"Conservative Media" Bootlickers for a President Trump?

As we head into the end of the most heartbreaking presidential cycle in American history my guess is that we will be talking about “President Elect Trump” at the end of the week. Of course I say that having thought Mitt Romney was going to beat Barack Obama 4 years ago…

A President Trump will present the nation with a raft of challenges… The first is the hope that his thin skin and short temper or his mancrush on Vladimir Putin don’t get us into a war. Beyond that, there are countless other things we hope he gets right, such as the Supreme Court, actually building a wall and streamlining the tax code. I say hope because if Donald Trump has shown us one thing, it’s been that he’ll say whatever he thinks will get him what he wants, and that his words and his deeds are often different by galactic proportions.

But this piece isn’t about Donald Trump… This piece is about the so called “conservative media” such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Fox News, Drudge, etc. For decades we’ve listened to these people or outlets tell us that the mainstream media is nothing more than a mouthpiece for the Democrat party. They’ve shown us, time and time again the hypocrisy of the New York Times, CNBC, the AP, CBS and the rest. And they’ve largely been right. If it’s Scooter Libby being falsely accused of leaking secrets he’s enemy number 1, but if it’s Hillary Clinton leaving classified information on a deliberately unsecure server open to hacking, it’s nothing more than the Republicans trying to destroy a strong woman for a minor oversight.

The question is, will the “conservative” media be half or even a quarter as objective when it comes to a President Trump? Frankly, I doubt it. Thus far, through the election cycle, Breitbart, Drudge, Rush and most of all Sean Hannity have been nothing more than bootlickers for Donald Trump. Can you imagine their response if Harry Reid had been caught on tape talking about grabbing women the way Donald Trump was? Can you imagine what their response would have been had Nancy Pelosi said that he could stand in the middle of the street and shoot someone and get away with it? What would their response be if Barack Obama had refused to release his tax returns or if the claims of charitable giving and the reality had been as different as it appears to be with Donald Trump? My guess is that the conservative media would have had a field day with all of that. But Donald Trump gets a pass on that and much more.

We already know that the mainstream media will vilify a President Trump at every turn. But that, frankly, is unimportant. Why? Because we already know that the mainstream media is indeed a Democrat tool, and, more importantly, their decades of hyperbole as it relates to Republicans have caused a significant segment of the population to simply tune them out. When the Democrat media painted Mitt Romney as a horrible human being who abused dogs and let family members of employees die, you knew they were utterly worthless. There were many things with which one could disagree with Romney on, but he is fundamentally a good man and most Americans recognize that. As such, when a mere four years later the media started to try and flail Donald Trump, who is much closer to actually being a vile human being, many people brushed it off as just more of the same.

With much of the public the mainstream media has zero credibility as a source of actual, factual news. Although a President Trump may give them much fodder to work with that is demonstrably true, like the boy who cried wolf, a significant portion of the population will dismiss it simply because of their long history of past cries. And so we are left with a conservative media to keep a President Trump and his ego in check. Two years ago I would have bet that it was possible to depend on Rush, Matt and Breitbart to keep an errant GOP president in check, but today I have grave doubts… and that’s a problem, particularly for a GOP president who has such a big ego, so few morals and almost no concept of limited government or understanding of the Constitution.

If the United States emerges from Donald Trump’s first – and likely only – term as a functioning republic, it will only be because somehow some conservative voice or voices decided that the Constitution was more important than being part of Team Trump and willingly stood up to the populist mob. The reality is, Donald Trump’s acceptance of the Constitution’s separation of powers, his fundamental understanding of the 10th Amendment and his dedication to individual liberty are no greater than Barack Obama’s are. But Barack Obama had conservatives who challenged his usurping of power, even if Congress and the Courts didn’t. Donald Trump will not have that thorn.

 While it’s certain that the mainstream media will hold his feet to the fire, their credibility is gone. It will only be conservatives who point to the Constitution as the fount of – and yoke on – government power who will have the credibility to objectively challenge his actions. The behavior of the “conservative” media over the last year one does have inspire great confidence that they will challenge President Trump as he seeks to turn Washington into his personal fiefdom. But I'm open to being pleasantly surprised.  Let’s hope that somewhere there emerges a voice who will not fall under the spell of the next Narcissist in Chief when he succeeds our current one.  Maybe then the discussion can get back to limiting government to only those things it's actually empowered to do rather than the things that the strongman in the White House wants it to do.

Rome Long Survived Countless Incompetent, Narcissistic Emperors, Will America Survive Barack Obama and His Successor?

I'm writing this while sitting on a cruise ship that’s docked in Mallorca, Spain. I'm heading to France and have just spent 4 days in Italy. I've only had a cursory look at the news from home, and what I've caught has been depressing, like this entire election cycle.

One of the most interesting things about this trip thus far - other than the obvious visits to Pompeii, the Coliseum and St. Peter's - has been observing how things work - or don't - and talking with people who live in Italy. The first thing you discover in Naples is that the place is absolute chaos. Driving is life threatening, things are expensive and the trash situation is a disaster. And that is from a tourist perspective, and we get to see the city's good side! For Italians it's far worse, particularly businesses, and it's not just Naples. The Italian government takes half of your REVENUE, strangles you with regulations and can’t provide basic services for anyone. At our Rome hotel our host asked us to make sure we turned off the light in the room because electricity is so expensive it might be the difference between his breaking even or taking a loss on our stay. A friend living in Naples told us that Italians rarely turn on heat in winter because the price of gas is too high.

This all comes on the heels of my having listened earlier this year to the History of Rome podcast. The most interesting thing about that history was the fact that the Roman Empire lasted for over 500 years... Or 1,500 years if you count the Eastern Empire. They had some spectacular rulers such as Augustus, Trajan, and Marcus Aurelius, and some of the worst in Caligula, Nero and Domitian. You would somehow think the Empire couldn't survive such incompetence and perniciousness, but somehow it would. So you ask yourself, cannot America survive whichever disastrous candidate emerges victorious from the 2016 election? If the Roman Empire could survive 500 years can't the US survive Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump? The truth is, I'm not sure, and I lean towards no...

Rome may have been a sophisticated empire, may have built thousands of structures that have survived two millennia, but make no mistake, the Rome that built an Empire and ruled the known world was a brute power. They survived by waging war on their enemies and taking their resources. As long as Rome was at war and winning, it was (mostly) strong. What's more, the Roman Empire was a dictatorship. The position of Emperor was usually passed from Father to son - sometimes adopted for that specific purpose - but there were countless coups where the resulting emperor was the man who controlled the most powerful legions or the one who bribed the Praetorian Guard. In essence Rome was a dictatorship that survived by taking the resources of its neighbors and supplicants.

