Posts Tagged ‘MITT ROMNEY’
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Politics, Social commentary on May 3, 2017 at 12:10 am
The ancient historian, Plutarch, warned: “And the most glorious episodes do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men.
“Sometimes a matter of less moment, an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and inclinations than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the bloodiest battles.”
It’s well to keep this warning in mind when judging the character of Rick Perry, the former Texas governor who is now Secretary of Energy for the Trump administration.
Five years ago, he was a candidate for President himself.
Anita Perry, his wealthy wife, wanted voters to know she sympathized with the plight of the unemployed.
Anita and Rick Perry
For her, unemployment meant that her son, Griffin, had resigned from his job at Deutsche Bank to campaign for his father.
“He resigned from his job two weeks ago because he can’t go out and campaign with his father because of SEC regulations,” she said in a Pendleton, S.C. diner on October 14, 2011.
The Securities and Exchange Commission had recently adopted stricter rules for investment advisers undertaking political activity.
Anita Perry’s comment came in response to a question from a middle-aged voter who had lost his six-figure job and now worked as a handyman.
“My son lost his job because of this administration,” she added.
Griffin Perry
Blaming the Obama administration is, of course, second-nature for those on the radical right. But Anita Perry may have forgotten that, on October 13, 2011, she said that her son had eagerly resigned.
She recalled that her husband assembled the family to discuss his run for the Presidency last May.
“So, our son Griffin Perry is 28. He loves politics, and he just couldn’t wait. He said ‘Dad, I’m in! I’m in! I’ll do whatever you need me to do. I’ll resign my job. I’ll do what you need me to do.’” she said in a speech at North Greenville University.
Anita Perry might have considered that there is a difference between voluntarily resigning from a job and being involuntarily fired from it.
And she might have consoled herself with the truth that, having a family fortune and the income of his attorney-wife to rely on, Griffin Perry wasn’t in danger of standing in a breadline anytime soon.
So why would Anita Perry stoop to mingling with those she considers her social inferiors? And why would she pour out her woes to people she would otherwise cross the street to avoid?
Simple. She needed them. Or, to be more accurate: She needed their votes.
True, her husband was hauling in huge campaign donations that dwarfed those of his rivals. But money can’t vote.
And with an estimated 14 to 25 million Americans unemployed, the Perrys had to reach beyond the minority of voters who would qualify for their country-club membership.
Of course, the voluntary resignation of her son wasn’t the only complaint Anita Perry had to make.
“We are being brutalized by our opponents, and our own party,” she told a South Carolina audience on October 13, 2011. “So much of that is, I think they look at him, because of his faith.
“He is the only true conservative–well, there are some true conservatives. And they’re there for good reasons. And they may feel like God called them, too. But I truly feel like we are here for that purpose.”
Actually, it was Rick Perry–through his surrogate spokesman-pastor, Robert Jeffress–who had repeatedly attacked the Mormon religion of his then-campaign rival, Mitt Romney.
Jeffress told reporters at the Values Voter Summit in Washington he believed Mormonism was a “cult.” While Perry has said he didn’t agree with the charge, he refused to repudiate the remarks–or support–of the influential Baptist pastor.
It was the same strategy favored by demagogues like President Richard Nixon: The “respectable” Nixon took the high road, while ordering his subordinate, Vice President Spiro Agnew, to attack the patriotism of anyone who dared disagree with him.
Why is all of this important?
Because the priorities of the leader of an organization usually determine the priorities of that organization. And those priorities, in turn, derive from the character of that leader.
So consider the character traits that Perry has so far revealed:
- He used surrogates to attack the religion of his opponents.
- He holds his own religious beliefs sacred.
- He sought to slash programs for the poor.
- He piled up millions of dollars for himself.
- His family believes he has been chosen by God to redeem the nation from becoming “soft” and “Godless.”
- His family believes themselves entitled to ignore laws that are supposed to govern all Americans.
It’s fascinating to imagine the verdict Plutarch would deliver on American politics today. After all, he did shrewdly analyze the ruthless political maneuverings of such despots as Alexander and Julius Caesar.
No doubt, would-be despots like Donald Trump and his self-righteous cronies like Rick Perry would find Plutarch’s verdicts highly upsetting.
And Americans who believe in liberty would find those verdicts incredibly frightening.
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In Business, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on April 28, 2017 at 12:05 am
Mitt Romney never had the chance to portray Marcus Licinius Crassus, once the wealthiest man in ancient Rome.
That part went to Laurence Oliver in the 1960 Kirk Douglas epic, Spartacus.
Laurence Oliver as Marcus Crassus in “Spartacus”
The film depicted a slave revolt led by an escaped Thracian gladiator named Spartacus (Douglas). A revolt that Crassus played a major role in destroying.
Still, Romney–whose wealth is estimated at $250 million–has had the opportunity to play the role of a patrician in real life. And nowhere was it on better display than during a May 17, 2012 private fund-raising event.
Mitt Romney
The event–closed to the press–was nevertheless surreptitiously recorded on video and leaked to Mother Jones magazine.
And Romney’s comments about those Americans who do not share his wealth-given privileges proved fatal to his Presidential campaign.
As F. Scott Fitzgerald said, the “very rich” are “different from you and me.”
To observe that difference, it’s necessary only to compare the attitude of Marcus Crassus–as depicted in Spartacus–with that of Mitt Romney.
SENATOR GAIUS GRACCHUS: The Senate’s been in session all day over this business of Spartacus. We’ve got eight legions to march against him and no one to lead them. The minute you offer the generals command…they start wheezing like winded mules….
CRASSUS: I take it the senate’s now offering command of the legions to me.
GRACCHUS: You’ve been expecting it.
CRASSUS: I have. But have you thought how costly my services might be?
GRACCHUS: We buy everything else these days. No reason why we shouldn’t be charged for patriotism. What’s your fee?
CRASSUS: My election as first consul, command of all the legions of ltaly, and the abolition of Senatorial authority over the courts.
GRACCHUS: Dictatorship.
CRASSUS: Order.
