The Gathering Storm: The National Organization for Marriage

Here's the new advertisment from the National Organization for Marriage, "The Gathering Storm":

April 8, 2009 (Trenton, NJ) -- Today the National Organization for Marriage is launching a nationwide Religious Liberty Ad Campaign designed to raise awareness of the religious liberty implications of same-sex marriage legislation.

Already, Boston Catholic Charities has been denied its adoption agency license because of their religious beliefs concerning marriage and the welfare of children. A New Jersey church group has been denied property tax exemption because they cannot in good conscience permit civil union ceremonies in church facilities. And individual service providers have been forced to choose between their faith and their profession. Religious liberty experts have said that these sorts of conflicts just scratch the surface of what we are likely to see if same-sex marriage becomes widespread.

The secularist media establishment is already attacking the ad campaign. The Hot Sheet has posted a screed entitled, "$1.5 Million Spent On Anti-Gay Marriage Ad." With less hysteria, Ben Smith at The Politico joins in with, "New campaign fights same-sex marriage."

More at Memeorandum.

Congressional Black Communists?

The Congressional Black Caucus is often identified by its acronym the "CBC," which, considering the oganization's meeting yesterday with Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, might as well be stand for "Congressional Black Communists":

Key members of the Congressional Black Caucus are calling for an end to U.S. prohibition on travel to Cuba, just hours after a meeting with former Cuban president Fidel Castro in Havana.

“The fifty-year embargo just hasn’t worked,” CBC Chairwoman Barbara Lee (D-Ca.) told reporters this evening at a Capitol press conference after returning from a congressional delegation visit to Cuba. “The bottom line is that we believe its time to open dialogue with Cuba.”

Lee and others heaped praise on Castro, calling him warm and receptive during their discussion. But the lawmakers disputed Castro's later statement that members of the congressional delegation said American society is still racist.

"It was quite a moment to behold," Lee said, recalling her moments with Castro.

“It was almost like listening to an old friend,” said Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Il.), adding that he found Castro’s home to be modest and Castro’s wife to be particularly hospitable.

“In my household I told Castro he is known as the ultimate survivor,” Rush said.

Rep. Laura Richardson (D-Ca.) said Castro was receptive to President Obama’s message of turning the page in American foreign policy.

"He listened. He said the exact same thing" about turning the page "as President Obama said," said Richardson.

Richardson said Castro knew her name and district. "He looked right into my eyes and he said, 'How can we help? How can we help President Obama?'"

U.S. Represenative Barbara Lee was the only member of either chamber of Congress to vote against the use of force to topple the Taliban regime in Afghanistan following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Representative Laura Richardson, the "deadbeat Democrat" from Long Beach, is widely recognized as the most corrupt member of Congress.

Now these idiots are getting Communist Cuba on board to "help" the President of the United States?

No doubt Obama will be receptive, and the academic elite and the mainstream press will sweep the Democrats' Communist Diplomacy under the rug. It's not like conservatives didn't anticipate this stuff. See, "Why Obama's Communist Connections Are Not Headlines."

A Constitutional Convention for Iowa?

At MyDD, "Des Moines Dem" fears the talk in Iowa on holding a constitutional convention:

Although I'm confident that over time a large majority of Iowans will come to support marriage equality, I confess that I am a bit nervous about the issue coming to a statewide vote in 2010 or 2011.

One might think that secular progressives would be more confident in their policies. The Des Moines Register reports on the possible issues that might be addressed at such a meeting. Interestingly, Chet Culver, Iowa's Democratic Governor, voiced the traditional line on same-sex marriage:

As I have stated before, I personally believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. This is a tenet of my personal faith. The Iowa Supreme Court’s decision has, in fact, reaffirmed that churches across Iowa will continue to have the right to recognize the sanctity of religious marriage in accordance with their own traditions and church doctrines.

Any changes to the constitution will go directly to the voters through ballot initiatives, although the process is lengthy. Yet, the sooner the voters decide the gay marriage question, the sooner we'll see how out of tune the state's leftists are with the majority of Iowa citizens.

Leftists Want in on Tea Party Action!

Here's Michelle Malkin on the left's efforts to shoehorn in on the conservative tea party buzz:

So, in addition to preemptive smears and sabotage efforts, the Left’s nutroots — feeling, well, left out of the spotlight after putting the Obamessiah in office — are organizing their own anti-Tea Party demonstrations.

Liberal guru Joe Trippi and government-subsidized Bill Moyers are pushing the new initiative, titled “A New Way Forward.” Hey, wasn’t Obama supposed to be your New Way Forward? Way to go!

The lefties have chosen April 11 to try and usurp media attention from the nationwide Tax Day Tea Party event on April 15. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

It's funny, but it was just a few weeks ago that leftists were ridiculing conservatives for "Going Galt", and last week Markos Moulitsas blamed the Pittsburgh cop killings on conservatives agitating "revolution." And this week faux conservatives are attacking Rush Limbaugh: "You're a brain-washed, Nazi!"

But they sure are looking to get in on the tea party action!

For example, "The Huffington Post wants to have citizen journalists at as many of these events as possible." Right. "Citizen journalists"? Make that counter-demonstrators, if anything.

In any case, via Glenn Reynolds, see "Tax Day Tea Party local events, videos and anti-tax boom." Also, Nice Deb asks, "Who’s Going to A Tax Day Tea Party?"

I will be attending the Santa Ana tea party, not far from my home (check Tax Day Tea Party - California" for more information on the California protests). And check out "Tea Party Sign Artwork" for downloadable signage.

**********

UPDATE: Actually, I saw the warning last night at Nice Deb, but check out, Via Memeorandum, "ACORN, HuffPo Organizing Efforts to Infiltrate Tax Day Tea Parties":

Acts of protest tend to be synonymous with the left and are usually considered unsurprising on the right. However, when conservatives demonstrate – liberals take notice in a big way.

On Fox News Channel’s April 7 “Your World,” host Neil Cavuto reported that the Tax Day tea party protests on April 15 will be “infiltrated” by their political opponents and led by left-wing activist organizations. He specifically named Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).

“Only eight days before a nationwide tea party, some over-caffeinated crashers aiming to lay waste to it,” Cavuto said. “Reports of very well-organized infiltrators trying to mix in and rain on this parade. Talk about taxing.”

