Ideology can be and often is a terrible thing. Emotionally-invested dogmatists of all stripes share at least one common behavioral flaw, the propensity to be absolutely sure that whatever the ideology deems true must be true.

After reading my article, “The Latest Education Fad Inverts Justice” (June 21, 2011), a government employee with a city’s “restorative justice” program sent me an email which started off cordially, giving the impression that the discussion might proceed in a levelheaded manner. Starting by suggesting certain studies and claiming that he ”had some questions” after reading my article, the emailer even admitted that “it is true that some ‘restorative’ practitioners are not well trained and do not always ensure the most restorative processes.”

The man called my attention to studies which allegedly show wonderful effects of restorative justice-based approaches in reducing jeuvenile crime and increasing victim satisfaction with the justice process itself. He claimed that “restorative justice is an excellent process when applied and executed correctly. It keeps kids in school, holds offenders accountable to victims and community members, and intervenes to teach valuable lessons while there’s still time to make an impression on young people.”

But the veil of cordiality then disintegrated. The man wrote:

It’s unfortunate that some people choose to disparage the concept without understanding (or perhaps while ignoring) its application and benefits. Even worse is doing so while trying to flare partisan flames, ie: labeling restorative justice as a “progressive” practice. This smacks of muckraking. Restorative justice is practiced in an attempt to improve communities and reduce recidivism, not to practice “progressivism”. I believe you characterize it this way in an attempt to ignite your audience and thereby increase your exposure by writing inflammatory articles.

Alrighty then. My admirer continued:

I thank you for taking the time to read this email and consider the source materials available through the above studies. Perhaps a perusal of the materials will convince you that there is merit in an honorably applied restorative justice approach, especially considering the failure of current zero tolerance and exclusionary discipline policies.

I look forward to hearing your response to my concerns about your article. Perhaps you would consider researching this topic more thoroughly, then printing a retraction, or at least an updated article that reflects your new learning on the subject.

Indeed. Here is my reply:

Judging from the material on the web concerning your efforts in restorative justice and in such events as the Boxing Day Tsunami, I’m guessing that you are generally an honorable man with good intentions. Unfortunately your initial email tells me that you have allowed yourself to fall into a trap—a trap constructed by people who allow zealotry to blind them to the consequences of their ideas, strategies, and tactics.

Your email comes across as a bit condescending and a lot preachy. Accusing me of muckraking for using real-world evidence to illustrate points that you don’t like is one illustration of the effects that blind enthusiasm can have. Again, I do not doubt your good intentions with respect to the use of restorative justice, but your email fails to address any of the concerns that I raise. You have instead chosen to focus on areas in which you claim RJ is effective. My article specifically focuses on the MISUSE of RJ in schools and the effects that this misuse has on children who become adults ill-equipped for the real world. Why should I retract what is true based on actual events?

Thank you for your concern, and I wish you good luck.

Take care.

Chuck Rogér

My email buddy responded by accusing me of writing a “bully blog.” He expressed mystification that I would interpret his “referencing recent research” as “condescending or preachy.”

Here we have a familiar behavioral trait in dogmatists. The man considers it okay to accuse me of “disparag[ing]” restorative justice “without understanding (or perhaps while ignoring) its application and benefits.” It seems that I am “trying to flare partisan flames,” “muckraking,” “ignit[ing]” readers, and gratuitously ”writing inflammatory articles.” But from the same mind that sees no fault in such character assaults leaps the contention that I felt condescended to and preached at when offered new research. Such thinking is hard to fathom.

The man continued to ignore the thrust of my article, which was the misuse of restorative justice in schools. I had pointed out the long-term bad effects that this misuse is likely to have on the moral fiber of chidlren as they grow into adulthood. I further expressed concern over the disservice that RJ does to kids by giving them unrealistic expectations of how the real world operates. He addressed none of these concerns.

And then the man put forth these gems:

You’re attempting to disprove that restorative justice is ever a possible approach with your poorly woven references to Samenow and Yochelson. You’re trying to lump every single youthful misbehavior into the framework of a professional criminal mind. You’re then trying to link restorative justice with crazy liberalism.