* * * * *
ROMNEY: The division of America, based on going after those who have been successful.
And then I quote Marco Rubio….I just said, Senator Rubio says–when he grew up here poor, that they looked at people that had a lot of wealth.
And his parents never once said, “We need some of what they have. They should give us some.”
Instead they said, “If we work hard and go to school, someday we might be able to have that.”
…And–and so my job is not to worry about those people [the 47% of Americans who allegedly don’t pay taxes and expect the government to assist the poor].
I’ll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for for their lives.
* * * * *
In Spartacus, Crassus becomes dictator of Rome and brutally crushes the slave revolt. Then he aims his fury at his longtime political enemy, Gaius Gracchus, the democratic leader of the Roman Senate–and hero to the poor.
CRASSUS: Did you truly believe 500 years of Rome could so easily be delivered into the clutches of a mob? Already the bodies of 6,000 crucified slaves line the Appian Way….
As those slaves have died, so will your rabble if they falter one instant in loyalty to the new order of affairs. The enemies of the state are known. Arrests are in progress. The prisons begin to fill….
Yet upon you I have no desire for vengeance. Your property shall not be touched. You will retain the rank and title of Roman senator. A house, a farmhouse in Picenum has been provided for your exile. You may take your women with you.
GRACCHUS: Why am I to be left so conspicuously alive?
CRASSUS: Your followers are deluded enough to trust you. I intend that you shall speak to them tomorrow for their own good, their peaceful and profitable future.
From time to time thereafter, I may find it useful to bring you back to Rome to continue your duty to her to calm the envious spirit and the troubled mind. You will persuade them to accept destiny and order, and trust the gods!
* * * * *
ROMNEY: The 5 to 6 or 7 percent that we have to bring onto our side—they all voted for Barack Obama four years ago….And because they voted for him, they don’t want to be told that they were wrong, that he’s a bad guy, that he did bad things, that he’s corrupt.
Those people that we have to get, they want to believe they did the right thing, but he just wasn’t up to the task.
But…you and I, we spend our day with Republicans. We spend our days with people who agree with us. And these people are people who voted for him and don’t agree with us.
And so the things that animate us are not the things that animate them….
If it looks like I’m going to win, the markets will be happy. If it looks like the President’s going to win, the markets should not be terribly happy….
My own view is that if we win on November 6th, there will be a great deal of optimism about the future of this country. We’ll see capital come back and we’ll see—without actually doing anything—we’ll actually get a boost in the economy.
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In Business, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on April 27, 2017 at 12:06 am
Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand.
They think, deep in their hearts, that they are better than we are because we had to discover the compensations and refuges of life for ourselves. Even when they enter deep into our world or sink below us, they still think that they are better than we are. They are different.
–F. Scott Fitzgerald
The 1960 Kirk Douglas epic, Spartacus, may soon prove to be more than great entertainment. It may also turn out to be a prophecy of the end of the American Republic.
In the movie, Spartacus (Douglas), a Roman slave, entertains Marcus Crassus (Laurence Oliver) the richest man in Rome. He does so by fighting to the death as a gladiator.
While Spartacus and his fellow gladiator/friend, Draba, slash and stab at each other in the arena, Crassus idly chats with his fellow patrician crony, Marcus Glabrus.
Crassus has just secured Glabrus’ appointment as commander of the garrison of Rome. Glabrus is grateful, but curious as to how he did it.
After all, Gaius Gracchus, the democratic leader of the Roman Senate, hates Crassus, and eagerly opposes his every move.
“I fought fire with oil,” says Crassus. “I purchased the Senate behind his back.”
Just as Crassus bought the Roman Senate in Spartacus, so, too, did Mitt Romney and his billionaire supporters try to buy the 2012 Presidential election.
Anyone who doubts this need only examine the controversial video of Romney addressing a private fund-raiser on May 17, 2012. The location: The home of controversial private equity manager Marc Leder, in Boca Raton, Florida.
True, the Romney Presidential campaign ended in disaster. But that of Donald Trump ended in a victory for plutocrats–of which Trump is one.
Thus, the values exhibited by Mitt Romney and warned about by F. Scott Fitzgerald now find their champions in Trump and a wealth-worshiping Congress.
In fact, it’s fascinating to compare some of the remarks of Olivier’s Crassus with some of those by Romney. Doing so will offer useful insights into the values of the super wealthy.
It is the wealthy, after all, who essentially own Congress–and who belong to it. Of the 535 men and women who control the House of Representatives and the Senate, more than half are worth $1 million or more
For both men are truly spokesmen for the privileged moneyed class–of which they themselves are pre-eminent members.
CRASSUS [speaking of Gaius Gracchus, the democratic leader of the Roman Senate]: For Gracchus, hatred of the patrician class is a profession, and not such a bad one, either. How else can one become master of the mob, and first senator of Rome?
Laurence Oliver as Marcus Crassus in “Spartacus”
* * * * *
ROMNEY: What he’s [President Barack Obama] gonna do, by the way, is try and vilify me as someone who’s been successful. Or who’s– or who’s, you know, closed businesses or laid people off and this is an evil bad guy. And that may work.
Mitt Romney
* * * * *
CRASSUS [To Julius Caesar]: For years, your family and mine have been members of the Equestrian Order and the Patrician Party. servants and rulers of Rome. Why have you left us for Gracchus and the mob?
CAESAR: I’ve left no one, least of all Rome. This much I’ve learned from Gracchus: Rome is the mob.
CRASSUS: No! Rome is an eternal thought in the mind of God.
CAESAR: I had no idea you’d grown religious.
CRASSUS: That doesn’t matter. If there were no gods at all, I’d revere them. If there were no Rome, I’d dream of her…as I want you to do. I want you to come back to your own kind. I beg you to.
CAESAR: Is it me you want or is it the garrison [of Rome, which Caesar now commands]?
CRASSUS: Both. Tell me frankly. If you were l, would you take the field against Spartacus?
CAESAR: Of course.
CRASSUS: Why?
CAESAR: We have no other choice if we’re to save Rome.
