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PrintMarch 24, 2010
Enough of the Doom and Gloom, Already
As a conservative, there's one thing I've never understood about conservatives: their propensity to see the glass as half empty. The health care battle that President Obama and the Democrats won on Sunday night is a case in point.
It's not that conservatives should be Pollyannas. Reality is reality, and as the late Scott Peck made a thesis in his book, The Road Less Traveled, the closer to reality one is, the saner one is. By that definition, Obama, Pelosi and Reid need to call their doctors' offices.
After Sunday night's loss, it's natural that conservatives should feel let down. Losing doesn't typically buoy anyone. But before conservatives start to write off the nation, as to some extent the otherwise insightful Mark Steyn has done, before concluding that freedom is lost, before conservatives make bulk purchases of one-way tickets to New Zealand or campaign for Alaska's secession, a little perspective is in order.
Through the long health care fight, a solid majority of Americans opposed the Democrats' campaign. Opposition to the Democrats' plan grew throughout the fight and, dare say, it deepened. Voters and taxpayers don't like to be dissed by their elected officials, especially a politician, Mr. Obama, who campaigned for office as a unifier and moderate.
In other words, conservatives aren't a beleaguered minority in this fight. Practical, freedom-loving Americans support the conservative position on health care, and by a majority. That should be a cause for hope and inspiration, not Alamo-like declarations.
By about a 2-1 spread, Americans are conservative more than liberal. And if you go issue-by-issue, among self-styled moderates, you'll find key social and economic issues where they're closer to the conservative rather than the liberal worldview.
Americans are quietly angry about Obama's and the Democrats' highhandedness. Yes, life goes on, and Americans will go on to other things, but they've quietly filed - not discarded - their disgust with the President and the Democratic-led Congress. Voter disgust is likely to be registered this November. Is that a given? The eminent Thomas Sowell doesn't think so, and he may be right, but I'll bet a buck or two that voters hand the Democrats a drubbing.
But if beleaguered-ness better suits your methods, then look at the potential in reality. The Americans who made a revolution against the British and established the freest nation on earth grasped the potential in reality. Had Washington and Adams and Jefferson and Hamilton and Madison, among other patriots, not done so, there never would have been a United States of America.
