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The Last Temptation of the GOP >>
01/17/2010
I am composing this appeal to your considerations, with all due respect for the fact that Conservatism manifests itself in many forms and stripes, and fully aware that no two people will always agree on everything. I tended to shy away from this debate as I’m a cartoonist and feel that the soul of the Conservative Movement should be decided by people with less time on their hands. Politically, I’m a Reagan Conservative, not so much of the Goldwater stripe. Yet in my online discussions, I have noticed a marked increase in anti-war and socially-mute stridency within the Republican Party, as well as the broader Conservative Movement. And while we should be an open party, opening up to leftist-style pacifism which besets our world presence as the cause of extremism, indicting corporation, shrugging off abortion and the 40 million children it has exterminated, and dismissing the institution of marriage and its reverberating effects on society (which run deeper than laws and thicker than blood) has tradeoffs. Accepting all of this does not wave the big, bold colors that differentiate us from the Left. There seem to be two main realms where the disagreement emerges: Islamic terrorism and social issues. Let’s start with the first.
To begin, the underwear bomber and his attempt at mass murder provoked me to answer, as I was shocked to learn what explanations were coming from sectors of conservatism. Dr. Ron Paul appeared on CNN the other day with Ben Stein and Sheila Jackson, stating that Abdulmutallab attacked America because we’re all occupiers or something. Note: Ben Stein’s apoplexy was so stark that he looks as though he was about to utter “Bueller? Bueller?”
Although Allahpundit was astute to point out that Nigeria and Yemen are not occupied and that Afghanistan isn’t really Abdulmutallab’s concern, this irksome rationalization of terrorism is disturbing, especially when it comes from our side of the spectrum. And while we can all agree that the Fed should not be printing money like water, needs oversight, and not to mess with Texas…there is a point where I draw the line. And the aforementioned video is it.
The history of Radical Islam has been a rather stormy one, and precedes the United States altogether. Yet if you listened to most on the Left and unfortunately some on the Right, you would think that we alone had kindled this problem. While the Hebrews warred in the early days of their nation to carve out a place in the world (and harbored monotheism, a subversive idea that many pagan nations wanted to squelch), such Jewish wars seemed to be a means to an end; lending and commerce. Yet looking at the history of Islamic conquest, war itself seems to be the end for some interpreters; no doubt the apogee of the Islamic faith in its formative years. Are there peaceful Muslims? Of course. Are there clerics who rail against violence and preach peace? Yes. But if not theologically, then culturally, Arabia and its petulance to surrounding nations were the context surrounding the emergence of the new religion. What separates the situation of Mecca from Jerusalem was that for Mohammed, outward expansion would become a policy from thenceforth and for all time. And it seems that at some point it became the clear and simple goal of the foreign policy of Muslim nations.
The History:
1. Mohammed’s Conquest of Mecca (628 AD)
2. Siege of Jerusalem (637 AD): The Umar Caliphate captures Jerusalem in an initially bloodless siege. These “new kids on the block” decide to impose Sharia Law onto a land which is holy to both Christians and Jews, ensnaring a city that was not even mentioned in the Koran and retrofitting it with Arabic regalia. That, of course, is not the modus operandi of occupiers… right?
3. Dhimmitude: Christians and Jews (people of the book) are unable to own weapons, own horses, give testimony in court, need to apply for special building permits in order to build anything, and routinely pay the jizya (protection tax) in order to continue practicing their faith. In addition, the Ottoman Empire, a minority occupier in the Balkans during the Middle Ages, sends garrisons into towns to collect the oldest children of Christian families to serve in the Janissary slave armies. Massacres were frequent, and the tolerant and non-occupying Muslims put down revolts with a strict vengeance. With such few rights granted to non-Muslims, it would only be a matter of time before the minority became the majority.