CRASSUS: Ah, Caesar! Which Rome? Theirs…or ours?
* * * * *
ROMNEY: Well, there are 47% of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right? There are 47% who are with him.
Who are dependent upon government, who believe that–that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they’re entitled to healthcare, to food, to housing, to you name it.
But that’s–it’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president [Barack Obama] no matter what.
And–and–I mean the President starts off with 48%, 49%, 40–or he….starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax. 47% of Americans pay no income taxes. So our message of low taxes doesn’t connect. And he’ll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean that’s what they sell every….four years.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Politics, Social commentary on March 24, 2017 at 12:47 am
During the 2008 Presidential race, Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin turned slander into an art form.
Her most poisonous charge: That Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama would make “death panels” a part of his proposed healthcare program.
Sarah Palin
But in 2012, she supported a candidate–Mitt Romney–who made his fortune through the “death panels” of his investors.
In 1983, Bill Bain, a management consultant, gave Romney a risky assignment: Launch Bain Capital, a private equity offshoot of his profitable consulting firm Bain & Company.
Mitt Romney
But there was a catch: Romney couldn’t raise money from Bain’s current clients. If the private equity venture failed, the consulting firm mustn’t disappear with it.
Romney and his partners considered a wide range of options.
Finally, they settled on one: A group of oligarchs from El Salvador were seeking new investment opportunities.
Romney decided to meet with them.
He flew to Miami in mid-1984 and met with the Salvadorans at a local bank. Both sides left happy with their arrangement.
The Salvadorans invested about $9 million–40% of Bain Capital’s initial outside funding.
Among those investors: Ricardo Poma, Miguel Dueñas, Pancho Soler, Frank Kardonski, and Diego Ribadeneira.
Two other wealthy and powerful El Salvadoran families–those of de Sola and Salaverria–also became founding investors in Bain Capital.
Determined to retain their privileged status, members of these families were directly or indirectly funding right-wing death squads in El Salvador.
The squads’ targets were reformers and left-wing guerrillas. According to a United Nations study, at least 75,000 were killed in the Salvadoran civil war between 1979 and 1992.
Death squad victims
By 1982, 35,000 civilians had been murdered–with right-wing death squads responsible for most of the killings, stated El Salvador’s independent Human Rights Commission.
Much of this carnage happened during the Reagan Administration (1981-1989), when right-wingers in Washington found common cause with those in Central America.
Romney’s highly lucrative dealings with men linked to Central American death squads have been verified by such publications as the Huffington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe and the Salt Lake Tribune.
A major reason why Romney refused to release more than two years’ worth of his tax returns could have been this: He had more to hide than just how little in taxes he had paid.
Some of those financial disclosures might lead–literally–to hundreds or even thousands of bodies dumped into unmarked graves throughout El Salvador.
The most prominent victim of those right-wing death squads was Oscar Romero, the archbishop of San Salvador. A longtime champion of the poor, he was celebrating Mass on March 24, 1980, when he was shot to death before his horrified congregation.
Oscar Romero
The murder was ordered by Major Roberto D’Aubuisson, founder of the right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party.
Roberto D’Aubuisson
After Obama’s election as President in 2008, Republicans bitterly opposed his efforts to provide all Americans–and not simply the richest 1%–with healthcare insurance.
Those efforts ultimately bore fruit as the Affordable Care Act–otherwise known as Obamacare.
As one of those Republican opponents, Sarah Palin repeatedly claimed that Obama intended to create government “death panels” to murder elderly and disabled patients.
Although she never offered a shred of evidence for this allegation, millions of American right-wingers eagerly believed it.
On the other hand, multiple and reputable sources demonstrated how Mitt Romney made money through men who either commanded death squads or were linked to others who did.
But Palin never had a single word of criticism for the man who would become the Republican nominee for President.
Little is reliably known about the full extent of Romney’s complex financial dealings. That’s why his refusal to release more than two years’ tax returns became an issue that wouldn’t go away.
Romney released only his 2010 returns and an estimate for his 2011 returns. But his own father, Michigan Governor George Romney, released 12 years of tax returns during his 1968 run for the presidency.
Perhaps Romney had nothing to hide and refused to release his tax returns out of sheer stubbornness.
But if he were truly innocent of any wrongdoing–financial or otherwise–then it would have been in his own best interests to make the returns public. And as quickly as possible.
This is, after all, a longstanding tradition among candidates for President. And doing so would have instantly squelched rumors and accusations that he had something sinister or embarrassing to hide.
Instead, Romney and his wife, Ann, acted as though the White House belonged to them by divine right. And that no one had the right to ask them any questions they didn’t want to answer.
During an interview with NBC News, Romney said: “We have been very transparent to what’s legally required of us. There’s going to be no more tax releases given.”
Romney could have followed the sterling example set by his father–whom he clearly admires–anytime he wished to.
But he didn’t.
Americans may never know if “the man from Bain” has the blood of Archbishop Romero–or other El Salvadoran death squad victim––on his hands.
And if Romney does know, he isn’t saying.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on December 6, 2016 at 12:12 am
When Republicans say, “We need to support our President,” they don’t mean every President.
They mean: Every Republican President. And only every Republican President.
For Republicans, Presidents elected by Democrats are to be obstructed as often as possible–and impeached whenever possible.
On October 1, 2013, Congressional Republicans shut down the government in an attempt to force President Barack Obama to de-fund his signature achievement: The Affordable Care Act (ACA).
President Obama refused, and 800,000 federal workers were furloughed.
On October 13, 2013, anti-Obama protesters gathered at the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C. They were angry because the memorial had been closed to the public.
They weren’t angry at the Republicans who had shut down the government. They were angry at the President.
World War II Memorial
One speaker was Larry Klayman of Freedom Watch, a Right-wing advocacy group. “I call upon all of you to wage a Second Amendment nonviolent revolution, to use civil disobedience, and to demand that this president leave town, to get up, put the Koran down, to get up off his knees, and to figuratively come out with his hands up.”
