The Hypocrisy of Mark Levin

     I was driving home late from work last night, and as if my stress level was not high enough from the day's machinations, I decided to listen to talk radio's biggest hypocrite, Mark Levin. Not that I disagree with much of what the former Reagan aide says, albeit the tactics he uses to say them bares no resemblance to arguably the greatest of our presidents of the last 100 years, if not our entire history. Last night Mr. Levin was falling all over himself, and quite noticeably slobbering over his guest, Senator Mike Lee, over the bill that passed the senate to repeal much of ObamaCare.
     I am certainly not a defender of the horrible piece of socialist legislation passed by Democrats with not even one Republican vote in either the Senate or the House, known as the Affordable Care Act. But the current Senate bill to repeal it, and more importantly Mr. Levin's sycophantic support of it, illustrates a real hypocrisy in the approach of the "conservative" author and talk show host. In the over 40 bills passed by the House of Representatives under the leadership of John Boehner that aimed to repeal ObamaCare, not one was free of Mark Levin's derision.
     Mr. Levin mocked the former Speaker and his colleagues for wasting time on showboat legislation that was only going to be vetoed by President Obama, or die in the Democrat-controlled Senate at the time. But he seems gleefully supportive of Senators Lee and Cruz's bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, even though it is headed for the same fate as all the House bills passed that aimed to do the same thing. I must surmise that Mark Levin's conservatism is not based on what value is advanced, but who advances it. 
     The fact is that Mr. Levin is so slavishly devoted to Mr. Cruz and Mr. Lee, and by extension their supporters, he is afraid to judge them by the same harsh standards he uses on those Republicans he calls, "Rinos," "traitors," and a slew of other derogatory sophomoric terms. His support for the Cruz/Lee bill, when he has been so dismissive of the Boehner House attempts to pass the same type of bills, shows a hypocrisy, that while being a major part or Mr. Levin's definition of conservatism, has no place in the edifice of conservatism built on the constitution, and by men like Ronald Regan, William F. Buckley Jr., Barry Goldwater, et al.
     I have written before about this new movement in the conservative arena whereby some pundits like Mark Levin have taken up the mantle of half-truths, fact-manipulation, and alternative-reality-building so successfully employed by the modern Left. If we as conservatives are to show a better way forward we can not simply employ the same tactics of the Left to advance a different message, but must engage honest and ethical methods to win hearts and minds. It appears that those like Mr. Levin believe conservatism is all about what one says and not what one does.
   

Does Freedom Caucus Represent Constitutional Values?

     There has been a great deal of consternation and gnashing of teeth among conservatives over the current quest for new leadership in the House of Representatives. Congressional Republicans are split between the so-called Freedom Caucus that wants to elect a Speaker that will advance and advocate for their "principles," and the more moderate Republicans, often called the "establishment" or "Rinos" by the former, who want to elect a Speaker who will work with Democrats in the House to advance legislation that is generally good for the country.
     The Freedom Caucus in the House is populated with around 40 members, but even in its minority status it wields a big stick. The caucus operates under an 80% rule, which means 80% of its members must agree on an issue otherwise the entire caucus must oppose said issue. Even the congress of the United States does not in any situation have such an inflexible rule, nor does the Supreme Court in its decision making require such a majority. This 80% rule means that a mere 8 members of the Freedom Caucus can influence a decision being made by the entire majority of the House. Not exactly what the Founders had in mind.
     Speaking of the Founders, and their brilliance enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, which is rightly and often used by conservatives to illuminate where political opponents have strayed, that same fidelity to constitutional principles must also be applied to our political machinations as well. The Speaker for which the Freedom Caucus is advocating is not exactly in the spirit, if not the actual letter, of the law of the constitution. The Speaker of the House is not an ideological position, but a managerial one, constitutionally speaking.
     The framers of the constitution state very clearly that House members elect by a majority vote a Speaker to lead them in the procedural tasks in the legislative process. The Speaker is not a representative of a minority part of any one political Party, e.g. the Freedom Caucus, nor is the Speaker even a representative of any one political Party in general. Constitutionally, the Speaker is to represent the entire House and manage that body in the legislative process to keep order and integrity in the procedural habits of that body.
     Fidelity to constitutional values is what should drive every conservative, whether those values are an impediment or a benefit to our political ideology. Those who oppose every person, issue, or solution that involves the slightest modicum of what they perceive as compromise, are not representing the best qualities the Founders outlined in this great nation's founding documents. And any body that claims to hold the ideals of the republic near and dear, and yet allows for minority rule instead of majority rule, is not in any sense following the example or the ideals of Jefferson, Madison, et al.
    

