I hope not. Last Sunday during an interview on Larry King Live, Vice-President Cheney floated a test balloon that Laura Bush may consider a run at the office held be her husband to face another contender whose husband at one time also occupied the White House. I oppose any nomination of Laura Bush to the Presidency of the United States. The GOP will not win, if they nominate her.
2008 offers America an opportunity to take the country in a different direction. Given the acrimony over the Iraq War, the sentiment of the country certainly is leaning toward change – specifically someone other than Bush. But if the Republicans are going to put up a Bush to face Hillary, why not Jeb Bush? Jeb Bush is even more conservative than the current Bush and a Roman Catholic. Certainly whoever the Bushies anoint Laura, Jeb or even Frist, that person will have to face McCain just as Hillary will have to face backlashes from non-contenders such as Ted Kennedy and Howard Dean.
But less tactically, I oppose the Laura Bush nomination on a strategic basis which in part deals with her qualifications. Laura Bush is a mother, an educator and a librarian. She demonstrates poise and a graciousness that is very reminescent of Jackie Kennedy. But other than withstanding the slings and arrows of the “I Hate America” protests in Egypt and Israel, what are Laura Bush’s qualifications to lead the most important country? Certainly, Hillary Clinton is more qualified than Laura Bush is to lead. After all, Clinton is an attorney, New York Senator, child advocate and the chief architect of the failed but politically bold and still viable Universal Health Care. Such a plan still resonates with key constituencies and could be resurrected and reconstituted as policy in a new Clinton II Presidency. Moreover, though universally hated in right wing circles, Hillary has taken controversial stands, withstood an uphill Senate challenge and further I know what Hillary stands for, what would Laura stand for?
If anything that the Clintons taught me, it is that it is not enough to be against something – you have to be for something as well. A lot of conservative pundits – most conspicuously Rush Limbaugh have lambasted Hillary as beatable in a national election citing that Hillary is so unpopular that people who normally do not vote would vote against her. But Limbaugh has been wrong about Hillary just as he was wrong about her chances of winning in the New York Senate against Rick Lazio in 2000, just as Limbaugh has been wrong about Bill Clinton in 96 and in the Democrats congressional gains in 98. The fact is that Hillary has cultivated her own mystique. Those vulnerabilities and strengths are unique and independent of her husband’s political prowess and casting her as in the American Spectator Magazine’s rendition of Lady Macbeth has proven a failed strategy – ask Rick Lazio.
In the absence of a substantive policy debate, one dubious strategy to beat Hillary points to making it personal. But whether on policy or personlity, one must choose to beat her on her own turf or at best energizing the base on the red states to counterbalance traditional blue state strongholds.
One of two things has to emerge in order to beat Hillary on the issues. Firstly, the Bush Administration has to move its stalled agenda forward. Secondly has to sell to the American people that these policies will affect a prosperity not yet felt. Americans felt prosperous under Reagan and Clinton, though the economy is strong, we do not feel prosperous. If we cannot feel prosperous, then Bush the Younger will inherit the air of Bush the Elder that his Presidency was a failure – ultimately hindering the future leadership of the Bush dynasty.
If Bush the Younger cannot affect all this in three years, then the failures of the Bush Administration have to be captured and answered by a conservative within the party – repudiating the Bush election machine – enter the reprise of John McCain. McCain would essentially enact the Clinton domestic agenda of fiscal discipline – maybe even raising taxes or at best not cutting taxes and not affect change socially or entangle himself in major foreign policy commitments.
Running Laura Bush would be a way to get around the 22nd Amendment, which in light of the new political actors on the stage – Bill Clinton and Arnold Schwarzenegger, perhaps should be repealed as well as revising the birth requirement. Such an audacious end run around the Constitution would not sit well with most Americans. Such a cynical interpretation of the Constitution would likely offend those Americans vociferous in their protests against judicial activism.
Running Laura Bush is not the same as accomplishing what you set out to do. Granted the late arrival of the Bush political doctrines promulgated on his second inaugural address is ambitious, worthwhile and are more likely to see fruition in three decades much less three years. That said, in failing to meet the mark in three years, the way to bring continuity is to run your Vice-President as Reagan and Clinton did.
Cheney may not be inclined personally or physically for such a task. In which case, Bush should groom a successor. If he has to run a woman, which I think would be insulting for the electorate and women who aspire to high office alike, than he should groom Karen Hughes or Condoleezza Rice. And if Cheney desires only to be Chief Consigliere, Cheney should resign as Vice-President, having served his purpose in re-election and allow this successor to intern as President. Cheney could still serve but also lengthen fortunes of the Bush doctrines as viable in 2008. For running a politically cosmetic Laura would appear at worst like banana republic style usurpation and at best a tacky marketing scheme.
