Both Sides of the Tolerance Coin.  There are moments in life that pass us by and we do not realize until later how very significant they might have been.  I’m not certain about this, but we (America) may have just had one of those moments.

 “The Book of Mormon” is a popular play currently on Broadway that satirizes the Mormon faith and Christianity in general.  It has either won or been nominated for, I think, nine Tony awards.  There are numerous instances over the last couple of decades where the National Endowment for the Arts has not only sponsored, but openly supported anti-Christian works of art all across this nation (Loveland?).  Hardly a month goes by without a State, County, or Local school board taking some type of action to make certain that our children are learning the valuable lesson of religious and cultural tolerance, yet we continue to see many of the tenets of the Christian faith, the faith that nourished the founding of our nation, removed from our schools and public facilities.  Now don’t get me wrong; I heartily support the separation of church and state when governing is considered in practice.  What I do not understand is how we give awards to a pair of gentlemen who produce a play that ridicules the Mormon faith while we drag a man out of his home in the dark of night in front of his family and friends for producing a trailer that ridicules the Muslim/Islam faith.  And now, to cap it all off, and following a litany of apologies for even feigning to defame the Muslim/Islam faith, our government officials are spending $70,000 to produce an apology film for any offense that “may have been” perpetrated by any particular Muslim-related piece of film, satire, or documentary emanating from America.  What the #$@* is wrong with this picture?

Webster defines tolerance as “being tolerant of others’ values, beliefs, practices, etc.”  How can we, as a nation, accept a premise that on the one hand demands tolerance beyond all reproach and question and, at the same time, practices extreme intolerance of any beliefs other than its own?  That is what we are seeing with the Muslim/Islam issues today.  While Muslim/Islam believers openly practice their faith in America, build their abodes of worship, and recruit newcomers to their beliefs, Christians across the Middle East are being persecuted.  That persecution extends not only to public distain and ridicule, but to the point of open hostility to the extreme of homicide and the destruction of their houses of worship.  Maher, Leno, Daly, Letterman, Saturday Night Live, Mad Magazine….the list goes on and on.  We have not only a history of tolerance in this country; we have a history of extreme tolerance.  Why is it that we demand anything less from the governments that we prop up with our foreign aid and political capital? 

There is political pragmatism and there is rank hypocrisy; I fear that what we are now seeing play out in this current Middle East crisis is not only the latter, but a total and unashamed abandonment of some of this great nation’s most precious principles.  The widening chasm between the political parties is another symptom of this trend.  Somehow, someway…a leader(s) must emerge to bridge the gulf and bring some semblance of function back to our government.  And we, as individuals, must further accept the fundamental truth that, as espoused by  liberals, there is a fundamental role for government in our lives and there are things that can be better served by government than the private sector.   There is also the right to live one’s life, as long as it does not infringe on the lives of others, in the legal fashion that they might choose to be personally and morally appropriate.  By the same token, liberals must better accept the fact that many conservatives value the founding documents of this nation dearly and would like to see a much greater adherence to those documents than we are currently witnessing.  The government is not the answer to all of society’s ills and America is heading towards a nanny-state condition.  Much like some middle-eastern governments, liberals must understand that if they demand tolerance for cultural decisions, they must in turn tolerate those who choose not agree with decisions.  I think the word I am looking for here is “civility”.  The tragedy is not so much that it has ceased to exist in America; the tragedy is that nobody seems to be looking for it.

Playing “The Game” to Win.  My life has been spent registered as either a Republican or an Independent.  I register Republican because my personal philosophies on government align more closely with their party; but I switch over to Independent when some of the influential idiots in the Republican Party forget that only the winners get to govern and start going their own way.

It is my opinion that one of the most inaccurate concepts in this election is that Mitt Romney is a weak candidate.  For the life of me, when I look at his resume and his overall (not individual) performances on the campaign trail, he is certainly not one of the weakest Republican candidates I have ever seen.  The truly amazing thing is that a great deal of this “weak candidate” chatter is coming from the Republican Party.    I don’t believe there has been or will be a more significant election cycle in my lifetime than the one coming up in November and I view the process as deadly serious and significant.  It infuriates me personally to see many Democrats take a more casual approach to the election, but I have realized that they have a much more effective strategy to win.  Each national party is composed of disparate groups and it is a continuing challenge for each to unify their groups behind their national candidates.  The Democrats seem to better understand this requirement and what some may call blind loyalty and irrational support would be classified by them as “playing to win the game”.  Republicans on the other hand seem to relish the role of being “political experts” and continue to dissect their candidates far past the point of good advisement (like now).  The taking heads on the blogs and radio are so very certain of their conservative principles that they do their utmost to wield whatever self-perceived influence they might have to continually fine-tune the Republican candidate.  In reality, this amounts to dithering while the Democrats long ago accepted their candidate and all his/her flaws and focus on the true point of elections…winning.  The truly amazing thing is that given these two approaches, the Republican Party stands to hold the House, has a decent chance to take the Senate, and is running neck-and-neck for the White House. 

