Cal Cunningham for North Carolina Senate
By Bernie Quigley
For The Hill on 3/31/10
In the last 20 years North Carolina has had the churning experience of letting go of the old and finding itself again underneath; returning again to the place where it started, the Democratic Party. Something good happened when the urbane Harvard-educated lawyer and entrepreneur Mark Warner teaming up with the rustic Scotch-Irish warrior Jim Webb from the deep hills of western Virginia. This was a new and auspicious Democratic paradigm; and advanced management and excellence model with Southern characteristics.
It was Mudcat Saunder’s South; the old South, the new South, the same South coming into the republic and bringing with it heart and substance. It awakened in North Carolina when Kay Hagen clicked her ruby slippers and sent Elizabeth Dole back to Kansas in 2008. It advances again with Cal Cunningham’s run against Richard Burr for the Senate in North Carolina. Cunningham, a captain in the army reserves and an Iraq war veteran who won a Bronze Star for his efforts, brings authentic leadership to North Carolina. He has recently been endorsed by General Wesley Clark.
"Cal would be the first veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to serve in the U.S. Senate. He would bring a veteran's unique perspective to policymaking in Washington,” said Clark.
When we were rearing our kids on our little farm in Tobaccoville, NC, the venerable Jesse Helms was our Senator. He came from the ‘50s and refused to let go. Like one of those old Japanese soldiers from World War II who refused to surrender and were still coming out of the jungle decades after the war had ended. But the South had already let go decades before and had joined the world, even led the world, while Jesse was still holding fast to the past. And in a monumental shift in sensibility my Baptist, Democrat precinct which had voted Democrat for 120 years, suddenly made a tectonic shift and 85% followed Jesse to the Republican party in the early 1980s.
But Warner and Webb returned it. They, with General Clark and a few others, brought a new face to the Democrats and a new face to the South, “a Democratic Team with Management Values.” Wesley Clark brought a uniform sense of honor, dignity, intelligence and duty to the country in the oldest tradition of the South and to the Democratic party. Like Hagan, Cunningham fits in this new model which forms an auspiciously rising paradigm and one which returns North Carolina back to its Democratic roots.
During 2008, Cunningham served as a military prosecutor in the Multi-National Corps-Iraq. During his tour, he was government counsel in the first court-martial of a contractor under military law since 1968. In addition to the Bronze Star Medal, he received the General Douglas MacArthur Award for his leadership.
In November 2000, Cal was elected to the North Carolina State Senate, representing Davidson, Rowan and Iredell Counties. In the Senate, Cal worked on privacy legislation, campaign reform, the patient's bill of rights, the clean smokestacks bill, class size reductions, and preservation of farmland. He served as Vice Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and on the Senate's education committees. He has since served on the Executive Committee of the North Carolina Democratic Party.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Cal Cunningham for North Carolina Senate - 2nd draft
The last 20 years North Carolina has had the churning experience of letting go of the old and finding itself again underneath; returning again to the place where it started, the Democratic Party. Something happened when urbane Harvard-educated lawyer and entrepreneur Mark Warner teaming up with the rustic Scotch-Irish warrior Jim Webb from the deep hills of western Virginia. This was a new and auspicious Democratic paradigm; and advanced management and excellence model with Southern characteristics. It was Mudcat Saunder’s South; the old South, the new South, the same South coming into the republic and bringing with it heart and substance. It awakened in North Carolina when Kay Hagen clicked her ruby slippers and sent Elizabeth Dole back to Kansas in 2008. It advances again with Cal Cunningham’s run against Richard Burr for the Senate. Cunningham, a captain in the army reserves and an Iraq war veteran who won a Bronze Star for his efforts, brings authentic leadership to North Carolina. He has recently been endorced by General Wesley Clark.
"Cal would be the first veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to serve in the U.S. Senate. He would bring a veteran's unique perspective to policymaking in Washington,” said Clark.
When we were rearing our kids on our little farm in Tobaccoville, NC, the venerable Jesse Helms was our Senator. He came from the ‘50s and refused to let go. Like one of those old Japanese soldiers from World War II who refused to surrender and were still coming out of the jungle decades after the war had ended. But the South had already let go decades before and had joined the world, even led the world, while Jesse was still holding fast to the past. And in a monumental shift in sensibility, my Baptist, Democrat precinct which had voted Democrat for 120 years made a techtonic shift and 85% followed Jesse to the Republican party.
But Warner and Webb returned it. They, with General Clark and others, brought a new face to the Democrats and a new face to the South, “a Democratic Team with Management Values.” Wesley Clark brought a uniform sense of honor, dignity, intelligence and duty to the country and to the party. Like Hagan, Cunningham fits in this new model which forms an auspiciously rising paradigm and one which returns North Carolain back to its Democratic roots.
During 2008, Cal served as a military prosecutor in the Multi-National Corps-Iraq. During his tour, he was government counsel in the first court-martial of a contractor under military law since 1968. In addition to the Bronze Star Medal, he received the General Douglas MacArthur Award for his leadership.
In November 2000, Cal was elected to the North Carolina State Senate, representing Davidson, Rowan and Iredell Counties. In the Senate, Cal worked on privacy legislation, campaign reform, the patient's bill of rights, the clean smokestacks bill, class size reductions, and preservation of farmland. He served as Vice Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and on the Senate's education committees. He has since served on the Executive Committee of the North Carolina Democratic Party.
The last 20 years North Carolina has had the churning experience of letting go of the old and finding itself again underneath; returning again to the place where it started, the Democratic Party. Something happened when urbane Harvard-educated lawyer and entrepreneur Mark Warner teaming up with the rustic Scotch-Irish warrior Jim Webb from the deep hills of western Virginia. This was a new and auspicious Democratic paradigm; and advanced management and excellence model with Southern characteristics. It was Mudcat Saunder’s South; the old South, the new South, the same South coming into the republic and bringing with it heart and substance. It awakened in North Carolina when Kay Hagen clicked her ruby slippers and sent Elizabeth Dole back to Kansas in 2008. It advances again with Cal Cunningham’s run against Richard Burr for the Senate. Cunningham, a captain in the army reserves and an Iraq war veteran who won a Bronze Star for his efforts, brings authentic leadership to North Carolina. He has recently been endorced by General Wesley Clark.
"Cal would be the first veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to serve in the U.S. Senate. He would bring a veteran's unique perspective to policymaking in Washington,” said Clark.
When we were rearing our kids on our little farm in Tobaccoville, NC, the venerable Jesse Helms was our Senator. He came from the ‘50s and refused to let go. Like one of those old Japanese soldiers from World War II who refused to surrender and were still coming out of the jungle decades after the war had ended. But the South had already let go decades before and had joined the world, even led the world, while Jesse was still holding fast to the past. And in a monumental shift in sensibility, my Baptist, Democrat precinct which had voted Democrat for 120 years made a techtonic shift and 85% followed Jesse to the Republican party.
But Warner and Webb returned it. They, with General Clark and others, brought a new face to the Democrats and a new face to the South, “a Democratic Team with Management Values.” Wesley Clark brought a uniform sense of honor, dignity, intelligence and duty to the country and to the party. Like Hagan, Cunningham fits in this new model which forms an auspiciously rising paradigm and one which returns North Carolain back to its Democratic roots.
During 2008, Cal served as a military prosecutor in the Multi-National Corps-Iraq. During his tour, he was government counsel in the first court-martial of a contractor under military law since 1968. In addition to the Bronze Star Medal, he received the General Douglas MacArthur Award for his leadership.
In November 2000, Cal was elected to the North Carolina State Senate, representing Davidson, Rowan and Iredell Counties. In the Senate, Cal worked on privacy legislation, campaign reform, the patient's bill of rights, the clean smokestacks bill, class size reductions, and preservation of farmland. He served as Vice Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and on the Senate's education committees. He has since served on the Executive Committee of the North Carolina Democratic Party.
Cal Cunningham - draft
The last 20 years North Carolina and the South have had the churning experience of letting go of the old and finding itself again underneath; returning again to the place where it started, the Democratic Party. We saw the Democrats rise in a new spirit with urbane Harvard-educated lawyer and entrepreneur Mark Warner as governor of Virginia, teaming up then with rustic Scotch-Irish warrior Jim Webb from the deep hills of western Virginia. This was a new and auspicious Democratic paradigm when it arose; and advanced management and excellence model with Southern characteristics. It was Mudcat Saunder’s South; the old South, the new South, the same South coming into the republic and bringing with it heart and substance. It awakened in North Carolina when Kay Hagen clicked the ___ and sent Elizabeth Dole back to Kansas in 2008. It advances again with Cal Cunningham’s run against Richard Burr for the Senate. Cunningham, a captain in the army reserves and an Iraq war veteran who won a Bronze Star for his efforts, brings authentic leadership to North Carolina. He has recently been endorced by General Wesley Clark.
"Cal would be the first veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to serve in the U.S. Senate. He would bring a veteran's unique perspective to policymaking in Washington,” said Clark.
It has been a long journey. When we were rearing our kids on our little farm in Tobaccoville, NC, the venerable Jesse Helms was our Senator. He came from the ‘50s and refused to let go. But say what you like about him, he was a fighter for his own; a representative of the mind of the South but a defensive mind, like the last warrior on “Lost” island in opposition to the Others.
But it was a South which had already let go decades before and had joined the world, even led the world, while Jesse was still holding fast to the past.
Then in a monumental shift in sensibility, my Baptist, Democrat precinct which had voted that way for 120 years made a techtonic shift and 85% changed registration to Republican. The South was coming into American and it was good for the South and good for America. Historian Dan Carter even proposed that America was becoming “Southernized.
It hasn’t been the smoothest transition. From old school pig farmer Lauch Faircloth (?) overnight to John Edwards, a new kind of Democrat who spend more on his hair than most of us in Tobaccoville spent on our pick up trucks.
The last 20 years North Carolina and the South have had the churning experience of letting go of the old and finding itself again underneath; returning again to the place where it started, the Democratic Party. We saw the Democrats rise in a new spirit with urbane Harvard-educated lawyer and entrepreneur Mark Warner as governor of Virginia, teaming up then with rustic Scotch-Irish warrior Jim Webb from the deep hills of western Virginia. This was a new and auspicious Democratic paradigm when it arose; and advanced management and excellence model with Southern characteristics. It was Mudcat Saunder’s South; the old South, the new South, the same South coming into the republic and bringing with it heart and substance. It awakened in North Carolina when Kay Hagen clicked the ___ and sent Elizabeth Dole back to Kansas in 2008. It advances again with Cal Cunningham’s run against Richard Burr for the Senate. Cunningham, a captain in the army reserves and an Iraq war veteran who won a Bronze Star for his efforts, brings authentic leadership to North Carolina. He has recently been endorced by General Wesley Clark.
"Cal would be the first veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to serve in the U.S. Senate. He would bring a veteran's unique perspective to policymaking in Washington,” said Clark.
It has been a long journey. When we were rearing our kids on our little farm in Tobaccoville, NC, the venerable Jesse Helms was our Senator. He came from the ‘50s and refused to let go. But say what you like about him, he was a fighter for his own; a representative of the mind of the South but a defensive mind, like the last warrior on “Lost” island in opposition to the Others.
But it was a South which had already let go decades before and had joined the world, even led the world, while Jesse was still holding fast to the past.
Then in a monumental shift in sensibility, my Baptist, Democrat precinct which had voted that way for 120 years made a techtonic shift and 85% changed registration to Republican. The South was coming into American and it was good for the South and good for America. Historian Dan Carter even proposed that America was becoming “Southernized.
