More than 40 years separate the eras in which two catchy slogans captured the American public’s attention: ‘I Like Ike’ (early 1950’s) and ‘Be Like Mike’ (mid 1990’s). The difference in the slogans’ objects represents more than just a time lapse; it highlights a change in our culture in terms of our reference to heroes — who they are, why we admire them and what we expect of them. In previous generations our heroes usually were politicians and soldiers, scientists and philosophers, statesmen and authors. For example, if we hark back to the mid twentieth century, the most common heroes would certainly have included — in addition to Eisenhower — Churchill, Einstein, FDR, MacArthur, Salk, and maybe a writer like Steinbeck or Hemingway. A half century earlier, businessmen and philanthropists like Rockefeller, Vanderbilt and Astor would have supplemented a list that surely included T. Roosevelt, Wilson and Mellon. Today, the most admired lists tend to be dominated by athletes, entertainers, and celebrities — people like Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey and of course, Elvis. Leaders have been replaced by personalities. Why is that? Perhaps we can discover the answer if, having decided who, we consider why and what.

One of my Websters defines a hero as ‘one who is admired for his achievements and qualities; one that shows great courage.’ In the past we admired those who led heroic lives or accomplished heroic deeds; those whose great achievements were wrought at substantial personal risk and entailed courageous action. Today, we look primarily to those who are absolutely brilliant at what they do — on the court, on the screen, in the public eye, but without any attendant requirement of personal risk or courage. The difference is somewhat subtle. To perform heroic deeds requires courage, selflessness, willingness to take great risk. To be the best at one thing requires dedication, perseverance, raw talent. These are all admirable qualities. But I venture that yesterday’s heroes manifested the latter qualities as well as the former, whereas today’s heroes, while usually exemplary in the latter, are often lacking the former.

Why this subtle change? I think there are numerous reasons, many bound up with the massive culture shift that we experienced over the last fifty years in the country. Here I would like to focus on one specific culprit — the media. I believe the media has played an enormous role in bringing about this change in the perception of heroism — for four reasons.

1. The muckraking, iconoclastic role of the media has escalated beyond bounds. No one is perfect of course, and while years ago the media was often complicit in hiding character flaws of our heroes, today they leave no stone unturned in their attempt to expose every possible wart that a potential hero might have. This applies particularly to politicians, soldiers and statesmen, making it nearly impossible for them to earn the unmitigated admiration of the public. John Kennedy was a womanizer, but the media did not report it. Conversely, every zip of Bill Clinton’s trousers made the evening news. 

2. Politics is a contact sport, but today it is bloodier than ever. The media has helped to drive a wedge through the body politic. The fault lines are clearly drawn and the media inflames the debate. In many ways the citizenry is divided down the middle and the opinions are so sharp that it is inconceivable that a man of the left could be admired by the people of the right — and vice versa. Thus it is hard to be a hero to the people if you start off with 50% of them detesting you. Because of this, political and religious figures don’t have a prayer of garnering widespread public admiration. Reagan was loved by those on the right, despised by the left, and exactly the reverse pertains to Obama.

3. Celebrities sell ink and electrons. The public has a seemingly insatiable appetite for news about pop culture. Celebrities sell magazines, newspapers, books, films, TV shows, DVDs and all other forms of electronic media. Fewer and fewer people pay much attention to hard news, but the popularity of celebrity magazines and web sites, ‘reality’ TV shows and music videos shows no sign of abating. The media encourages this and profits from it. Compared to Michael Phelps or Miley Cyrus, Hillary Clinton is a crashing bore.

4. The media has played a critical role in the vulgarization of the culture. The amount of violence, degeneracy and moral squalor that the media propagates is disgusting. The reputation of a classic hero cannot survive in that swamp; but it is not toxic to a modern celebrity. Moral degeneracy is just another ‘thing’ that a celebrity can excel at.

So, what do we expect of our heroes? In times past, we exacted a high moral standard. Heroes often failed to live up to those standards, but that does not change the fact that that is what we expected of them. They were role models par excellence, people who could inspire our dreams and elevate our spirits. Today’s heroes are merely expected to be the best at what they do. Roger Federer and LeBron James are phenomenal athletes; it is a joy and a pleasure to watch them. But they do not change the course of history; they do not inspire men and women to challenge their ideas about life and society; they do not discover new products or technologies to improve our lives; they do not take great physical or personal risks to achieve their goals. The old heroes did these things, and their and our lives were richer for it. We had inspiration instead of titillation, admiration instead of perspiration.

