Allow me to begin by saying that I am no fan of Al Franken and I'm not specifically picking on Rush Limbaugh. If and when Al Franken takes his seat in the senate, it will be a bad day for America. And I am using Rush Limbaugh as an example for all the radio and television talk show hosts, all the writers and bloggers out there including myself, who have ever despaired of the direction of the country, deplored the behavior of our elected politicians and thought that we had more common sense in our little finger that they had in their whole body.
The media has an important function in our society, which is why it is referred to in the first amendment. The ability to educate, inform and persuade is a powerful tool in the political process. But for all the words spoken by Rush and the other talk show hosts, for all the words written in newspapers, magazines and on the Internet, the stimulus package passed for want of one vote in the senate. Government health care, a nearly four trillion dollar budget, cap and trade may all be forced on us for the lack of one or two votes.
For all the talking, all the educating, all the informing done by talk radio and other conservative/alternative media, the country is falling rapidly into the black hole of statism. Why? First, while Rush's fifteen to twenty million listeners sounds like a lot, there are over three hundred million people in this country, over one hundred million voters. And not all those listeners agree with Rush's viewpoint, some are just entertained, and this goes for all of talk radio. The point here is that the vast majority of people in the country don't tune in to talk radio, they don't follow the news closely, they are not politically educated or aware. As products of a government education and fans of reality TV, they easily fall for a demagogue like Barak Obama.
Second, it is an "us vs them" approach to politics and this is encouraged by the behavior of both sides. On one side is the "us", the average citizen who actually seeks to inform himself and those who seek to do the informing. Then there is the "them", the "political class", the people who actually make the rules that govern our lives, rules that are increasingly intrusive and destructive. Too often we have the mindset that we are merely subjects of the king who stand outside the palace gates shouting our pleas and hoping we are heard. On the other side of the gate is the political class who turn a deaf ear to our pleas because they are confident in their power and position. When the vast majority of the incumbents are elected regardless of what they do, they see no problem ignoring the interests of anyone but themselves. The whole system turns on its head. Instead of serving us, the politicians serve themselves. Instead of seeing ourselves as part of the process, we are reduced to servants of the political class. We fear them, they don't fear us. According to Thomas Jefferson, that is the definition of tyranny.
This was a primary cause of the revolution. Parliament and the king, three thousand miles away, were making the rules without any input from the colonists. They were free to ignore them because there was nothing, short of armed insurrection, the colonists could do about it. The colonists could not vote for any representation yet they were told they were British subjects and had to follow the dictates of such an elected body. Today, we have the same problem. Washington may as well be on the moon for the amount of impact we, as average citizens, have on it.
Finally, and this is probably the most important point, talk radio, and the media in general, is reactionary by its very nature. Commentators, by definition, are reacting to something that has already happened. News, by definition, is a description of an event in the past. Conservatism by its very name, is reactionary. It seeks to conserve the status quo, conserve the liberty that remains. If we look back on the last hundred years, or even the decades since President Reagan, any objective observer can see that as a movement, it has done a lousy job "conserving" liberty. Government has grown and liberty has retreated under both major parties. For all the growth of talk radio and the "alternative" media, its real impact has been negligible because it is reactionary and has no cohesive agenda.
That is why the progressives, the statists, have been so successful. First, they have a cohesive agenda and a long term vision. If all else fails they can fall back on Marx as an ideological rallying point. Everything they do is geared toward expanding the power of the state until everything is under its, and their, control. Second, they are patient and persistent. If something does not work, they try something else with the same goal in mind. They will use legislation, the courts, the mob, executive order, bureaucratic fiat, whatever it takes to get their way. Third, they manipulate language to confuse their enemies. Look at he words liberal and conservative. Liberal once meant what libertarian does now. Personally, that is why I don't use it. I prefer statist, one who believes in the state. Conservative now means bigot, out of touch, sexist, redneck, hyper-Christian homophobe. President Obama is moving this along at a rapid clip. Success no longer means money but the poverty of government service. Wealth is evil, freedom is slavery, ignorance is bliss. Finally, and this is by no means a comprehensive list, the statist knows how to set the agenda. We have been dancing to the statist tune for one hundred years. Some may have tried a few new steps but the music hasn't changed.
If those of us who love liberty want to save our country from the statist vision that is quickly becoming a permanent reality, we must stop being reactionary. We cannot be like the little boy with his finger in the dike because there is an army on the other side always drilling new holes. The dike needs to be rebuilt with an impenetrable steel and concrete structure we once knew at the constitution. The only way to restore the constitution is to take power away from Washington, not to simply stop them from acquiring more. Consider the original Revolution. Samuel Adams and his friends in the Sons of Liberty didn't just write letters to parliament and the king asking them to please not take away their God given rights. They had an agenda, independence, that they worked towards for twenty years through networking, protests, pamphlets, "slanted" news, property destruction and intimidation of government officials; whatever they could do to move toward the goal of liberty.
