When World’s Collide
Earlier this year, there was an unintended collision of worlds in Wisconsin. It was not planned, was not supposed to happen, and certainly was not supposed to have the outcome.
You see, for reasons known only to Big American Labor, at a time when they were merging with worldwide Labor and other Leftist organizations to become a truly supranational movement, they chose to hasten the convergence of all their dreams of political power into an insignificant midwestern state to do battle with the Wisconsin legislature and its governor, who had just passed a law changing the financial nature of the state’s relationship with its unionized public employees.
The unions summoned agents from all over America to storm the State House. The governor held firm. Then a local partisan judge declared the law illegal, but after a special election to stack the state Supreme Court to affirm the lower court’s ruling, they failed on appeal, losing it all….over a few pennies from their member’s paycheck.
I said “they” lost it “all,” for “they” includes nearly every other public employee union in America. Every state now has the playbook to defend against the unions, for none of their dire predictions proved to be true. Not a single Wisconsin employee lost their job. In fact, the reverse happened. Soon school district account sheets in Wisconsin went from from red to black thanks to those few extra pennies. Moreover, all the employees are now getting a little extra in their own paychecks so the unions must find a way to extract those dues in another way, which promise a lessening of union participation, and ultimately membership. Expect the union to be decertified by the members within 10 years.
Not only was Greece-in-Wisconsin avoided, but Paradise was regained…all because Governor Scott Walker kept his covenant with his oath and the people…
…and then stared down the Beast.
The Convergence of Worlds, 2 August
Last week, Iowahawk asked Obama during his Tweet-to-Twit Conference:
“Are you smart enough to create a problem so big that even you could not solve it?”
Turns out, yes, Obama has created a problem so big he cannot solve it. And I’ll take a flier on the “smart” part for it seems he is doing a really, really stupid thing here, just like the unions in Wisconsin.
He seems to be faking going all-in, giving John Boehner the opportunity to force him to really go “all-in.”
Now the August 2 debt-ceiling deadline is both a fake deadline, and a fake “default” headline story, since America won’t default. What will occur, of course, is that current spending, already in deficit, will have to be pruned back, by operation of law. If the Congress and President cannot agree to agree as to what this pruning will look like, it will be left up to the Secretary of Treasury to decide what must be cut, and where. I’m sure you’ve noticed that the SecTreas (Timmy Geithner) is a pal of Obama’s and no pal of fiscal responsibility. He can be expected to do the President’s bidding.
But just what can the President bid…and get away with?
He seems to suggest he can deny social security and veterans their August checks…as a way to convey the immense non-legislative power he has. In doing this he has made a tingle run up Chris Mathews leg, but made warm pee run down Mitch McConnell’s.
That’s the news today, there will be more tomorrow.
Did it have its desired effect? Well, yes and no. After all, GOP senators have been soiling themselves for years from these kinds of threats. Demosquaw senators have their lodge poles filled with Republican scalps for what started out as just an attempt to count coup. Since a dozen of them are Mitch McConnell’s, being his rug-dealer must be good business.
But Obama has miscalculated. He assumes a world that went out of existence in November, 2010. The GOP senate has very little to say in this debt ceiling matter, and there are fresh GOP locks there that will never hang on a Demosquaw’s lodge pole. Causing Mitch to pee will do him no good. In the end, except for the usual suspects, they will sign onto any bill the House sends them that will achieve the basic principles they’ve laid out from the beginning; an extension of the debt ceiling in exchange for a tit-for-tat immediate reduction in spending, AND NO NEW TAXES.
Mitch, the Maine Blueberries, a new Gang of Seven spawned by Satan’s spawn, McCain, none of them can separate the elemental fact…
…that Obama must square his case with Boehner and no one else.
The Hastening
Why Obama, like the unions, has hastened to this point, when, like the unions, he could have simply admitted publicly he had a bad hand anyway, and accepted the GOP offer, I can’t say. After all, it could easily have been Bush’s fault. In old Democrat fashion, he could have slunk back into his cave to lick his wounds, reemerge in a few days, full of vim and vinegar, to start the fight anew, as if this whole debt ceiling mess had never happened. (With the media’s help this was always eminently doable. It always had been in the past.)
Instead, Obama’s decided to go “all in.” Sure, if he can force Boehner to cave, he wins next November. Duh. But no one in his camp has even a clue what the outcome will be if Boehner sticks to his guns. There is no guarantee who the public will blame as someone has to start cutting spending “without a deal.”
It’s a crap shoot. So I wonder if Obama has considered the opposite, namely that if he blinks, and concedes (which he easily could have done just a week ago without penalty) not only are his aspirations for being re-elected gone, but perhaps, like those idiot unions in Wisconsin, so may the greater movement they wanted to foist. Socialism-in-America, OK, its first of many death rattles, may begin to die on August 2.
So, this is as it should be: when you come to that point that the can can no longer be kicked. I’ve alluded to Reagan and Gorbachev at Reykjavik and Chamberlain and Hitler at Berchtegaden, but this is even bigger.
This isn’t just one of those once in a lifetime moments, it’s a genuine 1517 crucible, one of those unplanned and even dreaded moments when all American history, and world history (if you’re a fan of Liberty), when the American soul, the American potential for all humankind, Liberty, all that stuff, both the past and future, will all converge on just one simple “yes” or “no” by two ordinary men, placed in a position, one, I’m sure, never wished for, and the other, who way under-estimated the gravity.
If Boehner blinks (he doesn’t have to win the vote) Obama will likely win in 2012, the GOP will be finished, and it will be 40 years before we will return to power…by then a nation so misshapened as to be beyond recognition beyond any of us can imagine now (ask Russia, c1992) .
If Obama loses…(he doesn’t have to cave himself ), by changing the stakes to “making Boehner cave” he has gone all in. His loss will be a stake in the heart of the entire Leftist movement, which will speed the conservative victory.
Since I’m only advising John Beohner here (tough toenails, Barry), just understand the simplicity of this fight. It is no more complex than David standing before the giant. Your skill and assets versus his skill and assets. All else is vanity.
Just remember your covenant with the People, Mr Boehner, for if you truly believe it, it is more powerful than anything Mr Obama can muster. All you have to say,
You shall not pass!
And it will be finished.