Finally, what does the change in the nature of our heroes say about American society? I believe it is yet another reflection of our mutation from a society that prized rugged individualism into the nanny state. We are increasingly risk averse. Instead of demanding a level playing field upon which all individuals can compete and rise to heights that their talents and determination might take them, we look to the government and to ‘experts’ to salve our wounds and smooth our path to a safe, but uninspiring destination.

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This article also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

What’s Up with the Islamic Terrorists?

What’s up with the Islamic terrorists? Their latest failed attempt in Times Square does not stand alone in the litany of unsuccessful follow ups to 9/11. There was the incompetent Nigerian underwear bomber during the Christmas season. There was the infamous – and fortunately inept – shoe bomber, Richard Reid. There was also a failed Islamic plot to attack Jewish targets in the Bronx last year. And there have been numerous other attempts, both publicized and unpublicized, in which the terrorists have failed to achieve any measurable success.

Now I don’t want to portray the Islamic terror world as having gone hopelessly incompetent. That is belied by the heinously successful assault in FortHood and by the killing of the CIA agents in Afghanistan. But compared to the sophisticated, meticulously planned and deadly effective attacks of 9/11, many of the recent forays by our Muslim enemies have proven remarkably amateurish and unsuccessful.

 What’s up? I think there are four possible explanations:

  1. The terrorists were incredibly ‘lucky’ on 9/11; it would be unreasonable to expect circumstances to be so favorable for them in that way again.
  2. Since 9/11, we have killed or incapacitated their best people, leaving only second rate terrorist wannabees to plan and execute new attacks.
  3. Our defenses have improved considerably.
  4. They’re holding back.

 I think that there is some legitimacy to all four explanations. Not only were they ‘lucky’ on 9/11, but we were completely asleep. Incredibly, they could have been luckier – if the Newark flight had not been delayed, Todd Beamer and his heroic comrades would not have learned of their tragic fate soon enough and the Capitol might have been rubble. Certainly we have decimated much of the Al Qaeda leadership, but I doubt that there aren’t adequately capable lunatics available to replace them. Of the four, I give the least credence to the third explanation, as the events of last weekend demonstrate. But I worry that the fourth explanation is the most accurate. Neil Braithwaite argued in The American Thinker (http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/05/was_the_times_square_bomb_a_te.html) that the Times Square event was likely a trial run. Perhaps. More seriously, I worry that they are holding back their best operatives until they can deploy some sort of WMD – or at least a weapon that can inflict far greater damage than the airplane missiles of 9/11.

 I hope that explanations 1-3 are on target, but I fear that #4 could be the correct one. While they wait for their moment, they see no harm in continuing with ‘low level’ attacks – even if they fail. Such attacks: increase our paranoia, are cheap to perpetrate, keep their cause on page 1, provide training for their personnel and probe our weaknesses. Besides, they can’t help themselves; their hatred for us is so great that, whether they seek our death by a thousand pinpricks or via some huge Gotterdammerung, they are not going to stop trying.

This article also appeared in The American Thinker at:

 http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/05/whats_up_with_these_incompeten.html

The Progressive Assault on America

A Review of ‘We Still Hold These Truths,’ by Matthew Spalding
A small but growing portion of the US population has come to believe that America is at a tipping point. The people with this insight, a group that I shall refer to as the community of believers, see America in 2010 as radically changed from the America they believe existed in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. The changes that disturb this community are of course not in the material or technological details of daily life, but in the political, economic and cultural principles that determine how America is governed, how the people achieve and sustain prosperity and the spiritual and philosophical axioms that control their beliefs and behavior.

The community of believers sees a century-long atrophying of individual liberty, property rights, Constitutional rule of law, limited government, free market capitalism, American exceptionalism, moral character and conservative traditions. They also see its gradual; replacement by a progressive, collectivist, egalitarian, secular, anti-family, apologetic nation, which is dominated by an exceedingly powerful, repressive and paternalistic federal government. They believe that the current radical administration has brought the United States of America to a tipping point in that its socialist policies (Obamacare, cap and trade, amnesty for illegals and more) will push the society beyond the point that it could ever recover from the progressive calamity that has befallen us.

An avalanche of books, videos and manifestos has appeared that express the frustrations of those who hold this view. Many are structured to answer one or more of the following three questions:

1.     What exactly is it that we had prior to 1900 that is on the precipice of extinction?

2.     How was it lost and to whom was it lost?

3.     How do we get it back?

Matthew Spalding of the Heritage Foundation is among those who hold this view. His book, ‘We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future’ (Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2009) addresses the above three questions, albeit in an uneven fashion. In eleven eloquent and edifying chapters he provides answers to the questions. I say uneven because he devotes nine chapters to the first question and only one chapter each to the latter two.

With that kind of division of labor, one would expect the book to stand or fall on the quality of the first nine chapters. Indeed, Mr. Spalding presents a brilliant, if somewhat academic account of the principles on which our Founding Fathers built the American republic. Not surprisingly, the principles he emphasizes include:

·       Individual liberty is the prime right and main objective of the American people.

·       Government derives its powers only from the consent of the governed, whereas the people derive their rights from the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.

·       A democratic republic can succeed only if the people have moral character grounded in religious faith.

·       Property is sacrosanct; commerce is the foundation of our prosperity.

·       There should be no privileged classes; all stand equal before the law.

·       The rule of law emanates from our Constitution. It is the supreme law of the land and shall remain so forever. It may be altered only by a laborious process that requires the support of an overwhelming majority of the people.

·       Liberty is not the same as license; ours is to be an ordered liberty.

·       Family, community and religious and civic associations form the bedrock of our civil society and it is to them that our citizens look primarily for satisfaction, guidance and succor.

·       The Declaration of Independence put us in command of our fortunes and established that the USA is an exceptional creation in human history. Nations should look to us for guidance, not the other way around.

In fact, I have encapsulated his nine chapters in these nine bullets, which constitute Spalding’s answer to the first question.

I am certain that virtually all in the community of believers would endorse all of these principles. I am just as certain that President Obama believes in none of it. Nor do any of his henchmen who have brought us to the tipping point. But I think that Spalding believes that many Americans – perhaps even most Americans – would subscribe to these principles if they were not so totally blinded by the brainwashing they have endured at the hands of the educational system, the mainstream media, the legal profession, politicians (who are largely lawyers), the professoriate, the librarians and virtually all the opinion-forming organs of American society that have been captured by progressives. Given that, Spalding’s words mean hardly anything at all to the great brainwashed multitude. But I am getting ahead of myself – Question 3 comes later.

As I said, Chapters 1-9 are a nice read. They constitute a wonderful lesson in American history, civics, Constitutionalism and the nature of man. The writing is clear, the research is impeccable and the argumentation is persuasive. It will reinforce the opinions of any in the community of believers. But in fact these nine chapters do not constitute the main worth of the book. That can be found in Chapter 10. In 27 breathtaking pages, Spalding offers up the best explanation I have ever read of the progressive philosophy and methodology designed to destroy our Constitutional republic and replace it with a statist, social welfare state. His chapter title: ‘A New Republic: The Progressive Assault on the Founders’ Principles’ is a perfect description of what he has accomplished in the chapter.

Spalding explains how ‘progressive thinking was profoundly shaped by two revolutionary concepts: relativism and historicism.’ The former is the notion that there are no eternal truths or permanent principles; thus it is wrong to be guided by an ancient document (the Constitution) unless it is reinterpreted continuously in light of modern ideas. The latter concept teaches that not only are ideas relative, but their meaning is determined by their moment in time. ‘The problem with the American Founders, the new thinkers argued, is that they did not understand and account for the lack of permanence and the constant flux and change in all things.’

We know the outcome. A century-long progressive onslaught on our nation has yielded a society that – in direct contradiction of the nine bullets above – increasingly accepts the following alternate principles:

·       Equality of outcome takes precedence over individual liberty.

·       Government discovers new rights all the time and then grants them to the people.

·       Religious faith belongs to the past; it has been superseded by reason and science.

