Inclusion Not Dillution Or Surrender

Michael Medved opened my eyes.

On his radio show he was trying to explain on “Disagreement Day” to disheartened conservatives that trying to “purify” the Republican is not the correct course of action. The root of his argument:

You win by making your group bigger, not smaller.

First: you should not win by selling out. A win bought at so dear a price may not be worthwhile.

Second: you should not compromise your deepest principles either.

But, in my stands and beliefs there is a hierarchy: Abortion is one of my strongest concerns, to not value life is to not value life, there is no grey area. The issue of homosexual privilege is strong, though not as strong as abortion. Abortion is more external and more obviously a violation of laws and human rights and can be dealt with more legislatively than homosexual privilege.

The economy is a matter of principle: free market economics benefit the most people in a way most conducive to supporting Free Will as divised by God. But we can witness to people regardless of thier economic station and a faulty economy is less of a harm to people’s souls than abortion or homosexuality.

By balancing the hierarchy of beliefs and convictions and principles I can find ways to include people who I may have less in common with in reaching my goals.

I have no qualms working with members of the Mormon church to work for significant reinforcement of traditional marriage and the preventing of special privilege for homosexuals beyond the privilege accorded to heterosexuals, despite my serious disagreements with their beliefs.

I have no qualms working with Catholics to further the protection of the innocent unborn despite my belief that most Catholics are decieved and not Christians.

I have no problem working with athiests in pursuit of a libertarian economic policy despite serious disagreements on probably every other issue due to our differences in root beliefs.

The point is: Being wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove, I will work with any I can to achieve the ends which follow my convictions. I will be accepting and friendly to all as people so that none will have reason to say that I’m not for them as they could be for me.

With the devious I will be devious, with the narrow I will be narrow. The goal being that by any and all means, except those which violate my conscience and God’s law, we can advance the cause of physical and economic freedom here on earth for as many as possible, and hope and eternal freedom in the life hereafter for as many as will believe.

Refining this ideal is the fact that people follow a leader with a vision. It does not have to be a clearly defined vision so much as a stirring vision (or at least one spoken of stirringly, see Barack Obama). Reagan was the “Great Communicator” and people followed his visions. Barack Obama has a way with words, a visible empathy that stirs people to want to believe what he says.

Individually, we need to be ready and willing and able to act in concert with all kinds of people, making the “big tent” an actual Big Tent. Seek common ground more than ideological purity within the bounds of our own individual abilities to accept differences. Instead of finding people most like us, find people most able to bring most of us along with them in a path headed towards truth.

As a group we need to find those people who have strong and principled stands we can agree with mostly who are also strong communicators and vibrant individuals. Vision and passion have few foes who can stand against them working together.

That is my plan for real change.

Dirty Pol

Dirty politics are not what people call dirty politics.

Dirty in this context means wrong, false, lying, etc…

Truth is not dirty.

Are you with me so far?

It is a matter of fact that Bill Ayers is an unrepentant (and very lucky) terrorist.

It is a matter of fact that Jeremiah Wright (the man is unworthy of reverence) is a racist agitator.

It is a matter of fact that leading Democrats worked tirelessly to prevent any regulation of the Sub-prime mortgage market and allowed their community organizer arms to berate and bamboozle any who called for protection against this sure failure.

It is a matter of fact that Barack Obama associated himself and his family with the racist agitator Jeremiah Wright, that he valued his relationship with that man, and that he trusted his teaching and his counsel.

To make any of these factual statements is not dirty politics.

It is truth telling.

Dirty politics occur when people lie about their opponent and seek through illegal and unethical means to diminish their statements, beliefs, or person.

Dirty politicians occur more frequently than dirty politics, since even dirty politicians prefer to use the truth whenever possible to gain their desired goal.

Dirty politicians object most stridently to the truth being used against them because they have most to hide and the most to lose.

Dirty politicians cry “dirty politics” most often because they fear the truth most.

Dirty politicians know their so-very-righteous indignation is false at very best and continue using their own dirty methods to achieve their own dirty ends. Their desired end is usually their own power.

Their ultimate end is always the same.

Smile . . . It’s Just Tomorrow

I will admit it. I am sick of politics. In fact, I turned off the last Presidential debate after the first five minutes. I have become very concerned with the direction our country is heading with the spineless Republicans and arrogant Democrats running Washington. However, I just heard this song and was given a good perspective.