It is time we stopped reacting and started acting. It is time those who loved liberty started setting the agenda and removing the ability of our elected officials and unelected bureaucrats to make our lives miserable. If ACORN can rent a mob to intimidate corporate officials, it is time we showed up outside the homes of our elected officials with signs and pitchforks to get their attention. It is time we stopped being intimidated and started doing the intimidating. We need to develop long range plans to eliminate all non constitutional functions from government. For example, we can start with the Department of Education. The statist knows that as long as he can keep creating good little government robots through government education, his plans will succeed. If we return education to the state, and ultimately, the local level, we will once again have control. We need to defund the government. I believe, like Thomas Jefferson, that income taxes are immoral and therefore we should work toward repeal of the sixteenth amendment. Without the ability to take our wealth, it will be hard to redistribute it. The seventeenth amendment should go as well to to give the states themselves a voice in government as originally intended.
Ultimately, however, we need legislators who believe in the liberty of the people more than their own power who will introduce and pass such legislation. Al Franken threw his hat in the ring for the statist agenda. It is time those who talk a good game "put some skin in the game" as Joe Biden said. It is time to put up or shut up. Sam Adams and the Sons of Liberty were not just rabble rousers. Many of them were elected assemblymen who shaped the course of our nation's history. If men like Rush Limbaugh really care about the country, prove it. Do what needs to be done to change it. Take the pay cut and endure the media "anal exam" and put yourself in a position to really accomplish something. The statists have plenty of leaders, the lovers of liberty have none. We need a plan and courageous men and women to push it forward. Not career politicians but people who are willing to step forward as they did in the past to do a job that needs to be done. If it doesn't start happening now, if the agenda is not removed from the hands of the statist, the country our children inherit will be a nation no Son of Liberty would recognize.
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Comments: 25
Franken is an honest man and he deserves his seat. The Republicans have done everything they could to keep him out. It's time for him to take his seat and begin to serve.
Franken is NOT honest. Check the records. Enough said
And what records might you be referring to, Nora?
Interesting! When you ask for facts, she goes silent! ROTFLMAO
As Senator, Franken, yet to be seated, has done nothing. How can you denigrate him so early?
The people have voted and, Franken should be seated. Then let's judge his performance.
My most profound thanks for the followng excellent observation:
" Second, it is an "us vs them" approach to politics and this is encouraged by the behavior of both sides. On one side is the "us", the average citizen who actually seeks to inform himself and those who seek to do the informing. Then there is the "them", the "political class", the people who actually make the rules that govern our lives, rules that are increasingly intrusive and destructive. Too often we have the mindset that we are merely subjects of the king who stand outside the palace gates shouting our pleas and hoping we are heard. On the other side of the gate is the political class who turn a deaf ear to our pleas because they are confident in their power and position. When the vast majority of the incumbents are elected regardless of what they do, they see no problem ignoring the interests of anyone but themselves. The whole system turns on its head. Instead of serving us, the politicians serve themselves. Instead of seeing ourselves as part of the process, we are reduced to servants of the political class. We fear them, they don't fear us. According to Thomas Jefferson, that is the definition of tyranny."
My most profound criticism for mistaking the progressivess as statists. Though such an interpretation may be easy to make, you really need to examine such things as the role of the Internet in the comming revolution, the overthrow of the Yuppies in upper management as a consequence of our current "great" recession, and the growing realization by people on all sides of the political spectrum that the collection of patriotic and educational rationalizations that constitute public education are nothing more than a contest between various social agendaists and "conservative" agendaists who both fundamentally agree on the deliberate subservience of the student, inculcation of blind obedience of authority, deliberate sabotage and slowdown of the progress of the student - despite all claims to the contrary, in order to maintain the status of the educational system as a "social warehouse" which, in combination with MTV, consumerist envy and sports, are designed to keep the obedient masses happy, busy, and not let them get involved in naughty things like protests and rejection of their predetermined status. This has already been completely elucidated in books such as "The Underground History of American Education" by John Taylor Gatto, a brilliant book which is available to read on line - search for it.
Just as the Bushian neo-cons utilized the 9-11 attacks to push forth their agena, President Bush now has the poltical power to push forth his - neither one of any particular benefit to the American people as a whole, but both of them of enormous benefit to special interests. For the Bush era, it was the corporate special interests and for the Obama era it will be various social organizations, some corporations, and the power to continue to raid the treasury while preparing us for the inevitable California like financial situation which will soon be the lot of all the states.