4. The Umayyad Conquest of Spain (711 AD)
5. The Crusades (1095 AD): Since the capture of Jerusalem, some Islamic rulers begin to stop Christian pilgrims coming from Europe and other regions, leading to bitter resentment between the spheres. To add to that, the Turks (a nomadic people recently converted to Islam) gouge deeply into territories of the Byzantine Empire, which at the time is a storehouse of Western knowledge from Ancient Greece and home to the Hagia Sophia and St. Paul’s ministry. In response, Byzantine Emperor Alexius I appeals to Rome for assistance, thereby triggering the First Crusade. School textbooks seem to downplay this cause.
6. Sultan Mehmed II (1459 AD): Ottoman conqueror Mehmed II sends envoys to Romanian Prince Vlad Tepes, demanding a large monetary tribute and 500 local boys, to which Vlad responds by nailing the envoys’ turbans to their heads and sending back their bodies. As you might expect, war erupts. Vlad Tepes leads a successful guerilla campaign against the Ottoman Empire with night raids on enemy camps and incursions into Turkish territory. Mehmed II then assembles nearly 100,000 men to march into Wallachia, Romania. When the Ottoman Army pushes deeper into Romania, their blood runs cold upon discovering literally a forest of 20,000 impaled Ottoman soldiers suspended above the ground on stakes. Demoralized by unrelenting displays of cruelty and lightning attacks, the Ottomans retreat in horror. While Vlad’s “methods” were unsound, his redounding success with defeating a larger army underscores Islam’s fear of one thing they rarely seem to encounter: retaliation. 
Bram Stoker picks up where history leaves off.
7. The Siege of Vienna (1532 AD): Suleiman the Magnificent lays siege to a central European capitol and is rebuffed.
8. The Barbary Wars (1801-1805 AD): The pirates of the Barbary Coast have long been sinking merchant ships and enslaving coastal populations. The number of Europeans enslaved over the centuries amounts to over 1 million by some estimates. After an expensive and wearisome war with the British Empire, fledgling America is left to its own devices, which includes the defense of its maritime interests. Seeing that the United States has no credible Navy, Congress initially adopts appeasement, allocating monies for tribute to the Mohammedan pirates, but later learns that the cost is far in excess of their allocation. Thomas Jefferson, then diplomat, organizes negotiations with the ambassador from Tripoli, who insists that the Holy Koran permits his people the right to obliterate all the foes of Allah with impunity. Jefferson concludes that negotiations with terrorists are futile. Years later, war erupts between the United States and the Barbary States when Tripoli demands a massive tribute from the newly-inaugurated Jefferson Administration. Jefferson then wheels the swords and guns of the United States onto Tripoli and brings the conflict to a thorough end after some lopsided sea battles abroad. As a sidenote, Jefferson does this without declaring war, since Congress voted to give him authorization to use force (familiar?). I guess a smashing victory bespeaks more intent than declarations.
I’m sorry Mr. Paul. I think you have made gallant overtures towards federal transparency in years past, but on this issue, you’re dead wrong.
Collapse of the Old World: 
The European capitals like Paris, London, Berlin, and Luxembourg are slowly being overrun, and the barrio non-integration model of the Left in America as it pertains to immigration seems to demonstrate its own fruition on the old continent. The Paris Riots of 2005 were only a harbinger of things to come, and now, stunningly, Lord Phillips of the British Supreme Court announced that Sharia should gain regional autonomy on European soil in certain smaller matters. In the latter 20th century, Europe made a deal with the devil on refugee policy and integration (likely to normalize their own Mideast interests). And so to our transatlantic counterpart, a shoulder of the West: we will witness your collapse in our lifetimes. We may not notice it, as America’s defenses have eased the dangers of your power drain in the last century. But fall you will.
