March 2009

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Man cannot aspire if he looked down; if he rise, he must look up.

-Samuel Smiles

March 2, 2009

Why legislators don't worry about Constitutionality

Last week, the Senate rejected a proposal that would have given residents of the District of Columbia full representation in Congress (retrocession to Maryland), instead favoring the proposal to give full voting status to the DC delegate in the House [District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act (S. 160)]. Under this arrangement, the District would be the only place in America to have a vote in the House but not in the Senate.

I did write to my senators (Webb and Warner) on the issue, encouraging retrocession. I also wrote my Representative (Eric Cantor), for good measure. I pointed out to them that allowing DC to be the only non-state to have a voting member is not in accordance with the Constitution. I also pointed out to them that it sets a precedent that I do not support. Any territory or district that wants full representation should attempt to attain statehood, as has always been the case.

That's what I told them.

I haven't yet heard from the offices of Cantor or Webb, but today I did receive an email from the office of Senator Mark Warner, and I thought I'd share with you all exactly what it said:

I believe that the District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act takes a fair and balanced approach to granting District of Columbia residents the representation enjoyed by other citizens of the United States. In addition, we have received assurances that the bill will not open the door to any commuter tax or otherwise infringe on the rights of Virginians. I understand that some have raised concerns about the constitutionality of this legislation. While I appreciate these concerns, in my view, that matter is better left to the courts to address.

(Emphasis added.)

That's your plan?

I realize that legislators often pass laws that don't make sense and/or require a torturously loose interpretation of the text of the Constitution. But it seems to me that it cheapens the process to say Well, it might be constitutional and it might not... let's pass it and wait for somebody to file a suit and let it work its way through the courts and eventually see what SCOTUS says.

That's not what we Virginians sent you there to do, Mr. Warner.

Posted by Wulf | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Hoping for Failure

If you don't know anything about Lee Stranahan, know this: He's a liberal, and he said the following:

I believe that Limbaugh wants the President to fail because he loves the country...

A fantastic piece that encourages us to focus on our actual differences, and not on shallow propaganda like calling our opponents "traitors". I wish more people (of every political stripe) felt this way. Please read it.

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February 27, 2009

Intellectualism vs gimmick

"Talley" at Fr33 Agents posted this video clip of Rob Kampia, the co-founder and executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project, on the Glenn Beck program.

I am sharing it here because it seems to support my point in an ongoing debate with Rammage about intellectualism vs gimmick in the present and future of the Right. Glenn Beck identifies himself in this clip as a libertarian, and then proceeds to display a complete inability to have an intellectual conversation about legalization of marijuana. He just does cartoon voices and tries to belittle anybody he doesn’t agree with. He is bereft of facts, and he is a bufoon. In contrast, Kampia is dull and dry and not entertaining, but he’s got an intellectual argument about the topic at hand. Personally, I find that much more valuable. I see nothing redeeming in Beck’s performance here, and I don’t understand why people who care about the future of the Right would want to encourage Beck-like behavior.

Sorry, Rammage. I think the Right needs Joe the Plumber as a panelist on a CPAC Conservatism 2.0 Conference (“Activists, bloggers, students and scholars discussing new media strategies to shape the future of conservatism”) about as much as we need a William Buckley, Jr. to fix our leaky faucets. It’s not that Joe the Plumber or Sarah Palin or Glenn Beck are bad people, or even that they are necessarily wrong on the issues. It’s that the anti-intellectualism that fuels their popularity is as unnecessary and non-compelling coming from the Right as it is coming from the Left.

When the Right embraces anti-intellectualism, it signals to young aspiring intellectuals that their home is in the Liberal Elite. Is that where we want our brightest young people? What message do you think they get when they see the Right championed by the likes of Glenn "there's two brain cells up in my head" Beck?

Yes, there is certainly a place for the average Joe, and in fact the Right should arguably mostly be average Joes. But they shouldn't be the ones at the vanguard of policy debates or even necessarily running for high office. To suggest that the average Joe is the best option is to suggest that he has something that a conservative or libertarian intellectual does not, and I reject that argument. Ought we not to find the people who have that something, plus intellect? Isn't that the best future for the Right?

Posted by Wulf | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

November 5, 2008

What future for conservatives?

