Big Ambitions, Urgent Focus - Optimism And Realism

I have for months now intended to turn a corner on my Blog from political campaigning and commenting, and broaden it to include general philosophical perspectives. I haven’t luminous credentials in either politics or philosophy: I consider myself a studied amateur in both. I have observed politics most all of my life and participated in the process of political conventions. I studied philosophy in college and graduate school, finishing a couple of years before taking to work and marriage without finishing a thesis and securing a graduate degree to flaunt. However, I had determined to discuss my experience with multiple sclerosis and how that experience and study has illuminated my existing perspectives. I may not have a graduate degree or a political office, but I have a certifiable diagnosis of and 16+ years of experience with multiple sclerosis. The course of the disease varies in victims, from occasional disturbances to a gradual or possibly more precipitous decline. On such a scale of 1 to 10, I’m probably around a 5: many facilities are weakened, but none are entirely devastated. I walk a hundred yards or so, slowly with a walker. My vision is diminished somewhat, as is the tactical perception of my fingertips, my fine motor coordination, and some other ordinary physical facilities. But, my convictions seem to get only more sharpened, and my enthusiasm for discussing them is still keen.

I intended to direct my Blog in this ambitiously broad direction, and have written (but not posted) a post to announce having turned this corner. However, pulling it all together in one direction was an imposing project, and as time passes, the enormity and urgency of discussing the social prospects look ever stronger. I will still appeal to these other matters, and I AM positive that, as much as American politics provoke me. It is certainly not the most important thing in life. In fact, we as Americans are spoiled by what we have had. Most of the history of human life on earth has had to engage the challenge to be joyful with infinitely less in terms of both wealth and freedom. It’s probably the provision of both in America that highlights the grief of watching this dismantling of the values that produced it. For weeks now, I have wondered how America might surmount the massive folly of government usurping of authority and resources, extinguishing of innovation and production, and creating an almost unfathomable and certainly inhibiting debt. While I have listened to many conservatives who have reconciled their ambitions to recovery and even are confident of coming political victories, I have not grasped an answer to my question and am not so sanguine; the record in history of reversing the sort decisive changes that Barack Obama and the Democratic Congress intend and have already wrought is very poor and looks unlikely short of some dramatic upheaval. Achieving such a revolution absent violence would be an extraordinary accomplishment.

Speaking of overreach and subsequent reform, last Thursday, Glenn Beck had judge Andrew Napolitano on his program: Napolitano on Beck: Montana 2nd Amendment and States Rights Part 1 (5-7-09)(obviously, there’s a Part 2) They discussed a state measure in Montana that would reject federal attempts to regulate firearms that were manufactured and remained in Montana that would supposedly fall outside the federal justification of “regulating interstate commerce,” which over time has come to cover most any measure that the federal government wants to impose. State representatives from Utah and Texas who are posing similar measures joined them. Napolitano said he thought that the Supreme Court as comprised today, might affirm such measures, and Beck got a little excited about the idea that the interstate commerce justification might be undermined. I sat there thinking that would be great but he shouldn't get his hopes up: basically, that it isn’t going to happen. By Monday, Beck had a writer on who said he didn’t think The Supreme Court would buy it; that the laws needed to be more tightly defined.

But, even that writer isn’t considering the real problem, that once power is exercised, people don’t kindly give it up, whether in politics, in business, churches or anywhere else. It’s human nature. Let me give you a few examples from my own experience, and they are only examples of what is all but universal. I have a friend in Texas that I first met during the campaign preceding the 1996 election. He’s a fellow conservative who in the early '90’s served on The Republican Party of Texas rules committee and was a state parliamentarian. He’s a rules guy and changed some rules in the state party during that period…until the party caught on that the rules changes would make party officials more accountable to the state arty platform and devolve power from the central party apparatus to the state executive committee chosen from around the state and more accountable to the people: basically constraining the maneuvering and bargaining power of the central party officials. Henceforward, the party has put a sock in his mouth via parliamentary contrivance and personal ridicule. Even to today, he soldiers on with what would be worthy rules change proposals.

Until my uneven health made it difficult, I served for a while on the board of an extraordinarily connected and active pro-life organization. Much focus was of course, put toward the effort of pressing alterations in the law. At one point, with a case before The Supreme Court, our legal counsel expressed optimism about submitting a brief with an argument that he thought would undermine Roe v. Wade. A friend and I thought such optimism was ill founded and of course, it was.