But most importantly, running Laura Bush would be destroyed her appeal as the anti-Clinton of First Ladies. Laura Bush, like Barbara Bush and Lady Bird Johnson is a “stand by your man” First Lady. That is a very important point culturally. It may be fun every once in a while to have Laura come out of her shell and wise crack at the expense of her husband at a couple dinner parties. But overt political statements would be to imitate Hillary and to imitate Hillary would essentially help elect Hillary.
Such a Clintonization of the role of First Lady offends cultural conservatives like myself who was raised, just as George W. Bush was raised by a stay at home mother. Counterintuitive in our day where public spheres crowd out private ones, the old adage still holds that “the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.” But for Laura Bush, stay at home mothers – much maligned for being desperate housewives - still occupy a low social position. At best, some less culturally conservative view stay at home mothers as the supine bonbon popping soap opera devotee or at worst a bovine baby machine in sweat pants.
Laura Bush would be miscast as a modern day Judith or an American Maggie Thatcher where her role is more akin to the Biblical Mary, Ruth or Esther. Prior to the sexual revolution, most of our mothers for generations occupied this status proudly and craved it above the public spheres once occupied solely by men. Families, the basic unit in society traditionally consist of two parents, a husband and a wife, rearing their own or adopted children compose the basis of our society. In the words of a nineteenth century feminist Catherine Beecher, Mothers, primarily through self-sacrifice, shape the moral character of the next generation. Great families depend on great mothers. Thus great nations depend on great mothers – especially those who give their undivided attention to the fruit of their loins. Laura Bush exemplifies all that in spades.
When we allow others to malign stay at home mothers, we discourage motherhood the nurturing of the next generation to assume the mantle of leadership. Should we fail to do that, we risk living in a less secure world. Therefore, we must make every effort to esteem stay at home mothers if we want to ensure a secure future. And that is really what Laura Bush stands for – a submissive wife and a doting mother who in turn makes up the bedrock of our American character. It is an altogether different role – than the office of the President requires.
To defeat Hillary, one strategy, in the absence of winning on the issues would be to attack her Hillary as a woman. Hillary felt the humiliation of the Lewinsky affair most keenly. She must have felt that her femininity attacked as her husband rejected her sexually for another younger and more attractive. Second, Hillary’s daughter, Chelsea is showing signs of instability as a young adult. Demonstrating that Hillary an unfit, career and ultimately self-absorbed woman culpable dereliction in her primary responsibilities as a woman could possibly damage Hillary’s political ambition. Such a strategy would not be an honorable one and would divide and embitter Americans and cheapen any political capital gleaned from electoral victory. Further such a strategy would in all likelihood strengthen Hillary’s nomination and radicalize her administration resurrecting feminist thinkers best laid to rest in the Lewinsky affair.
If any Republican wants to be President, then let that person declare himself now. The President should anoint and groom his candidate in the absence of Cheney. Bush must continue to push his agenda. And if he should fail, then perhaps we should resign ourselves to a second eight year Clinton Presidency.
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Turning Point at the Checkpoint
Checkpoints in the Sand
After coming back from my third tour in Iraq, I took two weeks of leave to visit my poor mother. She, in the past two years, testified to the veracity of the Roman proverb that war is the scourge of all mothers. I fidgeted in my chair. The sagebrush, the arid earth, the contrast of blue on brown temporarily snapped me back to Iraq. As I drove back from the airport, my eyes darted across the medians and sidewalks looking for wires and debris - the tell tale signs of an IED. But the majesty of the Tucson Mountains, dwarfs to their elder brothers the Catalinas and the Rincons, brought to me a refreshing spirit. That spirit of familiarity that reassured me. I was indeed home. Things would be alright.
My parents arranged a meeting to see my brother who had taken residence in Southern Arizona. My parents and I listened to a Sean Hannity broadcast in Southern Arizona. Hannity lauded the minutemen – a volunteer militia patrolling the Sonoran desert. They had been intercepting migrants coming across the border in search of a better life. My mother complained about of an argument with a white middle aged co-worker who supported the minutemen’s mundane forays in the desert.
We passed them – the white working class people gathered around the Oregon flag flapping in the wind. At first glance, I thought it was a biker rally and almost invited myself to their picnic as barbeques appeared to be present. By now the discussion for me proved largely theoretical. I took comfort that Arizona – my home state took center stage. As Paula Abdul may attest, there is no such as thing as bad public relations. I sighed that Arizona’s charms had been overlooked by this problem and I took comfort that after four years of war perhaps things will return to normal where we Americans will forget about the important things like price of crude oil and the geography of the Middle East to stupid inane things like the crude behavior of Paris Hilton and the geography of Lindsay Lohan.
Then something happened- something visceral, primordial, an event that tells you what side of the line that you stand on. I had never been to the San Pedro Valley before. The San Pedro, a colossal valley whereby Buffalo Soldiers outfitted at the base of the Dragoon Mountains where the modern day Fort Huachuca now stands, chased after the Saracens of the Southwest, the famous brigand king, the Apache Geronimo across a wide valley toward his ancestral home – the far off mountains of the Mescaleros. Here, Wyatt Earp hunted and killed the remnants of the Clantons along the river by which the San Pedro River with its cottonwood palisade still flows. Surveying the land, here I can imagine the land grant given to the proud governor from the King of Spain that outlined one land grant roughly by the rims on set of mountains, green and lush bounded by the ridgeline of another set of mountains lunar and pockmarked.
