If it isn’t Right it’s Wrong

Back in the nineties when Pat Buchanan was wise enough to label the Culture War for what it was some of us asked, “How can a moral wrong be a civil right?”  This was back when those coming out of the closet were asking for freedom, and not trying to deny freedom to others.  Today the radical homosexuals froth at the mouth and impose boycotts against anyone with the impudence to say they support traditional values and with the bad taste to say they are married to their first wife.

The Corporations Once Known as the Mainstream Media joins the radical homosexuals distorting what was initially said and fanning the flames of hate.  Pandering politicians join in the pile-on and use their offices and the power voters entrusted them with to punish a lawful business because their CEO exercised his first amendment rights and stated something that not too long ago was so widely accepted it never would have had to be said.

Culturally the majority of Americans now live in a nation controlled and subjugated by a vocal minority intent on forcing their values on the rest of us.

Back in the nineties after America had defeated the Evil Empire we stood unchallenged as the world’s sole superpower.  Our industrial base was an 800 pound gorilla in everybody’s room.  We were the largest creditor nation in the History of the world.  Our science and our technology were the definition of cutting edge.  Today China rises like the red dragon in the East.  We are the largest debtor in the History of the world.  The fastest computer, the largest accelerator, and the number one computer and smart phone manufacturers are all in Asia.  Our manned space vehicle program is a memory, our astronauts have to hitchhike to a space station we paid for and built, and the Chinese have just announced they are going to the moon to replace the stars and stripes with communist red.

Technologically we are standing still at best while former third world nations lead the way to a brave new world.

Politically we are watching the Mideast go south.  We are bogged down in a quagmire in Afghanistan where the ultimate winner won’t be the corruption we have installed as government. The Chinese control the Panama Canal and the Port of Los Angeles.  NATO had a hard time defeating the definition of a tin-pot dictator and his band of sub-Saharan mercenaries.

How did all this happen?  How did it happen so fast?  Is there anything we could do to reverse our slide into insignificance?  Is there anything that will be done to lead the way back from the brink?

How did all this happen?  How did it happen so fast? 

The Culture War has been waged aggressively by its proponents: those who wanted an end to America’s traditional Judeo-Christian ethics and those who wished to profit politically by the end of the America we had known and loved.  The coalition of social deviants, media boosters, and political panderers rolled over a live-and-let-live public as they achieved their dreams and changed moral wrongs into civil rights.  It is now considered unacceptable to state your personal beliefs if they diverge from the culture of the lowest common denominator. Political correctness strangles freedom from college campuses to board rooms.  The murder of unborn babies has made the womb the most dangerous place for an American child. Television, movies, and music are filled with vile hateful filth.  Triple X superstores and legal gambling are now the trophies for the victors and tombstones for the vanquished in a war Mr. Buchanan was pilloried for having the courage to name.

What about the technology?

In their exuberance and hubris our leaders, Bush the First and Clinton the Last, decided that we could make free trade work for our advantage when it had killed every other empire that ever followed it to cheap consumer goods and industrial destruction.   Ross Perot was ridiculed when he would ask, “Do you hear that giant sucking sound?”  That’s American jobs being sucked out by NAFTA.”  But he was right.  Our balance of trade with Mexico went from more than a billion dollars a year surplus in 1994 to more than a 64 billion deficit in 2011.  This was followed with so-called free trade agreements with country after country systematically turning a positive balance of trade into a negative. 

Then when we combined free trade agreements with an American innovation, shipping with containers, we set the stage for our markets to be overwhelmed by Chinese imports.  Today if the balance of trade and the content of that trade were examined it becomes apparent that America is fast becoming a de-industrialized colony of China as they have been a financial colony of ours.  We supply them with vast amounts of invisible credit via the pegged, undervalued, yuan-dollar exchange rate and raw materials while they supply us with cheap manufactured goods.  Our own money is inflating a mercantilist predator poised to devour our industrial base. Even our military now relies on Chinese parts and our security may rest upon components that are designed to either malfunction or provide a backdoor for hackers.

What about politics?

Bush the First crowed about creating a New World Order and couldn’t beat a womanizing bubba in a tux.  Clinton the Last spent his Peace Dividend buying votes and gutting the military.  Bush the Next led us into a war in Iraq we never should have fought and refused to leave a war in Afghanistan he didn’t notice we had won.  Obama the Destroyer of Worlds leads from behind while following the UN, apologizes for American exceptionalism, and bows to foreign leaders.  When you fight a war against an enemy you won’t name how will you know if you have won?

Is there anything we could do to reverse our slide into insignificance? 

How do you end the degradation of our society into an open sewer of licentiousness?  Values are taught in the home or they are picked up in the street.  Ethics are passed on by people who believe there are absolutes and who live consistently as if those absolutes actually matter.  Telling our children to do as we say not as we do has produced generations of people who do whatever they want.  Hedonism and conspicuous consumption have combined to give us a world where getting what you want is prized above getting what you deserve.  Let those who live right be salt and light in this world and those who seek the day instead of the night will follow.  Billy Graham, Phyllis Schlafly, and the Bible are right Larry Flint, Hugh Heffner, and Bill Clinton are wrong.  And if it isn’t right it’s wrong.

Take the steel boot of regulations off the throat of industry and innovation.  Allow economic freedom and the invisible hand of entrepreneurship will once again transform America into the powerhouse of industry and technology.  Adam Smith and Milton Friedman had it right; Keynes and the Progressives have it wrong.  And if it isn’t right it’s wrong. 

End the so-called free trade, and insist upon equitable trade.  If someone uses tricks to add fees to our products add the same fees to their products.  If someone restricts our products in their markets put the same restrictions on their products.  Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan had it right; our progressive politicians have it wrong.  And if it isn’t right it’s wrong. 

 Return to what was once traditional American policy: a friend to all and entangled with none.  Why are American troops still garrisoned in Europe, Japan, and Korea?  Why are America’s finest stationed in hundreds of bases in over 100 nations?  Bring our troops home.  Let them guard our own borders from the hordes that now walk across them every day.  Let their bases provide an economic stimulus to American towns and cities instead of those of foreigners.  Washington, Hamilton, and Monroe had it right. The Bush dynasty, Clinton, and Obama have it wrong.  And if it isn’t right it’s wrong.

What’s right is right and what’s wrong is wrong.  How do we restore what’s wrong with America?  We do what’s right.

Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College.  He is the Historian of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com  Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens