Remake American Into Whose Image?

By Bob Ellis on January 20th, 2009

usconstitutionSome reflections on President Barack Obama’s inaugural speech…

President Obama said that we must now “begin again the work of remaking America.”  Into what?  

Since our nation has risen in a relatively short time to become the most powerful nation on earth–in human history–doesn’t it stand to reason that we did something right to get here?  And if that is the case, wouldn’t it make more sense to ”begin again the work of restoring America”?  

Wouldn’t it be better to restore our nation to our historic foundations of limited government, where government gets out of the people’s way so they can pursue their fullest potential?  Wouldn’t it be better to return to our historic foundations of a small tax burden, so that people have more of their own money to enjoy their lives, invest in creative enterprises, and simply use their own property in the way they see fit? 

Wouldn’t it be better to restore our nation to our historic foundations of private charity and personal responsibility, abandoning the disastrous experiment with the Marxist welfare state of the past 60 years?

Wouldn’t it be better to restore our nation to our historic foundations of federalism, which recognized that any powers not specifically granted to the central government by the Constitution by the enumerated powers are reserved to the States respectively or to the people?  That historic recognition that the federal government cannot legally do what the U.S. Constitution does not specifically state that it can do?  

Wouldn’t it be better to restore our nation’s historic foundations on a Christian worldview?  A worldview that recognized that human beings are fallen creatures with a nature predisposed toward evil. A worldview that recognized big governments–made up of those fallen human beings–tend toward oppression of the the people they should serve, the bigger they get?  A worldview that recognized the danger of divorcing religion and morality from the government and public square?  A worldview recognizing that while government and religious institutions should not be married, religious morality is vital to inform and guide the conscience of a nation.

With President Obama’s abundantly-demonstrated fondness for Marxism, I shudder to think what he may try to “remake America” into.

Note: Reader comments are reviewed before publishing, and only salient comments that add to the topic will be published. Profanity is absolutely not allowed and will be summarily deleted. Spam, copied statements and other material not comprised of the reader’s own opinion will also be deleted.

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Categories: Commentary
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  • Braden
    All I can say to respond to this is-

    YOU CONSERVATIVES HAD YOUR CHANCE! You had 8 years to do with the country what you wanted. But after a Democrat wins the White House more overwhelmingly than Bush ever did, what are Democrats supposed to do? Be conservative. Turn into Republicans. Well Americans have had 8 years of Republican solutions, and they don't want them anymore.

    All the things you list America must do are things George Bush said he was going to do. You conservatives wanted small government, but GW created the biggest budgets in history. You said you would return to the values of the constitution, yet the Republican administration violated habeus corpus, warentlessly spied on American citizens, and committed cruel & unusual punishment against prisoners of war.

    Republicans had their chance. Now give Obama a chance. If he fails and errors in the same way as Bush, then Americans will kick him out and we can try it your way again.
  • No, Republicans had their chance; conservatives never did. You're making the same mistake of confusing Republicans with conservatives that many people make. Whether that is an intentional misrepresentation or pure ignorance, I remain undecided, but the Republican Party in the last 8 years has NOT led according to conservative principles.

    With few exceptions, Republicans have provided only a toned-down version of liberalism.

    That liberalism has produced the problems we have today. Going from a 60% dose of the poison from Republicans to a 100% dose from Democrats is most certainly NOT going to make things better.
  • Braden
    Oh it's the George Bush wasn't a real conservative argument.

    OK, I'll bite on some parts of that. No Child Left Behind, the Medicare bill, probably not that conservative. The notion of preemptive war, definately not conservative, but neoconservative.

    But George Bush was a conservative. Or was the deregulation of Wall Street liberal? Was all the environmental deregulation liberal? Were the Bush supply-side tax cuts liberal?

    George Bush's budgets were bigger than Clinton's and Bush never generated a surplus. But was Clinton more conservative than Bush? Hardly.

    The Bush administration's biggest downfall was less about ideology and more about competence. The Bush administration was wholly incompetent, and you can't have an incompent president leading the most powerful nation on earth and expect things to go well. In 2000, Republicans championed George Bush as just a regular guy. And he is. But we need really, really smart people running the country, not average-to-stupid ones.
  • Bush was conservative in the War on Terrorism, tax cuts and the minimal environmental deregulation.

    But the "deregulation of Wall Street" to which you refer dealt primarily with the deregulation of Fannie and Freddie--government institutions, not private ones. And it was the deregulation of those entities--and resistance to calls for better monitoring--that lies squarely at the feet of Democrats.

    But he was liberal in his embrace of global warming, his expansion of government, his embrace of the prescription plan, signing the unconstitutional McCain-Feingold Incumbent Protection Act, his embrace of the farm bill, his lack of leadership in getting a federal marriage amendment passed, and his embrace of liberal bailout plan...and so on.

    And yes, he signed the massive wasteful spending bills created by liberals in the Democrat and Republican parties in Congress.

    And you already mentioned NCLB and Medicare.

    In short, while he is conservative in some areas, he is not "a conservative."

    Jimmy Carter remains the most incompetent president in American history, and Bill Clinton remains the most immoral president in American history. So while Bush won't go down as one of the best, he won't go down as one of the worst, either.
  • Excellent post and I agree completely. But as your other commenter said, this will fall on so many deaf ears. I have been dismayed listening to Republicans (not Conservatives) gush over Obama.
  • Haggs
    I think that's going to fall on deaf ears, Bob. The American people put liberals in charge of Congress and the White House. We have a new generation of politically active youth who leans to the left on political ideology and they actually want a smart government to fix the problems we're facing.

    So please continue shouting about how conservatism is right until you're blue in the face. In the meantime, President Obama will fix this nation's problems and conservatives will be left in the dust.

    After conservatives have tried their hardest to tear down this country and the Constitution in the last few years, I have no sympathy for them.
  • You might be right that it will fall on deaf ears. After all, so many Americans have abandoned any moral compass and are totally clueless about America's history and foundations and the way our country is designed to operate, that I might as well be speaking ancient Greek to them.

    But then again, after they see how radical Obama's agenda really is, they might just get a clue. After all, after the election, I actually heard some "moderate" people saying things like "Well, I'm glad Obama won. I just hope he doesn't do what he said he'd do." While I had to smack my head against the wall to try and get that one to sink in, I think it indicates a lot of people (a) don't think he's as Marxist as the evidence indicates, or (b) have no clue to begin with.

    By the way, you can't "fix something" by doing more damage to it. If your car stops running because someone poured sugar in the gas tank, pouring more sugar in won't fix it. If someone hits your cell phone with a hammer and breaks it, hitting it again with a sledge hammer won't fix it. If you're going in the wrong direction, keeping the wheel straight and slamming down the gas pedal won't get you going in the right direction.

    Liberalism is responsible everything that ails America today...and admittedly, much of it came while Republicans were at the helm. But more of the same poison may just put the patient six feet under.
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