This is from the musical “Annie.”

The sun’ll come out
Tomorrow
Bet your bottom dollar
That tomorrow
There’ll be sun!

Just thinkin’ about
Tomorrow
Clears away the cobwebs,
And the sorrow
‘Til there’s none!

When I’m stuck with a day
That’s gray,
And lonely,
I just stick out my chin
And Grin,
And Say,
Oh!

The sun’ll come out
Tomorrow
So ya gotta hang on
‘Til tomorrow
Come what may
Tomorrow! Tomorrow!
I love ya Tomorrow!
You’re always
A day
A way!

Now, I know this has nothing to do with politics but it has something more important, attitude. No matter what we are facing, remember, tomorrow is still ahead and, thanks to the Lord and the intelligence he has given us, it will be better than today.

In my personal opinion, there are really only two essential attitudes. This first, Grit is what most growing world power has used to establish themselves. The second is . . . a smile . . .? Yes, that is all. Or, if you want to look to “Annie” again, you can look up the lyrics to “You’re Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile.” I remember when my family was going through a hard time. Our family relationships were tense and nerves were being frayed. Then, for some weird reason (do not ask me why) I resolved to wear a smile every day all day long regardless of how I felt. I will never forget the result. My family, in a nose dive, did a U-turn.

Now, I doubt that I have the emotional energy to smile all the time now (growing up does that to one), but now I remember that tomorrow will come and I have a choice. Face it like another day and let the day define me or face it with a smile and make the day be defined by me.

To me, the choice is clear and I know what I will choose. Will you join me?

All Kinds Of Ugly

There are several things which caught my eye today, so consider this another installment of I, Pandora’s “Around The World”.

First, from the pen of Thomas Sowell comes an essay on race politics: “Mascot Politics“:

Years ago, when Jack Greenberg left the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to become a professor at Columbia University, he announced that he was going to make it a point to hire a black secretary at Columbia.

This would of course make whomever he hired be seen as a token black, rather than as someone selected on the basis of competence.

Would not it be so much better to just hire the best secretary? And if they were black, all the better. Even looking at that one individual from the ubiquitous perspective of identity politics, that one black secretary, having achieved their high success through their own hard work and having overcome all comers would have done provided a better and stronger role-model for thousands and millions of other than one hundred secretaries preferentially promoted due not to their ability, but to the color of their skin. Something, incidentally, they had nothing whatsoever to do with and therefore can claim no honor for.

So it would seem that this (primarily) liberal fixation with promoting based on immutable characteristics will only continue to cheapen people.

It is a wonder the liberal in need of a secretary can get anything accomplished if they are willing to write-off potentially qualified candidates in favor of one conforming to an arbitrary stricture predetermined.

So then conservatives take of the world of bureaucracy by employing qualified secretaries regardless of their race and get so much more accomplished we’ll rule by fiat.

Next, the Czech President Klaus is ready to debate Gore on Global Warming.

Klaus, an economist, said he opposed the “climate alarmism” perpetuated by environmentalism trying to impose their ideals, comparing it to the decades of communist rule he experienced growing up in Soviet-dominated Czechoslovakia.
“Like their (communist) predecessors, they will be certain that they have the right to sacrifice man and his freedom to make their idea reality,” he said.
“In the past, it was in the name of the Marxists or of the proletariat - this time, in the name of the planet,” he added.
Klaus said a free market should be used to address environmental concerns and said he opposed as unrealistic regulations or greenhouse gas capping systems designed to reduce the impact of climate change.

McCain the hot air maverick should take note. The Global Warming issue is yet another attempt by Marxist/Communists to enslave the world in thrall to their totalitarian dystopia.

Memories of his old friends in Hanoi should be sufficient to change his mind, or else he is no man.

And finally, Germany adds to the lies by opening a memorial to the homosexual victims of the Holocaust.

Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit, who is openly gay, hailed the grey, concrete memorial as a long overdue acknowledgment of the repression of homosexuals, 50,000 of whom were convicted by Nazi courts during Adolf Hitler’s 12-year dictatorship.