That is disingenuous and bad form. Your response to my email says that I haven’t answered your concerns. I believe I have. What has not happened is that you have not answered mine.

Ah, the gall. The blissfully clueless gall.

His recommended research is highly relevant while my references are “poorly woven.” He ran completely off the rails when he posited that behaviors in people with “a professional criminal mind” constitute criminal actions while criminal deeds in youngsters merely manifest “youthful misbehavior.” My accuser should clearly be allowed to parrot such crazy liberal contentions even as he accuses me of ”trying to link restorative justice with crazy liberalism.”

O-ther-world-ly.

Furthermore, it seems that my article is “disingenuous and bad form,” while preachy reprimands are precisely what preachers’ unreceptive audiences deserve. This particular preacher is entitled to ignore my article’s messages,  claim that he has acceptably responded to the article, make ad-hominem attacks, and throw the ball back into my court to address his contentions.

The ravings of a heels-dug-in ideologue are a sight to behold.

In a subsequent email, this man asked me not to ”use restorative justice to muckrake anymore,” suggesting that if I do write about RJ, I should “email [him] so we can have an online exchange based on the facts and the research and let people decide honestly for themselves.”

I doubt that such an exchange would be characterized by either civility or honesty. And really, how was I to know that authors must never draw conclusions based on evidence, but merely report “facts”—approved-of facts.

I responded to my fan:

Must be a tough job, being you that is. You know, being right all the time and having to referee other people’s thoughts so that they too can be as right as you.

Good luck with the belief in falsehood and the anger that drives you.

Have a nice life.

Yes, I was a bit testy in that one, and probably got what I deserved in his next response:

I guess it takes an angry misanthrope to know one. Good luck yourself. I’ll be keeping an eye on your muckraking column and from now on the discussion is public since you’re obviously not willing to trade ideas in a private forum like email without name-calling.

Cool.

Wrapping up with a threat seems to be a cherished tactic of dogmatists. With some religious fundamentalists it’s the threat of eternal damnation and suffering if you don’t toe the dogma line. With certain other zealots, the threat of public abuse seems to be a favorite punishment for opposing the respective doctrines.

At this point I offered the man my final reply: “Are we having fun yet?”

By Chuck Rogér

The Daily Caller quotes an evangelical leader, one Richard Land, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention:

“Mr. Speaker, if you want to get large numbers of Evangelicals, particularly women, to vote for you, you must address the issue of your marital past in a way that allays the fears of Evangelical women,” he wrote this week. “You must address this issue of your marital past directly and transparently and ask folks to forgive you and give you their trust and their vote.”

Seriously?

So “evangelical” voters will either sit out next November or vote for Obama or another candidate should a publicly-unrepentant Gingrich become the GOP nominee? Land’s sanctimoniousness is a sight to behold. What’s more, Land’s warning exudes recklessness. Would any clear-headed person reject an Obama opponent on the basis of that opponent’s lack of ideological purity? Would evangelicals really return Obama to office by not supporting the most viable opposition candidate?

If evangelicals follow Land’s direction, then America would witness quite a spectacle: flawed humans inviting four more years of one of the the most flawed presidents ever in order to brag about rejecting another flawed human who refused to publicly parade a personal flaw.

Most evangelical voters will probably ignore Land’s outrageous sermonizing. Most evangelicals will not stand idly by just to claim the right to wear preachy smiles for four years. People who are willing to follow Land’s guidance have a lot of growing up to do. Such dogmatic  followers deserve the hideous consequences of an Obama reelection. Unfortunately, Americans who see the destructiveness in Land’s prescribed tantrum would suffer along with the tantrum throwers.

It is stunning, after thousands of years of human “civilization,” that there are still elements in society that operate by barking out careless marching orders to people. It is bloody disturbing to realize that there are people willing to unquestioningly obey.

What can we expect when a majority of Americans finally comes to terms with a disgusting reality that H.L. Mencken exposed 71 years ago? In an article titled “The Suicide of Democracy,”¹ Mencken wrote:

In an ideal democracy, [the citizen] learns, property is at the disposal, not of its owners, but of politicians, and the chief business of politicians is to collar it by fair means or foul, and redistribute it to those whose votes have put them in office.