In both of these cases the main problem is not the rules or the argument. The main point is that when it came right down to it, neither of those things mattered. While the other side will do what it can with argument and finagling, if it is ultimately necessary, they will deceive and cheat, which is what happened in the face of rules changes at that 1996 convention. The issue isn’t rules or argument or laws. The issue is that power once held, will be retained if at all possible, by hook or by crook. So it is with Beck’s dreams of obviating the commerce clause justification for federal regulation, which would be about as easy to execute as removing Congress’ huge power to manipulate the tax code. Federally, I support The Fair Tax, which would do just that. But, I know that it would never be put in place short of an unprecedented social upheaval. And The Fair Tax itself doesn’t even directly address the problem of over-taxation and government waste. It just changes how the current level of taxation is collected, but returns control to the people, who determine the level of their taxation through the level of their spending.

As of today, reviving state sovereignty seems a more urgent project.

The Pros And Cons Of John McCain

I’m anxious to hang it up for today, but I wanted to say at least a little about John McCain. Understand: Tuesday is the Texas primary, I already voted early for Mike Huckabee, and will promote Huckabee and his ideas in the Texas convention process. Today, I was cited polls supposedly showing a poll margin of twenty or more percentage points for John McCain over Mike Huckabee. But, that will not happen. One direction or another, I think the difference will be single digits. I have a number of reasons to say that, but time will soon tell. As an example, Texas Governor Rick Perry has endorsed John McCain. And depending on turnout, that should prove a net (additional) negative for John McCain. A large turnout of relatively casual observers may favor McCain. But, the greater percentage of the vote that is more activist Republicans, the better it will bode for Mike Huckabee. Though it is March in Texas, I wish it would snow.

I have been critical of John McCain for over a decade. In 2000 when asked whether I liked McCain I said, “I loved my grandfather, but I wouldn’t recommend him for president.” It has become only plainer to me that, especially as he has aged, John McCain is a sober and well-intentioned human being with a substantially undefined philosophical compass. It is ironic that his philosophically brutish and constitutionally audacious lunge at tamping the influence of money in Washington, the infamous McCain-Feingold, is now nipping at his posterior as a presidential candidate. And that is hardly the beginning of his infidelities to The Constitution and misunderstanding of some basic inclinations of human nature.

But all of that said, should Republicans fail to deliver the miracle of fidelity of principle that give the nomination to Mike Huckabee and McCain is the nominee, barring an outrageous act that surely he would be warned away from , I would support McCain as I never did George W. Bush’s presidential bids. And by the way, in case you haven’t read it before in the past several years, I’m not mad at George Bush. I just think he is ill-equipped to lead or steer America out of the aimless ideological drift in which the Reagan administration was a hiccup.

When Bush was elected in 2000, I said, “Leviathan gets a night manager,” and history has shown that to be an accurate assessment. I have also said that with a Republican Congress, Al Gore could not have succeeded in expanding the federal government and its expenditures as Bush has, and I sincerely believe that. But though hardly perfectly, Bush has succeeded in giving us marginally better federal judges and has been resolute about the primary federal government responsibility of defending America and basic humanity. And in the face of strong pop-cultural headwinds, I must say.

I think that John McCain will be equally or more resolute and apt, in that regard, and will do an starkly superior job of restraining federal spending that in fact now threatens economic calamity. I also think that as an older man, he will be more sober about reckless judicial possibilities and the social pathologies that have settled into American culture.

Of course, it will make a great difference to me if McCain should choose a more philosophically meticulous running-mate to provide counsel to his administration. Though he is advised against it on left and right, I would be greatly more animated about a McCain ticket if Mike Huckabee were on it. And I believe it is true that this way or another, McCain would need to animate the social conservatives who inject the legwork and elbow grease that drives Republican campaigns and pulled the Republican Party out of the congressional shadows almost 30 years ago. Huckabee is the obvious choice in that regard. He understands the drift of American principle. And, it would be revolutionary and unprecedented productive if Huckabee could sell McCain on the virtues and prospects of The Fair Tax. That’s my two cents worth.

But today, I still hope and pray for a Huckabee victory in Texas on Tuesday, and that “miracle” of a brokered convention. It seems to me, that McCain and Huckabee could distinguish two factions of the Republican Party and in the spirit that they have exercised all along, unite them and the country to successes that neither the party or the country have seen in a long time.

If McCain Supposedly Has It Locked Up, Why Not Vote For Huckabee? - Wisconsin Tuesday, Sen. McCain's Lead In Texas Small

Supporters got an email message from Governor Huckabee with basically the same information as the web notice, below, and an appeal for contributions: http://www.mikehuckabee.com/ .