One organizer, Mark Meckler of the Sacramento Tea Party, dismissed the counter efforts and said they were to be expected.

“We don’t take them seriously at all, and I’ll tell you why,” “It’s not that they don’t exist – we expect people to attempt to infiltrate,” Meckler said. “We expect people to attempt to disturb what we are doing, but the reality is that this is a very broad-based grassroots movement. There is no leader at the top. There is no individual event that they can disturb that would cause us a problem nationwide.”

Meckler explained that everyone was invited – even if they come to promote a philosophy that runs counter to what the tea party movement is attempting to convey.

“So also, the people – we trust the grassroots,” Meckler continued. “We know, the people are skeptical of anyone approaching at these events, and we believe that people are going to handle it well. And in fact, we invite everybody to come to our events. We don’t care if they are from ACORN, The Huffington Post or the Daily Kos. We want them all there. We’re excited to have them attend.”

Obama's Polarization of America

Amy Walter has published a great essay at National Journal, "From 'Post-Partisanship' To Polarization":

Despite calls for a "post-partisan" presidency, a recent Pew Research Center study found that President Obama has the most polarized early job approval ratings for a new president in 40 years.

The 61-point gap in opinion is driven by almost universal support from his party (Democrats give him an 88 percent approval rating) and very low approval ratings (27 percent) from Republicans. In comparison, President Bush had a 51-point gap in April 2001 (he had higher approval ratings among Democrats than Obama has among Republicans), while President Clinton had a 45-point gap in April 1993 (his support among Democrats wasn't as strong as Obama's, though he had the same approval ratings among Republicans).

This sounds shocking on its face -- Obama more polarizing than Bush after the 2000 election? But it shouldn't come as that much of a surprise. After all, when a president pushes -- and passes -- an agenda that leans heavily on government spending, Democrats rally around him while Republicans move away from him. Our own polling backs up this theory.

You can read the entire essay, here, but the point is obvious for anyone with a moderate interest in politics: This administration has aggressively combined leftist big government activism with dishonest claims to bipartisanship. Just one look at this administration's sheer magnitude of deceit and hubris illustrates why Barack Obama is dividing the country more than any of his recent predecessors.

What's even more interesting is how totally cocooned are the hardline Democratic progressives. As soon as conservatives start to act like an actual opposition movement, they're branded by the leftist nhilists and libertarians as "hysterical bed-wetters" and panicked militia-movement "birther" extremists? Indeed, Michael Cohen's got a whole piece up at The Politico on Glenn Beck's recent hypothetical anarchy segments entitled, "Extremist rhetoric won't rebuild GOP."

Jimmy at Sundries Shack takes down the Cohen piece, in "It’s Easy to Call Someone a Conspiracy Theorist When You Can Just Make Up What They Believe."

Ain't it the truth.

But I'm glad to see some pushback here, because while polling data show that it's in fact the Obama administration that's now polarizing the nation, the left-liberaltarians and the progressive totalitarians are making a play to dominate the political framing wars. But let's return to Amy Walter's piece, where she notes:

With almost universal support from Democrats, Obama doesn't have to worry so much about keeping his base happy. But the fact that he has so little support from Republicans means that he can't afford to lose his standing with independent voters. At this point, independent voters are showing signs of disenchantment with the Democrats, but Republicans still need to give them a reason to support them and their policies.

So that's our play. As Robert Stacy McCain notes today, with reference to this week's bogus New York Times poll:

We are barely five months past the last election, the biggest Democratic victory since 1964, and Obama's been in office less than 90 days ... Opponents of Obamanomics ought not be worrying about polls at this point. Organize! Raise money! Identify and support promising candidates in promising districts.

Yeah, organize ... like a few more tea parties!

It's happening already, folks. The conservative comeback is the light at the end of the tunnel!

How Does Gay Marriage Affect Me?

Well, there's a lot of news on the gay marriage front today.

The Vermont legislature legalized same-sex marriage by overriding the veto of Republican Governor Jim Douglas (more here and here). Counterintuitively, what may be even more significant is the vote at the D.C. Council to recognize the gay marriage laws of other states. As the Washington Post reports, "The unanimous vote sets the stage for future debate on legalizing same-sex marriage in the District and a clash with Congress ..." And that debate would then raise questions in Congress surrounding the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996, which allows states to refuse recognition of the same-sex marriages of another state.

I've written so much on this question, and sometimes I have to wonder: Maybe Rod Dreher's right - are traditionals indeed "on the losing side of this argument?"

Actually, I don't think so. The problem is that I'm not seeing enough conservative activism against the same-sex movement, or maybe I missed it?

In any case, let me share another section of Robert Bork's essay making the case for a Federal Marriage Amendment, "The Necessary Amendment." I often hear the question posed, well, "how does gay marriage even effect me?" Bork responds:

How does homosexual marriage affect me? What concern is it of mine or of anybody else what homosexuals do? The answer is that the consequences of homosexual marriage will affect you, your children, and your grandchildren, as well as the morality and health of the society in which you and they live.

Studies of the effects of same-sex marriage in Scandinavia and the Netherlands by Stanley Kurtz raise at least the inference that when there is a powerful (and ultimately successful) campaign by secular elites for homosexual marriage, traditional marriage is demeaned and comes to be perceived as just one more sexual arrangement among others. The symbolic link between marriage, procreation, and family is broken, and there is a rapid and persistent decline in heterosexual marriages. Families are begun by cohabiting couples, who break up significantly more often than married couples, leaving children in one-parent families. The evidence has long been clear that children raised in such families are much more likely to engage in crime, use drugs, and form unstable relationships of their own. These are pathologies that affect everyone in a community.

Homosexual marriage would prove harmful to individuals in other ways as well. By equating heterosexuality and homosexuality, by removing the last vestiges of moral stigma from same-sex couplings, such marriages will lead to an increase in the number of homosexuals. Particularly vulnerable will be young men and women who, as yet uncertain of and confused by their sexuality, may more easily be led into a homosexual life. Despite their use of the word “gay,” for many homosexuals life is anything but gay. Both physical and psychological disorders are far more prevalent among homosexual men than among heterosexual men. Attempted suicide rates, even in countries that are homosexual-friendly, are three to four times as high for homosexuals. Though it is frequently asserted by activists that high levels of internal distress in homosexual populations are caused by social disapproval, psychiatrist Jeffrey Satinover has shown that no studies support this theory. Compassion, if nothing else, should urge us to avoid the consequences of making homosexuality seem a normal and acceptable choice for the young.

