Monday, November 24, 2008
Where Do We Go From Here? 2
In the first post of this series, I lined out how I wanted to tackle this subject. A thoughtful analysis of the last Presidential election using the format of an Army After Action Review (AAR). I thought it would be quick and easy. Four separate, relatively short posts following the 4 steps of an AAR.
Then, I started formulating the post that would be the first step in an AAR; "What was supposed to happen?" As I stated in my first post, I was going to use the military format of "Task, Conditions, and Standards." It quickly became apparent that, to do the subject justice, I was going to have to have three separate posts for the first step, alone. So, we will see how long this series ends up being.
Anyway, here we go ...
TASK
To review, anything that the US Army requires a soldier to execute has a corresponding manual. These manuals follow a very uniform style. For instance, the following is an excerpt from the old "Soldier's Manual of Common Tasks", a manual that delineates basic skills in which every soldier has to maintain proficiency. This excerpt is from a First Aid skill:
Task: Evaluate a Casualty (Tactical Combat Casualty Care)
Conditions: You have a casualty who has signs/symptoms of an injury. Your unit may be under fire.
Standards: Evaluate the casualty following the correct sequence. Identify all life-threatening conditions and other serious wounds.
Pretty simple, straightforward stuff. What to do, where it is to be done, and what is the measure of success.
However, this is a task that EVERY soldier, from the dumbest, greenest Private that has graduated from Basic Training to anyone that might end up on a battlefield. (Currently, a 3-star General is our highest ranking officer in Iraq.) As you move to more complex tasks, this section gets more involved.
Which brings us to our originally intended conversation.
This task was:
Elect a government that will act according to our (conservative) viewpoint and ideology.
This is where things get sticky. The above sounds all well, and good. However, given the current environment, that sentence can mean a lot of different things to different people. So much so, that it could be interpreted to be a pretty meaningless statement. That runs counter to the "Task, Conditions, Standards" convention.
S0, let me delineate what I understand to be "conservative ideology".
Let's start with an overarching statement to tie everything together:
Government should be big enough to guarantee freedoms, but not large enough to impinge upon them.
I think a good place to start is with the Declaration of Independence. The most famous portion of which is:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
I like to think of this portion of the Declaration as a kind of "mission statement", to borrow from corporate-speak, for our nation. Who we want to be, in other words. Who we are trying to become. Not that we have arrived, but that is the goal.
Now, pay attention to the fact that I said "nation", and not government.
For instance, in his 1961 inaugural speech, President John F. Kennedy (a Democrat, BTW) said:
And so, my fellow americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
JFK talked about "country", in that quote, not government. I said nation, not government. In conservative thought, they are not the exact same thing. (For a first point.) We ... you and I ... all 300 million of us, are the country. The government is a social structure that exists to insure an environment where we can have life, liberty, and be free to pursue our own happiness.
Which brings us to the next, crucial, historical document: the Constitution.
I have made a differentiation between the nation/country, and the government. So, let's look at government. This thing that is supposed to provide all of us an environment where we can pursue the American "mission statement." The Founders were very thoughtful ... and I mean that both ways: 1) kind; 2) full of thought, literally. Before they went into the "nuts and bolts" of how this government they were creating was supposed to work, they gave us another mission statement. This time, it was a mission statement for the government.
In the Constitution, it is called the Preamble.
If you haven't ever, I would suggest that, sometime, you read the Constitution. In general, it is not hard to follow.
Keep in mind, it was written before "legalese" was created in this country.
Anyway, the Preamble, written in 1787, goes like this:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
For those of you who voted for Obama, let me translate:
For about 12 years now, the former 13 colonies of Britain, in America, have had a form of government that just didn't work. This Constitution you are about to read is the structure of a new government and here is what we want it to do: establish rule of law, provide a safe environment to live, defend us from outside military invasions, PROMOTE economic well being for everybody; and give freedom to us, and our children.
Now, this is a logical place to discuss the ideology of the modern conservative movement.
Modern conservatism, as promoted by William F. Buckley, et al., can be summed up in the Three Pillars of Conservatism:
1) National Security
2) Fiscal Conservatism
3) Social Conservatism
Let's tackle each one of these at a time:
First:
National Security
To me, this should be a "no-brainer", but, given what has come from the Democrat party over the last 7 years, I can only say: "Apparently not."
Very simply, there is no "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness", if you live in fear of attack. I don't care if we are talking Pearl Harbor, 9/11, or Timothy McVeigh and the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City.
People that live in fear are not free.
To return to "modern conservative ideology", if we don't have this, FIRST, then EVERY other function of government is POINTLESS! Government CANNOT achieve any of it's goals, or, even exist, in the long term, unless, it provides for safety from military-style attack for it's citizens.
FISCAL CONSERVATISM
This one is bit more difficult.
It has everything to do with the Right to Private Property. Basically, "What is mine is mine, not yours.", to put it in kindegarten terms.
It is a fundamental refusal of the idea that everything belongs to the government. That we, you and I, all 300 million of us, can have ... stuff ... whether that is real estate, cars, or, even, our paychecks.
Conservative thought acknowledges that it is, individually, our civic responsibility to pay our "fair share" for the government that we need, but no more than that.
That means that there are certain areas that government, no matter how large (federal/national), or how small (city/county/school district), has no business legislating or taxing.
Hold that thought ... I was beginning to go somewhere, but I will save that for the end.
But, for now, you and I work hard to do, pretty much, whatever we want with what we earn. Right?
Government didn't give it to us. We earned it. I don't know about you, but I EARN my pay.
It might be cliche, but here is my view of a job: (from the John Wayne film: McLintock)
George Washington McLintock (GW): I've been punched many a time in my life but never for hirin' anyone.
Devlin Warren: I don't know what to say. Never begged before. Turned my stomach. I suppose I should have been grateful that you gave me the job.
George Washington McLintock: Gave? Boy, you've got it all wrong. I don't give jobs I hire men.
Drago: You intend to give this man a full day's work, don'tcha boy?
Devlin Warren: You mean you're still hirin' me? Well, yes, sir, I certainly deliver a fair day's work.
George Washington McLintock: And for that I'll pay you a fair day's wage. You won't "give" me anything and I won't "give" you anything. We both hold up our heads.
3) Social Conservatism
In some ways this area is both the easiest, and the most difficult to discuss.
The best place to start in this discussion is what, actually, happens when government, especially federal/national government, makes a decision on an issue that relates to "social conservatism". The latest hot topics are gay marriage, and abortion.
Whether we are talking Roe v. Wade, or Proposition 8 from the last election in California (my rebuttal to the idea of "Right Wing Rage" from the media), it doesn't matter.
The government comes up with a "one size fits all" answer, everytime.
Tell me, truthfully, have you ever had any garment that was "one size fits all" that fit you, at all?
The truth is that "one size fits all" answers NEVER work for ANYBODY EVER!. I don't care if it is clothes, or governmental policy ... IT JUST DOESN'T WORK!
WORSE!
It's not who we are, supposedly. It's not what we are supposed to be about, supposedly.
We read it, together, earlier ... Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness ... what makes me "happy", will, in ALL likelihoods, NOT make you happy ... you might enjoy it, but it won't make you HAPPY.
FINALLY
It all comes down to what you think government should do.
For instance, I think that government has no business in what I think of as "charity work".
Specifically, I don't think that government, especially the federal government, should be giving health care to ANYBODY, except the military, and veterans.
However, I have CHOSEN to spend my time, paid vacation, and money to go on medical "missions" trips on my overseas tours. I have spent more hours than I can count dealing with/helping the homeless at my first duty station. (I forgot to mention that a significant number of the homeless and poor of El Paso were in either my house, or those of my friends.)
That was my CHOICE.
Get the point?
I CHOSE to spend MY time, MY money, MY paid vacation on those things.
As opposed to some schmuck on Capitol Hill that voted for a bill to TAKE money from MY paycheck, and give it to someone else. ... no matter what I thought, or wanted.
There are a lot of things that need to be fixed in the world. I know, I have been there. I have lived on, at one point or the other, most of the continents of the world.
I have beat this point to death.
I leave you with the words of the first President I voted for ... Ronald Reagan ... I cast my first vote, ever, to re-elect him to his second term ... and, during his first inaugural adress he said:
In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.
One political commentator has called him "Ronaldus Magnus", for the greatness of his ideas.
28 years after those words were spoken, I find myself in a position where I am hard pressed to find a viable argument with the President or the commentator.
