If Only The Real World Wasn’t So Real …Obamaland Might Be OK

The conventions are over and the critical debates are looming just ahead. Election Day, so far off when the campaigning began, is now less than two months away.  Partisans of both parties have hunkered down and dug in – they have known that they are either voting for President Obama - or not for Obama - for at least a year. Is there anyone left out there without an opinion?

Every day there is the daily dose of new polls, followed by the droning analysis of store-bought “experts” explaining what Obama or Romney must do to win.  The discussion is always the same – who is winning, but not, “What if they do?”

This election is a referendum on Barack Obama, first, last and only.  Four years ago he was a new and charismatic figure with the soaring rhetoric and historical significance.  For the majority of voters, what was there not to like about a fresh new face and “hope and change,” after nearly 8 years of war and a financial meltdown?  Four years later, however, we know much more, and should be all the wiser for his record, you know, “Fool me once …etc.  We now know all too well that “hope” is not a strategy for governing, and the “change” was far more extreme than most people would have knowingly voted for. 

For many, and hopefully for most of us, there is little clarity, and less reason, as to why Obama has earned a second term.  There is, however, genuine concern about the harm a second term would inflict on America. Like Clark Griswald’s misdirected route to Wallyworld, Obama has created a similarly misguided path to “Obamaland,” filled with distracting sideshows, disconnected from his disappointing record or the failed promises he made to get elected. Obamaland, it turns out, is more about campaigning than governing, blaming not leading.  While even Republicans enjoy an occasional trip to the fun house, we live in the real world, and in the real world America needs governing and leadership.

So let’s take a peek into the future and ask if staying with Obama is the best real world course for America:

• One thing we know is that Obama believes that he’ll have more “flexibility” after the election when he no longer has to face the voters.  He actually whispered this to Russia’s President Medvedev next to a live microphone. Has anyone wondered/worried what this means to the Country he is entrusted to lead?  Doesn’t that make you feel that your quarterback is signaling the next play to the defense?
• Obama will very likely continue to make Don Quixote proud by chasing after as many windmills as our tax dollars will squander, and our National debt can withstand, hoping that at least one company remains solvent.  However, the Keystone Pipeline will most likely remain out of bounds, fracking will be ruled environmentally unacceptable by the EPA, and no drilling permits will be approved to American companies in the same Atlantic Ocean that Obama has loaned billions of dollars to Brazil to drill.  As a result, America will continue to import foreign oil and send billions of dollars to Countries that do not like us.  Is this what most Americans believe is best for America?
• Due to Obama’s Mid East policies, more US Embassies will likely be at greater risk around the world, leading to even more tragedies and hostage taking.  How can this be otherwise?  Obama’s offer to the Muslim world for a new beginning has been largely ignored, or interpreted as weak. By his holding back in Iran and Syria, “leading from behind” in Libya, and repeatedly giving Israel the back of his hand, Obama has created a power vacuum. It’s difficult not to have the feeling that the Muslim Nations are consciously dedicated to fighting us, despite billions in foreign aid payments from the US, while we are trying to deny we are in a fight.  Naïve? 
• And, what happens when there is even the slightest turmoil in the Mid East?  Oil prices increase.  And, since the dollar is the international trading currency of oil, as the Fed continues to print money and deflate the dollar’s value, the price of oil will only rise even higher due to our monetary policy.
• Accordingly gasoline prices, already more than double under Obama, will continue to move even higher, hardly a positive prospect, but that may be the “good news”. The worse news is that higher oil prices will increase the cost of fertilizers and transportation, raising food prices, and oil-based products.  Lack of job growth and lower disposable incomes will prolong the recession, further stress family budgets, and likely send millions more people to welfare and food stamp offices, raising the numbers of government dependents even higher.  None of this is positive.
• Retribution is an ancient business in the Mid East.  What can be expected from Muslim militants in reaction to the chants of the Democratic Party’s recent  brag-fest, (e.g., Kerry’s “Ask Obama if he is better off than he was four years ago,” Biden’s “binLaden is dead and GM is alive,” Clinton’s post-Khadafi comment, “We came, we saw, he died”?)  Even in the America that Obama chastised for being so arrogant, have we ever before heard such incendiary, wrong-headed bravado – arrogance - from our leaders? We must hope that Homeland Security tightens our borders and security process.  Will Obama/Holder be finally inspired enough to make this happen?
• The rising cost of social programs, without a corresponding responsible plan to pay for them, will continue to expand the National debt. Is Obama sufficiently concerned by the downward credit rating magnitude of his growing debt, and it’s crippling effect on future generations? Or, is it enough for him to continue to demand tax “fairness” (code for class warfare), as if “the so-called wealthy,” and not the shrinking workforce or his policies, are the culprits?

Obamaland is a giant step toward a 21st Century Utopia, a concept that has been tried and failed since the days of Plato.  Is this what we want America to be?  Is this what’s going to provide peace in our homeland, and prosperity to more people.  Is this the kind of society upon which our Nation was founded?

In my view, for the above reasons and others – like the expanding outreach of government and the higher costs and effects of Obamacare, four more years in Obamaland will be incalculably harmful to the future of our Nation, and our children’s children’s children who will inherit Anerica.  I certainly expect the “usual suspects” to disagree with me as they always do, but since this most significant election is about what we want America to be, we would all benefit if different voices from the ranks of the Unenrolled spoke up. 

As always, I look forward to your comments.