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America -- Almost Certainly Doomed
by Mac Johnson [scientist, author 9/11/07]

Last week I drove my butt out to Durham, New Hampshire and attended the Fox News "First in the Fall" GOP Presidential Debate. I did this for you, the reader, who couldn't be there because it was way the heck out in Durham, New Hampshire.

Sure I could've simply watched it on TV just like you, the reader, but I wanted to be able to deduct the mileage on my taxes. Also, my "limited acces" press pass entitled me to enter th"Spin Room" after the debate, where I could theoretically ask the candidates direct questions and where (more importantly) I might end up in the background of a TV report, thus thrilling my mother and providing photographic proof that I am entitled to deduct the mileage on my taxes.

These limited accomplishments being my goals, the trip was a smashing success. However, if you were hoping that I might be able to see or hear some gnostic tidbit of wisdom that would inform your choice for President, I'm afraid I can't help you. I saw essentially the same debate you did, but I was surrounded by much more annoying people than you were and thus probably couldn't concentrate as well as you.

But after seeing all the candidates I can tell you this for sure: America might be doomed.

I saw gifted candidates. I saw correct-thinking candidates. But I never saw both these traits in the same person. Granted, I was just called up from AAA ball to cover this major league event, but I'm telling you our bench is just not that deep. Somewhere, somehow, conservatism has gone astray at the highest levels of the movement. Where are our leaders?

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, the live debate experience. I assumed that the main difference between a live debate and a televised debate would be that I couldn't watch the live debate in my underwear. I assure you, however, that I could've gone totally unnoticed wandering around Durham in my underwear. It has been claimed that the freaks come out at night. But at a debate they show up around mid-afternoon and crowd around the barricades out front.

They believe that 9/11 was an inside job. They drive vehicles shaped like a giant pie chart of the federal budget. They are worried that global warming will endanger maple syrup. They belong to the Service Employees International Union. Freaks. Then there are the candidates' supporters.

If you can tell something about a candidate by his supporters, then it is clear that Mike Huckabee should be President. So obviously, that system breaks down in actual practice. But I must say the Huckaberries seemed like a clean cut and normal bunch. Rudy Giuliani's entourage was like Christmas Day at a nursing home: just a few, old, and fairly somber. Ron Paul's supporters seemed to have been bused in -- half from a NORML convention, the other half from a meeting of anti-tax militants. Mitt Romney's group seemed to be from someplace called "Stepford," and all seemed to have just made their sales goal for the quarter. And Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo, Duncan Hunter, and John McCain don't really exist, because they had no supporters out front. Shame about Tancredo and Hunter.

The most encouraging thing about the debate itself was the prominence given to the issue of immigration, which of course really means illegal immigration. If you had any doubt that the American people have finally gotten through to the elite of the Republican Party on this issue, it should've been erased by this debate. They now understand enough to lie to us about the issue. John McCain denies that "amnesty" is even actually a word -- let alone that he supported it fanatically a few months ago. Rudy "Sanctuary" Giuliani is all for increased federal enforcement of immigration law now. Sam Switchback wants a fence on top of a wall, backed up by a wall on top of a second fence. Mitt Romney is channeling Tom Tancredo on all immigration questions. And of course Tom Tancredo, as well as Duncan Hunter and Ron Paul, are still saying what they've always said and are thus the only ones I believe on the issue.

If words are any measure of belief, Romney gave the best short answer to solving the illegal immigration debacle -- we have to punish sanctuary cities and employers. A fence is necessary, of course, but will only be effective as an adjunct to internal enforcement. Unfortunately, Romney is an ambitious man, so driven to succeed that he is prone to changing what he says when need be.

And if words are any measure of IQ, Mike Huckabee gave the stupidest answer to solving illegal immigration -- he wants to outsource our visa tracking to FedEx since they do such a bang-up job tracking his amazon.com orders. This comparison would be more valid, however, if FedEx faced an environment in which every year several million packages snuck into their sorting centers, made up fake address labels for themselves and ran like mad when discovered. Other than that not being true, people as packages is a great analogy. Huckabee then showed his political acumen by stating that the opponents of open borders (i.e most voters) included lots and lots of racists. Yeah, The Huckster is the total package. Hillary Clinton must wake up giggling when she dreams of running against him.