But America is not that. Although the United States did grow partially by winning wars against the British, Indians, and others, geographically it has been largely static for over a century. We even gave up wide swaths of land – or more accurately, didn’t take them – after having won wars across the planet. In addition, the United States has never been a dictatorship. It has always been a nation where the leader has been elected by citizens, if indirectly. More importantly however, it has been a nation where the Constitution reigned supreme. From John Adams to Abraham Lincoln to Richard Nixon, the Constitution ultimately ruled the day. The limited government based on that Constitution is what has made America the most powerful and important nation in human history. We’ve sat atop of the world's hierarchy of power and influence for over half a century not because we subjugated our neighbors but because we inspired the world with individual freedom and economic opportunity that were based on that limited government. At the same time the economic prosperity sown by our freedom was coupled with a military position that largely dissuaded enemies from attacking us and our allies and gave much of the world confidence to trade somewhat freely with one another.

In November of 2016 however we find ourselves at a point where everything that has made America great is in peril, and the wound is self inflicted. At least the Roman people had the "excuse" that they lived in a dictatorship. Americans don't have that excuse. Not only is the culture under assault from within and without, far more importantly, the primary notion that government is limited to only those things it is specifically empowered to do is lost. Today the government is involved in virtually every aspect of American's lives. That is a recipe for economic stagnation and political ruin. Take a look at the remains of the Roman Empire to see the future of America... Italy – and much of Europe – is an economic basket case and quickly becoming a cultural one as well.

Government is a borg that grows until it is stopped. Our Constitution used to do that. Today it no longer does. Unlike the Roman citizenry who often found themselves ruled at the end of a sword, Americans have willingly put themselves in this position. Not only by putting two reprehensible human beings, two power hungry narcissists in a position to rule the country, but by buying into the notion that the government is the first and best vehicle for solving virtually every problem. Nothing could be farther from the truth, and there is the core problem: Americans, or an increasingly large portion of them want the government to take care of them, from cradle to grave and everywhere in between. Whether it’s providing them with an income, protecting them from evil businesses or limiting the offensive speech of others, we have become a nation of citizens who can no longer take care of themselves or aren’t willing to do so. Either way, with Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump in the White House individual freedom and economic liberty will continue to shrink. So too will prosperity and much of what remains of the American Dream. One wonders what will be the legacy of America in 2,000 years. No doubt, if someone is writing a history of America and chronicles her demise they will surely include Barack Obama and his successor as key players to her downfall, but the primary culprit will have been the American people, who voted to have the government replace individual liberty, individual responsibility and common sense.

Sure, Donald Trump may shiv us... but the country can't survive Hillary Clinton's thugs

Jonah Goldberg had a great piece over at National Review on Saturday. The title was: If Candidate Trump Can’t Be Managed, What Makes You Think President Trump Could Be? He makes a strong argument that a President Trump is going to be a disaster for the country, the Republican party, and particularly conservatives. He suggests that a President Trump will lie, obfuscate and essentially rule as the liberal Democrat he’s been his entire life. He makes a particularly strong argument that Trump will renege on his promise to appoint conservatives to the Supreme Court.

His critique of Trump should not be interpreted as an endorsement of Hillary Clinton however, because it’s not. He dislikes Hillary Clinton seemingly almost as much as he despises Trump. Here however is the crux of the piece: “But here’s the thing: Conservatives know how to oppose Clinton, who will come into office the most damaged and unpopular president in American history, having fulfilled her mandate to not be Trump on Day One. But it’s already very clear they do not know how to oppose Trump.”

Goldberg believes that America can survive another 4 years of fascist liberalism building on the last 8 from Barack Obama. This, largely because the GOP would fight her tooth and nail at virtually every point. He doesn’t believe however that conservatism can survive 4 years of President Trump because erstwhile conservatives will simply become lapdogs for a GOP president, even if he doesn’t govern like one.

I agree with almost every word of his piece, but I disagree with his conclusion. I agree that the GOP will more easily fight a Democrat president than they will a GOP president, but the fact of the matter is, that the reason we’re in this spot in the first place is because the GOP establishment did virtually nothing to stop Barack Obama from doing anything he wanted to. The GOP establishment has spent much of the last eight years rolling out the red carpet of acquiescence to Barack Obama simply out of fear that they would be called racists for doing so – or, in the case of immigration, because they agreed with him. What makes Goldberg think that they will be any less likely to push back on Hillary’s policies when Democrats start accusing them of being sexist in a country where 54% of voters are women?

Sure, she’s less popular than Obama is, but the GOP establishment is fundamentally made up of squishes who cry at the first boo. Imagine, they couldn’t even get up the courage to stop Obama from giving away control of the Internet, arguably the single most important economic, political and social tool developed in the last half century, to organizations run by tyrants and third world dictators, what makes Goldberg think they will fight Clinton on tax rates for “the rich” or regulations “insuring the uninsured”?

At the end of the day I have no illusions about Donald Trump being a good president. Goldberg’s right, he’s a liberal Democrat and will likely govern as such. But sadly, the choice we have isn’t between a liberal Democrat and a conservative. That ship sailed when the Democrats, the media and the GOP establishment pushed Ted Cruz over the side. No, we’ve got a choice between two liberal Democrats, albeit with one who is arguably slightly less liberal.

But here’s the thing… Goldberg says that the US can survive 4 more years of Barack Obama’s policies because the GOP will fight his heir. Neither the premise nor the conclusion of that statement are true. The GOP will not fight, and the country may not survive, at least not as a republic governed by the Constitution. Four more years of unfettered immigration and filling the courts with treacherous liberals will be enough to eviscerate any chance conservatives have to pull the country back from the abyss of progressive socialism and unfettered government intervention in every aspect of our lives. Adding millions of voters from Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, the Middle East and Africa will result in Democrats becoming the ruling party of record for literally generations. At a time when Republicans control record levels of government at the state level – in 23 states they control the governor’s office AND both houses of the legislature vs. 7 states for the Democrats – they have spent the last 8 years getting steamrolled by Democrats in Washington. Between the cancer of liberals on the courts and the extra constitutional operations of the Obama administration and the Washington bureaucracy, the chances of reining in Washington grows ever more remote.

Today, with possibly the most flawed candidate ever to run on a major party ticket, the Democrats are still poised to win the White house. Fast forward to 2020 after Hillary Clinton has expanded immigration from 3rd world banana republics from around the world and given millions of “new Americans” voting rights. Will there ever be another election as close as Bush Gore? No. Will the spineless GOP establishment ever have the stones to allow the nomination of an actual conservative? No. Will conservatism, limited government and individual freedom survive? No?

Goldberg suggests the country can survive another 4 years. He’s wrong. In four years the Democrats will have a virtual supermajority of takers and that spells the end of freedom and limited government as we know it. Trump may betray voters on every promise he’s ever made, including on the border and the courts… that would not surprise me. But on the other hand, he may not.

Yes, we know that Donald Trump may shiv us in the shower, but there’s a chance he won’t. With Hillary Clinton there is no such chance. Not will she shiv us, she’ll bring her gang of thugs with her to make sure that the job gets done and conservatism is left bleeding and dying on the floor, never again to see the light of day.