But in the desert beauty of the San Pedro, another page of history had been written, the checkpoint, the Alaska barriers, Abrams tank, AK-47 tottering Iraqis with their high tech American counterparts, waving one set of vehicles toward a long, long line where as other more armored vehicle passed without incident albeit with a flick and a smile. No one had patted down a mother in her black veils and robes and children did not wave as we passed, but the northbound traffic had been blocked off. Green suited border patrol agents looked inside the cabs of the vehicles at faces. Some women in blue jeans, brown faces and wearing a gel in their hair to give the appearance of a wet permanent curl had been detained corralled without faces.
It was there I knew what side on.
I went to school with Mexicans. I knew their culture and their history. Mexicans had been my friends all my life. They stood in the pews next to me. I dated their women. They tolerated my attempts at Spanish. I drank their beer and almost did a stint in their prison during a Spring Break adventure. Chongo, who demonstrated his prowess over and over again against more propertied Anglo teams, my Pop Warner team captain hailed of Mexican descent. As my ambiguous ethnicity attests, people considered me Mexican of which I did not protest or contradict. They are a proud and beautiful people, noble, kind, not without their faults but worthy of a lion’s share in regional leadership as promulgated by the Monroe Doctrine. I was proud to be considered one of them.
Yet this station of war had been set up literally in my backyard stood as a slap in the face toward that Mexicanidad that had been imbued in my heart and part of my culture.
I am not going to call anyone racist although within this debate there is room for racism especially when it comes to code words like “National Security.” I am not going to decry the minutemen as vigilantes. They are my people as much as the Mexican and the Navajo.
I cannot disparage the minutemen for there are passionate about their country. In a country that has too few volunteers, I salute their sacrifice as a kindred spirit in the care of our great country. They have done what the Border Patrol could not or would not do.
Further, I love Sean Hannity and I thank him for bringing attention to this issue. Though I think Governor Schwarzenegger sounds very Wilsonian in his rhetoric, and though I like his movies and I will probably vote for him as President provided that he and his in laws can amend or bypass the Constitution. But remember Arnold that Pete Wilson never made it to the Presidential chopper.
I want to thank the President and former President Clinton for their work in addressing this problem and bringing real solutions to the table. President Bush is correctly proposing an immigration policy that concurrently cracks down on illegal immigration while encouraging and expanding legal immigration – even going so far as proposing a policy that is in everything but in name - an amnesty program. We must urge Congress for immediate passage.
I do reject the libertarian call for an open border on absolute terms as an invitation to chaos. Further, with all due respect to the Stature of Liberty who had been fashioned by a Frenchman, I find no mention of huddled masses in the Constitution. Sovereigns wield the unimpeachable right to enforce who comes into our country and removing those that it does not desire . Ask the Europeans what they think of North African émigrés.
I do not nor do I think Mexican-Americans object to stricter border enforcement. What I cannot abide is lies. It is a lie to think that this border security is done in the name of National Security and not in defense of Anglo-Protestant Nativism – a vestige of the Black Legend. Not one of the nineteen hijackers entered through Mexico. They all came direct or by Canada.
What this is about is aesthetic composition of our body politic. Do we want brown faced Catholic Central Americans coming across the border, living in our homes, working jobs that we don’t want and doing things that we don’t do – like Banda, mariachis and speaking Spanish? Do we want all these kids running all over the place? Or do we want to keep things the same as they have always been?
I believe this to be the secret heart of Tom Tancredo’s rhetoric.
Personally, I think these are legitimate questions that should be discussed dispassionately without the name calling. But let us call it what it is, we want to be able to determine what future generations of Americans will look like because as of now, over fifty percent of us are Hispanic – a demographic Karl Rove exploited in the last campaign.
There are other deeper issues to at stake namely: that if you want to stop people from coming over, you have to make where they are living a better place to stay. Americans living in small towns know that, they see their young adults leave their towns like Pied Piper toward the universities never to return because as in Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador, there are no jobs.
I am a second generation legal immigrant myself. And if I lived in the barrios of Guanajato or the countryside of Michoacan and if I was going no where fast with no opportunity and no chance of being anything but a beggar or thief, I would say two words the first being a four letter one and the second being “this” and I would probe that border until I got something for me and my own. That’s just being a man even the minutemen will concede this.
Until the family of nations within North America addresses the economics that plague the region – we will always have immigration problem. I charge our diplomats and theirs to come to agreements that will keep our region competitive and offer hope to those who would like to stay and work and not have to depend on their expatriate relatives for the crumbs and scraps from the table of plenty.