Whisper Sweet Nothings in My Ear Conservatism

     It has recently occurred to me that there are two main drawbacks to living one's political life in an echo chamber. The first is that in being constantly bombarded with one's own beliefs, the senses become dulled and flaccid. The second is that echoes never solidify into solutions, they just create more echoes. It disheartens me that so many of my fellow conservatives have chosen to firmly occupy space inside a political echo chamber, resisting any attempts by truth or common sense to extricate them from this vacuous crucible.
     It seems that some in the conservative movement have substituted the substance of solutions for the vapidity of sweet nothings being whispered in their political ear. They seem willing to ban the torpedoes of real solutions in favor of emotionalism spoken in a language their hearts understand, but which is foreign to their intellectual sensibilities. The whisper-sweet-nothings-in-my-ear form of politics is the only explanation I can find for the popularity of candidates like Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.
     Both men say the things impressionable conservatives want to hear, yet in the echo chamber there is no room for the substance of results. There is only more and more echoes, building to a fevered and completely emotional pitch as one would experience at a Grateful Dead concert. In some cases the feeding of this echo chamber is characterized as "standing on principles." As if this is always a good thing. Sometimes the principles one stands on are not the right principles, then "standing on principles" is just pigheadedness for the sole sake of being pigheaded.
     Once one steps out of the echo chamber a whole world, brimming with ideas and solutions, can be realized. No more is the individual trapped in a relationship with self where political charlatans can advantage their political careers on the back of the individual's "principles." Not that principles are a bad thing, just the opposite. But principles that one never challenges are not principles as much as they are dogma. And dogma in politics is shorthand for achieving nothing.
     So I would implore my fellow conservatives to look at the good a candidate does and not whether they make you feel good. Step out of the echo chamber and intellectually process new information. It is only then that you will be able to truly see reality as it exists, not how you wished it existed. It is only then that you be able to see the destruction wreaked by the whisperers of sweet nothings in your ear, and your conservatism will be even stronger and more dynamic.
      

You Are a Member of the Establishment If...

     Words are funny things. Their definition can fluctuate depending on the person using them. In the world of politics, words are used to advance an agenda or cause the retreat of an opposing agenda. Even for those on the same side of the political ideology circle, words can be used to demarcate persons who are "true" to the ideology from those who are pretenders to it. One of the most overused words on the Right is establishment. It is used by many as a pejorative against those with whom they disagree on one issue or another.
     Writing this blog and commenting on social media about political issues has exposed me to being too conservative for some and too far Left for others. I have found the most harsh criticisms have emanated from those with whom I agree with on a majority of the issues facing this nation. I have been called derogatory names for even suggesting reason in the face of ideology, and rationale in response to unbridled political zeal. For anyone reading this who are not clear as to whether they are part of the establishment, or part of the politically pure unadulterated Right, following is a list of issues and the appropriate responses for anyone interested in avoiding the dreaded label of establishment.
     Illegal Immigration: If you believe in any solution to this problem short of mass deportation and the building of a huge wall on our southern border, you are a member of the establishment.
     Muslims in America: If you do not believe that every member of the Muslim faith are head-chopping, women-abusing, Sharia-law imposing, pedophiliacs, and bestiality-practicing evil bastards, you are a member of the establishment.
     President Obama: If you do not believe that Barack Obama is a secret Muslim hell bent on destroying America because he was born in Kenya and never actually achieved the academic accomplishments he said he did, you might be part of the establishment.
     Government Shut-Downs: If you do not believe that the constitution gives the right and authority to congress to shut down and defund parts of government in order to advance a political agenda when your Party is in the majority, you may be part of the establishment.
     Congressional Republican Leadership: If you do not believe that Republican leadership in the House and the Senate are exact copies of Democrats, and have done nothing but support the Obama agenda, and you further refuse to ignore the 70% cut in the deficit among other accomplishments, you are a member of the establishment.
     Term-Limits: If you believe in the vision of the Founders for a legislature consisting of duly elected individuals with no restrictions of choice put upon the voters, and you support the self-government model which does not impose term limits on members of congress, you are a member of the establishment.
     Well there you have it, a partial list of some issues which will allow you to determine if you indeed are part of the establishment or not. For further evidence of membership in the establishment, just tune into your nearest self-proclaimed leader of the conservative movement. There is no shortage of these folks on talk radio, on cable TV, or on social media. If you have any confusion about your matriculation into the establishment, these helpful folks will set you straight.   
    