Then, I started formulating the post that would be the first step in an AAR; "What was supposed to happen?" As I stated in my first post, I was going to use the military format of "Task, Conditions, and Standards." It quickly became apparent that, to do the subject justice, I was going to have to have three separate posts for the first step, alone. So, we will see how long this series ends up being.
Anyway, here we go ...
TASK
To review, anything that the US Army requires a soldier to execute has a corresponding manual. These manuals follow a very uniform style. For instance, the following is an excerpt from the old "Soldier's Manual of Common Tasks", a manual that delineates basic skills in which every soldier has to maintain proficiency. This excerpt is from a First Aid skill:
Task: Evaluate a Casualty (Tactical Combat Casualty Care)
Conditions: You have a casualty who has signs/symptoms of an injury. Your unit may be under fire.
Standards: Evaluate the casualty following the correct sequence. Identify all life-threatening conditions and other serious wounds.
Pretty simple, straightforward stuff. What to do, where it is to be done, and what is the measure of success.
However, this is a task that EVERY soldier, from the dumbest, greenest Private that has graduated from Basic Training to anyone that might end up on a battlefield. (Currently, a 3-star General is our highest ranking officer in Iraq.) As you move to more complex tasks, this section gets more involved.
Which brings us to our originally intended conversation.
This task was:
Elect a government that will act according to our (conservative) viewpoint and ideology.
This is where things get sticky. The above sounds all well, and good. However, given the current environment, that sentence can mean a lot of different things to different people. So much so, that it could be interpreted to be a pretty meaningless statement. That runs counter to the "Task, Conditions, Standards" convention.
S0, let me delineate what I understand to be "conservative ideology".
Let's start with an overarching statement to tie everything together:
Government should be big enough to guarantee freedoms, but not large enough to impinge upon them.
I think a good place to start is with the Declaration of Independence. The most famous portion of which is:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
I like to think of this portion of the Declaration as a kind of "mission statement", to borrow from corporate-speak, for our nation. Who we want to be, in other words. Who we are trying to become. Not that we have arrived, but that is the goal.
Now, pay attention to the fact that I said "nation", and not government.
For instance, in his 1961 inaugural speech, President John F. Kennedy (a Democrat, BTW) said:
And so, my fellow americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
JFK talked about "country", in that quote, not government. I said nation, not government. In conservative thought, they are not the exact same thing. (For a first point.) We ... you and I ... all 300 million of us, are the country. The government is a social structure that exists to insure an environment where we can have life, liberty, and be free to pursue our own happiness.
Which brings us to the next, crucial, historical document: the Constitution.
I have made a differentiation between the nation/country, and the government. So, let's look at government. This thing that is supposed to provide all of us an environment where we can pursue the American "mission statement." The Founders were very thoughtful ... and I mean that both ways: 1) kind; 2) full of thought, literally. Before they went into the "nuts and bolts" of how this government they were creating was supposed to work, they gave us another mission statement. This time, it was a mission statement for the government.
In the Constitution, it is called the Preamble.
If you haven't ever, I would suggest that, sometime, you read the Constitution. In general, it is not hard to follow.
Keep in mind, it was written before "legalese" was created in this country.
Anyway, the Preamble, written in 1787, goes like this:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
For those of you who voted for Obama, let me translate:
For about 12 years now, the former 13 colonies of Britain, in America, have had a form of government that just didn't work. This Constitution you are about to read is the structure of a new government and here is what we want it to do: establish rule of law, provide a safe environment to live, defend us from outside military invasions, PROMOTE economic well being for everybody; and give freedom to us, and our children.
Now, this is a logical place to discuss the ideology of the modern conservative movement.
Modern conservatism, as promoted by William F. Buckley, et al., can be summed up in the Three Pillars of Conservatism:
1) National Security
2) Fiscal Conservatism
3) Social Conservatism
Let's tackle each one of these at a time:
First:
National Security
To me, this should be a "no-brainer", but, given what has come from the Democrat party over the last 7 years, I can only say: "Apparently not."
Very simply, there is no "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness", if you live in fear of attack. I don't care if we are talking Pearl Harbor, 9/11, or Timothy McVeigh and the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City.
People that live in fear are not free.