On October 14, while Republicans were threatening to drive the nation into bankruptcy by refusing to raise the debt ceiling, former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin posted on Facebook her “secret plan” to impeach President Obama:
“It’s time for the president to be honest with the American people for a change. Defaulting on our national debt is an impeachable offense, and any attempt by President Obama to unilaterally raise the debt limit without Congress is also an impeachable offense.”
Sarah Palin
In short: If the Republicans force the country into default, Obama should be impeached. And if the President finds a way to avoid default, he should be impeached.
On October 16, the shutdown collapsed. The ACA continued to provide health insurance to millions of Americans too poor to afford to buy it.
The 2008 election of Barack Obama created a virtual overnight publishing industry for Right-wing authors. The titles of those books clearly reflected the hates, fears and ambitions of their authors–and audience:
- Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama’s Radical Agenda by Sean Hannity
- Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation by Jason Mattera
- How Barack Obama is Bankrupting the U.S. Economy by Stephen Moore
- The Manchurian President: Barack Obama’s Ties to Communists, Socialists and Other Anti-American Extremists by Aaron Klein
- The Blueprint: Obama’s Plan to Subvert the Constitution and Build an Imperial Presidency by Ken Blackwell
- Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Croniesby Michelle Malkin
- To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular-Socialist Machine by Newt Gingrich
- Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America by Christopher C. Horner
- Obama’s Betrayal of Israel by Michael Ledeen
- Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right by Ann Coulter
- The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality by Jerome R. Corsi
- The War On Success: How the Obama Agenda Is Shattering the American Dream by Tommy Newberry
- Liberalism is a Mental Disorder: Savage Solutions by Michael Savage
- Catastrophe: How Obama, Congress and the Special Interests Are Transforming…a Slump into a Crash, Freedom Into Socialism and a Disaster into a Catastrophe….And How to Fight Back by Dick Morris
- Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism by Ann Coulter
- Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them by Steven Milloy
- How the Obama Administration Threatens to Undermine Our Elections by John Fund
Liberals…catastrophe…shattering the American dream…leftists…communism…government terrorism…global warming myth…terrorism…socialism…secularism…environmentalism…takeover….corruption…betrayal…radicals…bankrupting…treason…subversion…slander…power grab.
These are the themes repeated endlessly by the American Right and its publishing industry.
Whether by accident or design, these works owe their popular success to the ultimate Right-winger of history: Adolf Hitler.
In Mein Kampf—“My Struggle”–his prophetic warning of the future to come, Hitler outlined his principles for the effective use of propaganda.
These are:
“The broad masses of the people are not made up of diplomats or professors of public jurisprudence nor simply of persons who are able to form reasoned judgment in given cases, but a vacillating crowd of human children who are constantly wavering between one idea and another.
“The great majority of a nation is…ruled by sentiment rather than by sober reasoning.
“This sentiment, however, is not complex, but simple and consistent. It is not highly differentiated, but has only the negative and positive notions of love and hatred, right and wrong, truth and falsehood.
“Propaganda must not investigate the truth objectively and…must present only that aspect of the truth which is favorable to its own side….The receptive powers of the masses are very restricted, and their understanding is feeble. On the other hand, they quickly forget.
“Such being the case, all effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials and those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotyped formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward.”
The Right has followed Hitler’s instructions to the letter.
The election of Donald Trump is the end result of it.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on December 5, 2016 at 1:10 am
On November 8, real estate mogul and reality TV showman Donald Trump was elected as the 45th President of the United States.
But millions of Americans are sickened that a self-confessed “pussy-grabber” will soon inherit the Oval Office.
One day after Trump’s election, thousands blocked traffic and flooded thoroughfares across the nation to protest his victory. Demonstrators clashed with police in Seattle, Berkeley, Portland, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston and Manhattan.
Thousands more declared on social media that Trump is “never my President” or “not my President.”
Since then, Republicans and their Right-wing allies have thundered: “He’s our President now, and we must all get behind him.”
Another often-heard Republican demand: “We need to give President Trump a chance!”
Of course, Republicans took exactly the opposite position after Illinois’ U.S. Senator Barack Obama won the Presidency in 2008.
Even before Obama was inaugurated, on January 20, 2009, Republican Senators agreed that they would block every legislative proposal the new President offered.
President Barack Obama
It didn’t matter whether the proposals offered concrete solutions for America’s ills. All that mattered was that they came from a Democratic President–and, worse, a black one.
Kentucky U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell summed it up: “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”
Since 1945, Republicans have charged “Traitor!” against anyone who dared to run against them for office or think other than Republican-sponsored thoughts. Among the foremost members of this decades-long treason chorus:
- Senator Joseph R. McCarthy;
- Senator/President Richard M. Nixon;
- Vice President Spiro Agnes;
- Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich;
- Broadcaster Rush Limbaugh;
And since the 2008 election of Barack Obama, Republicans have increasingly wooed voters with subtle and outright appeals to racism.
Most Republicans refuse to acknowledge this, but author Will Bunch has not been so reticent. In his 2010 book, The Backlash, he writes:
“…The year that had [conservatives] so terrified was 2050. In that year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. population would grow to some 399 million people–but only 49.8% would be white….”
This was given added weight by the 2008 election of Barack Obama:
“The Democratic upstart–and his legion of supporters among the nonwhite as well as the young–was a 9/11-sized jolt to the white masses already so worried about the cultural implications of immigration.
“The year 2050 suddenly wasn’t two generations away but right here knocking on the front door, with a dark face and that scary name: Barack Hussein Obama.
“Like a fire spreading across dry sagebrush, it took no effort for fear of The Other to leap from the Mexicans in front of the Wal-Mart to the man now inside the Oval Office.”
For Republicans, the Presidency of Barack Obama excited contempt and hatred:
- In September, 2009, Joe Wilson (R-SC) yelled “You lie!” during Obama’s health care speech to Congress.
- In January, 2010, an effigy of President Barack Obama was found hanging from a building in Plains, Georgia.
- In December, 2011, Brent Bozell, who runs the right-wing Media Research Center, called Obama to “a skinny, ghetto crackhead.”