Goldberg is right, Trump would be a terrible, horrible, liberal president… but on the two most important issues of our time, the courts and immigration, there is a speck of hope that he will do the right thing. With Clinton there is none, and the country can’t survive to lose on them.

Thoughts on Trump - When Life Gives You Lemons...

While I’ve come to despise Donald Trump, I hope he wins in November…

Donald Trump is a lying, manipulating, protectionist big government Democrat. I’ll still be voting for him, however, because Hillary Clinton is all of that and more. She will keep the welcome mat open for illegal immigrants from all sorts of 3rd world countries in order to create more Democrat voters. Donald Trump at least claims that he will build a wall along the southern border and tighten immigration from places rampant with Islamic terror.

The other critical issue is the Supreme Court. Donald Trump released a list of potential Supreme Court nominees that has pleased many conservatives. He has stated on numerous occasions that he plans on nominating conservatives to the Supreme Court. He may not, but we know for a fact that Hillary Clinton will nominate nothing but hardcore leftists in the vein of Justice Ginsberg and Justice Sotomayor.

Together immigration and the Supreme Court are the two biggest issues on the ballot in November. Between working to turn the US into a lefty paradise of a failed 3rd world country and eviscerating the freedoms contained in the Bill of Rights, I’m not sure the country can survive another four years of the statist Obama agenda. On both issues Donald Trump claims he will do the right thing while Hillary Clinton will do the exact opposite. As a known liar we may indeed be disappointed by Trump, but at least there is a chance he will keep his word and do the right thing. With Clinton there is zero chance.

Of course, one has to wonder if Donald Trump really wants to be President. He’s been running for the job for a year – and on and off numerous times before that – but he doesn’t seem to be interested in winning. Since he secured the nomination almost three months ago, and since the convention one month ago, Trump has focused almost all of his attention on his GOP critics and the media, rather than Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton is possibly the worst candidate the Democrats have ever nominated. Apart from her demonstrated incompetence, her treachery over Benghazi, her lies about her email server, her slush fund known as the Clinton Foundation and the fact that voters seem to barely be able to tolerate her, she’s a superstar. But somehow Donald Trump has figured out how to trail someone who would probably lose to “None of the Above” if that was the only other choice. Although his trip to Louisiana and his recent mea culpa were steps in the right direction, it remains to be seen if those are the beginning of a focused campaign to win or merely a feint in a long term plan to lose.

And of course it’s comical that I get emails every day from the Trump campaign seeking money. I will never send Donald Trump a single dollar. Why? Because he’s the one who brags that he’s worth $10 billion and that he’d be the only guy in the race funding his own campaign. It’s not that I wouldn’t want to help keep Clinton out of the White House, I do, but there’s no chance I would send the Trump Campaign money that they would simply use to attack Ted Cruz or the media or some other pointless ego salving debacle rather than focus on Clinton. The truth is, if I had $10 billion in the bank, I’d be more than happy to spend at least $9 billion of it winning the presidency, because while making lots money is no doubt fun – I imagine – saving the greatest nation in history is truly something exceptional.

Donald Trumps’s basic problem isn’t that he can’t attract moderates… his problem is that much of the conservative base – this writer included – pretty much hate him. While I’ll be voting for him, lots of others, particularly those in the Never Trump camp won’t be. If he can’t get his base out, he loses going away. There are simply not that many union members disaffected enough with the Democrats to make up for tepid support from the base.

My suggestion to Trump, if he wants to reengage conservatives, would be to release a list of his intended cabinet nominees, at least for those appointments conservatives care about. For Secretary of State, John Bolton, for Secretary of Defense, the slightly damaged David Petraeus, Rudy Guiliani for Attorney General… maybe. There are others too, such as perhaps Michelle Rhee for Education Secretary and others focused on streamlining government for positions in the EPA, the Department of Energy and the IRS. The ranks of the American Enterprise Institute, the Mises Institute and the American Center for Law and Justice would be great places to start.

Of course this might not be enough and those people might not accept anyway… but the reality is, Donald Trump has to get conservatives and the Never Trump people to hold their noses and pull the lever for him, otherwise it’s President Clinton all over again. And that really is the point. I’ve pretty much come to despise Donald Trump, half for everything he’s done and half for the stupidity of the GOP establishment for foisting him on us, but as much as I despise him, I love my country more, and while I’m leery of what he might do, I’m downright frightened that the country can’t survive what I know Hillary Clinton will do.

And finally, there is impeachment.  If Clinton were to get in, there is less than zero chance she would be impeached and convicted, regardless of what she might do.  She could literally set fire to the Constitution and she'd have no problem.  Trump however is a different story.  If gets into office and he steps out of line, or the Trump University comes back with a loss, there is a real possibility of impeachment and conviction as both Democrats and many Republicans would be happy to vote for both...

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade.  Donald Trump is lemonade.  Hillary Clinton is lemonade laced with strychnine... I'll take the regular lemonade, please.

Hillary Clinton: Where George Orwell Meets the Borg...

A few months ago, with his usual hyperbole Donald Trump boasted that he could shoot someone in the middle of 5th Avenue and his supporters would still vote for him. Sadly, I think he’s probably right. What’s becoming more apparent every day however is that Hillary Clinton could probably make the same boast with equal accuracy.

Why do I say that? Well, the first point is that Clinton is the nominee at all. Given the disaster Libya has become, given the events of Benghazi in 2012 and her proven lies about it, given the fact that ISIS is a direct result of the Obama Administration’s exit from Iraq – during her tenure – one has to wonder how she even made it past the first set of primaries. How is it that there was no other candidate who could come even close to beating her? While the cards were in fact stacked in her favor, while Bernie Sanders appealed to a small segment of the Democrat party, elsewhere there was never any real clamor for another candidate. Ask yourself, if Benghazi had been a GOP operation, would the Secretary of State overseeing it have been the GOP nominee four years later? Can you imagine the withering attacks he or she would have endured from the press? No chance they would have survived past March. Can you imagine the grilling a GOP Sec of State would take if he told the parents of one of the dead a lie just moments before telling her family the truth, then turned around and lied to the nation? Of course… but Clinton had to face none of that.

Next, her email problems have been in the air for years. It’s obvious to anyone other than the willingly blind that she set up that server for the specific purpose of hiding her correspondence from the prying eyes of Congress and pesky reporters with the FOI requests. And as has now been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, she lied to Congress and the American people and maybe even the FBI about her handling of Top Secret information. How is it possible that supporters feel that someone who has such little regard for American secrets should be in charge of the entire American intelligence apparatus? The security apparatus? The justice apparatus? Can you imagine the press coverage if a Republican was responsible for a breach that may have caused the death of an Iranian scientist helping the United States? With Clinton, little more than crickets.

How about the Russian Reset? Clinton famously kicked off the Russian Reset which was supposed to begin a new cooperative friendship between the US and Russia. Since then Russia has been anything but friendly. They’ve hacked American government computers, used gas as a weapon to intimidate Europe, they’ve threatened the Baltics and they’ve been harassing American diplomats across Europe. And don’t forget, a year after she left office our new Russian friends invaded Ukraine and annexed Crimea, That certainly seems like she built a strong foundation of friendship.