Latin America must follow the examples of Peru and Chile in adopting free market reforms, Columbia in aggressive enforcement of the narcotics trade, and Costa Rica in the rule of law - turning away from corruption and bribes and renew itself in the hope of future partnership. Convincing of that course is going to take money and it is our interests – the U.S. and Canada to see that it happens.
As to the aesthetic question as to whether ‘tis nobler keep things as they are in Tancredian stasis or embrace a browner future – as long as they speak English in schools and in business with me , I don’t have a problem with it. Catholic families will renew our desperate and lonely spiritual vacuum secularism, degenerate theological liberalism and “preach but do not practice” Protestant and Catholic religiosity. Fact is we need them more than they need us. Lastly, mass immigration of Latins, will be a political boon to the party of the status quo. Democrats Harry Reid of the Senate and Nancy Pelosi of the House who oppose any changes to Social Security will note a USA Today article which declares that without said immigration Roosevelt’s Ponzi scheme known as Social Security will be insolvent.
So when I visit the San Pedro again, I will smile and answer the border agent that “Yes, I am a U.S. citizen.” But that does not mean I will be silent any longer.
I am James A. Bretney and I invite you to look toward the Undiscovered Country.
After coming back from my third tour in Iraq, I took two weeks of leave to visit my poor mother. She, in the past two years, testified to the veracity of the Roman proverb that war is the scourge of all mothers. I fidgeted in my chair. The sagebrush, the arid earth, the contrast of blue on brown temporarily snapped me back to Iraq. As I drove back from the airport, my eyes darted across the medians and sidewalks looking for wires and debris - the tell tale signs of an IED. But the majesty of the Tucson Mountains, dwarfs to their elder brothers the Catalinas and the Rincons, brought to me a refreshing spirit. That spirit of familiarity that reassured me. I was indeed home. Things would be alright.
My parents arranged a meeting to see my brother who had taken residence in Southern Arizona. My parents and I listened to a Sean Hannity broadcast in Southern Arizona. Hannity lauded the minutemen – a volunteer militia patrolling the Sonoran desert. They had been intercepting migrants coming across the border in search of a better life. My mother complained about of an argument with a white middle aged co-worker who supported the minutemen’s mundane forays in the desert.
We passed them – the white working class people gathered around the Oregon flag flapping in the wind. At first glance, I thought it was a biker rally and almost invited myself to their picnic as barbeques appeared to be present. By now the discussion for me proved largely theoretical. I took comfort that Arizona – my home state took center stage. As Paula Abdul may attest, there is no such as thing as bad public relations. I sighed that Arizona’s charms had been overlooked by this problem and I took comfort that after four years of war perhaps things will return to normal where we Americans will forget about the important things like price of crude oil and the geography of the Middle East to stupid inane things like the crude behavior of Paris Hilton and the geography of Lindsay Lohan.
Then something happened- something visceral, primordial, an event that tells you what side of the line that you stand on. I had never been to the San Pedro Valley before. The San Pedro, a colossal valley whereby Buffalo Soldiers outfitted at the base of the Dragoon Mountains where the modern day Fort Huachuca now stands, chased after the Saracens of the Southwest, the famous brigand king, the Apache Geronimo across a wide valley toward his ancestral home – the far off mountains of the Mescaleros. Here, Wyatt Earp hunted and killed the remnants of the Clantons along the river by which the San Pedro River with its cottonwood palisade still flows. Surveying the land, here I can imagine the land grant given to the proud governor from the King of Spain that outlined one land grant roughly by the rims on set of mountains, green and lush bounded by the ridgeline of another set of mountains lunar and pockmarked.
But in the desert beauty of the San Pedro, another page of history had been written, the checkpoint, the Alaska barriers, Abrams tank, AK-47 tottering Iraqis with their high tech American counterparts, waving one set of vehicles toward a long, long line where as other more armored vehicle passed without incident albeit with a flick and a smile. No one had patted down a mother in her black veils and robes and children did not wave as we passed, but the northbound traffic had been blocked off. Green suited border patrol agents looked inside the cabs of the vehicles at faces. Some women in blue jeans, brown faces and wearing a gel in their hair to give the appearance of a wet permanent curl had been detained corralled without faces.
It was there I knew what side on.
I went to school with Mexicans. I knew their culture and their history. Mexicans had been my friends all my life. They stood in the pews next to me. I dated their women. They tolerated my attempts at Spanish. I drank their beer and almost did a stint in their prison during a Spring Break adventure. Chongo, who demonstrated his prowess over and over again against more propertied Anglo teams, my Pop Warner team captain hailed of Mexican descent. As my ambiguous ethnicity attests, people considered me Mexican of which I did not protest or contradict. They are a proud and beautiful people, noble, kind, not without their faults but worthy of a lion’s share in regional leadership as promulgated by the Monroe Doctrine. I was proud to be considered one of them.
Yet this station of war had been set up literally in my backyard stood as a slap in the face toward that Mexicanidad that had been imbued in my heart and part of my culture.