- In December, 2011, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wisc.), said of Michelle Obama: “She lectures us on eating right while she has a large posterior herself.”
- In January, 2012, Mitt Romney’s son, Matt, said his father might release his tax returns “as soon as President Obama releases his grades and birth certificate and sort of a long list of things.”
- In February, 2012, right-wing columnist Ann Coulter offered: “Voters with forty years of politically correct education are ecstatic to have the first Black president. They just love the idea even if we did get Flavor Flav instead of Thomas Sowell.”
- In May, 2012, a flatbed truck drove through new York holding a trailer with eight mannequin-like bodies hanging on nooses. One of the figures resembled President Obama, with a sign on the truck reading: “Obama Is Onboard, Find Out Why. Visit YouTube.com And Search Keyword PatriotPhipps.”
- In May, 2012, Patrick Lanzo, a bar owner in Paulding County, Georgia, posted a sign reading: “I do not support the nigger in the White House.” In 2009 he posted a sign that read, “Obama’s plan for health-care: nigger rig it.” Lanzo advertises his establishment as a “Klan bar.”
- Throughout the 2012 Presidential campaign, Newt Gingrich repeatedly called Obama “the greatest food stamp President in American history.”
- Obama has been portrayed as a shoeshine man, an Islamic terrorist and a chimp. The image of his altered face has been shown on a product called Obama Waffles in the manner of Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben. He has been repeatedly depicted with a Hitler forelock and mustache.
- Among the protest signs they have brandished by Tea Party members: “Obama’s Plan: White Slavery,” “The American Taxpayers are the Jews for Obama’s Ovens,” and “Obama was Not Bowing [to the Saudi King] He was Sucking Saudi Jewels.”
- Other Tea Party posters: “Imam Obama Wants to Ban Pork” and “The Zoo Has An African Lion, and the White House Has a Lyin’ African.”
- Tea Partiers have chanted at Obama: “Bye, bye, Blackbird” and “Kenyan go home!”
- During the Republican-imposed government shutdown–October 1-17, 2013–Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) told Obama: “I cannot even stand to look at you,” The incident occurred when Obama met with lawmakers to try to find a resolution to the shutdown.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on September 27, 2016 at 12:05 am
It didn’t take much for American Right-wingers to start salivating–and celebrating.
All it took was for Russia to move troops into its neighboring territories of Ukraine and Crimea.
Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the American Right felt dejected. Accusing Democrats of being “terrorist-lovers” just hadn’t been as profitable as accusing them of being “Communists.”
The torch had barely gone out at the much-ballyhooed 2014 Sochi Olympics when Russian President Vladimir Putin began menacing the Ukraine.
Even while the Olympics played out on television, Ukrainians had rioted in Kiev and evicted their corrupt, luxury-loving president, Victor Yanukovych.
And this, of course, didn’t sit well with his “sponsor”–Putin.
Yanukovych had rejected a pending European Union association agreement. He had chosen instead to pursue a Russian loan bailout and closer ties with Russia.
And that had sat well with Putin.
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Putin had yearned for a reestablishment of the same. He had called that breakup “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century.”
So it was almost a certainty that, when his chosen puppet, Yanukovych, was sent packing, Putin would find some way to retaliate.
And since late February, 2014, he has done so, gradually moving Russian troops into Ukraine and its autonomous republic, Crimea.
Vladimir Putin
By late March, it was clear that Russia had sufficient forces in both Ukraine and Crimea to wreak any amount of destruction Putin may wish to inflict.
And where there is activity by Russians, there are American Rightists eager–in Shakespeare’s word–to “cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.”
Or at least to use such events to their own political advantage.
Right-wingers such as Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachussetts who lost the 2012 Presidential election by a wide margin to Barack Obama.
“There’s no question but that the president’s naiveté with regards to Russia,” said Romney on March 23, 2014.
“And unfortunately, not having anticipated Russia’s intentions, the president wasn’t able to shape the kinds of events that may have been able to prevent the kinds of circumstances that you’re seeing in the Ukraine, as well as the things that you’re seeing in Syria.”
All of which overlooks a number of brutal political truths.
First, all great powers have spheres of interest–and jealously guard them.
For the United States, it’s Latin and Central America, as established by the Monroe Doctrine.
And just what is the Monroe Doctrine?
It’s a statement made by President James Monroe in his 1823 annual message to Congress, which warned European powers not to interfere in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere.
It has no other legitimacy than the willingness of the United States to use armed force to back it up. When the United States no longer has the will or resources to enforce the Doctrine, it will cease to have meaning.
For the Soviet Union, its spheres of influence include the Ukraine. Long known as “the breadbasket of Russia,” in 2011, it was the world’s third-largest grain exporter.
Russia will no more give up access to that breadbasket than the United States would part with the rich farming states of the Midwest.
Second, spheres of influence often prove disastrous to those smaller countries affected.
Throughout Latin and Central America, the United States remains highly unpopular for its brutal use of “gunboat diplomacy” during the 20th century.
American gunboat
Among those countries invaded or controlled by America: Mexico, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Columbia, Panama and the Dominican Republic.
The resulting anger has led many Latin and Central Americans to support Communist Cuba, even though its political oppression and economic failure are universally apparent.
Similarly, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) forced many nations–such as Poland, Hungary and Czechoslavakia–to submit to the will of Moscow.
The alternative? The threat of Soviet invasion–as occurred in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968.
Third, even “great powers” are not all-powerful.
In 1949, after a long civil war, the forces of Mao Tse-tung defeated the Nationalist armies of Chaing Kai-Shek, who withdrew to Taiwan.
China had never been a territory of the United States. Nor could the United States have prevented Mao from defeating the corrupt, ineptly-led Nationalist forces.
Even so, Republican Senators and Representatives such as Richard Nixon and Joseph McCarthy eagerly blamed President Harry S. Truman and the Democrats for “losing China.”
The fear of being accused of “losing” another country led Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard M. Nixon to tragically commit the United States to “roll back” Communism in Cuba and Vietnam.
