The Impeachment Issue

MONTY PELERINMARCH 4, 2014

The question of the day, at least in my mind, was the question of the day four years ago. When will the Democrats turn on Barack Obama?

Even the most cynical among us regarding political ethics and integrity know there is some point when the supporters turn.Bruce Bialosky discussed this issue in an excellent piece:

We are all guilty of providing a wide leeway to a politician that we favor. If the politician is someone we support, we restrain ourselves when something becomes public that would have us in a tizzy if done by someone with whom we dislike politically. That is referred to as “cutting someone some slack.” But there is a limit for everyone like there was for Anthony Weiner or Larry Craig. When will the grownups in the Democratic Party say enough is enough with Barack Obama?

How Bad Is It?

There is no economic recovery; nor can there be one given Obama’s policies. ObamaCare is a known disaster, acknowledged as much by many of its supporters and those most vulnerable to voter wrath. Creatures will continue to crawl out from under rocks as this monstrosity unfolds.

Obama is now readying to present a budget that claims that his first five years represented “austerity” and it is now time for government to begin spending again. Delusional is the only word that comes to mind regarding this belief.

The word “tyranny” is increasingly used to describe Obama’s style of governance. He clearly believes that his branch of the government is more equal than the other two branches. He did not believe that until he became president.

Scandal fatigue is another factor. No other Administration has been so embroiled in the number, magnitude and Constitutionally pertinent scandals. No other Administration has “stonewalled” investigations like this one. Richard Nixon was threatened with impeachment and asked to resign over what looks like jaywalking compared to the egregious improprieties of this Administration. Forty-year old ethics (which weren’t much when Nixon held office) would have forced impeachment hearings and probable resignation in Obama’s first term.

Internationally the world doubts whether the US can be trusted. Long-term allies distance themselves; long-term enemies are emboldened. Obama’s kumbaya version of diplomacy has been an utter failure. Realpolitic has overpowered his fairyland vision.

American has never been held in less esteem by the international community. Obama now ranks behind the hapless Jimmy Carter in terms of international respect. The world is substantially more dangerous as a result of his leadership (probably not a word that should be used in the same paragraph with “Obama”).

Is It Bad Enough?

As the Democrats approach a potential Waterloo election for them, political self-interest and survival could cause them to force a Weiner, Craig or Nixon moment upon Barack Obama. For several years I believed that would occur and that it would have occurred before now. I no longer believe it will happen. Three reasons have changed my opinion:

1. The Democrat Party has no easy solution to their problems. Having this President impeached is the right thing to do, given the Constitutional and (potentially) criminal violations that have occurred. That action would create an enormous blot on the Party that would linger for years. “Kicking this can down the road” is a way of not incurring that damage now. From a political (not ethical or legal) standpoint that is probably a prudent decision. After all, this albatross is gone in about three years.
2. I suspect, without any evidence, that the White House has information on every power player in Washington as a result of NSA monitoring. Most, if not all, of these powerful men and women have scandals, illegalities or other improprieties in their closets. The NSA can and probably already has obtained information on them. Congressmen that fit this category are easily dissuaded (blackmailed) from creating problems for the President. One wonders whether this tactic was used against General Petraeus, Chief Justice Roberts and others. Surely, the large numbers of high-ranking military removed from office would not all sit idly by and watch the country deteriorate.
3. Even if the prior point were false, Obama believes that he is “above the law.” He also appears to be clinically delusional. It is doubtful that a Congressional delegation providing him with a “go to Nixon” meeting would do any good.

Mr. Bialosky ends his piece with the following:

It is time for Democrats to stand and say no more. If you don’t do it now there could be permanent harm to our democracy. Certainly some of you will no longer be in office come this November because the American people will certainly say enough is enough.

Sadly, it was time long before this to say “no more.” It wasn’t done then and it will not be done now unless there is some piece of evidence that is so egregious that the Dems will judge it more costly to not act than to act. Even so, 25% of the country will continue to support Obama regardless of the evidence.

That is the state of our democracy. Ignorance has already permanently harmed it. An informed electorate would never have elected this man in the first place, and certainly not twice!

I just took action to strengthen our energy future. Join me and take action now.

I just took action to strengthen our energy future. Join me and take action now.