Both Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter handled the illegal immigration issue with earnest conviction, but lack the political gifts of Romney, Giuliani or even McCain. Overall though, I thought Hunter did well in the debate, in that he was imaginable as President, unlike, say, Sam Brownback -- who should take mercy on humanity and euthanize his campaign before more needless suffering occurs. If he'll quit, I'll write his "spend more time with my "family" speech for free.

The other major topic of the debate was Iraq and Terror. On this subject, McCain did well (as did Giuliani). Whatever McCain's other flaws (a major book for whoever wants to write it), he understands well what is at stake in Iraq. Iraq is not about saving the Iraqis or Huckabee's idiotic "you break it, you buy i" theory of geopolitics. It's about the United States' reputation as a serious and formidable military power. If we lose in Iraq, if we run like weak fools, we needlessly declare open season on ourselves. Everybody wants to provoke conflict with a declining power that lacks the will to win.

Speaking of which, let's discuss Ron Paul. I must admit I have long had a soft spot for Representative Dr. Paul. It's a character flaw on my part. I love the human hand grenade in politics. I hate authority so much that I purposely take my prescription pills with alcohol just because that little fascist bottle has a sticker telling me not to (Live Free or Nap Deeply, I say). However, whatever soft spot I had for Paul totally hardened and became quite flaky and irritated last night. Paul's position on Iraq (and Afghanistan) is infantile. We can argue about whether the war should have been started for years to come. But it was started, and you don't get a do-over in history. You win or you lose while all the world watches. If we withdraw under fire -- not just from Iraq in his plan but from all the region (an attempt to appease Al Qaeda by our withdrawal from the Arabian peninsula) -- America will never recover. It will be an irreversible calamity. Every war is born of the ones that come before it. Headlong retreat from Iraq will plant the seeds of dozens of defensive wars to come.

Winning this imperfect war, by contrast, will make us seem militarily unassailable for the next 20 years. Yet most of the candidates talked more about how soon we could withdraw than of how important it is to win.

All told, by the end of the evening I was left depressed, unable to see conviction, correctness and charisma emerge in a single candidate. This depression was made worse since all night long, the candidates had invoked Ronald Reagan -- the exemplar of conviction, correctness and charisma for the conservative movement. They invoked him in an attempt to inherent some of his power -- to associate themselves with a dead hero of old. But the comparisons had the opposite effect. All eight on the stage seemed smaller in the shadow of the great man.

So I decided America was doomed and I left around midnight to go buy a comforting cholesterol sandwich at a McDonald's I had passed earlier that day. "Fas" food is a relative term -- especially in a college town drive-through late at night -- and I became stuck in a line that inexplicably included a group of pedestrians ordering between the cars. Bored, the impossibly young cashier asked if I had just come from the debate and I remembered finally to remove the press ID from around my neck. We talked a bit about Ron Paul and John McCain, the specter of Fred Thompson and, of course, Iraq. Her brother, an infantry scout, leaves for Iraq this month she said. I wished him luck and in a strained effort to show her that not everyone with a press ID is too precious and liberal to understand her brother I told her how I'd failed the physical to join the reserves after September 11th. That story made her laugh for some reason -- probably because I am so svelte and athletic looking, you see.

She told me that she couldn't get off work, but had wanted to go to the debate, because she had just turned eighteen and registered to vote. "I guess I want to learn something and try to get involved in my country now that I can vote," she said, smiling and embarrassed.

"I wish I could tell you who you should vote for, but I have no idea at all after that debate," I replied.

We laughed -- at the idea of the conversation as much as anything else -- and then I felt OK again. America will be OK, I thought. Our greatness as a country doesn't flow from our leaders. It comes from people like that little red-headed cashier -- and her brother who leaves for Iraq this month when so many others would run away.

America will be OK, please pull forward to the second window.

Thank you, whoever you were, little girl. ExileStreet

First appeared at Human Events

copyright 2007 Mac Johnson

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