There is, finally, very real uncertainty about the forms of sexual arrangements that will follow from homosexual marriage. To quote William Bennett: “Say what they will, there are no principled grounds on which advocates of same-sex marriage can oppose the marriage of two consenting brothers. Nor can they (persuasively) explain why we ought to deny a marriage license to three men who want to marry. Or to a man who wants a consensual polygamous arrangement. Or to a father to his adult daughter.” Many consider such hypotheticals ridiculous, claiming that no one would want to be in a group marriage. The fact is that some people do, and they are urging that it be accepted. There is a movement for polyamory—sexual arrangements, including marriage, among three or more persons. The outlandishness of such notions is no guarantee that they will not become serious possibilities or actualities in the not-too-distant future. Ten years ago, the idea of a marriage between two men seemed preposterous, not something we needed to concern ourselves with. With same-sex marriage a line is being crossed, and no other line to separate moral and immoral consensual sex will hold.

Now, just wait ... Pam Spaulding and other representatives of the nihilist hordes will no doubt be attacking me as "bigot" for even posting this.

God, what is happening to this country?

Ta-Nehisi's Blood of Martyrs

I just read over Krissah Thompson's piece at the Washington Post, "Blacks at Odds Over Scrutiny of President." It's a decent article - rather interesting, enlightening even. Thompson indicates that President Barack Obama's honeymoon is wrapping up for a growing and critical black constituency that wants action on a number of pressing issues facing black Americans:

As the nation's first black president settles into the office, a division is deepening between two groups of African Americans: those who want to continue to praise Obama and his historic ascendancy, and those who want to examine him more critically now that the election is over ....

... a growing number of black academics, commentators and authors determined to press Obama on issues such as the elimination of racial profiling and the double-digit unemployment rate among blacks.

Ms. Thompson highlights some prominent radio and television personalities, like Jeff Johnson and Tavis Smiley. Folks like this are facing pushback from the hegemonic "blood of martyrs" old-boys' club of corrupt left-wingers in the Democratic Party's race-hustling shakedown machine.

Interestingly, it turns out that Ta-Nehisi Coates, at the Atlantic, is an aspirant-in-good standing of the Democratic blood of martyrs patronage regime. Ta-Nehisi takes exception to Thompson's piece not be refuting her argument, but by excoriating her as an illegitimate journalist, dismissing her as among a class of "young reporters whose editors don't care enough" to smack down." Ta-Nehisi provides only one example for such demonization, which is that Thompson's use of Tavis Smiley's "Uncle Tom" quotation is weak, and from that Ta-Nahisi can write off Thompson, saying she "does no digging to see if there's more to the story."

The problem here?

The story obviously isn't Smiley's alleged bogus story (to which Ta-Nehisi provides no counter evidence or links). The issue is that Thompson's story challenges the Obamessianism among the far-left civil rights activist contingent - and Ta-Nahisi's obviously down with them "boyz n the hood."

The "Blood of Martyrs" refers to the chokehold the far-left grievance masters have on the post-1960s Democratic Party. As told by Juan Williams, in Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America - and What We Can Do About It, the story goes back to Al Sharpton's speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, where Sharpton attacked President George W. Bush for taking the black vote for granted:

"Our vote is soaked in the blood of martyrs, the blood of Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner, soaked in the blood of four little girls in Birmingham, Alabama. This vote is sacred to us. This vote can't be bargained away...given away. Mr. President, in all due respect, read my lips: Our vote is not for sale!"

But as Williams asks, what record of achievement could the Democrats claim to justify continued black partisan support?

The answer: absolutely nothing. But by waving the red flag labeled "blood of martyrs," Sharpton diverted all attention from dealing with bad schools, persistent high rates of unemployment, and a range of issues that are crippling a generation of black youth. Somehow, "blood of martyrs" remains the anthem of black politics at the start of the twenty-first century. Black politics is still defined by events that took place forty years ago. Protest marches are reenacted again and again as symbolic exercises to the point that they have lost their power to achieve change. As a result, black politics is paralyzed, locked in a synchronized salute and tribute, by any mention of the martyrs, the civil rights workers who died violent deaths at the hands of racists. The major national black politicians invoke these icons and perform shallow reenactments of the powerful marches of the movement as hypnotic devices to control their audiences. And if people try to break the spell by suggesting we move beyond these ancient heroes and their tactics, they are put down with language that implicates them as tools of the white establishment, reactionaries who've "forgotten their roots." Race traitors.

Or "truly lazy journalists" not "smacked down" by the editorial bosses. Right, Ta-Nehisi? .

Phyllis Chesler: Voice of Moral Clarity

Phyllis Chesler placed me on her e-mail list sometime after I blogged about the honor killing of Aasiya Hassan. I'm glad she did. Dr. Chesler, a professor emerita of psychology and women's studies, and a contributor at Pajamas Media, is a voice of reason and moral clarity in a world where right and wrong seems to evaporated from the culture.

It turns out that Dr. Chesler has been attacked mercilessly in a series of e-mails from the followers of Norman Finkelstein. See the whole post, "My Norman Finkelstein Problem—And Ours."

I'll just share one of the attacks on Dr. Chesler here:

Dear Dr. Chesler, I’ve just finished reading your article entitled ‘Our Eternal Struggle’ written for the Jewish Press, and I felt compelled to write you. I have to ask you, in all seriousness: do you genuinely believe this hysterical, vacuous drivel you’ve discharged upon we the already steeped-in-bullshit reading public? Do you genuinely believe in this absurd and unjustifiable conflation of legitimate (and legally supported) criticism of Israel’s post-1967 occupation, warmongering, war crimes, rejectionism, torture, settlement expansion, house demolitions, imprisonment of civilians without trial, slaughter of innocent men, women and children (please show me the evidence from any respected, independent Human Rights organisation’s records to support the claim that Palestinian militants routinely use innocent civilians as human shields); with this old, recycled “New Anti-semitism”? Are you not even a little tempted to entertain the overwhelmingly more credible hypothesis that whatever little new anti-Jewish feeling that does exist can adequately be accounted for by Israel’s very real, very consistent and very gross violations of basic human rights in the eyes of the world? Do you feel at all guilty for damaging, albeit in a very tiny but still notably insidious way, the prospects of achieving a just and lasting peace for both sides to the conflict in the form of a two state settlement in accord with UN Resolution 242 and International Law? I mean, surely this MUST bother you in some small way. Do you suffer from nervous ticks at all? From the trademark Dershowitz facial spasm, perhaps? Guilt must manifest somewhere, surely? Assuming, of course, you’re not a hopeless sociopath.

