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Saturday, January 8, 2011

The Decline of the Left

I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground that 'all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states or to the people.' To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specially drawn around the powers of congress is to take possession of a boundless field of power, not longer susceptible of any definition. ... [The Constitution] was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers. In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution." — Thomas Jefferson

On January 5, 2011 a new Congress was sworn into office and a new Speaker of the House elected. Their first act was to read aloud the Constitution of the United States. Each of the 435 members of the 112th Congress read part of an article from the Constitution, some with passion and others in the tone of an errant schoolboy reading a passage from a text he was required to read.

Not all members of Congress and many in left-wing media thought this no more than a stunt to placate the members of the Tea Party that had voted many of these new members into to office last November. Congressman Gerald Nadler (D-NY) said the Constitution was not a sacred document and that we should not place such reverence in it. Ezra Kline, a nobody journalist at the Washington Post, stated the Constitution was over 100 years old and written in a language no longer relevant in our society. Joey Behar, a dumber than a stone TV personality, questioned “what is this fetish we have over the Constitution?’

These attitudes have resulted from 50 to 60 years of a cultural takeover of our institutions by the left. Our public schools, universities, courts, political elite and entertainment industry and media have been infiltrated by people who have no regard for the Constitution unless it can be bent to their agenda. The enumerated powers vested in the federal government mean nothing to them. They believe all rights stem from government and the government can do anything it deems in the public good. In essence they have replaced God with government.

You can go on any college campus across the country and find thousands of 20 year old kids that know next to nothing about the history of the United States, but they will tell you how much they hate the country. Again, this is due to a total lack of education of our children about our founding fathers and our constitution. They are taught from a playbook that totally denies the exceptionalism of the United States, our form of government and the numerous contributions we have made to civilization. They are virtually ignorant of our economic system and the benefits of capitalism. They believe that they are entitled to almost everything including a college education, a job and government health care. They also have no idea of the sacrifices made by previous generations to insure their freedoms and way of life. They can tell you all about the latest rock star, video game or smartphone but they can’t name the nations we fought in World War II or what the inalienable rights referred to in the Declaration of Independence are. You can read more about the lack of knowledge of our history, Constitution, economic system and how our government functions by clicking here.

I believe that the rise of progressivism reached its zenith on January 20, 2009 with the inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama the 44th president of the United States. Obama was what the progressive left had been waiting on for years. He was the epitome of the perfect candidate for the left. He was young, eloquent and above all he was black — but not too black. He was the left wing’s messiah, the one they had been waiting for since the death of Bobby Kennedy. He was someone they could rally behind. He had very little political baggage and he came from the roots of community organizing, something the left loved. Unlike the dull and bland leftists like Mondale, McGovern, Carter, Gore and Kerry he had the charisma the left had been so longing for. He even surpassed Bill Clinton in the eyes of the true believers on the left. After all if there had been no Ross Perot in 1992 Bill Clinton would have faded away into the history of failed Democrat presidential candidates. In the eyes of the left Obama had it all, he would be their savior.

The media, academia, students and the entertainment industry fell in love with Obama. He was, in the words of Sean Hannity, “the anointed one.” The timing was perfect for Obama. We were engaged in two unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the country was entering a recession, the GOP had been disgraced in the 2006 congressional elections and the Republican candidate, John McCain, while a war hero was dull and lacked the charisma the American people were looking for.

Obama had just one flaw — he didn’t know how to govern. He was great on the campaign trail, but when it came to governing the country he fell flat. As the recession deepened and unemployment climbed to 10% Obama risked all on his universal health care program and his endless stimulus spending. He also had a Democrat controlled House and Senate that was spending like true progressives and taking more control of the lives of Americans.

Like the fable of the emperor’s new clothes the American people soon saw the naked truth about Obama — he was an arrogant fraud. He was leading the nation into economic disaster with his big government spending and growing deficit. The American people, like never before, began to rise up against the Obama, the government and the progressive left. This movement was dubbed the “Tea Party.” It was scoffed at by the political elite and left wing media. People began reading the Constitution and seeing that many of the things the Congress was doing were not what the founding fathers had wanted for this Republic.

In November of 2010 the American people rejected the Democrat Congress by sending 65 new conservative member to Washington and over 650 to the various state house across the nation. This was the largest rebuke of a sitting Congress in 65 years, almost double the conservative revolution of 1994.

Throughout history people began by pulling together to create a civilization. This was the case of the Greeks, Romans Minoans, and our American civilization. When these civilizations begin to decline they do so from the top down, not from the bottom up. The people on the bottom have little or no power to prevent the top down rot. With the explosion of the Internet the people on the bottom now have the power to take on the elite leaders and the media that supports them. This is the difference that is making itself present today. The Internet has given the people on the bottom the power to challenge the top and is one of the reasons the progressive left, that has controlled our media for so long, is now losing its hold on shaping the thinking of the American electorate. The success of the Tea Party movement proves this. For the first time in nearly 60 years the progressive left is beginning to lose the battle for the hearts and minds of the American people.

Since the end of the First World War Europeans have been living with socialism. Today throughout Europe the socialist system of government is failing. This is evident by riots in France, Greece, Spain, Portugal and the United Kingdom. At the same time we have progressives in this county who want us to move in the direction the Europeans are trying to leave. This move is being rejected by the American people. To a progressive liberal capitalism is a system that works in the practical sense, but is wrong in theory. To our founding fathers it was the only way to build a sustainable civilization.

Politics in the United States is a game played between the 40 yard lines. You do not have to move the ball 90 yards to change the direction of the country. Obama and the 111th Congress attempted to violate this rule and is the main reason they failed and why progressive liberalism will decline over the next decade. A recent Gallup poll stated that those who professed to be progressive liberals accounted for 19% of the electorate, while those professing to be conservative amounted to 45%. The progressive left, while being highly visible in the media and entertainment industry, is becoming less relevant in our politics. Conversely, those in Tea Party will become more relevant in future elections. This is why the 112th Congress will not fall prey to the same fate as the 1994 Congress.

In 1994 conservatives were swept into Washington on a wave of resentment for Clinton’s hard left spending, tax increases and attempts to change our health care system. The problem they had is that as time went by these conservatives lost their way in the swamps of Washington politics and fell victim to the accouterments of power. They were soon building bridges to nowhere and spending and regulating like their progressive counterparts. There was no unified force to hold them to the Constitution or their conservative values. This is not the case today. With the rise of the Tea Party movement and the Internet conservatives have more power to hold the 112th Congress accountable for their actions.

With the death of the Kennedy political dynasty the left no longer has the charismatic great leader that can succeed Obama. There are only mediocre left wing politicians that could be the savior of the left. There is only one Obama and his tern is up in 2012. Even if he is reelected his relevancy will be severely dampened if the Congress remains conservative. This will be the challenge for conservatives and the Tea Party movement for the next two years. If they keep pressure on the House and change the balance of power in the Senate we can change the course of this Republic.

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