It’s Time for a Reality Check

We currently face, as a people, the most dire threat to the republic since December 7, 1941. The worst of it is that to wrap your mind around the immensity of the threat, requires the abandonment of age old notions of our social construct. Roosevelt at his worst gave lip service to patriotism, support for the military, and had the capacity to identify the enemy. Johnson obviously wrestled with his own demons as he declined to continue in office. Even Carter, a book length disaster on his own, managed to hide much of his incompetence behind an assumed “spiritual” façade. Clinton also, when faced with hard choices for his agenda, managed a turn to the center to appease the public clamor for restraint.

Each of the aforementioned brought a measure of executive experience to the office. Roosevelt was governor of New York, Johnson as House member, senator and finally vice president, Carter as a two-term Georgia Senator and then governor, and Clinton as attorney general and then governor of Arkansas, all brought considerable prior service to the job of president. Each, although subject to criticism in their own right, did not require “on-the-job” training to manage the basic necessities of governance. To varying degrees, each of these men recognized certain aspects of the public will and acted accordingly.

Some challenge the value of experience by asking the legitimate question, “Does he have twenty years of experience or one year of experience twenty times?” That may well be valid if the job is fastening pop rivets but the presidency requires a far more varied level of expertise. All too often successful management boils down to not specifically knowing how to get the job done but rather which person to task with the assignment. Little would be gained by having the president descend to the BP well head in a diving bell to assess how to repair the gusher. Micro-management of government should be shunned in favor of securing those who know the widely varied fields of government with an intimate base of knowledge to be competent. Individual professionalism should always trump partisan party politics.

Our current chief executive claimed about two years ago, before the election that if he were chosen it would be then that; “our planet began to heal” and “the rise of the oceans began to slow.” What seemed a presumptive statement at the time has now turned into a source of legitimate ridicule. Quite the contrary, we find not just gushers deep under the sea but every where we look is an uncontrolled effusion of our national wealth and security. Our treasury is spewing national resources uncontrollably. Our borders are unable to control the flow of illegals. We have observed resurgence in the flood of murderous attacks on American citizens by radical Islamists. There are serious leaks in nearly every aspect of our economy; jobs, housing markets, high finance, manufacturing with little actual realistic action being taken to stem the tide.

In response to these national tragedies we are getting “shout outs,” “date nights,” shameful avoidance of our established national military heroes, capitulation to tin-pot dictators, insulting behavior to former loyal allies, crushing suppression of faith, manufactured race crisis, socialized medicine which we can ill-afford, and the continued propagation of the global warming myth. Couple these complaints with an endless round of campaign appearances for upcoming office seekers and one wonders when they find time for maintenance on Air Force I. (Does the DNC pony up its share for the use of that plane?) It is safe to assume that the end is not in sight.

As one inventories the stable of replacements within a constitutionally mandated order, the prospects are not inviting; Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton……. .What’s that old commercial line? “Trading a headache for an upset stomach,” just barely describes that outcome. Obviously, the solution lies with the electorate. If they rise as a body and demand the restoration of national purpose and integrity with their votes in November it would be possible to emasculate the ongoing effort to destroy the country. Barring that, I must conclude I have overestimated the American thirst for liberty.

In His abiding love,

Cecil Moon