It’s the easiest thing in the world to be a pessimist, and the least American. We’re optimists, and as tough as things are, as many skirmishes as we’ve lost, we haven’t lost this country to the left quite yet. If you had to choose between being them or us, you’d be crazy to choose being them. We’re going to win, and America is going to rise again.
Pessimism is a cop-out, an excuse to do nothing and wait for the end instead of figuratively fixing bayonets and charging head-long into the enemy. That military metaphor is no accident, because decades in the military taught me that “pessimism” is just another name for “failure.” You don’t always get to pick your enemy. You don’t always get to pick your situation. Your job is to take whatever you face, find your advantages, and exploit them to drive on to victory.
We’re conservative Americans. When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade, Irish it up with a little Stoli, and then grill a rib-eye while you drink it.
Let’s assess our situation as conservatives. We face a leftist President and his senatorial minions. The media is against us. Our culture embraces a whole range of bizarrely self-destructive and immoral notions. The supposedly conservative party is divided between folks who want to promote conservatism and those who want to promote themselves.
So we’re under siege. So what else is new?
Now let’s look at the situation from a different perspective, one that looks for hope and opportunities. They’re there all right – we just need to be willing to see them.
Every day makes it clearer that President 51% is the lamest of ducks. The only thing he’s squandering faster than money borrowed from the Chinese to subsidize his coalition of lazy government hacks and welfare bums is his political capital.
The closest thing he has had to a political victory since eking out a win over Mitt Romney by a couple percentage points is getting through the Fiscal Cliff morass by making permanent the Bush tax rates on all but a few people. Yeah, his big success was making automatic taxes increases apply to fewer folks than it otherwise would have. That sort of failure is only considered a “victory” if you’re a MSNBC commentator or a French general.
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And the sequester? Not only didn’t the sky fall but people kind of looked around, read their money market statements, and thought, “Uh, if this is what happens when we cut 2% of the budget, let’s see what happens when we cut 10%.”
That normal people are realizing that the Democrats’ sound and fury about slashing the budget signifies nothing is huge.
And the Senate? If I were Senator Mitch McConnell I’d be barging into Majority Leader Harry Reid’s office to start measuring the drapes. The GOP stands a great chance of snatching a bunch of Democrat seats up in 2014 if it can avoid nominating a bunch of Akin clones.
For example, just look at Mitch’s likely opponent, a puffy, washed-up actress who claims Tennessee residence and talks like a particularly militant Gender Studies TA at a second-rate liberal arts college. There’s a perfect fit for the Bluegrass State’s electorate – I’m surprised Mitch can keep a straight face.
You’ll note that the Minority Leader showed up at the Rand Paul party a few weeks ago. Mitch McConnell is a lot of things, but a guy who bets on losers isn’t one of them. He stood with the Wacko Birds while Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham fumed. That’s all you need to know about which way the wind is blowing inside the Beltway.
Oh, and Lindsay may be facing a primary challenge from the right by Bruce Carroll, a guy who used the Twitter handle “GayPatriot.” Watch for Lindsay to respond by backpedalling on immigration – and watch Marco Rubio shrug his shoulders and say, “Well, I tried,” as it becomes obvious to him that there is a liberal/squish conspiracy to fake border security in exchange for amnesty.
But that’s all mere politics – let’s look at the big picture. For all the abuse it has been taking, our Constitution remains strong and Americans are tenaciously defending it from the liberals’ assaults on the God-given rights it guarantees.
The right to freedom of religion is under attack, often via Obamacare’s un-American mandates, but citizens are successfully litigating those threats in courts across the country. No one is rolling over and giving up on our right to live in conformity with our faith.
The right to free speech remains strong. Sure, nitwits like the mayor of Philadelphia and academic neo-fascists whine about it, but Americans aren’t ready to surrender their right to say what they think just because the elites disapprove. Contrast that with once-Great Britain, where the subjects of that once-great nation are willingly casting away their ancient freedom because of an anti-free press campaign led by celebrity Hugh Grant.
Yeah, the U.K. has fallen so far that its people are willing to give up their tradition of liberty in reliance upon the judgment of a guy who gave up mega-hottie Elizabeth Hurley for some tacky L.A. streetwalker. Good plan, limies.
And the Second Amendment? The fury of Senator Feinstein at Harry Reid’s unwillingness to join in her Senatorial majority suicide pact says it all. Notice how the President has said nothing about it? He knows how weak this utter rout on his marquee priority makes him look, and he’s happy to let the egg splatter on DiFi’s face. It is mighty crowded under the Obama bus.
Sure, Colorado Democrats squeaked some limited anti-gun laws through, but they’ll wish they hadn’t. Remember those conservatives who sat out the last election? They’ll be flocking to the polls in the Centennial State to extract their unholy vengeance. No one ever wins elections by pushing gun control, but Colorado’s voters are about to demonstrate that folks do lose elections by pushing gun control.
How about the rest of the Bill of Rights? Rand Paul’s epic filibuster threw a spotlight on the fact that there is a huge overlap when it comes to the concept of liberty between conservatives and liberty-loving people who currently think of themselves as liberals. Next up – a conservative-hipster campaign to repeal the iPhone jailbreaking felony fiasco and similar corporate-sponsored assaults on freedom.
This is a huge opportunity to expand our coalition based not on superficial things like race or ethnicity or gender or any of that consultant-fetish nonsense but upon a solid foundation of a shared love of liberty. It’s an opportunity we need to ruthlessly exploit. As we continue our painful campaign of conservative self-assessment – itself a tremendously good sign that we intend to learn from our mistakes –we need to look for ways to cut into other groups that our opponents take for granted.
Our opponents have grown lazy. They have also grown old and tired. Their great gray hope Hillary will be a frisky 69 years old in 2016. She’ll energize the youth vote just like the dynamic John McCain did. Their ideas – which all seem to boil down to taking money from people who work to give it to losers who vote for Democrats – are played-out. Their short-term dream of retaking the House (Ha!) and keeping the Senate (Good luck!) are almost certain to be crushed.
It’s glorious.
This is no time to be a pessimist. Americans are natural optimists, and we conservatives have reason to be. The initiative and the momentum are with us in the campaign to take this county back from the liberal elites and their spineless lackeys. We’re going to win, and America is going to rise again.
In fact, I almost feel sorry for our opponents.
Almost.
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