In the days after the Presidents insulting and grating speech on Afghanistan Monday night, I have been fascinated by the reaction from the various talking heads in the political media.
All the leftists are busy doing what we expect them to; cry about the escalation and broken campaign promises, blaming Bush for everything and when all that fails, try and convince us that Obama's escalation of surrender is somehow a good idea.
The mesmerizing point is how many supposed conservatives are actually praising Obama for the decision. What is there to applaud? That it took Bama six months to decide to short General McCrystal 40 to 60 thousand troops that he requested or the fact that there is now an 18 month window to wrap it up. Even the 30,000 he is sending won't be at full force for four to six months (if they hurry) so the window is really a year and the rules of engagement are so weak they won't even get to kill any of the bad guys while they're there.
So why the tepid applause by some Republicans? First of all, many weak kneed Republicans just love being seen by the DC crowd as reasonable and willing to work with the opposition. It's their own personal ecstasy every time George Stephanopolous gives them a cookie. That's only part of it though, the other part involves two things i constantly rail on.
Stupidity and shame.
We have tons of one and not enough of the other. Let me elaborate.
Shame is a very powerful tool, especially when conducted in the public arena. It's one of the great hidden benefits to the First Amendment, incompetent people get empowered to speak freely, thus exposing their truly mediocre nature for all to see. The public, once alerted to the stupidity at hand, then proceed to shame the moron at hand to the back bench where they are then marginalized and therefore can do no harm to anybody. Former Presidents like Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Bush I for very valid reasons became complete jokes during their terms for being completely inept. Dan Quayle, John Kerry, etc. were also subsequently disposed of for incompetence and the list could go on for ages and Barak Obama should be added to that list as well.
He never will though, which brings us to the second point.
Shame is a difficult thing to do properly and it requires a semi-advanced level of intelligence to be done properly in the public arena and simply put, too many people in the public and private spheres are simply to stupid to handle the task. This involves all sides as well. The media, in addition to their built in liberal bias has some of the most ill-informed members in its ranks. Some of the responses by Mike Moore, Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, etc. were almost as confounding as Obama's speech. They knew somethings wasn't quite right but what got articulate was unintelligible. Many of the FOX pundits showed similar lack of mental cohesion as they somehow deduced that Obama was committed to winning now. When asked what part of the speech made them feel that way the spring in the hamster wheel in their brain just snapped right in half. Most politicians are similarly unqualified to call out the opposition as well. We know this by their frank admission that they don't even read bills they vote on. Way to build that credibility. Guys like Jim DeMint, Judd Gregg (sometimes) and Joe Lieberman (sometimes) stand out as real ideological firebrands only because they are some of the few guys who have any real idea what they are talking about. Conversely, you could listen to hours of speeches by Lindsey Graham, John McCain, Barbara Boxer, Diane DeGette, etc. and not find one tangible thought. All those people just fall back on one issue (bipartisanship, maverickness, abortion/radical feminism) and scream about it until they get hoarse. People like this make up 97% of Congress. Sadly, because the media and Congress are so inept, it is very difficult for the voting public to be well informed. Information can be difficult to find, especially when most people have jobs, kids, etc. to focus on.
Many people don't like this theory of productive shaming, which applies to all walks of life not just politics. They buy into the theory that all people all unique snowflakes just waiting to dazzle us with their radiance. This is pure sophistry pushed by shallow minded people, the same people who decide not to keep score in little league games. This world is not all snowflakes, it is chock full of acid rain and tundra that needs to be pruned from society. Half the job is already done for us. Incompetent people always expose themselves sooner or later. All the rest of us have to do is wait for them to surface then take them out. This involves two things that need changing. First, the public must abandon any hope that media will keep them informed and seek independent information from numerous, conflicting sources. British journalism is a good place to go for some combative journalism and the Internet makes some basic fact checking easy. Getting the intellectual weaponry is key, if you try and expose a fraud without the firepower, you yourself become the fraud. Secondly, people must get bolder. Americans are generally nice people who don't like confrontation. This must change. Exposing stupidity where ever it may be may seem abrasive and you might feel like an a**hole afterward. I assure you this is normal but can be overcome. Just know that by helping to scrub clean the human debris from our wonderfully constructed civil society is the the most patriotic thing you can do. I would go so far as to say it is your civic obligation to rail against incompetence where ever it holds power. If enough people take my advice, these would be backbenchers will have no choice but to retreat into the shadows of irrelevance never to bother us again. Then the power will return to where it rightfully belongs, the public.
After all, it was Jefferson who said "When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty." Nothing scares incompetence more than the threat of being exposed and it;s time we got back to making it standard practice.
Posts