To return to "modern conservative ideology", if we don't have this, FIRST, then EVERY other function of government is POINTLESS! Government CANNOT achieve any of it's goals, or, even exist, in the long term, unless, it provides for safety from military-style attack for it's citizens.
FISCAL CONSERVATISM
This one is bit more difficult.
It has everything to do with the Right to Private Property. Basically, "What is mine is mine, not yours.", to put it in kindegarten terms.
It is a fundamental refusal of the idea that everything belongs to the government. That we, you and I, all 300 million of us, can have ... stuff ... whether that is real estate, cars, or, even, our paychecks.
Conservative thought acknowledges that it is, individually, our civic responsibility to pay our "fair share" for the government that we need, but no more than that.
That means that there are certain areas that government, no matter how large (federal/national), or how small (city/county/school district), has no business legislating or taxing.
Hold that thought ... I was beginning to go somewhere, but I will save that for the end.
But, for now, you and I work hard to do, pretty much, whatever we want with what we earn. Right?
Government didn't give it to us. We earned it. I don't know about you, but I EARN my pay.
It might be cliche, but here is my view of a job: (from the John Wayne film: McLintock)
George Washington McLintock (GW): I've been punched many a time in my life but never for hirin' anyone.
Devlin Warren: I don't know what to say. Never begged before. Turned my stomach. I suppose I should have been grateful that you gave me the job.
George Washington McLintock: Gave? Boy, you've got it all wrong. I don't give jobs I hire men.
Drago: You intend to give this man a full day's work, don'tcha boy?
Devlin Warren: You mean you're still hirin' me? Well, yes, sir, I certainly deliver a fair day's work.
George Washington McLintock: And for that I'll pay you a fair day's wage. You won't "give" me anything and I won't "give" you anything. We both hold up our heads.
3) Social Conservatism
In some ways this area is both the easiest, and the most difficult to discuss.
The best place to start in this discussion is what, actually, happens when government, especially federal/national government, makes a decision on an issue that relates to "social conservatism". The latest hot topics are gay marriage, and abortion.
Whether we are talking Roe v. Wade, or Proposition 8 from the last election in California (my rebuttal to the idea of "Right Wing Rage" from the media), it doesn't matter.
The government comes up with a "one size fits all" answer, everytime.
Tell me, truthfully, have you ever had any garment that was "one size fits all" that fit you, at all?
The truth is that "one size fits all" answers NEVER work for ANYBODY EVER!. I don't care if it is clothes, or governmental policy ... IT JUST DOESN'T WORK!
WORSE!
It's not who we are, supposedly. It's not what we are supposed to be about, supposedly.
We read it, together, earlier ... Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness ... what makes me "happy", will, in ALL likelihoods, NOT make you happy ... you might enjoy it, but it won't make you HAPPY.
FINALLY
It all comes down to what you think government should do.
For instance, I think that government has no business in what I think of as "charity work".
Specifically, I don't think that government, especially the federal government, should be giving health care to ANYBODY, except the military, and veterans.
However, I have CHOSEN to spend my time, paid vacation, and money to go on medical "missions" trips on my overseas tours. I have spent more hours than I can count dealing with/helping the homeless at my first duty station. (I forgot to mention that a significant number of the homeless and poor of El Paso were in either my house, or those of my friends.)
That was my CHOICE.
Get the point?
I CHOSE to spend MY time, MY money, MY paid vacation on those things.
As opposed to some schmuck on Capitol Hill that voted for a bill to TAKE money from MY paycheck, and give it to someone else. ... no matter what I thought, or wanted.
There are a lot of things that need to be fixed in the world. I know, I have been there. I have lived on, at one point or the other, most of the continents of the world.
I have beat this point to death.
I leave you with the words of the first President I voted for ... Ronald Reagan ... I cast my first vote, ever, to re-elect him to his second term ... and, during his first inaugural adress he said:
In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.
One political commentator has called him "Ronaldus Magnus", for the greatness of his ideas.
28 years after those words were spoken, I find myself in a position where I am hard pressed to find a viable argument with the President or the commentator.
Labels: Abortion, conservative ideology, Pearl Harbor, Presidential election, Proposition 8, Roe v. Wade, Ronald Reagan, Timothy McVeigh, US Constitution, William F. Buckley
