Présidentielle américaine/2012: Comme Hollande il y a cinq mois (It’s demographics, stupid!)

When a society has entered on this downward progress, either civilisation of liberty must perish. Either some Caesar or Napoleon will seize the reins of government with a strong hand; or your republic will be fearfully plundered and laid waste by barbarians in the twentieth century as the Roman Empire was in the fifth; — with this difference, that the Huns and Vandals will have been engendered within your own country by your own institutions. Thomas Macaulay (Letter to America, 1857)

Il est clair qu’une civilisation qui se sent coupable de tout ce qu’elle est et fait n’aura jamais l’énergie ni la conviction nécessaires pour se défendre elle-même. JF Revel

Barack Obama était devenu président de la revue juridique d’Harvard sans avoir publié un seul article de droit. Il fut élu à Chicago, en 1995, dans une élection rendue plus facile par le fait que tous ses opposants sérieux avaient été disqualifiés par des arguties juridiques. Son autobiographie trouva un éditeur avant d’avoir été écrite, malgré l’obscurité qui était alors la sienne. Il déclara sa candidature à la présidence après moins de deux ans de travail au Sénat, sans y avoir rédigé aucune législation mémorable.Toute la vie adulte du Président a ainsi été marquée par des succès faciles, dans lesquelles l’histoire de sa vie et sa personnalité emportaient l’adhésion sans qu’il ait à prouver le moindre résultat concret. Sébastien Castellion

Obama est le premier président américain élevé sans attaches culturelles, affectives ou intellectuelles avec la Grande-Bretagne ou l’Europe. Les Anglais et les Européens étaient tellement enchantés par le premier président américain noir qu’ils n’ont pu voir ce qu’il est vraiment: le premier président américain du Tiers-Monde. (…) Le gouvernement Obama est prêt à abandonner l’Ancien monde dans la poursuite d’un monde unique. (…) Obama a une politique délibérée de réduction des relations de l’Amérique avec tout d’abord la Grande-Bretagne, puis avec le reste de l’Europe. Il est d’avis que les États-Unis — oui, son propre pays — et la Grande-Bretagne et les principaux pays européens, aussi, d’ailleurs, sont des puissances impériales qui ont exploité sans vergogne le Tiers-monde pour leur propre profit. (…) Oubliez la cadence noire de Chicago d’Obama. Elle est bidon. Il l’a copié du genre de prédicateurs noirs qui étaient inconnus de lui jusqu’à ce qu’il devienne adulte et qu’il réinvente son image politique. Ce que le gouvernement Obama a presque effacé de l’histoire personnelle du président est que ses seuls liens d’enfance avec l’Amérique ont été comme un élève dans une école privée huppée d’un Hawaii dominé par l’Asie, où il fut élevé par sa grand-mère blanche cadre de banque. Chicago n’est pas la patrie d’Obama et n’a jamais été son influence formative. La vision du monde du président est plus alignée sur celle de l’Indonésie. (…) A quoi avons-nous à faire ici? Selon Dr Lucier, la politique d’Obama est retirer aux États-Unis, à la Grande-Bretagne et à l’Europe l’hégémonie mondiale et élever à leur place l’hégémonie du Tiers-monde dans le cadre de la gouvernance internationale. Ne l »oubliez pas, Obama est un déraciné. Il n’a aucune racine. C’est un homme issu de l’Asie-Pacifique élevé sans aucune révérence pour l’ancienne histoire constitutionnelle qui, jusqu’à présent, liait à travers l’Atlantique l’Amérique et la Grande-Bretagne. Le président pense réellement que la Constitution américaine, qui est issue de la Magna Carta et de la Bill of Rights de 1689, est « insuffisante ». En effet, Obama a déclaré qu’étant donné que la Constitution des États-Unis ne garantit que des « droits négatifs » — c’est-à-dire n’établit que ce que le gouvernement américain ne peut faire aux individus ou aux États souverains — au lieu d’assurer aux gens les garanties de nourriture, d’éducation,  d’abri et de soins de santé et le reste, elle est « insuffisante ». The Daily Mail

Culturellement, Obama déteste la Grande-Bretagne. Il a renvoyé le buste de Churchill sans la moindre feuille de vigne d’une excuse. Il a insulté la Reine et le Premier ministre en leur offrant les plus insignifiants des cadeaux. A un moment, il a même refusé de rencontrer le Premier ministre. Dr James Lucier (ancien directeur du comité des Affaires etrangeres du Senat américain)

Incredibly, the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s. This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anticolonial ambitions, is now setting the nation’s agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son. The son makes it happen, but he candidly admits he is only living out his father’s dream. Dinesh D’Souza

49 percent of American voters say President Barack Obama does not share their values, compared to 46 percent who say he does. (…) The fact that so many Americans think the President does not share their values might worry the White House. Historically, voters tend to see Democratic presidents as more likely to share their values than Republicans. Quinnipiac University (September 13, 2010)

Ohio likes crony capitalism. The automotive bailout is popular in Ohio, and not just among self-interested workers and investors in that industry. Putting General Motors on federal life support is economically daft and morally dubious, but it gave the Obama administration a powerful tool for convincing middle-class workers that the president is on their side. He might be doing something silly and destructive, but to be seen as doing something is politically useful. That it was General Motors and Chrysler was critical: Americans have a particularly romantic attitude toward automobile manufacturers, probably because Americans have a particularly romantic attitude toward automobiles. The (mostly mythical) image of the blue-collar homeowner supporting a four-person family in comfort by spending 40 hours a week on the assembly line is up there with mom and apple pie in the pantheon of American sentimentality. If President Obama had associated himself with the bailout of, say, Eastman Kodak — which will cease providing health care and other benefits to 56,000 retirees as part of its bankruptcy — it would not have imbued him with quite the same glow. (…) The lessons of Ohio are that Barack Obama is a skillful demagogue, that the ancients were wise to number envy among the deadly sins, and that offering Americans a check is a more fruitful political strategy than offering them the opportunity to take control of and responsibility for their own lives. (…) For many years, Republicans have relied on Jude Wanniski’s “Two Santa Claus” theory, the strategy of using the promise of tax cuts to compete with Democrats’ promises of cash and other benefits. In part as a consequence of that strategy, a great many Americans pay little or no federal income taxes, while many of the other federal taxes they pay are indirect or partly hidden. Mitt Romney was right: You can’t use tax cuts to buy off people who are net recipients of tax transfers. Figuring out what we can offer them that is consistent with our principles is the task of conservatives between now and the next election.Kevin D. Williamson

In a year with a variety of high-profile ballot measures, Maryland voters also approved same-sex marriage, in-state tuition for illegal immigrants who meet certain conditions and the state’s congressional redistricting map, which had been petitioned to the ballot by opponents. WTOP

As president, Obama is presiding over America’s decline, and is in many important ways the apostle of that decline. He is betraying Israel; warring against free speech; refusing to take real steps to stop Iran’s nuclear program, despite the many genocidal statements Ahmadinejad has made against Israel, and the open contempt the mullahs have shown for his efforts to reach out to them. Obama is turning allies into enemies and enemies into allies; submitting the U.S. to international law; bankrupting us with socialist schemes both domestically and internationally; bypassing the democratic process and the system of checks and balances by governing through a proliferation of “czars”; and using global warming as a pretext to redistribute wealth from the First World to the Third World. He has appointed numerous proponents of the primacy of international law over U.S. law, including Harold Koh, legal adviser for the State Department; Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and now Elena Kagan; John Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Co-Chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) – that is, the science czar; Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change – that is, the global-warming czar; and Cass Sunstein, Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, or Regulatory Czar. Obama has never demonstrated any respect for the freedom of speech, the fundamental protection the Bill of Rights gives us against tyranny. He has appointed a proliferation of officials who have in various ways advocated restrictions on the freedom of speech: Kagan, Sunstein, Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; and Attorney General Eric Holder. Obama comes from a Muslim background, as detailed in the book, and has numerous friends and associates who are inveterate foes of Israel. Not just Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright and Louis Farrakhan, but also Samantha Power, the National Security Council’s Senior Director for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights; Robert Malley and Zbigniew Brzezinski, two key foreign policy advisers; Rosa Brooks, advisor to the undersecretary of Defense for policy; and Chuck Hagel, co-chair of the Intelligence Advisory Board. The book details all this and much more, including Obama’s betrayal of the freedom movement in Iran and of the democratic forces in Honduras, and his attempts to use climate change to destroy American sovereignty. Everything flows from his core beliefs, which were shaped by some of his earliest experiences and confirmed by his later associations. The book also makes some shocking new revelations, including details of how Obama took campaign money from Gaza, in violation of federal law; how ACORN, with which Barack Obama has been deeply involved for years, destroyed Republican voter registrations; the full truth about how making America safe for Sharia is not incidental, but is a cornerstone of Obama’s presidential program; and about how Obama is consistently, not just occasionally, anti-democratic and favors authoritarian regimes and measures. (…) Obama sees America as just another country. His vision is to make America part of a socialist internationalist supranational construct, destroying American sovereignty. Obama makes Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton look like conservatives. He said it himself during a visit to London for a summit of the Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (G-20. A reporter asked Obama: “[C]ould I ask you whether you subscribe, as many of your predecessors have, to the school of ‘American exceptionalism’ that sees America as uniquely qualified to lead the world, or do you have a slightly different philosophy?” It was a question Ronald Reagan once answered without ever having been asked it. He said: “With all its flaws, America remains a unique achievement for human dignity on a scale unequaled anywhere in the world.” But Obama offered no similar avowal of American uniqueness. Instead, he equated American exceptionalism with the national pride that a citizen of any nation could feel: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.” Then, perhaps realizing how much he had just trivialized the achievements of the greatest republic and most magnanimous nation the world had ever known, Obama avowed: “I’m enormously proud of my country and its role and history in the world.” He even allowed for the possibility that there were some reasons that Americans should not be embarrassed by their nation’s history: “If you think about the site of this summit and what it means, I don’t think America should be embarrassed to see evidence of the sacrifices of our troops, the enormous amount of resources that were put into Europe postwar, and our leadership in crafting an Alliance that ultimately led to the unification of Europe. We should take great pride in that.” Embarrassed? Who would even think such a thing? Except someone who is embarrassed by America. It’s as if the most beautiful girl in the world walks into the best party, bedecked in the most magnificent dress and finest jewels, and someone whispers to her, “Don’t be embarrassed.” Obama even acknowledged that “we have a core set of values that are enshrined in our Constitution, in our body of law, in our democratic practices, in our belief in free speech and equality, that, though imperfect, are exceptional.” But in saying that he may have sensed that he was venturing into areas where he didn’t want to go, so he backtracked: “Now, the fact that I am very proud of my country and I think that we’ve got a whole lot to offer the world does not lessen my interest in recognizing the value and wonderful qualities of other countries, or recognizing that we’re not always going to be right, or that other people may have good ideas, or that in order for us to work collectively, all parties have to compromise and that includes us.” It was a defining moment. Barack Obama could find some praiseworthy aspects of America – but in saying that he was careful to say also that every country could say the same, apparently in equal measure, and while the U.S. Constitution and system of government – “though imperfect” – had some “exceptional” features, well, other countries also had “wonderful qualities.” (…) It basically can really only mean one thing: that for him, America is nothing special. Even when Obama does refer to America’s essential goodness, as he did in his 2010 State of the Union address, it is only to advance his commitment to socialist internationalism and redistribution of American wealth: he wields Americans’ empathy and compassion like a club to manipulate us into funding bad foreign policy and despotic regimes. Obama went to work from his first day in office to make America’s decline become a reality. As the most powerful man in the world, he would level the playing field, even if it meant cutting America off at the knees. Good and evil would be made equivalent, with evil sanctioned by the world’s only remaining superpower: democracy and tyranny, dictator and elected leader would be given the same moral sanction. He traveled around the world and denigrated American achievements and American uniqueness. He reached out in friendship to our enemies and the enemies of freedom and individual rights, including Hugo Chávez and even Fidel Castro, and offered Russia a significant boost on its way to returning to superpower status tried by selling out Eastern Europe. He catered to – and fawned shamelessly over – Islam and Muslim countries, making preposterous statements about how much the United States owes Islam, and even about how America was a Muslim country. Obama clearly believed that doing all this would bolster his image in other countries. But he was taking a calculated risk: that his apparent lack of concern for American national security, and for America’s historical achievements and place in the world, would backfire and anger Americans. Nonetheless, he took the risk. He must have believed that he was powerful enough and popular enough to neutralize any domestic political backlash that may result – and he certainly had the mainstream media on his side, as he did during his presidential campaign, to cover for him, make excuses for him when he failed, and obscure the full scope of what he was doing. Barack Hussein Obama has chosen the path of the post-American presidency. He seems to envision himself as more than just the president of the United States, but as a shaper of the new world order, an internationalist energetically laying the groundwork for global government: the president of the world. (…) He could severely damage American sovereignty by making us subject to treaties that bind us to obey international law. He has been trying to do this over the climate change issue, among others. He is also well on his way to destroying the American economy by nationalizing huge sectors of American industry: the banks, the automobile industry, and now the healthcare industry. (…) He sees his job as one of subjecting America to international laws. The problem for Americans is that in his quest for internationalism and global socialism, Obama is leaving the United States twisting in the wind. He is treating America as a stepping stone to help get him where he wanted to go, and he seems willing to do anything to destroy America’s prestige in the world. The consequences could be disastrous, and the presidency and the nation damaged irreparably.(…) Our enemies could never have defeated us; we can only defeat ourselves. Pamela Geller

Si vous n’aviez pas eu la tempête, la campagne de Romney aurait eu une meilleure chance de parler du déficit, de la dette, de l’économie. Il y a eu un bégaiement dans la campagne. Quand l’attention est détournée vers autre chose, ce n’est pas à son avantage. Karl Rove

I’m so glad we had that storm last week because I think the storm was one of those things — no, politically I should say. Not in terms of hurting people. The storm brought in possibilities for good politics. Chris Matthews

What went wrong? First, demographics. This election is testimony to the fact that Republicans cannot survive by being the party of old white men. The white share of the electorate has steadily declined for the last several elections, and this time around, whites accounted for just 72 percent of the vote. Other demographic changes worked against Republicans as well. For example, single women now outnumber married women in the electorate, and they favored Obama by roughly 30 points. The gender gap overall was bigger this year than in 2008. Moreover, the youth vote was larger this year than in 2008, and Obama dominated that too. American voters have changed, but Republicans haven’t changed with them. Republicans must face up to the fact that their hard-line stance on immigration is disqualifying their candidates with Hispanics. Whereas George W. Bush once carried 44 percent of the Latino vote, Mitt Romney couldn’t crack 35 percent. To see why Romney appears to have essentially tied in Florida, for example, just look to Obama’s margin among non-Cuban Hispanics. Similarly, the growing Hispanic vote clearly cost Romney both Nevada and Colorado. President Obama is likely to push immigration reform in his second term, and Republicans are going to have to find how to address the issue in a way that will not cost them the Latino vote for generations to come. Second, social issues continue to hurt Republicans with women, young voters, and suburbanites. The problem is not just a matter of their stance on the issues, but their tone. It’s not just that Republicans oppose abortion or gay marriage, but that they often sound intolerant and self-righteous in doing so. Romney himself may not have put much emphasis on social issues, but the Republican brand was too easily associated with the words of Todd Akin. Christian conservatives appear to have supported Romney by roughly the same margins they had previous Republican candidates. Exit polls suggest he won more than two-thirds of regular churchgoers. But their support couldn’t overcome Romney’s losses among economically conservative, socially moderate voters in the suburbs. Republican candidates seem culturally out of touch with a large swath of the electorate. Michael Tanner

Barack Obama n’avait (…) pas hésité à jouer sur la peur d’un retour au pouvoir d’un parti républicain particulièrement rétrograde sur des questions de société tels que les droits des femmes ou encore le mariage gay. L’enjeu était d’autant plus important que, en plus de l’élection présidentielle, se tenaient les élections législatives ainsi qu’une série de votes par référendum dans plusieurs Etats sur des sujets tels que l’euthanasie, le cannabis ou l’union homosexuelle. (…) Les différents référendums de leur côté ont également donné des résultats qui, hors période d’élection présidentielle, auraient fait la une des journaux nationaux. Les militants de la dépénalisation du cannabis ont en effet pu célébrer les résultats des votes dans les Etats du Colorado et l’Etat Washington dont les électeurs ont voté en faveur d’une proposition visant à légaliser l’usage récréatif. Concernant les droits des homosexuels, les électeurs des Etats du Maine, de Washington et du Maryland ont été les premiers à approuver par référendum le principe du mariage, créant ainsi une énorme brèche dans ce débat au niveau national. Autant que la réélection de Barack Obama en elle-même, ces différentes victoires ont contribué à créer un véritable sentiment de renouveau progressiste. Pour le site Buzzfeed, nous pourrions même assister à l’avènement de « l’Amérique libérale ». (…)  grâce à ces différentes victoires, Barack Obama pourrait même endosser le rôle historique de leader idéologique d’une nouvelle ère progressiste, comme son prédécesseur Ronald Reagan l’avait fait pour les conservateurs dans les années 80. Le Nouvel observateur

