Wrecking America 61

David Limbaugh asks these questions at Townhall:

Does Obama truly harbor a grudge against America? What did he mean when he said he wanted to fundamentally change America? What did his wife mean when she said she’d never been proud of America in her adult life before he rose to power? What possesses Obama to deride and apologize for America? What drives him to instinctively distrust business and the private sector and to believe that federal planners ought to have enormously more discretion in how our income and wealth are distributed? What drives him to reject the American concept of equal opportunity and promote the notion of equality of outcomes? Why is he determined to energize labor unions and encourage a permanently adversarial climate between labor and management? Why is he so adamant about the United States deferring to international bodies in the conduct of its foreign affairs? Why is he hellbent on downscaling our nuclear and conventional forces and dismantling our military space program and our missile defenses?

The questions ineluctably give rise to another. He asks:

Do I believe that he wants to “destroy” America, as such?

To which he answers?

No.

!

Then why is Obama doing this wrecking job?

Apparently, David Limbaugh thinks, out of a kind of insanity:

In his mind, as warped and foreign as I think it is, he doubtlessly believes he is helping to create a better America – a utopia of sorts. That is, he is intentionally trying to fundamentally transform America into something that he believes would be better but that most Americans – and infinitely more if they understood the full scope of what he is up to – would consider horrific, an America that we would barely recognize as the one bequeathed to us by our ancestors.

On the financial front alone, Obama is single-handedly preventing entitlement and discretionary spending reform, without which — as I’ve said dozens of times — America will face financial catastrophe. There is less than zero question that he is doing that on purpose, regardless of whether you think he is otherwise intentionally damaging America. There is no question that he is acting as though he has a vendetta against the oil, coal, natural gas and nuclear power industries. There is also little question that he is intentionally dividing Americans on the basis of race, economic class, gender, sexual orientation and, sometimes, religion.

You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to recognize the damage Obama is doing to the republic, and we haven’t even touched on his unconstitutional and lawless usurpations of authority.

And yet –

The question isn’t whether he is intentionally destroying America. The question is whether he is intentionally pursuing a set of policies that are definitely damaging America, irrespective of his motives.

The answer is — irrefutably, emphatically — “yes.”

So David Limbaugh thinks that Obama is destroying America;  that everything he is doing that is destroying America he is doing on purpose; but that he might not really mean to destroy America, only make it something quite different that he – Obama – thinks will be better, because his mind is “warped and foreign”.

While he is right about all that Obama is doing, and we applaud him for raising the questions he does, we find that his explanation doesn’t  make sense. Ignoring the implications of the possible “foreignness” of Obama’s mind, we consider the plea-in-mitigation that his mind is “warped” as he deliberately wrecks the Republic and turns it into a poorer, weaker, ever more collectivist, nightmare.

We declare it a monstrous crime, and reject the insanity defense.

Athens and Sparta 221

Sparta: The government disciplined the citizenry to make every single man, woman and child healthy and strong. Kept them thinking alike too, soberly and politically correctly. Crowds could move perfectly in unison. Life was – well, spartan. Cold water, spare diet, low salt, lots of tasteless fiber, no alcohol, constant exercise …

And what came out of Sparta? Can you think of anything?

Athens: Mess and muddle, personal choices, private pursuits, idiosyncrasies, imagination, success and failure, high aspiration and low, virtue and vice, argument, a compost heap of ideas, fierce competition, lots of laughter, feasting, gaming, wine-quaffing …

And what came out of Athens? Science, philosophy, poetry, drama, art and craft and engines, in sum most of the ideas that launched Europe’s greatness. Start a list of the great Athenian names and works and inventions and it will soon run over the page.

Nothing new has emerged, or ever can, from a collective. Socialism kills the spirit and enervates the mind. It is static. It etherizes the will. It is soporifically boring. A collectivized society is a doomed society. There is no renewal, no advance in it. Socialism is a slow, generalized death.

Freedom is the source, the well, the fountain of all discovery, invention, innovation – all that can be called genuine “progress”.

The freedom we need is not the natural state of man. Nobody is free in a state of anarchy any more than in a tyranny. Freedom is a product of civilization. It must be protected by the rule of law, so that everyone’s freedom is limited only by everyone else’s.

To stay free, watch out for those who would force you to do all manner of things “for your own good”, and never let them have power over you.

A warning too late? In a recent article, David Limbaugh points out that under the would-be dictatorship of Barack Obama, America is being Spartanized, though he doesn’t use that analogy. Here’s part of what he says:

I cannot be the only one who feels as if every new day brings a new assault on this nation and its people by this administration. Indeed, many people I know say they can’t even watch the news anymore because it’s so depressing. And it is.

Some of these assaults occur under the radar, and others are right out in the open. As an example of the former, last week, President Obama issued an executive order “Establishing the National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council,” which will focus on “lifestyle behavior modification (including smoking cessation, proper nutrition, appropriate exercise, mental health, behavioral health, substance-use disorder, and domestic violence screenings).” It will even recommend changes in federal policy to reduce “sedentary behavior.”

The socialized medicine nightmare is already beginning. Many of us warned that Obamacare would serve as an all-purpose justification for government intervention in every aspect of our lives. Have we become so far removed from our founding principles that we don’t grasp the perniciousness of such government encroachments into our private lives and personal liberties?

You must read the executive order: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-establishing-national-prevention-health-promotion-and-public-health. Then you’ll understand that the council and “Advisory Group” it establishes will not be merely advisory. The provisions of this “order” underscore the disturbing extent to which Obama and his band of authoritarians intend to control our lives.

The “Advisory Group,” in consultation with the council, must submit, by March 23, 2011, a “national strategy” to “set specific goals and objectives for improving the health of the United States through federally supported prevention, health promotion, and public health programs, consistent with ongoing goal setting efforts conducted by specific agencies.” …

Will we tolerate any manner of government control over the most minute aspects of our lives under the rationale that we have to improve our lifestyles to get healthier … ? Does liberty mean nothing to us anymore? …

Lifestyle behavior modification is none of the government’s business, but it is even less the prerogative of a renegade, unaccountable executive acting outside the law through unconstitutional executive orders. On that point, by the way, please check out Section 3G, which provides that the council will “carry out such other activities as are determined appropriate by the President.” No limitations, just whatever this omniscient president determines is appropriate.

Read it all here.