Mark America

I’ve had a few comments from sincere people who have argued in response to my last post that we must focus on defeating Barack Obama until after the election.  I still wanted to know how we were to hold Romney’s feet to the fire.  It’s a simple question: “How?”  A number of my longtime readers responded to some of the Facebook comments by repeating my simple query.  Naturally, there’s no answer, or if the proponents of this theory know one, they’re not offering it.  Time after time, I’ve been berated by ostensibly conservative people who tell me that I must “focus on Obama,” as if by looking at that awful picture, it will relieve me of the awful truth about Mitt Romney.  Again and again, I ask them to explain how Romney will be bent to a more conservative direction, and time and again, I am told to focus on Obama.  This sort of redirection hints at the desperation so many feel about this election, but it also demonstrates a willingness to dissemble and it’s surprising to see it coming from conservatives.  At the end of it all, if you can corner them into an answer, it amounts to an undefined, unexplained “somehow.”

“Somehow” is the retort of leftists when you tell them that the budget cannot be sustained as it has been, and that by simple mathematics, it’s not possible to continue.  You might ask them how they’ll pay for it all, and when they’ve exhausted all of the ludicrous ideas about taxing the rich, their last resort is almost invariably the same: “Somehow!”  Somehow?  My paycheck doesn’t come to me “somehow.”  My taxes don’t pay themselves “somehow.”  Food doesn’t leap onto my table “somehow,” but when you ask them for the concrete steps that must be undertaken to pay for all the spending they propose, it always comes down to “somehow,” which in the short run means “some one,” but in the long run means they haven’t a clue, and worse, don’t care enough about it to bother with the details.

When you ask a liberal about their latest environmental scheme, their energy-limiting, anti-industrial, pathologically anti-human schemes, they are no less evasive.  First, they hurl insults. Next, they tell you how important it is for future generations(a.k.a. “the children”) to save our planet by the measures they propose, but when you show them the math, and the undeniable truth of the insufficiency of wind, solar, and hydro-electric or geothermal resources, and you want to know from them how you’re to maintain anything like your current standard of living under their scheme, they might utter something about “shared sacrifices” but if you’re insistent, they will retreat to “somehow.”  In this context, the “somehow” they’re imagining is one they’d prefer not to name, since it comprises entirely of reducing the human population of the Earth, and the standard of living among those who remain(except them, naturally,) but since they’ve been less than successful at convincing the Third World of this goal, they’ve switched their focus and will begin with you.  That’s the essence of the “somehow” they dare not name, and it consists of reducing you to the state of a hut-dwelling refugee in some barren wasteland.

All of this is to be expected from liberals or leftists, since it signifies the dishonesty and delusion enabling their philosophy, but what has happened that heretofore conservative Americans resort to similar language?  I have seldom heard such an amazing collection of otherwise conservative Americans adopt the language and argumentation of the left.  Apart from the intellectual laziness implied, there’s something horrifying about the proposition that good and serious Americans would offer us “somehow” in answer to anything.  I hope it is a temporary affliction, but alas, I don’t see it as such.  I don’t know how one can go from “somehow” back to concrete answers at the drop of a hat.  It usually ends badly, in more rationalizations.

I asked how it could happen that Mitt Romney’s feet could be “held to the fire,” and the first thing I was offered was that I am guilty of a treason against the country.  After that, I was told I need to focus on Obama, but when I would not relent, and instead focused on the answer to my question, what I was given, if anything, is “somehow.”  How will we maintain our principles while supporting a man who doesn’t share them?  “Somehow.”  How will we protect our values if the nominee we’re supposed to support thinks they’re fungible?  “Somehow.”  How will we get Mitt Romney to make conservative appointments to the bench if John Boehner has already engineered it right out of Congressional oversight?  “Somehow.”  How will we get Mr. Romney to do anything at all, such as the complete repeal of Obamacare, if he’s already abandoned that position and now speaks of his fondness for some portions of it?  “Somehow.”  How will Paul Ryan’s position as Vice President have any bearing upon the kind of legislation Mitt will sign into law?  “Somehow.” How will we exert pressure on him by running a challenge to him in the 2016 primaries, since the RNC has essentially amended the rules to make that almost impossible?  “Somehow.”

No, the truth of the matter is that the only way we have available to exercise any control over Mitt Romney is now, here, at this time, before he’s elected, and the fact of the matter is that if he is, he will not cater to our wishes.  He can only be controlled if we exercise that control this moment.  Since we have no control, many of us having departed the party proper in disgust, there is only one method of control we can exercise.  Only one.  Exercising it may lead to Mitt Romney’s defeat.  Exercising it could, in a backward sense, contribute to Barack Obama’s re-election.  Why is that the fault of people who rightly ask these simple questions about Romney?  Why is that the fault of people who simply want to know how it is that Mitt Romney is to be controlled by those who are being asked to entrust him with the presidency?  Maybe I’m stubborn, or maybe I’m out to make a point to all of these who have in desperation leaped onto the Romney bandwagon:  You can’t trust him, and even if you elect him to oust Barack Obama, there will be no end to this fight. Or, will there be?

When they get around to “somehow,” what I suspect is that either they haven’t the foggiest idea and haven’t considered it, or they do not care to throttle Mr. Romney’s liberal tendencies.  Either way, it’s unacceptable to me.