A broad majority of Americans are convinced the United States is in decline. The first years of the early twenty first century provide a stunning contrast to the optimistic, can-do attitude of the postwar years in which the Baby Boomer generation was raised.
- 62% of Americans believe the United States is in decline.
- 76% of Republicans, 64% of Independents, and 43% of Democrats believe this despite the "hope and change" promised by the Obama administration.
- 58% of the young and 57% of the old believe America is on a downward slide.
- 73% of Americans believe Washington has too much power.
These numbers reflect a total repudiation of the progressive worldview.
Americans don't have confidence in the federal government to improve their lives. They don't believe Washington technocrats and bureaucrats should be empowered to solve our national problems. They don't believe Congress is doing its job. They don't even believe Congress is willing to listen to them anymore.
Who can blame them?
Consider the following recent news items:
1.) The Obama administration is searching for a way to pass a stealth amnesty without the authorization of Congress. Having failed to pass "comprehensive immigration reform," the federal government has decided to impose its will on the public anyway.
Who cares about annoying federal statutes or antiquated notions like consent of the governed? The Obama administration picks and chooses which laws to enforce on the basis of the political advantage it accrues to the Democratic Party.
In the absence of a clear legal mandate, the Obama administration simply exercises its royal prerogative and dictates public policy on the basis of its own authority, flagrantly violating the separation of powers inherent in the Constitution.
2.) The twisted logic of Judge Bolton's decision has now been exposed to public view. The inconveniences imposed on "legal aliens" are laughable. The Obama administration doesn't want the law enforced and persuaded a Clinton appointed Democratic political hack to neuter it.
3.) 72% of Americans (with good reason) do not believe the federal government is willing to enforce our immigration laws.
4.) Eric Holder's Justice Department issued a recent statement that essentially said "sanctuary cities" are fine. A city can defy federal law if doing so works to the political advantage of the Obama administration. On the other hand, a state can be sued in federal court for enforcing federal law.
The federal government doesn't want Arizona to enforce this particular federal law, which it dislikes, but requires Arizona on other states to enforce all the other federal laws. This makes a mockery out the rule of law.
5.) The Obama administration recently signed the Trial Law and Order act. This laws allows tribal police officers to enforce federal law on Indian reservations. Indian tribes are given the power to enforce federal law, but not state officers.
Indian reservations even have the power to enforce federal law "whether or not the offender is an Indian." In this case, the Obama administration has completely dropped its faux opposition to racial profiling.
6.) You're probably thinking it couldn't possibly get worse.
The sympathies of the Obama administration are wholly with illegal aliens over native citizens, with tax consumers over taxpayers, with the "protected classes" of citizens over the unprotected, and with lawbreakers over the law abiding.
Now the Obama administration is pushing to neuter the drug laws and appoint leftwing activists to the Supreme Court for it can stuff the voting rolls with as many felons and criminals as possible. This also works to the advantage of the Democratic Party.
A common thread runs through all these stories: the American people are no longer governed by the Constitution or laws, but by an entrenched political class that will flaunt, ignore, pick and chose, and make up laws that suit its political and material interests.
Nancy Pelosi promised to create "the most honest, most open, and most ethical Congress in history," a Congress which turned out to be riddled with corruption, which doesn't even bother to pretend to represent the American people anymore.
Americans are unlikely to put up with being arrogantly treated like subjects for long. George W. Bush received a "thumping" in 2006, but Democrats are inviting a reckoning in 2010.
Some Democracy
Government of the Ruling Class, By the Ruling Class, For the Ruling Class
Next time you hear Barack Hussein Obama sing the praises of American democracy to foreigners, consider the following facts about our great society:
- 68% of Americans want to complete the Mexican border fence. 21% of Americans oppose its construction. In March, the Obama administration halted construction of the fence.
- 76% of mainstream voters think the border fence should be completed. 67% of the political class are opposed to it.
Like Louis XVI at Versailles, Barack Obama and the political class thumb their noses at the will of the people, and sue a state for protecting itself from invasion.
- 11% of Americans have a "great deal" or "a lot" of confidence in Congress. 76% of Americans have a "great deal" or "a lot" of confidence in the military.
American democracy has declined to the point where a dictator - an American Pinochet - would be more popular than the House of Representatives under Nancy Pelosi.
- 56% of Americans oppose the Justice Department lawsuit against Arizona. 61% of Americans want Arizona's law in their own state. 54% of Americans think the federal government should crack down on "sanctuary cities."
The Obama administration supports the "sanctuary cities" and sues Arizona for enforcing federal law.
- 56% of Americans believe it is possible to stop illegal immigration. 58% of the political class think it is impossible.
- 68% of Americans believe the political class doesn't care what Americans think anyway.
What's the use of the political class? Many Americans are beginning to ask that question.
The Obama administration got its way this afternoon: a federal judge in Phoenix blocked key portions of Arizona's SB 1070. The law has been gutted.
The federal government has sent a message to the American people. Washington refuses to secure the Mexican border and will fight all attempts on the state level to do so.
Americans no longer have the right to make their own laws. Laws will now be made by federal judges and progressive bureaucrats. Illegal aliens will be coddled. Taxpayers will be demonized as "racists" and "bigots" and fleeced to promote diversity and subsidize criminals.
Arizona is sued for enforcing federal law. "Sanctuary cities" can ignore federal law without having to deal with lawsuits.
It shouldn't come as a surprise that 11% of Americans have "a great deal" or "a lot" of trust in Congress. 50% have no trust in Congress at all. 76% of Americans trust the military.
The legal fight over SB 1070 won't end today. Instead, there will be a protracted, bloody legal struggle that will eventually work its way up to the Supreme Court where the conservative majority will reverse the decision.
This is the best of all possible scenarios.
The Obama administration will now get a "conversation about race" and illegal immigration - one that it will lose, one that will alienate even more independent voters - that will last into the midterm elections and far beyond.
In drinking from the divisive cup of racial politics, Barack Obama discredited his own message of a "post-racial" and "post-partisan" America. Having sold Americans on a bill of goods, the Democrats can now sit back and wait for the electoral avalanche in November.
Virginia NAACP Condemns Jim Webb
The Virginia NAACP vehemently disagrees with Jim Webb's article on "Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege."
What a shocker: the NAACP believes that Asian, Hispanic, and African immigrants (read: their political allies) whose ancestors were never enslaved or experienced discrimination in the United States should benefit from affirmative action over native born White Americans. The NAACP clearly believes that racial discrimination against Whites is justified to promote "diversity" and fight "white privilege."
We've clearly come a long way from JFK's "Address on Civil Rights" on June 11, 1963:
In the speech above, JFK justified civil rights reform on the basis of equality and colorblindness. He said that new laws were needed. He said all Americans should have equal rights and equal opportunities. He said that we should treat other Americans as we would want to be treated.
Couldn't we all just forget about race, abolish discriminatory laws, and identify solely with our nation? Eventually, the vast majority of White Americans came around to that point of view, and those who disagreed were marginalized on the fringes of society.
This is the consensus that prevails in the Tea Party and the conservative movement. If you fall afoul of that consensus, you are treated as an outcast. The NAACP and the Far Left have departed from that consensus. They don't believe in equality and colorblindness anymore.
Like the segregationists of the Jim Crow South, the NAACP believes in promoting black racial consciousness, blacks voting as a racial bloc, defending black institutions, a black national anthem, black empowerment, racial discrimination in government, housing, and employment that works to the advantage of blacks.
The NAACP even supports racial discrimination against Whites when there is no historical injustice to remedy. Out of racial spite, these "civil rights icons" like Charles Sherrod (see below) do it purely to stick to the White man.
When attention is drawn to their outrageous hypocrisy, the NAACP (a race-based organization) accuses conservatives, and now even some Democrats, of pandering to the divisive elements in our society.
The NAACP and National Council of La Raza (read: "the race") accusing others of divisiveness. The so-called "One Nation" these groups stand for is the one where they rule and everyone else submits and pays tribute.
What would happen to America if everyone started to think along the same tribal lines?
Stop The White Man and His Uncle Toms
Here's Charles Sherrod, the husband of Shirley Sherrod, speaking in January 2010. The Left has assured us that Shirley Sherrod is an innocent woman who overcame her racial prejudice against White people long ago.
"Firmly, we must stop the White man and his Uncle Toms from stealing our elections. We must not be afraid to vote black. We must not be afraid to turn a black out who votes against our interests. . . . And tell white folk, all over, wherever we are running somebody for an office ... that blacks are going to TAKE that office over. And thousands are coming to the polls. And you gotta get it."
If you want to know where the Sherrods stand on race, consider the fact that they named their children "Russia" and "Kenyatta." Russia, of course, is a reference to the Soviet Union. "Kenyatta" refers to Jomo Kenyatta, a black nationalist, and the first president of Kenya.
In this video, Charles Sherrod bemoans that the money of blacks ends up in the pockets of the White man, and asks when shall we trust our own.
In a recent interview, Charles Sherrod claimed that "racists" still "control our economy" and "much of the cultural development in our country." Keep in mind that Shirley Sherrod has accused FOX News of "racism" and Andrew Breitbart of wanting to restore slavery.
Charles Sherrod is considered a "civil rights icon": a man who advocates voting on the basis of the race and telling "white folk" that blacks are going to "take over."
But no, the real story, you see, is that the Tea Party is racist and that Shirley Sherrod is an innocent black woman who was persecuted by evil White racists like Andrew Breitbart.