It hasn’t been the smoothest transition. From old school pig farmer Lauch Faircloth (?) overnight to John Edwards, a new kind of Democrat who spend more on his hair than most of us in Tobaccoville spent on our pick up trucks.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
The delusional totalitarianism of Obama’s “Global Marshall Plan”
By Bernie Quigley
- At The Hill on 3/30/10
In the first Gulf War the popular Colin Powell was at the helm, but people were scared. We hadn’t been at war in a long time and John Kenneth Galbriath called the age a “culture of contentment.” At the college I worked at there were somber prayer meetings in the chapel and an astonishing number showed up. Many reflexively blamed Israel for Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait. One professor stopped by my house as I was watching the news. Iraq was lobbing bombs into Israel, quite possibly loaded with the famed WMDs. The Israelis were distributing gas masks. The professor, shaking a finger at the TV, said, “See, the Israelis are inciting violence by passing out gas masks.”
This would not be so much a case of anti-Semitism as one of simple ignorance and arrested development. But it is in its kernel the same complaint that General David Petraeus has brought against the Israelis creating Arab-Israeli tensions by their positions on Jerusalem and the settlements. Pat Buchanon makes the point that “ . . . each new seizure of Palestinian property, each new West Bank clash between Palestinians and Israeli troops inflames the Arab street.” As the Wall Street Journal’s Bret Stephens points out, so does Lady Gaga.
I was surprised by the comments coming from Petraeus. Can you imagine the Russians saying such a thing? Possibly he is posturing for a VP matchup with Hillary in 2012. She gets her foreign policy advice from Tikkun, a magazine which hopes “ . . to heal, repair and transform the world. “ In 1996 Obama approached Tikkun and asked to speak at their national conference in Chicago “ . . . and he gave a rip-roaring pro-peace, pro-environment, pro-labor speech,” reports Michael Lerner in the magazine. Obama met with the author and assured him that “he felt fully aligned” with “ . . . our vision of a Global Marshall Plan” although he warned the author that “ . . . he thought it would be a hard sell ‘inside the Beltway.’” Let the healing begin.
We are today experiencing institutionalized denial regarding Israel. Ideas which fix in a generation and are thus expected to be “true” by the next generation. They almost never are. Netanyahu’s problems these past weeks in Washington are being caused by internal politics in Israel. Although it has gone fully unreported in the press, Netanyahu’s leadership is being challenged by folksy new elements that could take control away from him later in April. Netanyahu must look tough on the Americans to survive through to May. What is happening is that the benign center of equilibrium between right and left is changing in Israel. Israel is rising, virtually alone, to a new generation which could have enormous influence in the first decades of the new century. And the institutionalized denial of the American policy makers and publicists are trying to push it back to the past.
The constant reinforcement of outmoded paradigms, including these purely delusional, totalitarian visions of Obama and Hillary (and the State Department? And the Army?) have made the MSM’spolitical discourse a polite but absurd garden party conversation between David Brooks and Gail Collins, gleefully parroting and reinforcing generational irrelevancies. They create a conditioned reflex in the public, which brings shock and awe when history, time and original life force awakens again - the Tea Parties and the state sovereignty movement, Sarah Palin – even Twilight and Ron Paul - and now Israel.
By Bernie Quigley
- At The Hill on 3/30/10
In the first Gulf War the popular Colin Powell was at the helm, but people were scared. We hadn’t been at war in a long time and John Kenneth Galbriath called the age a “culture of contentment.” At the college I worked at there were somber prayer meetings in the chapel and an astonishing number showed up. Many reflexively blamed Israel for Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait. One professor stopped by my house as I was watching the news. Iraq was lobbing bombs into Israel, quite possibly loaded with the famed WMDs. The Israelis were distributing gas masks. The professor, shaking a finger at the TV, said, “See, the Israelis are inciting violence by passing out gas masks.”
This would not be so much a case of anti-Semitism as one of simple ignorance and arrested development. But it is in its kernel the same complaint that General David Petraeus has brought against the Israelis creating Arab-Israeli tensions by their positions on Jerusalem and the settlements. Pat Buchanon makes the point that “ . . . each new seizure of Palestinian property, each new West Bank clash between Palestinians and Israeli troops inflames the Arab street.” As the Wall Street Journal’s Bret Stephens points out, so does Lady Gaga.
I was surprised by the comments coming from Petraeus. Can you imagine the Russians saying such a thing? Possibly he is posturing for a VP matchup with Hillary in 2012. She gets her foreign policy advice from Tikkun, a magazine which hopes “ . . to heal, repair and transform the world. “ In 1996 Obama approached Tikkun and asked to speak at their national conference in Chicago “ . . . and he gave a rip-roaring pro-peace, pro-environment, pro-labor speech,” reports Michael Lerner in the magazine. Obama met with the author and assured him that “he felt fully aligned” with “ . . . our vision of a Global Marshall Plan” although he warned the author that “ . . . he thought it would be a hard sell ‘inside the Beltway.’” Let the healing begin.
We are today experiencing institutionalized denial regarding Israel. Ideas which fix in a generation and are thus expected to be “true” by the next generation. They almost never are. Netanyahu’s problems these past weeks in Washington are being caused by internal politics in Israel. Although it has gone fully unreported in the press, Netanyahu’s leadership is being challenged by folksy new elements that could take control away from him later in April. Netanyahu must look tough on the Americans to survive through to May. What is happening is that the benign center of equilibrium between right and left is changing in Israel. Israel is rising, virtually alone, to a new generation which could have enormous influence in the first decades of the new century. And the institutionalized denial of the American policy makers and publicists are trying to push it back to the past.
The constant reinforcement of outmoded paradigms, including these purely delusional, totalitarian visions of Obama and Hillary (and the State Department? And the Army?) have made the MSM’spolitical discourse a polite but absurd garden party conversation between David Brooks and Gail Collins, gleefully parroting and reinforcing generational irrelevancies. They create a conditioned reflex in the public, which brings shock and awe when history, time and original life force awakens again - the Tea Parties and the state sovereignty movement, Sarah Palin – even Twilight and Ron Paul - and now Israel.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
McCain/Palin 2012 - copy final
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/28/10
John McCain might be to politics what Brett Favre is to football. Too old? Even at their ages they are head and shoulders above the others. Favre brings leadership, clarity and entry at least to post-season football to a team. I’d like to see him play again. Should McCain run in 2012? Why not? There have been leaders at the helm of cerebral jobs up to 85, improving with age. McCain is only 73. His political instincts are as quick today as ever. And at his Senate reelection rally with Sarah Palin over the weekend he was at perfect pitch.
And so was Sarah Palin. What’s different this time around is we’ve had a year of Barack Obama, who the media compared to Kennedy, Roosevelt, Lincoln and Jesus last time around, and he has brought the country financially almost to the point of no return, and quite possibly beyond it. And the MSM voices which brought him here by the most disgraceful slanders and abuses of Palin and her children, are reduced a year later to only an occasional racist and woman-hating rant from a NYTs columnist and one or two others. ABC’s Charles Gibson has been sent to the hinterland while rumors abound that since Katie Couric took over the anchor job, ratings have dropped so low at her network that it is about to be sold to the Doublemeat Palace franchise.
But as Perry Noonan and so few other s have pointed out, something else has happened in our country. Not everyone would respond to tyranny and abuse of power by falling to their knees as Team Obama anticipated. Millions in just the past year, since April 15 last, have learned that the state can defend them against false government and was intended to. This is an awakening process which has advanced several steps.
This past week 14 states have challenged the federal health care plan as unconstitutional. Suppose they lose their case. They probably will. But suppose they still feel they are right? What would be the right thing to do? What is to be done?
The state of Colorado brings a ballot initiative banning abortion in the state in November. If it is successful, a challenge to federal law in the Supreme Court will follow. They will probably lose. But this is different. Abortion is a larger moral issue than political corruption. It raises the stakes. What should Colorado do then? There is potential in this issue for casus belli, the moral trigger which could lead to separation.
We have been moving fast here this past year and will be moving faster next. It is fair to say, reading Paul Krugman’s, Frank Rich’s and Charles Blow’s NYTs columns this past week that both sides hate one another.
Sarah Palin can bridge these issues of states’ rights and federal jurisdiction, but she can’t help men who simply hate women (or the women who work for them). Possibly McCain can. He is an authentic American folk hero; our Gray Champion, and torture and abuse in POW camps could not dim his spirit nor temper his love of country. A year from now it should be looked at. There is no question in my mind and never has been that as McCain said in his speech over the weekend that Sarah Palin will be with us “ . . . for a long, long time.” But I hope he is not planning on going anywhere. He may be the only “authentic American hero” who can hold us together.
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/28/10
John McCain might be to politics what Brett Favre is to football. Too old? Even at their ages they are head and shoulders above the others. Favre brings leadership, clarity and entry at least to post-season football to a team. I’d like to see him play again. Should McCain run in 2012? Why not? There have been leaders at the helm of cerebral jobs up to 85, improving with age. McCain is only 73. His political instincts are as quick today as ever. And at his Senate reelection rally with Sarah Palin over the weekend he was at perfect pitch.
And so was Sarah Palin. What’s different this time around is we’ve had a year of Barack Obama, who the media compared to Kennedy, Roosevelt, Lincoln and Jesus last time around, and he has brought the country financially almost to the point of no return, and quite possibly beyond it. And the MSM voices which brought him here by the most disgraceful slanders and abuses of Palin and her children, are reduced a year later to only an occasional racist and woman-hating rant from a NYTs columnist and one or two others. ABC’s Charles Gibson has been sent to the hinterland while rumors abound that since Katie Couric took over the anchor job, ratings have dropped so low at her network that it is about to be sold to the Doublemeat Palace franchise.
But as Perry Noonan and so few other s have pointed out, something else has happened in our country. Not everyone would respond to tyranny and abuse of power by falling to their knees as Team Obama anticipated. Millions in just the past year, since April 15 last, have learned that the state can defend them against false government and was intended to. This is an awakening process which has advanced several steps.
This past week 14 states have challenged the federal health care plan as unconstitutional. Suppose they lose their case. They probably will. But suppose they still feel they are right? What would be the right thing to do? What is to be done?
The state of Colorado brings a ballot initiative banning abortion in the state in November. If it is successful, a challenge to federal law in the Supreme Court will follow. They will probably lose. But this is different. Abortion is a larger moral issue than political corruption. It raises the stakes. What should Colorado do then? There is potential in this issue for casus belli, the moral trigger which could lead to separation.
We have been moving fast here this past year and will be moving faster next. It is fair to say, reading Paul Krugman’s, Frank Rich’s and Charles Blow’s NYTs columns this past week that both sides hate one another.
Sarah Palin can bridge these issues of states’ rights and federal jurisdiction, but she can’t help men who simply hate women (or the women who work for them). Possibly McCain can. He is an authentic American folk hero; our Gray Champion, and torture and abuse in POW camps could not dim his spirit nor temper his love of country. A year from now it should be looked at. There is no question in my mind and never has been that as McCain said in his speech over the weekend that Sarah Palin will be with us “ . . . for a long, long time.” But I hope he is not planning on going anywhere. He may be the only “authentic American hero” who can hold us together.
McCain/Palin 2012
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/28/10
John McCain might be to politics what Brett Favre is to football. Too old to play? Even at their ages they are head and shoulders above the others. Favre could bring leadership, clarity and entry at least to post-season football to a team. I’d like to see him play again. Should McCain run again in 2012? Why not? There have been women and men at the helm of cerebral jobs like his up to 85, improving with age. McCain is only 73. He doesn’t look old. His political instincts are as quick today as they ever were. He metabolizes experience to build himself better. And at his Senate reelection rally with Sarah Palin over the weekend he was at perfect pitch.
And so was Sarah Palin. What is different this time around is that we have had a year’s experience of Barack Obama, who the media compared to Kennedy, Roosevelt, Lincoln and Jesus last time around, and he has brought the country almost to its knees. Almost to the point of no return, and quite possibly beyond it. And the MSM voices which brought him here by the most disgraceful slanders and abuses of Governor Palin and her children, iare reduced a year later to only an occasional racist and woman-hating rant from a NYTs columnist and one or two others. ABC’s Charles Gibson has been sent to the hinterland. And Katie Couric’s network is about to be sold to the Mr. Chicken chain or to Mattress King.
But as Perry Noonan and so few other s have pointed out, something else has happened in our country. Not everyone would respond to tyranny and abuse of power by falling to their knees as Team Obama anticipated. Millions in just the past year, since April 15 last, have learned that the state can defend them against false government and was intended to. This is an awakening process which has advanced several steps. This past week 14 states have challenged the federal health care plan as unconstitutional. Suppose they lose their case. They probably will. But suppose they still feel they are right? What would be the right thing to do? What is to be done?
The state of Colorado brings a ballot initiative banning abortion in the state in November. If it is successful, a challenge to federal law in the Supreme Court will follow. They will probably lose. But this is different. Abortion is a larger moral issue than political corruption. It raises the stakes. What should Colorado do then? There is potential in this issue for casus belli, the moral trigger which could lead to separation.
We have been moving fast here this past year and this will be a fast year ahead. It is fair to say, reading Paul Krugman’s, Frank Rich’s and Charles Blow’s NYTs columns this past week that both sides hate each other.
Sarah Palin can bridge these issues of states’ rights and federal jurisdiction, but she can’t help men who simply hate women. Possibly McCain can. He is an authentic American folk hero; our Gray Champion, and torture and abuse in POW camps could not dim his spirit nor temper his love of country. A year from now it should be looked at. There is no question in my mind and never has been that as McCain said in his speech over the weekend that Sarah Palin will be with us “ . . . for a long, long time.” But I hope he is not planning on going anywhere. He may be the only “authentic American hero” who can hold us together.
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/28/10
John McCain might be to politics what Brett Favre is to football. Too old to play? Even at their ages they are head and shoulders above the others. Favre could bring leadership, clarity and entry at least to post-season football to a team. I’d like to see him play again. Should McCain run again in 2012? Why not? There have been women and men at the helm of cerebral jobs like his up to 85, improving with age. McCain is only 73. He doesn’t look old. His political instincts are as quick today as they ever were. He metabolizes experience to build himself better. And at his Senate reelection rally with Sarah Palin over the weekend he was at perfect pitch.
And so was Sarah Palin. What is different this time around is that we have had a year’s experience of Barack Obama, who the media compared to Kennedy, Roosevelt, Lincoln and Jesus last time around, and he has brought the country almost to its knees. Almost to the point of no return, and quite possibly beyond it. And the MSM voices which brought him here by the most disgraceful slanders and abuses of Governor Palin and her children, iare reduced a year later to only an occasional racist and woman-hating rant from a NYTs columnist and one or two others. ABC’s Charles Gibson has been sent to the hinterland. And Katie Couric’s network is about to be sold to the Mr. Chicken chain or to Mattress King.
But as Perry Noonan and so few other s have pointed out, something else has happened in our country. Not everyone would respond to tyranny and abuse of power by falling to their knees as Team Obama anticipated. Millions in just the past year, since April 15 last, have learned that the state can defend them against false government and was intended to. This is an awakening process which has advanced several steps. This past week 14 states have challenged the federal health care plan as unconstitutional. Suppose they lose their case. They probably will. But suppose they still feel they are right? What would be the right thing to do? What is to be done?
The state of Colorado brings a ballot initiative banning abortion in the state in November. If it is successful, a challenge to federal law in the Supreme Court will follow. They will probably lose. But this is different. Abortion is a larger moral issue than political corruption. It raises the stakes. What should Colorado do then? There is potential in this issue for casus belli, the moral trigger which could lead to separation.
We have been moving fast here this past year and this will be a fast year ahead. It is fair to say, reading Paul Krugman’s, Frank Rich’s and Charles Blow’s NYTs columns this past week that both sides hate each other.
Sarah Palin can bridge these issues of states’ rights and federal jurisdiction, but she can’t help men who simply hate women. Possibly McCain can. He is an authentic American folk hero; our Gray Champion, and torture and abuse in POW camps could not dim his spirit nor temper his love of country. A year from now it should be looked at. There is no question in my mind and never has been that as McCain said in his speech over the weekend that Sarah Palin will be with us “ . . . for a long, long time.” But I hope he is not planning on going anywhere. He may be the only “authentic American hero” who can hold us together.
Friday, March 26, 2010
“ . . . a dangerous place, actually”
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill, 3/26/10
Press observations the day after:
I filed for Social Security last month with the idea that it would be better to apply early, at 63, because there might not be anything left when I’m 65. Looks like I broke the bank. The New York Times reports today that this year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016. The bursting of the real estate bubble and the ensuing recession have hurt jobs, home prices and now Social Security, they report. Guess they forgot to factor in reality. Felt that one coming up here where people my age have been coming from the city in BMWs and Porsche Boxsters and building chicken coops.
And cashing in their T bills. A sudden drop-off in investor demand for U.S. Treasury notes is raising questions about whether interest rates will finally begin a march higher—a climb that would jack up the government's borrowing costs and spell trouble for the fragile housing market, the Wall Street Journal reports.
“For months, investors have focused their attention on the debt crisis in Europe, but there are signs the spotlight is turning to the ability of the U.S. to finance its own budget deficit,” writes the WSJ’s Tom Lauricella.
They haven’t been making much progress last year and this. Last year, Gloom, Boom and Doom’s Marc Faber said to buy one anyway to explain inflation to you children, because in 20 years they will be worth zero.
And now that beacon of penguin-class prosperity, the Massachusetts health care plan, the model for Obama’s, has got issues. Tim Cahill, the state treasurer of Massachusetts who is running for governor as an independent candidate, says the program is a fiscal train wreck. “The universal insurance coverage we adopted in 2006 was projected to cost taxpayers $88 million a year. However, since this program was adopted in 2006, our health-care costs have in total exceeded $4 billion,” he writes in the WSJ. Bad for Mitt Romney as well. As governor, he sponsored the plan and he is possibly the only guy smart, disciplined and skilled enough to extract us from it.
Ruth Marcus today in the Washington Post writes, “If I were a member of Congress, my floor speech before casting a yes vote would have boiled down to: ‘Gee, I hope this works.’”
You betcha, says Sarah Palin.
“So where are we?” asks the WSJ’s Peggy Noonan, who consistently understands things better than most. “In a dangerous place, actually.”
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill, 3/26/10
Press observations the day after:
I filed for Social Security last month with the idea that it would be better to apply early, at 63, because there might not be anything left when I’m 65. Looks like I broke the bank. The New York Times reports today that this year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016. The bursting of the real estate bubble and the ensuing recession have hurt jobs, home prices and now Social Security, they report. Guess they forgot to factor in reality. Felt that one coming up here where people my age have been coming from the city in BMWs and Porsche Boxsters and building chicken coops.
And cashing in their T bills. A sudden drop-off in investor demand for U.S. Treasury notes is raising questions about whether interest rates will finally begin a march higher—a climb that would jack up the government's borrowing costs and spell trouble for the fragile housing market, the Wall Street Journal reports.
“For months, investors have focused their attention on the debt crisis in Europe, but there are signs the spotlight is turning to the ability of the U.S. to finance its own budget deficit,” writes the WSJ’s Tom Lauricella.
They haven’t been making much progress last year and this. Last year, Gloom, Boom and Doom’s Marc Faber said to buy one anyway to explain inflation to you children, because in 20 years they will be worth zero.
And now that beacon of penguin-class prosperity, the Massachusetts health care plan, the model for Obama’s, has got issues. Tim Cahill, the state treasurer of Massachusetts who is running for governor as an independent candidate, says the program is a fiscal train wreck. “The universal insurance coverage we adopted in 2006 was projected to cost taxpayers $88 million a year. However, since this program was adopted in 2006, our health-care costs have in total exceeded $4 billion,” he writes in the WSJ. Bad for Mitt Romney as well. As governor, he sponsored the plan and he is possibly the only guy smart, disciplined and skilled enough to extract us from it.
Ruth Marcus today in the Washington Post writes, “If I were a member of Congress, my floor speech before casting a yes vote would have boiled down to: ‘Gee, I hope this works.’”
You betcha, says Sarah Palin.
“So where are we?” asks the WSJ’s Peggy Noonan, who consistently understands things better than most. “In a dangerous place, actually.”
Thursday, March 25, 2010
14 Free States and the horde
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/25/10
Politics and possibly life and probably everything are a struggle between power and anti-power; anti-power makes power stronger until it overrides it. Then it kills it. With the historic health care vote this week the forces of anti-power have overwhelmed and conquered the American impulse to power. That is a good thing as we won’t be nuking the Russians now. It is a bad thing because we won’t be doing anything else of consequence. It is a marker, like Waterloo to Napolean, like Lenin’s black train to Nicholas and Alexandra’s Russia. Change has come.
Life in America as we have known it since 1946 is finished. Something else will happen. What is interesting is that this yielding was to internal American forces and not to external threats. It is possible to envision America ahead to be not unlike England in the 1950s, broke and broken, with cheap rents in Liverpool and Manchester, and the men with the “right stuff” on the docks of Liverpool who conquered the world in ships 200 years before, idled and impotent but with full healthcare. And desperately seeking passage to America. They had no where to turn but to America. Possibly we have no where to turn now but to China, begging for mercy and sponsorship. Signals from Copenhagen suggest it will not be forthcoming. As with Victoria’s England and the Romanov’s Russia, neighbors and opponents begin sharpening their swords when they sense mortal weakness.
At a high school honors ceremony last week a student said that character is not just knowing what to do. Everyone knows that. Character is having the courage to do it. Out of the 30-some states that have initiated states rights legislation last year, 14 differentiate themselves by bringing a Constitutional challenge to the bill. They have found courage to challenge a bill that has been in the works, as President Obama said, for 100 years. It is the 100-year ride of the philosophy of the anti-hero he refers to; the agent and agency of the horde.
The horde has won. The horde always wins in time. Fouad Ajami writes eloquently on the philosophy of the horde and there are a number of books about American’s pending decline, like David Murrin’s Breaking the Code of History and William Strauss and Neil Howe’s The Fourth Turning.
But these books and most books like this look at America as a unified economic and cultural matrix when in fact, the agricultural center of the country is a different America with different values than the urbanized, post-industrial America on the edges. The center, marked by the initiative of the 14 states, is alive and well with good values. It is the edges that are sick and dying.
The Constitutional challenge will likely not hold up. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison warned us that if the federal government became the sole and exclusive arbiter of its own powers, those powers would continue to grow, regardless of elections, courts, separation of powers or other much-vaunted checks and balances, says Michael Boldin, founder of the Tenth Amendment Center. But it too is a marker and has drawn new, original boundaries. This is no longer about Republican and Democrat. It is about regions. And the healthy center states must find a way now to protect themselves from the dying edges.