I am not going to call anyone racist although within this debate there is room for racism especially when it comes to code words like “National Security.” I am not going to decry the minutemen as vigilantes. They are my people as much as the Mexican and the Navajo.
I cannot disparage the minutemen for there are passionate about their country. In a country that has too few volunteers, I salute their sacrifice as a kindred spirit in the care of our great country. They have done what the Border Patrol could not or would not do.
Further, I love Sean Hannity and I thank him for bringing attention to this issue. Though I think Governor Schwarzenegger sounds very Wilsonian in his rhetoric, and though I like his movies and I will probably vote for him as President provided that he and his in laws can amend or bypass the Constitution. But remember Arnold that Pete Wilson never made it to the Presidential chopper.
I want to thank the President and former President Clinton for their work in addressing this problem and bringing real solutions to the table. President Bush is correctly proposing an immigration policy that concurrently cracks down on illegal immigration while encouraging and expanding legal immigration – even going so far as proposing a policy that is in everything but in name - an amnesty program. We must urge Congress for immediate passage.
I do reject the libertarian call for an open border on absolute terms as an invitation to chaos. Further, with all due respect to the Stature of Liberty who had been fashioned by a Frenchman, I find no mention of huddled masses in the Constitution. Sovereigns wield the unimpeachable right to enforce who comes into our country and removing those that it does not desire . Ask the Europeans what they think of North African émigrés.
I do not nor do I think Mexican-Americans object to stricter border enforcement. What I cannot abide is lies. It is a lie to think that this border security is done in the name of National Security and not in defense of Anglo-Protestant Nativism – a vestige of the Black Legend. Not one of the nineteen hijackers entered through Mexico. They all came direct or by Canada.
What this is about is aesthetic composition of our body politic. Do we want brown faced Catholic Central Americans coming across the border, living in our homes, working jobs that we don’t want and doing things that we don’t do – like Banda, mariachis and speaking Spanish? Do we want all these kids running all over the place? Or do we want to keep things the same as they have always been?
I believe this to be the secret heart of Tom Tancredo’s rhetoric.
Personally, I think these are legitimate questions that should be discussed dispassionately without the name calling. But let us call it what it is, we want to be able to determine what future generations of Americans will look like because as of now, over fifty percent of us are Hispanic – a demographic Karl Rove exploited in the last campaign.
There are other deeper issues to at stake namely: that if you want to stop people from coming over, you have to make where they are living a better place to stay. Americans living in small towns know that, they see their young adults leave their towns like Pied Piper toward the universities never to return because as in Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador, there are no jobs.
I am a second generation legal immigrant myself. And if I lived in the barrios of Guanajato or the countryside of Michoacan and if I was going no where fast with no opportunity and no chance of being anything but a beggar or thief, I would say two words the first being a four letter one and the second being “this” and I would probe that border until I got something for me and my own. That’s just being a man even the minutemen will concede this.
Until the family of nations within North America addresses the economics that plague the region – we will always have immigration problem. I charge our diplomats and theirs to come to agreements that will keep our region competitive and offer hope to those who would like to stay and work and not have to depend on their expatriate relatives for the crumbs and scraps from the table of plenty.
Latin America must follow the examples of Peru and Chile in adopting free market reforms, Columbia in aggressive enforcement of the narcotics trade, and Costa Rica in the rule of law - turning away from corruption and bribes and renew itself in the hope of future partnership. Convincing of that course is going to take money and it is our interests – the U.S. and Canada to see that it happens.
As to the aesthetic question as to whether ‘tis nobler keep things as they are in Tancredian stasis or embrace a browner future – as long as they speak English in schools and in business with me , I don’t have a problem with it. Catholic families will renew our desperate and lonely spiritual vacuum secularism, degenerate theological liberalism and “preach but do not practice” Protestant and Catholic religiosity. Fact is we need them more than they need us. Lastly, mass immigration of Latins, will be a political boon to the party of the status quo. Democrats Harry Reid of the Senate and Nancy Pelosi of the House who oppose any changes to Social Security will note a USA Today article which declares that without said immigration Roosevelt’s Ponzi scheme known as Social Security will be insolvent.
So when I visit the San Pedro again, I will smile and answer the border agent that “Yes, I am a U.S. citizen.” But that does not mean I will be silent any longer.
I am James A. Bretney and I invite you to look toward the Undiscovered Country.
