Pat Buchanan is a prophet, not some "far right fringe," as the author ignorantly writes. I am not going to waste my time saying anything more herein. Thank you.

Pat Buchanan is a prophet, not some "far right fringe," as the author ignorantly writes.

If you really believe that then you yourself occupy the same far right fringe as Buchanan.

I am not going to waste my time saying anything more herein. Thank you.

Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.

Is Buchanan going to switch back to the Democrats and join the rest of the leftists again so he can run for president?

Dave

I've never been convinced by the right-libertarian argument that the authoritarian right are some wierd kind of leftists. If anything, the extreme authoritarian 'left' have fallen off the edge of the political spectrum and come back round the other end.

As a right-libertarian, I've never been convinced of it either. An authoritarian is an authoritarian.

As stated on another thread recently, Buchanan shares a curious number of positions with Ralph Nader: pro-union, anti-NAFTA, most notably.

Pat Buchanan is an honest intellectual, and a decent man.

Leftist Ideologues have waged a relentless, aggressive war on Western Civilization for a long time. Their most effective tactic is to use their unearned moral superiority to tarnish and squelch the dissent of anyone who has the courage to defend Western Civilization, as they feverishly work openly and aggressively to dismantle it.

Pat Buchannon is a victim of this. Any reasonable person, upon listening to PB on a cable news show for the first time is likely to think: Wow! I wonder what all the hysterical shrieking about this guy was for.

dietdoc seems a little naive with the enthusiasm for Hillary. (no disrespect implied) She's obviously posturing for the run. She's engaging in the same ol' double speak phonyism liberals always have to resort to... to fool people instead of win them over. It's fun to watch, but a little creepy. Sort of Terminator like. Emotionless, calculating, cold-blooded.

A Hillary/Condoleesa Presidential Debate would be most interesting.

Dietdoc, you seem like a nice enough fella, but you must be writing yourself some interesting scripts if Hillary is your idea of the uniter that's going close those gaps. Yowsa!

dietdoc is to be applauded for displaying signs of intelligence and an appreciation of reality; it is indeed "compromise that moves us along".

mary, dan and mr barger demonstrate both how rare this and how ambitious a project.

i really believe that if the usa does not find ways to resolve these internal conflicts, it will destroy itself from within. there are countless examples of this throughout history.

i also think that such a fall would be a bad thing, for everybody.

Amazon please

Alienboy writes:

"i really believe that if the usa does not find ways to resolve these internal conflicts, it will destroy itself from within. there are countless examples of this throughout history."

Reply: I think it was Abraham Lincoln who said, paraphrasing, "America will can never be defeated; it can only die by suicide."

I appreciate your comments. I see the same problems you do and fear the same end game.

Cheers,

Ron

A very thoughtful post. HRC, if elected will be hated by a certain far-right portion of the electorate with a vehemence that will make their hatred of her husband look positively tame. Simultaneously, she will become hated by a portion of the far-left portion of the electorate for "selling out" their agenda (i.e., becoming a centrist). For the rest of us, she could be a very good President.

Roy:

I agree. If willing to compromise, I think HRC could be a major step toward one nation again. I really am disturbed at what I see today. I honestly still believe harsh times call for harsh measures. At the same time, I am clinging to a belief that in 2008, we will not need what we need now.

Thanks for the comments.

Cheers,

Ron

It will take 2+ years of consistently centrist action - votes, not just talk - to reposition Senator Clinton to a winnable stance for 2008. We're all watching.

Keep in mind, she will need to worry just as much about attention from the liberal Democrat base as from her right-wing critics.

Dr. Pat writes:

"Keep in mind, she will need to worry just as much about attention from the liberal Democrat base as from her right-wing critics."

Reply: Absolutely. As she drifts, I expect, toward just-left-of-center, the far left will howl. It will probably be very difficult to distinguish where the loudest howls come from - the boo birds from her own party or the (far) right wing. I agree voting record speaks louder than words.

Cheers,

Ron

I (and many liberals I would guess) believe in the commonly heard motto, "Abortions should be legal, safe and RARE".

I would take conservatives worries about abortion more seriously if they gave as much passion to those already alive. The mortality rate in America is going up. But once they are born I guess it doesn't matter anymore. 130 Iraqi children died in the war. Doesn't matter if there was a good excuse for the war, they don't matter anymore, they were already born.