“The monument consecrated today is a reminder to us of the horrors of the past and draws our attention to the degree of discrimination that currently exists,” Wowereit said.

“Great efforts will still need to be undertaken before the sight of two men or women kissing here or in Moscow or elsewhere on the planet is accepted by society in general.”

How easy it is to overlook the insignificant fact that the Nazi party was started in gay bars and by pedophiles.

The brown shirts and the Nazi youth grew out of a German young-mens group known for rampant homosexuality, and many of the leaders of the Nazi party were known for their preference for young boys.

So then, who were all these homosexuals killed in the Holocaust?

They were the effeminate “girly-men” homosexuals. Butch’s and pedophiles were the leaders, worshiping an enhanced manhood and ushering an era of super-maleness and domination. They could not brook weakness, either racially or sexually.

All this and more in “The Pink Swastika” (you can read the book in it’s entirety at that link). It is well researched and documented and a necessary read in today’s culture.

For The Love Of Power

Political Power, unlike money, is a zero sum game.

In order for one to gain and consolidate more of it, another must lose it through neglect and carelessness or bitter struggle.

At the same time, power is not necessarily directly correlated with size. A large organization can run fluidly and freely given good leadership and skilled and involved members. A power-grabbing entity does tend to bloat with those drawn to power and the ease of corruption.

It is not size that corrupts, but immoral people.

The presidential race should give us each an opportunity to see honestly and completely the morals, ethics, and skills of those who would lead us but which instead tends to show us carefully scripted appearances controlled by any number of variously corrupt entities.

The candidates themselves try to control their images. None of them have nothing to hide, and therefore, they dodge and obfuscate.

The media, with it’s control over what is shown in living rooms across the world, has a powerful ability to shape the discourse. If it doesn’t show up on the nightly news, it didn’t happen.

Charles Kessler, in a speech before Hillsdale College summarized in In Primis, speaks to the difference between size and power, and how size and corruption are not necessarily related.

Juan Gonzalez, in the New York Daily News, tells the sordid tale of pork and corruption which has birthed an amazingly idiotic tax hike in downtown New York:

No one could recall such a naked combination of arm-twisting and pork-barrel handouts to pressure City Council members to approve the huge tax increase known as congestion pricing.

The real problem is always complex and deep, but a significant part of the root is that we, the people, don’t really care.

Like Charlie Brown’s baseball team, we don’t want to be held accountable for our government. We pass the buck to the elected officials, who pass the buck on and on.

If we and a larger percentage of the population of America took responsibility for our government, there would not be a problem of usurpation of power and conglomeration of authority.

An aware and concerned citizenry is a powerful citizenry and the bane of corrupt politics everywhere.

To Some, They’re Truth

The words of Jeremiah Wright, the wrong words he’s spoken and made a central part of his message for the 20 years Barak Hussein Obama has considered him a spiritual leader, to some, they are truth.

Mr. Wright, for I do not consider him to be worthy of reverence or title beyond that of a normal man, is not the only person to preach those words either.

They are a variant of the philosophy and world view known as Liberation Theology, specifically, Black Liberation Theology.

From GotQuestions.org:

Simply put, Liberation Theology is an attempt to interpret Scripture through the plight of the poor. It is largely a humanistic doctrine. It started in South America in the turbulent 1950’s when Marxism was making great gains among the poor because of its emphasis on the redistribution of wealth, allowing poor peasants to share in the wealth of the colonial elite and thus upgrade their economic status in life. As a theology, it has very strong Roman Catholic roots.

Liberation Theology was bolstered in 1968 at the Second Latin American Bishops Conference which met in Medellin, Colombia. The idea was to study the Bible and to fight for social justice in Christian (Catholic) communities. Since the only governmental model for the redistribution of the wealth in a South American country was a Marxist model (gained in the turbulent 1950’s), the redistribution of wealth to raise the economic standards of the poor in South America took on a definite Marxist flavor. Since those who had money were very reluctant to part with it in any wealth redistribution model, the use of a populist (read poor) revolt was encouraged by those who worked most closely with the poor. As a result, the Liberation Theology model was mired in Marxist dogma and revolutionary causes…

…Liberation Theology has moved from the poor peasants in South America to the poor blacks in America. We now have Black Liberation Theology being preached in the black community. It is the same Marxist, revolutionary, humanistic philosophy found in South American Liberation Theology and has no more claim for a scriptural basis than the South American model has.