How Freedom Dies

How Freedom Dies
By Patrick J. Buchanan

 

Tuesday - February 25, 2014

"Religious Right Cheers a Bill Allowing Refusal to Serve Gays."

Thus did the New York Times' headline, leaving no doubt as to who the black hats are, describe the proposed Arizona law to permit businesses, on religious grounds, to deny service to same-sex couples.

Examples of intolerance provided by the Times:

"In New Mexico, a photographer declined to take pictures of a lesbian couple's commitment ceremony. In Washington State, a florist would not provide flowers for a same-sex wedding. And in Colorado, a baker refused to make a cake for a party celebrating the wedding of two men."

The question Gov. Jan Brewer faces?

Should Christians, Muslims, Mormons who refuse, on religious grounds, to serve same-sex couples -- that photographer, that florist, that baker, for example -- be treated as criminals?

Or should Arizona leave them alone?

"Religious freedom," said Daniel Mach of the ACLU to the Times, is "not a blank check to ... impose our faith on our neighbors."

True. But who is imposing whose beliefs here?

The baker who says he's not making your wedding cake? Or those who want Arizona law to declare that either he provides that wedding cake and those flowers for that same-sex ceremony, or we see to it that he is arrested, prosecuted and put out of business?

Who is imposing his views and values here?

What we are seeing in Arizona in microcosm is what we have witnessed in America for half a century: the growing intolerance of those who preach tolerance and the corruption of the concept of civil rights.

We have seen the progression before.

In 1954, the Supreme Court declared that segregation in public schools was wrong and every black child must be allowed to attend his or her neighborhood school. By 1968, the court was demanding that white children be forcibly bussed across entire cities to insure an arbitrary racial balance.

Under the civil rights acts of the 1960s, businesses were told that in hiring, promotion, pay, and benefits, black and white, men and women must be treated alike. Equality of opportunity.

But, soon, that was no longer enough. We needed equality of result.

Corporations were ordered to maintain extensive records of the race, gender, ethnicity and sexual preferences of their entire work force to prove they were not guilty of discrimination.

And if your work force is insufficiently diverse today, you are a citizen under suspicion in a country we used to call the Land of the Free.

Consider how far we have come.

Virtually all decisions to hire, fire, promote or punish employees, to oversee the sale and rental of housing, to ensure that all minorities have access to all restaurants, hotels and motels, are under the jurisdiction of these minions who are right out of Orwell's "1984."

Scores of thousands of bureaucrats -- academic, corporate, government -- are on watch, overseeing our economy, patrolling our society, monitoring our behavior.

A radical idea: Suppose we repealed the civil rights laws and fired all the bureaucrats enforcing these laws.

Does anyone think hotels, motels and restaurants across Dixie, from D.C. to Texas, would stop serving black customers? Does anyone think there would again be signs sprouting up reading "whites" and "colored" on drinking foundations and restrooms?

Does anyone think restrictive covenants against Jews would be rewritten into contracts on houses? Does anything think that bars and hotels would stop serving blacks and Hispanics?

In his indictment of George III, Jefferson wrote of the king: "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance."

Is that not what we have today in spades?

Why do we need this vast army of bureaucrats?

They exist to validate the slander that America is a racist, sexist, homophobic and xenophobic country which would revert to massive discrimination were it not for heroic progressives standing guard.

And, indeed, some bigots might revert to type. But so what?

Cannot a free people deal with social misconduct with social sanctions?

And isn't this what freedom is all about? The freedom of others to say things we disagree with, to publish ideas we disbelieve in, even to engage in behavior we dislike?

As for the Christians of Arizona and same-sex unions in Arizona, if they don't like each other, can they not just avoid each other? After all, it's a big state.

Why will we not see the lapsing or repeal of civil rights laws whose work is done? That would mean cracking the rice bowls of hundreds of thousands of diversicrats who would then have to apply for jobs from folks they have spent their lives harassing.

Last year, the Supreme Court struck down the preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Yet, somehow, Mississippi still has more black elected officials than any other state.

If the conditions that called for the laws of the 1960s have ceased to exist, why do those laws still exist?

Intervene? Or End Syrian War?

Friday - February 28, 2014 at 2:08 am

By Patrick J. Buchanan

Whether saber rattling or not, word is out that the White House is “rethinking its options” on intervening in the Syrian war.

