Transforming America

One of the mantras used by President Obama during his first Hope and Change campaign was that he would basically transform America. He claimed that he would make the United States Constitution into a promise of positive liberties instead of a document of negative liberties which tied the hands of government instead of forcing government to act. President Obama did not likely realize this at the time but he was simply following in the footsteps of the majority of former Presidents, he was just more vocal and moved the ball across the field of play faster and further than most. There was a reason why the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution in such a manner as to strictly define those powers allowed to the Federal Government and then adding in Amendment IX that the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. In addition the Founding Fathers went even further in the next with Amendment X restraining the Federal Government exclaiming that the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. One trait of governance that the Founding Fathers knew all too well was the inclination for government to desire to grow in scope, size, power, and control. Having government do more is an easy task, just don’t oppose it and government will acquire new powers and simply continue to gather more power to itself hoarding everything it takes in and never relenting on powers assumed. My bet is President Obama knew this and was counting on there being no resistance allowing him to grow government through including goodies in the form of giveaways spread to varied and different groups such that everybody would feel like they were getting something for nothing. That is where President Obama may have gone too far as he awakened within an otherwise normally quiet group the spark of preserving that which they vaguely, some more so than others, the warnings from the Founding Fathers and other notable Constitutionalists from throughout American history. Probably one of the most pessimistic predictions came from the same pen that wrote the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson who has been quoted, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

 

Another statement from President Obama was noting that people from every nation believes their home country to be exceptional and that American exceptionalism is no different than British or French or any other nation’s exceptionalism. There is much truth in that statement from President Obama as his actions in remaking the United States such that should he complete what he envisions for the United States, the United States would be indistinguishable from any European nation and would fit perfectly within the European Union and could just as readily adopt the Euro and drop the dollar. This would very probably be seen as a great stride forward by President Obama though there are a fair number of Americans who would recoil in horror from just the thought of such. Already the United States has approached the European national average for unemployment, is currently installing what will eventually become a single payer government run healthcare system, expect it to be sooner rather than later, and there are record numbers of people collecting a wide variety of Federal Government monetary payouts from numerous programs and the workforce has dropped to one of the lowest percentages of eligible workers in modern history. In foreign policy President Obama has gone to great lengths to make the United States as unremarkable as possible. He has almost completely lost any influence or other gains that may have been the result from the Afghan and Iraq wars by completely mishandling the peace efforts resulting in Iraq becoming just another arm under Iranian control and being used by Iran as a friendly skies and highways for funneling weapons and IRGC troops to Bashir al-Assad in Syria. Meanwhile the Taliban has become resurgent in Afghanistan while al-Qaeda has turned much of Iraq into a bomb range setting off car and truck bombs as well as suicide bombers detonating themselves often in police stations or at checkpoints making the position of Iraqi policeman an extremely dangerous position. The violence has risen to levels not seen since before the surge, which should have resulted in victory had the peace been handled more competently. The coup de grâce to the United States reputation of being the turn to nation and the exceptional friend in times of need came in two parts, the first in Benghazi and the second over the Red Line and Syria. In both cases the inability of the United States to either back their own and rescue men fighting valiantly for hours and still not receiving any relief or reinforcement despite numerous assets within close proximity was a disgrace that reflected badly on American armed forces despite that the real collapse was from somewhere much higher and the American servicemen and servicewomen were prevented from responding despite their readiness and willingness. Whomever originated the stand-down order should be shamed as well as tried for crimes against the nation and those who died valiantly trying to protect others as well as themselves and the American honor. The debacle that was the lack of response, direction, clarity, or any definition would be the response to the use of chemical weapons in Syria. In what should have been a ready response already been assigned to special forces units who would have then planned, practiced, and trained for every conceivable contingency just needing the go order to response as President Obama had threatened instead turned into the Keystone Cops meet the Three Stooges except nowhere near as amusing. The inaction, dithering, lack of leadership, and apparent vacuum of leadership from the very top was an embarrassment especially when Russian President Putin of all people had to ride to President Obama’s rescue. There was sufficient egg on Uncle Sam’s face to feed an entire battalion breakfast. The entire affair was a complete embarrassment period.

 

There is some good news that I saved to end. Much of what has dragged the United States down off her pedestal, a place she has earned numerous times by aiding and rescuing others and then giving them a helping hand in rebuilding or rescue or whatever the need without asking for anything in return has been the responsibility of the lack of honest leadership in the White House. When the United States elects a President who has it as their main effort to restore the reputation of the United States, then she will once again climb back on that pedestal. It is as the Carlie Daniels Band says it in their song, “In America”, “This lady may have stumbled but she ain’t never fell.” There have been times in American history when isolationism has been the policy and politics of the day but when the world needed a savior the United States always has awakened and saved the free world. The one hope is that the United States has recovered before the world comes calling to be saved another time. There is little doubt that the American people will be ready even if that day comes tomorrow and even if the leaders of the nation would prefer to sleep through and not respond, the people will make the final choice. What many do not realize is the greatness of the United States does not lie with the day-to-day leadership but rather it lies in the leadership, philosophies, and radical ideals upon which she was founded. Never before or since in the history of man has a more enlightened, knowledgeable, wise, and able group of people come together to form a nation based on the guarantee of human and individual rights, the noble nature and creation of the human being, freedoms, liberties and faith that there is a higher source which defines goodness and provides guidance for behaviors which allow for the betterment of the human condition. The Founding Fathers wrote the documents upon which America was built and that foundation was strong and can still be resurrected and applied today. The magic is that they wrote the entirety of these documents in what was plain language of the day and is easily understood still in modern times. They used a great efficiency of words, something our current politicians should learn to emulate and have no more multiple thousands of pages legislation written in legalese codes. Perhaps we can limit all future legislation to being in total less words than used in the Declarations of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights combined. I wonder if the long winded fools currently in Congress could manage such a task, and I know there are a select few who do not fit that description, but it is unfortunately a select few and not the majority. That is the electorates’ fault and something that would require an educated and involved electorate which I have no idea how such can be brought forth. But there is always hope, but always ask what the change is when somebody links hopes to change.

 

Beyond the Cusp