Incidentally, the new TV show “V” starts this month. That is what it is about: The benign takeover of America’s political life and soul by benevolents (alien lizards in Pelosi, Hoyer, Reid clothing), and a path to survive and defend against it.
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/25/10
Politics and possibly life and probably everything are a struggle between power and anti-power; anti-power makes power stronger until it overrides it. Then it kills it. With the historic health care vote this week the forces of anti-power have overwhelmed and conquered the American impulse to power. That is a good thing as we won’t be nuking the Russians now. It is a bad thing because we won’t be doing anything else of consequence. It is a marker, like Waterloo to Napolean, like Lenin’s black train to Nicholas and Alexandra’s Russia. Change has come.
Life in America as we have known it since 1946 is finished. Something else will happen. What is interesting is that this yielding was to internal American forces and not to external threats. It is possible to envision America ahead to be not unlike England in the 1950s, broke and broken, with cheap rents in Liverpool and Manchester, and the men with the “right stuff” on the docks of Liverpool who conquered the world in ships 200 years before, idled and impotent but with full healthcare. And desperately seeking passage to America. They had no where to turn but to America. Possibly we have no where to turn now but to China, begging for mercy and sponsorship. Signals from Copenhagen suggest it will not be forthcoming. As with Victoria’s England and the Romanov’s Russia, neighbors and opponents begin sharpening their swords when they sense mortal weakness.
At a high school honors ceremony last week a student said that character is not just knowing what to do. Everyone knows that. Character is having the courage to do it. Out of the 30-some states that have initiated states rights legislation last year, 14 differentiate themselves by bringing a Constitutional challenge to the bill. They have found courage to challenge a bill that has been in the works, as President Obama said, for 100 years. It is the 100-year ride of the philosophy of the anti-hero he refers to; the agent and agency of the horde.
The horde has won. The horde always wins in time. Fouad Ajami writes eloquently on the philosophy of the horde and there are a number of books about American’s pending decline, like David Murrin’s Breaking the Code of History and William Strauss and Neil Howe’s The Fourth Turning.
But these books and most books like this look at America as a unified economic and cultural matrix when in fact, the agricultural center of the country is a different America with different values than the urbanized, post-industrial America on the edges. The center, marked by the initiative of the 14 states, is alive and well with good values. It is the edges that are sick and dying.
The Constitutional challenge will likely not hold up. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison warned us that if the federal government became the sole and exclusive arbiter of its own powers, those powers would continue to grow, regardless of elections, courts, separation of powers or other much-vaunted checks and balances, says Michael Boldin, founder of the Tenth Amendment Center. But it too is a marker and has drawn new, original boundaries. This is no longer about Republican and Democrat. It is about regions. And the healthy center states must find a way now to protect themselves from the dying edges.
Incidentally, the new TV show “V” starts this month. That is what it is about: The benign takeover of America’s political life and soul by benevolents (alien lizards in Pelosi, Hoyer, Reid clothing), and a path to survive and defend against it.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Warriors and a wus
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/23/10
Warriors:
Mitt Romney - “President Obama has betrayed his oath to the nation — rather than bringing us together, ushering in a new kind of politics, and rising above raw partisanship, he has succumbed to the lowest denominator of incumbent power: justifying the means by extolling the ends.” – in National Review
Sarah Palin – Health care bill is “a clarion call to action” she wrote in her Facebook.. “In the weeks to come, we can expect [Congress] to try to change the subject, but we won't forget,"
John McCain – “This bill is terribly wrong for America and I call on you to join with me to challenge this bill in every way we can.”
Newt Gingrich - “This will not stand.”
. . . and a wus:
Scott Brown - Boston Globe: “As his fellow Republicans girded to oppose health care legislation in the Senate this week and readied a nationwide repeal effort, Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown said yesterday that he was not ready to join those efforts and was keeping his options open. By last night, Brown had clarified his position, promising to vote against the Democrats’ health care reconciliation package and pledging to support GOP repeal efforts. He said his earlier remarks were mischaracterized.”
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/23/10
Warriors:
Mitt Romney - “President Obama has betrayed his oath to the nation — rather than bringing us together, ushering in a new kind of politics, and rising above raw partisanship, he has succumbed to the lowest denominator of incumbent power: justifying the means by extolling the ends.” – in National Review
Sarah Palin – Health care bill is “a clarion call to action” she wrote in her Facebook.. “In the weeks to come, we can expect [Congress] to try to change the subject, but we won't forget,"
John McCain – “This bill is terribly wrong for America and I call on you to join with me to challenge this bill in every way we can.”
Newt Gingrich - “This will not stand.”
. . . and a wus:
Scott Brown - Boston Globe: “As his fellow Republicans girded to oppose health care legislation in the Senate this week and readied a nationwide repeal effort, Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown said yesterday that he was not ready to join those efforts and was keeping his options open. By last night, Brown had clarified his position, promising to vote against the Democrats’ health care reconciliation package and pledging to support GOP repeal efforts. He said his earlier remarks were mischaracterized.”
Monday, March 22, 2010
The Two Americas: Greater New York and the 37 states
By Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/22/10
I’m just a simple Ray Wylie Hubbard liberal but I’ve lost track of how Nancy Pelosi got to run the country. Someone from such a rare, esoteric, even strange and narrow constituency and one generally at odds with the main run of the country. But there it is, that aging Mod Squad skipping to work; she with that mad amphetamine grin, hand in hand with Steny Hoyer and John Lewis, singing Kumbaya. We were screwed when the Democrats started calling for rock stars instead of responsible executives.
The vote is the first material step in the division of America from one nation to two. There are 37 states in the one group. They are bringing a states rights challenge to the bill, called for by Rick Perry, Governor of Texas, months ago and advanced by governors Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Buddy Otter of Idaho. The other nation is Greater New York and it has two parts, East and West.
This quote from Alexis De Tocqueville posted by Eric Parks of Red State Eclectic might be considered representative of the 37: “It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights – the ‘right’ to education, the ‘right’ to health care, the ‘right’ to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery – hay and a barn for human cattle.” – Alexis De Tocqueville
Four things:
- What is historic about this vote is that the economic contention since 1865, Hamilton vs. Marx, has shifted now to contention between Hamilton and Jefferson. This is the way it was before 1865. It portends the end of Hamilton’s vision of globalization. Historian David Smiley, late of Wake Forest University and a legend in his time, pointed out in his lectures that when the United States went to the Hamilton position, the world followed. We could return now to Jefferson’s federalism, all of us. Futurist Gerald Celente of the Trends Research Institute is saying we will.
- While the New Yorkers advanced their arc in 1865 with Lincoln and Grant, the 37 states began theirs in 1981 when the South universally shifted from Democrat to Republican to vote for Ronald Reagan. The 37 states will now find their center. It will be Texas. Remember the Alamo. It is a Creation Myth.
- Poets have noticed that political temperament changes. As Emerson said at the beginning, we see ourselves ascending a stairs. But then we descend and it reflects in the character and abilities of the politician. That which began in New York with Lincoln and Grant with the Roosevelts in the middle, ends at the bottom of the stairs with Joe Biden, Pelosi and Barney Frank. This is the way the world ends, said T.S. Eliot, not with a bang, but with a whimper. But the representative art is great at the end, like Nurse Jackie (but dark, like Nurse Jackie).
- One of the big problems here with the Two Americas is economy. As in Europe, the hard working end up getting dragged by the laggards. Here the 37 states are mostly prosperous, rich in commodities and with a uniform work ethic. They are largely agrarian. Greater New York is a basket case, is bankrupt, and its historic work ethic was mocked to death. Now, what Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds calls the worst Congress in his lifetime (he is 50), is demanding that the prosperous Conquered States of last centuries support the dead beat Conqueror States. You can see how this would create problems.
By Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/22/10
I’m just a simple Ray Wylie Hubbard liberal but I’ve lost track of how Nancy Pelosi got to run the country. Someone from such a rare, esoteric, even strange and narrow constituency and one generally at odds with the main run of the country. But there it is, that aging Mod Squad skipping to work; she with that mad amphetamine grin, hand in hand with Steny Hoyer and John Lewis, singing Kumbaya. We were screwed when the Democrats started calling for rock stars instead of responsible executives.
The vote is the first material step in the division of America from one nation to two. There are 37 states in the one group. They are bringing a states rights challenge to the bill, called for by Rick Perry, Governor of Texas, months ago and advanced by governors Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Buddy Otter of Idaho. The other nation is Greater New York and it has two parts, East and West.
This quote from Alexis De Tocqueville posted by Eric Parks of Red State Eclectic might be considered representative of the 37: “It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights – the ‘right’ to education, the ‘right’ to health care, the ‘right’ to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery – hay and a barn for human cattle.” – Alexis De Tocqueville
Four things:
- What is historic about this vote is that the economic contention since 1865, Hamilton vs. Marx, has shifted now to contention between Hamilton and Jefferson. This is the way it was before 1865. It portends the end of Hamilton’s vision of globalization. Historian David Smiley, late of Wake Forest University and a legend in his time, pointed out in his lectures that when the United States went to the Hamilton position, the world followed. We could return now to Jefferson’s federalism, all of us. Futurist Gerald Celente of the Trends Research Institute is saying we will.
- While the New Yorkers advanced their arc in 1865 with Lincoln and Grant, the 37 states began theirs in 1981 when the South universally shifted from Democrat to Republican to vote for Ronald Reagan. The 37 states will now find their center. It will be Texas. Remember the Alamo. It is a Creation Myth.
- Poets have noticed that political temperament changes. As Emerson said at the beginning, we see ourselves ascending a stairs. But then we descend and it reflects in the character and abilities of the politician. That which began in New York with Lincoln and Grant with the Roosevelts in the middle, ends at the bottom of the stairs with Joe Biden, Pelosi and Barney Frank. This is the way the world ends, said T.S. Eliot, not with a bang, but with a whimper. But the representative art is great at the end, like Nurse Jackie (but dark, like Nurse Jackie).
- One of the big problems here with the Two Americas is economy. As in Europe, the hard working end up getting dragged by the laggards. Here the 37 states are mostly prosperous, rich in commodities and with a uniform work ethic. They are largely agrarian. Greater New York is a basket case, is bankrupt, and its historic work ethic was mocked to death. Now, what Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds calls the worst Congress in his lifetime (he is 50), is demanding that the prosperous Conquered States of last centuries support the dead beat Conqueror States. You can see how this would create problems.
The Two Americas: Greater New York and the 37 states
Eric Parks on Red State Eclectic
I’ve kind of lost track of how it has been possible that someone so naïve and unprepared for her work as Nancy Pelosi came to run this country. Someone from such a rare, esoteric, even strange and narrow constituency and one fully unrepresentative and generally at odds with the main run of the country. But there it is, skipping to work with that contemptuous amphedamene grin, holding hands with Steny Hoyerr and John Lewis, singing Kumbaya.
The votes, the whole drama led by Pelosi is the first material stepin the change. And the change is the division of America from one state to two. There are 37 states in the one group. They are bringing a states rights challenge to the bill. The other state is New York and it has two parts, East and West. West is where Pelosi lives.
This quote from Alexis De Tocqueville posted by Eric Parks of Red State Eclectic might be considered representative of the 37: It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights – the "right" to education, the "right" to health care, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery – hay and a barn for human cattle. – Alexis De Tocquiville
Three things:
- All countries divide by temperrment which manifests in economics. What is historic about this vote is that The economic contention that has dominated the country and the world since 1865, Hamilton vs Marx, has shifted now to contention betweeen Hamilton and Jefferson. This is the way the country was before 1865. It portends the end of globalization. Historian David Smiley, late of Wake Forest Univerrsity, pointed out in his writing and lectures that when the United States went to to the globalist Hamilton view the entire world followed suit. Likewise it could return to Jefferrson’s federalism. Futurist Gerald Celente says it will.
- While the New Yorkers began their arc in 1865 with Lincoln and Grant, the 37 states began theirs in 1981 when the South universally shifted from Democrat to Republican to vote for Ronald Reagan. The 37 states will now find their center; their capital. It will be Texas. Remember the Alamo. It is a Creation Myth.
-
- Poets have noticed that political temperament changes as it follows the power arc. As Emerrson said at the beginning, we see ourselves ascending a stairs But then we descend and it reflects in the character and abilities in the politician. That which began in New York with Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant with the Roosevelts in the middle, end its descent with Joe Biden, Pelosi, Barney Frank. This is the way the world ends, said T.S. Eliot, not with a bang, but with a whimper. But the art is good at the end, like Nurse Jackie, which is terrific.
Eric Parks on Red State Eclectic
I’ve kind of lost track of how it has been possible that someone so naïve and unprepared for her work as Nancy Pelosi came to run this country. Someone from such a rare, esoteric, even strange and narrow constituency and one fully unrepresentative and generally at odds with the main run of the country. But there it is, skipping to work with that contemptuous amphedamene grin, holding hands with Steny Hoyerr and John Lewis, singing Kumbaya.
The votes, the whole drama led by Pelosi is the first material stepin the change. And the change is the division of America from one state to two. There are 37 states in the one group. They are bringing a states rights challenge to the bill. The other state is New York and it has two parts, East and West. West is where Pelosi lives.
This quote from Alexis De Tocqueville posted by Eric Parks of Red State Eclectic might be considered representative of the 37: It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights – the "right" to education, the "right" to health care, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery – hay and a barn for human cattle. – Alexis De Tocquiville
Three things:
- All countries divide by temperrment which manifests in economics. What is historic about this vote is that The economic contention that has dominated the country and the world since 1865, Hamilton vs Marx, has shifted now to contention betweeen Hamilton and Jefferson. This is the way the country was before 1865. It portends the end of globalization. Historian David Smiley, late of Wake Forest Univerrsity, pointed out in his writing and lectures that when the United States went to to the globalist Hamilton view the entire world followed suit. Likewise it could return to Jefferrson’s federalism. Futurist Gerald Celente says it will.
- While the New Yorkers began their arc in 1865 with Lincoln and Grant, the 37 states began theirs in 1981 when the South universally shifted from Democrat to Republican to vote for Ronald Reagan. The 37 states will now find their center; their capital. It will be Texas. Remember the Alamo. It is a Creation Myth.
-
- Poets have noticed that political temperament changes as it follows the power arc. As Emerrson said at the beginning, we see ourselves ascending a stairs But then we descend and it reflects in the character and abilities in the politician. That which began in New York with Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant with the Roosevelts in the middle, end its descent with Joe Biden, Pelosi, Barney Frank. This is the way the world ends, said T.S. Eliot, not with a bang, but with a whimper. But the art is good at the end, like Nurse Jackie, which is terrific.
Friday, March 19, 2010
The Clintons and Israel
- by Bernie Quigley
- for The HIll on 3/19/10
Diplomatic relations with Israel in the 1990s should be comprehensively reviewed from top to bottom as it has become clear since that the President at the time was on the take. That his wife is now Secretary of State is simply ludicrous.
The Clinton leisure class era was every day in every way an age of appeasement. But it is not the casual million dollar bribes – one to get an Israeli businessman out of jail – that will bring Bill to historic infamy. Not the 50 gold watches. Not the white trash adolescent sexuality unabashedly pioneered by him, customary now among governors of all races and creeds, but the signing of the Oslo Agreements with Yasser Arafat on September 13, 1993.
The Empire State hates it when one of its distant provinces like China or Israel speaks up without permission and relations with Israel took a turn these last weeks with Joe Biden’s visit to Israel. The NYTs had a rapid response to the kerfuffle, floating a header above their op-ed page on March 19 with a picture of Arafat, a “classic op-ed” and the headline, “Israel’s best friend.” But not everybody’s; those on the receiving end of the intifada, like his Romanian communist handlers who supplied him with homosexual prostitutes, were disgusted with him. And it is astonishing that anyone today would be charmed and would see him as anything other than a terrorist. War changes people. It makes them less accommodating. Less cowardly. So did 9/11. And anyone who thinks the giddy treaties offered by Nantucket liberals in the silly season of Clinton/Arafat will hold up today is still lost in the Cloud Coocoo Land of Clinton world.
Best observation is this, by the Times’ Roger Cohen.: “I had lunch the other day with Ron Nachman, the mayor of Ariel, one of the largest West Bank settlements. He told me breezily that there ‘can be no Palestinian state,’ and that ‘Israel and Jordan should divide the land.’ I liked his frankness. It clarifies things.” Welcome to post-9/11. Welcome to the millennium.
In the mid 15th century, Prague Jewry had come to a crossroads. Times were getting good. Shipping in Amsterdam led Christian entrepreneurs to kehillah – Jewish benevolent societies – for financial advice and aid. But Prague’s great Rabbi Loeb had dreamed of a Golem. It could mean the light was going out of Europe. Jews began to leave Prague and later Stalingrad, then Cherry Hill, NJ and Brooklyn Hieghts, on the most astonishing inner journey in the human chronicles, known as “the return” and meeting unimaginable horrors along the way. They are almost there. They are five feet away from the center; the “center of the universe” – the Temple Mount. Anyone who thinks that getting yelled at now by Hillary will stop them is misguided.
- by Bernie Quigley
- for The HIll on 3/19/10
Diplomatic relations with Israel in the 1990s should be comprehensively reviewed from top to bottom as it has become clear since that the President at the time was on the take. That his wife is now Secretary of State is simply ludicrous.
The Clinton leisure class era was every day in every way an age of appeasement. But it is not the casual million dollar bribes – one to get an Israeli businessman out of jail – that will bring Bill to historic infamy. Not the 50 gold watches. Not the white trash adolescent sexuality unabashedly pioneered by him, customary now among governors of all races and creeds, but the signing of the Oslo Agreements with Yasser Arafat on September 13, 1993.
The Empire State hates it when one of its distant provinces like China or Israel speaks up without permission and relations with Israel took a turn these last weeks with Joe Biden’s visit to Israel. The NYTs had a rapid response to the kerfuffle, floating a header above their op-ed page on March 19 with a picture of Arafat, a “classic op-ed” and the headline, “Israel’s best friend.” But not everybody’s; those on the receiving end of the intifada, like his Romanian communist handlers who supplied him with homosexual prostitutes, were disgusted with him. And it is astonishing that anyone today would be charmed and would see him as anything other than a terrorist. War changes people. It makes them less accommodating. Less cowardly. So did 9/11. And anyone who thinks the giddy treaties offered by Nantucket liberals in the silly season of Clinton/Arafat will hold up today is still lost in the Cloud Coocoo Land of Clinton world.
Best observation is this, by the Times’ Roger Cohen.: “I had lunch the other day with Ron Nachman, the mayor of Ariel, one of the largest West Bank settlements. He told me breezily that there ‘can be no Palestinian state,’ and that ‘Israel and Jordan should divide the land.’ I liked his frankness. It clarifies things.” Welcome to post-9/11. Welcome to the millennium.
In the mid 15th century, Prague Jewry had come to a crossroads. Times were getting good. Shipping in Amsterdam led Christian entrepreneurs to kehillah – Jewish benevolent societies – for financial advice and aid. But Prague’s great Rabbi Loeb had dreamed of a Golem. It could mean the light was going out of Europe. Jews began to leave Prague and later Stalingrad, then Cherry Hill, NJ and Brooklyn Hieghts, on the most astonishing inner journey in the human chronicles, known as “the return” and meeting unimaginable horrors along the way. They are almost there. They are five feet away from the center; the “center of the universe” – the Temple Mount. Anyone who thinks that getting yelled at now by Hillary will stop them is misguided.
The Clintons and Israel - draft
- add quote from Cohen
Diplomatic relations with Israel in the 1990s should be comprehensively reviewed from top to bottom as it has become clear since that the President at the time was on the take. That his wife is now Secretary of State completes the irony.
But it is not the casual million dollar bribes – one to get an Israeli businessman out of jail – that will bring Bill to historic infamy. Not the 50 gold watches. Not the white trash adolescent sexuality pioneered by him, customary now among governors of all races, but the signing of the Oslo Agreements with Yasher Arafat in 1993. He may still be the NYT's best friend, but most by now would consider this ally of Saddam in the Gulf War a terrorist.
Relations with Israel come back to center this week with Joe Biden’s visit to Israel. Must have been tough for a guy whose father was a “righteous” supporter of Israel as Obama seems not to like Israel but is kind of blue on its enemies.
In the mid 15th century, Prague had come to a crossroads. Rabbi Loeb dreamed that he had conjured a Golem. The light had gone out of Europe. Jewry The Jews that left Prague, Chile, Stalingrad, cherry Hill, NJ, on the most astonishing inner journey in human history, known as “the return” meeting untold horrors along the way, are almost there. They are five feet away from the center; the “center of the universe” – the Temple Mount. Anyone who thinks that getting yelled at now by Hillary will stop them is misguided.
- add quote from Cohen
Diplomatic relations with Israel in the 1990s should be comprehensively reviewed from top to bottom as it has become clear since that the President at the time was on the take. That his wife is now Secretary of State completes the irony.
But it is not the casual million dollar bribes – one to get an Israeli businessman out of jail – that will bring Bill to historic infamy. Not the 50 gold watches. Not the white trash adolescent sexuality pioneered by him, customary now among governors of all races, but the signing of the Oslo Agreements with Yasher Arafat in 1993. He may still be the NYT's best friend, but most by now would consider this ally of Saddam in the Gulf War a terrorist.
Relations with Israel come back to center this week with Joe Biden’s visit to Israel. Must have been tough for a guy whose father was a “righteous” supporter of Israel as Obama seems not to like Israel but is kind of blue on its enemies.
In the mid 15th century, Prague had come to a crossroads. Rabbi Loeb dreamed that he had conjured a Golem. The light had gone out of Europe. Jewry The Jews that left Prague, Chile, Stalingrad, cherry Hill, NJ, on the most astonishing inner journey in human history, known as “the return” meeting untold horrors along the way, are almost there. They are five feet away from the center; the “center of the universe” – the Temple Mount. Anyone who thinks that getting yelled at now by Hillary will stop them is misguided.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
What Israel understands in a year “gone to waste”
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/14/10
Israel understands that when America sends a high school hall monitor to do the job of a diplomat, there will be advantages. Was Secretary of State Clinton really shocked (again) at the announcement of new building in East Jerusalem, “accidentally” (strategically) announced during Joe Biden’s visit? Fool her twice. She and President Obama were played the very same way in Copenhagen by the Chinese. Most everyone who reads the journals (or my blog in the past three weeks) is aware that new political dynamics are awakening in Israel. Did the State Department forget to renew Secretary Clinton’s library card again?
American diplomacy is fatally flawed with Secretary Clinton at the helm. She is as she said she would be in her campaign, a cultural emissary for Global Clintonism. To paraphrase Eleanor Roosevelt, “I am my husband’s scold.” The season has long passed.
Israel is a small country living on the knife’s edge, says Aaron David Miller in a Washington Post survey of experts this past Saturday. And any American who doesn’t understand this doesn’t get very far. Kissinger, Carter and James A Baker, Secretary of State in the George H.W. Bush administration, each “made clear that there was a cost to saying no to a superpower . . .”
But this administration has shown itself to be vulnerable in Copenhagen. Hillary was shocked and called the Israeli announcement “insulting.” As she and Obama were shocked at Copenhagen when the Chinese took the initiative in talks without even inviting them to the table. It strategically put the opponent (us) at a psychological disadvantage (the object of war, says Sun Tzu) and began to establish a new Chinese relationship in world authority and a new global paradigm.
Only Joe and Hillary would actually believe that the announcement of the settlements during Biden’s visit was completely accidental. Like the Chinese, the Israelis judge the strengths and weaknesses of the “superpower” – a phrase we don’t hear that much now – by its performance and personnel. Real Superpowers have real State Departments.
America has both hindered and advanced the progress of Israel and China these past 50 years. But in spite of what Bill and Hillary think of themselves, they are not existential necessities to Israel and China. And when they and the America they represent become obsolete, the world moves on. But a flaky State Department – and one with political patronage rather than a diplomat at the top – presents opportunities. The Israelis and the Chinese have three more years to take advantage.
As NY Times columnist Tom Friedman wrote this Sunday, what the Israelis did “. . . played right into a question a lot of people are asking about the Obama team: how tough are these guys?” Not tough.
Relations with China entered a breach at Copenhagen. I am convinced that we are seeing a similar breach with Israel. Israel today finds two basic American attitudes toward Israel: Tom Friedman’s and Pastor Hagee’s. Success in the war in Iraq may have made one of those positions historically irrelevant to Israel’s immediate needs and interests. Both the Chinese and the Israelis seem to have correctly sized up this administration in, as Senator Scott Brown said this weekend, an entire year that “has gone to waste.”
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/14/10
Israel understands that when America sends a high school hall monitor to do the job of a diplomat, there will be advantages. Was Secretary of State Clinton really shocked (again) at the announcement of new building in East Jerusalem, “accidentally” (strategically) announced during Joe Biden’s visit? Fool her twice. She and President Obama were played the very same way in Copenhagen by the Chinese. Most everyone who reads the journals (or my blog in the past three weeks) is aware that new political dynamics are awakening in Israel. Did the State Department forget to renew Secretary Clinton’s library card again?
American diplomacy is fatally flawed with Secretary Clinton at the helm. She is as she said she would be in her campaign, a cultural emissary for Global Clintonism. To paraphrase Eleanor Roosevelt, “I am my husband’s scold.” The season has long passed.
Israel is a small country living on the knife’s edge, says Aaron David Miller in a Washington Post survey of experts this past Saturday. And any American who doesn’t understand this doesn’t get very far. Kissinger, Carter and James A Baker, Secretary of State in the George H.W. Bush administration, each “made clear that there was a cost to saying no to a superpower . . .”
But this administration has shown itself to be vulnerable in Copenhagen. Hillary was shocked and called the Israeli announcement “insulting.” As she and Obama were shocked at Copenhagen when the Chinese took the initiative in talks without even inviting them to the table. It strategically put the opponent (us) at a psychological disadvantage (the object of war, says Sun Tzu) and began to establish a new Chinese relationship in world authority and a new global paradigm.
Only Joe and Hillary would actually believe that the announcement of the settlements during Biden’s visit was completely accidental. Like the Chinese, the Israelis judge the strengths and weaknesses of the “superpower” – a phrase we don’t hear that much now – by its performance and personnel. Real Superpowers have real State Departments.
America has both hindered and advanced the progress of Israel and China these past 50 years. But in spite of what Bill and Hillary think of themselves, they are not existential necessities to Israel and China. And when they and the America they represent become obsolete, the world moves on. But a flaky State Department – and one with political patronage rather than a diplomat at the top – presents opportunities. The Israelis and the Chinese have three more years to take advantage.
As NY Times columnist Tom Friedman wrote this Sunday, what the Israelis did “. . . played right into a question a lot of people are asking about the Obama team: how tough are these guys?” Not tough.
Relations with China entered a breach at Copenhagen. I am convinced that we are seeing a similar breach with Israel. Israel today finds two basic American attitudes toward Israel: Tom Friedman’s and Pastor Hagee’s. Success in the war in Iraq may have made one of those positions historically irrelevant to Israel’s immediate needs and interests. Both the Chinese and the Israelis seem to have correctly sized up this administration in, as Senator Scott Brown said this weekend, an entire year that “has gone to waste.”
Saturday, March 13, 2010
What Israel understands
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/15/10
What Israel understands: When they send a hall monitor to do the job of a diplomat, there will be advantages. Was Secretary of State Clinton really shocked (shocked, again) at the announcement of new building in East Jerusalem, “accidentally” (strategically) announced during the visit by Vice President Joe Biden? Fool her twice. She and President Obama were played the very same way in Copenhagen by the Chinese. Most everyone who reads the journals (or my blog in the past three weeks) knows new political dynamics are awakening in Israel. Did the State Department forget to renew Secretary Clinton’s library card again?
Israel is a small country living on the knife’s edge, says Aaron David Miller in a Washington Post survey of experts this past Saturday. (Are America and Israel drifting apart?) And any American who doesn’t understand this doesn’t get very far. Kissinger, Carter and James A Baker, Secretary of State in the George H.W. Bush administration, each “made clear that there was a cost to saying no to a superpower . . .”
But this is an administration that has shown itself vulnerable. Hillary was “shocked.” As Obama and the Secretary were shocked at Copenhagen when the Chinese took the initiative in talks without even inviting them to the table. It put the opponent (us) at a psychological disadvantage (the object of war, says Sun Tzu) and began to establish a new relationship in world authority and a new global paradigm.
Obama has already backed down from Israel last year when he called for “an unrealistic comprehensive freeze on settlement, including natural growth” (Miller). This is how you get to know your opponent’s strengths and weaknesses; his or her threshold of will and believability.
Only Joe and Hillary would actually believe that the announcement of the settlement during Biden’s visit was accidental.
Like the Chinese in Copenhagen, the Israelis have judged the strengths and weaknesses of the “superpower” – a phrase we don’t hear that much now – which is America and has learned to leverage its advantage. America has both hindered and helped their progress these past 50 years. But in spite of what Bill and Hillary think, they are not existentially necessities to the world. And when they become irrelevant, the world moves on. But a flaky State Department – and one with political patronage rather than a diplomat at the top – presents opportunities. The Israelis and the Chinese have three more years to take advantage.
“There is a generational shift underway, driving apart post-Zionist Israel and 21st-century America,” says Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute in the Post survey
Perhaps we are at another breach. The Clintons, cultural missionaries more than states persons, seem to be unaware of this. And Obama too is a cultural emissary as well and not a statesman. Both the Chinese and the Israelis seem now to have correctly sized up this administration.
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/15/10
What Israel understands: When they send a hall monitor to do the job of a diplomat, there will be advantages. Was Secretary of State Clinton really shocked (shocked, again) at the announcement of new building in East Jerusalem, “accidentally” (strategically) announced during the visit by Vice President Joe Biden? Fool her twice. She and President Obama were played the very same way in Copenhagen by the Chinese. Most everyone who reads the journals (or my blog in the past three weeks) knows new political dynamics are awakening in Israel. Did the State Department forget to renew Secretary Clinton’s library card again?
Israel is a small country living on the knife’s edge, says Aaron David Miller in a Washington Post survey of experts this past Saturday. (Are America and Israel drifting apart?) And any American who doesn’t understand this doesn’t get very far. Kissinger, Carter and James A Baker, Secretary of State in the George H.W. Bush administration, each “made clear that there was a cost to saying no to a superpower . . .”
But this is an administration that has shown itself vulnerable. Hillary was “shocked.” As Obama and the Secretary were shocked at Copenhagen when the Chinese took the initiative in talks without even inviting them to the table. It put the opponent (us) at a psychological disadvantage (the object of war, says Sun Tzu) and began to establish a new relationship in world authority and a new global paradigm.
Obama has already backed down from Israel last year when he called for “an unrealistic comprehensive freeze on settlement, including natural growth” (Miller). This is how you get to know your opponent’s strengths and weaknesses; his or her threshold of will and believability.
Only Joe and Hillary would actually believe that the announcement of the settlement during Biden’s visit was accidental.
Like the Chinese in Copenhagen, the Israelis have judged the strengths and weaknesses of the “superpower” – a phrase we don’t hear that much now – which is America and has learned to leverage its advantage. America has both hindered and helped their progress these past 50 years. But in spite of what Bill and Hillary think, they are not existentially necessities to the world. And when they become irrelevant, the world moves on. But a flaky State Department – and one with political patronage rather than a diplomat at the top – presents opportunities. The Israelis and the Chinese have three more years to take advantage.
“There is a generational shift underway, driving apart post-Zionist Israel and 21st-century America,” says Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute in the Post survey
Perhaps we are at another breach. The Clintons, cultural missionaries more than states persons, seem to be unaware of this. And Obama too is a cultural emissary as well and not a statesman. Both the Chinese and the Israelis seem now to have correctly sized up this administration.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Ready for Rudy?
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/11/10
Vice President Joe Biden went to Jerusalem to scold. He “condemned” the Israelis, saying the East Jerusalem housing plans "undermined the trust required for productive negotiations.” "Sometimes, only a friend can deliver the hardest truth,” he said.
Is Joe a friend of Israel?
Biden’s visit to Israel is part of the Obama Theater of diplomacy. Netanyahu is probably more concerned right now with the upcoming Likud Central Committee elections to take place on April 28th.
Biden may be a dork, as Karl Rove said, but his real problem is that he works for a pre- 9/11 President. I think we needed a rest, as we did after Vietnam with Jimmy Carter and as England did after World War II with Clement Atlee. But rest time is over. The time for smoozing is over.
War changes people’s temperament. We are a different people today than we were in the Clinton ‘90s, which John Kenneth Galbraith called a “culture of contentment,” and in the Carter ‘70s, which Christopher Lasch called a “culture of narcissism.” The election of a soldier in pacifist Massachusetts, Scott Brown, to fill “Ted Kennedy’s seat” should be testament to that.
The war in Iraq is over. We won. We won with ominous threats from Toby Keith and Rudy Giuliani backed up by American boots on the ground. We won with some unconstitutional acts – as Lincoln and Roosevelt did - and some egregious practices by the George W. Bush administration. It happens, as anyone who served in the Vietnam War or any other war will tell you. The time for recriminations is past. It is water under the bridge. Those who dwell on the dark side of it become poisoned by it.
And because of these things the United States has a brand new place in the world. But post-9/11, post Iraq war, relations cannot be established by a President who reaches back to the 1980s and 1990s for his agents and advisors. It is the politics of denial.
Only Sarah Palin has brought focus on Israel under the new circumstances, met of course with fear and trembling in the MSM. Rick Perry will in time as the Christian Zionists in Texas have been better friends to Israel and more dependable ones these war years than Biden, Clinton and Obama. Netanyahu said their vision preceded his own. There is an opening for Rudy Giuliani here as well and he should speak up now to the issues of national security, especially related to Iran and Israel. Because if a demure and reticent Massachusetts is ready for Brown, America might be ready for Giuliani.