Now Republicans–who claim the United States can’t afford to provide healthcare for its poorest citizens–want to turn the national budget over to the Pentagon.
They want the United States to “intervene” in Syria–even though this civil war pits Al Qaeda and Hezbollah, two of America’s greatest enemies, against each other.
They want the United States to “intervene” in Ukraine–even though this would mean going to war with the only nuclear power capable of turning America into an atomic graveyard.
Before plunging into conflicts that don’t concern us and where there is absolutely nothing to “win,” Americans would do well to remember the above-stated lessons of history. And to learn from them.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on September 8, 2016 at 1:21 am
In late July, Donald Trump’s new spokeswoman, Katrina Pierson, accepted an impossible mission that even Jim Phelps would have turned down:
Convince Americans that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were responsible for the death of Captain Humayun Khan, who was killed by a truck-bomb in Iraq in 2004.
Appearing on CNN’s The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer on August 2, Pierson said: “It was under Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton that changed the rules of engagements that probably cost his life.”
Katrina Pierson
Totally ignored in that scenario:
- President George W. Bush lied the nation into a needless war that cost the lives of 4,486 Americans and wounded another 33,226.
- The war began in 2003–and Khan was killed in 2004.
- Barack Obama became President in 2009–almost five years after Khan’s death.
- Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State the same year.
- Obama, elected Illinois U.S. Senator in 2004, vigorously opposed the Iraq war throughout his term.
Pierson’s attempt to rewrite history touched off a frenzy on Twitter, leading to the creation of the hashtag #KatrinaPiersonHistory. Its purpose: To mock Pierson’s revisionist take on history.
Among the tweets offered:
- Hillary Clinton slashed funding for security at the Ford Theater, leading to Lincoln’s assassination.
- Obama gave Amelia Earhart directions to Kenya.
- Remember the Alamo? Obama and Hillary let it happen.
- Obama and Clinton kidnapped the Lindbergh baby.
Not content with blaming President Obama for the death of a man he never sent into combat, Pierson claimed that Obama started the Afghanistan war.
Appearing again on CNN, Pierson said the Afghan war began “after 2007,” when Al Qaeda “was in ashes” following the American troop surge in Iraq.
“Remember, we weren’t even in Afghanistan by this time,” Pierson said. “Barack Obama went into Afghanistan, creating another problem.”
In fact, President George W. Bush ordered the invasion of Afghanistan following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Millions of Americans who lived through 9/11 remember that.
When your spokeswoman becomes a nationwide laughingstock, your own credibility goes down the toilet as well.
In July an Associated Press/GfK poll found that half of Americans saw Donald Trump as “racist”–and only 7% of blacks viewed him favorably.
There are numerous reasons for this:
- His enthusiastic support by racist white supremacist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party.
- His “birther” attacks on President Obama as a non-citizen from Kenya–and thus ineligible to hold the Presidency.
- His attacks on the Black Lives Matter movement and calling on his supporters at rallies to rough up minority protesters.
Since 1964, blacks have overwhelmingly voted for Democratic Presidential candidates. President Lyndon B. Johnson’s won their loyalty with his support for and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
President Johnson signing the 1964 Civil Rights Act
Republican Presidential candidate Barry Goldwater opposed it–as did the majority of his party.
Since 1964, fewer than six percent of blacks have voted for Republican Presidential candidates. Whites have not only remained the majority of Republican voters but have become the single most important voting bloc among them.
John McCain received four percent of black votes in 2008 and Mitt Romney received six percent in 2012. When a Republican collapses into single digits among blacks and other minorities, it reduces the number of white votes a Democrat needs to win the presidency.
To counter this, Donald Trump has turned to his Director of African-American Outreach: Omarosa Manigault.
Trump made the appointment just hours before the first night of the Republican National Convention.
Omarosa Manigault
Manigault is best known as the villain of Trump’s reality-TV show, “The Apprentice”–where she was fired on three different seasons. Her credentials include a Ph.D. in communications, a preacher’s license, and topping TV Guide’s list of greatest reality TV villains in 2008.
During the Clinton administration she held four jobs in two years, and was thoroughly disliked in all of them.
“She was asked to leave [her last job] as quickly as possible, she was so disruptive,” said Cheryl Shavers, the former Under Secretary for Technology at the Commerce Department. “One woman wanted to slug her.”
In her role as Trump’s ambassador to blacks, Omarosa has inspired others to want to slug her. Appearing on Fox Business, she ignored Fox panelist Tamera Holder’s question on why blacks should support Trump,and then mocked her “big boobs.”
Manigault isn’t bothered that blacks regard Trump so poorly in polls: “My reality is that I’m surrounded by people who want to see Donald Trump as the next president of the United States who are African-American.”
Appointing as your public relations director a woman who gratuitously insults and infuriates people is not the move of a smart administrator. Nor the move of a smart Presidential candidate.
If Donald Trump becomes President, he will inherit the authority to appoint thousands of officials to domestic and foreign agencies. Voters have a right to judge him on the quality of the appointments he has already made to his own campaign.
A review of those named within this series gives serious cause for concern.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on September 7, 2016 at 12:18 am
Even the Secret Service can’t protect Donald Trump from the notoriety of his supporters.
The current manager of Trump’s Presidential campaign is Stephen Bannon, who’s under fire for anti-Semitic remarks and having been registered to vote at a vacant house in Florida.
But before Bannon signed on, his predecessor was Paul Manafort, whom Trump hired to add stability to his often scattershot campaign.
Paul Manafort
For Trump, Manafort came with a dangerous liability: His longstanding ties to pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine–which inevitably led to Vladimir Putin.
For years, Manafort worked for Viktor Yanukovych, a Putin protege who was deposed as Ukraine’s president in 2014 amid widespread demonstrations.
In August, the New York Times unearthed handwritten ledgers that listed $12.7 million in cash payments to Manafort from Yanukovych’s political party between 2007 and 2012.
Trump’s own ties to Putin were already facing increasing scrutiny for a number of reasons:
- Trump’s and Putin’s public expressions of admiration for each other’s toughness.
- The removal from the Republican party platform, written at the convention in Cleveland in July, of references to arming Ukraine in its fight against pro-Russian rebels who have been armed by the Kremlin.
- In July, high-ranking Democratic officials–including presumptive Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton–were embarrassed by a hack of thousands of Democratic National Committee emails. This was quickly traced to Russian hackers allegedly working on behalf of the Kremlin. Their alleged motive: To tip the election in favor of Trump.
- Trump drew more suspicion upon himself by inviting Russia to find 30,000 emails deleted from the private server used by Clinton while she was Secretary of State in the Obama administration: “I think you will probably be mightily rewarded by our press.”
Added to Manafort’s embarrassing ties to Russia was another minus: He and Trump didn’t get along. Trump had begun calling him “low energy”–a term he once aimed at his former GOP rival, Jeb Bush.
Manafort wanted Trump to bring more self-discipline to the campaign and concentrate his fire solely on his Presidential rival, Hillary Clinton. Instead, in late July, Trump ignited a days-long feud with members of a Gold Star family, costing him support within the veterans community.
Manafort also wanted Trump to establish a conventional chain-of-command organization typical of a Presidential campaign. But Trump resisted, preferring to improvise and rely on his instincts and the counsel of his family.
In late August, Trump fired him.
Foreign policy nearly always plays a major role in Presidential elections. Yet Trump has shown a surprising lack of respect for a detailed knowledge of it.
Asked on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” who he consults about foreign policy, Trump replied; “I’m speaking with myself, number one, because I have a very good brain and I’ve said a lot of things.”
In late August, former Republican Congresswoman (2007-2015) Michele Bachmann claimed that she was now advising Trump on foreign policy.
Michele Bachmann
A member of the Right-wing Tea Party, Bachmann has said that diplomacy “is our option” in dealing with Iran–but wouldn’t rule out a nuclear strike.
Among the statements she’s made:
- “I don’t know how much God has to do to get the attention of the politicians. We’ve had an earthquake; we’ve had a hurricane. He said, ‘Are you going to start listening to me here?'”
- “Carbon dioxide is portrayed as harmful. But there isn’t even one study that can be produced that shows that carbon dioxide is a harmful gas.”
- “President Obama waived a ban on arming terrorists in order to allow weapons to go to the Syrian opposition….U.S. taxpayers are now paying to give arms to terrorists, including Al-Qaeda.”
- “I’m a believer in Jesus Christ. As I look at the End Times scripture, this says to me that the leaf is on the fig tree and we are to understand the signs of the times, which is your ministry, we are to understand where we are in God’s end time history.”
A woman who believes that God causes earthquakes and hurricanes, and that mankind has arrived at “End Times,” can hardly be a comfort to rational voters.
Another Trump adviser is former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes. His assignment: Prepare Trump for the upcoming fall debates with Clinton.
But Ailes comes with huge notoriety: In July he was fired from Fox News on multiple charges of sexual harassment.
At first, only Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson dared accuse him. But then more than two dozen women came forward to accuse Ailes of sexual harassment.
On September 6, Carlson reached an out-of-court settlement with the parent company of Fox News for a reported $20 million.
At least two other women have settled with Fox, an anonymous source told the New York Times. And others may be planning to file lawsuits.
All of which makes Ailes the poster boy for sexual harassment.
Trump has been married three times and has often boasted of his sexual conquests–including ones he believes he could have had.
(Shortly after the 1997 death of Princess Diana, he told a radio interviewer he could have “nailed” her if he had wanted to.)
In a mid-March CNN/ORC poll, 73% of female voters voiced a negative view of Trump. Associating with a notorious sexual harasser like Roger Ailes can only do even more damage to his candidacy.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on September 6, 2016 at 12:08 am
“The first impression that one gets of a ruler and his brains is from seeing the men that he has about him.
“When they are competent and loyal one can always consider him wise, as he has been able to recognize their ability and keep them faithful.
“But when they are the reverse, one can always form an unfavorable opinion of him, because the first mistake that he makes is in making this choice.”
So wrote the Italian statesman Niccolo Machiavelli more than 500 years ago in his famous treatise on politics, The Prince.
And his words remain as true in our day as they were in his.
Niccolo Machiavelli
They are especially important to remember when evaluating Donald Trump’s talents as an administrator.
In pursuing the Presidency, he is seeking the most powerful office in the world, one that would give him authority to appoint thousands of officials to domestic and foreign agencies.
Consider some of those he has placed around him in his campaign for President:
Founder of Latinos for Trump Marco Gutierrez told MSNBC’s Joy Reid: “My culture is a very dominant culture. And it’s imposing, and it’s causing problems. If you don’t do something about it, you’re gonna have taco trucks every corner.”
At a Tea Party for Trump rally at a Harley-Davidson dealership in Festus, Missouri, former Missouri Republican Party director Ed Martin reassured the crowd that they’re not racist for hating Mexicans: “Donald Trump is for Americans first.
“He’s for us first. It is not selfish to support, or to be for, your neighbor, as opposed to someone from another nation. And Mexico, Mexicans, that’s not a race. You’re not racist if you don’t like Mexicans. They’re from a nation.”
From the outset of his Presidential campaign, Trump has polled extremely poorly among Hispanic voters. This is perfectly understandable, given his comments about Mexicans as:
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists.”
Trump has also promised to “build a great, great wall on our southern border and I will have Mexico pay for that wall.”
Donald Trump
These comments made Trump the winner of the Republican primaries, where voters always nominate the most extreme Rightist candidate.
But the general election phrase requires Republican and Democratic candidates to appeal to both their base and beyond it. As a result, Trump is now desperate to attract the votes of Hispanics.
Comments such as those by Marco Gutierrez and Ed Martin guarantee this won’t happen.