Your genuinely concerned “new anti-semite” (I can safely assume my preceding remarks more than qualify me as a worthy target for this particular piece of ideological excrement?),

Hugo Newman.

p.s. Shame on you.

Hugo Newman, hugonewman@gmail.com

This is not out of the ordinary for those on the contemporary left.

There are a couple of more letters attacking Phyllis at the link.

Personal Message to the Rich in America

I was interviewed by Bill Whittle when I appeared on Pajamas TV last October. Whittle's blog, Eject! Eject! Eject!, is now available at the Pajamas site, and I've been checking over there every few days for new content. You see, Whittle's one of the best conservatives writing today - always a pleasure to read.

In fact, his essay this morning is no disappointment, "A Message to the Rich":

So let me now send a personal message to The Rich in America ...

As an American and a patriot, I implore you – I go to my knees and beg you – LEAVE NOW.

Leave. Just go away. Retire to the Cayman Islands or Bermuda or wherever, but do it now, please, while you still have some love for this country. Close your companies, fire your employees, shutter your factories and offices, sell your property, and take all of that somewhere else… better yet: somewhere scenic but poverty-stricken. Somewhere that could use some wealth creation. Somewhere that people simply are grateful to have a job in the first place. Somewhere where you will be appreciated.

You are not welcome in America any more. Take your wealth and prosperity and inventiveness and hard work and vision and insight and bold risk-taking and joy in seeing growth and wealth creation and just go away – right now, before it’s too late. Because if you stay, Joel Berg and Barack Obama and Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank and Chris Dodd will continue to come after you for more and more and more and they will not ever stop – not ever – until you are forced to flee. And when that day comes, you will go with not with fond remembrances and a desire to return home, but rather a black heart and hard and bitter memories.

So on behalf of those few of us who still believe in the Land of Opportunity, I beg you and implore you, in the name of our common patriot ancestors who worked so hard and sacrificed so much so that we could become so spoiled and ungrateful: take your 60% of the total income taxes and just go away.

Because if you do, then there will no longer be an Enemy for the Left to stick it to. Then, perhaps, the half of the country that pays no income tax might have to put some skin in the game. Then, perhaps, with most of the wealth generation gone we will turn to our community organizers to provide the wealth creation, and the tax dollars, and the innovation. When you have gone the President of the United States, supported by an army of little acorns like Joel Berg, will have to start calling for the rest of us to be taxed more to address the inequality gap.

This isn't the best part. Whittle's personal confession is even better, so be sure to read the whole thing.

Hat Tip: Memeorandum.

Also: Serr8d's Cutting Edge, "Rich Man, LEAVE!"

Defense Budget Marks Shift in Military Priorities

There's a lot of attention to the news today that Defense Secretary Robert Gates has proposed a dramatic reshaping of the Pentagon budget. The New York Times has a big story in this, and see the additional commentary at Memeorandum.

By chance, I found the story earlier at Business Week, "Defense Budget Reflects Shifting Priorities":

U.S. military spending cuts urged by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates on Apr. 6 represent a fundamental shift in military priorities and strategy that could save large sums of money for the government. But even though a number of high-priced weapons programs are being pegged for the scrap heap, investors seemed relieved that cuts had not gone deeper. They also seemed heartened by the prospect of gains on other projects—and possible restoration by Congress of at least some of the money for programs such as the F-22, whose builders astutely spread production across 44 states.

Gates aims to slash elements of many weapons programs in a manner not seen in Washington for decades. Among them: the Future Combat Systems program, the F-22 Raptor, an $11 billion satellite network for the Air Force, and the nation's missile defense program, refocusing the latter on the "rogue state and theater missile threat." Many of the programs have faced substantial cost overruns, and military strategists now question their necessity.

Other systems were terminated entirely, including the Multiple Kill Vehicle, the Transformational Satellite program, and a second airborne laser prototype aircraft.

The lefties are loving it! (See here, here, here, and here, for example.)

But see also, "Pentagon Chief Rips Heart Out of Army's 'Future'."

If Gates wants to shift military emphasis to fighting small wars on the periphery, the new focus in fact might well shore up one of the historically more vulnerable areas of America's strategic primacy, the "contested zones" of international conflict. See Barry Posen, "Command of the Commons: The Military Foundation of U.S. Hegemony."

Photo: F-22 Raptor.

Farrah Fawcett: "Not on Death's Door"

Farrah Fawcett, the actress and former "Charlie's Angel" sweetheart, was hospitalized because of complications from cancer treatment. She was reported earlier as "unconscious," but the Los Angeles Times has confirmed the Ms. Fawcett is "doing fantastic":

Your prayers have been answered, folks. Farrah Fawcett is not at death's door!

LA Now reports that her friend/producer Craig Nevius confirmed Monday to Associated Press that the 62-year-old "Charlie's Angels" star has been hospitalized for a blood clot, a side effect of treatment she underwent in Germany. But she's not near death.

"She's doing fantastic," Nevius said. "Her fight goes on ... She's not going anywhere anytime soon."

He added: "As previously reported by everybody, she's not unconscious. She is not on death's door. The family has not gathered to say goodbye."

This guy is producing Fawcett's documentary chronicling her fight against cancer, called "A Wing and a Prayer." The actress was diagnosed with the disease in late 2006. She had chemotherapy and radiation and was in remission in early 2007. However, a few months later, her cancer returned. She eventually pursued alternative therapy abroad.

Fawcett's doctor, Lawrence Piro, said that Fawcett had abdominal bleeding and a hematoma after undergoing aggressive alternative cancer treatments in Germany.

More at the link.