And finally then there’s the Clinton Foundation, that billion dollar vehicle largely funded by groups – read Wall Street banks and Middle Eastern governments – who are ostensibly anathema to her basic “principles” of support for the middle class and poor against the rich and support for gay rights. The fact that the foundation seems to be little more than a vehicle for enriching the Clintons, and is now under investigation by the FBI, New York, Washington and Little Rock seems to bother no one on the left.

Getting back to the shooting of someone on 5th Avenue. Hillary Clinton is not Donald Trump. While they both may be lying, manipulative Democrats, that’s not the point. He sits at the head of a cult of personality that animates thousands of people to show up for his rallies. She is at the head of a borg where the hundreds of people who attend her rallies look as if they are punching the clock and can’t wait for the end of day whistle. If he were to die the air in the Trump movement would dissipate quickly and the GOP would find itself struggling to find a replacement who could carry the party to victory. If, on the other hand, Hillary Clinton were to die the Democrats would simply push her corpse to the side, take down the generic Clinton logo and put in her place the next functionary and things would move forward as if nothing had happened.

And that’s the point. Hillary Clinton is not inspiring anyone. She is taking her turn. She is the opposition of anything that is proffered by the GOP, regardless of who they trot out. (You may think their demonizing is Trump specific… It’s not. Remember what they did to Mitt Romney.) Like the mind numbed audience in Apple’s debut commercial in 1984… or the zombies in book itself, Democrats step in and vote for whoever is on the ticket, regardless of who that person is. And in this case of it’s Hillary Clinton. It’ doesn’t really matter what she’s done, what she’s “accomplished’ or what she stands for – if anything – the only thing that matters is that she’s not the Republican. If there was video of Clinton shooting the guy on 5th Avenue could she really still get elected and would the robot Democrats vote for her anyway? If the guy was wearing a Trump shirt I’m pretty sure they would. One has to wonder what the playing field would look like if the GOP had nominated a real conservative to oppose the borg...

America's Game of Russian Roulette: Clinton vs. Trump or Revolution vs. War

I remember in 2008 I told my wife that that presidential election was the most important in a generation. I told her in 2012 that that election was the most important in my lifetime. Both of those statements were completely true. In putting Barack Obama in the White House, for the first time Americans elected a race bating closet Muslim socialist / fascist as the leader of the free world. That is of course unfortunate in many ways for many people around the world. Not only has the American economy been stuck in the worst recession in 65 years, race relations are the worst they’ve been in 50 years, our borders are practically nonexistent, freedom and the Constitution are under constant attack and the image of the United States as a leader on the world stages is in tatters.

Now it’s possible that the election of 2016 is even more important, but sadly there is no relative superhero like John McCain or Mittens Romney on the ticket. I was against both of those squishy centrist candidates from the start and would have much preferred to have an actual conservative on the ticket… but alas it was not to happen.

It was with great expectations that I looked forward to the 2016 campaign as finally an opportunity for a true conservative to emerge from the mosh pit and lead the nation to a victory over the cancer of today’s Democrat party. Unfortunately however that did not happen. Between the GOP establishment’s incompetence and fear of a real conservative, as well as the media’s love of ratings – and that includes the so called “conservative” media – today we have Donald Trump as the standard bearer for the party of Ronald Reagan.

And so it is that Americans, with a population of over 320 million people have put themselves in a situation where the only two people with a realistic chance of becoming the leader of the free world are a lying big government socialist and an uninformed narcissistic thin skinned crony capitalist with no love for freedom. This is essentially the opposite of winning the lottery. Americans have somehow managed to put themselves in a game of Russian Roulette where all of the chambers have rounds in them!

While the elections of 2008 and 2012 set the nation on the road to ruin in terms of economic stagnation, stultifying regulation, the undermining of the Constitution and eviscerating America’s position as leader of the free world, the election of 2016 will have even more devastating effects.

The election of Hillary Clinton will result in the continuation of the policies of Barack Obama, only on steroids. We will get a Supreme Court that will look to the UN charter rather than the US Constitution. We will get continued and increasing regulation which suffocates prosperity and entrepreneurship but which helps big business. We will get increases in taxes, skyrocketing government spending and more race bating. And perhaps most of all, we will surrender our borders and will transform our nation into a refuge from which immigrants can escape the third world only to then work to turn our country into a mirror reflection of said third world.

The election of Donald Trump will give us a crapshoot of broken promises, protectionism, and isolation. At the same time the 1st Amendment may go by way of the dodo bird while regulation will likely grow for the benefit of big businesses and at the expense of entrepreneurs. More ominously, a Donald Trump presidency will create great divisions between the United States and our NATO allies and others who have helped maintain a relative peace for much of the last half century. As the increasingly bellicose Chinese and Russians seek to expand their spheres of influence, the world will watch a President Trump seek to pull back the American footprint. Osama Bin Laden once said “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature, they will like the strong horse”. In this case the strong horses will be China and Russia, and that does not bode well for freedom or peace for anyone.

So at the end of the day, Americans have a choice to make, and neither is a good one.

The first option will put Hillary Clinton in the White House, and that will lead to a fracturing of the nation, along lines of race, along lines of income, along geographic lines and fundamentally about an understanding of the Constitution and freedom. And that fracturing could very well lead to revolution. And not a theoretical revolution played out in newsrooms and college campuses and on the editorial pages of the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. No, this may indeed turn out to be a real revolution where people revolt against the tyranny of an economically and culturally oppressive government and a dearth of opportunity of any kind. It won’t show itself by a fife and drum corps marching down Main Street. No, it will be in the shadows as more police are targeted, more citizens take matters into their own hands and order starts to come apart while an increasingly militarized police force seeks to keep things in check. This revolution will look a lot more like the one that started in France in 1789 than the one that started in the colonies in 1776.

The second option will put Donald Trump in the White House and that will lead to a calcifying of the American economy, estrangement between the US and erstwhile allies, and at some point, war. And this war will not be a guerilla war fought against jihadis seeking to bring about the caliphate. No, this war will be against Russia or China. As Trump and his little hands pull back from the world stage, the Russians and Chinese will seek to expand their empires, taking Ukraine and Taiwan respectively. In both cases Trump will likely acquiesce, which will only lead to further expansion such as with the Baltics in the case of Russia and any one of half a dozen other countries or islands in the case of China. At some point the threat will become sufficiently ominous and American allies so vocal that the United States will have to engage. And unlike Korea or Vietnam or Afghanistan in the 1980s, this will not be a proxy war limited to some theater most Americans couldn’t find on a map if their lives depended on it. No, this will be a real, hot war with sophisticated enemies throwing billions of dollars of weapons at one another. One can only hope that such a conflict stays conventional…

So as we stumble towards the 2016 election Americans should be aware… they have left themselves with not only no good options, but only terrible options, both of which will likely lead to much bloodshed, chaos and possibly the end of the Republic. Good job Rush, Matt Drudge and the GOP establishment. When your country needed you, you decided to whore yourselves out to a populist megalomaniac. The citizens of dystopia in America’s future will no doubt be quite grateful to you.