Political temperament changes like the four seasons. Mitt Romney is right to call on an America without apology. But that is Rudy’s America to a t and always has been. The election of Brown and the awarding of a movie about an honest, competent and unapologetic warrior by Hollywood this month suggest the winds of change are at hand. It is dawning on America that this is not Vietnam and that this is a war that we have won. A Giuliani run with Keith’s unapologetic Courtesy of the red, white and blue, playing somewhere in the hinterland – as rousing an anthem as Rule Britannia – gave tremors to the timid in 2008, but could well be the coat that fits in 2012. And in contrast, it would make the messianic ardor of Obama, which shook the world in 2008, appear merely bookish in 2012.
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/11/10
Vice President Joe Biden went to Jerusalem to scold. He “condemned” the Israelis, saying the East Jerusalem housing plans "undermined the trust required for productive negotiations.” "Sometimes, only a friend can deliver the hardest truth,” he said.
Is Joe a friend of Israel?
Biden’s visit to Israel is part of the Obama Theater of diplomacy. Netanyahu is probably more concerned right now with the upcoming Likud Central Committee elections to take place on April 28th.
Biden may be a dork, as Karl Rove said, but his real problem is that he works for a pre- 9/11 President. I think we needed a rest, as we did after Vietnam with Jimmy Carter and as England did after World War II with Clement Atlee. But rest time is over. The time for smoozing is over.
War changes people’s temperament. We are a different people today than we were in the Clinton ‘90s, which John Kenneth Galbraith called a “culture of contentment,” and in the Carter ‘70s, which Christopher Lasch called a “culture of narcissism.” The election of a soldier in pacifist Massachusetts, Scott Brown, to fill “Ted Kennedy’s seat” should be testament to that.
The war in Iraq is over. We won. We won with ominous threats from Toby Keith and Rudy Giuliani backed up by American boots on the ground. We won with some unconstitutional acts – as Lincoln and Roosevelt did - and some egregious practices by the George W. Bush administration. It happens, as anyone who served in the Vietnam War or any other war will tell you. The time for recriminations is past. It is water under the bridge. Those who dwell on the dark side of it become poisoned by it.
And because of these things the United States has a brand new place in the world. But post-9/11, post Iraq war, relations cannot be established by a President who reaches back to the 1980s and 1990s for his agents and advisors. It is the politics of denial.
Only Sarah Palin has brought focus on Israel under the new circumstances, met of course with fear and trembling in the MSM. Rick Perry will in time as the Christian Zionists in Texas have been better friends to Israel and more dependable ones these war years than Biden, Clinton and Obama. Netanyahu said their vision preceded his own. There is an opening for Rudy Giuliani here as well and he should speak up now to the issues of national security, especially related to Iran and Israel. Because if a demure and reticent Massachusetts is ready for Brown, America might be ready for Giuliani.
Political temperament changes like the four seasons. Mitt Romney is right to call on an America without apology. But that is Rudy’s America to a t and always has been. The election of Brown and the awarding of a movie about an honest, competent and unapologetic warrior by Hollywood this month suggest the winds of change are at hand. It is dawning on America that this is not Vietnam and that this is a war that we have won. A Giuliani run with Keith’s unapologetic Courtesy of the red, white and blue, playing somewhere in the hinterland – as rousing an anthem as Rule Britannia – gave tremors to the timid in 2008, but could well be the coat that fits in 2012. And in contrast, it would make the messianic ardor of Obama, which shook the world in 2008, appear merely bookish in 2012.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Joe Goes to Jerusalem: What would Rudy Giuliani do? (W.W.G.D.)
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/11/10
Joe Biden went to Jerusalem to scold. He “condemned” the Israelis, saying the East Jerusalem housing plans "undermined the trust required for productive negotiations.” "Sometimes, only a friend can deliver the hardest truth,” he said.
Is Joe a friend of Israel? His boss seems not to like Israel at all and presumably Israelis. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized to Uncle Joe, saying that he did not know the announcement of the settlements would be made when he was visiting and he didn’t want to spoil his visit. That explanation might have held up in George W. Bush’s cabinet when they announced the new preemptive policy a day before German elections, or in the random diplomacy of Joe and Hillary. But in Israel, it is much as Dr. Freud said: “There is no such thing as an accident.”
Biden’s visit to Israel is part of the Obama Theater of diplomacy. Netanyahu is probably more concerned right now with the upcoming Likud Central Committee elections to take place on April 28th. The Israelis are just waiting politely for Biden and co. to go away. Probably they have been waiting for almost 40 years now when the conspicuous benevolence of peacetime diplomacy started with Jimmy Carter as part of a showcase of global American love fest. But Jews have old souls, like the Chinese, and in the center-most place, they understand that this too shall pass.
Biden may be a dork, as Karl Rove said, but his real problem is that he works for a pre- 9/11 President. I think we needed a rest, as we did after Vietnam with Jimmy Carter and as England did after World War II with Clement Atlee. But rest time is over. The time for smoozing is over. The war in Iraq is over. We won. We won with ominous threats from Toby Keith and Rudy Giuliani backed up by American boots on the ground. We won with unconstitutional acts and some egregious practices by the George W. Bush administration. It happens, as anyone who served in the Vietnam War or any other war will tell you. The time for recriminations is over. It is water under the bridge. Those who dwell on the dark side of it become poisoned by it.
And because of these things Israel has a brand new place in the world and so does the United States. But post-9/11, post Iraq war relations cannot be established by a President who reached back to the 1980s and 1990s for his agents and advisors. It is the politics of denial.
Only Sarah Palin has brought focus on Israel under the new circumstances, met of course with fear and trembling and that chicken soup of the liberal northeast, light irony. Rick Perry will in time as the Christian Zionists in Texas have been better friends to Israel and more dependable ones these past few years than Biden, Clinton and Obama. There is an opening for Rudy Giuliani here as well and he should speak up now to the issues of national security, especially on Iran and our friendship with Israel.
Because in Israel and in the United States, the 20th century is over. The past is past we are approaching very quickly now the beginning of things.
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/11/10
Joe Biden went to Jerusalem to scold. He “condemned” the Israelis, saying the East Jerusalem housing plans "undermined the trust required for productive negotiations.” "Sometimes, only a friend can deliver the hardest truth,” he said.
Is Joe a friend of Israel? His boss seems not to like Israel at all and presumably Israelis. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized to Uncle Joe, saying that he did not know the announcement of the settlements would be made when he was visiting and he didn’t want to spoil his visit. That explanation might have held up in George W. Bush’s cabinet when they announced the new preemptive policy a day before German elections, or in the random diplomacy of Joe and Hillary. But in Israel, it is much as Dr. Freud said: “There is no such thing as an accident.”
Biden’s visit to Israel is part of the Obama Theater of diplomacy. Netanyahu is probably more concerned right now with the upcoming Likud Central Committee elections to take place on April 28th. The Israelis are just waiting politely for Biden and co. to go away. Probably they have been waiting for almost 40 years now when the conspicuous benevolence of peacetime diplomacy started with Jimmy Carter as part of a showcase of global American love fest. But Jews have old souls, like the Chinese, and in the center-most place, they understand that this too shall pass.
Biden may be a dork, as Karl Rove said, but his real problem is that he works for a pre- 9/11 President. I think we needed a rest, as we did after Vietnam with Jimmy Carter and as England did after World War II with Clement Atlee. But rest time is over. The time for smoozing is over. The war in Iraq is over. We won. We won with ominous threats from Toby Keith and Rudy Giuliani backed up by American boots on the ground. We won with unconstitutional acts and some egregious practices by the George W. Bush administration. It happens, as anyone who served in the Vietnam War or any other war will tell you. The time for recriminations is over. It is water under the bridge. Those who dwell on the dark side of it become poisoned by it.
And because of these things Israel has a brand new place in the world and so does the United States. But post-9/11, post Iraq war relations cannot be established by a President who reached back to the 1980s and 1990s for his agents and advisors. It is the politics of denial.
Only Sarah Palin has brought focus on Israel under the new circumstances, met of course with fear and trembling and that chicken soup of the liberal northeast, light irony. Rick Perry will in time as the Christian Zionists in Texas have been better friends to Israel and more dependable ones these past few years than Biden, Clinton and Obama. There is an opening for Rudy Giuliani here as well and he should speak up now to the issues of national security, especially on Iran and our friendship with Israel.
Because in Israel and in the United States, the 20th century is over. The past is past we are approaching very quickly now the beginning of things.
Monday, March 08, 2010
"When I’m 64 . . .": HIstory and Taylor Swift's Happy Dance
Cities in the east such as Newark and Baltimore now have drug-dealing as their principal commercial activity . . . Simon Heffer, Telegraph, UK
If all goes as planned I will turn 64 this year, which should be of interest for two reasons: First, approximately 40 million Americans – war babies – will turn 64 at the same time and another 40 million not long after. Second, as the ancient Roman and Chinese historians understood, all historic regimes start to go to pieces in the 60th year and end around the 64th year. And if the Eliot Wave currency theory holds true, which has the dollar ending its creative arc in the year 2011, that would likely include us.
This theme as been advanced recently by writers William Strauss and Neil Howe and in my opinion some of their observations were good, some not so good. Unfortunately, the clever William Strauss, has passed away (at age 60). But the cyclical nature of history has some formidable footings in writing of the last century. Historian Herbert J. Muller writes in The Uses of the Past that Arnold Toynbee discovered C.G. Jung and Oswald Spengler well into the middle of his world history and came to understand the cycles better. These mature insights are all still available.
Take the last American cycle which began at Appomattox in 1865. Then count forward 60 years to 1925 when The Great Gatsby was published followed quickly by The Sun also Rises. Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald filled young hearts with disillusioned desire, sending them to the Jardin des Tuileries to catch pigeons for breakfast and do absinth into the night at Les Deux Magots. Four years later – the 64th year, the economy crashed.
Look at Victoria who went to the throne on June 20, 1837, and left January 22, 1901, 64 years. At her Diamond Jubilee in 1897, actually 60 years, the smell of blood was in the water as the Germans arrived to celebrate with bigger ships, better steel, more proletariat, the better to make the war machines to follow. Robert Graves chronicled growing up around the end of things with this good title: Good-bye to All That.
Or the Russians, who did so poorly last week at the Olympics. But they are better off, as they’ve gone back to Jesus. In 1917 twelve days that shook the world began the U.S.S.R. Plus 60 comes to 1977 and the Miracle on Ice would be just around the corner, when the CCCP hockey team fell to a handful of American school boys in 1980. Russia’s Soviet Empire lasted a little longer, 1922 to 1991, 69 years, but the last few of that was mush.
Our own post-war world began in 1946 and hit 60 in 2006. Then came the first whack to the economy, but by no means the end of things. Too early for that. Our period is at 64 now, like the 40 million my age. So it should be interesting.
Good news is that Mao’s China turned 60 this year. They’ll start falling apart soon and Japan already is, so forget the Pacific Century. But I’m looking forward to the next part because things don’t really end, they just change and in my observation in the long sequence of cycles they tend to alternate, moving outward and then back inward. Like the Russians are doing. And anyway, the next is always better than the last, at least for the young,now doing the Taylor Swift happy dance, who will transcend the end and get back to the beginning.
Cities in the east such as Newark and Baltimore now have drug-dealing as their principal commercial activity . . . Simon Heffer, Telegraph, UK
If all goes as planned I will turn 64 this year, which should be of interest for two reasons: First, approximately 40 million Americans – war babies – will turn 64 at the same time and another 40 million not long after. Second, as the ancient Roman and Chinese historians understood, all historic regimes start to go to pieces in the 60th year and end around the 64th year. And if the Eliot Wave currency theory holds true, which has the dollar ending its creative arc in the year 2011, that would likely include us.
This theme as been advanced recently by writers William Strauss and Neil Howe and in my opinion some of their observations were good, some not so good. Unfortunately, the clever William Strauss, has passed away (at age 60). But the cyclical nature of history has some formidable footings in writing of the last century. Historian Herbert J. Muller writes in The Uses of the Past that Arnold Toynbee discovered C.G. Jung and Oswald Spengler well into the middle of his world history and came to understand the cycles better. These mature insights are all still available.
Take the last American cycle which began at Appomattox in 1865. Then count forward 60 years to 1925 when The Great Gatsby was published followed quickly by The Sun also Rises. Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald filled young hearts with disillusioned desire, sending them to the Jardin des Tuileries to catch pigeons for breakfast and do absinth into the night at Les Deux Magots. Four years later – the 64th year, the economy crashed.
Look at Victoria who went to the throne on June 20, 1837, and left January 22, 1901, 64 years. At her Diamond Jubilee in 1897, actually 60 years, the smell of blood was in the water as the Germans arrived to celebrate with bigger ships, better steel, more proletariat, the better to make the war machines to follow. Robert Graves chronicled growing up around the end of things with this good title: Good-bye to All That.
Or the Russians, who did so poorly last week at the Olympics. But they are better off, as they’ve gone back to Jesus. In 1917 twelve days that shook the world began the U.S.S.R. Plus 60 comes to 1977 and the Miracle on Ice would be just around the corner, when the CCCP hockey team fell to a handful of American school boys in 1980. Russia’s Soviet Empire lasted a little longer, 1922 to 1991, 69 years, but the last few of that was mush.
Our own post-war world began in 1946 and hit 60 in 2006. Then came the first whack to the economy, but by no means the end of things. Too early for that. Our period is at 64 now, like the 40 million my age. So it should be interesting.
Good news is that Mao’s China turned 60 this year. They’ll start falling apart soon and Japan already is, so forget the Pacific Century. But I’m looking forward to the next part because things don’t really end, they just change and in my observation in the long sequence of cycles they tend to alternate, moving outward and then back inward. Like the Russians are doing. And anyway, the next is always better than the last, at least for the young,now doing the Taylor Swift happy dance, who will transcend the end and get back to the beginning.
Saturday, March 06, 2010
Zen and Hurt Locker’s Sgt. James
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/8/10
As it is described in Winston L. King’s classic, Zen and the Way of the Sword: Arming the Samurai Psyche, Zen is the art of doing things in the unconscious. Doing without thinking. Internalizing knowing to as close as can be got to the core of one’s being by practice, by doing the work again and again until the outer self virtually falls away. A good example was at the end of the Olympic hockey game when Canadian captain Sidney Crosby scored the winning goal in overtime: “I just hit it quick,” he said. “I didn’t even see the net.” In the original Star Wars movie, the beginner Jedi/Samurai is taught to fight blindfolded, so as to not even see the net, a page borrowed from Eugen Herrigel’s Zen and the Art of Archery. This is Sgt James, taking off the safety suit with eyes and mind for the ordinance only and with total disregard to his own safety. He is Master Chief. He is Zen Man. Worth understanding when viewing The Hurt Locker.
There is discussion about this by veterans and soldiers as some aspects of the movie – the uniforms and the informality of the marines, for example – are not true to the reality on the ground in Iraq. But this is a work of art by director Kathryn Bigelow, not a piece of reportage, and should be seen that way.
And what is enriching about this picture is that it does present Zen man at war without idealism, without patriotic indulgence, without interpretation, without propaganda, without bullshit. Sgt. James is the internalized warrior at the center of conflict. In Iraq, he is “the man at the center.” Like World War II era Sgt. Rock of comic book lore 50 years ago, he is in Zen terms the “common stone.” If he is not present in the conflict the conflict will not be won.
Ordinary men and women ride with him and become brave because he is there driving the humvee into fire. “I don’t even think about it,” he says. He brings transcendence to the others to do the common duty which must be done, but which most are not naturally prepared to do raised in a normal, happy environment. When I was in military 40 years ago I remember encounters with soldiers like Sgt. James. They seemed usually as common as I was or even less, and most, like James, were lifers of low rank and status. But when danger approached they became transformed and we became transformed as well just by staying in the jeep and riding to it with them.
That Bigelow’s film won so many awards in Hollywood is good karma. It means we have won or are winning the war on Iraq. Because in Zen the truth is always beneath and you can’t superimpose it from the outside. If you win the war you get Sgt. Rock and Sgt. James. If you lose you get a crippled, drug addicted, deranged or otherwise broken man (“betrayed by his own country”), as in so many novels and movies about Vietnam.
Because war is a young Masai throwing a spear at a lion. The spear either kills the lion and that determines a positive, fruitful and fertile future for the tribe or it doesn’t. And this failure or success pervades everything; how we dress, how we behave with our families and friends, the psycho music they pipe into supermarkets and how we will vote in 2010, 2012 and for decades thereafter.
By Bernie Quigley
- For The Hill on 3/8/10
As it is described in Winston L. King’s classic, Zen and the Way of the Sword: Arming the Samurai Psyche, Zen is the art of doing things in the unconscious. Doing without thinking. Internalizing knowing to as close as can be got to the core of one’s being by practice, by doing the work again and again until the outer self virtually falls away. A good example was at the end of the Olympic hockey game when Canadian captain Sidney Crosby scored the winning goal in overtime: “I just hit it quick,” he said. “I didn’t even see the net.” In the original Star Wars movie, the beginner Jedi/Samurai is taught to fight blindfolded, so as to not even see the net, a page borrowed from Eugen Herrigel’s Zen and the Art of Archery. This is Sgt James, taking off the safety suit with eyes and mind for the ordinance only and with total disregard to his own safety. He is Master Chief. He is Zen Man. Worth understanding when viewing The Hurt Locker.
There is discussion about this by veterans and soldiers as some aspects of the movie – the uniforms and the informality of the marines, for example – are not true to the reality on the ground in Iraq. But this is a work of art by director Kathryn Bigelow, not a piece of reportage, and should be seen that way.
And what is enriching about this picture is that it does present Zen man at war without idealism, without patriotic indulgence, without interpretation, without propaganda, without bullshit. Sgt. James is the internalized warrior at the center of conflict. In Iraq, he is “the man at the center.” Like World War II era Sgt. Rock of comic book lore 50 years ago, he is in Zen terms the “common stone.” If he is not present in the conflict the conflict will not be won.
Ordinary men and women ride with him and become brave because he is there driving the humvee into fire. “I don’t even think about it,” he says. He brings transcendence to the others to do the common duty which must be done, but which most are not naturally prepared to do raised in a normal, happy environment. When I was in military 40 years ago I remember encounters with soldiers like Sgt. James. They seemed usually as common as I was or even less, and most, like James, were lifers of low rank and status. But when danger approached they became transformed and we became transformed as well just by staying in the jeep and riding to it with them.
That Bigelow’s film won so many awards in Hollywood is good karma. It means we have won or are winning the war on Iraq. Because in Zen the truth is always beneath and you can’t superimpose it from the outside. If you win the war you get Sgt. Rock and Sgt. James. If you lose you get a crippled, drug addicted, deranged or otherwise broken man (“betrayed by his own country”), as in so many novels and movies about Vietnam.
Because war is a young Masai throwing a spear at a lion. The spear either kills the lion and that determines a positive, fruitful and fertile future for the tribe or it doesn’t. And this failure or success pervades everything; how we dress, how we behave with our families and friends, the psycho music they pipe into supermarkets and how we will vote in 2010, 2012 and for decades thereafter.
Monday, March 01, 2010
U.S. v. Canada” “The greatest game in history”
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/1/10
Since 2002, the Winter Olympics have been becoming more interesting for two reasons. First, the high point of the games is getting to be the two hockey games at the end, the women’s and the men’s matches. Second, that healthy competition is increasingly looked forward to as a match between Canada and the Unites States. Real rivalries tell us who we are. In 1980, in the so-called Miracle on Ice, the game between the United States and the Soviet Union claimed our identity as cold warriors and as European outlanders with an ancient legacy of contention. But that century and millennium is past and a new century is upon us. And if sports help tell our story, Canada today is our growing friend and competitor. As it should be with two new world countries very much alike.
Hockey changed in the women’s hockey match in 2002 when the Canadian women’s team beat the Americans and the same followed the next night in men’s hockey. For anyone who had been watching closely, Canada also changed. Canada gained a new confidence in relationships with Americans and in global affairs. The games this week which featured the victorious Canadian women partying on the ice smoking cigars and cavorting on the Zamboni, was typically uncharacteristic of Canadians, but it was all in good fun and showed a Canada grown confident in its new national character.
We Americans have something to gain with greater friendship with Canada. If the American dollar begins to yield we may think of a common currency. And certainly we should share in a common defense on our shores to the north where we are both vulnerable. But Canadians also have strong hearts and even temperament, like that displayed by the grace and good-natured acceptance of the gold by team captain Sidney Crosby yesterday.
NBC analyst and hockey legend Jeremy Roenick called yesterday’s game the “most important game in history.” But maybe the 2002 women’s match was more important. When Hayley Wickenheiser led the Canadian woman’s hockey team to gold victory in the 2002 winter Olympics, head coach Danièle Sauvageau, who had brought the women passion, leadership and instinct, gathered the team around her after the victory for a final word on the virtues that would carry the women and their families through the difficult times in their lives. Huddled in a circle, she said three words to them: Responsibility, Determination and Courage. This speaks to Canada and it speaks to Americans. We couldn’t have better friends on the ice or off.
by Bernie Quigley
- for The Hill on 3/1/10
Since 2002, the Winter Olympics have been becoming more interesting for two reasons. First, the high point of the games is getting to be the two hockey games at the end, the women’s and the men’s matches. Second, that healthy competition is increasingly looked forward to as a match between Canada and the Unites States. Real rivalries tell us who we are. In 1980, in the so-called Miracle on Ice, the game between the United States and the Soviet Union claimed our identity as cold warriors and as European outlanders with an ancient legacy of contention. But that century and millennium is past and a new century is upon us. And if sports help tell our story, Canada today is our growing friend and competitor. As it should be with two new world countries very much alike.
Hockey changed in the women’s hockey match in 2002 when the Canadian women’s team beat the Americans and the same followed the next night in men’s hockey. For anyone who had been watching closely, Canada also changed. Canada gained a new confidence in relationships with Americans and in global affairs. The games this week which featured the victorious Canadian women partying on the ice smoking cigars and cavorting on the Zamboni, was typically uncharacteristic of Canadians, but it was all in good fun and showed a Canada grown confident in its new national character.
We Americans have something to gain with greater friendship with Canada. If the American dollar begins to yield we may think of a common currency. And certainly we should share in a common defense on our shores to the north where we are both vulnerable. But Canadians also have strong hearts and even temperament, like that displayed by the grace and good-natured acceptance of the gold by team captain Sidney Crosby yesterday.
NBC analyst and hockey legend Jeremy Roenick called yesterday’s game the “most important game in history.” But maybe the 2002 women’s match was more important. When Hayley Wickenheiser led the Canadian woman’s hockey team to gold victory in the 2002 winter Olympics, head coach Danièle Sauvageau, who had brought the women passion, leadership and instinct, gathered the team around her after the victory for a final word on the virtues that would carry the women and their families through the difficult times in their lives. Huddled in a circle, she said three words to them: Responsibility, Determination and Courage. This speaks to Canada and it speaks to Americans. We couldn’t have better friends on the ice or off.
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