Observations

Double Dose

Appealing to the Scared Little Boy and Girl in All of Us

The late H.L. Mencken explained the devious strategy now so prominently on display in the political campaigns and in the media by saying, "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed, and hence clamorous to be led to safety, by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."

In less frantic times global warming or gay marriage are the enemies of everyday Americans. But in the full glory of a heated presidential campaign the focus shifts to things of more immediate concern, like the economy, mortgage failures, health care, and taxes.

In this laughing gas-influenced atmosphere the message the media and the Democrats want to send is that our pretty-good economy is really in the tank, and after a few months of this negativism and demagoguery, magnified by a stunning lack of objectivity in the media, voila: the economy has stalled, though still not in the recession we hear daily that it is in. The media and the Democrats have created a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the gullible American public has fallen for it hook, line and sinker.

More important than the faux crisis that we hear so much about—like the mortgage bump and the cyclical economic slowdown—are the truly important issues of terrorism and keeping government from gaining even more control over us in the November election. From what we are hearing, the Democrats either don’t think these latter issues are important, or they don’t want to talk about them, believing that they can fare better by focusing on the scary topics of recession, a lack of health care, and people losing their homes.

If the election turns on the faux crises that the Democrats are running on, and if one of those Democrats is elected with a Democrat Congress behind him or her, those of us who prefer limited government and also think our government has far exceeded its Constitutional boundaries had better batten down the hatches. Freedom will be under a full-scale attack.

Democrat’s Rules Pose Terrific Problem

The Democratic Party has disenfranchised Florida and Michigan voters/delegates because those states moved their primaries up on the calendar, against Party orders. The result was, in Florida, for example, that only Hillary Clinton actively campaigned in the state and, of course, won handily. And now the Democrats have a huge problem: As things stand now Florida’s votes don’t count and Florida’s delegates won’t be seated at the convention when, it appears, the decision on the nominee will be will be made. The same situation, or a similar one, exists in Michigan.

So the Democrats at the national level have a real problem: Do they stick to their guns and punish Michigan and Florida because they didn’t follow the dictates of the national Party leadership? Or, do they relent and allow Florida and Michigan to seat their delegates based upon the election results? The latter option would seem to present a whole new set of problems, inasmuch as those results are not truly representative of the preferences of the voters of those states, since there was no real campaign in either state. Or, do the Dems allow a do-over vote in Florida and Michigan?

Whatever they decide, it isn’t going to be a positive for the Democrat nominee.