You know something weird is going on if I'm quoting/linking Mark Steyn (whose writing I just don't personally care for):

As for us losers, there's no point going down the right-wing version of Bush Derangement Syndrome. Any shrill vicious ad hominem invective would be much better directed at each other. The Republicans lost this election.

First, yes. The Republicans lost this election because they aren't unified and they've lost their way. I say that as somebody who has never been a registered Republican, but who knows he has a vested interest in how the Republicans respond to the 2008 elections. I just might be a Goldwater-style Republican, if the GOP would just give a damn about those kind of values. For all the lip service about small government, the GOP just hasn't delivered, and I've found that more offensive than the openly big government redistributionist rhetoric from Democrats over the years. I've found it so distasteful that I've gone for the protest vote in the past.

Christ, when you've got me voting LP over Republican, you're clearly not offering me a viable small government option. You're doing it wrong.

Second, Steyn is completely correct about there being no point in developing the right-wing version of Bush Derangement Syndrome. It was a putoff when you did it with Clinton, and he was slick enough to make you look stupid for it. Obama will, too. And it's just not helpful. Grow up and focus on the issues. (Wait, Steyn said that? It must be serious.)

Steyn, again:

I think we are near a point at which America joins the rest of the west as a center-left society — that's to say, a society whose assumptions about the role of government and the size of the state are far closer to Continental social democracies than to the Founding Fathers. In a grim media-cultural environment, the temptation for American conservatism is to be seduced into becoming one of those ever so mildly right-of-left-of-right-of-left-of-center parties they have in Europe. We should have the fight about conservatism's future vigorously and openly...

This fight is currently going on in several places, including The Next Right, a website whose very purpose is to have that fight and define the direction of American conservativism. Unsure about whether they're being serious? Check out this gauntlet thrown by Jon Henke:

The problem is not Republican politicians, although many Republicans politicians are a problem. The problem is not with the basic ideals of limited government and personal freedom, either. The problem is a movement that plays small-ball and cedes responsibility for infrastructure to business interests, leadership that rewards those who make friends rather than waves, an entrenched Party and Movement support system that mostly supports itself, an echo chamber that has rotted our intellect, a grassroots that is ill-equipped to shape the Republican Party, and a Republican Party that has replaced strategy with tactics, substance with marketing.

Now is exactly the time for Republican soul-searching... does the GOP want to stand for something other than raw opposition to the Democrats? This can't be decided in smoke-filled back rooms. It has to be done openly, or it will look like the rhetoric and gimmicks.

If you want in, get in. If you don't, you have no business saying the Republican Party is any better than the Democratic Party.

Posted by Wulf | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

October 2, 2008

The future of Sarah Palin

It just occurred to me that if McCain is elected, Sarah Palin would be the President of the Senate, where she would preside over Barak Obama, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton.

For sheer entertainment purposes, I don't see how I can vote against that scenario.

Posted by Wulf | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

September 24, 2008

Again leading from the rear

Thus Spake Al Gore:

If you're a young person looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now, and not done, I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration.

It is my fervent hope that within the month we will see the former Vice President and a few dozen young persons chained to construction equipment outside Pittsburgh, chanting pro-nuclear slogans and eating soy granola.

I mean, that would be seriously fantastic.

Of course, it was just over a year ago that Mr. Gore said “I can’t understand why there aren’t rings of young people blocking bulldozers, and preventing them from constructing coal-fired power plants.”

While the spectres of Rachel Corrie and Daniel McGowan loom behind Mr. Gore, I can't help but wonder why he keeps putting the onus on young people to chain themselves to the construction equipment. Surely he's not afraid to get his hands dirty in order to save the planet? It's time to lead by example, Mr. Gore--and stop placing excessive burdens on future generations. Rather than asking the youth to risk jail or physical harm, wouldn't it be more responsible to encourage them to go see the last of the polar bears, or the few remaining glaciers? Before they're gone?

Let those few baby boomers who have a conscience bear the consequences of sacrifice. After all, this is a cause worth sacrificing for, isn't it Mr. Gore?

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September 16, 2008

The abortion non-issue

This article in the Economist got me thinking…

The Palin appointment is yet more proof of the way that abortion still distorts American politics. This is as true on the left as on the right. But the Republicans seem to have gone furthest in subordinating considerations of competence and merit to pro-life purity. One of the biggest problems with the Bush administration is that it appointed so many incompetents because they were sound on Roe v Wade. Mrs Palin’s elevation suggests that, far from breaking with Mr Bush, Mr McCain is repeating his mistakes.

Well, it is true that abortion is a very dangerous topic in American politics. Neither major party likes to tolerate dissent on the issue—at least, from spotlight personalities like the presidential nominee. We won’t see a pro-choice Republican ticket any more than we will see a pro-life Democratic ticket.

But what I currently find alarming is the perception on the Left that we are on the brink of overturning Roe v Wade and sending young women to bleed to death in back alleys across America. That’s simply not the case, and the dire anti-abortion warnings about the McCain-Palin ticket are either misplaced or disingenuous.

The Left warned us that a Bush administration would overturn Roe v Wade, and despite appointing two conservative Justices to the Supreme Court, that hasn’t happened and doesn’t appear imminent. Consider also that the Democrats will keep and in fact increase their majority in the Senate this November. You know, the Senate. The body that confirms the president’s appointees with their “consent and advice”... or doesn't?

Who on Earth could John McCain appoint to slay Roe v Wade over a Democratic majority? Who could Sarah Palin ever manage to push through a Democratic Senate, in the event both McCain and Ginsberg (or Breyer or Souter) were forced to leave office?

I don’t believe a majority of people want that decision overturned anyway, and I think Republican politicians realize how it would damage them if they were to pursue Roe v Wade round Good Hope, round the Horn, and round the Norway maelstrom.

And even if they did, that wouldn’t actually ban abortions anyway. It would make the procedure subject to state laws… which would leave abortion legal in 43 states (discussed previously).

Keep in mind how liberal we as a society have become over the past few generations. Forty years ago the nation still struggled with race-based marriage restrictions; today we openly debate gay marriage. No, we will probably never see abortion outlawed in this nation. We don’t want it to be. Despite all of the mystique and emotion surrounding the issue, it actually ranks low on the list of issues weighing on the minds of voters. It falls behind the economy, the war in Iraq, terrorism, health care, energy, corruption, education, and taxes.

At this point, most Republicans do not consider Roe v Wade to be much of a litmus test. It’s okay for Republicans to be wishy-washy on this issue, or even to be openly pro-choice (see Christine Todd Whitman, Rudy Guliani, and Arlen Specter).

In other words, Democrats are only able to make it a rally flag by fear-mongering. The Left’s attacks on John McCain and Sarah Palin are to be expected, and on some topics they are certainly justified, but on the issue of Roe v Wade it comes across as a desperate attempt to scare undecided women voters into voting Democrat. We should have the audacity to hope for better than that.

Posted by Wulf | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

September 9, 2008

Game over, man!

According to a poll conducted by the BBC, everybody outside the USA would prefer Barack Obama to be US president instead of John McCain.

By a 4-to-1 margin.

So, I guess that settles that.

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August 30, 2008

John McCain is 72 years old! [laughter, applause]

Happy birthday to Senator John McCain, who turned 72 this week. His age is playing a huge factor in the current presidential race, or so we are told and told and told and told and told again. His age is such an issue that Conan O’Brian begged John McCain to give us something else to pick on him about (see this vid, especially around 1:20 – 2:20).

It got me wondering about the Republican Party and their nominees over the years. Age has been a recurring theme for the GOP. Not counting George W. Bush, the Republicans haven’t nominated a man younger than 60 years of age since Nixon. In the entire post-WWII era, the Republican candidate has been older 12 out of 16 races, and by an average age of 12.9 years. The last time the Democrats ran a candidate who was more than three years older than his opponent was Truman’s upset over Dewey in 1948. This just isn’t new territory for the Republicans, so I’m not surprised that they don’t seem very bothered by it – even with McCain being ten years older than the post-WWII Republican average.

Interesting, no?

Of course none of this addresses whether or not McCain’s age is a legitimate concern. I think in general we would be fools not show some concern about the health of any candidate, and more concern is warranted for older candidates. But John McCain appears to be vigorous, healthy, and in control of his faculties. It wouldn’t surprise me if he outlived John Kerry, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton. No, my concerns about John McCain will remain substantive and issue-based. Until I see evidence to the contrary, the issue of his age appears to be mostly of concern to late-night comedians.

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