The False Prophets Of Our Republic

     As a Christian I have been taught to be aware of false prophets. False prophets are those individuals who use the scriptures and any other forms of Christina doctrine to advance their own selfish goals. The false prophet will make his followers believe that he will advance them down the path of righteousness to the promised land, but too often he just takes the faithful further away from their spiritual goals. As a patriotic American I have likewise been instructed in the methods used by  the false prophets of our republic.
     I am sure many reading this will recognize the persons I am referring to, the supporters and advocates of secession by their state. It is hard to make the case that someone is being both patriotic and secessionist, the concepts after all are mutually exclusive. But the secessionists use the founding documents of this country, and the political beliefs of Madison and Jefferson to support their proposition of breaking from the union created in part by the concepts proffered by those two men. Neither of which believed in secession, the union being of paramount importance to the principles they burned into the founding.
     In their time, the Founders faced the issue of secession. First with Rhode Island, which did not even send a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, and then during the War of 1812 when the New England states met to decide on the issue of seceding from the union. Later the issue of secession was so important to Southern states, and preserving the union so important to the Northern states, that a bloody civil war was fought over it.
     The modern day secessionists have much passion, but little else. They do not seem able to think beyond the act itself to what happens after. Do they print their own money, have their own relationships with foreign governments, raise an army of their own, etc.? More importantly do they deny those in their state, who were not in favor of secession, their United States citizenship and the benefits thereof, and force them to join their now "liberated" country? Or do they simply deny these persons the right to live in their state?
     I would not want anything I have written here to suggest that those who believe in secession are in any way nefarious with mischievous intentions. It is that their passions have inflamed them beyond the bounds of rational thought. And these passions have been fueled by the profiteers of discord, disjointedness, and disunion. These political conmen prey on those burdened by the excessiveness of government to push their own personal agendas, usually rooted in making money.
     Our hope as a nation is not in smashing the boulder of our union into much weaker pebbles, but remaining intact and changing those things which threaten individual liberty. A boulder is much less likely to be moved than a pebble, which can be kicked down the street by even a child. Situations are never as bad as the worse assessment, nor as good as the most positive one. A true patriot does not abandon his country, especially in perilous times. The mark of a true patriot is the ability to persevere through the storm and help guide the ship of state to the shores of reasonable governance and personal liberty.
    

The Lack Of Principled Conservatism Present In Christie Defenders

     I have deliberately kept my opinions to myself the last couple of days about the Chris Christie circus in New Jersey over the lane closures on a busy bridge in Fort Lee. The lane closures, which caused quite a traffic jam, was apparently political payback aimed at the Democrat mayor of that city. Mr. Christie took 107 minutes on Thursday to explain that he knew nothing about the lane closures and was very peeved at members of his administration who did, firing Bridget Ann Kelly, a close aid to the rotund Governor since  2010. My opinion about this dog and pony show is more about reaction from those on the Right than it is about what Governor Christie knew and when he knew it.
     Beyond the scandal created either by Mr. Christie's political vengefulness or his lack of judgment with regards to those with which he has populated his administration, is the reaction by some on the Right that borders on defense, or suggests that he should be defended by his fellow Republicants. Even the elder statesman of conservatism, Rush Limbaugh, suggested that more of a defense of Christie should take place within his own party. Others in talk radio have verbally tripped over themselves to extol what they say are the characteristics of great leadership exhibited by Governor Christie in Thursday's press conference.
     The repeating theme on much of talk radio yesterday and Thursday was to exculpate Chris Christie of any blame or wrongdoing by immediately enumerating every one of the many Obama scandals from his tenure in the White House. This is analogous to excusing a man for stealing a car simply because another man embezzled a million dollars from the corporation for which he worked. One of the core conservative principles is advocating for righteousness and truth, regardless of the party affiliation of the wrongdoer.
     I am not saying that closing a couple lanes of a major bridge in a city run by a political opponent, causing a snarling traffic jam, is on par with allowing four Americans to die at the hands of terrorists in Benghazi, Libya. Nor is it as serious as using the Internal Revenue Service to suppress votes of your political opponent in an election year. Nor any other Obama scandal one wishes to use in comparison. But everyone can agree that the lane closures were wrong. Mr. Christie did nothing to repair the damage to his reputation and character, showing little honor by sacrificing Bridget Ann Kelly to the gods of the Leftist media, while he sheltered himself behind empty platitudes and righteous indignation.
     Governor Christie has never impressed me as anything but a bullying opportunist, lacking in core convictions other than keeping himself supplied with political power and cheeseburgers. And those who call themselves conservatives, and also wish to defend Mr. Christie, should examine their own convictions and values. For the two positions, in my opinion, are mutually exclusive and cannot peacefully coexist in anyone who counts themselves among principled conservatives.