But the Internet, quielty works its power, uniting voices of dissent, restoring ommitted and ignored major news items, enabling people to speak out, compare notes and, most importantly, EXPOSE the political, corporate and social corruption which has rusted and rotted all our major insititutions just as it has in Europe and Russia where the once pontifical statues of Lenin now lie toppled and rusting in the scrapheap of history.
In less than a decade it will begin - what spark will set it off, what unexpected symptoms will cause it to cascade as the media desperately tries, first to ignore, the to discount as unimportant and localized and then at last to acknowledge the waves of outrage that will force the real reforms, reforms that will topple and reshape every level of governent until, once again, the politicians will come to fear the people and understand the meaning of the phrase "L'Etat, C' est Moi!
LOL
Join or organize a TEA party (taxed enough already). every state has several chapters. Send your reps emails or faxes or letters and hold their feet to the fire. A nation of sheep will be ruled by a minority of wolves..
Start tea bagging now!
Hopefully, tea parites will help to "take power away from Washington,"
Demonstrate, write, call, demonstrate again and again and again.
Those folks in Washington are prety dense, can't think things through logically and obviously can't read or understand economic theory. G H U
Rush Limbaugh couldn't be elected to anything. He is in the pockets of corporate polluters. He doesn't recognize global warming, but a recent MIT study says that it will be worse than we thought. He know nothing about science, yet he thinks he is smarter than the top scientist at MIT. What we need is clean, renewable energy. We don't need to be dependent on the Arabs for our energy. What are we going to do when the world runs out of oil?
OOOh yes, MIT the heart of liberalism education/not
Well, LOTS of scientists disagree, And non biased reports poo poo . the sham. But you can go and paint your roof white. By scientist Chu's dictum. Guess that will power cars/planes as much as the windmills.
It's amazing but whenever you neocons don't agree with something, your first line of defense is to call it liberalism or call the person a liberal. You can't come up with any real rebuttal based on the subject so that's what you fall back on.
As far as global warming...even Bush's government scientists confirmed the existance of this and Bush silenced them and fired some of them.
thanks
Although, I personally am so far to the left, that even the even the democrats appear to me to be "right-wing," I consider myself to be a strict constitutionalist. It is my opinion that since its inception there has been an organized and systematic assault on the civil liberties written into the US Constitution by the conservatives of this country. The “War on Drugs”; “War on Terror”; “War on Communism” and a host of other wars waged by the right wing are really nothing more than a War on People--an excuse to erode civil rights to the point of non-existence. I invite you to my website devoted to raising awareness on this puritan attack on freedom: http://freethegods.blogspot.com/
When you witness a child's life destroyed by drugs, perhaps you wil join that war.
When communism storms in to take all you've worked hard to earn, you might join that war.
When your loved ones are killed by terrorist, you might join that war.
Enough said.
I've seen plenty of people devastated by drugs; after a lifetime of being ripped off by capitalists, I don't have anything for the communists to take; terrorism is a direct result of oppression.
Enough said.
Amongst that "vast majority" who are not "politically educated and aware" the 20 million or so listeners to Rush Limbaugh talk radio show are first in line.
When Bush was in power, Limbaugh denied that there was anything wrong with the economy even though it was collapsing. Now that Obama is President, he admits that there is a problem with the economy. However, he is like Herbert Hoover. He somehow thinks that it will correct itself if the government does nothing. That is what Hoover thought, and it resulted in the great depression. The Roosevelt got in there and fixed the problem. Obama is trying to fix the problem. Limbaugh announced that he met with Obama and told Obama that he hoped that Obama would fail. After that he complained that Obama is willing to meet with Chavez but wouldn't meet with conservatives.
An earthworm has more guts than Rush Limbaugh.
" I'm Looking For ...: thoughtful and meaningful discourse; connection with intelligent, kind-hearted, and well-meaning fellow hominids"
Hmmm, your own words don't "fit" you, with the above comment you made. Shame
Really?
Well, EXCUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSE ME!
You'd be more credible if you could spell "Barack."
"For all the talking, all the educating, all the informing done by talk radio"
I think they do more misinforming than imforming. How about Limbaugh claiming Powell's endorsment of Obama was based on nothing but race, he can't know how Powell reached the decision. Remember that time Rush said all drug users should be in jail? I haven't heard about him checking into the crowbar hotel but I have heard about his drug use. He doesn't seem like a credible source of information to me. I think Rush is more interested in making a buck than he is with educating anybody.
It's important because it is in the First Amendment is a logic gone wrong. The First Amendment was a ping-pong ball of politics then and now. Find or explain the reason it is important. The proverbial slippery slope (1) it's imporant (2) because it is in the Constitution (3) two hundrerd years pass by (4) everything still the same thing. Oh well, that was fun. Thanks for the chance to make good sense non-sensical.
Oh, I'm for Franken.