Dr. Robert Owens Chronicles the History of the Future

We Can Do This Unless We Don’t June 24, 2011

If Alfred E. Newman with his “What me worry?” grin was President of the United States he couldn’t do a more pathetic imitation of leadership than we are currently witnessing in Chicago on the Potomac.

Dismissing the easy visuals of an out-of-touch Imperial President such as:

• Playing golf more in two years than Bush did in eight. With over seventy rounds of eighteen holes in 2.5 years and more that eleven weekends in a row this year it makes one wonder if he’s practicing up for a second career perhaps taking Tiger Woods place once he leaves the White House.
• The 2010 decision to skip the wreath laying ceremony at Arlington to make a pilgrimage to his political Mecca by the Lake,
•  Joking about the failure of the 800+ billion dollar stimulus with his cronies at the ironically named Jobs Council when he quipped with his usual uh … uh … off-script eloquence and profundity, “Shovel-ready was not as … uh .. shovel-ready as we expected.”

These types of politically tone-deaf blunders are merely the insensitive actions of a self-indulgent prima donna on his way to a Jimmy Carter style one-term ejection and should surprise no one.   When you hire a novice to do a master-craftsman’s job don’t be surprised when the paint peels or the wood warps.

However, President Obama, even with the debt exploding, the economy imploding and  his poll numbers in free fall has a glimmer of hope for a surprise re-election commonly known as the Republican Party.

The re-treaded leadership in the House, which the new Tea Party majority-makers allowed to continue even after they handed the momentum back to the Progressives with the Lame-Duck Deal, seem determined to hand Mr. Obama a second term.  How can this be? One continuing resolution after another, a budget deal trading a real 1.6 trillion dollar deficit for phantom cuts, re-affirmation of the liberty-smothering Patriot Act, the soon-to-be vote to raise the debt limit, and the political hacks that pass for conservative leaders will prove it’s business as usual for the two-headed bird of prey that is America’s party of power.

The GOP needs the energy and votes of the Tea Party to win.  With a record of caving to the Progressives who will rally round the Republican flag?  Then there is the coming nominee.  Who will it be?  Will it be someone who could fire up the rank-and-file or will it be another in the long line of “It’s My Turn” RHINOs that the Party sets up to get knocked down?  Will Romney be the next McCain, the next Dole, or the next George H. W. Bush?  Will a Huntsman or a Pawlenty garner enough votes of Democrats voting in Republican primaries and thus win a plurality of the votes as McCain did?

Does the party of Reagan have the courage to nominate someone like Ron Paul who has the record to prove he stands by his limited-government positions?  Do the people who want their constitutionally limited government back have the sense to ignore the drone of the Corporations Once Known as the Mainstream Media and refuse to allow them to succeed in their efforts to make Sarah Palin over into anything but the winner she is?  Do they have the foresight to draft Chris Christie and demand that he run?  In other words do the Republicans have the political integrity to actually run a conservative or will they stick with the same old lackluster Progressive Lite that has spelled doom in the past?

President Obama is eminently beatable.  His successes: healthcare and financial reform were shoved through over the determined resistance of the American public.  His expansion of the wars and his support for the Arab Spring which is code for Islamist take-over has eroded our security.  His religious adherence to the Cloward-Piven Plan to collapse the economy as a means to fundamentally transform America has brought us to the brink of financial disaster.  And his in-your-face golf-while-Washington-burns party at the end of the age lifestyle has made him vulnerable to any candidate who will actually stand for everything the President is against.

The President may say he isn’t on the campaign trail but it would be more accurate to say he has never left the campaign trail except for weekends of golf, luxury vacations, and celebrity parties.  While he was far too busy running for the presidency and miss-managing the country for two years to release a reasonable facsimile of a birth certificate he always has time for important things like the Oprah Show or jetting across the country to glad hand donors.

We all know the President is an excellent campaigner, which according to himself was one of his chief qualifications for becoming President.  With his 2012 campaign headquartered in his adopted home of Chicago, the home of vote procurement procedures, and his goal to raise and spend one billion dollars there should be no doubt that his will be an energetic and effective campaign.

He may have the organization and he may have the money; however, what is the President’s strategy to overcome his record as the first President since Jimmy Carter determined to manage the decline of America instead of working to ensure its continued success?  How is he to convince the great majority of Americans that his program of reckless spending, apology tours, abandoning friends and embracing enemies is deserving of another four years?  The short answer is he can’t, and so he won’t.

President Obama, aided and abetted by the Progressive Media will pretend the economy is recovering or that prosperity is just around the corner.  They will tell the voters we can’t change horses in the middle of the stream.  The storyline will be, “You may be out of a job and waiting to be foreclosed on but it could be worse and it’s getting better.”  I predict this has about as much chance of working as convincing a Steve Jobs worshipping Apple Devotee that a PC really is better.  So what’s the President going to do?

I believe his only chance for a second term is to either use the media and primary cross-voters to help the Republicans nominate the next “It’s my turn” loser or to split the conservative vote.  The Progressive Media will do all they can to promote a like-minded left-wing RHINO ala-McCain, but if the Tea Party wing has enough juice to nominate Ron Paul or Michelle Bachmann or enough power to draft Palin or Christie I predict there will be a pseudo conservative third party candidate even if the DNC has to finance it.

Four more years of managed decline without a re-election to restrain him and President Obama’s transformational vision of America as just another country may become more than just the content of his latest apology or the lesson taught to our children in public schools.  It may become the shabby reality we will have to endure and the shameful remnant we leave to our grandchildren.  We must stay united, stay focused, and work together for the restoration of America.  We can’t let divisions divide us anymore.  We can do this unless we don’t.

Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College.  He is the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com View the trailer for Dr. Owens’ latest book @ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ypkoS0gGn8 © 2011 Robert R. Owens dr.owens@comcast.net  Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook.