He's Makin' a List, and Checkin' It.........NEVER

Happy New Year!

Hope you had a Merry Changemas, with multi-dimensional greetings to all.

Now that the election is in the bag, the dinosaur media have given permission to mention the President-Elect's middle name again--and not just on late night right wing radio.

So I'll use it here to kick things off.

For the first time in history we have an actual office of state called "The Office of the President-Elect", complete with its own podium, a nifty set of flags the local International House of Pancakes might still be looking for, and stately logogram on an official looking seal. Impressive!

So, congratulations to the Office of The President-Elect, Barack Hussein Obama. Congratulations to Michelle Obama; for the second time in her adult life, she's proud to be an American.

Aye, congratulations to George Soros' well-funded media star's shining ascendancy.

While I, like many people, strongly disagree with his numerous goals and his core beliefs about the direction the nation should take at this critical juncture in history, surely his rise from relative obscurity to the highest office via his hard work, his intellect, his political savvy, and his sheer determination hailing from humble beginnings but knowing enough to get steeped into Chicago politics, speaks volumes to us about the possibilities open in the Land of the Free. Or, at least in the home of the Politically Brave.

Many Blessings, and may God's Grace keep him while we trust him to have the nation's interest at heart, and defend the integrity of the Constitution and our hard won freedoms. We dare not take them for granted. Neither should he, even if some of his supporters seem to. Indications so far, at least from previous comments, are that Senator Obama feels in some cases the Constitution and the courts have been barriers to things like "wealth redistribution." While it's true Obama has chosen a temporary compromising path in the pick of Robert "The Surge" Gates to stay aboard from the Bush days, as the interim Secretary of Defense, Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, and Paul Volcker ("Reaganomics Lite") to head up the newly created Economic Recovery team, it remains to be seen--but can be guessed at--his picks for the Supreme Court's impending replacements and a host of other ideological placements. Leftward we move anyhow.

Our Next President fought a well-orchestrated campaign, and deflected every attempt to even raise eyebrows about his ideology and his associations, much less his lofty and charitably questionable goals for our nation. One must say this is quite a dandy he's working on here. The people have spoken here, and I'll try not to harp too much on the presumptions/interests of the electorate as they saw them at the time. We dare not take this peaceful process of transition in politics for granted. Neither should he.

It has, however, come to the attention of some of us the Office Of The Next President has compiled quite a wish list. Some of these bullet points are clearly understandable desires, others are noteworthy and necessary, and others are--to be blunt--pure socialistic slush and rank egalitarianism posing as hard nosed policy initiative. There are some grave concerns or two nestled in here, especially in light of an economic downturn that many see as just gearing up for a humdinger letdown.

Let's examine just some of these for a moment or two. Or three.

By the next Solstice Season's List, Barry would like to, at a minimum:

--"give a tax break to 95 percent of Americans who work every day and get taxes taken out of their paycheck every week";

--"eliminate income taxes on Social Security for seniors making under $50,000";

--"give homeowners and working parents additional tax breaks";

--not increase taxes on anyone if they "make under $250,000; you will not see your taxes increase by a single dime –- not your income taxes, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains tax";

--"end those breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas";

--"give tax breaks to companies that invest right here in the United States";

--"eliminate capital gains taxes for small businesses and start-up companies that are the engine of job creation in this country";

--"create two million new jobs by rebuilding our crumbling roads, and bridges, and schools -- by laying broadband lines to reach every corner of the country";

--"invest $15 billion a year in renewable sources of energy to create five million new energy jobs over the next decade";

--"reopen old factories, old plants, to build solar panels, and wind turbines";
build "a new electricity grid";

--"build the fuel efficient cars of tomorrow";

--"eliminate the oil we import from the Middle East in 10 years";

--"lower premiums" for those who already have health insurance;

--"if you don't have health insurance, you'll be able to get the same kind of health insurance that members of Congress give themselves";

--"end discrimination by insurance companies to the sick and those who need care the most";

--"invest in early childhood education";

--"recruit an army of new teachers";

--"pay our teachers higher salaries, give them more support. But ... also demand higher standards and more accountability";

--"make a deal with every young person who's here and every young person in America: If you are willing to commit yourself to national service, whether it's serving in our military or in the Peace Corps, working in a veterans home or a homeless shelter, then we will guarantee that you can afford to go to college no ifs ands or buts";

--"stop spending $10 billion a month in Iraq whole the Iraqis have a huge surplus";
"end this war in Iraq";

--"finish the fight and snuff out al Qaeda and bin Laden";

--"increase our ground troops and our investments in the finest fighting force in the world";

--"invest in 21st century technologies so that our men and women have the best training and equipment when they deploy into combat and the care and benefits they have earned when they come home";

--"No more homeless veterans"; and....