A Nation is Calling: Ted Cruz Should Launch a Coup d'état

Ted Cruz has agreed to speak at the GOP convention.

Ted Cruz has maneuvered himself into a speaking spot at the GOP convention.

I’m not sure which of those statements is true. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Ted Cruz is speaking at the convention and will be speaking to much of the nation at the same time. It is an historic opportunity for him and for the nation… and he should not waste it.

The nation is at a precarious point in history. From racial strife to leadership on the world stage to economic stagnation to failing, dysfunctional government to open borders, the US as a functioning nation is in peril. Perhaps not the same peril as Venezuela or Greece – yet – but in peril nonetheless. The federal government continues to take more and more of our money while imposing more and more control over our lives, turning the country into a nation of calcified robots going through the motions of life. Incomes stagnate while working hours increase – for those who choose to or can find work – while the number of those who choose not to or simply stop looking grows. At the top of the income spectrum the rich manipulate Rube Goldberg laws and regulations to grow stratospherically richer and bureaucrats pad their tax payer provided nest eggs. At the bottom the poor get an endless array of subsidies while the middle class watch helplessly as their American dreams slip away in the form of increasing taxes, regulation and diminishing opportunity.

The country is in a desperate place as the economic and individual freedoms that have been the hallmarks of American prosperity and success fade into ancient history. The United States needs someone to stand up and make a full throated defense of American liberty. We need someone to stand up and make a compelling case for small, limited government. We need someone to stand in front of the American people and make a fierce argument for American values of hard work, private property, free markets and the rule of law. But most of all we need someone to stand up and make a passionate case for American Exceptionalism. Next to Thomas Sowell Ted Cruz may be the best man in the country to make those arguments. He should take that stage and leave not a single mind in the audience unconvinced that the United States is indeed the greatest nation in the history of the world. That is what he should do…

But that’s not all. Before that he should launch a coup d'état. Not on the country, but on the GOP. By now everyone knows that Donald Trump has won enough delegates to win the GOP nomination. True. But the fact of the matter is, the Convention Rules Committee meets this week and a coup is actually possible. It only takes the support of 28 of the 112 members to put an issue in front of the convention. In this case, freeing the delegates to vote their consciences rather than as their voters polled. At that point Ted Cruz could unambiguously make his case. That may be a lousy way to run a party and a nominating process, but we wouldn’t be in this position if the GOP establishment had bothered to close primaries to GOP voters rather than letting Democrats pick the nominee. In addition, if Trump was denied, his voters would be livid and would likely stay home or might even vote for Hillary Clinton. So be it. The goal here is not to win the GOP nomination, but to win the White House and attempt to save the country.

This is particularly plausible now that James Comey has done the nation a great service – even if he did it unknowingly. By not indicting Hillary Clinton he has kept her in the race while laying bare all the reasons why she should have actually been indicted. People often mistake a jury’s decision of “Not Guilty” for “Innocent”. While someone may both be judged “Not Guilty” and actually be innocent, in reality those are two separate. OJ Simpson and Casey Anthony were judged “Not Guilty” by juries, but few people believe either of them are innocent of their crimes. The problem was vapid juries and or incompetent prosecutors or both. In either case the number of Americans who would wish to invite said “Not Guilty” persons to live in their guest rooms is likely relatively small.

So too with Hillary Clinton. With the facts laid out by the FBI and focused by the House and Senate committees, it’s obvious to most Americans that Hillary Clinton has little respect for the rule of law, is a lying, scheming manipulative politician who will do and say pretty much anything to get what she wants. Whether it’s Benghazi or her email lies or her apparent fondness for throwing ashtrays in the White House, most Americans do not want to vote for Hillary Clinton. Comey’s attempt to protect her from a jury’s verdict has only made that feeling worse.

The problem for the nation however, is that the GOP is about to nominate someone Americans seem to like even less than Hillary! It’s like your daughter coming home with two prospective dates… Joseph Stalin or Adolph Hitler… how the hell do you pick between them? Imagine if she added a third choice, say… Bernie Madoff! You’d wrap your arms around that guy like he was your best friend… hell, even your family members who lost fortunes might welcome him into their homes too.

But of course Ted Cruz is not Bernie Madoff. He’s an actual, real live conservative who can articulately make a compelling case for small government, for individual freedom and free markets. But more importantly, he is a brilliant debater who would eviscerate Hillary Clinton on the debate stage. He’s a Constitutional scholar who would deftly expose her lies and obfuscation. He is a brilliant wordsmith who could easily and clearly demonstrate to a majority of the American people how much better off the nation would be with him in the White House rather than Hillary Clinton. None of those are things Donald Trump could do.

With a severely damaged Hillary Clinton it’s possible that the incoherent Donald Trump could stumble into the White House, but it’s even more likely he will simply be himself and put her there. With Ted Cruz making the case for voting for freedom there’s no chance that would happen. The nation is begging for a real alternative to Hillary Clinton.  The time is now for Ted Cruz to put to work those skills he forged on the debate team and in front of the US Supreme Court. Everything he’s done has been preparation for saving his country from a disaster… his moment is now. Let’s hope he takes it.

Why I May Pull the Lever for Trump: Shooting Oneself in the Head vs. in the Foot

I can’t stand Donald Trump. Like many others I’ve been long aware of him since he first splashed his way onto the national stage as a self proclaimed real estate genius. It was, frankly, pretty entertaining to watch him showcase government dysfunction in the Wollman Rink affair and I found myself visiting the glitzy Taj Mahal when it first opened after years in the news. I even applied to be on the second season of The Apprentice. In other words, I was aware of Donald Trump to the degree I was aware of any celebrity in our celebrity driven culture and took a mild interest in stories or events that caught my eye.

After a year of Trump being on the campaign trail however, I feel like I know him a lot more than I used to… and I like him a lot less! Why? Because previously he was some distant arrogant rich guy who was crowing about crossing home but tried to pretend he wasn’t born on third base. But there are lots of guys like that and other than taking $20 bucks or so from me at his casino, I had little reason to have a real opinion about him one way or another.

That all changed when he threw his ring in the hat for president. At first I was glad he had stepped in, particularly with the issue that I think is probably the single most important facing the Republic right now… the unfettered immigration of people from dysfunctional third world disasters. I was glad he put the issue on the map but had little thought that he might actually get the nomination.

As his competitors fell to the side one by one however, I started to pay closer attention, and I didn’t like much of what I saw or read. Donald Trump is a crony capitalist. Donald Trump is duplicitous. Donald Trump has anti-freedom, fascist tendencies. Donald Trump has little use for free markets, indeed he’s a protectionist – and don’t forget, protectionism turned a mild recession into the Great Depression. In other words, Donald Trump stands for pretty much everything I don’t, what’s more, he stands against most of the things I stand for and care about. So, how in the world could I possibly even remotely consider voting for him?

Because, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, Donald Trump is the worst viable candidate running for president… expect for the other viable candidate running for president.

I may dislike and, frankly, fear Donald Trump, but not as much as I abhor virtually every single thing Barack Obama has done since he entered the White House, and I expect Hillary Clinton to be exactly like him, only worse, if that’s even remotely possible. For eight years the country has been wrecked with racial animus due to Barack Obama’s constant race baiting. For eight years we’ve seen the government insert itself into everything from where companies must hire employees, to what the demographics of your neighborhood must be to when a man is a man and when you have to let him pee in the stall next to your daughter. We’ve seen government literally steal companies out from under the real owners, we’ve seen government use the banking system to put law abiding companies out of business, we’ve seen government decide they can dictate virtually everything that has to do with the Internet while at the same time deciding dictators around the world could better run it than Americans have. In eight years we’ve seen the economy and prosperity wither, we’ve seen regulations strangle businesses big and small and we’ve added more debt than in the previous two centuries. And that’s just domestic policy…

On the foreign policy front, we’ve careened from one disaster to another, from prematurely exiting Iraq and laying the foundation for ISIS to capitulating to the Chinese in the South China Sea to essentially handing the Iranians $150 billion and the keys to nuclear weapons. From Egypt to Russia to Cuba we have embraced tyrants while in Iran and Honduras we rebuffed those advocating freedom. We’ve thrown allies like Israel, Poland and the UK under the bus. The world was certainly challenging under George Bush, under Barack Obama it’s become an abject disaster.

As much as I dislike Donald Trump and worry he will do some of the same things Barack Obama has, I know for certain that Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders would do all of the same things Barack Obama has done, and more.

Donald Trump may not appoint a clone of Scalia to replace Scalia, but I expect he’s not going to appoint another Ginsberg, Sotomayor, or Breyer. He may be a crony capitalist, but he’s unlikely to use regulation to try and strangle the energy companies, farms and gun manufacturers – the latter particularly after the NRA just endorsed him. Hey may have isolationist tendencies, but he at least professes the need to restore a military that Barack Obama gutted back to WWI levels. He may backtrack on his promise to build a wall along the southern border, but at a minimum one would imagine he’ll rescind the open invitation Barack Obama has sent to the third world. He’s every bit as arrogant at Barack Obama, but at least he recognizes the United States is a positive influence in the world and won’t betray her every time he walks onto the international stage.

I have no illusion that a Donald Trump presidency will be anything remotely close to what we need right now… i.e. a president who reins in government and restores free markets and liberty. No, my only hope with pulling a lever for Donald Trump would be to slow the advance of liberalism sufficiently that conservatives can figure out how to make a stand outside of the treacherous Republican Party. That may be a pipe dream and the liberal steamrolling of American values and the Constitution may continue, but with Trump in the Oval Office and advisors who used to be considered conservatives, it’s possible that the crush will be slowed to such a degree that the country doesn’t devolve into revolution and can be pulled back from the brink.

I’m not, frankly, optimistic, but in a country where voters have seen fit to put Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton at the top of their respective tickets, who would be? It’s sad, but for me it’s the difference between shooting oneself in the head vs. shooting oneself in the foot. One will certainly kill you, the other probably won’t. It could if left unattended, but if treated properly it’s possible to fully recover and maybe even go on to run again.

Calling BS on Bootlickers Hannity, Gallagher et. al Because I Don't Slobber at the Altar of Donald Trump

NOTE: Previously I suggested Dennis Prager as part of this group. I actually meant Mike Gallagher. From what I have heard, Prager is decidedly anti-Clinton and not a Trump apologist. My apologies... 

Carl von Clausewitz famously said “War is the continuation of politics by other means”. He is of course right. But it’s also true that politics is war by other means.

Frankly, I’m tired of listening to guys like Sean Hannity, Dennis Prager, Herman Cain and others suggest that I’m not a real conservative or that I must be a closet Hillary supporter or something of that ilk because I do not support Donald Trump for president. (Which probably explains why I listen to a LOT more sports talk radio these days…) These paragons of conservatism gripe “Why aren’t they focusing their attention on Hillary?” or “Why haven’t you been focusing this much energy on President Obama?” Well, the fact is, since my first blogposts seven years ago: Racism: America’s Original Sin  and The Gift of Freedom, I have done little else than write about the perils of the cancer of liberalism, tried to highlight the irrefutable fact that free markets, individual freedom and limited government are the keys to prosperity, and argue that our Constitution is the greatest document in human history.

Now I don’t harbor the conceit that Hannity, Cain or any of the others are actually talking about me specifically. They don’t know me and I’ve no idea if they’ve ever even read my blog. But there are no doubt more than a few conservatives who have spent years listening to the talking heads on “conservative radio” opining that if we only had a real conservative carrying the banner for the GOP then we’d have a chance to save the nation, who are now stunned to watch as those same talking heads have swooned like teenage girls as they fawn over Donald Trump. And now they lecture us that we’re somehow traitors to the conservative cause because we don’t become sycophants too?

The reality is, standing for conservative principals applies whether a candidate is in the Democrat or the Republican Party. Principals don’t bend just because the liberal candidate is on your side of the isle. That’s why I supported Christine O’Donnell over RINO Mike Castle. Sure, she may have been a flawed candidate, but she was an actual conservative rather than being part of the squish GOP establishment that has proven itself to be all about power and privilege – its own – as opposed to standing for limited government and actually trying to stop Barack Obama.

So today we find ourselves subjected to tirades that the #nevertrump movement – of which I’m not a member – and conservatives who are trying to figure out how to push an illiberal liberal from the perch the media anointed him with – via $2 billion in fawning coverage – atop the GOP are somehow not true conservatives at all but are really Hillary supporters. Somehow if we still fight, even if it’s only for the flicker of hope that somehow Trump will implode or the convention will somehow figure out how to nominate someone else, we are somehow turncoats who were never believers in the first place.

That is, frankly, bullshit. It’s not that we don’t have disdain for fascist Barack Obama’s extra constitutional progressive policies. It’s not that we don’t despair at the thought of a vain liberal, crony capitalist opportunist sitting in the White House. We do. But the point is, we don’t want a vain liberal, crony capitalist opportunist running for president under the banner of the party that claims to represent conservatism and limited government. While I agree that a President Hillary Clinton – or Bernie Sanders or Pocahontas Warren – would be a disaster for freedom and prosperity that doesn’t mean that I have to support Donald Trump as the savior. The reality is, Donald Trump is every bit as much a big government crony capitalist as Clinton is. Well, maybe he’s a bit less of one, but at least Clinton only whined about the “vast right wing conspiracy” where as Trump has actually suggested that Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post as a tax dodge with the implicit threat that once in office he will use the mechanisms of government to punish Bezos and Amazon. Maybe he’s right about Bezos, but his threat, along with a similar approach to dealing with Ford and Carrier certainly suggests that a President Trump won’t be much of a free market and limited government guy.

Which brings us back to the point… conservatives are conservatives because they are (generally) conservative and believe in things like limited government, individual freedom and free markets. Conservative does not equal Republican, particularly when the Republican banner is being carried by a guy who is anathema to all of those things. That does not mean that I won’t vote for or even argue for Trump against Clinton in the general. I may do both, albeit reluctantly, but we’re not there yet. Strange things can happen… I remember shaking hands with Gary Hart in Florida a few months before he shot himself in the political head when he invited reporters to follow him, and they did.

Until Donald Trump is absolutely the only real option for keeping Hillary Clinton out of the White House, he will not get my support and I will continue to do what I can to highlight the fact that he is no conservative savior, no conservative and no savior at all. He is a petty, spiteful, manipulative crony capitalist narcissist who would continue Barack Obama’s assault on the Constitution. Maybe it will be all for naught and maybe I’ll end up pulling the lever for him in the general as a nod to the reality that the other crony capitalist in the race would be even worse, but don’t accuse me of being a closet liberal because I don’t rejoice that bootlickers like Hannity et al have turned the party of Abraham Lincoln into the party of Bozo the Clown.

Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night... Ted Cruz, The Constitution and Third Party Choices

I’ve never seen a train wreck, but I’m told they are somewhat difficult to turn away from if you see one occurring right in front of you. That was my experience two nights ago watching Donald Trump roll in Indiana and then Ted Cruz suspending his campaign.

What made the night almost surreal is that it came on the heels of Ted Cruz simply destroying Trump at a press conference earlier in the day. I couldn’t help but wonder if things might have turned out differently had Cruz not done the same a month before. I’m not sure it would have made a difference with the treacherous John Kasich still in the race, but one never knows.

So now we have it… A GOP nominee selected by Democrats, the media – and that includes the faux conservative media – and angry GOP voters not bright enough to recognize that while bluster and bombast might make for great reality TV, they rarely make for successful real world leaders, at least other than dictators. While the former two groups can be forgiven for trying to select the weakest challenger to their nominee – after all, that’s just good politics – the latter deserves a particular level of enmity as they profess anger at the establishment and then vote for someone who has spent his entire life canoodling with that very establishment.

Now the question facing many of us is whether or not to pull the lever for Trump or take the quixotic path of supporting a third party candidate. On the one hand it would almost be suicidal to do so – in terms of the pursuit of reviving the Constitution – as Clinton would certainly triumph, but on the other hand, the Constitution stands little chance of surviving regardless of whether Clinton or Trump is elected. The only reason to ever consider voting for Trump in the first place was his promise to build a wall. Given that he told the NY Times that he wouldn’t be building any walls, there is literally zero reason to bother pulling the lever for him.

Whether Clinton or Trump makes it into the White House, the freedoms that Americans used to cherish, free speech, free markets, gun ownership and limited government find themselves on the ash heap of history. Barack Obama started down the strongman path of extra constitutionality, and either Trump or Clinton would pick up that ball and run with it.

The 2016 election is simply lost. Absent some miracle that keeps Trump from the nomination, the 2016 will be the end of the Republican party as we know it, and potentially the Republic as we know it. So the question is, what are conservatives to do? What are those who value freedom and limited government to do? What are those who prefer Madison, Jefferson and Reagan to Marx and Castro and Obama to do? Do we take our lumps, swallow our pride and pull the lever for Trump simply because he’s representing the party ostensibly opposing the socialists? Do we sit out the election so that whichever candidate wins we can honestly say we had nothing to do with the consequences? Or do we do something else?

I’d suggest something else. Given that Donald spells the end of the GOP, why not use 2016 the way the Tea Party did in 2010… build something… but rather than hitching our wagon to the festering, corrupt and debauched Republican Party, build something far superior. Build a party that actually stands for something other than its own power. Build a party that champions real limited government, not the use of government to support big business and hinder small business. Build a party that advances the notion that prosperity is the result of free markets, not government intervention in favored industries. Build a party where free speech and free religion are the valued over the feelings of delicate flowers who are offended by practically everything. Build a party where hard work and individual achievement are valued and empowered rather than punished by confiscatory taxes and government social engineering.

Of course building such a party might guarantee a Hillary Clinton presidency. That’s true, but a Clinton presidency is the likely outcome of a contest against Donald Trump regardless. So be it. I once had a friend who told me she didn’t want to go to college because she was 27 and would be 31 when she graduated. I asked her how old she would be in 4 years if she didn’t go to college… Win or lose, a GOP party headed by Donald Trump is no longer a party that respects the Constitution, is no longer a party that respects free markets, is no longer a party that respects free speech and individual liberty. As such, we can choose to do nothing with the five months until November, or we can choose to do something that lays the foundation of a new party to stand up and challenge the big government GOP Democrat duopoly in 2018 and beyond. (Don't forget, the GOP itself was founded in 1854 but didn't win the White House until 1860.)  Granted, it will be an uphill battle, and given the track records of 3rd parties over the last century, it may even be a Sisyphean one, but at the end of the day the choices are clear. Stand by and watch as the foundations of your beloved country crumble, or choose to fight to save the Constitution and greatest republic the world has ever known. I hope Ted Cruz is listening and chooses not to go gently into that good night…

The coming Armageddon - Donald Trump may be the match, but the GOP set the kindling...

Absent a political earthquake, Donald Trump will be the GOP’s nominee for President of the United States. It is possible that he won’t, but the odds are long. His nomination will set the nation on a disastrous course that is only partly – and a small part at that – of his making.

When Donald Trump wins the nomination the $2 billion of free media he has received thus far will turn against him. If Mittens Romney thought he was portrayed as a monster just wait until the lefty media gets done with the Dean of Trump University. It will be an unmitigated bloodbath. And, frankly, it doesn’t matter who shows up on the left. Whether it’s Hillary Clinton or, in the event she’s already been indicted, Bernie Sanders, it won’t matter. Left is left is left.

During the general campaign there will likely be riots across the country as socialists, Communists, anarchists and every other faction of the Democrat Party seek to eviscerate Donald Trump’s 1st Amendment rights. But unlike the 1968 riots which resulted in a decisive Nixon victory, 2016 will see the party of the rioters win, decisively. And they are likely to take the Senate with them and possibly the House.

From there things will go south… rapidly. Not only will there be no wall built, but the US southern border will basically disappear as the United States of America evolves into the United States of Latin America, just another failed state. The façade of budget restraint the GOP has been pretending to impose will be gone. Government spending will rocket beyond a quarter of GDP within a few years and keep growing beyond that. Taxes will become more complex as they rise precipitously. Regulation will strangle free markets. And China and Russia will assert themselves even more than they have against the obsequious Barack Obama. ISIS will thrive and will find greater success here at home. The American military will become a full blown social experiment and social program all rolled into one. And of course, political speech – at least the kind that utters anything against the regime or against global warming or for traditional marriage – will be essentially outlawed while political correctness will become the order of the day in schools, churches, offices and everywhere else, enforced by thugs empowered by an approving government…. And then to top it all off, regulations driven by the global warming hoax and socialist hubris will devastate the American economy, sending investment and jobs beyond our borders as government policies drag the world into a 2nd Great Depression, just as they did a century before.