En quelques jours, Taubira a choisi : ses victimes, ses bourreaux. Les femmes, les jeunes des banlieues sont dans le bon camp, à protéger. Les hommes blancs, dans le mauvais. (…) Dans les banlieues, Hollande a réalisé des scores de dictateur africain. Eric Zemmour

Il s’est produit à l’occasion de l’élection présidentielle de 2012, le même phénomène qu’à celle de 2008 aux Etats-Unis, où Barack Obama a été élu grâce à l’apport des minorités ethniques, alors qu’il était minoritaire dans la catégorie ‘blanc non hispanique’. Laurent Chalard

Ordinarily, a president enacts various policies in his first term, the public test-drives the changes, and the president’s reelection campaign is a referendum on those new policies. The difference in Obama’s case is that in order to secure reelection, he has backloaded nearly all of his most transformative and controversial changes into a second term. (…) Obama’s transformative changes to date have been far more theory than practice. (…)  And this time, the public could be angered not only by the policies, but by growing recognition that actual enactment of Obama’s agenda was delayed for political purposes. The fact that Obama has only very narrowly secured reelection — unusual, since reelected presidents normally expand their initial electoral margins — might seem to contradict this high-conflict scenario. (…) Yet (…) Obama took the intentionally risky path of alienating half the country with an in-your-face negative campaign because he believed that demographics now allow him to cobble together a leftist majority in support of transformative change. Stanley Kurtz

C’est la démographie, imbécile!

93% des noirs (13% de la population), 71% des hispaniques (10%?), 73% des Asiatiques (3%), 39% des blancs (72%) …

Au lendemain d’une encore plus courte victoire qu’il y a quatre ans du premier président américain prétendument « postracial » mais en réalité explicitement post-américain …

Avec l’aide peut-être décisive, quand les écarts sont si serrés, de la surprise d’octobre de l’ouragan Sandy qui comme il y a quatre ans avec la crise financière semble avoir stoppé net la jusque là irresistible remontée du candidat républicain …

Comment ne pas repenser à la stratégie explicitement obamienne de ciblage systématique de minorités ethniques en pleine expansion qui avait permis il y a cinq mois aux socialistes français de François Hollande de recueillir, on le sait en certains endroits et sans compter les DOMTOM, jusqu’à 93% des suffrages?

Mais aussi à l’actuelle stratégie des mêmes socialistes de noyage de poisson et d’avancée masquée qui fait que les gens ne se rendent pas compte tout de suite, du mariage pour tous, sans compter la légalisation des drogues « récréatives », à la coûteuse mise sous dépendance de l’ensemble de la population, de la portée des changements envisagés par les nouveaux apprentis sorciers de l’ingénierie sociale?

Une courte victoire démographique

Laurent Chalard

Libération

13 mai 2012

François Hollande a été élu président à une courte majorité, avec un score de 51,6%. Ce résultat s’explique en partie par un facteur oublié des analystes politiques, la démographie, au rôle pourtant majeur, en France comme aux Etats-Unis.

Le corps électoral évolue en fonction de la croissance démographique. Or, cette dernière est le produit de deux facteurs.

Le premier est la progression de l’espérance de vie, qui conduit à un vieillissement de la population par le haut, c’est-à-dire qu’une large partie de l’augmentation de la population française est due à la hausse du nombre de personnes âgées et non de celui des jeunes. Par exemple, pour l’année 2011, alors que le solde naturel de la France est de + 253 000 personnes, l’accroissement des 65 ans et plus est de 308 000 personnes. Le solde naturel français est donc uniquement le produit du vieillissement de la population (sinon la population diminuerait).

Le second facteur est l’immigration, la France ayant un solde migratoire positif depuis la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Ce phénomène vient gonfler la croissance démographique du pays, d’autant qu’il agit aussi sur la natalité (sans immigration, le nombre de naissances serait moins élevé). En 2011, le solde migratoire est estimé à + 80 000 personnes. En conséquence, ces deux facteurs jouent un rôle primordial sur le résultat des élections, mais en sens opposé.

Le vieillissement sensible de la population a mécaniquement tendance à augmenter l’électorat de droite, puisque les études sociologiques montrent qu’en vieillissant les électeurs sont plus tentés par les partis conservateurs, du fait d’une certaine nostalgie pour le passé. Or, les premières générations de baby- boomers, nées après la Seconde Guerre mondiale, ont désormais plus de 65 ans. La stratégie de Patrick Buisson, conseiller de Nicolas Sarkozy, reposant sur une droitisation du discours s’adressait principalement à cette population et fut finalement couronnée d’un relatif succès. En effet, ces générations ayant peu côtoyé d’immigrés dans leur enfance ont une certaine peur face aux évolutions démographiques constatées dans les grandes métropoles.

A l’opposé, l’immigration récente (c’est-à-dire post-1975), constituée essentiellement de jeunes ménages d’origine extra-européenne, renforce le vote de gauche pour des raisons évidentes. Le discours de Nicolas Sarkozy, du «nettoyage au Kärcher» jusqu’aux remarques sur les «musulmans» lors du débat présidentiel, ne peut que révulser cette population. Du fait des naturalisations (plus de 100 000 par an) et d’une hausse naturelle sensiblement supérieure aux populations d’ascendance européenne, leur part dans l’électorat s’accroît, faisant plus que compenser le vieillissement de la population, ce que n’ont pas su voir les dirigeants de droite, leur stratégie reposant sur l’espoir que cette population s’abstiendrait.

Sans le vote des immigrés extra-européens naturalisés et de leurs enfants et petits-enfants nés français (leur pourcentage dans l’électorat est impossible à déterminer), le candidat socialiste aurait été difficilement élu président, étant donné le vieillissement de la population. L’étude de la répartition géographique du vote pour François Hollande, montre l’importance de ce facteur. Dans les communes à fort pourcentage de populations ayant des origines non européennes, le candidat socialiste progresse beaucoup plus qu’en moyenne nationale par rapport au score réalisé en 2007 par Ségolène Royal. Les exemples de Clichy-sous-Bois, La Courneuve, Garges-lès-Gonesse ou du XVe arrondissement de Marseille témoignent d’une progression de plus de 10 points en cinq ans, avec des scores bien souvent supérieurs à 70%. Cet électorat a massivement voté pour la gauche, ou plutôt contre le discours stigmatisant de Nicolas Sarkozy.

Il s’est produit à l’occasion de l’élection présidentielle de 2012, le même phénomène qu’à celle de 2008 aux Etats-Unis, où Barack Obama a été élu grâce à l’apport des minorités ethniques, alors qu’il était minoritaire dans la catégorie «blanc non hispanique». François Hollande devra tenir compte de l’espoir qu’il porte pour cette jeunesse d’origine extra-européenne qui a des réelles difficultés d’insertion dans le pays, au risque sinon de la faire définitivement basculer dans le communautarisme, processus déjà engagé, mais encore potentiellement réversible. Quant à la droite, elle devra prendre en compte l’existence de cette population, appelée à croître dans l’électorat, si elle souhaite reconquérir le pouvoir. La stratégie de droitisation de son discours et d’éventuelle alliance avec l’extrême droite est donc suicidaire à long terme.

Voir aussi:

Get Ready for Obama’s First Term

Stanley Kurtz

The National review online

November 6, 2012

Barack Obama has won reelection. Will America now lose its distinct characteristics and be transformed into a Euro-style welfare state? Quite possibly, yet there remains one way out. At this point, only a sweeping new grassroots rebellion on the model of the Tea Party could change things. In the wake of a presidential election so discouraging for conservatives, a massive new tea-party wave may not appear to be in the cards. Yet a resurgent second-term challenge to Obama from populist conservatives is far more likely than it seems.

That’s because the president’s first term hasn’t really happened yet, at least not in the conventional sense. Ordinarily, a president enacts various policies in his first term, the public test-drives the changes, and the president’s reelection campaign is a referendum on those new policies. The difference in Obama’s case is that in order to secure reelection, he has backloaded nearly all of his most transformative and controversial changes into a second term. Obama’s next term will actually put into effect health-care reform, Dodd-Frank, and a host of other highly controversial policies that are already surging through the pipeline yet still barely known to the public.

Obama’s transformative changes to date have been far more theory than practice. While reelection may bring sullen public acceptance when Obama’s most controversial policies actually take effect, the reverse is equally possible. Once people actually begin to experience de facto health-care rationing, for example, they might get even angrier than they were in 2009–2010, when rationing was only a prospect. The same principle applies to a host of other issues (cap-and-trade via regulation, financial regulations, comprehensive immigration reform, national school curricula, urban-suburban policy). And this time, the public could be angered not only by the policies, but by growing recognition that actual enactment of Obama’s agenda was delayed for political purposes.

The fact that Obama has only very narrowly secured reelection — unusual, since reelected presidents normally expand their initial electoral margins — might seem to contradict this high-conflict scenario. You can certainly argue that a barely-reelected president would be smart to pull in his horns and govern from the middle. Yet that’s not who Barack Obama is, and it’s certainly not the premise upon which he ran his campaign. Obama took the intentionally risky path of alienating half the country with an in-your-face negative campaign because he believed that demographics now allow him to cobble together a leftist majority in support of transformative change. Whether that demographic vision is accurate or not, Obama and his advisers believe that it is, and so will govern with relative disregard for opposition, however vocal.

The reelection of a Republican House of Representatives might also seem to have a moderating impact on the president, and to a limited degree it does. Yet Obama has cast aside conventional restraints on executive power with his pre-election orders on welfare reform and immigration. He will thus interpret reelection as a license to rule by executive order — well beyond the traditional limits on executive power. In the absence of intense populist pressure on a Congress facing another tea-party electoral wave in 2014, it will be impossible to prevent Obama from abusing his executive authority.

Even the conventional post-election honeymoon period may be short-lived. A huge controversy over the fiscal cliff looms in the lame-duck session of Congress. Obama has predicted that in the wake of his reelection, the Republican “fever” will break. Given the stakes, his conduct of this campaign, and Obama’s evident transformative intentions, a bitter showdown is more probable.

The long and short of it is that President Obama has won reelection, but in a way likely to propel national polarization well beyond its current level. By delaying his most controversial policy changes to a second term, laying the basis for (arguably unconstitutional) rule by executive order, and running a negative campaign designed to realign the electorate leftward, Obama has laid the foundation for a high-conflict future. What’s more, he knows it, and he’s ready for it. Obama is willing to pay the price of national division for the sake of making the transformative changes he seeks. So a massive increase in polarization is exactly what we’re likely to get.

To put it another way, because the public has never truly seen the changes he’s enacted put into practice, Obama has an exceedingly tenuous mandate. But he doesn’t care. All Obama wants to do is to squeak by, after which he plans to depend on shifting demographics to cement his sweeping transformation in place. The question is, have Americans really changed as much as Obama thinks, or will the actual arrival of his long-delayed first-term agenda in his second term set off a populist movement that brings his plans to a halt?

Voir encore:

Md. voters approve gambling expansion

WTOP

11/7/2012

Voters cast their ballots at a polling station inside the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2012 .After a grinding presidential campaign President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, yield center stage to American voters Tuesday for an Election Day choice that will frame the contours of government and the nation for years to come. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

Brian Witte

Associated Press

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) – Gambling in Maryland will soon include table games like blackjack and a casino near the nation’s capital, after voters on Tuesday approved an expansion measure that generated the most expensive political advertising campaign in the state’s history.

In a year with a variety of high-profile ballot measures, Maryland voters also approved same-sex marriage, in-state tuition for illegal immigrants who meet certain conditions and the state’s congressional redistricting map, which had been petitioned to the ballot by opponents.

With 98 percent of precincts reporting, the gambling question had 52 percent of the votes. The measure received an enormous amount of attention, largely because more than $90 million was spent on television and radio advertising.

Table games like craps and poker could begin early next year at Maryland’s three existing casinos and at two expected to be built later. Because the question also passed in Prince George’s County, a casino can also be built near the nation’s capital.

MGM Resorts International wants to build an $800 million casino near National Harbor. The Prince George’s County casino can’t open until 2016. The ballot question also reduces the tax rates paid by Maryland casinos to varying degrees, partly to make up for added competition from the added casino.

Gov. Martin O’Malley called a special session in August to consider the expansion. Lawmakers passed legislation that still needed voter approval.

Voters had a lot to say about the gambling question at the polls on Tuesday.

« Oh, my God, yes, they’ve got to bring them closer to me, » said Carolyn Barton, a retired medical assistant who voted in Hagerstown, adding that she and her husband Charles have made numerous trips to Las Vegas and neighboring states to gamble.

But there were plenty of opponents, as well, who expressed concerns about social ills and didn’t believe proceeds will go to benefit education in the state.

Saeed Roshan, an Iranian immigrant and registered Democrat, said he voted against the gambling question.

« In Iran, the gambler is called the loser, » Roshan, of Rockville, said. « The gambling brings the prostitution, brings the thieves. »

Maryland became the first state to approve a state’s version of the Dream Act by popular vote. Illegal immigrants can pay in-state rates if they attend a Maryland high school for three years and if they or their parents can show they filed state income taxes during that time.

Supporters said helping more people get an education would only make the state stronger and more productive. Opponents said it wasn’t fair to people who have worked hard to enter the country legally.

On a separate ballot question, Maryland voters approved the state’s congressional redistricting map. It had been petitioned to the ballot by opponents who said it had been gerrymandered to favor Democrats.

Tony Campbell, who helped lead the effort against the map, said his coalition would push next year in the Maryland General Assembly for an independent redistricting process to replace the current method, in which the governor sends a bill to the legislature.

Voters also passed a constitutional amendment requiring elected officials to be suspended from office once convicted of certain crimes and removed automatically if they plead guilty or no contest. That tightens current law, which only removes someone from office at sentencing.

___

Associated Press writer Jessica Gresko in College Park, David Dishneau in Hagerstown, Brett Zongker in Wheaton and Eric Tucker in Parkville contributed to this story.

Voir enfin:

The Post-American Presidency

Jamie Glazov

FrontPage Magazine

July 30, 2010

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Pamela Geller, founder, editor and publisher of the popular and award-winning weblog AtlasShrugs.com. She has won acclaim for her interviews with internationally renowned figures, including John Bolton, Geert Wilders, Bat Ye’or, Natan Sharansky, and many others, and has broken numerous important stories — notably the questionable sources of some of the financing of the Obama campaign. Her op-eds have been published in The Washington Times, The American Thinker, Israel National News, Frontpage Magazine, World Net Daily, and New Media Journal, among other publications. She is the co-author (with Robert Spencer) of The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War on America (forward by Ambassador John Bolton) — just released on July 27.

FP: Pamela Geller, welcome to Frontpage Interview.

Tell us about your new book and what you have discovered about Obama’s war on America.

Geller: Thanks Jamie.

The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War On America is the product of three years of research I’ve done on Barack Obama: his socialist internationalism, his ties to America-haters and anti-Semites, his race-baiting, and more. As president, Obama is presiding over America’s decline, and is in many important ways the apostle of that decline. He is betraying Israel; warring against free speech; refusing to take real steps to stop Iran’s nuclear program, despite the many genocidal statements Ahmadinejad has made against Israel, and the open contempt the mullahs have shown for his efforts to reach out to them.

Obama is turning allies into enemies and enemies into allies; submitting the U.S. to international law; bankrupting us with socialist schemes both domestically and internationally; bypassing the democratic process and the system of checks and balances by governing through a proliferation of “czars”; and using global warming as a pretext to redistribute wealth from the First World to the Third World.

He has appointed numerous proponents of the primacy of international law over U.S. law, including Harold Koh, legal adviser for the State Department; Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and now Elena Kagan; John Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Co-Chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) – that is, the science czar; Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change – that is, the global-warming czar; and Cass Sunstein, Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, or Regulatory Czar.

Obama has never demonstrated any respect for the freedom of speech, the fundamental protection the Bill of Rights gives us against tyranny. He has appointed a proliferation of officials who have in various ways advocated restrictions on the freedom of speech: Kagan, Sunstein, Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; and Attorney General Eric Holder.

Obama comes from a Muslim background, as detailed in the book, and has numerous friends and associates who are inveterate foes of Israel. Not just Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright and Louis Farrakhan, but also Samantha Power, the National Security Council’s Senior Director for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights; Robert Malley and Zbigniew Brzezinski, two key foreign policy advisers; Rosa Brooks, advisor to the undersecretary of Defense for policy; and Chuck Hagel, co-chair of the Intelligence Advisory Board.

The book details all this and much more, including Obama’s betrayal of the freedom movement in Iran and of the democratic forces in Honduras, and his attempts to use climate change to destroy American sovereignty. Everything flows from his core beliefs, which were shaped by some of his earliest experiences and confirmed by his later associations.

The book also makes some shocking new revelations, including details of how Obama took campaign money from Gaza, in violation of federal law; how ACORN, with which Barack Obama has been deeply involved for years, destroyed Republican voter registrations; the full truth about how making America safe for Sharia is not incidental, but is a cornerstone of Obama’s presidential program; and about how Obama is consistently, not just occasionally, anti-democratic and favors authoritarian regimes and measures.

FP: How come Obama’s Muslim background is never discussed in our media? And Obama camouflages it as well, even though it is a fact. Explain to us why this matters.

Geller: Jamie, the media doesn’t discuss it simply because it would reflect poorly on Obama. Yet it matters because Islam has since its inception had a political and expansionist character, and that that would mean that ties to Islam had a greater significance than simple allegiance to this or that religious group.

And Obama himself, with his Muslim father and stepfather and Muslim upbringing in Indonesia, knows the stakes involved. It is impossible in our post-9/11 world to be a leader and not know what Islam means, or at the very least know the hell being wreaked upon the free and not-so-free world by the warriors of Islamic jihad. And Obama has already told us which side he will be on when the lines are fully drawn: “In the wake of 9/11,” he wrote in The Audacity of Hope, “my meetings with Arab and Pakistani Americans, for example, have a more urgent quality, for the stories of detentions and FBI questioning and hard stares from neighbors have shaken their sense of security and belonging. They have been reminded that the history of immigration in this country has a dark underbelly; they need specific reassurances that their citizenship really means something, that America has learned the right lessons from the Japanese internments during World War II, and that I will stand with them should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.” [1]

In the first year of his presidency, he showed in numerous ways that he would indeed stand with them.

FP: Tell us a bit about how anti-Semitism plays into all of this. We know Islam’s disposition to Jews and so, perhaps, Obama’s bullying of Israel is no coincidence at all?

Geller: Indeed Jamie, Islamic anti-Semitism is part of the Koranic imperative and the pervasive influence of Islamic Jew-hatred cannot be ignored when assessing the impact of Barack Obama’s early life experiences upon the later trajectory of his career. If a devout Muslim prays the obligatory five daily prayers, he will repeat the Shehadah, the first chapter of the Koran, seventeen times; that chapter concludes with prayers that Muslims generally understand as asking Allah not to make the believer like the Jews (“those who have earned Allah’s anger”) or the Christians (“those who have gone astray”). The prayers generally conclude with the dua qunoot, a prayer that Allah’s wrath would overtake infidels.

Imagine the influence that all this – inculcating contempt for Jews and Christians seventeen times a day – might have on a young mind and a future president. Troubling psychological wiring might have been set in place for a lifetime.

Yet Obama has never spoken about the influence his early experiences with Islam had upon his mind and heart – in sharp contrast to others who were raised in Islam and left the faith. Obama would have had to make a decision to reject Islam.

If so, when did he make that decision? How?

Muslims who have left Islam are generally vocal about why they left: Wafa Sultan, Ibn Warraq, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Walid Shoebat, and others have spoken out fearlessly on these issues. Obama may not wish to engage in critiques of Islam, but if he left Islam, he must have very definite thoughts about it. And even if this is simply not an important issue to him, then he can still appreciate how important it is – knowing what he knows about Islam and apostasy.

Apostasy is punishable by death in Islam. Yet there have been no calls for Obama’s death from the Islamic world. Why is this? Islam gives no free passes.

Obama’s posture on this is hard to define or understand – all the more so because this is a critical issue.

Transformational issues facing this nation and the world at large – the world at war, creeping Sharia, the perversion of the rights of free men – hang in the balance during the Obama administration as never before. The stakes could not be higher. On foreign policy, Europe has lain down. The political elites have capitulated to Islamists and to multiculturalists. Europe is committing slow cultural and demographic suicide. It seems unclear that they could hold up their end even if America did the heavy lifting. As far as Israel is concerned, Obama has already made it clear that while he is in the White House, Israel is on its own.

As Obama continues to pursue his pro-Islamic and anti-Israel policies, this will only get worse. And so his deception about his Islamic ties must be explored. The potential damage to this country is incalculable.

These are dangerous times. Those consequences are, in this post-American presidency, already becoming apparent.

FP: How does Obama see the world and America? What is his vision and ultimate goal? Was there ever such a radical person to have occupied the White House

Geller: Obama sees America as just another country. His vision is to make America part of a socialist internationalist supranational construct, destroying American sovereignty. Obama makes Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton look like conservatives.

He said it himself during a visit to London for a summit of the Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (G-20. A reporter asked Obama: “[C]ould I ask you whether you subscribe, as many of your predecessors have, to the school of ‘American exceptionalism’ that sees America as uniquely qualified to lead the world, or do you have a slightly different philosophy?”

It was a question Ronald Reagan once answered without ever having been asked it. He said: “With all its flaws, America remains a unique achievement for human dignity on a scale unequaled anywhere in the world.”

But Obama offered no similar avowal of American uniqueness. Instead, he equated American exceptionalism with the national pride that a citizen of any nation could feel: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.”

Then, perhaps realizing how much he had just trivialized the achievements of the greatest republic and most magnanimous nation the world had ever known, Obama avowed: “I’m enormously proud of my country and its role and history in the world.” He even allowed for the possibility that there were some reasons that Americans should not be embarrassed by their nation’s history:

“If you think about the site of this summit and what it means, I don’t think America should be embarrassed to see evidence of the sacrifices of our troops, the enormous amount of resources that were put into Europe postwar, and our leadership in crafting an Alliance that ultimately led to the unification of Europe. We should take great pride in that.”

Embarrassed? Who would even think such a thing? Except someone who is embarrassed by America. It’s as if the most beautiful girl in the world walks into the best party, bedecked in the most magnificent dress and finest jewels, and someone whispers to her, “Don’t be embarrassed.”

Obama even acknowledged that “we have a core set of values that are enshrined in our Constitution, in our body of law, in our democratic practices, in our belief in free speech and equality, that, though imperfect, are exceptional.” But in saying that he may have sensed that he was venturing into areas where he didn’t want to go, so he backtracked:

“Now, the fact that I am very proud of my country and I think that we’ve got a whole lot to offer the world does not lessen my interest in recognizing the value and wonderful qualities of other countries, or recognizing that we’re not always going to be right, or that other people may have good ideas, or that in order for us to work collectively, all parties have to compromise and that includes us.”

It was a defining moment. Barack Obama could find some praiseworthy aspects of America – but in saying that he was careful to say also that every country could say the same, apparently in equal measure, and while the U.S. Constitution and system of government – “though imperfect” – had some “exceptional” features, well, other countries also had “wonderful qualities.”

FP: What does this crystallize about Obama?

Geller: It basically can really only mean one thing: that for him, America is nothing special. Even when Obama does refer to America’s essential goodness, as he did in his 2010 State of the Union address, it is only to advance his commitment to socialist internationalism and redistribution of American wealth: he wields Americans’ empathy and compassion like a club to manipulate us into funding bad foreign policy and despotic regimes.

Obama went to work from his first day in office to make America’s decline become a reality. As the most powerful man in the world, he would level the playing field, even if it meant cutting America off at the knees. Good and evil would be made equivalent, with evil sanctioned by the world’s only remaining superpower: democracy and tyranny, dictator and elected leader would be given the same moral sanction. He traveled around the world and denigrated American achievements and American uniqueness. He reached out in friendship to our enemies and the enemies of freedom and individual rights, including Hugo Chávez and even Fidel Castro, and offered Russia a significant boost on its way to returning to superpower status tried by selling out Eastern Europe. He catered to – and fawned shamelessly over – Islam and Muslim countries, making preposterous statements about how much the United States owes Islam, and even about how America was a Muslim country. [2]

Obama clearly believed that doing all this would bolster his image in other countries. But he was taking a calculated risk: that his apparent lack of concern for American national security, and for America’s historical achievements and place in the world, would backfire and anger Americans. Nonetheless, he took the risk. He must have believed that he was powerful enough and popular enough to neutralize any domestic political backlash that may result – and he certainly had the mainstream media on his side, as he did during his presidential campaign, to cover for him, make excuses for him when he failed, and obscure the full scope of what he was doing.

Barack Hussein Obama has chosen the path of the post-American presidency. He seems to envision himself as more than just the president of the United States, but as a shaper of the new world order, an internationalist energetically laying the groundwork for global government: the president of the world.

FP: What is the worst damage Obama can perpetrate?

Geller: He could severely damage American sovereignty by making us subject to treaties that bind us to obey international law. He has been trying to do this over the climate change issue, among others. He is also well on his way to destroying the American economy by nationalizing huge sectors of American industry: the banks, the automobile industry, and now the healthcare industry.

FP: How do we take our country back? Can we reverse the damage that Obama has done? Is there a chance that Americans might actually re-elect Obama?

Geller: A great deal hinges on November 2010. But with the Republicans generally clueless or afraid to challenge Obama as he should be challenged, or unaware of the implications of what he is doing, and the media in his pocket, he could easily be reelected.

FP: What are some thoughts you have, or things you know, after writing the book that are different before you started writing it? Has anything surprised you?

Geller: I have been investigating Obama in depth since 2007. Nothing he has done as President has surprised me. I saw it all coming and sounded the warning at my website AtlasShrugs.com. I was derided and vilified for doing so, but what I wrote then has been proven right.

FP: How does Obama view his role as President of the United States?

Geller: He sees his job as one of subjecting America to international laws. The problem for Americans is that in his quest for internationalism and global socialism, Obama is leaving the United States twisting in the wind. He is treating America as a stepping stone to help get him where he wanted to go, and he seems willing to do anything to destroy America’s prestige in the world. The consequences could be disastrous, and the presidency and the nation damaged irreparably.

FP: Final thoughts?

Geller: After just one year of the post-American presidency, on January 29, 2010, Solidarity hero and former Polish President Lech Walesa spoke of the new post-American world:

“The United States is only one superpower. Today they lead the world. Nobody has doubts about it — militarily. They also lead economically, but they’re getting weak. They don’t lead morally and politically anymore. The world has no leadership. The United States was always the last resort and hope for all other nations. There was the hope, whenever something was going wrong, one could count on the United States. Today, we lost that hope.” [3]

Our enemies could never have defeated us; we can only defeat ourselves.

Whether Barack Hussein Obama succeeds in destroying America or not, those words could be the epitaph of his post-American presidency.

FP: Pamela Geller, thank you for joining Frontpage Interview.

Notes:

[1] Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope, Three Rivers Press, 2006, p. 261.

[2] “Interview of the President by Laura Haim, Canal Plus,” WhiteHouse.gov, June 1, 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Transcript-of-the-Interview-of-the-President-by-Laura-Haim-Canal-Plus-6-1-09/. “Remarks by President Obama to the Turkish Parliament,” WhiteHouse.gov, April 6, 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-By-President-Obama-To-The-Turkish-Parliament.

[3] Kathleen Gilbert, “Lech Walesa: World Has ‘Lost Hope’ of America’s Moral Leadership,” LifeSite News, February 5, 2010.