According to a USA Today report, "Fawcett, 62, was diagnosed in 2006 with anal cancer, which has since spread to her liver ..."

Photo Credit: Los Angeles Times.

Barack Obama’s European Apology Tour

President Barack Obama, on his European diplomatic tour, is aggressively apologizing for the last few years of American foreign policy - a direct repudiation of historic role of American primacy in world affairs, and an obvious slap at the Bush administration's policy of taking the fight to the terrorists. The video below features Charles Krauthammer on Fox News last Friday.

Soeren Kern puts things in perspective in his essay at Pajamas Media, "The Obama Doctrine: Europe 1, America 0":

U.S. President Barack Obama’s debut in European summitry has been good for Europe but bad for America. While a highly deferential Obama gave in to all of the negotiating demands established by the Europeans, the Europeans in turn exploited Obama’s naïveté and refused to concede to any of his. Indeed, Obama not only allowed the Europeans to set the agendas of the recent G-20 and NATO summits, but in his zeal to curry favor with the Europeans, Obama even apologized for American primacy. Obama’s diplomatic philosophy, which seems to put the interests of other countries ahead of those of the United States, could be called the “Obama Doctrine.” If it is carried out in practice to its logical conclusion, it will have the long-term effect of gradually transferring U.S. geopolitical power and influence to Europeans and other American rivals.

Obama started his trip to Europe by proclaiming that “I would like to think that with my election, we’re starting to see some restoration of America’s standing in the world.” He then legitimized European anti-Americanism by saying that the United States was sorry for wrecking transatlantic relations, as if the Europeans were innocent victims of U.S. oppression; Obama told an audience of 3,000 giddy European students that “America has been arrogant and has even ridiculed” its European allies. Later, Obama followed up by declaring that “I believe in a strong Europe,” even though European integration is at base a project that seeks to counterbalance American power on the global stage. Obama topped it all off by offering pacifistic Europeans a utopian vision of a world free of nuclear weapons.

Maybe Obama thought his new “smart power” approach to U.S. diplomacy would woo his European counterparts into reciprocating their love for America. But defiant European leaders shunned Obama’s romantic advances, insisting instead on a redistribution of global power.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the international economic order dominated by the United States was finished. “The old Washington consensus is over,” Brown declared. “I think a new world order is emerging with the foundation of a new progressive era of international cooperation,” he said, referring to an incipient globalism that seeks to demolish American sovereignty.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel declared that Europe would no longer follow America’s lead on setting the global economic agenda. Sarkozy and Merkel called for a “new financial architecture” that would subject the U.S. financial system to European regulation. They added that their demands were not negotiable.

There's more at the link.

See also, John Hinderaker, "The Apology Tour: Will It Ever End?" (via Memeorandum).

Plus, don't miss William Jacobson's, "When Will The Europeans Apologize To Us?"

Today's Michele Bachmann Feeding Frenzy

The secular collectivists are piling on Representative Michelle Bachmann once again. It turns out that Ms. Bachmann appeared on Minnesota's KTLK-AM radio over the weekend, and she went off on the Obama administration for a number of its extreme left wing policies.

The Minnesota Independent is hammering Ms. Bachmann's attack on the administration's AmeriCorps program in its essay, "Bachmann fears ‘politically correct re-education camps for young people’." Read the post for the context, but Ms. Bachmann's comments make perfect sense to me, considering the mindless left-wing indoctrination currently the rage in schools and colleges today. And for some reason, the "Dump Bachmann" blog thinks the following comments are controversial:

I feel like I have a front row seat on history right now. I cannot believe what I'm seeing. This is our country. We love our country and I'm watching our freedoms slip out the door every day. Just this week with the G-20 and what President Obama is wanting to do to cede American sovereignty to transnational global authorities makes your head spin and we as members of congress have to bind him down with that authority, we cannot agree to these things that he is wanting to do, because it will continue to take away freedom from individuals in the United States.

*****

It is a dream come true for people who want to transform our country from a free-market economy to a centralized government planned economy. It is completely different and antithetical to what our founders gave us and I think people should be shocked, they should be stunned with what is happening and the speed at which it's happening and in particular, what is happening with the G-20 and the transnational aspects of what our President is committing our nation to.

There's absolutely nothing in these comments out of the ordinary for conservative political discourse. Indeed, we need more folks like Michele Bachamann standing up for what's right, and telling it like it is for this president, who is now travelling the world over putting other nations' interests ahead of our own.

What's Wrong With Rod Dreher?

A few weeks back Robert Stacy McCain wrote an extremely interesting post umasking Rod Dreher, the "crunchy conservative," for his abject surrender to the forces of postmodern cultural nihilism.

More on that below. For now, it turns out that Dreher, in the wake of his recent gay marriage debate with Damon Linker and Andrew Sullivan, has a new essay at Real Clear Politics discussing the "tyranny of liberalism" in contemporary culture (where he cites the new book by James Kalb). The article's generally a pleasure to read. It lays out clearly Kalb's case for leftist cultural totalitarianism, but I'm taken back by the conclusion:

Conservatives find it hard to articulate a case for traditional marriage in terms acceptable in liberal rights discourse, as well as in the shallow rhetoric of contemporary debate. Defending traditional marriage requires burrowing deep into the meaning of the human person, sex, gender, society and law - and that's just for starters. Life in community is a mysterious and complex thing that cannot be radically remade to suit a preferred outcome.

"If you can redefine [marriage] so that the sex of the parties has nothing to do with it, then you can redefine anything in human life any way you want," Kalb told me in an interview. "Man becomes the artifact of whoever is in power."

This, I think, is what scares ordinary people the most about the swift attempt to kick the foundation out from under traditional marriage. They intuit that there is something, well, tyrannical in the idea that virtually overnight, the long-settled meaning of marriage could change in a vast social experiment without historical precedent - and that any attempt to resist this radicalization stands condemned as God-intoxicated bigotry.

Trads are on the losing side of this argument, at least in the short run, given the cultural conditioning of latter-day Americans. Still, it is instructive to ponder the fate of modern Western societies that have cast out the biblical god as the source of moral reality. Wrote eminent historian Paul Johnson, "The history of modern times is in great part the history of how that vacuum has been filled."

For those fearful of despotism, it is not a happy tale.

This is poppycock. 