--"no more fighting for disability payments."

And no sweat either.

The above was from just ONE speech. No doubt there are other items to add to the pitch from other speeches, and more to come as this new administration moves on. I'm SURE there are NO contradictions here either. Grab Bag politicking is so darned easy. Too bad it actually works.

No, not the pitches. Rather, the getting elected part--through scammery.

Not that the McCain campaign had many well explained retorts---or answers itself. It didn't. When it comes to the whole "tax" rebates are "welfare" issue--which they are--McCain had little room to speak. But John McCain didn't make Obama's level of grabby-bag, changy-change, jibber jabber styled promises. (Part of the reason McCain lost to the Clueless Coalition of the Cockamamie, one presumes). And McCain was not totally on board with the whole "CRA-styled EZ Credit" Fannie Mae mess primarily concocted by Democrats.

Unfortunately, no one cares to hear something about what government cannot, or should not, do. McCain has not offered that government is to do it all for us, and on the health care issue, while he offered aid in the form of tax credits, he's not gone full throttle Euro-rationing advocacy. Government reimbursed health care costs? (And this is what we're talking here, as the real issue in the United States is not quality or availability, but COST). Forcing health insurance companies to ignore actuarial stats--reality--and ending "discrimination by insurance companies to the sick and those who need care the most"? Forcing health insurance premiums down? Sounds wonderful!

Now enter the Dark Side of socialized health care, often erroneously and carelessly cited as "Single Payer", "Universal Health Care" and "health care is your 'right'" and other such jibber-jabber about things being "free" to the end user. Euro-styled socialism in medicine, along with those 33 hour work weeks and other laxities that are getting them in trouble demographically, ARE good for broken bones and patching sore throats at the free clinics for the kiddies. And? The other side of this is forced rationing. Always. There is no other way. Why not? When you manage 1/7th of a nation's economy under direct government auspices, edicts, and controls, you invariably cannot afford to increase the SUPPLY side of the equation. The predictable result, never falsified, is called "rationing". Rationing, boys and girls, is when you have LIMITED supply, but many hands are out, so you have to pick and nip and tuck and choose WHICH expensive procedures have to be jettisoned in order to account for the fact that you are both unwilling and unable to hit taxpayers for absolutely everything. And for the fact that not enough doctors and medical supplies exist for such ventures. The procedures on the handy "Don't Bother Anymore" list can be many.

How is this shortfall made up? The shortfall is made up by service rationing, as is done in all nations that have socialized medicine, and which is the ultimate direction of such talk anyhow. This also falls nicely in line with increasing government and busybody pressure regarding Americans' personal health habits, or perceived lack thereof.

But ya see, government rationing of anything--health care included--is a miraculous Fish and Loaves trick for the masses that only the real Messiah could make good on.

The Government has no more access to money collectively than the citizenry does--collectively--at any particular time (unless we plan to pass health care costs to the next generation, along with everything else)and can't pay for all procedures and office visits anymore than the market does, or is willing. It's just that with market solutions, as with, say, choosing to lower premiums by eschewing payments for routine office visits and paying only for catastrophic coverage, people can direct their dollars to the most likely scenarios of their expectations, lifestyle, and background. For most people it's usually better to pay out of pocket on lower cost, lower level, non-specialized, routine, or other non-emergency needs, insuring only the truly dire health issues. For the poor and indigent needing, say, maternity care, there could be a means-tested compromise on which procedures (e.g. screenings, tests, ultrasounds, prenatal checkups, etc.) would be fully or partially covered. Contrast this with some national models that handle the whole ball of wax, where sniffles and shots are handled OK, but MRIs can take months of waiting. And, if you don't meet the correct age and condition profile, your chances of heart surgery can be close to zilch. Even if scott free to YOU. Not everything in life can be covered by either system anyhow. But I'm guessing for most people its deemed better to go into hock for heart surgery--and pay as you live on--than not live at all.

Leaving aside Obama's flip dismissal of the War in Iraq as proximate to the goal of stability in the Mid East, and the concurrent fight against terror elements in that nation who, like that late Chief Headnipper, Abu Zarquawi said, are quite naturally allied with Bin Laden's sadistic goals, most amazing on this list are federal level "tax cuts" for millions in this "working" group not even paying, well....federal taxes. (Interestingly too, the Iraqis have a take on our elections as well. While they cannot vote in our elections, perhaps we can take their stance with some consideration about conditions in post-Saddam Iraq.)

"Tax cuts", for those not paying taxes--a rather creative use of Her Majesty's English.

Which is tantamount to direct welfare transfers from Pocket A to Pocket B.
I do remember from my youth that old axiom about the sin of "robbing Peter to pay Paul" in dealing with personal finances.

On the national scale, it seems Pocket A is Peter.

Pocket B is Paul.

The President-Elect's so-called "tax cut" will absolve 48 percent of Americans from paying any federal income tax at all, while the remainder left will pay more. Just under half the population will be, as Daniel Henninger pointed out in The Wall Street Journal, on the dole. If we bailed out Bear Stearns, sent AIG for back rubs and seaweed wraps on the public dime at fancy hotels and feast in ways that make Caligula look like Mother Teresa, and are now pondering keeping GM from sinking under the waves of non-competitive union legacy payments that plunk 2000 bucks onto every Detroit car that automakers are taking a loss on, why the blazes not? If the Wall Street Titans get to keep their corporate condos in Barbados, why can't little Miss Flossy keep her home just off the access road, in Plaintown, USA?

Government is now to take care of everyone. This time with bailout of one kind or another. Right?

Not much emphasis on nuclear energy here, and we know biofuels (a scam even worse than windmills) and solar panels cannot suffice for a modern civilization's energy needs. Maybe that's the point: When it comes to solving a hobgoblin, or at most, a Laodicean hellfire called Global Warming, most of the real hot air comes from politicians sniffing out new paths to taxation and personal power, not carbon dioxide's heat retention qualities. So, I suppose one could argue there's no point in proffering actual, long-term solutions to problems the pols apparently don't really think exist in the first place.

(***UPDATE 03/10/2009--Per Slate Magazine's Timothy Noah, Obama is about to all but shut down nuclear power production for the foreseeable future in this country***)

Interestingly, no mention (in light of TRILLIONS in new bailouts' liability from the late unpleasantness not really necessary) that nuclear power plants could be built for a FRACTION of The Great Bailout Sky Pie. Carbon reduction, anyone? Solar is nice, fluffy, warm--and safe for pandas--but is not practical for large scale electric grid healing. It's too diffuse of a source; it's like striking 10,000 matches to boil a quart of water. Technically possible, but not practical on the fingers--or your patience. Solar Power is akin to the attempt to boil the water one match at a time. If you're spending 15 billion a year in "renewables", you might start by putting people to work building more nuclear power plants. Nor, for that matter, do we see any mention of extra federal money to beef up the construction speed and strength of a true "border" fence on the imaginary line between Mexico and the Southwest US. (Web sites that are in favor of this are presently asking for donations in $10 increments).

Speaking of this, will our Illegal Guests, (a.k.a, "the Undocumented Community") continue to feast on free health care access in addition to free public education? Just curious. I'm supposing we'll continue to get billed for this too. So not only is the entire US citizenry to be on the mooch, but apparently our pols have seen fit to have one-third of Mexico join our spending fiesta, and beat on the piñata as well.

So, just how big is this grand Christmas (err, "Solstice Holiday Festivity") pie that barely scratches the surface on private initiative and investment; one that deals primarily with placing large slices of the economy--particularly the banks and lending organizations--under direct government control? As of this writing, the estimates range from a low orbit of 4.6 TRILLION bucks to well over 8.5 Tril. Either of these vapor-trail-of-zeros figures is more--MORE--than the combined total of other famous bailouts, purchases, and government level investments COMBINED: The Louisiana Purchase, the Marshall Plan to rebuild post WWII Europe, all NASA expenditures combined since its founding, including the Race to the Moon (Apollo Program), the Savings and Loan Bailout of the 80s, the New Deal, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, both Iraq Wars, the War on Terror, and all benefits paid out in relation to these conflicts, and not just the military operations' expenditures. The total of these pocketbook encounters? 3.2 Trillion, adjusted for inflation. Add in the combined costs of The New Deal, WWII, and the Great Society and we'll come close to surpassing the high end of the current estimates for the "The Great Bailout of '08." And yet, to this date, not one penny to my knowledge has been earmarked for nuclear power plants, offshore drilling, securing the southern "border", or for that matter the hefty cap-n'-trade provisions of the impending return to Kyoto Hypocrisy to ward off Carbon demons.

In this punchlist fashioned mostly for teachers' unions and various handout bureaucracies and those with little tax liability, only once does Obama mention--indirectly--the free market, market ideas, market solutions, entrepreneurship, or new product innovation (the "Green" car pitch notwithstanding, which is a good goal but does nothing for the major culprit in carbon emission from electricity generation, which is coal-fired power plants). He mentioned capital gains tax breaks for small businesses, yes. Good call. The problem here is that the capital gains liability for most small businesses is very limited, unless they're selling off major assets(other than buildings much of these would be worn out useless, or at least far past their prime condition), selling the business itself, or other such unusual transactions. Supposedly, the Obama campaign is actually talking about a break on investment money gathered for start-ups, but I've no direct proof of this. Credit cards and pocket cash start many small business ventures, so while I appreciate the President Elect's recognition of their contribution to job creation, it's questionable at best for him to claim capital gains advantages for the small fry under his plan.

He has surrounded himself with an "economic" team comprised of men who hail from a background in eggheadery; specialists in Marxian redistributionist strategy studies.

Not business.

Who among these men is an innovator who's brought revolutionary new products to market? Not one.

Who among them has overseen the management of a new way to, say, more efficiently pour iron ingots to compete with overseas steel industries? Not one.

What is their collective answer for the Big Three Automakers' apparent lack of enthusiasm for innovation and the stranglehold of unions while they have their tin cups out for yet another bailout from the taxpayer? Not much, other than proposed legislation (force) about Greenmobiles the size of pregnant roller skates?

Where is their decades-long business experience that can be lent to others? Very little. Perhaps as little boys and girls some of them tended lemonade stands, and at that presumably enacted price controls to make sure the poor kids paid less for each sip.

Granted, some parts of this list are laudable goals when it comes items not necessarily in league with special interests, handout mentality, putatively free this and that, and make work; like alternative energy, polishing off Bin Laden and Co., and patching infrastructure. But how to be done? One of Obama's campaign slogans has been, in addition to all the creepy, albeit childlike, Maoism Lite "Changy-Change" bruha, the phrase "YES WE CAN." It seems when it comes to energy independence, at least, the consistent answer has been "NAH, DON'T EVEN BOTHER" on intermediate steps like increased drilling for domestic oil sources. All journeys begin with steps tiny and large, and whether offshore oil drilling meets your fancy as one vs. the other, it IS a step on the path to the avoidance to oil from the House of Saud and terror funding, while nascent, long-term, petroleum-free energy innovations take root. It's not the primrose path, but it's a path. Given his Energy Secretary's desire to raise fuel prices to Euro levels, however, it seems the nascent Obama administration's desire to help our pocketbooks on his path to energy independence is hardly to be taken seriously, and does not sound like a kick-start to the economy in any case. Yeah--that'll boost trucking, shipping, delivery, the railroads, mining, excavation, construction, and infrastructure building:

Hike the price of diesel! Brilliant.

Virtually everything to the "community-activist" Senator is about Government doing this, that, and a couple of these. And government only. Certainly, he's not a huge fan of the core idea enshrined in market economics--freedom. For the robotic pundits loyal to this man in the media---the Obots---who've been careful to hide his past associations and his friends from wider public scrutiny, what matters is not freedom, but rather the shared vision this man has that government power and force are the best arbiters of economic values. In their heady, learned estimations, "Individual Responsibility" and "Self-reliance" are titles from Grimm's Fairy Tales For Suckers. And it’s a sucker's bet that these old-fashioned, fuddy-duddy, Wasilla-trinket-shop notions would be on an Obama agenda.

Certainly, he has little regard for capitalism next to his own flip-sounding story of allegedly being mocked as a "commie" (by John McCain) due to "sharing his toys" as a tyke in Miss Daisy's kindergarten class--or some such yarn in whatever versions are floating around. Not that McCain is a paragon of much besides compromise on ideology himself on many issues. Market economics included.

However, tall tale or not, cute stories meant for the amen choir can reveal more about the pulpit's ideology than generally acknowledged.

As Mark Steyn reminded us just a few days before the election of the Messiah, and just after the staid media and the Obama campaign wrapped up its dual-front mockery of "Joe the Plumber" and Gov. Sarah Palin:

...communism is not "sharing." In a free society, the citizen chooses whether to share his Lego, trade it for some Thomas the Tank Engine train tracks, or keep it to himself. From that freedom of action grow mighty Playmobile cities. Communism is compulsion. It's the government confiscating your Elmo to "share" it with someone of its choice. Joe the Plumber is free to spread his own wealth around – hiring employees, buying supplies from local businesses, enjoying surf 'n' turf night at his favorite eatery. But, in Obama's world view, that's not good enough: The State is the best judge of how to spread Joe the Plumber's wealth around.

The Senator is a wealthy man, mainly on the strength of two bestselling books offering his biography in lieu of policy and accomplishments. Many lively members of his Kenyan family occur as supporting characters in his story and provide the vivid color in it. But they too are not merely two-dimensional cartoons. His Aunt Zeituni, a memorable figure in Obama's writing, turned up for real last week, when the dogged James Bone of the London Times tracked her down. She lives in a rundown housing project in Boston.

In his Wednesday night infomercial, Obama declared that his "fundamental belief" was that "I am my brother's keeper." Back in Kenya, his brother lives in a shack on 12 bucks a year. If Barack is his brother's keeper, why couldn't he send him a $10 bill and nearly double the guy's income? The reality is that Barack Obama assumes the government should be his brother's keeper, and his aunt's keeper. Why be surprised by that? For 20 years in Illinois, Obama has marinated in the swamps of the Chicago political machine and the campus radicalism of William Ayers and Rashid Khalidi. In such a world, the redistributive urge is more or less a minimum entry qualification.

