Rebuttal: Charles Krauthammer’s “Hard Power” Dreams

By: Matt Fay

Having never served a day in the military myself, I often wonder how others who have never been a member of the armed services can so often call for use of the military without being lynched by those who have served.  Charles Krauthammer – a neoconservative editorial writer for The Washington Post, contributing editor to The Weekly Standard, and long time panelist on Fox News Sunday – is one such person.  In his recent article for Real Clear Politics, titled “How Hostages, and Nations, Get Liberated” – referred to on The Weekly Standard’s blog as “In Praise of ‘Hard Power’” – is one more, in a long line of articles by neoconservatives, that pushes, at the very least, the threat of U.S. military power as the most effective means of bringing about peace and justice in a chaotic world.

By Isaac M. Morehouse

Last night my wife and I were watching another episode of Joss Whedon's Firefly. (By the way, this show is awesome. Besides the coolness of a sci-fi western, it's full of anti-bureaucracy, pro-freedom themes. It ran for less than one season on Fox in 2002, but you can watch it free in it's entirety at Hulu.com) During a commercial we saw this ad.

Cute little kid faces somberly saying, "Tick" one after another led me to believe it was a public service announcement warning parents and children about Deer Ticks, which can be carriers of Lyme disease. Seemed like a reasonable warning - I live in the country, so I have to check my son for Ticks after he's been in the tall grass. But alas, this was not an insect removal reminder. It was an ad for fightglobalwarming.com - reminiscent of and just as disturbing as LBJ's famous 1964 "Daisy" ad.

The ad seemed cheap and exploitative. I guess guilt and fear were the feelings they were trying to inspire, but it just made me feel weird. The old, "If you don't do this babies and puppies will die" line always raises suspicion. When facts won’t do, cart out the children.

The creators of the ad would do the public a far greater service if it went something like: "Tick, tick, tick...check your kids for ticks if they've been outside!" After all, Lyme disease has harmed more people than manmade global warming ever will.

(Cross posted at the SFEblog)

By Isaac M. Morehouse

Sometimes I feel like a dog who's handed a piece of fake bacon for rolling over. Or maybe one of those porpoises who gets some frozen fish chunks for splashing tourists at Sea World. Election time will do that.

These days, the pressure to "Vote or Die" is worse than the pressure to play Pogs was in junior high. A recent TV commercial that interrupts my Family Guy episodes shows a wheelchair bound woman going out in the rain, getting on a bus, doing the limbo under a gate and entering a gymnasium with great difficulty; the music builds, she looks determined, and at the climax she casts a ballot. The ad ends with some statement like, "be a hero today". We have no idea what she voted for. For all we know, she could've voted to forever outlaw the playing of Pogs, or the feeding of Porpoises. No matter. She voted, and that makes her a hero.

“That’s All We Can Ask”

By Isaac M. Morehouse

This morning on a local radio station they mentioned presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama making recent visits to Michigan. The host said something like, "They didn't stay long, but we got attention from both major party candidates, and that's all we can ask".

I almost spit out my English Breakfast Tea. What did he mean, "That's all we can ask?" I can't be sure, but considering the tone and context, it felt like a star-struck fan longing for a moment with his hero and realizing that a glance would have to tide him over. Or maybe an attention starved child being happy to get at least a few minutes with their parent. But these are politicians we're talking about. Politicians! They spend half of their life groveling and flattering and promising things they know they can't deliver on - some of which they wouldn't even if they could - so that we will like them, and the other half trying to make sure we don't notice the things they do that we don't like. They are door-to-door salesman desperately seeking to make a sale. Would we be overjoyed and delighted that a vacuum cleaner salesman worked out neighborhood? Would we say, "He wasn't here long, but that's all we can ask"?

For some reason we believe that prospective presidents have magical power to grant us wishes and bring sunshine, lollipops and rainbows. What if they could? Would we really want them to? Government has nothing to give except that which is first takes - from you and me. If a president is powerful enough to give you everything you want, he's powerful enough to take everything you've got.

American presidents were not intended by our founders to be dream-fountains for the populace. They were meant to execute the narrow tasks of the Federal government - a military to protect from foreign invasion, the appointment of judges to mitigate legal issues, and the maintenance of a basic structure to protect individual and state's rights. They were to be the stewards of the skeleton; we, the individual citizens, were left to, paraphrasing musician David Gray, “Put flesh on the bones of our dreams”.

If voters stopped greeting candidates with a look of longing and an outstretched hand ready to receive goodies, maybe politicians would stick to their proper job-description.

I wish to be left alone. That is all I can ask.