Shadows and Foreshadows

shadows…

The latest example of what the Obama administration considers transparency was the long awaited testimony of Hillary Clinton this week on the catastrophe in Benghazi. Fortunately, Mrs. Clinton’s health issues were finally resolved long enough for her to allow Congress a few hours of her valuable time, and the benefit of her vast knowledge on the issue of Benghazi. Unfortunately, her “vast knowledge” turned out to be not so vast after all. Apparently, despite the fact that Mrs. Clinton has taken full responsibility for the events, she maintains that she was in no way responsible for the events for which she has taken full responsibility.

That’s the way the whole testimony went. The structure of Congressional inquiry is poorly designed to acquire information anyway. Alternating questioning by detractors and then supporters, both generally more concerned with making political points than elucidating the subject matter, is a poor way to find a way out of the shadows, especially when the witness is clearly intent on remaining in them. Feigning outrage that she would even be asked why the story about the video was pushed, “What difference does it make…”, and almost coming to tears (almost) describing how she had lied to, I mean comforted, the families of the dead victims. Her responses were clearly intended to obfuscate, and discourage further inquiry through aggression, feigned indignation, and crocodile tears; common tactics for those hoping to hide something.

What happened in Benghazi we may never know without a whistleblower. The few witnesses have been spirited away, no one even knows who they are. There seems to be little effort being made to find the perpetrators, as if it would be better if the whole thing was buried with the dead. The amount of effort being expended in keeping us in darkness would seem to indicate that it was something pretty dark indeed. You don’t have to see what’s in the shadows to know that something is there.

Within twenty-four hours of Mrs. Clinton finishing her testimony, Leon Panetta announced that women would now be allowed in combat positions. Ignore those shadows, nothing to see, let’s talk about something else now… look at this shiny object! Misdirection is the flashy accomplice of obfuscation. This is not to say that women in combat is not something the Administration had planned, but the timing is all too convenient. Moving news coverage and debate off of one thing by introducing another is a strategy you can expect to see more often, as the press is easily manipulated, and increasingly, so is the public. I suspect that the whole gun control debate may be just that. Not that the President would mind if the improbable happened, and New York style gun control was passed nation-wide; but it is so unlikely that it is more likely a diversion… I mean, how serious can he be about it… he put Joe Biden in charge!

foreshadows…

If shadows hide things in darkness, foreshadowing brings limited light to what is on the horizon. A dim light shines into the future and gives a glimpse of what is to come. Without a re-election bid to be concerned about, the President was free to foreshadow for his followers his agenda for the upcoming term in his recent inaugural address. Most of his agenda will be aimed at consolidating or rewarding his base of minorities, young women, unions, and environmentalists. I expect his main focus will be on environmental issues including carbon taxes. Climate change has proven to be highly lucrative for Al Gore, and I don’t doubt that the President is seeing the dollar signs in CO2. Follow the money.

Beyond the inaugural address, President Obama’s first term foreshadows what to expect in the second. More pushing the limits of the powers of the Presidency, more marginalizing of Congress, more attempts at diminishing the Republican party, and conservatism in general. There will be more regulatory proliferation, centralization of power, and of course, more tax increases. What there has been no foreshadowing of is any kind of cuts in spending. At heart, President Obama is a Keynesian (I didn’t say Kenyan!), and, despite the occasional homage to budget cuts in his speeches, huge deficits are not really a problem in his world view, and that debt clock will keep ticking ever faster.

IMHO: Ms. Clinton and President Obama are both self-proclaimed Progressives, a movement that has been around since the turn of the 20th century. Like their Fabian Socialist counterparts in England (Tony Blair, Gordon Brown…), Progressives believe in revolution through evolution. Instead of espousing the bloody revolutions associated with Communism, proponents of Progressivism hold to transformation by gradualism. They are willing to accept change over longer periods of time, doing their part to move things “forward”, but then handing off the baton to those who follow them after their term of office or even their lifetime. The gradualism is not so much a matter of increasing education of the masses, as it is instituting change incremental enough to avoid arousing substantial resistance. They worship at the altar of their own ideas, believing that those ideas justify whatever means are necessary to institute them. As such, popular opinion is only important in so much as it can further their cause, and if popular opinion is against them (as it was with Obamacare), then the masses are an obstacle to be overcome by whatever means necessary, for their own good. When push comes to shove, “Freedom” takes a back seat to what the Progressives call “Justice”, and indeed, the two might ultimately prove mutually exclusive. For this reason, Progressivism needs to move slowly most times, picking up the pace as opportunities present themselves (“You never let a serious crisis go to waste”). It is expected that the disarray of the Republicans will be seen by the President as such an opportunity. Transparency is seldom a hallmark of the operation of Progressives, as the ultimate change they desire might prove unwanted by the “ignorant masses”. Despite his rhetoric, the President’s first term behavior does not foreshadow sunlight in the second. The Progressive is comfortable in the shadows, it is where he feels most at home; but walking in darkness is hazardous, eventually you get tripped up.

“If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world. But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.”

The Gospel of John