Obama's Cosmic Justice Juice from the Chicago Machine marinade thusly leaks through:

Joe the Plumber is halfway listened to at first, media eyes roll to heaven over his unsophisticated, quotidian concerns, he gets chastised in the next breath for his lack of insight about the need to smear the wealth around. Finally, he's mocked for good measure, by Obama and VP pick Joe Biden when they preached to the flock outside of Middle America's Ohio suburbs. (One guesses that Joe's section of Holland, Ohio is one of those icky, primitive, Wasilla-esque hamlets where--as Obama famously rebuffed--ignorant rednecks are still found "bitterly clinging to their guns and God.")

"Brother, can you actually spare a dime--and not merely 'paradigm'--for your own brother?"

Far from Kenyan villages where close relatives linger in poverty, on the cusp of ultimate power for the world's last--albeit fading--superpower, this tightward liberal compassion warrior has little patience for the arguments from leading economists that government involvement in propping up---after creating--unsustainable and absurdist requirements in creatures like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, had ANY part in the recent credit meltdown. The legacy of ACORN and the CRA is the legacy of Fannie Mae's forced, but oddball, lending practices.

See for example this, or this.
Ahh--here we find a blast from the past---a warning:

Update, to where the blame is to really be found:

Golly Gee Wilkers--guess who tried to stop some of this:

Instead, this natural market correction for the overexhuberance/government meddling is labeled by Obama as "market failure." How Orwellian. Then, he and Bush both acquiesced to the notion that the way out of this is to intervene in the very manner that brought this crap to us in the first place: As we might guess, only government power and supposed prowess holds the answer key to these economic puzzles. So we're told. After the banks and the Big Three auto makers and others holding the tin cups out in Washington after stepping off their chartered jets, where is the money for all the rest coming from anyway? Merely a three percent hike on the "very rich" tax rates?

Out of all this expenditure, you'd think there'd be more mention of, say, worker rehabilitation and/or job training for something other than armies of bureaucrats and teachers. Not creating 600,000 government jobs. These jobs have their uses, but are of little good in making more widgets in the meantime, or shoring up a fall in tax revenue to pay for all this. No one doubts the efficacy of education and basic comprehension skills for the next generation of workers. But the whole More Money/Class Size shibboleth has been exploded as myth many times. As William Henry III said, sometimes you do more with less. See John Taylor Gatto on this one; more time could be spent on the Three R's and less on PC platitudes like "diversity" and "tolerance", for much the same prices we already have in public education. Public education needs a radical restructuring--not necessarily a salary hike for teachers and their many Indian chief administrators. Tolerance and diversity are wonderful goals, and the idea is that this horizontal learning style in the public schools (among peers) makes for a better and more accepting society. No doubt there is some truth in this sales pitch. But there are other ways to accomplish the goals of acceptance and "working together" while still concentrating more heavily on academic excellence. When it comes to societal arguments, as well as individualistic ones, no greater need is found than for our future scientists, doctors and other health care professionals, programmers, engineers, and workers of all types, creeds, and races to have the best education and perspective on science, math, and history as possible. That helps create cohesion in society too, as well as economic prosperity and relative comfort.

And why NOT allow the auto makers and banks to fail? If a company is allowed structured bankruptcy, often the market finds a better allocation of those resources channeled elsewhere. As one pundit put it, if you're truly "too big to fail" then maybe you're too damned big for anyone's good. Bigness breeds inefficiency.

Free college--"no if, ands, or buts"? Sounds nice too. But, on that count we have to ask if that's even warranted for many people, much less doable. Is it not better in some cases to have some kids just move on with life and family and jobs rather than pretend everyone is college-bound? This cornucopia of guarantees, gimmes, gimmicks, and goofs is beyond unaffordable or even unadvisable. Worse, it is the Europeanization of America, and the beginnings of the complete and utter loss--with no return--to the founding ideas of liberty, due the requisite government micromanagement of economics and, ultimately, life itself.

As Dwight Eisenhower purportedly said (and if not, I'll say it here) a government powerful enough to give you everything is powerful enough to ultimately take what you already have. And take, it must, to fulfill the attempted Swedenization of America. No more worry about fuel prices and covering your monthly mortgage for "your" house (as one woman interviewed claimed would be the boon of an Obama administration)?

A level of government involvement of this dystopian magnitude in the lives of citizenry ultimately infantilizes the populace, shielding them not only from the responsibilities and struggles of adult life, but severing the natural relationship of citizen to government in general. Government becomes the pusher. Citizens, the addict. The chances of being weaned off populist largess from other people's wallets become more and more difficult with each passing year. The chances of getting government to reverse course on dozens of issues being equally slim. Cold Turkey withdrawal from sumptuous benefits is not a realistic strategy in the modern Secular Progressive State. Ironically, this leads to a situation where government assumes the full mantel of responsibility for life; a situation where "populist politics" ultimately leads to a condition of such government dependence that the population is no longer even listened to. We could even say, if we dare, that for all practical purposes we need not even bother with political parties, or competition at the polls. Why should we? Already in the Blogosphere, some left-leaning sites are proudly crowing, due the Obama boost, that if nationalized (RE: socialistically rationed) healthcare ever comes to fruition in the United States, it will all but mark the end of conservative social policies and free market arguments on most other topics. Makes sense. We enjoy having 1000 cable channels to choose from, but mess with the big issues of life, and even our bodies and homes, and we happily subcontract that out to government. So why should market forces, as price setter, be the arbiter of much anything beyond pizza delivery and beer selections? The People roar with approval with every removal of personal responsibility, only to be told later they have few freedoms either. And no, your sex partner of choice and state-funded abortion are not the only things going on in life.

History bears out the precedent. See the entire history of socialism on this one. We can also take our clues from others in current events: Venezuela's single-manned, charming, hammy, and popular variety sitcom show, Hugo Chavez, was narrowly rebuffed by his own nation's Supreme Court on this notion of El Presedente for Life, but for the most part has managed to shut down media and political opposition. Across the Pond we go: All throughout Europe, the only distinct squabbles at the highest offices pitched to voters are merely about "free" daycare, pension plans, and which candidate offers more paid vacation time. When the people voted "Non" on a European constitution that would envelope the entire Continent, the government leaders decided that this meant "Oui"--thus they will fight on for ratification nonetheless. Yes means yes. But a loud-mouthed, impudent "NO" from concerned citizens apparently means "Yes" also.

Or, so the chancelleries and other Euro authorities tell Mr. Smith (or Gerhard, or Francois).

That's about it.

Paraphrasing Charles Murray: When citizenship is little more than playtime and vacation from reality and struggle and kids and expenses, the hard questions of life and more profound philosophical insights--the Big Questions--become mere irritants. This is the legacy for the foreseeable future, now coming to America: Eurosocialist A vs. Eurosocialist B. Yet by instinct we know that Eurodee vs. Eurodum is not the answer to all of life's bigger issues, problems, and security threats. It only answers our creature comforts.

On the whole, do Europeans even seem to care anymore (beyond statements about how Islamic terror is all Bush's fault, or Israel's fault, or we're too ugly to the Palestinians, or we need more multicultural outreach to the Islamists)?

On the whole, do we Americans do much better? After all, we're starting to mumble the same kinds of things more often these days. As the recent election amply demonstrated, foreign policy insights and military experience apparently have no bearing whatsoever. We can make this point merely contrasting Senator McCain's full life of experience with that of Obama's. For that matter, we can contrast Obama with the allegedly Podunk and unsophisticated resume' of the Snowbilly Queen of Wasilla, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Obama has written autobiographies before doing almost anything else in life, before actual achievement; certainly before stepping so much as to the podium of higher level politics. This is not, contra the NY Times' opinion, the making of a legendary writer along the lines of Teddy Roosevelt, but a self-absorbed individual steeped in Leftist ideology and the Political Machine. GOVERNOR Palin has run a commercial fishing operation, a town, and a state that has more than a smidgen to do with energy policy from time to time. Obama has, for the most part, merely run his mouth. His real-world experience with "business" concerns and monetary transaction is making pitches to the public schools growing wish list of social activism, and the baloney of "community organizer" in Chicago. Whatever that really means.

Palin, the "ignorant" Guns-n'-God Girl, by contrast, has what British Labour Party pol Denis Healy likes to call a "Hinterland" existence - a life beyond politics. When Senator Obama attempts anything "beyond" politics, such as bowling, or visiting a Waffle House, he comes over like a visiting dignitary to a foreign country getting conscripted into some bizarre local folk ritual for the camera. Sarah Palin isn't just on the right side of the issues intellectually. She won't need the usual staged "hunting" trip to reassure gun owners: she's lived the Second Amendment all her life. Likewise, on abortion, we're often told it's easy to be against it in principle, but what if you were a woman facing a difficult birth or a handicapped child? Been there, done that. Got the T-shirt. Energy? Unlike Biden and Obama and virtually all polysci profs and urban-bound bureaucracy peddling politicians alike, she's been to the icebound wasteland called ANWR and, like most Alaskans, supports drilling there. There is more than meets the eye here. Cultural confidence of Palin's type--not eggheadery--is key to a nation's long-term survival. Recognition of freedom, our past, our core values, our faiths, our confidence and not compromise and "negotiation" with the terror lords, our shared experience as Americans, etc

The Clintonistas and their policy wonks used to say, "it's the economy, stupid." Meaning: The personal pocketbook's size is what matters to the voter when the economy turns sour. Everything else can take a hike. So if your pitch is helping people stay in "their" homes and not "worry" about fuel prices, there's your answer to power.

