ConservativeINC

Senator Craig is a creep. I guess the only gang signs white GOPers know these days are the ones that will get you plugged in a different way. Michael Vick has somehow tarnished the reputation of the NFL, which, I think, was a harder feat than it would be getting a man on Mars. So kudos Mr. Vick on making the drug abusers and gang members in your league look refreshingly normal. And of course there is the bear market that is waking up from its extended slumber. What would we be doing if we didn’t have these very important things to worry about?

Well, I am not one of those people who think the American public is just a ignorant mass of consumerism if that is what you wanted to hear. But the American public will consume what is the best stuff out there. And, unfortunately, liberals are responsible for an overwhelming majority of what is put on the air. This means that we have gotten a long line of ever more decreasing moral values in everything we watch and listen to.

The rationale for such depraved shows and music is that they are just responding to what the market is demanding. That is why we have barely legal pop stars parading around on stage in barely covering clothing. And that is why every show on TV must show sex as currency. But this is not what the American people want.

I could point out the increasing attendance of churches, which I just have, or I could point out High School Musical 2. I didn’t watch nor would I (I like Deadwood, Rome, and The Sopranos). What it does prove, however, is that when quality content is put on TV people will watch it in droves. I can come up with many other examples of shows that are moral and rake in the viewers but I would still contend that those shows are greatly outnumbered by the crude and the sensationalized content that comes into our homes everyday.

Please don’t misunderstand my meaning however. I think that television and music execs should have the freedom to produce whatever they want to. We all have the power of the remote control or, as the case may be, the click wheel.

My true meaning for writing this article is that there is a lot of money, I think substantially more actually, to be made in producing content that speaks to true American values like the family, honor, perseverance, religiosity, and the all encompassing Judeo-Christian morality. The reason you rarely see any of this is because the ones making the movies do not agree with you, their values are based in a Little Red Book and a Manifesto, not in the Bible.

In order for our side to win out in the culture war is for us to start producing more moral content and making money off these ventures so we can grow. This isn’t a battle we should fight in the courts or in the legislature but home to home. BigT

Discourses

I’ve heard bandied about during the last year or so the notion that we can just divide Iraq up and everything will be fine. Some of these proponents point out that Switzerland is situated thusly and it is a fine country. I cannot speak about Switzerland because I do not know enough about that situation but it seems to me that making a comparison between one country that has been around for hundreds of years and another that has been around as a country for less than 100 years is a mistake. Furthermore, one of my favorite authors speaks to this exact situation in his book The Discourses and this is what he has to say.

Machiavelli wrote in his masterpiece The Discourses that there were three options when dealing with a divided city. You either have to kill the ringleaders responsible for the divisions, exile them, or force them to make nice. The worse choice, according to Machiavelli, was the last option because it allows the previous trouble makers the ability to continue their trouble making anew. Exiling the bad guys is just as bad because they have the ability to come back (think: Sadr). Human nature is enduring for both good people and the bad. You cannot count on people changing their stripes just because you make some changes. They will continue to search for and occasionally find ways to gain the advantage through whatever devious ways they can.

Furthermore, this is what Machiavelli has to say about keeping a city divided:

First of all, whether it be a prince or a republic that is governing them, it is impossible for you to remain friends with both of two factions. For it is natural and inevitable that men should take sides in any dispute, and should be more drawn to this side than to that. So that, if one party in the town you hold is discontented, it will cause you to lose it as soon as war comes along, for it is impossible to hold a city which has enemies without as well as within. If it is a republic that governs the city, there is no surer way of making its citizens bad subjects and of provoking divisions in your own city than to have to govern a divided city; for each party will seek to win favour, and each will use corrupt practices in order to gain supporters. From which two very serious inconveniences arise. First you will never make them your friends owing to your inability to govern them well so long as their government changes frequently according as now one and now another humour prevails. Secondly, the encouragement of parties in the city must needs provoke divisions in your republic. To this Biondo bears witness when he says of the Florentines and the Pistoians that: ‘In their endeavour to restore unity to Pistoia, the Florentines themselves became divided.’ Hence it is easy to see to what evils a divided city gives rise.

What needs to be done is that we kill all the bastards that need killing in order for the rest of Iraq to live without fear. It is also advisable that the political situation is remedied by constitutionally destroying the divisions that are caused by religious and tribal authority. Our constitution gives no heed to a single denomination or even a single religion. Nor were there any provisions for party affiliation in it. However we do it it must get done or there will be a major reckoning in the future visited upon the whole world and not just some crazy jihadists in the deserts of the Middle East. BigT

Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10

This is by far the most awe-inspiring book I have read in the last year. It is the true life story about a team of Navy SEALs who go on a mission into the mountainous regions (is there any other type of region there?) of Afghanistan. Once there they are forced into a deadly situation due to the extremely unrealistic rules of engagement they have to follow. Without going too much into the plot of the book the only survivor, the Lone Survivor, is the one who is writing this book. Facing insurmountable odds he is able to survive thanks to his SEAL training and a quirk of Afghani tribal tradition.

Most of the first half of this book covers how the SEAL, Marcus Luttrell, and his SEAL teammates became SEALs in the first place. Their BUDS training is gone through in agonizing detail with the author completing a portion of the training with a broken bone. Peppered throughout the book is the author’s obvious hatred of the rules that prevented him and his men from doing what they do best, being SEALs. These rules prevented his team from taking out the three men who would soon betray the SEALs’ position to a top ranking Al Qaeda leader and began the movie-like battle where three of the team members died and Marcus was wounded (but never lost his gun).

The rescue operation that was launched to find these men ended in disaster as well as some Al Qaeda bastard shot an RPG into the rescue helicopter which killed everyone inside. The silver lining of this case study in liberal interventionist Rules of Engagement making BS is that at least Marcus lived to tell his story. And he tells the story without pulling any punches against our liberal friends across the aisle. Read this book to know what our troops are really like because the author and his brothers in special operations are the very best this country has to offer. BigT