And there won’t be a thing the GOP can do about it. Why? Because the party will be gone. Like a zombie its body may be around for a little while, but it will be gone. Conservatives, fed up with a quarter century of the GOP being nothing more than an extension of the Democrat party will bolt. The energy of the Tea Party from early on in the Obama presidency will rise like a Phoenix and will be far larger this time. Not only will it include conservatives, but it will include many – not all – of the Trump supporters who are angry and feel disenfranchised and marginalized by government and have been told their outsiders in their own county.

And make no mistake, as bad as things have gotten under an Obama with a supplicant GOP, they will only get worse under a Democrat president without even a faux opposition. And that means in every way… economically, militarily, culturally and perhaps most importantly, politically – in terms of how citizens deal with one another, particularly those with whom they disagree with.

It will take years for the Tea Party / marginalized citizen party to find its footing and make its mark as it will have to fight the GOP zombies who won’t have yet realized their party is dead. The question is, by the time the new entity finds its legs will the county have become Venezuela? Will there be an actual revolution between those who see that a bloated, unrestrained, rapacious government has become an enemy of freedom against those who see the redistributive and regulatory happy government as the central element of their lives? Or will it be possible to recover Benjamin Franklin’s Republic through Constitutional means? That’s a good question, because a Constitution is only as strong as the character of the citizens sworn to protect and defend it, and with Barack Obama we’ve only begun to see exactly what can happen when a man of the left – read anti-American – is given that duty.

Barack Obama and Benghazi: What is the body count that separates a president from a candidate?

There have been three different parts to the Benghazi story. Not surprisingly, Barack Obama has managed to fail spectacularly in all three.

The first aspect of this failure has to do with the run-up to September 11th. Given terrorist’s general penchant for anniversaries and the fact that September 11th is such a trophy date for them, the Obama administration should have had every American embassy and consulate on the highest security level possible, with terrorist friendly places like Libya, practically on lockdown. Add to that the chaos associated with the fledgling government and Libya should have been ground zero for extra security measures.

Sadly, it was not. The State Department, in the specific person of Hillary Clinton, denied repeated requests for increased security. Indeed the American mission at Benghazi "was like a cardboard building, there wasn't even bullet proof glass” and security personnel “were not even allowed to have bullets”.

The second aspect of failure at Benghazi was the response to the attacks themselves. The attack on the American compound began on September 11th at 9:40 PM local time, 3:40 Eastern time. In addition to dozens of people storming the front entrance to the compound the attack included small arms fire, mortars and RPG rounds. By 6:00 AM local time the attacks on the compound and the annex were essentially over and the survivors were being transported to the airport. During the 8 hour siege no support came from outside of Libya – although a six man security team from Tripoli (including 2 DOD employees) arrived at 1:30 AM to help evacuate personnel and retrieve bodies of those killed, including Ambassador Stevens. There was however never any military support sent. Of note is the fact that 3 hours after the attacks began, the Secretary of Defense ordered anti-terrorism security teams sent from Spain, but five hours later, by which time the attacks were over, they had not even gotten off of the ground. More consequentially however is the fact that prior to the attack on the annex a Special Forces unit in Tripoli was preparing to fly to Benghazi. They too never got off the ground because they were told to stand down, that they couldn’t go because they didn’t have authority. This is in stark contrast to the administration’s claim that no one was ever given a stand down order and that all available resources were used.

The third aspect of failure, and the most consequential for the American people as a whole, although certainly not for the families of the victims of the attacks, is the obfuscation and cover-up. Coming just 2 months before the presidential election, Barack Obama made the conscious decision to lie to the American people. Indeed, in an attempt to further his administration’s fiction that terrorism was on the wane and that America was once again loved around the world, Barack Obama tried to pretend as if nothing of consequence had happened as he jetted off to Vegas on a campaign stop. What’s worse, five days later, despite knowledge to the contrary, he trotted Susan Rice out in front of the nation to lie and blame the events in Benghazi on a YouTube video. Later, Hillary Clinton claimed that she had never denied any increased security requests from Libya. Today, eight months later we know that both were lies.

What is particularly disturbing about the events surrounding Benghazi is that they are sequential, i.e. they compound one another. After any one of the three they could have decided to make good, honest decisions. They didn’t and taken as a whole the Benghazi affair is a disaster. We all know that mistakes get made in life and in any organization, government or otherwise. As they say, nobody is perfect and we should not expect our politicians to be so. And we don’t. We do however expect them to be competent and honest. In this case Barack Obama and his administration showed themselves to be not only imperfect, but incompetent, dishonest, and most of all, self-servingly callous with the lives of four Americans who were in Benghazi serving as representatives of the American people.

It’s possible for Americans to believe that in the chaos of Libya in the summer of 2012, that somehow security measures were not quite what they should have been or that the security in place seemed adequate but turned out to fail in a perfect storm of events. After all, “No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy”.

What’s not possible for Americans to believe however is that in the midst of a raging battle of unknown duration, the President of the United States would refuse to allow Special Forces to attempt to protect and rescue those Americans who were being attacked. From the very beginning the administration understood the gravity of the situation – both on the ground and for their campaign. Rather than jettison the fiction of a terrorism free middle east, the president choose to order reinforcements to stand down. Additionally, later pronouncements that military aid from outside Libya would not have arrived in time are simply absurd. As far as we know the terrorists do not punch clocks for an 8 hour shift of causing mayhem. By definition a terrorist attack timetable is not coordinated with the victims beforehand. In the middle of the battle there was no way of knowing if it would last 5 more hours or 5 more days. In that light the decision to refuse reinforcements shows Barack Obama to be at best an incompetent Commander in Chief and at worst a narcissistic politician for whom his power is the only issue of concern.

Finally there is the cover-up. Every American understands that safety and security are messy affairs and that tragedy occurs and people die, often brave people who have willingly borne the burden of defending us. While Americans might be able to accept as human the misjudgments in preparation in the run up to September 11th, and while they might reluctantly accept the fact that they have elected an incompetent Commander in Chief, they will not, or at least should not, accept a president who, when four Americans die on his watch, lies to the American people about the cause so that he can win reelection. At some point you have to ask, is there nothing that rises above politics? What is the body count that separates the president from the candidate? What if the number had been 8 victims? Would 16 victims have been enough bloodshed to cause him to delay his trip to Las Vegas? Had 20 Americans died would they still have dared to blame it on the video?

Barack Obama has shown himself to be an incompetent president, an ineffectual Commander in Chief and most of all a pernicious politician. One has to wonder where things will go from here. Say what you will about Richard Nixon, when the time came he at least knew when the game was up and had the grace not to drag the nation into a constitutional crisis. If we get to that point with Barack Obama one wonders if grace will emerge as one of the character traits that’s been hidden for the last five years… Don’t count on it.