The collapse of John Kerry’s Geneva 2 talks between the rebels and regime, the lengthening casualty lists from barrel-bomb attacks, and a death toll approaching 150,000, are apparently causing second thoughts.

All the usual suspects are prodding Obama to plunge in, if not with troops, at least with a no-fly zone to prevent Bashar Assad from using his air power.

Our frustration is understandable. Yet it does not change the reality. This is not America’s war. Never was. As Obama said, it is “somebody else’s civil war.”

Still, the case against intervention needs to be restated.

First and foremost, Obama has no authority to go to war in Syria, for Congress has never voted to authorize such a war.

An unprovoked attack on Syria would be an impeachable act.

Last August, the American people were almost unanimously opposed to intervention. The firestorm they created was why Congress ran away from the Obama-Kerry plan for missile strikes.

So if Obama has no authority to attack Syria, and America does not want a war, why, after Iraq and Afghanistan, would Obama divide his nation and plunge his country into that civil war?

What are the arguments for intervention? Same old, same old.

America has a moral obligation to end the barbarism. At the time of Rwanda we said, “Never again!” Yet it is happening again. And we have a “Responsibility to Protect” Syrians from a dictator slaughtering his own people.

But while what is happening in Syria is horrible, all Middle East ethnic-civil-sectarian wars tend to unfold this way.

And if there is a “moral” obligation to intervene, why does it not apply to Israel and Turkey, Syria’s nearest neighbors? Why does that moral duty not apply to the European Union, upon whose doorstep Syria sits? Why is it America’s moral obligation, 5,000 miles away?

It is not. The Turks, Israelis, EU and Gulf Arabs who hate Assad would simply like for us to come and fight their war for them.

The Washington Post says we must address not only the moral “nightmare,” but also the “growing threat … to vital U.S. interests.”

Exactly what “vital interests” is the Post talking about? Syria has been ruled by the Assads for 40 years.

And how have our vital interests been imperiled?

And if our vital interests are imperiled, how much more so are those of Israel and Turkey? Yet neither has chosen to invest the blood of their sons in bringing Assad down.

If we have an enemy in this fight, it is al-Qaida, the al-Nusra Front, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, all of which are terrorist and implacably anti-American.

And who is keeping these enemies of ours out of Damascus?

Assad, Hezbollah, Iran and our old friend Vladimir Putin.

And who has been supplying the terrorists? Our friends in the Gulf, with weapons funneled through Turkey, our NATO ally.

Have the interventionists who are beside themselves watching all these insurrections and wars breaking out thought through what is likely to happen if we intervene?

The Syrian war would become a more savage affair, as Assad would know he was now in a fight to the finish. As U.S. air power was committed to the defeat of Assad, his allies would likely provide more weapons for his defense. Casualties could soar and the probability of a wider war would increase geometrically.

Should Assad fall, his routed soldiers and Alawaites and Christians would face reprisals for which we would be morally responsible, as it was our intervention that brought this about. We might have to intervene with troops to stop a massacre by jihadists.

And if Assad fell, pro-Western rebels would likely have to fight the al-Qaida rebels for power. Syria could come apart, and we would own it.

Obama’s frustration is understandable. He said two years ago Assad must go. Assad flipped him off. Obama said use of chemical weapons would be a “red line” which, if crossed, would bring serious consequences. Assad’s troops apparently crossed that line.

What did we do? Worked with Russia to remove the weapons.

Washington is enraged that Putin continues to support Assad.

But Assad’s regime is the recognized and legal government of Syria. Russia has a naval base in Latakia, is owed billions by Damascus, and has been Syria’s ally for decades.

Why should Putin abandon Assad at our request?

What have we done for him lately? Besides send Billy Jean King to his Olympics? Why, Putin might ask, should he abandon his Syrian allies rather than us, the Turks, and Gulf Arabs abandoning ours?

There is a grave moral issue here — for us.

How, under just war theory, can we continue to sustain a conflict that is killing thousands every month with no end in sight? Are we not morally obliged to try to stop such a war?

Stop The Killing Of Black Babies

The Unmarked, Matte-Gray Crown Vic (+playlist)

Mark Levin: An Articulate, Knowledgeable, Confident Conservative Can Win | CNS News

Mark Levin: An Articulate, Knowledgeable, Confident Conservative Can Win | CNS News