Only conservatives still true to JFK's ideals
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(Gamecock's second dead tree MSM column of February 13, 2007 is reprinted with permission of The Charlotte Obsever)
Democrats have lost the compassion and will to bear burden for liberty
MIKE DEVINE
Special to the Observer
"I don't care about the people of Iraq."
I was shocked when that statement was made to me last year by a Democrat friend.
I shouldn't have been!
That quote pretty much sums up the moral bankruptcy of modern-day liberalism and my former party today.
The sentiment expressed in that quote is consistent with the giggles I heard from fellow liberal Democrats in 1983 in reaction to President Ronald Reagan's "Evil Empire" speech.
I was also shocked then. I shouldn't have been!
The best reason for why I should not be shocked occupies the receptionist chair in my SouthPark office.
She is a descendant of the Hmong people of Laos who were allies of the United States until the government of South Vietnam fell in 1975. Massive slaughter of millions followed at the hands of the North Vietnamese communists and Cambodia's Pol Pot. More than 300,000 Laotians, mostly Hmong, fled. But thousands of Hmong continued to fight against the evil of communism; hundreds of their guerilla fighters surrendered only last month.
In 1975 I was an idealistic teen animated by the "Bear any burden for the cause of liberty" rhetoric by President John F. Kennedy, complimented by the "Love they neighbor" rhetoric of Jesus Christ, but quite ignorant of the details of the Vietnam War. I was a self-identified liberal anxiously awaiting my 18th birthday so that I could actively participate in my grandfather's party.
Eyes averted from slaughter
Sadly, almost from the beginning of my political activism, I had to reconcile the irreconcilable, i.e. the rhetoric of JFK with the reality of the words and actions of the flower children of the 1960s and the McGovernites who took over the party. Democrats cut off funds from our South Vietnamese allies, averted their eyes from the slaughter and celebrate their role in "ending the war" as one of their greatest accomplishments even to this day.I shamefully averted my ears from the liberal Democratic giggles at Reagan's notion of good and evil until the summer of 2001.
The "conservative epiphany" came as a result of confronting what I knew in my heart was true as I read Reagan's letters and speeches and books about his long war against communism. Reagan cared so much for the oppressed that he even deemed the policy of containment to have immorally sentenced half the globe to slavery. He told the so-called "realists" in 1981 that henceforth, American policy toward the Soviet Union would be "We win, they lose."
This was the liberal I had been looking for.
Did liberals stop caring about the oppressed when their hero was assassinated in 1963 or when they faced the draft board in 1968?
When I was an idealistic teenager, it was a given that America was good, that totalitarianism was evil, and that what America should be most proud of was our liberation of the oppressed. I still consider this a given.
The post-Watergate liberal Democrat Congress was warned of the likelihood of falling dominoes of slaughter in 1975, but they chose to avert their eyes. Many warn that the same fate will await the Iraqis if we abandon them a second time.
Will we betray Iraqis?
One of the most credible is John Burns, war correspondent for The New York Times, who covered genocide in Bosnia.
Asked to compare the situation there with Iraq, he said, "There's all likelihood if the United States withdraws its forces that there will be a great deal more killing."
Of course, I don't need Burns to tell me that betrayal is wrong, especially when greeted daily by my Hmong receptionist.
My eyes, ears, heart, mind and soul tell me that the most powerful nation on earth must love its neighbors enough to bear any burden for liberty, especially when it is so inextricably tied to our own liberty and, especially, our honor.
I care about the people of Iraq and my country's soul.
This conservative never lost his liberal heart.
Mike
DeVine
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Observer community columnist Mike DeVine is vice president of Intequity Inc., a Charlotte-based marketing firm, blogs as "Gamecock" at http://gamecock.townhall.com, www.race42008.com, and http://www.theminorityreportblog.com and is legal editor for http://www.hinzsightreport.com.
Write him c/o The Observer, P.O. Box 30308, Charlotte, NC 28230-0308, or at mikedevinelaw@yahoo.com.
avenging the Mets. Where did they go?
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
this is the best work you have ever done!
A great column! I'm proud of you!
At last. A NeoCon who's honest about where his heart truly lies.
Idealism based upon someone elses blood and someone elses taxdollars.
It's PeaceCorps Republicanism. Not Conservatism.
elses' blood?
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
Define "NeoCon." And I'll give you a hint: folks like Moe and Gamecock fall under that definition; folks like, say, Erick and I do not.
My comments were in reply to GC, Jeff. If you don't consider yourself a NeoCon, fine. But we live in an era when the definition of conservative is under threat of meaning nothing more than Republican. NeoConservatism is the resort to foreign policy adventurism in order strike fear into American to get their votes and to effectively reject Goldwater Conservatism i.e. the return to the American system of Federalism and a limited Federal government. It's also a sop to the political correctness that the Democrats have peddled for years and now the GOP has inherited.
I believe there are more than a few genuine conservatives who are conflicted in this instance because they just don't want to be out of step with official GOP. Look, 2008, will be a landmark. Either the Bush ideology is repudiated (Medicare Drug Prescription benefit, No Child left behind, and all) or conservatism is eclipsed because no one cared to stand up for it.
Someone has to.
Because I am a neocon, I have no desire to cause fear in anybody except the violent enemies of the good - and I get to enforce standards of politeness around here. You aren't meeting them.
