Obama's Gotta Wonder--Is Anybody Listening?

For a long time now whenever an American president has spoken, the world has listened. The global (and domestic) audience might not have liked what they heard, but ears were attentive, brains were engaged. As recently as last year the American president was both heard and heeded on matters both great and small. If nothing else people were ready and willing to hope that the new voice meant substantial and positive change in affairs ranging from health care at home to a globe ranging recession and the very nasty little war in a very faraway place.

In recent months, weeks, even days, the situation has reversed course with an abruptness which startles the observer. Bluntly put, a new dynamic exists, a new dynamic which bloomed with stunning rapidity, a new dynamic in which no one really cares what the American president might say--other than to dismiss the words as not having been worthy of hearing.

There are two excellent indicators of this new dynamic. One comes from the domestic front in the familiar form of a poll. The other comes from the nations comprising the G-20 nations, in the quite unfamiliar form of flat rejection.

The most recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll conducted between 17 and 21 June shows that Mr Obama and his progressive agenda have been rejected by very significant pluralities of We The People. The numbers, particularly the sixty-two percent who believe "the country is headed down the wrong path," are those one would expect from, say, a Rasmussen, or even a Republican Party sponsored "push poll" not one from the WSJ/NBC News folks.

There are, of course, many inputs to this new domestic perspective. These include the nature and extent of the Great Transformational Agenda so beloved by the Progressive Caucus and the Man in the Oval but which violates the American propensity for modest changes achieved slowly. There are other, equally or more important factors involved. The administration's response to the BP oil blowout is one. The failure of the economic stimulus packages is another. Even the evident erosion of American influence around the world plays a role.

There is no little probability that the president's action of yesterday--firing McChrystal and replacing him with a man who is a highly regarded political general but no warfighter--will add more suspicion and distrust to the mix in the weeks to come, particularly if General Petraeus alters the McChrystal strategy and operational plans. The net effect of appeasement, getting tough with Israel, bowing to a Saudi king, appearing far less than resolute when faced by an act of war by North Korea, kicking the British in the crotch, encouraging the Russians to behave more and more like the Soviets of bygone days, has been to lessen America in the eyes of the world and the American president in the esteem of We the People.

The more head snapping demonstration of the new dynamic comes from the G-20, more specifically the European members of the assemblage of the largest economies. You recall that Mr Obama sent a letter to the heads of government of all G-20 states which, in essence, begged one and all not to become deficit hawks but rather to continue along with the US on the path of stimulus spending.

Apparently, the political advisers who line the walls of the Oval like vultures around the slaughter house came to realize that the Social Democrat propelled states of Europe had reversed course with the blinding rapidity more characteristic of a school of tropical fish than a cluster of European parliamentarians. In a femtosecond or less, the several European states had gone from their traditional stance of cradle-to-grave benefits provided by other people's money to a posture of austerity severe enough to bring a smile to the face of Messrs Calvin and Knox.

At the same time, the US continued to cruise along fueled by money which is not our own in pursuit of the Great Transformational Agenda. The Sages of Politics feared that this lonely position might impose a political cost on the Democratic Party and the incumbent president. So, the begging letter emerged.

It was written. It was signed. It was delivered. It was ignored. With greater or lesser degrees of courtesy, the American president's plea for unity was blown off. Blown off by one and all. The Eurocrats had come to the conclusion that there were times when the US should be quite unilateral.

The irony in this is as tasty as a triple chocolate cake. The American president in common with many of the American hoi oligoi sees Western Europe with its economic and political philosophy of democratic socialism, its post-modernist languor, its cultural relativism, to be the most seductive of Edens, the most attractive of Paradises, the capstone of ten and more cycles of centuries of human "progress."

"If only we could be more like them," came the lovelorn sigh of thousands of Americans, members in good standing of the self-appointed elites of politics, media, and academe.

Just as the new American president seemed to be leading his people successfully out of the wasteland of America-past and into the Promised Land of Europe-West, a not-so-funny thing happed over in the Continent of Dreams. The place morphed overnight it seemed from the Repository of All Things Great to a a remake of the Old USA.

Benefits beyond count, vacations which never ended, being held harmless against all perils foreign and domestic, became suddenly, shockingly, totally yesterday. In a flash, the good life, the "third life," la dolce vita, was cast aside, to be replaced with the pain and suffering, the sackcloth and ashes of austerity.