The race problem in America is real, that is undeniably true. But I do not think it is true in the way many assume it to be.

First, slavery was an inexcusable evil and a dark time for America. Today, many of us can trace roots back to those who participated, freely or under coercion, in slavery in America.

But at the same time, many of us can’t. And a significant majority have ancestors from the both the ideological North and South in their blood, as well as those who had no part at all. There has been significant immigration by all races to America after the conclusion of the Civil War and the active work of slavery.

The continuing and very real race issue was summed up by a new friend of Ed Kaitz’s. Ed had been spending time with the Vietnamese immigrants who’d settled in the Bayous of Louisiana, and while flying home he met a an American Black who’d been studying psychology and working as a prison psychologist in Missouri.

Ed tells it like this:

His answer, only a few words, not only floored me but became sort of a razor that has allowed me ever since to slice through all of the rhetoric regarding race relations that Democrats shovel our way during election season:

“We’re owed and they aren’t.”

In short, he concluded, “they’re hungry and we think we’re owed.  It’s crushing us, and as long as we think we’re owed we’re going nowhere.”

“They” are the Vietnamese Ed had spent time with, “we” are the gentleman’s own race, his fellow American Blacks.

Ed concludes his commentary on Obama’s inability to recognize the powerful forces of good in his life and the state of racism in America with this call to recognize real sources of ability and equality, accomplishment and future:

We now know that Barack Obama really has no interest in the “audacity of hope.”  With his race speech, Obama became a peddler of angst, resentment and despair.  Too bad he doesn’t direct that angst at the liberal establishment that has sold black people a bill of goods since the 1960s.  What Obama seems angry about is America itself and what it stands for; the same America that has provided fabulous opportunities for what my black friend called “hungry” minorities.  Strong families, self-reliance, and a spirit of entrepreneurship should be held up as ideals for all races to emulate.

Read Obama’s Anger at American Thinker.

Doug Ross, at Opinion Journal, quotes Nicholas Stix in Mens News Daily regarding Barak Hussein Obama’s run against Alan Keyes. Regarding Barak’s religion Nicholas has this to say:

…Obama’s closest religious advisers — Fr. Pfleger, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright of Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, and Illinois State Sen. James Meeks, who moonlights as the pastor of Chicago’s Salem Baptist Church – may have quotes from Scripture always handy, but are theologically closer to Karl Marx and black nationalism, than to Christianity… The transcendent-non-transcendent motto the Rev. Wright has given Trinity is, “Unashamedly Black and Unapologetically Christian.”

Yes, we need a Marxist president. Exactly what the country needs.

More information on Black Liberation ideology.

LA Times speaks with moral relativism and class warfare.

Roger Simon writes, in homage to Andrew Goodman “Barak, I didn’t do it for this”

And what about the New Black Panthers?

Where Is The Warming?

Thanks to Stefan at Sound Politics:

Some 3,000 scientific robots that are plying the ocean have sent home a puzzling message. These diving instruments suggest that the oceans have not warmed up at all over the past four or five years. That could mean global warming has taken a breather. Or it could mean scientists aren’t quite understanding what their robots are telling them.

PBS: The Mystery Of Global Warming’s Missing Heat

Superdelegate Spitzer And Moral Responsibility

It is not a normal thing, by any means, for IPandora to link to the DailyKo(ok)s and it’s assortment of nutroots, but truth, wherever found, is still truth.

BarbinMD wrote today:

Spitzer’s actions are in no way a reflection of Clinton’s judgement or character. But it does put an open letter sent out this weekend by super delegate Steven Grossman, the former Chairman of the DNC and Clinton supporter, in a whole new light.

And BarbinMD’s excerpt from that letter:

…our party concluded that we had demonstrated the ability to act as stewards of the national party–and of the national interest. By dint of our experience in the community and our public service, we were adjudged fit to fulfill a moral responsibility to act in the best interest of the country as we saw it–

“What they do in the bedroom is no business of mine” is a common refrain in cases of moral failure by elected government officials of all stripes and parties, usually by those who’ve invested effort in getting those officials in their positions.

If we really believe that, why are not Spitzer’s actions dismissed out of hand?

Because we don’t believe that.

What is done in the bedroom matters very much outside the bedroom.

If a man cannot honor his wife and family in his own home, his word cannot and ought not be trusted in any other part of his life.

And we know it.

Tellingly, BarbinMD completes their commentary with this gem:

All things considered, perhaps Mr. Grossman and his ilk should spare us their experience and morals and instead respect the will of the voters.

UPDATE: Roger Simon asks for a reality check-up on Alan Dershowitz who apparently doesn’t think it’s such a big deal.

And points Spitzer has made it a signature part of this platform putting prostitutes in jail.

What about the johns? And Spitzer?

UPDATE: Hugh Hewitt highlights an article by Carol Platt Liebau “Will Spitzer Resign” in which she makes the following statements:

…(Spitzer) may not plan to resign.  If that’s true, it’s part of a new and troubling pattern in American political life.  It’s not a partisan thing; Larry Craig’s refusal to resign was another manifestation of it.

The whole idea, pioneered by you-know-who and enabled by you-know-who-else, is that illicit sexual behavior and the scandals resulting therefrom can be brazened out by the insistence that they are irrelevant to the discharge of public duties.

…it’s all part of a new ethical calculus concluding that – uniquely in the constellation of virtues — sexual morality is a subjective and purely personal matter that’s of relevance only to “religious” people (or else prurient and “judgmental” ones), even when it impacts the public.

IPandora is ashamed to say we did not trumpet the call for Mr. Craig’s resignation. In defense, I thought there was a lot of condemning going on and not a lot of proof or evidence at the time.

Nothing against the condemning, just when I wasn’t convinced of the burden of proof I wasn’t ready to condemn.

Now That It’s Clear

With McCain having actually won the nomination, free and clear, the real work begins. We must not only convince American conservatives that McCain is a workable choice that we should be willing to put effort into electing, we must also show Americans in general how McCain is so vastly superior a choice for effective and constitutional leadership of America.

To do this there ought to be a “dream team” of the former presidential contenders, working together, giving speeches, stumping for McCain.

I have often thought one of the biggest failures of conservatism is it’s inability to spread it message effectively.

Liberalism has the entire university and college and public school system. It has the media and the combined peer pressure of millions of sheeple living around us.

Conservatism exists because people in the real world, working hard and living on the fruits of their own labor, realize the purpose and power of personal property and the necessity of personal responsibility and moral self-governance.

We need to get this message out, showing incontrovertible proof of the superiority of conservative principles in all of life.

The way we do this without the ‘help’ the left gets for their ideas from bastions of culture, is to make it so accessible and frequent as to be unavoidable by the common masses and our intellectual enemies, those who need more convincing.

This is not politics, this is necessity.

Super Duper Election Linkfest

From Doug Ross: Gomer Melts Down - Huckabee claims there’s a conspiracy against him, and proceeds to lose the facts left and right. Such as the fact that Clear Channel and Sean Hannity are not affiliated. Hannity is syndicated by ABC Radio.

Come on Huck, give it up already. You’ve damaged God, America, Arkansas (on top of the damage the Clintons have done to that (otherwise) fine state), and now you’re just hurting yourself.

WorldMagBlog asks Christian liberals to reexamine the nature of their belief: Evangelical Liberals Rejection Of Reality (link invalid):

If you set government policy based on bad economics — i.e. policies based on economic principles that do not correspond to the way God created the world to operate — they will be counterproductive and bring unhappy results. They won’t “work.”

Hugh sees Romney surging and talk radio leading:

Once the score was clear after Florida –a McCain or Romney nomination– the Republican base quickly began to rally to Romney because the Republican base cares deeply about the issues that bind the Reagan coalition –tax cuts, originalist judges, free markets, and of course the value of unborn life and traditional marriage.

And WorldMagBlog tells us what to watch (link invalid):

Super Tuesday will be key to deciding the presidential nominees but don’t expect the race for the nomination to end today — especially for the Democrats. McCain’s lead over Romney is widening, and if he captures the most states and delegates tonight he should emerge the clear victor. Obama has narrowed Clinton’s once-wide lead and Democrats award victory based on a combination of popular vote, delegates won, and states won. Expect some spin once the votes come in.

Now, stop reading and GO VOTE!