For purposes of getting plunked into office, that seems about right these days.

But life is broader than this, and the interconnectivity between domestic policies--the so-called "pocketbook" issues--and other facets of life, including how they affect or get affected by, say, international terror, should be paid attention to more often, even if this connectivity is not always obvious. A more obvious angle: How well will the economy prosper under threats of terror and actual crumbling buildings and crushed/burned citizens? The 9/11 attacks didn't make New York bustle all that well, nor did it do wonders for the airline industry. What about our safety and security in other realms?

Islamists on the march for--and gaining--Sharia Law now making rulings in Britain? Train bombings in Madrid and the London Tube? Candlelight vigils and cries to leave Iraq--that will do the trick! European Union outlawing yet something else in the privacy of your own home? Londoners being photographed more than any citizenry on the planet--save for some North Korean inhabitants? The French and Swedish "youth" (RE: Muslim Youth) riots? The murders of Dutch artists? Threats on Danish cartoonists for mostly mild representations of the Prophet? The Islamist terror attacks in Mumbai (Bombay, India), with women--as well as men--tortured and mutilated to death in hotels, and in one case leaving a child an orphan after the slaughter of his parents in front of his very eyes? An attack funded in large part by London mosques, Pro-Islamic, pro-Multi Culti, transcultural elements sympathetic to the Cause of Jihad? A recent report suggesting the strong likelihood of a major biological or nuclear attack before 2013? San Francisco flouting federal law as a "sanctuary city" and dealing with a murder rate out of control? Senate seats for sale in Illinois by the Governor himself? Iran's continued nuclear ambitions that have little to do with electricity generation? Kim Jong Il's pursuit of the same?

Nothing to see here, we're told. After all, the Old Testament Hebrews were "just as violent"--or so the secularist piety pie-faces assert.

The Left's obsession with Armageddon used to be all the rage. What with the The Day After, "people-to-people" trips to Moscow, constant media frets over US involvement in some backwoods tyranny that sported red flags, and kindergarteners employed to draw crayon-colored atomic mushroom clouds in class warning what would happen under the Reagan Terror.

These days its much easier to just coddle a glass of wine at the beach, than worry about such poppycock matters. Free daycare--now THAT's a winning hand!

Besides, the dear leaders on both sides of the Atlantic, on both sides of the aisle, have it covered. The best crack MBA minds are on the case. Right. So let's just talk about this year's Christmas retail numbers, or maybe Brittney Spears' MTV special detailing her harrowing trials of life as a rich celebrity. Perhaps in the long run, however, the better angle is seeing the full one.

Perhaps it's the stupidity, economists."

Again, the ever-bitter, God-fearing, and clingy gun-toter du jour, Mr. Steyn, says it best on the need for a return to American "hard power" and the eschewal of Euro-softness on such matters:

Yes, technically, this is still a two-party state, but one of the parties is like Elton John’s post-Oscar bash and the other is a church social in Wasilla.

As David Sedaris put it in The New Yorker:

“I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. ‘Can I interest you in the chicken?’ she asks. ‘Or would you prefer the platter of s**t with bits of broken glass in it?’

“To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.”

Well, to be honest, I’ve never much cared for chicken.

McCain vs. Obama is not the choice many of us would have liked in an ideal world. But then it’s not an “ideal world”, and the belief that it can be made so is one of the things that separates those who think Obama will “heal the planet” and those of us who support McCain 'faute de mieux'. I agree with Thomas Sowell that an Obama-Pelosi supermajority will mark what he calls “a point of no return”. It would not be, as some naysayers scoff, “Jimmy Carter’s second term”, but something far more transformative. The new president would front the fourth great wave of liberal annexation — the first being FDR’s New Deal, the second LBJ’s Great Society, and the third the incremental but remorseless cultural advance when Reagan conservatives began winning victories at the ballot box and liberals turned their attention to the other levers of the society, from grade school up. The terrorist educator William Ayers, Obama’s patron in Chicago, is an exemplar of the last model: forty years ago, he was in favor of blowing up public buildings; then he figured out it was easier to get inside and undermine them from within.

All three liberal waves have transformed American expectations of the state. The spirit of the age is: Ask not what your country can do for you, demand it. Why can’t the government sort out my health care? Why can’t they pick up my mortgage?

In his first inaugural address, Calvin Coolidge said: “I favor the policy of economy, not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save PEOPLE.”

That’s true in a more profound sense than he could have foreseen. In Europe, lavish social-democratic government has transformed citizens into eternal wards of the Nanny State: the bureaucracy’s assumption of every adult responsibility has severed Continentals from the most basic survival impulse, to the point where unaffordable entitlements on shriveled birth rates have put a question mark over some of the oldest nation states on earth. A vote for an Obama-Pelosi-Barney Frank-A.C.O.R.N. supermajority is a vote for a Europeanized domestic policy that is, as the eco-types like to say, “unsustainable”.

More to the point, the only reason why Belgium has gotten away with being Belgium and Sweden Sweden and Germany Germany this long is because America’s America. The soft comfortable cocoon in which western Europe has dozed this last half-century is girded by cold hard American power. What happens when the last serious western nation votes for the same soothing beguiling siren song as its enervated allies?

Hmm. Good question. Even if the real choices in life not being quite so stark as chicken vs. less palatable kinds of platters. More likely the choices are overcooked chicken vs. a soggy beef brisket. Stale Ham Sandwich vs. Watery Macaroni and Cheese. Take your pick. This could be as long of a fight on the Culture War's front lines as well as pragmatic economic ones. If America seems poised to cease "being America", and follows the Europath to self-immolation paved with the good intentions of free Whatever Your Heart Desires, who will fund the future entitlements of the West?

More to the point, who will defend what's left of the West? We can't do it all. To try is to engage in the Fool's Errand.

Now, Obama has mentioned that infrastructure rebuilding and lower tax rates on corporations that keep their accounts away from the Cayman Islands, are wonderful things. No doubt this would lead to safer roads and higher employment due both moves, yes, and would be welcome news to many communities for such reasons. But this pitch comes on the heels of a rather large set of negative red numbers in the government's checkbook, and nothing much has been proposed for industries across the board other than verbal promises that only the big guys are going to pay higher taxes and capital gains cuts of little avail anyway.

We'll see soon enough whether government manages the reins of business better than actual businessmen. So far, no historical, real world evidence suggests this. What has transpired with the recent "bailout" initiatives, and pols complaining about the prices of things while NOT addressing the continuing rise of cost of government, is not a "plan" so much as another government sponsored house of cards. Those leftist pols complaining about ATM fees and home prices might want to also take a look at price hikes continuing to enrich government at the cost of private initiate and consumer spending: income taxes, corporate taxes, property taxes going up in many locales, and on and on it goes.

All this in the face of some curious contradictions. Thus for example Obama is on record as chastising Americans' gluttonous ways in consuming massive resources (though he never mentions how much we PRODUCE) and YET he and the real economists, both here and in Europe, know and declare that the Euros and the Chicoms and the Russians and all the rest of Spaceship Earth (as the envirobrats call it) is too moribund to jump start the economy unless/until Joe Paycheck grabs more big screen TVs and stuffs his guts with meat and potatoes while watching football. In other words, its time to spend again, Joe. Thus the newfound neoliberal emphasis on tax cuts and stimulus packages galore, from 50K GM SUVs for the rich (assuming the bailouts hold water) all the way down to six packs for the guys who tinker with lug nuts.

As far as many of us are concerned, Obama's ideology remains a theoretical Ayersesqe construct hailing from the halls of academe at best, with depravity and enforced, cosseted poverty sprinkled with soft-core tyranny, at worst. We'll also see for certain just how much of Obama type ideology bleeds over into this policies. People might claim he'll govern from the center or even center-right. And yet leftward the nation marches economically and culturally. Those conservatives hoping for a backlash, a la Jimmy Carter's lackluster performance, are betting that the nation will not pine for the government goodies. As Tom Wolfe wrote in Bonfire of the Vanities, at some point the welfare recipients will figure out how to cross the street, fend for themselves--and "stick it" to the politicians that created the Dependency Class. Maybe. But in an age where everyone from college professors, schools, whole cities, hospitals, insurance companies, banks, mortgage holders, mortgagees, auto workers, and even their golf resorts (the UAW owns a nice one) are about to be on the public dole, I'm betting the conservatives are wrong on that count. Federal obligations now exceed the net worth of all Americans. All of us. Bill Gates included. No one is left to even pay the freight on all this.

In the meantime, along this Road To Serfdom for the planet's last free and culturally confident people, some of whom are nevertheless piddling with, and worshipping, the heathen god named "Bail", I'm reminded of the words of a one William J. H. Boetcker (1873 – 1962), who, according to Wikipedia, was an American religious leader and popular public speaker best known for The Ten Cannots:

"You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help small men by tearing down big men. You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatreds. You cannot establish security on borrowed money. You cannot build character and courage by taking away a man’s initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves."