More bad news for our non-tyrannical government

Obama recently gave a speech in which he attempted to marginalize those of us who are anti-statists. Obama was speaking to young people getting ready to graduate and go out into the world. Obama highlighted government service, and he told his young audience to reject the voices which are criticizing government and warning of tyranny, implying that the critics of government are unfairly denigrating government for no good reasons.

Since that speech, media have been overloaded with reasons to criticize government, especially government that violates individual rights and exercises powers that are un-constitutional. On top of Benghazi and the IRS scandals, yesterday media was finally realizing, because it happened to them, how out of control this government has become. The DoJ has accessed phone conversations of a 100 or more journalists under the guise of investigating a leak regarding some overseas military mission. The overly broad scope of the investigation has caused media to push back, so you know the rights violations are serious, now.

Obama claims he knows nothing about the phone spying, and he said he learned about the IRS scandal from the news reports on Friday. I don't believe either of these claims. It's obvious that this administration is as corrupt as some of us thought they were, and probably more corrupt than anyone imagined. All the political vermin who supported Obama because that's where the power resided are now scurrying for cover.

But don't write off Obama, and don't think that media will necessarily destroy Obama. If there's a Tea Party reaction that crosses a line and, say, a violent act occurs, the media will switch to Tea Party destruction and try their best to wipe away the memory of all Obama scandals by explaining them away. The Obama administration is simply trying to bring all media in line during this scandal blitz he knew was coming. The Obama adminstration is firing warning shots at whistleblowers and ambitious journalists. Unless Obama is impeached, he still has power, and he doesn't show any signs of bending to humility and admitting to any wrong-doings. I'm sure the State machine is busy strategizing how to turn this bad-news dump into an overload that backfires on Republicans and those like myself who are warning about the dangers of a powerful State.

Saving US sovereignty

The longer the Obama administration goes on the more I get the feeling Obama has his eyes on something greater than winning small battles against House Republicans. Some in media have excused Obama's lack of relationship-building with Congress as just not his style, but Obama has built relationships all his life. It's easy to notice that Obama thinks very little of Congress, mostly as obstacles that are presently a necessary evil in our system of governance. Obama, like Clinton and Gore and Carter, has his eyes on global relationships and issues of global governance, development and law-making.

I might be wrong. I guess we'll see how the negotiations over budgets and such go in the next few months, but it seems beneath Obama at this point to get excited about the prospects. The media-created "charm offensive" has been a joke. Obama and his team were taking so much heat from public opinion regarding dysfunction in government, they had to do something. One WH official even admitted it's a joke and only for show. My hunch is that Obama is focused on 2014, like many pundits have suggested, as a short term goal, then on setting up America to advance further in international relationships (pundits haven't suggested the last part). Global governance is a bigger concern to Obama than US governance. In fact, the worse our situation becomes, and the worse the situations of the world at large become, the less likely Americans are to become cocky and independent again. I'm not saying this is a conspiracy and that major governments have all decided to collapse together so that a new order can be created. No, I think Obama and the leaders of other countries and international power players all see the last remains of capitalism crumbling, thus they foresee a day soon when a new order will become necessary. Worldwide interventions in the various economies have been so great and numerous, the world thinks of what's collapsing as capitalism, but it is nothing of the sort, except maybe in a technical, partial defintion of capitalism. What we've experienced in the US and what's been experienced around the world has definitely had nothing to do with free markets, but then statist global leaders, including Obama and his predecessors, don't think free markets are even possible. They see free markets as an illusion carried forward by simplistic proponents of an American ideal that's never been realistic or possible. They especially think free market principles are silly notions in the context of global needs for cooperation, development in third world countries, laws to prevent human rights abuses, or the establishment in general of social justice.

Global development efforts are nothing new -- it's just that US media and political pundits don't talk much about it. Al Gore, George Soros, Kofi Annan and Maurice Strong know about globalism, but not many people know much about them or their activities, except Gore as a national joke because he was once VP.  It's more interesting for media to do their reality TV deal wondering if Boehner and Obama are going to play golf and talk about a Grand Bargain or whether Boehner's redneck base will prevent him from acting, and whether Harry Reid will block the House and say something stupid, and so forth. Yes, Obama has been aloof in all this, because it's just a lot of small political wrangling in his eyes. The issues of the UN, IMF, the World Bank, WTO, etc, are where the action is for ambitious world players like Obama. Clinton has surely kept Obama in the loop regarding his interactions regarding global advancements toward development and international law. Global governance, global development and international law are more important than economic concerns in the US, which to Obama seem small and self-serving for US business people thinking only about profit and personal gain.

If Obama has any concern with "business" it's on a larger, global scale in the vein of corporate governance talked about a few decades ago and is now in full bloom with the big international corporations which are enmeshed with governments of major nations. The large multi-national corporations are fully protected from competition. They were globally grown to fit into the global scheme to control production needs and to fund global governance, development and law-making. This is where I believe Obama and his circle of associates are headed. Like Clinton, Obama is young, and global concerns are where the action is at for those out to change the world.

Americans, although we're simple and foolish, had better gain control of our government, unless we want to obey the would-be global masters who've been working diligently for control for a long, long time.

Sequestration Madness -- Catch It!