Anyway, I think Hilary is great and she really is not very radical, she is pretty much a centrist like her husband. I myself don't think she goes far enough in several liberal areas. But she is brave enough to speak her mind AND she has a mind smart enough to see reality. Wouldn't it be great to have a President who had BOTH qualities?

d-oh, okay, I should have checked this first, infant mortality (not just mortality as I wrote above) is not increasing in America, I heard that somewhere and repeated it without checking. However our infant mortality rate is still piss poor compared to other countries http://www.unicef.org/sowc03/tables/table1.html so my point about priorities still stands, just not QUITE as strongly as before..

For more on the correlation between conservative opposition to abortion and lack of concern for infants, this article about Mississippi appeared in The Nation: Post-Roe Postcard. One of the more enlightening parts:

Such concern for the rights of fetuses does not appear to translate into a commitment to promoting the well-being of the children they may become. The uncomfortable irony for an opposition movement purportedly concerned with saving "innocent babies" is that restrictions on abortion are associated with worse outcomes for actual babies. Indeed, children fare terribly in Mississippi. The state with arguably the least access to abortion also has the second-highest rate of child poverty in the country, according to the Children's Defense Fund. Mississippi's infant mortality rate--a good indication of the health of both women and children--is the highest in the country. For every 1,000 live births, 10.5 infants under age 1 die in Mississippi. In parts of the impoverished Delta region, that number ranges up to 18. (The national infant mortality rate, by comparison, is 6.8.) Interestingly, a postelection comparison found that "red" states had higher infant mortality rates than "blue" ones. In general, states that restrict abortion spend far less money per child than prochoice states on services such as foster care, education, welfare and the adoption of children who have physical and mental disabilities, according to a 2000 book by political scientist Jean Reith Schroedel.

Nah, it's still pretty lame. Try a little analysis: You think that maybe the higher rate of births in the US than some of the higher ranking countries might count for something? And just possibly, that because of advances in neo-natalogy, premature babies that might not even stand a chance elsewhere are often handled here where they would otherwise be written off? Would you rather take your child to a pediatrician in China?

The post compares Mississippi with other states in the United States, not with foreign countries. As a rule, states most opposed to abortion also take worse care of their children.

My comment was in response to # 15/16.

The point that I am promoting (in #17) is exactly the same as the one in #15 or #16. Comparing states within the US probably makes the point more strongly than attempting to compare the United States with other countries.

The point you are promoting is just more agenda driven B.S. How original!

Hillary's really not particularly all that radical in her policy stances, certainly not since she actually began seeking her senate seat.

She's got some very likely insurmountable problems though, probably the worst of which is really her history of extreme and overtly, maliciously and ruthlessly dishonest partisanship. You could start there, for example, with her famous "vast right wing conspiracy" that was supposedly making up lies about her husband.

Then there are just SCADS of personal scandals, the memory of which will not be erased. Jebus Criminy, those people couldn't just manage to vacate the White House without stealing the frickin' furniture.

I don't that much mind the rather unlikely idea of President Hillary. Some Democrat will be elected president again someday, and I'd rather see her than a President Kerry. Flaws aside, she's probably got a little more sense than most of her party.

I just wonder how anyone so ambitious will do once in office? I mean, she didn't divorce Bill merely on stand by your man principles, she knows it would hurt her later, just as being a radical loudmouth in the Boxer vein would hurt her later. I am not saying she is dishonest or incompetent, but she knows what she wants and will play her cards close to the vest until she gets there.

She might be a good choice, but she would have to really work hard to make me believe she any other than raw ambition to get my vote.
Maybe in the next next 3 years she will step out a bit to show what she that she has a vision and is capable.

SFC SKI: Surely it should be taken for granted that anyone interested in high public office is ambitious?

the fact that you can see Ms Clinton playing politics can only be to her credit. and if she has to compromise to get ahead, i see no harm, that's just the nature of the game.

perhaps you could lay out the vision of her opponents, as all i can see is a cold disdain for the needs of both citizens and the larger world.

i really feel like vomiting when presented with ivy league educated rich people pretending to be just plain folk. then i see people actually buying it and do indeed vomit

Before Mr Barger or Mr Nalle start calling me a Democrat (or worse, lol), let me say i'm not.

However, if I had to pick, i'd go for honest ambition over cheesy falseness any day.

The tradition of ivy league elitists pretending to be 'just plain folk' is one of the great traditions in American politics going back to Thomas Jefferson who was about the biggest elitist on earth but still won the presidency on the strength of being an advocate for the little people. I think it really goes back even farther in politics to the days of leaders like Peter the Great in Russia. It's the idea of the nobleman who chooses to live like a peasant so that he can understand their plight and rule them better when he comes to power. It's a very appealing, very romantic idea.