Say it ain't so, Joe! Say it ain't so, Barack! Nancy! Somebody! Anybody?

But, it is so. And, the US is alone. Swimming upstream. Headed by a leader to whom no one will listen. Urged on by a voice unheard in the world and increasingly unheeded or unbelieved by those of us who are members of We the People but not card carrying adherents of the domestic elite.

Once, not that many months ago, a conveniently unnamed aid to the Man in the Oval (in)famously remarked, "We were elected to preside over the graceful decline of the United States." Now it appears that We the People unwittingly elected a man destined to preside over, not the decline, but the defeat of the US.

We elected the man for a number of reasons. Some of us practiced identity politics--placing the subgroup of ethnic, racial, religious, economic, or ideological affiliation above the primary loyalty to the US. Some of us voted from a basis of frustration and alienation, terminally fried off by the hypocrisy and duplicity of the Bush/Cheney years. Still others of us were taken in by the false flag campaign of Mr Obama. (Of course that latter is no excuse as all political campaigns are to some extent of the false flag sort and experience should have made us too hip to have been taken in by the "hope and change" slogans coming from the TelePrompter propelled mouth over the palpably empty suit.)

In any event We the People still have some faint chance of forestalling our looming defeat in the world. If nothing else we can take a clue from the Europeans. That's right, boyo, the Europeans.

The European hoi polloi have shouted "enough is enough!" The common men and women of West Europe have had it up to their dandruff with cultural relativism, multi-culturalism, the surrendering of painfully won defining institutions and values to the new barbarians, the hordes of arrivals from the primitive regions of the Islamic world.

We can do no less. And, no more. Tolerance, forbearance, and diversity are valuable values, but none mean we must abandon the unique features and attributes which have served so well for so long to make us a self-conscious entity.

Now European politicians are demanding of their people (and in the case of the new British government, themselves) that individuals no longer ask, "what's in it for me?" but rather ask, "how will this benefit us all?" European politicians are seeking to force a powerful and painful change upon their societies and polities, a change from indulgence to sacrifice, a shift from give-it-to-me-now! to delay-for-a-better-future. They are asking the nearly impossible--to surrender an overly pleasurable today for the prospect of an OK tomorrow.

We can do no less. Since so few of our political figures are willing or able to emulate their European counterparts, We the People must demand that they do so. This is to ask of ourselves something even more strenuous, more arduous than the European politicians have asked of their publics.

Yeah, that's where it is at--demand that our politicians demand of us both austerity and the accompanying sacrifice of our version of la dolce vita.

It may be an impossible task for us to undertake. However, the alternative, the defeat of the US, makes the task not only important but central--if we are to have a tomorrow.

The Decline And Fall Of The US

Reports of the death of the US at least on the international stage have littered the landscape of the past four decades. They have lurched back to the surface in recent months most recently in a piece by British historian Niall Ferguson in Foreign Affairs.

As Mark Twain famously remarked, "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

The US and its global influence were declared dead during the Seventies in the wake of the Vietnam debacle and the hype-ridden aftermath of the Watergate break-in, the impeachment proceedings against Richard M. Nixon. However, much to the dismay of both the domestic blame-America-first and all those Yankee hating members of the European hoi oligoi, the US came back from the morgue to which it had been prematurely assigned.

During the Eighties following the Reagan recession which ended the decade of stagflation and ushered in the de-industrialization of the US, the pundits and prophets both here and abroad solemnly announced that the American Century had come to an end. The US was being replaced both economically and diplomatically by Japan, Incorporated. All things Japanese were lauded to the edge of deep space while all things American were deprecated.

Once again Uncle Sam refused to recline for the post-mortem. Japan entered a long age of deflation and the US cruised to new levels of prosperity. The Cold War ended with the US being the last man standing. And, in a display of coalition building the US led the effort to toss Iraq from Kuwait.

The theme of American decline reemerged during the Clinton administration. This recrudescence was minor compared to the earlier death notices, but was put to rest when the US economy showed new robustness after a (very) short hiatus and the Clinton team of lawyers put aside their unease with untidiness long enough for the Bosnian intervention.

Now the prognosticators of America's imminent demise have come back, bigger and seemingly more justified than ever. Making the current predictions of the decline and fall of "the American Empire" more believable than before is the simple fact that roughly half of We the People share the belief.

Leaving aside the sheer nonsense of using the term "Empire" to describe the relationship of the US with the rest of the world, the fact remains that the US is under severe pressure from a number of interlocking factors which does seem to justify a guarded prognosis at best. Even more reinforcement for the view that the US is on the skids is found in that most of the constellation of enervating problems are of our own political making.

To put the matter bluntly: The decline of both the structural integrity of the American economy and the perceived legitimacy of the Federal government are homemade. They are both self-inflicted wounds.

The tsunami of national debt which could go to many times the total GDP in coming years as well as the dependence upon foreign funding of this debt are the creation of the Federal government. Responsibility for this wound resides with both Republicans and Democrats, both the Executive and Congress. The existence of the debt and the concomitant reliance upon China and other less-than-friendly governments to underwrite it did not just happen. The sorry and weakening state of affairs was created by a succession of agendas pursued vigorously by politicians of both parties. It is the result of belief (and the power of special interests) held deeply by both the neocon ninnies of the Bush/Cheney years and the Progressive ninnies of more recent vintage.

This judgement requires a follow-on evaluation. The ultimate responsibility for the perhaps fatal weakening of the American economy and faith in the governmental institutions of the US finally resides with We the People. We have both allowed and encouraged the fiscal hemorrhaging. We allowed, encouraged, demanded the access to cheaper foreign made products, the loss of a manufacturing base, the shrinkage of domestic savings base. We have demanded more, ever more from Washington without any regard as to how the money would be found.

In short We the People have proved that de Tocqueville was right nearly two centuries ago when he predicted that the ultimate failure of American democracy would come when We the People discovered we could vote ourselves goodies from government. We, whether as individuals or as corporate fictions, not only allowed but required that the Federal government do more for us, give us more goodies, make life today somehow better while saying, "Screw the future, we don't live there."

At the same time a trajectory launched in the Thirties by FDR during the First and Second New Deals and boosted by the "Judicial Revolution" of 1937 gave us the ever larger, ever more remote administrative state comprising bureaucracies beyond count, one-size-fits-all regulations beyond comprehension, and bureaucrats without faces. The distant and impersonal administrators and functionaries chipped away at the belief that government was both responsible and responsive to the citizenry.

In the past year both the negative financial situation and the loss of perceived legitimacy of the Federal government have accelerated. Regardless of the reasons adduced by the proponents of both the "transformational agenda" put forth by the Obama administration and the Progressive Caucus in Congress, the results have been uniformly negative for the longer term status of the US on the global stage.

Foreign observers take a dekko at the current stasis in Washington which has the health care overhaul as its center and conclude (as does the Obama administration) that the Federal government, indeed the political process, is irreparably broken. This is a valid view albeit a superficial one. It sees the stasis but not the idiocy underlying it.

It should be noted here that the word "idiot" and its variants such as "idiocy" have a Greek root, idiotes. In the original language the word denoted a person who did not meaningfully engage in the political life of his nation.

Until very recently too many of We the People have been idiots in this way-back-when meaning. We have not meaningfully engaged in political life. We have been too quick and too eager to practice the politics of what's-in-it-for-me? rather than what is best for us as a collective nation.

Making us even more idiotic has been the siren song of the politics of victimization. Compounding our status as idiots has been the blind following of ideological flags. No matter how one spins reality, the "neo liberal" approaches of Bill Clinton with globalization and opening trade to China as well as the "neocon" policies of George W. Bush were intellectually blinkered by True Belief in ideologies rather than reality based attempts to advance American national interests.

True Belief results in failed policies more often than not. It is not surprising that we are living in the midst of failure today.

If the predictions of the decline and near-term fall of the US as the major global force are to be proven wrong it will be the result of We the People accepting, demanding really, a 180 degree change of course.

It will be necessary for We the People to demand less from both the Federal government and the market.

It will be necessary for We the People to do the impossible--vote away the goodies, the promises of security and safety offered by the central government.

It will be necessary for We the People to turn away from the Federal government and turn toward the local or state governments or, perish the thought, to ourselves, for comfort, safety, security, and the other better things of life.

It will be necessary for We the People to do the unthinkable. Demand of ourselves a fair degree of sacrifice as individuals for the better future of our nation.

It will be necessary for We the People to demand that our government stop trying to project a presence everywhere in the world in order that our core national and strategic interests can be both protected and advanced.

Unless We the People are willing and able to abandon our comfortable idiocy, we will shortly be living in a world where China is the preeminent power. A world where Islamist jihadists are a fact of everyday life. A world in which the values we once espoused, fought and died for are far more endangered than the spotted owl.

Unless We the People abandon our comfortable idiocy, we will be citizens of an irrelevant country, a country which can be ignored with impunity by any and every other country, large or small.

Shoveling dirt in Uncle Sam's face may be the perfect dream for many in the hoi oligoi, but it would not be good for the hoi polloi of the world--or the US. While one (unnamed) member of the Obama administration was reported to have said, "We were elected to preside over the graceful decline of the US," this low ambition can be thwarted by We the People. But, only if we stop being idiotes.

What Happened to the "Hidden Hand?"

Periodically, when the Geek is feeling entirely too masochistic to read the usual dull, tendentious and all-too-often agenda driven works of academic historians, he returns to his favorite piece of intellectual torture--Das Kapital. The current global exercise in the markets' version of the China Syndrome required another visit to the narrow guage view of history put forth by Karl Marx.

Showing his inherently schizoid nature, the Geek followed that excursion by reacquainting himself with Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations and touching base with a strong Adam Smith maven--Allan Greenspan's memoirs.

When the reading was over, the Geek was struck with a couple of salient lacks shared equally by Marx and Smith, and, of course, Greenspan--

"Wait one, Geek!" I hear you interrupting, "What do you know about micro or macro-economics, your thing is history?"

All the Geek can do is agree. The dismal science is not one with which the Geek is overly well acquainted. However, decisions about economic matters are made by human beings, by Joe the Plumber as well as the glittering elite of international finance. You have to remember that the study of history is the study of the record of human choices, good and bad. History is the sum total of all humans' hopes and fears, strengths and weaknesses, greed and altruism, all the good and evil of which people are capable.

To those exemplified by Marx, Smith and Greenspan, economic matters are strangely isolated from the realities of the human condition. Reading these men one is left with the impression that while economic imperatives operate on people, people and their choices have little to do with the processes of wealth creation, distribution and usage.

One human emotion runs through the writings of Smith and Marx as a bright thread. Greed. Both men quite explicitly acknowledge the power of greed as a motivator of economic choice. Greenspan makes the same point.

Smith and Greenspan seem to agree with the noxious character Gecko, in the movie Wallstreet, in extolling greed as a good. Marx does not share this favorable position on greed, or "self-interest," as Smith termed it.

There is a sub-text to Smith and Greenspan (and to a somewhat lesser extent, Marx.) That sub-text is that the market is inherently rational. That it is an institution of rationality based on the enlightened, knowledgeable pursuit of self-interest.

Get a grip, boys!

Humans are not primarily rational. Greed is not the primary emotion motivating decisions whether in the economic area or any of the others which comprise the human experience.

The primary emotion of humans is fear. Naked, unadulterated fear. Not anxiety. Not apprehension. Not even worry. Fear, pure and simple.

We are all born globally afraid. Life's journey consists of restraining, controlling, domesticating fear. Turning the voracious wolfpack in our guts from feral creatures eager to devour us from the inside into a useful and well tethered band of watchdogs warning us of danger.

The wolves of fear are always straining at the leashes. Always trying to break free. Always seeking a way to gnaw and yowl. We are all--each and everyone of us--fractions of a second away from being eaten alive by our fears.

Life is inherently risky. As a species we emerged to occupy a precarious ecological niche. Fear was and is necessary, utterly essential, to stay alive. Fear, like fire, is a wonderful servant but a terrible master.

All human institutions have emerged to address the risks and fears of life. They all exist, all justify their existence, by how well they serve to reduce and distribute risk. By appearing to provide a reason to keep our wolf packs of fear under control.

Greed (or self-interest, if you prefer a milder term) is the flip side of fear. In a manner identical to the striving for power, status, prestige, potency, greed is a mechanism by which individual fear is addressed, the individual's risks apparently reduced.

The Democratic Socialist's call for "fairness" is an attempt to reduce risk through distribution. The more widely risks seem to be distributed among a group, the less reason exists for any individual to give free expression to fear.

The free-market capitalist's call for minimal regulation of his activities is motivated by an attempt to reduce risk through distribution. Or, to err on the side of accuracy, to reduce risk by displacement. The free-market capitalist seeks to place his individual risk onto the backs of others. To reduce his fear by transferring it to others.