The Fathers of the Republic, who seem to have been men of suspicious minds, apparently foresaw that the theory of democracy might develop along such lines, and they went to some trouble to prevent it. Their chief device to that end was the scheme of limited powers. Rejecting the old concept of government as a kind of primal entity, they tried to make it a mere creature of the people. So far it could go, but no further. Within its proper province it had all the prerogotives that were necessary to its existence, but beyond that province it had none at all. It could do what it was specifically authorized to do, but nothing else. The Constitution was simply a record specifying its bounds. The Fathers, taught by their own long debates, knew that efforts would be made, from time to time, to change the Constitution as they had framed it, so they made the process as difficult as possible, and hoped that they had prevented frequent resort to it. Unhappily, they did not foresee the possibility of making changes, not by formal act, but by mere political intimidation — not by recasting its terms, but by distorting their meaning. If they were alive today, they would be painfully aware of their oversight. The formal revisions of the Constitution have been relatively few, but at this moment it is completely at the mercy of a gang of demagogues consecrated to reading into it governmental powers that are not only wholly foreign to its spirit, but categorically repugnant to its terms.

Dishonest, manipulative, agenda-consumed politicians who hold power will not easily surrender that power. Today, an overwhelmingly “progressive” mainstream media feed progressive politicians’ lies as truth directly to the people, thereby reinforcing the lies, giving the lies credibility in the minds of a mostly gullible electorate. The education establishment distorts school curricula and softens the brains of the young, creating sponges eager to soak up the media-reinforced political untruths.

But when the growing awareness of this nastiness reaches a critical mass, just what kind of ugly revolt will America be in for? Just what will happen when the cries of ”Stop!” reach deafening levels but the ruling class elites ignore the calls?
__________________
¹ H.L. Mencken, A Second Mencken Chrestomathy, Vintage Books, 1994, p. 49.

By Chuck Rogér

A recent email from a reader carried a poignant message. The woman, a citizen of South Africa and successful business owner, wrote:

I have to tell you that most people (rational people, not jihadis and Soviets) are astonished at Obama and much of the confusion that is the result of really bad policies and leadership.

Watching the U.S.A. fumble and make very big blunders is bizarre! …

We are speechless… [The] U.S.A. is becoming one of those issues that no one wants to openly discuss in polite company. … Nothing the Obama admin is doing makes sense. …

It is becoming an issue that is considered bizarre. When factoring in future planning, CEOs in many companies are starting to speak about America in the same dismissive way as [those CEOs speak of] Greece or the Soviets.

One cannot trust what the U.S.A. is going to do… so one moves the business of planning to somewhere else and raises one’s eyes to the ceiling, as nobody can predict that America will take rational actions or protect itself (never mind protect the global economical system).

It has gone beyond a domestic U.S.A. issue; it’s beyond jokes. It’s become an embarrassment to commonsense business people everywhere — that’s why the world is buying gold and bullion.

[...]

[A] rogue American government [is] endangering the rest of civilization.

A growing body of Americans must wonder, do this South African businesswoman’s sentiments sum up the impression of the United States that Barack Obama intended to give to the rational world?

Routing other people’s money through the government alchemy machine is supposed to somehow magnify national wealth and income, while leaving it in the pockets of those who earned it is somehow a drag.

This priceless statement by economist/historian Lawrence Reed accurately encapsulates the attitude of big-government money launderers. The most visible of the launderers is the big-government “progressive.” But all politicians almost by definition have the laundering attitude.

Ruling class elites view themselves as creators of all things good in society. For the politician surely knows how to spread constituents’ money around better than the constituents. Big-government overseers view permitting people to determine the disposition of their own money as a sacrilegious exercise.

In the final analysis, the attitude of the big-government politician boils down to something straightforward — sanctimony. Whether conservative or progressive, there is one behavioral trait shared by all lovers of the government leviathan — the reflexive urge to use other people’s money to bring about the fulfillment of a vision of a “good” world.

America’s Founders never envisioned a behemoth that vacuums up the people’s wealth, runs that wealth through “the government alchemy machine,” and thus achieves the objectives of whatever elites happen to be at the controls. Nevertheless, this disgusting state of affairs is precisely what America has come to.