When done in a way which seem genuine - as in the case of George W. Bush - it can be very effective. To make it work Bush had to largely separate from his family, go out and fail in business several times and then sort of work his way up to prominence on his own. When it't done in a way which seems artificial I think it's a disastrous strategy - Louis XVI and his fake peasant village at Versailles.

But what makes it a bad thing? Would you rather have an elitist like John Kerry who says effectively "I'm better than you so I'll do your thinking for you" or one like George W. Bush who says "I may have a priveleged background, but I've worked hard to understand you and I think I can speak for you because of that."

Dave

Morning Dave,

Interesting points - see, I knew you could be relevant and interesting when you want to! lol

Just because there is a long tradition of deceit amongst your educational "elite" doesn't make it acceptable, does it?

Do you think that a member of the ruling elite can ACTUALLY come to understand the needs and aspirations of the larger, more impoverished public?

I think it might be possible - but not without a lot of effort and disciplined hard work, far more than any contemporary leader could ever spare.

I guess the question of whether Bush does a good job is a subjective thing, but please trust me when I say that, from a distance, it seems very difficult to see the difference between Bush and one of those travelling snakeoil salesmen. He really comes across as fake, kind of like a commission-based sales person.

I'm not up on the details of Bush's business past, but I seem to recall reading an article that said he managed to run an oil company, in Texas!, into the ground and was then bailed out by some rich family friends.

If that is a true story, it would rather change the image of the man, no?

Do you think the successes and failures of an Ivy Leaguer can, in all seriousness, be compared to the daily grind of just plain folks? It seems a bit of a stretch to me.

It seems important that if someone wants to be trusted to be given the job of leading a country, the least they could do is be honest and open about it. After all, if they're lying to their own electorate, how can they be trusted on anything else at all?

I don't think Kerry has ever said that, and doubt he thinks it, although he does come off like that sometimes.

Bush has the "Tin Men" routine down to a fine art, but it plays way better in the USA than internationally, where that kind of cheesiness just doesn't play so well. He just comes across as rather bogus.

One of the most important qualities of a leader is to NOT give in to the worst impulses of a society, but the current regime seems to embody these impulses, not channel them.

This is one of the things that worries the USA's close friends and partners, particularly in Europe, as some of the reaction to US "initiatives" inevitably splashes over its close friends.

If the USA then displays indifference to the messy splatter, who wouldn't be offended by that? Nobody would tolerate that kind of behaviour on a personal level, so why would it be acceptable on an international level where the stakes are so much higher?

Alienboy writes:

"please trust me when I say that, from a distance, it seems very difficult to see the difference between Bush and one of those travelling snakeoil salesmen. He really comes across as fake, kind of like a commission-based sales person."

Reply: My father, a died-in-the-wool Democrat and union man all his life, says that the one thing he really finds obnoxious about GWB is his smile. He describes it much as you - a smirk more than a smile. He really has strong negative feelings about the man. We completely avoid the issue altogether as I am just right of center, politically. My mother always tries to steer the conversation away from politics, completely.

But I never cease to be amazed at how angry he can get about the person, not necessarily the agenda, of the man, himself.

Cheers,

Ron

Alienboy:

>>Just because there is a long tradition of deceit amongst your educational "elite" doesn't make it acceptable, does it?<<

It's actually the old money aristocracy of wealth, not the educational elite. These folks are the closest thing we have to a nobility here in the US. The educational elite are part of a separate class of intelligentsia and generally not people who go into politics, though there is overlap between the two groups.

>>Do you think that a member of the ruling elite can ACTUALLY come to understand the needs and aspirations of the larger, more impoverished public?<<

I think that's a matter of how capable he is of projecting himself into other peoples viewpoints. Some people are just naturally very good at this. Others are not. If he's a person who reads a book and makes an emotional connection with the characters in the book and comes to understand them and people like them better as a result, that's good enough. If Bush read and understood John Grisham's "A Painted House", for example, it would hav equipped him to understand a whole segment of the population he would normally never have contact with. Maybe that's superficial, but it's as good as you're likely to get. And the truth is that no one is going to elect a poor farmer or an inner city garbage man president anytime soon. And if they WERE elected they'd have as much trouble understanding the needs of the middle class as Bush has understanding them.

>>I think it might be possible - but not without a lot of effort and disciplined hard work, far more than any contemporary leader could ever spare.<<

Well, what do you think those 30 years bumming around Texas half drunk all the time were all about. Bush made himself part of a class of people, the entrepreneurial salesmen of the oil industry of that era, and that took him out of his background, put him with a new class of people, and put him in contact not only with people of the same class, but also the people they did business with and who worked for them. That's a lot of exposure, from quasi-legal Mexican roughnecks to pipe fitters to truckers and real estate speculators and everyone else you come into contact with in a day of work.