Wayne Root, opening speaker and master of ceremonies at many Trump events, told Virginia radio host Rob Schilling that people on public assistance and women who get their birth control through Obamacare should not be allowed to vote:
“If the people who paid the taxes were the only ones allowed to vote, we’d [Republicans] have landslide victories. But you’re allowing people to vote. This explains everything! People with conflict of interest shouldn’t be allowed to vote. If you collect welfare, you have no right to vote.
“The day you get off welfare, you get your voting rights back. The reality is, why are you allowed to have this conflict of interest that you vote for the politician who wants to keep your welfare checks coming and your food stamps and your aid to dependent children and your free health care and your Medicaid, your Medicare and your Social Security and everything else?”
Wayne Root
According to a March Gallup poll, 70% of women–or seven in 10–have an unfavorable opinion of Trump.
Such comments as Root’s aren’t going to increase Trump’s popularity with them. Nor with anyone who receives Medicaid, Medicare or Social Security.
Donald Trump’s new campaign manager, Stephen Bannon, was charged with misdemeanor domestic violence, battery, and dissuading a witness in 1996, after an altercation with his then-wife, Mary Louise Piccard, in Santa Monica, California.
Picard also said in a 2007 court declaration that Bannon didn’t want their twin daughters attending the Archer School for Girls in Los Angeles because many Jewish students were enrolled there.
Stephen Bannon
Not only is this certain to lose Trump votes among women, it will make him unpopular among Jews. A campaign manager charged with anti-Semitism could cost Trump heavily Jewish states like New York and Florida.
In addition: Bannon and another ex-wife, Diane Clohesy, were registered to vote at a vacant house in Florida, a possible violation of election laws in a key swing state.
Republicans have vigorously denied voting rights to tens of thousands on the pretext of “voter fraud.” More than a dozen states still have voting restrictions in place since 2012.
A Washington Post investigation found just 31 credible cases of voter fraud from 2000 to 2014, out of an estimated 1 billion ballots cast in the U.S. during that period.
Meanwhile, voting rights groups have been fighting back–and winning.
“Voter ID” laws in Texas, Wisconsin and North Carolina have been found discriminatory against minorities–who traditionally vote Democratic.
With evidence of Republican fraud like that supplied by Trump’s own campaign manager, victories against “Voter ID” laws may well increase.
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AN ANCIENT WARNING THAT APPLIES TODAY
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Politics, Social commentary on May 3, 2017 at 12:10 amThe ancient historian, Plutarch, warned: “And the most glorious episodes do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men.
“Sometimes a matter of less moment, an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and inclinations than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the bloodiest battles.”
It’s well to keep this warning in mind when judging the character of Rick Perry, the former Texas governor who is now Secretary of Energy for the Trump administration.
Five years ago, he was a candidate for President himself.
Anita Perry, his wealthy wife, wanted voters to know she sympathized with the plight of the unemployed.
Anita and Rick Perry
For her, unemployment meant that her son, Griffin, had resigned from his job at Deutsche Bank to campaign for his father.
“He resigned from his job two weeks ago because he can’t go out and campaign with his father because of SEC regulations,” she said in a Pendleton, S.C. diner on October 14, 2011.
The Securities and Exchange Commission had recently adopted stricter rules for investment advisers undertaking political activity.
Anita Perry’s comment came in response to a question from a middle-aged voter who had lost his six-figure job and now worked as a handyman.
“My son lost his job because of this administration,” she added.
Griffin Perry
Blaming the Obama administration is, of course, second-nature for those on the radical right. But Anita Perry may have forgotten that, on October 13, 2011, she said that her son had eagerly resigned.
She recalled that her husband assembled the family to discuss his run for the Presidency last May.
“So, our son Griffin Perry is 28. He loves politics, and he just couldn’t wait. He said ‘Dad, I’m in! I’m in! I’ll do whatever you need me to do. I’ll resign my job. I’ll do what you need me to do.’” she said in a speech at North Greenville University.
Anita Perry might have considered that there is a difference between voluntarily resigning from a job and being involuntarily fired from it.
And she might have consoled herself with the truth that, having a family fortune and the income of his attorney-wife to rely on, Griffin Perry wasn’t in danger of standing in a breadline anytime soon.
So why would Anita Perry stoop to mingling with those she considers her social inferiors? And why would she pour out her woes to people she would otherwise cross the street to avoid?
Simple. She needed them. Or, to be more accurate: She needed their votes.
True, her husband was hauling in huge campaign donations that dwarfed those of his rivals. But money can’t vote.
And with an estimated 14 to 25 million Americans unemployed, the Perrys had to reach beyond the minority of voters who would qualify for their country-club membership.
Of course, the voluntary resignation of her son wasn’t the only complaint Anita Perry had to make.
“We are being brutalized by our opponents, and our own party,” she told a South Carolina audience on October 13, 2011. “So much of that is, I think they look at him, because of his faith.
“He is the only true conservative–well, there are some true conservatives. And they’re there for good reasons. And they may feel like God called them, too. But I truly feel like we are here for that purpose.”
Actually, it was Rick Perry–through his surrogate spokesman-pastor, Robert Jeffress–who had repeatedly attacked the Mormon religion of his then-campaign rival, Mitt Romney.
Jeffress told reporters at the Values Voter Summit in Washington he believed Mormonism was a “cult.” While Perry has said he didn’t agree with the charge, he refused to repudiate the remarks–or support–of the influential Baptist pastor.
It was the same strategy favored by demagogues like President Richard Nixon: The “respectable” Nixon took the high road, while ordering his subordinate, Vice President Spiro Agnew, to attack the patriotism of anyone who dared disagree with him.
Why is all of this important?
Because the priorities of the leader of an organization usually determine the priorities of that organization. And those priorities, in turn, derive from the character of that leader.
So consider the character traits that Perry has so far revealed:
It’s fascinating to imagine the verdict Plutarch would deliver on American politics today. After all, he did shrewdly analyze the ruthless political maneuverings of such despots as Alexander and Julius Caesar.
No doubt, would-be despots like Donald Trump and his self-righteous cronies like Rick Perry would find Plutarch’s verdicts highly upsetting.
And Americans who believe in liberty would find those verdicts incredibly frightening.
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