Watching Morning Joe today, the panel, Richard Haas, Chris Matthews, Mika, Joe Scarborough, and a few others, discussed sequestration. The talk in media now is that both sides deserve blame for setting up this stupid automatic spending cut trigger if they failed to make a deal on raising the debt and developing smart cuts and reforms in government spending to offset the growing costs of entitlement spending. The reason media sources like Morning Joe, and pundits like Chris Matthews, switched from blaming the GOP solely to blaming both sides for the sequestration stand off is that Bob Woodward came forward and revealed conversations he had with WH personnel during the writing of his new book in which the WH admitted to coming up with the sequestration idea, and that the deal was only planned -- negotiated spending cuts would be considered to avoid across the board cuts. Woodward destroyed the Democrats' narrative of GOP obstructionism, and Woodward accused President Obama of moving the goal posts, as Obama reportedly did when dealing with John Boehner on the original Grand Bargain.

It appears that Obama doesn't want a deal in which both sides look good. Obama wants to make the Republicans look like obstructionists protecting the super-rich, or Obama wants Republicans to capitulate on more taxes and divide the Republican Party even deeper and wider. The guests on Morning Joe have talked some about the political games played, but it's usually in terms of Republican obstructionism because they're captured by an extreme Tea Party base. The guests will sometimes admit that Obama is playing hardball, but they excuse it by saying Obama won the presidential election and, therefore, has the political clout to mostly get his way. The pundits usually fail to mention that GOP lawmakers won in the House, and we have a balance of power in US government, not a monarchy.

I've written recently about the danger in giving our Presidents the power we now give them. If there's any hope of avoiding bankruptcy, complete loss of freedom and eventual collapse, it's with representatives in the House and Governors in states. We can't allow a few pockets of power in federal government to control the nation and our economy. Obama has declared war on all obstacles to his pursuit of power. Obama is not pursuing power alone -- he's pushed by Progressive forces who see this opportunity as their time to shine, to make policy that will transform America into a post-capitalist era of democratic socialism which frees us from economic tyranny and establishes a real path to social justice and equality. Obama has taken every chance to rail against the rich and demand that they pay their fair share. Of course, some of the rich are necessary partners in the Progressive agenda, so they get preferential treatment, but they are only tools, not real partners. If Progressives succeed, the winners in a transformed world State planned of production and services will be determeined by political, ad hoc expediency, and those who are favored today might be disfavored tomorrow. When our nation and economy are control by political means, it will be a totally different world. They will achive equality in that the standard of living for the great majority will be low. The few in power will not be accused of inequality because they are protecting the people from the tyrannical rich who will rise again if not for the courageous efforts of the few in control.

So, this sequestration silliness is only a diversion. There are some in the political realm who understand the stakes, but they haven't decided where they stand and what they're willing to risk. Fighting against a gigantic State machine is intimidating, not for the weak of heart, and we have a lot of weak hearts in Congress. There are many in the political realm who will call what I've written extremist rhetoric, and they will make jokes about the Kenyan Marxist President, and they will go along, like they go along with drone strikes and a war that's killing men and women and children for purely political reasons. These people are lost in the obscurantism and rationalizations of political power.

Obama the Populist

Obama is on a campaign tour to gin popular support for his agenda. Obama has to do this in part because the country is not behind him on some key issues dear to his political heart. The public is not clamoring for gun control. The Left, and many moderates, have to push hard for gun control and hide their intentions behind tragedies like Sandy Hook. Just ask yourself why gun control advocates are coming out of the woodwork making recommendations that will not prevent future mass killings by maniacs.

Some issues, like minimum wage, are in sync with public demand, but only because workers will always want more money -- why wouldn't they? Most workers, though, aren't likely considering  the rise in unemployment or prices that a boost in minimum wage will cause. Most older, skilled and semi-skilled workers are making more than 9 dollars an hour. Young people who need entry into the labor market so they can become skilled workers will be hurt by a higher minimum wage. Government will have to force companies to hire young, unskilled workers at 9 dollars an hour if they want it to work as they envision, because companies won't do it on their own unless they have to -- so, this means companies will hire the bare minimum of unskilled workers and will look for ways to cut these workers from the payroll if at all possible. It means that industries like McDonalds who provide entry level jobs will cut labor to the bone and raise prices if possible.

Potential small business owners thinking about starting a business will think twice, and some will surely decide they can't do it, because they can't charge enough for their products or services after paying the labor costs. Several things can happen by raising labor costs on businesses across the board -- higher unemployment (or fewer hours worked), higher prices which negate the higher wages, businesses going out of business or businesses never getting started. This is a political move by Obama to make the GOP look bad when they vote against it. It's a cynical political ploy by Obama, not an economic plan to help workers. Obama the Populist continues to hurt the populace.

With public opinion anything is possible

Obama, like most progressives, believes that public opinion and pragmatic government policies are better societal guides than ideology and principles. Over and over, Obama has denigrated ideology while praising pragmatism, plus, Obama takes his agenda to the people, to pump up public opinion and pressure, rather than check his agenda against Constitutional limits. Let me stipulate that contrary to the modern demonization of the word ideology, it basically means a set of ideas -- the Constitution is built on a set of ideas.

In the David Gregory interview, Obama channelled Lincoln through a quote -- "with public opinion there is nothing you can’t do and without public opinion there is very little you can get done in this town.” This is a dangerous way for Presidents to think, even Lincoln. It was public opinion that blocked Emanicipation for so long -- principles and ideology led to the end of slavery. It was a terrible mistake at the time of the creation of the Constitution that the principles within the document were not applied to slaves and women.

When a President depends on public opinion, or manipulates public opinion, to achieve political ends, it's not the opinion of the President or the public that matters -- what matters is what's Constitutional and what's not, what is the role of government and what is not.

As long as the Constitution is not totally ignored in favor of shifting public opinion and presidential political agendas, then it's wrong that anything can be done in DC with the support of public opinion, and this is a good thing -- it's something a President should know.