The point that Smith, Greenspan and, yes, even Marx missed is simple. The capitalist is not the only or even the major risk-taker in a market oriented economy. Arguably, the worker takes a much greater risk. While the capitalist may have many places for investment (after all, distribution of money equals distribution and thus limitation of risk) the worker has only one job. Lose that and the worker loses all.

In addition to the worker, the employee of a capitalist enterprise, there are many other actors with as much at risk as the capitalist. Suppliers and customers for example. Or the town where the business is located.

Life is risky and fear is universal. It is no surprise that the capitalist, large or small, seeks to distribute risk, reduce his own vulnerabilities and keep his wolves under control. The market model might serve to be an effective way to do this, to protect and reassure not only the investor but also the worker, the buyer, the seller, and, heck, even the tax collector.

However, the market can only be both free and effective if all players, no matter what their role might be, act on the basis of equal, perfect information and with a supreme detachment from the emotions, particularly fear and its direct anodynes such as envy and greed.

Perhaps there is a world where that sort of halcyon situation exists. But, planet Earth is not to be found among their number. As a result the free-market so admired by Adam Smith and Allan Greenspan will never be a perfect or even an effective means to reduce and distribute risk--to assist us in the never ending task of keeping our wolves of fear under control.

The record of socialism whether of the European Democratic sort or Soviet style Communism is no better historically than is that of the free-market. Perfect fairness, true equality is a chimera, and a dangerous one at that.

In so far as talents, abilities and motivations of people differ, inequality and unfairness of outcome will necessarily result. In any system dedicated to the proposition that society can and should guarantee equality and fairness, some will find the loopholes.

Some will find ways and means to become somewhat more fair and equal than others. Still others will harbor bitter resentment and sour envy. We all meet our inner wolves in different ways. We all hear the warning barks of our watchdogs within differently.

History powerfully argues that the answer to economically based fears is not found in systems. Neither the hidden hand nor the government dictate can assure outcomes which are non-risky, not likely to produce fear in one form or another.

The answer, history suggests, is to be found within each and every one of us. It is to be found in how well we understand the evolutionary psychology which lies between our ears and how it expresses itself. The answer to fear is the knowledge necessary to keep a firm hand on the leash.

History teaches that when humans give in to the wolves within, they become howling beasts on two legs.

It's The Economy, Stupid!

We the People may hope that life is that simple. The politicos may fervently wish that the next four years will revolve around the economy alone. Even the MSM may wish to pretend that life is so one dimensional that economic man will occupy its attention to the exclusion of all else.

Heck, wouldn't that be nice? In comparison to foreign affairs and national security policy, economic matters--even the collapse of major banks--seems so simple. It's all a matter of money. And, money is just so manageable. Right?

Sure, spending money is easy. Appropriating money is easy as well. Collecting money is harder, but not so hard as solving foreign policy dilemmas.

The Geek has to admit it would be enjoyable for him if the world would simply go away for a few years. He has a backlog of books to read. And, he has gotten bored with watching the same global problems rise up every day defying the solution du jour from the Inside-the-Beltway deep thinkers.

The truth is the real world won't let us alone. Foreign affairs won't go away and leave us to feel our way out of the fiscal fog.

The Mideast is not going to suddenly break out in peace. The dove will not become the national bird of Israel. Nor will the symbol of peace replace the sword on assorted Arab flags. Hamas will not morph into the Woodstock Nation.

The US has accomplished its minimum strategic goal in Iraq. Our forces can withdraw without the odor of defeat attaching itself to our boots.

Beyond that one more-or-less happy thought, life for the next president will be demanding in the region. Unless we wish to continence defeat, more troops must be deployed to and die in Afghanistan. Reaching the minimum strategic goal of "not-losing" will be harder in Afghanistan than it was in Iraq. Not only is Pakistan a coterminous state, so also is Iran. The potential for Iranian proxy efforts in Afghanistan is lesser than it has been in Iraq due to the Sunni-Shia habit of mutual distaste. Still the Iranian proximity will be unhelpful. Equally unhelpful is the world wide appetite for Afghanistan's number one commodity--opium. (OK, to err on the side of accuracy, it's not the opium but the refined products of the poppy.)

Nor is it likely that Iran is going to join the ranks of adult, responsible global citizens. The mullahocracy is unlikely to discontinue its support for insurgents in Iraq, or Hezbollah in Lebanon or Hamas. It is not probable that the Iranians will abandon their quest for the bomb, particularly as they can continue to count on the PRC running interference for them.

