Another Mugging

AM:  America got mugged last night.

Old Gadfly:  Are you referring to a funding bill that includes Planned Parenthood?

AM:  Yes.

Old Gadfly:  Explain.

 

AM:  Democrats said to Republicans, give us the money or we’ll shoot.

Old Gadfly:  You are saying “shoot” metaphorically?

AM:  Yes.  Democrats, who are heavily supported by Planned Parenthood lobbying and campaign contributions, said they were essentially committed to shutting down the government, knowing Republicans would get blamed for it.

IM:  Such corruption and collaboration is not new in our history.  Don’t forget the Barbary Pirates.  Here is an interesting passage in Rudyard Kipling’s poem, “Dane-Geld,” that rings so true of the Planned Parenthood-inspired mugging:

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:—

“We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!”

 

AM:  Is the soul of our nation lost?

Old Gadfly:  If we can’t grow a backbone and stand on principle, then, yes.  However, we overcame the Barbary Pirates.  Can we overcome Planned Parenthood?

Stupid Is as Stupid Does

IM:  Gentlemen, remember scenes when Forrest Gump’s mother coached him on life matters?  One of the notable quotes in the movie is from Forrest’ own observations:  “stupid is as stupid does.”

Old Gadfly:  Where are you taking us with this theme?

IM:  Current talk about a possible government shutdown.

AM:  And the question is typically worded this way:  Are Republicans willing to shut down the government to push legislation to defund Planned Parenthood? 

Old Gadfly:  What exactly is the logic being implied by this question?

AM:  The majority of Americans are repulsed by videos portraying the harvesting of fetal tissue for profit.  Responding to this concern, Republicans in the House have advanced legislation that shifts nearly half a billion in taxpayer funds away from Planned Parenthood and to reallocate these same funds for other health providers providing similar services, but not the abortions.  Democrats are saying they are opposed to defunding Planned Parenthood and will vote against the legislation.  Republican leadership in the Senate, fully aware that Republicans were blamed for the last shutdown talk about kicking the can down the road because even if the Senate passed defunding legislation, President Obama will veto it.

IM:  If Democrats and the Administration are not willing to acknowledge the will and intent of the majority of Americans and to compromise with Republicans who are legislating on behalf of the people, then why is it logical to blame Republicans for shutting down the government?  It sounds like Democrats are not willing to compromise, but expect Republicans to fully capitulate, that is, surrender any moral obligation to stand on principle.

Old Gadfly:  Americans have short memories.  During the last shutdown, Republicans in the House of Representatives tried several iterations of legislative language to defund or at least delay funding portions of the Affordable Care Act.  The final version gave Democrats everything they wanted but delayed funding for some of the more controversial measures of the Affordable Care Act.  Two months earlier, the Obama Administration issued an Executive Order delaying the employer mandate by one year because it would have been a political disaster for upcoming Democrat elections.  Not only was the Executive Order unconstitutional, it was an insult to the Republicans who already understood the consequential impact on the American economy.  Ever since the passage of the Affordable Care (without a single Republican vote) the labor participation rate plummeted and is now the lowest it has been since October 1977, with most of these Americans now on government subsidies.

It was the Democrat caucus that refused to compromise even on this last version proposed by the House.  By choosing not to compromise, Democrats are the ones that chose to shut down the government because they could shamelessly blame it on Republicans for refusing to compromise.  Republicans made numerous compromises.  Democrats allowed none.  This Democrat-manufactured notion that Republicans shut down the government is called a meme, and it took on irrefutable truth in the minds of Americans.  This was a case of unconditional surrender, and Republicans bought it.  And now they own it, until they grow a backbone and argue for the actual truth. 

AM: So, why are Democrats willing to lie and cheat to keep Planned Parenthood funded?

 IM:  It’s all for political power.  Planned Parenthood spends millions each year lobbying the government and contributing to political campaigns.  Just in Colorado, according to Secretary of State data, Planned Parenthood spent $3.3 million since January 2013.  This money was spent on promoting Democrat candidates, defending two Democrat incumbents during recall elections, and on opposing statewide ballot measures to redefine the term "person.”  These data represent only one of the 50 States.  Can you imagine the impact defunding Planned Parenthood would have on Democrat resources for political campaigning?  The half billion in funding does not just go away.  House Republicans reallocated the funding to other health care providers to provide similar services, minus abortion.

Old Gadfly:    Walter Cronkite, often called “the most trusted man in America,” wrote the preface to a 1983 Signet Classic version of Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty-Four. Here is an excerpt: "If not prophecy, what was 1984? It was, as many have noticed, a warning: a warning about the future of human freedom in a world where political organization and technology can manufacture power in dimensions that would have stunned the imagination of earlier ages." In our time, it is manufactured "pop culture" folklore (such as “the war on women” and “war against reproductive rights”) that wires so many to think the way the political establishment wants. Progressive Democrats cannot continue their success in advancing an administrative state (as we discussed in our last conversation) without the duplicitous, mendacious, and complicit collaboration of Planned Parenthood.  This is why Obama and Democrats in Congress have drawn a line in the sand.

IM:  So, if I may be so blunt, who are the stupid ones?

Old Gadfly:  Well, I think we can identify at least three groups:  (a) establishment Democrat politicians who subscribe to their own lies and deceitfulness; (b) Democrat constituents who subscribe to the establishment narrative; and (c) establishment Republican politicians who are either naïve in the face of blatant duplicity, mendacity, and complicity, or lack courage to stand for moral principle.

AM:  How about Republic constituents?

Old Gadfly:  Republican constituents are frustrated and disappointed.  Elected Republicans failed to deliver on expectations following elections in 2010 (Republicans took control of the House) and 2014 (Republicans kept even stronger control of the House and regained control of the Senate).  The notion that “we just need to elect the right people” is not working.  Thus, there is now a growing movement to seek another solution to overcome the corruption in Washington, D.C.  It is called the Convention of the States Project (www.cosaction.com; authorized by Article V of the U.S. Constitution) to propose amendments to the Constitution under three main topics:  fiscal responsibility, power and jurisdiction, and term limits.  If 34 State legislatures pass a resolution for such a convention, Congress shall establish a date and a location.  Any amendments proposed by the convention would then be sent to the State legislatures for ratification, which requires 38 or more States to approve.  This is a peaceful, Constitutional solution, advanced by “we the people” on behalf of State legislatures to rebalance political power in our nation. 

IM:  Of course, understanding the vision and wisdom of our Constitutional framers, who anticipated the need for such a solution, requires some refresher education. 

Old Gadfly:  The fate of our nation depends upon such a refresher and a commitment to action if we are to preserve our self-governing Constitutional Republic.  We cannot assume this problem will take care of itself.  We will all own the consequences, whether we choose to be stupid or not.

Evidence of an Administrative State

IM:  Gadfly, what are your thoughts about the recent Planned Parenthood revelations?

Old Gadfly:  You are referring to the harvesting of fetal tissue?

IM:  Yes.

Old Gadfly:  Interestingly, those who support abortion frame the issue in terms of the means by which this practice was revealed, and find that part immoral.  So they attack the messenger and not the message.  Many of these same people have no issue with Harry Reid accusing Romney of not paying taxes for 10 years and then recently publicly acknowledging it was a false statement from the outset.  His response to a reporter was “Romney lost didn’t he?”  Where is the outrage for blatant dishonesty?  But, I digress.  This current debate is really about unalienable rights—one party believes the unalienable right to life came from God.  The secular humanists, however, believe the administrative state has the superior authority to grant the unalienable right to abort a life— the Supreme Court institutionalized this unalienable right in the Roe versus Wade ruling in 1973 and now the administrative state funds the largest abortion producing institution, Planned Parenthood, with around $500 million annually.  