·       Property is ultimately the province of government; business must be subservient to government.

·       The people’s lives are best guided by ‘experts’ – federal bureaucrats whose regulations have the force of law.

·       In addition, law is what the President, Congress and especially the Supreme Court say it is, not what the Founders wrote in the Constitution.

·       Distinguishing liberty from license is not a useful exercise as long as the people get what the government deems is good for them.

·       Government is far more important than family or community. The latter are transient; while a benevolent government is the true bedrock of society.

·       America is one of many nations. Moreover, it has a checkered history. It has no special role to play in the world saga.

Spalding closes the chapter as follows: ‘The result of all this is that America seems to be moving even further away from its original principles and constitutional design. While progressive ideas have not completely won the day…the dominance of these arguments – in our schools, in the public square, and in our politics – has significantly weakened the very foundations of American constitutionalism, making it all the more difficult not only to defend but more importantly to recover the ideas and institutions of America’s Founders. Is it still possible to revitalize our country’s principles and to renew our liberty?’

Unfortunately, the answer he provides in the final chapter is by far the weakest part of the book. The chapter is full of exhortations like: ‘We must return to…’; ‘We must look to the principles of the American Founders…’; ‘We must reverse this course…’; ‘Americans must be familiar with the history of the American Revolution…’; ‘We must continue to teach the principles of liberty…’; ‘We need learned judges who take the Constitution seriously…’ The point is: How? What is the actual recipe for recapturing our Constitutional republic from the hands of the progressives who have decimated the work of our Founders? Of this there is precious little in the chapter.

Perhaps this is an unfair criticism. It is only recently that more than a sliver of the population has come to appreciate the incredible damage done to our nation by progressivism and, amazingly, how far it has succeeded in fundamentally altering the nature of the United States of America. Hopefully, books like Spalding’s will spread the message and increase the size of the community of believers. If the recent Tea Party phenomenon is an indication, that might be happening. But a blueprint for reversing course – if there is even time to do so – is not to be found in Spalding’s book. For that, readers will have to look elsewhere.
This article also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

Obama Wants the US to Join Europe’s Suicide Pact

Barack Obama’s background is found in Kenya, Indonesia, Hawaii, Chicago and other parts of the United States. One wonders, therefore, why he is so smitten with Europe as a role model in his aspirations for America. A great deal has been written about how he wishes to complete the conversion of the United States from a Constitutional republic into a European-style social welfare state. All the evidence of his 15-month presidency supports this assessment. Every policy that he advocates, every word that he utters, every argument that he makes underscores his belief that America as constituted by its founders is fundamentally misconceived. The idea of a limited government republic, steeped in religious morals, holding property sacrosanct, considering itself exceptional, pursuing a free market economy, characterized by rugged individualism, and governed according to the rule of law is all repugnant to him. Instead he seeks a different America, one with a massive, all-powerful – yet benign – federal government, multiculturally diverse and unswervingly secular, sharing its wealth equally among its citizens, living peacefully and unexceptionally within a world family of nations, governed by experts who guarantee ‘social justice.’ His heroes are not George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison or Benjamin Franklin, but rather Jean Monnet, John Dewey, Antonio Gramsci and Saul Alinsky.

Yet Obama’s vision of 21st century Europe as a model for the US is belied by his seeming disdain for Europeans. He bows to the Saudi King, the Japanese Emperor and the Chinese chief thug. He curries favor from Chavez, Castro and other non-European goons. But he treats the Queen and Prime Minister of England with contempt, snubs the French and German leaders when it suits him, pulls the rug from under the Poles and Czechs, and cozies up to Medvedev. This apparent contradiction is explained by the second major way in which Obama would like the US to ape Europe. In fact he wants us to be like Europe more than just by copying its current political, economic and cultural systems. He wants us to join it in the suicide pact it has entered.