Whether it be progressives scooping up our tax dollars, spreading pixie dust on those dollars, and losing the “war on poverty,” or conservatives blowing our money to lose the “war on drugs,” the attitudes and behaviors are identical — and identically destructive. Wealth is destroyed and the problems not solved. Whether it be progressives pushing cultural Marxism in schools or conservatives wanting schoolchildren to be taught religious views alongside the theory of evolution, the attitudes and behaviors are identical — and identically destructive. Clear thinking is subjugated to indoctrination.

Government, all government, needs to get out of the nannying business, all nannying — both monetary and moral.

Reactions to my article, “Conservatism that Assures the Unthinkable: the Reelection of Barack Obama,” continue to roll in. I received an email from a woman asking me to consider the “high costs of liberal social ideology” as a key element in any plan to right the American economy. The woman directed me to an article titled “It’s the Demographics, Not the Deficit” by Robert W. Patterson, editor of The Family in America: A Journal of Public Policy.

After reading Patterson’s essay, it has become even clearer that there are conservatives unprepared to budge from their insistence on always making elections about moral purity even at the cost of installing Barack Obama in the White House for four more years.

I found Patterson’s hard-line arguments to be full of sweeping, hand-waving points put forth without evidence.

Specifically, in writing that Paul Ryan “is painting Republicans into a corner if he thinks exploding federal outlays can be reduced without addressing underlying family demographics,” Patterson makes a ridiculous assertion. For it is eminently possible to reduce federal spending without getting into issues surrounding the American family. There is no sound basis for Patterson’s assertion. Yet, certain conservatives relentlessly foist up similar justifications for using the big government that said conservatives allegedly detest to push social agendas when simple fiscal sanity is called for. 

Patterson also writes: “One might think that such ‘progress’ and ‘economic growth’ would have translated into lower levels of government dependency and less federal spending to guarantee well-being, ‘fairness’ and income security.” This illustrates a time-honored debating technique—make a claim for which there is no evidence as though the claim were quite simply true, and then base an argument on the unsupported claim. It’s similar to the classic “straw man” technique, and ideologues of all stripes use the tactic when real-world evidence and logic go against their positions.

Patterson writes: “The unacknowledged reality that drives this insatiable demand for government is family breakdown all across America — in ‘blue states’ as well as ‘red states,’ within both parties, and among adherents to our key faith traditions.” That’s impressive-sounding, but where is Patterson’s proof that family breakdown drives the welfare state? In fact, isn’t precisely the opposite relationship supported by the evidence—that the welfare state drives family breakdown?

We could continue, point for point through Patterson’s essay. The piece is full of logical errors and unsupported claims with follow-on arguments built on those faulty claims. Making a big push for big government to drive yet more moral agendas, this time from the right, would be a fatal mistake in Campaign 2012. American needs to be righted economically. Then we can set about more rationally conducting the social battles.

Election 2012 must be about economics and fiscal policy. The process know as “budgeting” occurs at all levels of society, from the family, to the small biz, to the mega-corporation, to government. But at only one of these levels is budgeting bastardized into something other than the practice of basing spending on income. That outlier is government. Patterson’s “demographics” have nothing to do with what makes government unaccountable. Government is unaccountable mainly because in order to buy votes needed to stay in power, politicians succumb to the irresistible urge to spend other people’s money—which those politicians assume they will always be able to obtain.

It is encouraging that positive reaction to my “Conservatism that Assures the Unthinkable…” article far outweighs negative reaction — by a ratio of perhaps 10:1. Two specific GOP candidates must “get” the message about focusing on economics and laying off the divisive social issues, otherwise we could see dwindling chances for an Obama defeat in 2012.

By Chuck Rogér

Despite emerging victorious from a class action suit alleging sex discrimination, Walmart recently announced costly programs designed to “help empower women across its supply chain.” Over the next five years, the mega-company will “source” $20 billion from female-owned American companies and double purchases from global suppliers run by women. Walmart will offer training and specific career opportunities to 60,000 female factory workers to help those women “develop the skills they need to become more active decision-makers in their jobs and for their families.”

