Ernie: You say that I will be surprised in 2020? But in what way is that a political strategy? Sounds a lot like Daniel Pipes to me. To be sure, 2020 could be a very good year, maybe a terrific year. Maybe all the stars will line up "just right." Maybe there will be a great candidate for president whom the multitudes can finally rally around, the best conceivable choice. OK. Let's grant all of your hopes and regard them as a package and a "done deal." Here's what's wrong with that picture: There are four years between now and then. The damages that either Hillary or Trump can cause "in the meantime" could be enormous. The reason why I eventually voted for Romney despite serious misgivings was because of what Obama could do "in the meantime." Those damages have been horrific. Romney was wooden, uninspiring, a true stuffed shirt, out of touch with normal Americans, and all of that, but he would not have torn down the country to implement his policies. You knew he would exercise necessary caution when he should and not compromise away what is most important about America. He wasn't imaginative, he lacked boldness, he was excessively risk averse, but he was no fool. What we got with Obama, after his first four years turned out as badly as they did, was a pro-Muslim Leftist whose interests lay with every pathological interest group in the country, from Al Sharpton's followers to feminist crazies to the ranks of the perverted, and even more. His foreign policy was a disaster, his domestic policy was basically a joke, he was incompetent at nearly everything he did. As much as I detested Bush Jr., from the vantage of 2009 - 2016 the "W" years were a golden age in retrospect. Which tells you how bad Obama really has been. And now we are supposed to passively await the tender mercies of Hillary or Trump and do nothing? I think I understand where you are coming from. For sure, what I actually know about your "off camera" life is limited, but some things are clear enough. Your sense of values has come across loud and clear. You want peace at any price, that is the bottom line. Peace is hardly a bad thing, of course. Indeed, it is a very good thing. And the sentiment is shared by millions of people. But we live in dangerous times and wishful thinking does not make it less dangerous. Your value system also overlaps with that of many other Evangelicals. To be sure, it would be an overgeneralization for me to put you in the category "Evangelical voter" and say no more. There are plenty of exceptions to that rule in your life. Still, the commonalities do exist and mean something. There are different types of political personalities. Both Left and Right there are those people who prefer to fight guns with flowers. There also are those who reduce all issues to economics, both Left and Right. And there are those, Left, Right, and Other, who prefer to march with pitchforks by day and with lighted torches by night. And that more-or-less is the category you will find me in. I love a good fight -a good political fight. For me, and I think for most of the "political class," politics is war by other means. I not only accept this truism (so it seems to me) I think it is a good thing. As "peaceful" as politics gets by this model is when it temporarily becomes courtroom drama -which, of course, still is adversarial. That's OK with me. But the fighting part is what I thrive on. The "peaceful solutions" approach is exactly what is best for families; the most successful families fight as little as possible and seek to live love-centered lives. And fights among friends are 99. 9 % a bad idea. As well, when it comes to governance, it is far better to seek peaceful outcomes that bring people together. However, politics is not governance, it is a substitute for revolution. As such it has a different character altogether. It requires fighting. just as does, say, the sport of boxing or wrestling or, for that matter, football or hockey. Governance is more like baseball or basketball. or maybe gymnastics. Fierce competition in either case but politics is a different animal and people do get hurt in it. But you know this when you sign up -or should know this. What has been my experience is that Evangelicals are loathe to cultivate "fighting skills" when it comes to politics. They may show great courage and even willingness to make martyrs of themselves for a worthy cause, but marital skills are not in the picture. Some exceptions, Ralph Reed comes to mind, but he is a perfect example of someone for whom this is all a "second language" and who, accordingly, "doesn't get" any number of things. He also has what I consider to be a characteristic weakness of the Evangelical position in the political arena, the view that as long as there is progress against abortion everything else can slide. That is very far, indeed, from my philosophy of politics even if I also would like to see progress made in limiting abortions. But that issue is not a priority for me, you already know my priorities, and in my view those other issues matter far more politically because of everything that is implied. The abortion issue for the Left is secondary in a different sense, a sense that the Religious Right does not fathom. The Right is like the Byzantine Empire, willing to sacrifice Manzikert, then Smyrna, then Antioch, even Athens, as long as they can defend Constantinople. But in the end, with everything else sacrificed -or put off for another time- even Constantinople fell to the Saracens. That is how it looks to me. Plus the Byzantines hobbled themselves by their unwillingness to make common cause with Rome. Offers of alliance with "heretics" were unacceptable on principle and so they had no allies. Whether or not this historical sketch is 100% accurate is not the issue. The issue is this model of events as a formula for political failure. And I think this is where America has gotten. Billy
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