Irrespective of how Wisconsin goes on Tuesday, there’s a sure shot at winning Texas, if we get out everyone we know to vote on March 4. That would give the campaign a big push. If the delegate race goes to convention, a late string of wins will be difficult to overlook. I think conservatives should bombard McCain’s campaign and The Republican National Committee, demanding The Right To Life and The Fair Tax be given the consideration that has been earned. I’ll tell them that after this year’s campaign, the party cannot shrug off these constituencies and expect the fervency and work from them that is essential to Republican victory and first pulled them almost 50 years of minority status in 1980. I believe that reviving the sanctity of human life to the public conscience is essential to the long-term maintenance of a civil society. And, The Fait Tax is the most potentially liberating and empowering proposal of my lifetime.

If Huckabee does not gain the top of the ticket, wisdom would make him the running-mate, ensuring the enthusiasm of these constituencies for election cycles to come. I know that the distortions of Romney and Thompson and the reactions of some conservatives who were unnerved by Huckabee’s expressions of empathy for all humans, have left a sentiment among some that he is “not a conservative.” Just yesterday, I heard a radio host bemoaning Huckabee’s “Christian socialism” that supposedly sees government as the vehicle of Christian responsibility, which this person doesn’t see. The problem is that Huckabee has never said any such thing. He has a clearer than ordinary understanding of human nature and how government can corrupt it. And he also has a clear understanding of a conservative essential that many conservatives seem to have forgotten: the distinction between the responsibilities and capacities of state and federal government in The United States.

Mike Huckabee is also smart enough to engage this directly when given the opportunity. The great irony is that is Huckabee does not win the nomination, it will have been with the help of supposed conservatives that he will have not succeeded electorally for the first time in almost 16 years. He beat Democrats repeatedly. It took conservatives to slow him down, though he hasn’t stopped, yet.

February 15, 2008 - 12:59 PM
Sen. McCain's Lead In Texas Small
by Team Huckabee
Two new polls in Texas from ARG and POS show a 6 and 4 point lead for Senator McCain in Texas.
As Gov. Huckabee said in his email yesterday, Texas is the place to fight for the nomination. These leads are small considering the attention the media has been heaping on Senator McCain as the "frontrunner."

Here are a couple of red states we might mention, where Senator McCain had a similar lead:
Georgia won by Gov. Huckabee
Tennessee won by Gov. Huckabee
Alabama won by Gov. Huckabee
Louisiana won by Gov. Huckabee
Kansas won by Gov. Huckabee

See This Short Video: What We Need/We Just Need To Do The Right Thing

This video was posted at the campaign blog, today: What We Need

One of the friends that I sent it to responded…” Thank you Larry, I agree completely! I truly hope he wins....I will forward this to friends...”

I answered with these comments about what forces were at work:

Thanks. I honestly think that the battle is in the early states. In Iowa, conservative Christians like Huckabee. In a vacuum, he would win, especially after he has aired some television ads. What’s working against Huckabee is ironically, the people that should be for him. The old guard social conservatives like him, but they are so tuned to the conventional media that they don’t have confidence in the work that Huckabee has done and what he has accomplished in the early states. How much will their neglect persuade people who like Huckabee to not vote for him? Prominent talk-radio host Hugh Hewitt has been declaring that it’s really a two-man race and any social conservative who votes for Huckabee or Thompson is taking a vote from Romney and in effect voting for Giuliani. He even went so far as to say that supporters of McCain and Giuliani are working for Huckabee and Thompson to derail Giuliani.

That’s an interesting thought, but it has crossed over into delusion when he says he thinks that’s what Giuliani and McCain did at the Ames Straw Poll in August to give Huckabee a strong showing. Giuliani and McCain passed on competing in the Ames Straw Poll and snubbed Iowa Republicans, obviously because they knew that they couldn’t win by trying. And, EVERONE knows that that didn’t sit too well with Iowa voters. Huckabee’s success at that straw poll was simple straight-up face-to-face engagement and persuasion.

Voters just need to ignore what they always thought were their “leaders,” which is now an especially inapt word because the “leaders” are really followers. And they aren’t even following their constituents but the faithless winds of the popular culture. People can now do all of their own investigation and should. You can access information in any form on the Internet and weight it and see what you like for yourself.

Anyway, if Huckabee does well in the early states, I’m sure he’ll do just fine in Texas.

Larry