>>I guess the question of whether Bush does a good job is a subjective thing, but please trust me when I say that, from a distance, it seems very difficult to see the difference between Bush and one of those travelling snakeoil salesmen. He really comes across as fake, kind of like a commission-based sales person.<<

I think that's a personal thing. Having known a lot of people like him, or like the personna he has adopted, living here in Texas, I see exactly what he is trying to be and am not so troubled by it.

>>I'm not up on the details of Bush's business past, but I seem to recall reading an article that said he managed to run an oil company, in Texas!, into the ground and was then bailed out by some rich family friends. <<

Yep, and there's no better experience in the world than running a small, doomed, entrepreneurial business where all the responsibility is on your head. Even if he was bailed out in the end, he still got the experience of trying desperately and failing. And later business ventures did better. He really did do a remarkable job when he was wit the Texas Rangers Baseball team.

>>If that is a true story, it would rather change the image of the man, no? <<

Why?

>>Do you think the successes and failures of an Ivy Leaguer can, in all seriousness, be compared to the daily grind of just plain folks? It seems a bit of a stretch to me.<<

Believe me, it's plenty humiliating to have to be bailed out by your dad's friends, and even if you don't end up personally impoverished, you still know you failed.

I've known so many people like Bush who went through the same life cycle without necessarily having as good connections. They pick up the pieces, start another enterprise and move on. They may fail a dozen times before they either hit the right groove or drink themselves to death. We're talking people who solely on wit and charm go from millionaire to bankrupt to millionaire to bankrupt in the course of 5 years.

>>It seems important that if someone wants to be trusted to be given the job of leading a country, the least they could do is be honest and open about it. After all, if they're lying to their own electorate, how can they be trusted on anything else at all?<<

I don't see how he's hidden anything about his background. It's just like Kerry's in most ways, except that he at least tried a career in business while Kerry went straight into government on a golden carpet.

>>Bush has the "Tin Men" routine down to a fine art, but it plays way better in the USA than internationally, where that kind of cheesiness just doesn't play so well. He just comes across as rather bogus.<<

After all this time doing it I don't think it's bogus, though. If you play a role long enough you become the role.

>>One of the most important qualities of a leader is to NOT give in to the worst impulses of a society, but the current regime seems to embody these impulses, not channel them. <<

I don't think Bush would agree and I'm not sure that I do. I think his actions are motivated by a desire to do good, but things don't always work out the way he expects.

>>This is one of the things that worries the USA's close friends and partners, particularly in Europe, as some of the reaction to US "initiatives" inevitably splashes over its close friends.

If the USA then displays indifference to the messy splatter, who wouldn't be offended by that? Nobody would tolerate that kind of behaviour on a personal level, so why would it be acceptable on an international level where the stakes are so much higher?<<

People here don't see the situation this way, though. We haven't asked the Europeans to come in and bail us out, or tried to dump our problems on them. But we also haven't rewarded them for not being supportive in the first place. Their response to that has been very petty. We apparently haven't shown them the 'respect' they think they deserve, but that's because we're showing them the respect they've earned, and they're not used to that.

Dave

So the coalition of the willing didn't primarily consist of Britain and other Europeans?

Let's face it, even the USA isn't the power it once was. Just as the internet is democratising so much information that used to be that much harder to discover, by interconnecting everything, so the whole world is becoming more closely bound together.

The USA is constantly asking other countries for support on all its initiatives but doesn't seem to understand it's a 2 way street.

There are a LOT of great ideas being developed in the USA, and we all respect and appreciate the contribution. However, being young and gifted doesn't justify boorish behaviour.

We don't have to earn your respect: firstly, we don't need it. there are more of us than there are of you and once europe's integration is more developed, you might find yourselves struggling to catch up with us! So it would be prudent to build alliances not stress them.

secondly, showing respect is nothing more than an extension of courtesy and being so ill-mannered as to blow one's own trumpet so much gets real old real fast.

The respect we've earned?

Versus the respect you've earned?

Interesting math possibly but where's it get us? We still have a hot, dangerous, polluted, hungry planet to sort out.

There is a fallacy to perfectionism that argues "since we cannot do everything now, at once, perfectly and ideally, we should do nothing.

Or to quote from memory, "Pick your battle and fight it to win. Then chose your next battle... The day you refuse that battle is the day you die. Believe me, there are a lot of dead men walking around, wondering where their ideals went." --John Cielewicsz

Dr Pat: Huh?