Before anyone decides that North Korea can be relegated to the category of "no problem," we have to note that the recently agreed to (for the umpteenth time) framework, does not address the Hermit Kingdom of the North's highly enriched uranium production efforts. This means that even if the Northerners turn over a full and accurate accounting of every decigram of plutonium produced and even surrenders their stockpile to adult supervision, the denizens running the NKPA will continue to have the capacity to pursue bomb making.

Russia has problems. Lots of them. Economy and demography are among the number. So also is the running sore of separatist movements. A test launch of a new ICBM in no way addresses the larger scale deficiencies of the Russian military and the infrastructure which supports it.

In spite of its difficulties and arguably because of them, Russia may well become more of a global bad boy in the next few years. The US will have to deal with Russia realistically and hardheadedly. No more looking the Russian leader in the eyes and discerning some sort of hidden truth there as W. Bush apparently did.

If all those threats and challenges seem too far from home to concern us, then look down south. Hugo Chavez not only dislikes the US intensely (to put it mildly), he has donned the mantle once worn by Fidel Castro. Chavez intends to tweak the beard of Uncle Sam as often and hard as he can. To this end he has not only embarked upon an unprecedented arms purchasing campaign, but has joined hands with Hezbollah and Iran. Chavez and his running buddies, the jefes of Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua, are not inclined to make small plans in their opposition to the Colossus of the North, Neither are they the kind to back down without genuine cause.

Still too far from home to worry you, bucko? Then try Mexico. The shooting war between the drug gangs as well as between the gangsters and the government has made the Land Down South one of the most deadly environments in the world. Over the years there has been a strong tendency for violence and disruption in Mexico to spill over into the US. The Great Fence of Presumed Security is not likely to stop this predilection.

Mexico too far away? Jest kaint get all that fired up over what those taco benders are doing? Well, matey, how about the following

The US national debt is very large. Is all of it owed to Americans? No. Quite a bit of it is owed to foreigners. Quite a bit is held by Sovereign Wealth Funds. Some of those are controlled by states whose governments are not all that favorably inclined toward the US and its policy goals.

(Can we say, for example, Peoples Republic of China? Or, how about repeating after the Geek, "House of Saud?")

A diplomatically phrased but no less menacing version of, "Remember, boy, we hold your note," can have a significant inhibitory impact upon US policy initiatives.

OK, to again err on the side of accuracy, foreign ownership of US notes can do far more than simply inhibit policy demarches, but you get the point. The net effect of the current financial market morass will be a significant increase in national indebtedness. Much of that increase will end in the hands of foreign governments.

Then there is that old standby, foreign oil. Unless and until We the People and those who purportedly represent us in Congress and the Oval resolve to "drill, ye terriers, drill" in order to buy the time necessary to develop new and better forms of energy prime movers whether nuclear, clean coal or renewable, the US remains to some extent at the policy and self-interest mercy of foreign states.

This has been a (necessarily) abbreviated tour of the horizon. It should have been enough to illustrate the accuracy of the Geek's contention: The next administration will be a foreign policy oriented administration.

We have seen what can happen to our nation and its place in the world under an administration more controlled by ideology than a strong sense of realpolitik. We cannot afford another ideologically driven regime.

We cannot afford another Cheney. We cannot afford another loyal water carrier like Condy Rice. We cannot afford more ninnies whether neocon or progressive.

We have also seen what happens to our role in the world under an administration which was naive about foreign policy. The Clinton Administration was both naive and uninterested in foreign and national security matters. Beyond that, the President lacked experience and thus moral authority to deal with the senior military establishment.

We and our nation will not do well with another group of naive and disinterested folks in and near the Oval. Remember, we've been there. Done it. Have the scars to prove it.

The polls and the MSM to say nothing of most of the Gang of Five Hundred urge the Geek to accept the political reality. The Geek is urged by all other than Joe the Plumber to accept and embrace the coming of the Obama administration.

The Geek can accept much. Embrace much. Life and war have taught him the necessity of doing so. He is unwilling to embrace the prospect of more years of failure for our nation. Sixteen years of naivete, of ideology, of blown opportunities is enough.

Elections over the past forty years have more often than not revolved around choosing the lesser of two evils. This time around, for the first time in eight years the Geek must choose the Republicans. He must hope that change means less ideology and more realism in both foreign and economic policy--the inseparable twins.

He can only hope that enough people go along with the same choice.