The point to all this is that radical strains in Islam have existed much longer than the United States, and long before Israel was reestablished as a nation. Even hostile powers have interests and assets on our soil, and we refrain from divesting them where other nations would nationalize in a minute, because we are free and capitalist. So knowing this, obscure claims of military bases here and there do little to explain such widespread hatred, especially given that such nations have often asked for our protection. Isolationists also overlook the aid that we send to the Middle East and the times we have militarily interdicted anti-Muslim pushes in places like Yugoslavia and Bosnia. So the assertion that a base here or involvement there generates terrorism is a canard that ignores our olive branches. Yet all that said, there will come a temptation for conservatives, as Third Party candidates position themselves as isolationists, opportunistically hoping to capitalize on the healthy mistrust by conservatives and the unreasoning pacifism of liberals. But to embrace this perspective makes two horrid mistakes: it denies the history of Islamofacism as an evangelistic, expansionistic, and traditionally unprovoked aggressor. In political terms, it ensures lasting Democrat victory by splitting the Right into disorganized factions, and not differentiating our ideas in stark relief to the Left. The consequences for national security with continued leftist domestic policy could be catastrophic. And yes, I’m fearmongering.
I am a Republican who is quite upset with the past behavior of some so-called "conservatives," such as was made manifest in the NY 23rd District. But as bad as some actors in this party have behaved, I believe in the underlying planks in our platform. Jumping off one horse and onto another while referring to oneself as "generally conservative" is not sufficient enough of a platform to combat fanaticism, especially if it produces the dominion of a party that believes in "Man-Made Disasters." And as much a drubbing as the RNC deserved for its past liberal actions, continuing to savage our party into 2010 is not a winning strategy; you may claim that you’re targeting bad leaders and not the good party planks, but the undecided onlooker may not discern that and just assume that you disdain everything about it. You’ll become the Left’s favorite conservative in no time flat.
Some "alternative" conservatives have perceived the underwear bomber and other terrorist acts as some sort of backlash against occupation and globalism, thereby ignoring history and blaming America for terrorism. Yet they do this while blind to fanaticism’s preeminence during that oh-so-cherished age of America’s national reclusiveness. So pretending that terroristic activity would diminish by contracting our nation inwardly is a farce, and whatever course of action we take, wahabi radicals will always find a grievance to vindicate their cause and rally their disaffected youth (sort of like Al Sharpton, but with C4). Dismissing a nemesis and focusing the argument on dubious claims of empire and past grievance skews morality and is a miscarriage of our moment's urgency.
"I think we're against the hypocrisy of assailing our allies because here and there they cling to a colony, while we engage in a conspiracy of silence and never open our mouths about the millions of people enslaved in the Soviet colonies in the satellite nations." -Ronald Reagan, A Time for Choosing
“In a country where it is now generally understood and proclaimed that Communism is an enemy bound to destroy us, Congress annually deliberates over means of "co-existing" with the Soviet Union.” –Barry Goldwater, The Conscience of a Conservative
Morality in Decline:
Now as to social issues, I believe that mores, tradition, and decency are the fabric that hold societies together, especially where the law in silent. Hurricane Katrina sadly demonstrated the character of a people who felt that nobody was watching them “rescue” television sets. Alexis d’Tocqueville pointed out that liberty blazed from America’s pulpits and paid homage to the goodness of its early inhabitants. The founders (them crazy deists) purchased bibles with congressional funds for distribution to the public. We were and still are a Judeo-Christian nation, both in faith and philosophy. Should the government get into the business of pushing one faith on other people? By no means! God granted humankind free will and the right to choose their respective destinies, and nobody is “too big to fail.” But I am against the intense scrubbing of faith and tradition from all public life.
Since the 60’s, the Democratic Party and the Leftist elements within its ranks have sought to cleanse America of faith, family, and tradition. They believe in the ideal of Plato’s Republic, where we are all common brothers and sisters, the military is our father and the welfare state is our mother. Family and God are the only things that stand in the way of all of this, and it is traditionally why Castro and other dictators sought to expel and attack religion and family, even encouraging children to rat on their parents on command. In a society where rights are conferred by a state -- not God -- and where purpose and meaning are only derived from government, people become fish who do not know that they are wet. Unfortunately, some libertarians conservatives seek to ignore this leftist conspiracy, suggesting that all of these issues will be satisfied if we left it to the states. If this were true, I would be more likely to shrug off the crazies in Vermont and move ahead. But that is not the case. As an example, California did in fact speak out for traditional marriage. Bravo. This may be good enough for the libertarian crowd (many of whom themselves are Christian), but it is not good enough for the radical left that seeks to bring the matter to DC and repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (which protects states from the choices of others), thereby overriding the states all together. This effectively results in either gay marriage nationwide or none, depending on who wins in DC. So while many libertarians seem reluctant to make a federal case of such an issue they may themselves believe in personally, someone else will, and gladly override your states’ rights position altogether given the chance. If you’re not at the dinner, then you are on the menu. The same rule can be applied to abortion or any other social issue. I think of slavery, and how some found it immoral, and others a matter of state’s rights. Some states varied, but eventually the friction between the states grew so hot that it had to be decided as all or nothing, by federal action. Many socially conservative libertarians will face this dilemma as things become all or nothing, and might need to assess what they morally believe on these issues and then stand on that all the way.
Make no mistake, my libertarians of faith: Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings and his ilk are coming to a public school near you. They will do it on the state level, and if that doesn’t work they’ll try another rout until your kids have memorized “powerfisting” and “rimming” on your dime. On another front, it’s a widely accepted norm of this country that the Arts in America are one of the reasons conservatives lag behind and liberals dominate in their stead. Theatre, cinema, literature, paint media, and other high arts set the tone, attitudes, and expectations of generations, and conservatives (be they Republican or Libertarian) cannot shun this aspect of life. To do so is to guarantee diminished relevance for the next century. So although social contours are sloppy variables, liberals achieve their ends by setting trends and planting memes, turning the unimaginably obscene of one generation into the commonplace of another, operating within or without the framework of the law. This is why Scotsman Andrew Fletcher boasted: “Let me write the songs of a nation - I don't care who writes its laws.” Conservatives of all stripes will have to ponder not only the type of naked liberty exercised by the man who blurts “fire” in a crowded theater, but also ask the deeper question appertaining to the content of their nation’s character—and what that nation ends up looking like in years to come. And lastly, if it will even be recognizable at all.
Linking social values to Islam’s meteoric rise, we can observe the fact that Europe has no belief and no nationalism. Just go to Spain’s festivals, and notice that you see 100 Moorish prince costumes and only two lonely knights in the corner. European youth live on the government tit in a postmodern milieu, with a cringingly servile European identity that they are rapidly trading for a robust, proud, Muslim identity. Atheism has existed since the skeptics of Greece, and probably as long as the proposition of faith has been before humankind. At any rate, it is older than Islam and Christianity, being more of a mindset than a belief system. But since the people of Europe live self-centered and pampered lives of statist comfort, devoid of meaning while producing no families… Islam finds its inroads. Fanaticism is a relatively weak force in its own right, as it can be scrutinized and rejected. But it finds success if it is pushing against something much weaker…such as nothing.
Farbeit from Dr. Ron Paul to realize that Arabs spend just as much time condemning our decadence as they do foreign policy in order to sell jihad to younger generations.
Some of my brothers in arms of the libertarian hue nod with me from time to time regarding their unspoken agreement on “the better angels of our nature.” But on the same token they suggest that the situation is hopeless on that front and that some things must be accepted for keeps. I surely hope not, because if we’re at that point, then perhaps they are right. Perhaps there is not much left to save and naught to be done in saving it. If so, then that raises another point as to the new libertarian zeitgeist, and if it is not just the resigned despondency of traditionalists that some things are simply beyond salvage. The statist seems to war against the human nature to live, while the social conservative’s struggle is against the human drive to self-immolate. Yet neither are battles that can be fought forever without a public in sync to their call to arms. Decline is a choice, and great nations seem to die by sputtering madness and suicide as opposed to murder. Sadly, that choice seems to always be a collective one, and there never is an opt-out.
For writing like this and questioning the vogue of certain morally libertine and isolationist waves sweeping the Republican Party, I’m rather certain that both I and my followers will be labeled “neocon” by people who aren’t aware of my stance to unplug the UN, post troops on the US-Mexico Border, pass the Fair Tax, expel Kathleen Parker from our websites, castrate the Federal Reserve, and abolish Social Security and Medicare altogether.
Yup. People call me Arlen Specter. >>
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