Sunday, May 15, 2005
The New Crusade:
What the Middle East Needs is Jesus Christ not George Washington
This weekend hosts word of mouth endorsements for Ridley Scott's KINGDOM OF HEAVEN starring twenty something heartthrob Orlando Bloom. Incidentally, the opener came on the heels of news of a recent survey citing a majority of Iraqis - the newest member of the family of democracies desiring the Shariah as their primary legal canon and news of anti-American protests from Afghanistan to Indonesia amid reports of so-called “desecration of the Koran” in Guantanamo Bay. The timely film which anecdotally balances both perspectives will certainly sway the court of public opinion to reexamine our interests and motives in the Middle East tacit rejection of aggression and the open embrace of “an open dialogue” whatever that means. But whatever policy ideas that left has to offer in contrast to the regent neoconservatives, neither policy will confront “The Clash of Civilizations” that we face. Democracy alone cannot work in the Middle East or elsewhere. Taking a cue of the neoconservatives, putting a democratic face on Islam with all its bloody borders will only embolden Islamo-fascists like bin Laden. Following the Realist tradition of Nixon, governing the provinces through US backed headmen like the House of Saud, Mubarak, and Musharraf will at best serve as a temporary fix to Islamic aggression on the Western world. To permanently quell Islamic aggression means embarking on a crusade for the total annihilation of the Islamic civilization militarily, economically, culturally, and lastly politically.
Democracy alone cannot work. As Monarchy extols the value of loyalty to the sovereign as Aristocracy extols virtue, Democracy holds the triumph of reason. Without reason, the ability to choose virtue over vice, then democracy collapses under the yoke of demagoguery. For example, in short perusal of the twentieth century demonstrates how the citizens of Germany, Italy and Spain donned black shirts and brown shirts entering the fascist flanges in order to better bootlick their demagogue in chief. After the demise of another World War, the war weary citizens of Europe turned again to totalitarianism with this madman decked in red. But for the covert intervention of the United States, governments all across Western Europe to include France, Italy and even England would have gone over freely to the Communist.
Further, we must reorder the way we think about democracy. Democracy even in its modern form is at best a rather limited monarchy. When we look at one particular instance of democracy – the most influential democracy by which the rest of the family of democracies share characteristics with, the United States, we find a head of state – who much like a king creates and sets policy. He has a limited reign – at most eight years and has limitations imposed by our Constitution, the Congress and the Supreme Court – but by and large he is much the monarch as the Raja in his regal majesty.
Further, our own institutions though they extol the values of egalitarianism, our society is not the utopia of Enlightened philosophers, but indeed an aristocracy predicated on money and power – its just easier in our country to acquire money and power more quickly than in places with a more rigid class system.
I do not state what I believe about the United States to criticize it as mandate for political or social change. I rather like the United States the way it is and see no need for change. I say this to deflate the myths we have about ourselves so that if we are going impose our imprint of democracy onto the world, as we most certainly are in the Middle East, of which I again do not object, let us see ourselves more perfectly.
Simply put, we are a Christian nation from a Christian civilization and that Christianity distinguishes our civilization from the Confucian and the Muslim. Further, the labors of Christianity have produced a generous bounty by which we richly feed to the world’s envy.
Since men compose the state, we cannot separate church from state anymore than we can separate religion from man. The absence of, the disbelief in or ambivalence toward religion still constitutes a religion – a system of beliefs, attitudes and practices about man and the universe. This ascendant Jacobean view of the world, a view held by over 40 million Americans and most Europeans that God and religion does not matter conceal the contributions upon which we walk like Lilliputians on this giant named Christ.
In the Nicenan Creed, we believe in a “Loving God” who rules the universe mercifully and justly. Contrast that view to the Muslim who believes that his God, Allah, the forceful master ambivalent to right and wrong who rules to promote his favorites among his slaves. The word Christianity comes from the Greek word for Messiah or Savior – in that we derive our beliefs in the self sacrifice from our God who leads us and conversely serves us. The Muslim is essentially the slave of Allah. Islam means submission, surrender or slavery – a common name in the Arab world is Abdullah – Abd means slave Allah of course means God. This is not the time or place to embark on a comparative analysis between the two great religions, but suffice it to say that in the small comparisons lay great chasms between us in the way that we order the world especially when it comes to forgiveness, tolerance, justice and self-sacrifice when it comes to leadership and governance.
In short, democracy coupled with a vibrant Christian faith has largely been responsible for course of human progress since the fall of Roman Empire.
Democracy alone will not work. Neoconservatives point to Islamic democracies like Turkey and Indonesia. Turkey, the stronger of the two examples, is at best a mixed success due in large part due to the recognition of the superiority of Western civilization over that of Islamic one. Turkey, a NATO ally, uniquely situated near Europe has enjoyed relative peace with the West including diplomatic recognition and cordial relations with Israel. Multiple parties have governed Turkey since the 1940’s. These various governments ensure basic human freedoms chief among them limited freedom of speech, assembly and religion. Modern Turkey exists today due to the visionary and dynamic leadership of one man - Kemal Ataturk, a military man who spent most of his life in the Balkans, knew that he could not change the Islamic character of Turkey but that the best he could do was co-opt its influence in favor of Western institutions. If Iraq, Afghanistan and other Muslim emerging nations are to enjoy the “success” that Turkey has enjoyed, a similar prescription to include a similar generous donation of materials and interest from the West would be in order.
That said, just because Turkey adopted Western style reform does not mean it fully understood them in their proper context i.e. without Christian tutelage. Turkey has experienced three military coups, one as recent as 1997. Turkey’s close position to the West does not immunize it from the sway of Islamo-fascism. Persecution of Turkish Christians persists and Al Queda sleeper cells are operating in Turkey. Recently, operatives ignited a bomb at the British Consulate and at a bank. In that respect, Turkey though standing mostly firmly against its peers still teeters toward the chaos of seventh century world view.
Indonesia, the most populous Muslim nation, like Turkey, is not Arab nation. Nonetheless, the Malay servants of Allah have only been a democracy since 1998 with the demise of General Suaharto. As the bombing in Bali demonstrates, Indonesia is an Al Queda stronghold and thus cannot be trusted.
We have no assurance that the men we ally ourselves with today will not be our enemies tomorrow. One need not scroll over the annuals of history to be convinced of Arab duplicity, the biographies of men like Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussien testify to the broken marriages of convenience with the Great Satan – bin Laden in the Soviet-Afghan War and Saddam, the great admirer of Stalin, in the Iran-Iraq War.
In the James Jones novel The Thin Red Line, an American soldier – an agent in yet another clash of civilizations locked in race war over turf proclaims roughly that he is fighting this war so that thirty years from now, his children and grandchildren do not have to fight this war. Let us not be foolish and press for terms of peace that will only lead us back to war’s chariot’s in twelve years on less favorable terms as in the first Persian Gulf War or twenty one years later as in the Second World War. Let us be wise in choosing those terms.
If by peace, we mean to re-draw maps and reorder the faces of governments; then let us elevate men who will allow for unrestricted freedom of religion and will prosecute vigorously further attempts to persecute Christians in the Holy Land. Let us encourage the active conversions to Arab Christianity. So that finally martyred blood will no longer flow freely like turgid waters of the Euphrates. Let us ensure that Christendom’s sway not just extend to Ptolemy Europe and the Americas but across North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and the Far Pacific. Lastly, let us live our faith. We must confront the godless and instruct those who do not know God. For wars at there very heart are spiritual struggles. If we want a lasting peace, we have to have a vibrant faith. As Christ embraced His Cross, as the knights embraced their sword in their Holy Crusade, let us begin a new a Crusade for Christ.
I am James A. Bretney and I invite you to look toward the Undiscovered Country.
This weekend hosts word of mouth endorsements for Ridley Scott's KINGDOM OF HEAVEN starring twenty something heartthrob Orlando Bloom. Incidentally, the opener came on the heels of news of a recent survey citing a majority of Iraqis - the newest member of the family of democracies desiring the Shariah as their primary legal canon and news of anti-American protests from Afghanistan to Indonesia amid reports of so-called “desecration of the Koran” in Guantanamo Bay. The timely film which anecdotally balances both perspectives will certainly sway the court of public opinion to reexamine our interests and motives in the Middle East tacit rejection of aggression and the open embrace of “an open dialogue” whatever that means. But whatever policy ideas that left has to offer in contrast to the regent neoconservatives, neither policy will confront “The Clash of Civilizations” that we face. Democracy alone cannot work in the Middle East or elsewhere. Taking a cue of the neoconservatives, putting a democratic face on Islam with all its bloody borders will only embolden Islamo-fascists like bin Laden. Following the Realist tradition of Nixon, governing the provinces through US backed headmen like the House of Saud, Mubarak, and Musharraf will at best serve as a temporary fix to Islamic aggression on the Western world. To permanently quell Islamic aggression means embarking on a crusade for the total annihilation of the Islamic civilization militarily, economically, culturally, and lastly politically.
Democracy alone cannot work. As Monarchy extols the value of loyalty to the sovereign as Aristocracy extols virtue, Democracy holds the triumph of reason. Without reason, the ability to choose virtue over vice, then democracy collapses under the yoke of demagoguery. For example, in short perusal of the twentieth century demonstrates how the citizens of Germany, Italy and Spain donned black shirts and brown shirts entering the fascist flanges in order to better bootlick their demagogue in chief. After the demise of another World War, the war weary citizens of Europe turned again to totalitarianism with this madman decked in red. But for the covert intervention of the United States, governments all across Western Europe to include France, Italy and even England would have gone over freely to the Communist.
Further, we must reorder the way we think about democracy. Democracy even in its modern form is at best a rather limited monarchy. When we look at one particular instance of democracy – the most influential democracy by which the rest of the family of democracies share characteristics with, the United States, we find a head of state – who much like a king creates and sets policy. He has a limited reign – at most eight years and has limitations imposed by our Constitution, the Congress and the Supreme Court – but by and large he is much the monarch as the Raja in his regal majesty.
Further, our own institutions though they extol the values of egalitarianism, our society is not the utopia of Enlightened philosophers, but indeed an aristocracy predicated on money and power – its just easier in our country to acquire money and power more quickly than in places with a more rigid class system.
I do not state what I believe about the United States to criticize it as mandate for political or social change. I rather like the United States the way it is and see no need for change. I say this to deflate the myths we have about ourselves so that if we are going impose our imprint of democracy onto the world, as we most certainly are in the Middle East, of which I again do not object, let us see ourselves more perfectly.