IM:  Joy Overbeck wrote an interesting column along these lines, singling out Hillary Clinton and her perspective on this subject.  What many good Americans do not comprehend is the very deliberate machinations taking place to secure political power.  By eliminating or diminishing God, the administrative state becomes the ultimate moral authority.  This is exactly what has happened in totalitarian nations that embraced fascism (Germany and Italy) and Communism (the former Soviet Union, China, and North Korea).

AM:  Yet, I must say Planned Parenthood does have an attractive leader at the helm.

Old Gadfly:  I offer two comments in response.  First, the leader is paid over $590,000 per year in salary and benefits for a 35 hour work week (according their most recent IRS Form 990 report).  Second, Hannah Arendt might have something to say about the “banality of evil” when associating apparent attractiveness with the insidious evil taking place under the leader’s command.[1] 

IM:  This conversation motivates me to reread Jonah Goldberg’s, Liberal Fascism.  And, as I recall, one of our discussions about deliberate engineering of public sentiment was based on clearly establishing indentured classes—women being one of them.

Old Gadfly:  Sadly, too many within these indentured classes believe the progressive rhetoric and acquiesce to being human instruments in the elite, central planner cause to achieve and to maintain political power.  As C.S. Lewis astutely observed in his book, The Abolition of Man, the conditioners are relatively successful in conditioning those who become the conditioned.  Even before Lewis, Alexis de Tocqueville, in his book, Democracy in America, warned of the “soft tyranny” that would evolve when people vote for “government-provided entitlements.”  Politicians and government administrators would then abuse this dynamic.  Lacking this understanding, Americans will become, in Tocqueville’s prophecy, “a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.”

AM:  To accelerate a move toward a timid flock, progressives must attack those who seek the truth.

IM:  AM, that is a very sobering observation:  “progressives must attack those who seek the truth.”  We have discussed numerous times Hayek’s observations about the end of truth:  that it is not tolerable to disagree with elite, central planning values; that each individual must internalize those values to the point where he or she spontaneously reacts to any opposition.[2]

AM:  Exactly.  Four U.S. Representatives, all Democrat (Jan Schakowsky, Zoe Lofgren, Jerry Nadler, and Yvette Clarke) have thus reacted and asked the U.S. and California Attorneys General to open a criminal investigation against the Center for Medical Progress, which collected the Planned Parenthood video footage.

Old Gadfly:  We have previously discussed how controlling the narrative is critical for the progressive movement.  Manipulating language to conflate and obfuscate is an important tactic.   A university professor describes how this tactic was employed in 2006 by the State of Maryland to successfully pass legislation allowing state taxpayer funds for human embryonic stem cell research.^[3]  She emphasized the role of “clear, non-controversial terminology in debate, discussion, and potential compromise. . . . For instance, what does the term ‘embryonic’ stem cell evoke in ordinary citizens, and how can policymakers avoid images of little fingers and toes, or abortion clinics, when discussing them?”^[4]  After describing the chronological development of legislation, the professor highlighted the key changes in wording that led to successful passage:  “Throughout the bill, the words ‘human embryo’ were replaced by ‘certain material’ or ‘unused material.’”^[5]  She continued with this observation: “Proponents of stem cell research funding had to learn to use less politically sensitive terms, substituting ‘unused material’ for ‘human embryos’ when discussing donations from infertility treatments.”^[6] This is clearly an example of one ideological group—that is, the elite, central planners--manipulating language to achieve a desired outcome. Once enacted, settled law achieves momentum that makes it difficult to reverse or change course.  As my good friend, Dennis, and I discussed just yesterday, settled law, or legal precedents, are treated as unchallenged axioms, even though subsequent conditions and circumstances may be significantly different.

AM:  Are we destined, then, to be “a flock of timid and industrious animals” controlled by the administrative state?

Old Gadfly:  Not necessarily.   Americans have unwisely and unwittingly outsourced that political power to a growing administrative state.  For those Americans that possess the capacity to think for themselves, “we the people” still have inherent, political power and unalienable rights that are God-given.  I believe we still have time to restore the balance of political power.  The Article V Convention of States project (www.ConventionofStates.com) provides such a remedy, and I am fully on board with this peaceful, Constitutional solution. 