"Trads," which is short for "traditionalists," don't have problems "articulating a case" for the historical and normative foundations of marriage. In fact, huge majorities in Iowa and nationally not only discern the stark cultural revisionism in the left's hegemonic same-sex marriage discourse, but they reject it as well. See my recent essay at Pajamas Media for more on that, "An Attack on Traditional Marriage in Iowa." 

The problem for Dreher is he's totalitarian himself. In his debate with Linker and Sullivan, he was easily pigeonholed as a bigot because he apparently rejects loving same-sex partnerships altogether, not just gay marriage. But note that the data show that that position violates popular sensibilities just as much as does the left's gay marriage extremism.

Conservatives have no reason to fear the "tyranny of liberalism." We live in a democracy of majority rights under the rule of law. The Iowa Supreme Court's ruling last week was deeply flawed on the both the merits and the result. But what's worse is for allegedly "crunchy cons" to throw in the towel on the penultimate battle of today's culture wars, the right's "hill to die on." In any case, here's Robert's conclusion at his post taking down Dreher: 

We are now a mere 18 months from Labor Day 2010, when that climactic political battle will be fully engaged. There a lot of important work to be done -- and done now, over the next three to six months -- if there is to be any hope of anything but the abomination of desolation. Our utter destruction is at hand unless good men rally to the colors, and we no longer have the luxury of indulging in these petty playground feuds and the children who enjoy them.

To the extent that conservatives need a philosopher now, I'd say we need to be studying Sun-Tzu.

If Rod Dreher wants to join Andrew Sullivan and David Brock (yes, I said "Brock," not "Brooks") in the ranks of the vaunting army outside the camp, let him go over and be gone. But don't sit pouting inside the camp, giving aid and comfort to the adversary by your demoralizing pronouncements. If that stuff is going to be tolerated among conservatives, there won't be enough left of a constitutional republic after Nov. 3 for anyone to bother trying to "conserve" it, and no hope at all that it might be restored.

As always, I'll have more on this in upcoming posts ...

Abortion Extremism: Babies as Physical Intrusions

An essay from Sherry Colb, a Professor at Cornell Law School, has been making its way across the conservatives blogosphere, so I thought I'd share it with readers: "Why a Botched Abortion Case Should, and Does, Inspire Outrage: The Sycloria Williams Story."

Professor Colb retells the story of Sycloria Williams, who was induced for a late-term abortion procedure, and delivered a live baby when the doctor failed to arrive on time. An owner of the clinic, Belkis Gonzalez, threw the baby in a toxic waste bag with gauze and other debris. The baby's remains were found by police a week later in a cardboard box.

Now, here's Professor Colb's analysis:

An important feature of the facts that distinguishes what occurred here from abortion more generally is that if the narrative alleged by the prosecution and by Sycloria Williams is accurate, then Belkis Gonzalez – the woman who is said to have placed a live fetus into a biohazard bag – did something that goes well beyond what can be called "terminating a pregnancy."

Indeed, Gonzalez apparently had nothing to do with the termination itself: She did not dilate Williams's cervix or induce labor or otherwise play any role in removing the fetus from Williams's body. It was only after Williams had given birth to her fetus that Gonzalez cut the umbilical cord and deposited the allegedly live, writhing, breathing infant into a biohazard bag, along with gauze and other garbage.

One might argue, as some pro-life advocates have, that there is no meaningful difference between what Gonzalez did and what an abortion provider does, because in both cases, a fetus is killed. This argument, however, ignores one of the main premises of the right to abortion – the bodily-integrity interest of the pregnant woman. Particularly at the later stages of pregnancy, the right to abortion does not protect an interest in killing a fetus as such. What it protects instead is the woman's interest in not being physically, internally occupied by another creature against her will, the same interest that explains the right to use deadly force, if necessary, to stop a rapist. Though the fetus is innocent of any intentional wrongdoing and the rapist is not, the woman's interest in repelling an unwanted physical intrusion is quite similar.

Once the fetus is no longer inside the woman's body, though, killing it is not necessary to preserving the woman's bodily integrity. If Gonzalez had, instead of suffocating the infant in a garbage bag, placed it into an incubator with a respirator, for example, Williams would not have been any more pregnant than she was in the circumstances that actually unfolded. And once Williams was no longer pregnant, and thus no longer occupied by an unwelcome intruder, she had no more right to procure the death of her fetus than did anyone else, including Belkis Gonzalez.

You can read the rest of the article at the link, althought I can't resist including another passage, from the conclusion:

Most women who terminate their pregnancies do so in the first trimester, when there is no question of viability and when the developing fetus does not yet evidence the capacity to experience pain or pleasure. Such abortions understandably do not generate the same revulsion and outrage as the later ones do. Late-term abortions are morally complicated, because the later-term fetus may experience pain and may therefore plausibly be described – without any need for a religious gloss – as truly being a victim of the procedure. This does not, as some claim, necessarily mean that a woman should not have the right to terminate a pregnancy. It does, however, counsel in favor of measures that will move desired abortions up to as early a point in pregnancy as possible.

This is where laws intended to reduce the incidence of abortion by placing obstacles in women's paths may exacerbate the situation. To cite one example, thirty-four states currently have "parental involvement" statutes that require pregnant minors to notify or obtain consent from a parent before obtaining an abortion. Laws like these are very popular and strike many people as intuitively attractive. The Guttmacher Institute recently published findings, however, showing that such measures "delay access to the procedure, reducing safety and resulting in later, more costly abortions." When an abortion is delayed, moreover, not only is the procedure more physically risky and challenging to the woman, but it also involves a more developed and possibly sentient fetus.

The notion that a viable baby is an "unwanted physical intrusion" reveals the stomach-churning indifference to life among those on the pro-choice side of the abortion debate. But there's a lot in this conclusion as well. I personally cannot conceive of "fetal viability" as a legitimate concept. What's important is life itself, and abortion kills, whether in the first few weeks after fertilization, or months later when pro-choice extremists are debating whether the "alleged" baby would survive outside of the uterus. But further, notice how the same abandonment of morality treats childhood pregancy as a surprisingly legitimate access point for state control, with state power usurping the authority and autonomy of parents. That is, the fact that voters and representative bodies in thirty-four states believe as a matter of public policy that parents rather than minors are in a better position to make the ultimate decision regarding the fate of an unborn child appears of little consequence to Professor Colb, and no doubt to her allies in the radical feminist abortion lobby.

Conservatives really have lost the culture wars if it's to the point that health professionals and legal experts can seriously argue that consent laws are dangerous. Children getting pregnant is what's dangerous. Once a baby is conceived the assumption of those thirty-four states is that the parents are in better position to advise their daughter on what should happen next. The parents, as well, are certainly going to be in a better financial position to assist in decision-making, and thus robust parental notification laws are more likely to preserve life and liberty of young girls and their potential offspring.

What is so hard about this?

Readers can see why I refuse to capitulate not only to the nihilist left, but to the "postmodern" conservatives as well, "pomo" nihilists who are busy enabling all of this death worship by arguing that conservatives should "take the libertarian route" when it comes to culture. Yeah, sure. Kids can smoke a couple of joints on the way to the abortion clinic.

I know I've been blogging quite a bit on the gay marriage question, but conservatives cannot abandon the protection of the unborn as a first principle of a vigorous and intellectually honest political agenda. Vote life ...

Hat Tip: Darleen Click.

Tough Economy Puts Pressure on "Grandfamilies"

Here's an interesting story, from the Wall Street Journal, on the strains facing grandparents raising children amid the recession, "'Grandfamilies' Come Under Pressure":

Until she lost her job last September, Wendy Nocar denied nothing to her granddaughter, Summer, whom she has raised since she was a baby. The blonde 6-year-old was plied with Barbie dolls, clothes, ballet lessons, trips to the mall, and outings to Broadway shows and her favorite restaurant, Red Lobster.

These days, Ms. Nocar, 57, unable to land a job interview much less a job, is worried about stocking the refrigerator and paying her mortgage. She is also fearful of being unable to support Summer, who she says was born addicted to heroin, and who has been in her custody since infancy.

Summer is anxious about her grandmother's situation. "We don't have a lot of money," says the first-grader, whose pictures adorn the cluttered three-bedroom house she inhabits with her grandmother, two cats, a dog and a rabbit named Whiskers. "We need a lot of money; she has to get a job," Summer adds.

"She seems to understand a lot more than children do her age," Ms. Nocar says.

Today, more and more children are being raised by their grandparents. These grandparents provide a crucial safety net, allowing children whose parents can't provide for them to remain in families, instead of winding up as wards of the state. But as the recession hits "grandfamilies," that safety net is under stress.

The unemployment rate for older workers is lower than the overall rate. But once they become unemployed, older workers find it harder to land a job and they tend to remain out of work longer than younger workers, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The unemployment rate for those 55 and over has been climbing significantly in recent months; in March, it rose to 6.2% -- the highest it has been since September, 1949, according the bureau.

At the same time, the number of grandfamilies has been growing. In 1970, about 3% of all children under 18 lived in households headed by a grandparent. By 2007, 4.7 million kids -- or 6.5% of American children -- were living in households headed by a grandparent, according to Census Bureau data. This shift was driven by a variety of factors, including more parents hit by drug use, AIDS or cancer, and the large numbers of single parents who, if struck by tragedy, leave children behind.

Read the whole thing at the link.

Business as Usual at Daily Kos

Here's Markos Moulitas, on Twitter, using the murders of three Pittsburgh police officers as grist for political snark:

When we were out of power, we organized to win the next election. Conservatives, apparently, prefer to talk "revolution" and kill cops.

As Captain Ed notes, "Markos Moulitsas twittered his list to blame the shooting on the conservative movement, and apparently joke about the murders."

Recall that Moultisas and Daily Kos have longed claimed to represent the "mainstream" of the Democratic Party. I've written previously about Moulitsas' representative secular demonology. But check out Caleb at Red State, "Kos & Kompany: Cop Shooting Equals Twitter Fun:

Diaries and comments at DailyKos indicting conservatives as inciters of murder are utterly commonplace. And not just at DailyKos. To a whole wing of the Democrats it’s axiomatic that Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck cause violence. I’m reminded of a recent episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, wherein he and his panel claim that the invective and hyperbole of conservative pundits is so excessive and that it invites harm on Obama, and then equate Glenn Beck with Nazi sympathizer and apologist Father Coughlin. Yes, all in the same segment. Yes, Keith “YOU’RE A FASCIST, SIR” Olbermann.

It’s very telling. Calling conservatives Nazis isn’t even hyperbole to their minds. But calling Obama’s socialist policies socialist is an incitement to murder.

There's more at Memeorandum.

On Defending the Constitution: A Reader Writes

Here's the e-mail sent to me from Maj. Steven Givler, published by permission:

Sir,

Thank you for your blog. I’ve often wondered lately whether my more than 20 years of military service have been devoted to defending a constitution that is no longer recognized by the people who benefit from its protections.

Every once in a while something encourages me to believe that there are still Americans who understand what makes us different from other nations, and who are willing to preserve that difference. Your blog, which I found via RS McCain’s blog, is one of those things.

Thanks for the encouragement.

All the best,

Steven

STEVEN A. GIVLER, Maj, USAF
Assistant Air Attache
US EMBASSY Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Steven blogs at Steven Givler Online.

It's always nice to get letters from readers, and coming from a member of our armed forces, this one is extra special.

Thank you for your service, Steven.

Levi Johnston on Tyra Banks Show

Last night, at People Magazine, I saw Governor Sarah Palin's response to Levi Johnston's interview with Tyra Banks. Now Allahpundit picks up the story, and he links to the video:

Here's this from the Palin family's statement, with no added comment necessary:

"Bristol did not even know Levi was going on the show. We're disappointed that Levi and his family, in a quest for fame, attention, and fortune, are engaging in flat-out lies, gross exaggeration, and even distortion of their relationship," says the statement from the Palin family rep, Meghan Stapleton.

"Bristol's focus will remain on raising Tripp, completing her education, and advocating abstinence," the statement continues. "It is unfortunate that Levi finds it more appealing to exploit his previous relationship with Bristol than to contribute to the well being of the child."

The statement ends, saying, "Bristol realizes now that she made a mistake in her relationship and is the one taking responsibility for their actions."

Defending Traditional Marriage

Okay, as promised, my essay on the implications of the Iowa Supreme Court's gay marriage ruling is published at Pajamas Media: "An Attack on Traditional Marriage in Iowa."