The pact is explained brilliantly in a new book by Theodore Dalrymple, The New Vichy Syndrome: Why European Intellectuals Surrender to Barbarians. This book follows in the footsteps of Mark Steyn’s America Alone and Walter Laqueur’s The Last Days of Europe. All of these well-written books describe clearly the nature of the suicide pact that the Europeans have entered into: startling low marriage rate; even more startling low birth rates; importation of foreigners – especially Muslims – to provide economic fodder to fuel the massive welfare state that the aging, childless people of Europe have accorded themselves; unwillingness to assimilate these immigrants into European society and culture, thereby creating a demographic time bomb; disarming precipitously; totally abandoning their religious heritage; denigrating their traditional culture and their cultural achievements; and surrendering sovereignty to an authoritarian, pan-European regime in Brussels.

Where Dalrymple differs from Steyn and Laqueur is that he goes into a deeper explanation of the Europeans’ rationale behind their decision to self-destruct. Indeed, why have the Europeans abandoned their historic culture and why are they intent on committing hari-kari? In this regard Dalrymple, who, unlike Steyn and Laqueur, is actually a European, can more readily understand the underlying causes as well as identify the symptoms of European sickness. Dalrymple attributes the desire to self-immolate to two main causes: the carnage that the Europeans inflicted upon themselves in two world wars and the mayhem, destruction and permanent damage they believe they inflicted on Asia and Africa in the pursuit of their colonial empires. It’s not that Steyn, Laqueur and others have not pointed out these scars on the European psyche. But Dalrymple goes deeper. His argument is essentially as follows:

The crimes of the world wars and colonialism were committed by Europeans. They are grievous crimes resulting in massive destruction, wanton death and grinding poverty. Nazism, Communism and imperialism were conceived in European minds, implemented by Europe’s ‘finest’ and – because of the cruelty, stupidity and bigotry of Europeans – these movements brought monstrous tragedy to scores of innocent people. Clearly, any culture responsible for such unparalleled evil does not merit survival. Moreover, the design flaws in European, i.e., Western Civilization that produced these awful outcomes must have been present from the beginning. Nothing that is good in European history and culture – be it soaring cathedrals, Shakespearean literature, Beethoven’s music, Newtonian science, the British legal system or Dutch commerce – none of these achievements can counteract the unspeakable barbarity unleashed by European civilization. The evil far outweighs the good. Therefore, the only way to atone for their sins is for the Europeans to destroy the culture that is responsible for these sins – i.e., to commit cultural and political suicide. And this they are hell bent on doing – with an amazing degree of success, sad to say.

Now we see why Obama likes what Europe is doing, but holds the Europeans in contempt. He too believes that Western Civilization is corrupt, misconceived and a font of evil. He would like to see it destroyed. The Europeans are doing that. But America is resisting. Obama wants us to get with the program. Why?

He has no reverence for the Constitution or for our founding principles. To the progressive mind, these principles are responsible for a country in which:

·       black people were enslaved, and even after emancipation were subjected to horrendous discrimination;

·       genocide was perpetrated upon the indigenous peoples;

·       self-appointed, property-owning WASPs controlled the country, its land, culture and commerce to the exclusion of Catholics, Jews and other minorities;

·       lands were stolen from Hispanic people in the southwest, and other lands were stolen from native Hawaiians, native Alaskans, the French, the Spanish (Florida) and even the English (Maine);

·       women were suppressed and denied their basic rights;

·       poor people, laborers and immigrants were exploited by rich business interests;

·       Japanese-American citizens were incarcerated without cause or justification;

·       aggressive and unwarranted wars were waged against Mexico, Spain and the Philippines;

·       the inequities caused by the capitalist system are gross and inexcusable; and

·       an aggressive and belligerent foreign policy is a more accurate description of our posture in the world than is ‘a beacon of freedom.’

As with Europe, the evil in America outweighs the good. Our defeat of Nazism and Communism, our prosperity, our individual freedoms, our scientific advances, our accomplishments in space exploration, our humanitarian efforts in response to natural disasters in the world – all of these are easily outweighed by our past and current sins. We deserve the same fate as the Europeans do. And if Obama can arrange it, we will suffer it. I believe that in his heart, Obama sees America – like Europe – as rotten from its inception and so it deserves to perish in its current form. Converting the United States from a Constitutional republic into a Euro-style social welfare state accomplishes two of our traitorous President’s purposes: first, it changes the fundamental nature of the nation into something much more to his tastes; and second, it is a huge step toward atonement for the sins America committed in its original incarnation.
This post also appeared as an article in The Land of the Free.Net at