The Self-Delusion of the American Political Establishment
Washington D.C. is not just a city of monuments, museums and millions of square feet of buildings housing a preponderance of left-leaning overpaid bureaucrats complaining about how hard they work, it is also the home of the American Political Establishment (APE). This monolithic body has evolved over the past eighty years as an ever increasing amount of political power once delegated to the states and the people has been seized by the federal government. Within this entity are two branches: the senior partner -- the Democratic Establishment -- and the junior partner -- the Republican Establishment.
There are no offices on Connecticut Avenue in Washington with signs reading "The Republican Establishment" or the "The Democratic Establishment"; rather both are an amalgam of like-minded groups with one common interest: the control of the government purse-strings and the attendant influence and ego-gratification that brings about.
These establishments are made up of the following:
1) many of the current members of Congress who have served more than two terms and as a result have become dependent on the income, perquisites and notoriety in holding elected office;
2) a vast cadre of retired national office holders whose livelihood as lobbyists and political appointees as well their narcissistic needs depends upon fealty to Party and access to government largesse;
3) the majority of the media, including pundits, editors, writers and television news personalities based in Washington and New York whose proximity to power and access is vital to their continued standard of living and social status;
4) numerous think-tanks, law firms and members thereof who are waiting to latch on to the next Republican or Democrat administration for employment and ego-gratification;
5) the reliable deep pocket political contributors, crony capitalists and political consultants whose future is irrevocably tied to the political machinery of either party.
Therefore the overriding interest of this cabal has been and continues to not only be their narcissism and wealth accumulation but the amassing of power through the control of the income, borrowing and spending by the Federal Government.
For many decades it has been tacitly understood among those in both party hierarchies the role that each play in the kabuki theatre that is the American Political Establishment. For the Democrats, it has been to be the presumptive champion of the downtrodden and disenfranchised, and for the Republicans to be the promoters of free enterprise as an unending and growing source of income for the state, while maintaining some semblance of mitigating government spending. Both actors have been content in the knowledge that each party would at some point have control of various levers of government be it the White House or one or both Houses of Congress.
For many years, as the junior partner, the Republican Establishment was satisfied in being a permanent minority in Congress as long as they could win the presidency upon occasion and join with the Democrats in feeding from the government trough. Thus, with the exception of Ronald Reagan and the Republican-controlled House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999, the Republican Establishment has been content since 1952 to merely slow down the big-government policies of the Democrats while publically decrying their tax and spend policies.
This scenario was tolerated and generally ignored as long as the nation was experiencing overwhelming and seemingly endless peace and prosperity. However, the American Political Establishment's infatuation with the personal attributes of Barack Obama is threatening to undermine the incestuous relationship between the parties. Rather than examine his philosophical core and determination to transform the nation into a second class economic and societal entity, they chose to ignore it and instead viewed conservatives and the Tea Party movement as the real threat to their existence.
The APE, conditioned to believe that Obama was just another traditional Democrat president, has willingly abetted his near destruction of the economy and society. However, living among others of similar philosophical bent and income strata in the bubble that is Washington D.C., many still do not see that the earth has begun to move under their feet. They refuse to acknowledge that Obama and his radical cabal are determined to permanently destroy the Republican Party and complete the makeover of the Democratic Party into a socialist/Marxist entity bent on destroying everyone's individual liberty and standard of living.
The deliberate lies told regarding Benghazi and the willingness of the Obama regime to sacrifice four American for political expediency; the Justice Department's targeting of reporters; the egregious falsehoods about the Fast and Furious debacle; the political persecution of conservative groups by the IRS; and the potential destruction of individual privacy inherent in the massive data collected by the NSA; together with many failed economic and policy initiatives, should have sent off alarm bells among members of the Establishment. It has not; in fact they are proceeding as if it were business as usual.
The mad dash to pass an immigration bill immediately legitimizing 11 to 20 million people illegally in the country is being proposed by the APE as a means of insuring their continued existence. This would be accomplished by the increase in the voting population of those favoring an ever-expanding government while concurrently diminishing the influence of conservatives or the Tea Party movement. That the impact on the middle class or low wage workers will be devastating in an already shrinking economy with unsustainable social spending is immaterial; the Establishment believes their future will be assured. However, the reality of what this bill does is make permanent an unfettered Democratic Party machine controlled by the radical left.
The only chance this nation has of reversing its headlong dash over the cliff is to dismantle the American Political Establishment. Many conservatives and rank and file Republicans have rightly railed at the myopia of the Republican Establishment and have thus focused their attention and anger at them. However, this plays into the hands of the Obama cabal.
Rather, the attention should be shifted to first, tabling any immigration bill in Congress and second, defeating at all levels anyone running for office as a Democrat in 2014 or 2016. The Democratic Party is now fully in the thrall of Barack Obama and his fellow-travelers who control the purse-strings of the Party and thus who receives campaign funding. All those running as Democrats are, in reality, enablers in furthering the aims of the far-left to destroy this nation as founded.
While it is important who the Republicans nominate to run for office in 2014 and 2016, it is monumentally more important that the Democratic opposition be defeated. At this critical juncture in American history it is essentially immaterial who the Republican candidates are--they must be victorious. The process of weeding out those Republicans not committed to conservative principles can begin later. It will be far easier to alter the landscape in a Party whose base is overwhelmingly conservative and libertarian and where there are already a multitude of like-minded office holders.
The self-deluded fools in the American Political Establishment refuse to comprehend the long-term peril the country faces as well as the reality that the tactics of the Obama Regime are no different than those of Hitler or Mussolini in the early years of their dictatorship. That entity must be, therefore, be dismantled.