Simply put, we are a Christian nation from a Christian civilization and that Christianity distinguishes our civilization from the Confucian and the Muslim. Further, the labors of Christianity have produced a generous bounty by which we richly feed to the world’s envy.
Since men compose the state, we cannot separate church from state anymore than we can separate religion from man. The absence of, the disbelief in or ambivalence toward religion still constitutes a religion – a system of beliefs, attitudes and practices about man and the universe. This ascendant Jacobean view of the world, a view held by over 40 million Americans and most Europeans that God and religion does not matter conceal the contributions upon which we walk like Lilliputians on this giant named Christ.
In the Nicenan Creed, we believe in a “Loving God” who rules the universe mercifully and justly. Contrast that view to the Muslim who believes that his God, Allah, the forceful master ambivalent to right and wrong who rules to promote his favorites among his slaves. The word Christianity comes from the Greek word for Messiah or Savior – in that we derive our beliefs in the self sacrifice from our God who leads us and conversely serves us. The Muslim is essentially the slave of Allah. Islam means submission, surrender or slavery – a common name in the Arab world is Abdullah – Abd means slave Allah of course means God. This is not the time or place to embark on a comparative analysis between the two great religions, but suffice it to say that in the small comparisons lay great chasms between us in the way that we order the world especially when it comes to forgiveness, tolerance, justice and self-sacrifice when it comes to leadership and governance.
In short, democracy coupled with a vibrant Christian faith has largely been responsible for course of human progress since the fall of Roman Empire.
Democracy alone will not work. Neoconservatives point to Islamic democracies like Turkey and Indonesia. Turkey, the stronger of the two examples, is at best a mixed success due in large part due to the recognition of the superiority of Western civilization over that of Islamic one. Turkey, a NATO ally, uniquely situated near Europe has enjoyed relative peace with the West including diplomatic recognition and cordial relations with Israel. Multiple parties have governed Turkey since the 1940’s. These various governments ensure basic human freedoms chief among them limited freedom of speech, assembly and religion. Modern Turkey exists today due to the visionary and dynamic leadership of one man - Kemal Ataturk, a military man who spent most of his life in the Balkans, knew that he could not change the Islamic character of Turkey but that the best he could do was co-opt its influence in favor of Western institutions. If Iraq, Afghanistan and other Muslim emerging nations are to enjoy the “success” that Turkey has enjoyed, a similar prescription to include a similar generous donation of materials and interest from the West would be in order.
That said, just because Turkey adopted Western style reform does not mean it fully understood them in their proper context i.e. without Christian tutelage. Turkey has experienced three military coups, one as recent as 1997. Turkey’s close position to the West does not immunize it from the sway of Islamo-fascism. Persecution of Turkish Christians persists and Al Queda sleeper cells are operating in Turkey. Recently, operatives ignited a bomb at the British Consulate and at a bank. In that respect, Turkey though standing mostly firmly against its peers still teeters toward the chaos of seventh century world view.
Indonesia, the most populous Muslim nation, like Turkey, is not Arab nation. Nonetheless, the Malay servants of Allah have only been a democracy since 1998 with the demise of General Suaharto. As the bombing in Bali demonstrates, Indonesia is an Al Queda stronghold and thus cannot be trusted.
We have no assurance that the men we ally ourselves with today will not be our enemies tomorrow. One need not scroll over the annuals of history to be convinced of Arab duplicity, the biographies of men like Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussien testify to the broken marriages of convenience with the Great Satan – bin Laden in the Soviet-Afghan War and Saddam, the great admirer of Stalin, in the Iran-Iraq War.
In the James Jones novel The Thin Red Line, an American soldier – an agent in yet another clash of civilizations locked in race war over turf proclaims roughly that he is fighting this war so that thirty years from now, his children and grandchildren do not have to fight this war. Let us not be foolish and press for terms of peace that will only lead us back to war’s chariot’s in twelve years on less favorable terms as in the first Persian Gulf War or twenty one years later as in the Second World War. Let us be wise in choosing those terms.
If by peace, we mean to re-draw maps and reorder the faces of governments; then let us elevate men who will allow for unrestricted freedom of religion and will prosecute vigorously further attempts to persecute Christians in the Holy Land. Let us encourage the active conversions to Arab Christianity. So that finally martyred blood will no longer flow freely like turgid waters of the Euphrates. Let us ensure that Christendom’s sway not just extend to Ptolemy Europe and the Americas but across North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and the Far Pacific. Lastly, let us live our faith. We must confront the godless and instruct those who do not know God. For wars at there very heart are spiritual struggles. If we want a lasting peace, we have to have a vibrant faith. As Christ embraced His Cross, as the knights embraced their sword in their Holy Crusade, let us begin a new a Crusade for Christ.
I am James A. Bretney and I invite you to look toward the Undiscovered Country.
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