My argument at the piece distills a lot of the commentary I've offered here over the last few months, so readers may see some familiar themes. The push for same-sex marriage is more than about non-traditional wedded partnerships. It's about achieving a social revolution of nihilism and extreme secularization. One of the more interesting debates on the topic this week is the discussions by Rod Dreher, and the attacks on him by Damon Linker and Andrew Sullivan. Conor Friedersdorf jumps on the "pomo-con" bandwagon here.

Actually, Dreher doesn't do justice to the complexity of the issue, and thus he's easily attacked and ridiculed remorselessly as a theocon homophobe. Dreher makes it easy for his antagonists because he sets up opposition to same-sex marriage as opposition to homosexuality in toto. My personal experience in writing about this topic for the past six months, and in discussing it with people of various persuasions, is that people don't hate homosexuals. There's little homophobia per se. What gay hatred we do see, no matter how isolated, is highlighted and enlarged by the gay extremists as respresentative of an alleged hegemonic hetero-dominant dictatorship. Yet, when examining polling data, Americans demonstrate huge support for a type of civil unioin that affords all the legal guarantees of rights and responsibilities of marriage, while at the same time recognizing "marriage" as it's been historically substantiated - normatively and politically - is between one man and one woman for the regeneration of society.

Robert Stacy McCain's been shifting over to social conservatives issues in his writing this week, and he's got a really powerful essay up at the American Spectator that make the case for traditionalism, "Marriage: A Hill to Die On."

Robert notes that "Over and over, we find ourselves fighting what is essentially a defensive battle against the forces of organized radicalism who insist that "social justice" requires that we grant their latest demand." And further, "Such is the remorseless aggression of radicalism that conservatives forever find themselves contemplating the latest "progressive" demand and asking, 'Is this a hill worth dying on?'"

Yes, marriage is a "hill worth dying on." That is to say, there's not a whole lot left in the culture that hasn't been broken down and destroyed by radical individualism. Conservatives, as Mark Levin points out in Liberty and Tyranny, borrowing from Edmund Burker, are not opposed to change. But change absent of prudence is radical and destabilizing.

But let's go back to Robert's essay on why traditionalism is worth the fight:

Some conservatives are wholly persuaded by the arguments of same-sex marriage advocates. Others, however, are merely unprincipled cowards and defeatists. Concerned about maintaining their intellectual prestige, some elitists on the Right do not wish to associate themselves with Bible-thumping evangelicals. Or, disparaging the likelihood of successful opposition, they advocate pre-emptive surrender rather than waging a fight that will put conservatism on the losing side of the issue.

Yet if the defense of traditional marriage - an ancient and honorable institution - is not a "hill worth dying on," what is? In every ballot-box fight to date, voters have supported the one-man, one-woman definition of marriage. As indicated by exit polls in California last fall, this is one issue where the conservative position is widely endorsed by black and Latino voters. Should such a potentially promising political development be abandoned? ....

It is only by the activist rulings of judges and other officials, never at the behest of voters, that the radical crusade for same-sex marriage has advanced this far. We know which side the people are on. Even Barack Obama was shrewd enough to declare his opposition to same-sex marriage during the presidential campaign. We have seen voters in 30 states pass constitutional amendments to defend the "one-man, one-woman" definition of marriage, and conservatives in Iowa are now planning efforts to add their state to the list.

Having been given an inch, the radicals now attempt to take a mile. But this is a hill to die on.

Read the whole essay at the link.

Degrading the U.S. Nuclear Arsenal

This video was swirling around the web early last year. Some of you may remember it. A lot of conservatives bloggers posted it semi-permanently in their sidebars. Candidate Obama called for the denuclearization of U.S. defense policy, with the goal of the complete elimination of nuclear weapons on the planet. Obama's proposal was the worst kind of leftist idealism, the results of which would weaken U.S. security and put Americans at the mercy of sworn enemies of this country.

It turns out President Obama is making good on his campaign promise.

The Wall Street Journal discusses the administration's arms control discussions with the Russians:

The Obama Administration wants to replace the soon-to-expire 1991 START treaty with a new regime that would set a ceiling of 1,000 nuclear warheads apiece for the U.S. and Russia. That would dramatically cut the two countries' existing number of operational weapons, both strategic and nonstrategic, from a current estimated total of about 4,100 for the U.S. and 5,200 for Russia. It would also exceed the terms agreed by the Bush Administration in the 2002 Moscow Treaty, which committed each side to reduce their arsenals to between 1,700 and 2,200 strategic warheads by 2012.

As we learned in the 1970s, the devil of arms control often lies in the technical arcana of warheads and delivery systems, so we'll await the text before pronouncing judgment. But the devil of arms control also lies in the overall concept, with its implicit assumption that the weapons themselves are inherently more dangerous than the intentions of those who develop and deploy them.

We would have thought this thinking was discredited after the Second Lateran Council outlawed the use of crossbows in 1139, or after the Hague Convention of 1899 banned aerial bombardment, or after the Kellogg-Briand Pact outlawed war. Nope. Mr. Obama has set the ultimate goal of eliminating nuclear weapons, and as one of his first official acts he pledged to "stop the development of new nuclear weapons."

What Mr. Obama wants to kill specifically is the Reliable Replacement Warhead, which the Bush Administration supported over Congressional opposition, and which Mr. Obama now opposes despite the support of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the military. Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told us this week that "we do need a new warhead." When we asked about Mr. Obama's views on the warhead, the Admiral said, "You would have to ask him."

The RRW is not, in fact, a new weapon; it has been in development for several years and is based on the W89 design tested in the 1980s. It is said to be a remarkably safe and long-lasting warhead, a significant consideration given the gradual physical deterioration of the current U.S. arsenal, particularly the mainstay W76.

The irony is that Mr. Obama's opposition is making substantial reductions in the total U.S. arsenal that much riskier. In the absence of actual testing, which hasn't happened in the U.S. since 1992, the only real hedge against potentially defective weapons is a larger arsenal. Naturally, arms-control theologians are instead urging the Senate to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and ban the production of weapons grade uranium and plutonium.

The entire essay is available at the link.

See also, "Obama calls for 'world without' nukes" (via Memeorandum).