IM:  Count on me being part of the reawakening!

AM:  Count me in as well.    

---

[1] See Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem:  A Report on the Banality of Evil, (New York, NY:  The Penguin Group, 2006 [1963]).

[2] F.A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom, (Chicago, IL:  The University of Chicago Press, 2007 [1944]), p. 171.

[3] Patricia M. Alt, “The Political Linguistics of Maryland’s Stem Cell Research Bill,” Ethics Today, Volume 8, Number 4, Summer 2006, retrieved October 7, 2011 from http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/aspa/unpan024115.pdf 

[4] Ibid, p. 5.

[5] Ibid, p. 11.

[6] Ibid, p. 12.

I See Hell

IM:  Gadfly, we have not heard from you since early March.

Old Gadfly:  I apologize for the lack of communication.  My father was very ill.  He experienced congestive heart failure at the end of October 2014 and initially was not expected to leave the intensive care unit alive.  He received some blood transfusions that turned his situation around and was released from the hospital with the expectation that many follow-up actions take place with specialists.  He agreed to let my wife and I be primary care providers from our home.  While it changed our routines, it was a true blessing because it gave my wife and me an opportunity to really get to know my father.

AM:  I was wondering why we had not heard from you, Gadfly.  How did things go?

Old Gadfly:  Most of my father’s care was through the VA system.  We experienced first-hand many of the concerns that have put the VA in bad light.  I would like to save that discussion for another day.

IM:  Why?

Old Gadfly:  There is something far more important to share.

AM:  What could be more important than the arguably criminal activity at the VA hospitals?

Old Gadfly:  As I process things going on in our society, there is something even far more important than the negligent or criminal behavior at VA hospitals.  It is spiritual accountability.

IM:  Tell us more, Gadfly.

Old Gadfly:  I was with my father in hospice, as he was dying.  The last words he spoke were on the 9^th of March.  He sat up in bed, reached for me, looked me in the eyes without any fear and said, “I see hell.”  He was not afraid, so I immediately recognized that he was a messenger—revealing a message for me and all living human beings.  There is a heaven and a hell.  All of us will be rewarded with one or the other based on choices we make in this life.

AM:    Your father did not say anything else after this?

Old Gadfly:  My father communicated in another way.  At around 4:00 AM on the 10^th of March, he sat up in bed.  He opened his eyes.  They shined and radiated pure joy.  He let go of my hand and reached out to entities in the room I could not see.  Who did he see?  Angels?  My mother?  Other family members?  There was no doubt that he had connected to a dimension that we might call the afterlife.

IM:  What are we to take away from this?

Old Gadfly:  Most of us are so consumed by our daily lives that we typically accommodate the easy path.  It is easier to be on good terms with those we know as opposed to enduring commands or principles.

AM:  Let me be the devil’s advocate.  What if I have a loved one who is engaging in behaviors that might be considered sinful by a God?  Should I not show compassion for this loved one?

Old Gadfly:  Absolutely.  Jesus was far more interested in the lost sheep than those that were not.  Yet, His role was not to celebrate being lost or to keep them lost, but to return them to the flock of salvation.

IM:  But there is a growing population that believes the state is just as capable of establishing the standards of moral behavior—as in a very recent US Supreme Court ruling on same sex marriage.

Old Gadfly:  From a secular legalistic perspective, two Supreme Court Justices violated the law by not recusing themselves because they had presided over same-sex marriages before making a judgment in this case.  They violated the law (man-made law) by not recusing themselves in the case.  But, apparently, it was more important to violate the law than to advance a political agenda.  And what is that agenda?  That man determines rights, not God.  Of all the things that my father might have said as he was dying, he said, “I see hell.”  My Dad always offered good “fatherly advice” to me in my lifetime.  Why would I doubt his counsel at this existential point in his own life?