So now go apologize to gamecock. Sincerely. In your next post.
Moe
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC.
Take JFK and put him in more of a swing state, Ohio or the red parts of California (no need to pander to MA liberals.
Given his devotion to spreading democracy and hardline stance with Communism, I see it impossible that he would be affiliated with the Democratic Party today.
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
And in making this assertion is Kennedy moving to the Right? Or is the Republican Party moving the Left???
This is the irony of the last 12 years. '94 was supposed to be the fulfilment of the Reagan revolution. A move of the U.S. to the Right. Instead we see a GOP that is the inheritor of the New Frontier and the Great Society instead og Goldwater, the Father of modern Conservatism.
The GOP has oficially become contentless. Were there no Democratic Party there would be no GOP. Get my point? There is nothing there worth fighting for.
Many are going to. Given 2006 and Bush's 51% win over John Kerry in '04 are really so glib at the prospect?
...because when a moderator says 'Apologize', apologize*.
Anyway, if the next two years do not teach every faction of the GOP the consequences of holding out for a potential full loaf tomorrow over an actual half loaf today - or even a quarter loaf - then... we'll have to have the lesson again, I guess. I'm betting that we won't.
Moe
*Loathe all you like, as long as you keep to minimal standards of politeness.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC.
It's been, like a week. We've banned tons of people since then. What, it's not fun anymore?
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC.
The post is an excellant description of how an idealist can transmute from "bear any burden in the cause of liberty" to the realist "We win. They lose." Many Democrat/liberals take a reverse course in expressing concern over Rawanda or Darfur but rejecting Vietnam or Iraq precisely because there is a critical strategic interest for the US in the outcome. Idealism cannot be idealism unless it is without self benefit.
Call it neo-con or conservative or realpolitic, we have an interest in the spread of liberty, of the Western concept of liberty, if for no other reason, because an ideology, like a company or a nation or any other organism, must either grow or die. It was not the policy of contrainment or detante that succeeded in the Cold War, but simply "We win. They lose." It is not a policy of "Fortress America" or "redeployment" that will be successful in thwarting the "Death to America" Islamofascists. We must be on the offensive and in the process bring the blessings of liberty (Western style) to Afghanistan, Iraq, and as many other countries as is necessary to marginalize the threat to our way of life.
The "do good only for its own sake" liberals and the isolationist libertarians do not comprehend, or do not agree with, this cause of action.
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
Your right, Skorrent. I don't agree. And I'm in awe that you do. You honestly believe that Western civilization is being embraced by Islam??? This political correctness is just staggering.
in a dark room? Maybe its not you...maybe it's all of us!
Democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan will not look anything like our form of government. We don't espect it, nor should we. But then, neither is Great Britain, France, or India. BUT, they are Democracies!
The Iraq and Afghani models seem closer to France...which is to say, they don't work very well, but what can you expect out of French people?
The problem with any form of government in the Mideast is IGNORANCE and ILLITERACY! Freedom requires an informed electorate. In those parts of the world where the media is funneled through filters, so that only one point of view is presented, the system fails. When children are not taught to read and write, they are consigned to poverty and ignorance, and are easily led by demogogues.
Schools, built by the coalition forces are teaching boys and girls in those two countries for the first time. Freedom will not be easy, but any other alternative is unthinkable.
missed it the first time
glad I got to read the reprint!
I wish you weren't so correct in your assessment!
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
is coming out when I read this story. I agree with you that the sentiments expressed by JFK in speeches he made are completely absent from the current crop of politicians in the Democratic party. Unfortunately some of the micromanagement of US military and US espionage activity that JFK practiced are the very same micromanagement being used by Democrats today. Bay of Pigs? Remember? I really am more upset with folks that leave our troops in a situation where they are fighting but not allowed to win than I am with folks who won't put the troops into the conflict. I'll never forget a program I once saw in the '90's when a man from Ohio asked the question
about the Bosnia conflict: "Will they let us fighting men win this time?"
You’re a persistent cuss, pilgrim.
John Wayne to Jimmy Stewart in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
column limitations allows. I was very specific.
I held up the ideal by the Democrat's icon that inspired a generation. Much of that generation abandoned the ideal within 7-11 years and chose instead the McGovern ideal.
Reagan conservatives embraced the JKF pronounced ideal. In fact, Reagan hinself embraced it in the 50s!
Pilgrim, GC is learning the limitations of 800 words in the MSM. Learm it with me you ole cuss!
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
cut you some slack in this new MSM 800 word limitation world you are living in. I agree that President Reagan also embraced the JFK pronounced ideal. President Reagan also knew how to keep his hands off of micromanaging operations. Under President Reagan a missile attack in Libya was successful. Under President Carter missions were micromanaged poorly and failed.
You’re a persistent cuss, pilgrim.
John Wayne to Jimmy Stewart in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
and Bravo Pilgrim, you hit the nail on the head of my column. I said conservatives embraced the JFK ideal and specifically cited Reagan, and in fact
my formula for these 800 dead tree incursions are:
1-an attention grabbing quote as the opening line
2-take liberals to task for betraying their own ideals
3-quote scripture of refer to a judeo-christian ideal
4-use Reagan's examples
nice eh?
both of my columns have done this
Mike Gamecock DeVine @ The Charlotte Observer
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
as always, my fine feathered friend.