Not enough, says National Organization for Women President Terry O’Neill. In O’Neill’s way of thinking, Walmart has committed many past sins for which the company must repent. Spending a mere $20 billion that the company is not legally compelled to spend on women’s professional development apparently doesn’t scratch the surface layer of required penance.

O’Neill wants Walmart to “follow the law, stop discriminating against women … be transparent [and] allow independent auditors to go in and actually ascertain that they are following civil rights laws with respect to employment discrimination.” O’Neill also wants Walmart to “create some family friendly policies for women trying to make it up the corporate ladder at Walmart.” The NOW president explained that the company should create work schedules in which women are not forced to decide whether to spend time with their children on holidays or work at Walmart.

Point for point, the NOW president’s demands are harebrained.

First, NOW wants Walmart to stop engaging in a practice (sex discrimination) for which the Supreme Court of the United States found insufficient evidence of existence.

Secondly, what constitutes “independent” audits in NOW’s view is not specified. Picture any company, from mom’s and pop’s country store to the world’s largest retailer, allowing a third party to probe into, analyze, and judge hiring, firing, performance review, and employee promotion practices. A realistic expectation? Or a shrill Big Sister on steroids?

And finally, O’Neill’s third demand–holiday flex-time specifically aimed at moms–is a jewel. How does a fair-minded, logically-operating employer go about deciding which employees to boost up the “corporate ladder?” The operative terms are “fair-minded” and “logically-operating.” To act in a fair manner, an employer would select workers for promotion after applying logic to objective performance data. In other words, employees who contribute more would get promoted faster than employees who contribute less.

But gender-tribalist organizations such as NOW see such reasoning as obstructive to the feminist agenda–an agenda in which employers must create special “work schedules” to preferentially treat certain employees. The gender gap warrior’s El Dorado is a workplace that exempts women who want to spend less time at work and more time with their children from the same performance evaluation criteria against which other employees are judged.

NOW President O’Neill’s holiday work-time thinking is something to behold. The logic is worth breaking down.

1. Require that people who find a way to manage both family and work put in the holiday hours.
2. Let moms who do not wish to give up holiday time be credited with the same dedication and contributions as employees who do give up holiday time.
3. Women who want to be moms and corporate executives must be considered a special class which deserves to be treated as, well, special.

It’s a special world, the world inside the feminist mind.

Guest Post

By Don Ross

Reaction to my article, “Conservatism that Assures the Unthinkable: the Reelection of Barack Obama” (also at American Thinker), has been understandably mixed. Most reactions have been refreshingly receptive, demonstrating a recognition of the catastrophic effects of GOP presidential contenders pushing social issues on the cusp of an economic inflection point.

Yet there have also been emails and comments suggesting that a fair number of conservatives are unwilling to take a measured strategic approach to Election 2012. And there are die-hards determined to push the conservative social agenda even if the tactic gets Barack Obama reelected.

Several comments are so insightful that I thought it good idea to reproduce the remarks here and expand where appropriate.

Enjoy.

1)  We cannot trade nanny state Democrats for Christian sharia. Sanctimonious social intervention and control from either left or right won’t work and guarantees endless controversy and strife (of which we have way too much already). It poisons the discourse (as many on the left have so deftly demonstrated). Enough already.

… Issues like abortion and gay marriage are best left to individual choice. It’s not like we’re not already overrun with dumb people (as the whole world is). …[F]undamentalists of whatever stripe are a real hindrance to common sense and moving forward.  Enough already! Free markets in a free country!

Though commentator #1 employs an over-the-top analogy with the use of the term “Christian sharia,” the point is well-taken. Sanctimoniousness of any kind, forced on the people through the power of government, will not bring about a truly free America.

2)  Every time I read one of these indignant commenters [sic] here who wants to dig in and keep warring to the bitter end on every moral issue, I brace myself for an inevitable sequel to Hope & Change. That’s fine, gentlemen, go down with the Titanic, heroically brandishing your swords over gay marriage and faith, denouncing the loathsome RINOs who agree with you only 80 percent of the time instead of the mandatory 100 percent. Let’s see how that works.

[…]

To you conservatives who think the average American wants an arch-conservative in the White House who majors in social issues: You need to expand your circle of acquaintances. You’re misjudging the electorate, to our great peril.

The ideological stubbornness criticized by commentator #2 constitutes a surefire recipe for alienating independent voters who just want to live lives free of ideological oppressiveness from any direction — right or left.

 3)  …a GOP professional politician would be the worse thing for this country.  I’d rather have Obama and a Republican Congress than a substitute crony capitalist. The GOP professional politician “frontrunners” …reek of crony capitalism.

Commentator #3 provides an important perspective. Indeed, would merely another corporatist in the White House, this time wearing an elephant skin, be all that much better than the guy in the donkey skin currently in residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

4)  Since the 1960′s, an alien leftist ideology has conquered America by invading and “marching through its institutions” — education, the universities, the media, film and theater, the arts and literature — a strategy developed and elaborated by the Italian communist Antonia Gramsci and by the Frankfurt school.  Subvert the culture they said, and the apparatus of all political power will fall into our hands without firing a shot.  The overarching goal of the great American conservative movement must be “reconquest” — to “march back through the institutions” and take back the culture and America.  The goal of the invaders was to subvert the culture; hence the effort to destroy the roots of culture, which is the family and religion.

However, in their strategy of reconquest, the Spanish adopted flexible tactics, sometimes advancing, sometimes retreating. As I read Chuck Rogér, he is not talking about the longer-term goal but about shrewd tactics.

Precisely. Commentator #4 understands that something that took decades to accomplish — the nastification of American society — will take time to reverse. Trying to use the 2012 election to reverse decades of cultural Marxism will turn off a large number of voters that the GOP candidate will need in order to defeat Obama.

5)  With only 2 choices (parties), peripheral issues can skew the election results, because of voters who do not grasp the overall picture and vote on one issue. If we want to reduce the size & scope of government to save our economy, the candidates need to concentrate on that and put the social issues aside for now.  If we end up with an economic collapse and civil unrest, the social issues become moot.

Commentator #5′s observations sum up exactly what must happen in 2012. Republicans biting off a bigger chunk than necessary to save our economic butts will result in our butts getting flushed down the economic drain by a Barack Obama who will grow ever more ideologically crazy in his second four years.

6)  If our more socially/religiously conservative brethren must (at least overtly) temper their fundamentalist, scriptural literalist zeal in the effort to DEFEAT OBAMA, so be it. We must struggle within the confines of our political reality. Smart up conservatives!

Commentator #6′s analysis needs no clarification.

7)  Wow, I think many of you that remain staunch in our “Conservative Values” miss the man’s point. To stick to a 100% “No-Bend” righteous viewpoint (or we won’t vote conservative) is absurd. I don’t care if it’s Howdy Doody up against Obama, I’m voting for the Doody ticket . . .

This isn’t about compromise at all, and nobody suggests that we change our Values. It’s about Priorities Folks. Stay on the Fox hunt and quit chasing the Rabbits the MSM keeps throwing out there to distract the Top priority. Obama and the Left’s Agenda needs to be jettisoned off the Planet. You think 25 Million folks out of work care about Darwin, Gays, and Abortion right now?

Talk about “get it”; commentator #7 nails it. People who really want to work but cannot, because of Obama’s economically devastating policies, care not one iota whether the fossil record shows the “transitional” lifeforms that “should” be evident if the theory of evolution is correct. The motivated but unemployed also couldn’t care less whether Jim and John have the same government license for their relationship as George and Tammy have. And while many of the unemployed may care about the millions of babies killed each year in abortions, they also recognize that with other voters not seeing things the same way, 2012 is not the time to make abortion an election issue.

8)  I am not a citizen of the USA. It is my modest opinion that if the conservatives want to win ANY future elections, they have to “get out”…

1-Get out of peoples’ bedrooms! Are you against “The pursuit of happiness”? We are talking about consenting humans above the age of consent.

2-Get out of science! The applications of science and technology are something that comes under the jurisdiction of law makers. Science as the FREE pursuit of knoweledge for knoweledge sake should bee, well, FREE. Your never-ending bickering with Evolution only makes you (the conservatives) look ridicoulous.

3-Get out of religion! Yes, freedom of religion includes freedom FROM religion. Otherwise it’s up to the Capitol to decide what is religion and what is not! Does THE RELIGION OF ATHEISM qualify?

Even if I have not convinced you, don’t you understand that NOW is the time to save Western Civilisation?

Commentator #8′s remarks capture the pure libertarian spirit of the Founders, who never intended that government get involved in any of the three areas discussed.

9)  The left is aware of this and will surely try to sidetrack every debate by bringing these issues up.

If a candidate simply says: “That issue is completely irrelevant,” then that candidate will be seen in a negative light. Americans have been propagandized to expect definitive opinions on these issues, and will be disappointed if they don’t get the answers.

So, the advice should not be to candidates so much as to the American people to get away from thinking inside the idological box.

Commentator #9 reinforces common sense.

Let’s end with a real barn-burner.

10)  I could not disagree [with Chuck Rogér] more. If the only way to beat Obama is to accept such huge parts of the “Cultural Marxist” agenda, then I don’t care if Obama wins. What difference does it make? For example take illegal immigration. We can implement all the Tea Party planks with respect to limited government, federalism, low taxes, less regulation, etc etc etc, yet if we don’t stop and reverse the ethnic cleansing of white America due to the tidal wave of illegal immigrants swarming over the border and putting unbearable and unaffordable burdens on our welfare, then nothing matters anyway! All victories will just be temporary as white people are erased from our own homeland. You make it sound like it is so important to win the upcoming battle that it doesn’t matter if we lose the war (our country). I say, I want a full fledge dyed in the wool conservative or i will just stay home on election day. I have nothing but contempt for someone who only cares about economics while the rest of our country goes to Hell.

Ah, commentator #10 provides the preeminent staunch conservative mindset and engages in two thought errors:

• That my thesis is that “the only way to beat Obama is to accept such huge parts of the ‘Cultural Marxist’ agenda.” (This is categorically not my thesis, not at all.)
• That if weak thinkers like this commentator have to give up their weak thinking, then they “don’t care if Obama wins” again in 2012.

Had I pondered long and hard, I could not have encapsulated this mindless, over-the-top emotional, staunchly ideological posturing. The commentator’s position is exactly the nonsense at which my article is aimed. The piece lays out a case for focusing on the economy for 2012 in order to make it possible to later address the social issues. The payoff paragraph reads: “There will be plenty time for America to debate the contentious social issues that distinguish the progressives who dominate government, education, and media from the conservatives who once enjoyed but lost similar dominion.  But there will be time for such debates only if America returns to prosperity.  Without economic healing, economic survival will consume the people.” But to the stubborn ideological crusader, these three sentences did not, and might not ever, register.

Commentator #10′s rant about the “ethnic cleansing of white America due to the tidal wave of illegal immigrants” is so shrill that I wonder if the comments may be a plant by a lefty. Yet, I have observed such absurdities coming from known conservatives. And finally, as if to illustrate my point, it appears as though I arranged for this commentator’s call for “a full-fledged dyed in the wool conservative,” followed by the promise to “just stay home on election day” if said arch-conservative does not emerge. But I did not arrange for this ridiculousness. Such people really do exist. And if enough of them “stay home on election day,” then we will all be screwed.

Take heart. Many more of the responses to my article read like the next one, which came shortly after the remarks posted by commentator #10.

11)  Good grief, people here are declaring they’ll stay home on election day if they don’t get a gung-ho social conservative on the ticket. Words fail me. Just what do you think the president’s job is? To elevate the moral climate of our nation? To promote faith and personal virtue? None of those things fall within the strict purview of government, certainly not the Constitution. It’s up to families, religious institutions and individual citizens to foster those things, not the president. Your unwavering demand for 100-percent ideological purity — if it’s shared by enough people like you — will usher in Obama II. Is that what you want?! Don’t you see the bankrupting of successive generations as a moral issue? I’m baffled by you people. Baffled!

Baffled indeed. Let’s hope that the vast majority of conservatives understand the utter stupidity of including “gung-ho” social conservatism in the GOP platform. I, for one, do not wish to experience Obama II.