An objective analysis will show that the majority of voting Americans agree more with Republican philosophies than with Democrat philosophies; it has been this way for awhile.  The simple truth, however, is that Republicans think it is sufficient to be more right than the Democrats and the candidate is just a vessel for the Party.  It might very well be the ultimate truth that the party is the vessel for the Candidate.

Is He Really “That” Good?  Under the watch of the President who was going to stop the rise of the oceans, heal the planet, write better speeches than his speechwriters, who knew more about foreign policy than his foreign policy experts, who would bring us the most transparent administration ever, who would have nothing to do with lobbyists and crony capitalism, and who would instantly, with his inauguration, heal all the outstanding wounds between America and the Muslim world…we now have the current middle east crisis and a simultaneous meltdown of  the U.S. economy.  If Obama is correct in saying that his lack of successful policy implementation is the mess he inherited from Bush, does that mean that if Romney wins in November, he will be totally unaccountable for all he heirs?  Because one can make a strong case that his legacy would be far more flawed than the one waiting for Obama.

There has been a theme woven throughout the Obama presidency; a theme of arrogance.  We have all seen those movies where the character can move at super-speed and this is illustrated by them moving through the room while everyone else remains still.  I honestly believe that this is how our President perceives himself in his current position.  He truly believes that he is “so” good, that all he has to do is show up for work, listen politely, and grace others with his glorious prose on selected occasions.  He moves through the room oblivious of those around him and cognizant only of himself and his purposes; ridiculing others at will and with no consequence.  Once the Democrats passed their health care legislation and Obama signed it, he gave up on governing and has put our government on auto-pilot in order to seek re-election; to do otherwise would have required lowering himself to deal with less stellar individuals, such as Senators and Representatives and Voters and that, no doubt, is challenging work.

What we have seen in the failure of both our national economy and foreign policy isn’t so much a sin of commission, but rather a sin of omission.  As Condi Rice so aptly stated at the Republican convention, when leadership is not exerted, it creates a vacuum...and that vacuum will be filled.  History may record that Obama’s auto-pilot methods were successful; the verdict may not yet be complete.  It has been argued on occasion that government is best that governs the least.  However, it also the hard truth that our greatest regrets involves not the things we did, but the things we didn’t do.  Another hard truth is that the Presidency is hard work, it requires making hard choices, and it requires taking actions in clear and unequivocal terms.   Whatever verdict history may deliver on the merit of Obama’s policies; the verdict is clear on his leadership…MIA.

Dueling Icons of Deniability.  My, but those Democrats do love them some Clinton; very much like those Republicans do love them some Reagan.  You would think that given their enshrinement in party lore, their records would reflect the bedrock principles of their respective parties.  I submit to you that a closer and broader reflection on their accomplishments tells a different story and that each party, in their loving embrace of the two icons, is in a state of denial.

One would think that each man’s record would reflect a “party platform’s worth” of conservative or liberal principles, but is that really the case?  A close examination of each President’s record shows that their most significant and effectual benchmarks were in fact products of bi-partisan actions; great examples of the two parties compromising in order to fashion legislation that truly reflected the “will of the people”.  Is it any surprise that both men started out their first terms as “firebrands” for their parties and encountered, in some form or fashion, a high degree of gridlock and resistance from the opposing party?  But each man, in his own way, learned to function in their office as a leader and producer of results.  This ability to evolve and grow resulted in some historical accomplishments for each man.  The American People recognize and respect results.

Watching the party conventions transpire over the last few days and reading their official platforms, one would think that the extreme factions in each control the policy apparatus of the organization; I would hope this is not the case.  Rather, I would  hope that each nominee, if fortunate enough to reach the magic 270 number in November,  will realize history has shown us that the only meaningful accomplishments of past Presidential icons have been of the bi-partisan nature; the kind that reflect the best thinking of both parties and their respective leaders. 

Like many others, I was hopeful that after the Democrats were soundly rebuked in the 2010 election cycle, Obama would turn towards the center and we would see some actual legislative progress over the last two years.  That obviously did not happen and, I am sure, there is sufficient blame for that failure on both sides of the political aisle.  However, the ultimate challenge lies with the ultimate leader and that is the President.  Of all the things that one might fault Obama for, this to me is the most damning.  The colossal expenditure of political capital on Obamacare in his first two years was, in hindsight, a huge miscalculation; a squandered opportunity.  But, a case can perhaps be made that the cause it represented was sufficiently important to Obama and the Democrats that they should spend whatever it took to get it done.  However, following the unambiguous message of the 2010 mid-term elections, President Obama would clearly have been served much better by finding some way to work with Boehner and McConnell to pass some good law and begin to clean up the mess this country is in.