By Chuck Rogér

It is time that someone said, straight up and out loud, “Enough.“

As America flirts with permanent economic decline, certain GOP presidential contenders talk of gay marriage, Charles Darwin, and religiosity.  Are we losing our minds?

While the current progressive regime is rife with overbearing economic and social agendas, the critical battle — which, if lost, would render all other battles irrelevant — is singularly economic in nature.

Let Election 2012 not be about spreading “conservative values” throughout the land.  Let the election be about restoring America to economic good health.  Let the election be about freeing the people from legislative, regulatory, and judicial tyranny inflicted by congresses, administrations, and courts both Democrat and Republican.

Now is not the time in the course of human events to push what Peter Berkowitz calls “The Myth of Conservative Purity.” Berkowitz observes:

The great mission of American conservatism — securing the conditions under which liberty flourishes — has always depended on the weaving together of imperfectly compatible principles and applying them to an evolving and elusive political landscape.

There will be plenty time for America to debate the contentious social issues that distinguish the progressives who dominate government, education, and media from the conservatives who once enjoyed but lost similar dominion.  But there will be time for such debates only if America returns to prosperity.  Without economic healing, economic survival will consume the people.

Conservatives could choose to expend energy asserting mythically pure values, but this won’t bring Barack Obama’s defeat.  GOP contenders, and later the GOP nominee, can either try to push a rope uphill or advocate a doable conservatism — i.e., a non-idealistic approach.

An eminently doable form of conservatism is something with which most Americans would be happy.  Vociferous ideologues relentlessly claim inside knowledge of the American mindset, but in reality, the conditions that would please most people are simple and few: a physically secure country, government that maintains that security and plays favorites with no corporation or individual, and citizens free to pursue lawful aspirations without governmental interference and imposed social agendas.

Today’s America is home to armies at both ends of the sociopolitical spectrum, with warriors preaching of giving no quarter to the “other side.”  On the sociopolitical left, many soldiers speak venomously, thuggishly, often using wartime metaphors.  Indeed, staunch ideologues of all stripes see conciliation as the path of weaklings.  But Berkowitz instructively points out that although many conservatives see compromise as “the province of the mealy-mouthed, weak-kneed, and lily-livered[,] … when circumstances warrant — and they often will — compromise will be the considered choice of the steely-eyed and stouthearted.”

In other words, it takes confidence and courage to willingly engage threats posed by ideological impurities.  It takes wisdom and patience to hunker down and weather the threats to achieve the objectives demanded by one’s principles.

To win the White House and possibly the Senate, while maintaining a majority in the House of Representatives, Republicans must sell to a critical mass of “independent” voters a plan consisting of more than promises.  And the plan must be focused.  It must stick to economics.  The GOP presidential nominee’s platform must hint of no rhetoric on gay marriage and the theory of evolution, with no overly enthusiastic speechifying on illegal immigration.

Such distractions would alienate voters who otherwise have been growing more and more inclined to embrace conservative politicians.  By railing against gay marriage, illegal immigration, and Darwin at this point in time, the GOP presidential nominee could easily antagonize the very people itching to vote against Obama.  Indeed, a most dunderheaded Republican tack right now would be to parade religiosity as not just a conservative virtue, but also a virtue required to lead America out of an utterly secular disaster.

Two GOP presidential contenders’ campaigns suggest a belief that Christians who oppose illegal immigration, gay marriage, and the theory of evolution will not support a candidate who refuses to carry the religious right’s banner all the way to the polls.  If this belief reflects reality, then disengaged “values-driven” conservatives could assure the reelection of Barack Obama.

It remains distinctly possible that Republican presidential contenders will continue to push divisive social issues even as America faces economic oblivion.  On the other hand, the candidates may abstain from the social rhetoric, motivating social conservatives to stay home on November 6, 2012.

But there is a third option, in which social conservatives accept a Republican candidate with a solid plan to defeat Barack Obama even if that plan is silent on social issues.  If this sane and most pragmatic alternative does not materialize, then history might record that social conservatives were willing to let an unimaginable reality — four more years of the most destructive American presidency ever — come to pass.

I cannot accept that conservatives would invite this mother of all calamities.