Tag Archives: United States

by | October 11, 2013 · 7:30 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS-81 THE ADVISOR

CITIZEN BEWARE

greendoor

One thing you could say for this President is that he knows when he calls, people jump. The Advisor smiled and thought, even me. The office carries real and mystical power. It must be something deep in our human genes from thousands of years of picking leaders by widely varying methods. Once a man is the supreme leader he or she exudes an aura of power. I know who this man is. I know his shortcomings and, still, when he sends word he is coming down, I jump. I even tidy up the meeting room. Glad he never wanted to see my living quarters. Me, one in a long unbroken line of Advisors, am still a citizen and he is my chief.

It was mid-afternoon when the President placed his palm on the old iron door with the fading EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS copper plaque dating back to colonial days. President Obama was only an hour late. No problem; that was his prerogative. He made no apology, just took his seat in the small conversational grouping of furniture and waited until the Advisor poured coffee. The President was addicted to good coffee and cigarettes. The advisor had quit smoking fifty years ago and disliked breathing in second-hand smoke but it was not that often and the man needed to be able to relax. After taking his first drag, President Obama said, “I just had to get away. My staff is trying to kill me by constantly presenting problems they should solve themselves. Take this closing of the Government thing. Hell, I’d like to close the White House, not to tours, but to the idiots who work there.”

The President paused to take another drag and a sip of coffee.

“Yes, I wanted to make the Republicans look bad by causing the citizens some pain and reasons to blame the House Tea Party faction, but to delay paying death benefits to dead soldiers is too stupid to even think about. And then to close an open air memorial to WWII veterans is even worse. Yet I can’t fire anyone because when push comes to shove they will say, ‘I was only carrying out what the President wanted.’ No way. I’m just tired of putting out fires. The bureaucracy is an awesome thing. A huge anthill with all the ants striving to please their queen without a second of thought. They do not even do what is right for the people or the nation. Never enters their heads. They are only guided by the need to protect their little kingdoms. They know they will be here in their little fiefdoms long after I’m gone. Jumping up and down in the Oval Office chanting their age old mantra, ‘Look at me.’

“I swear when I achieve my goal of a one party system overseeing fairness, income distribution and equality for all, I will break the back of the entrenched bureaucracy.”

“Mr. President, even the liberal media is starting to question your failure to lead in finding the solution to problems. Soon they will stumble on the theory that your interests lie in the continued acquisition of power not in the solution of problems. While you’re not resolving issues, you are increasing the power of the Executive Office. The polls show a remarkable drop in your public ratings. Are you concerned about that?”

“Not in the least. I will come out of this so-called budget crisis with what I want. A further weakening of the opposition and the acquisition of more power in the Executive. The Progressives may even pick up more legislative seats in the 2014 elections. If that happens I will be unstoppable.” The President ground out his cigarette with gratification, ignoring the Advisor’s wide eyes. “Thank you for listening to me bitch and moan. It’s good to have a place where I can be myself.” The President smiled and said, “Stick around. I may need another session soon.” The President walked swiftly to the door and left.

The Advisor opened his current journal and began to write. He thought as he was recording, No one will ever believe this. I’m not even sure I can.

This fictional account of a meeting that should happen but doesn’t is by the author of the Brandon novels. The author has 27 years of Government service, including two years serving President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s as an advisor. Considering today’s volatile political situation, you are encouraged to share this on Facebook and to click the “like” button below. Comments and dialogue are welcome.

Meeting with President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Deputy National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and General Colin Powell in the Oval Office.

1 Comment

Filed under Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, Intelligence & Politics, political solutions, Politics, Progressives

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

by | October 9, 2013 · 7:30 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS-79 THE ADVISOR

THE ISSUE IS THE ISSUE 

greendoor

It was time for the sun to come up. The Advisor had to turn on his big-screen TV to see it. Every day the world is renewed with this life-giving force. If only everyone could see the sunrise as another chance to do good things. Maybe spending so much time underground has made me more sensitive to the eternal promise of the light pushing away the dark. I’m worried about my mission to advise the President. He seems to have a hard core of anger and missionary zeal to mold America into a nation of equality, fairness, and centralized control. I don’t think he recognizes that universal fairness and equality are good, if unattainable goals, that are possible only with the excesses of centralized control.

The conflicts he has with his political opposition are rooted in the centralized control issue that cannot tolerate individual freedom or the compromises required to govern this nation. He doesn’t see it like that. To him individual freedom where each person strives to do the best they can destroys the building of socialism by an elite group. His dream is to bring about the birth of unqualified equality, not only to America but to the entire world. He believes individual freedom and nationalism must be sacrificed in the journey to a better world.

The President’s devotion to socialism and the teaching of Saul Alinsky that the issue is never the issue prevent him from devoting his talent to the solving of important national and international issues. President Obama can only see issues as opportunities to be used to destroy opposition. The destruction of the opposition clears the way for the building of an equal opportunity society where wealth is distributed by a centralized government. Just like Mr. Alinsky taught in his “Rules for Radicals.” Mr. Alinsky is a brilliant revolutionary but he was never president. His teaching may have guided Mr. Obama to the presidency but it surely does not help him to govern where issues are real. If you don’t solve them, you are held accountable. Cute messaging and flip flopping on nearly every issue, such as the raising of the debt, are hurting the president’s ability to govern. Recall his vote against raising the debt as being unpatriotic during President Bush’s tenure. Inconsistency and the loss of respect for your word damages any leader. This president just doesn’t seem to understand that lesson of history.

I believe he really doesn’t care about how the Affordable Care Act affects the people as long as it puts seven percent of the economy under government control. Nor does he worry about the number of people out of work, or the insecure national borders, foreign affairs, or the increasing cost of welfare. All these issues bring more people under the care of the central government. To maintain the momentum of people coming under government care he must keep spending beyond the nation’s income. An economic crisis will enable him to nationalize more of the economy and destroy the flow of money to the opposition for a competing  political agenda.

His plan won’t work in the long run and it will cause great damage to the nation and the American safe harbor for individual freedom which is the bedrock of a free people. I’m the Advisor and I don’t know what to do. I’ll give him the best advice I can but I must also protect the nation. Maybe he will see a better path.

By the author of the Brandon novels. The author has 27 years of Government service, including two years serving President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s as an advisor. Considering today’s volatile political situation, you are encouraged to share this on Facebook and to click the “like” button below. Comments and dialogue are welcome.

Meeting with President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Deputy National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and General Colin Powell in the Oval Office.

Related articles

2 Comments

Filed under Alinsky, centralization, class warfare, Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, Intelligence & Politics, Obama, political solutions, Progressives, Utopian

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

by | August 19, 2013 · 9:07 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 70 – THE ADVISOR

 EGYPT AND OBAMA

Safe in the Shadows

The Advisor sat in front of his wide-screen TV watching the streets of Cairo turn to chaos. Minutes later he was astonished at President Obama’s comments on nationwide TV. Advisors were not to be surprised by the actions and statements of their Presidents. For the past two weeks, since the President had not sought his advice, the Advisor had been frantically searching the Presidential Journals written by Advisors since Washington’s first term. He had a treasure of history lined up on the floor to ceiling book shelves. Surely there were bits of history that would help him advise this President, he had thought. His search had not turned up evidence of another Advisor being  continually surprised by the man in the Oval Office.

Recently, a thought had been trying to insert itself in his thinking. Maybe he was using the wrong assumption. All of his predecessors assumed, rightly, that their Presidents were seeking solutions to problems affecting the nation’s well being and progress. What if President Obama has a different vision? A vision that required the destruction of the present to usher in a period of greater fairness and equality for, not just America, but for the entire world? He definitely had a serious problem with the colonial past of both Great Britain and, a different kind of world domination by the United States. Nothing he was doing or planning to do would improve National Security or the nation’s economy. His record showed he was constantly putting obstacles in the way of national independence in the energy field from fossil fuels in favor of a vision of green energy from non-existent technology that was, at least, several decades in the future. Cheap energy in America would do more to bring back manufacturing jobs and products than all his cumbersome regulations and pronouncements. 

Egypt is what brought the President’s destructive words and actions into focus. Here, the people rejected a military dictatorship for free elections and democracy. Their sacrifices brought elections that put the most organized opposition into power. The Muslim Brotherhood  is not a political party. It’s like Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Both are armed militias that do a modicum of social work. Once acquiring power, either by coup or the ballot box, they do not give up power. One person, one vote, one time. Germany under the Nazi party had a similar experience. Once the Muslim  Brotherhood under Morsi gained power they moved immediately to ensure their permanency. Their intent was not to benefit the Egyptian people or nation, it was to install an Islamic nation under sharia law.

The Egyptian people ousted the dictatorship of the Brotherhood with the backing of the Army. President Obama gave lukewarm support to the overthrow of Morsi, while lamenting the loss of democracy. The Brotherhood took the fight to the streets demanding the return of Morsi and democracy, vowing to fight to the death. The streets are jammed with Brotherhood supporters, even though they are a definite minority. Chaos is spreading. The already shaky economy is vanishing. The Army moves to restore order. The Brotherhood uses weapons to fight back. Casualties mount on both sides. Progressives, with the President at the point, condemn the Army’s brutality in putting down the Brotherhood revolt, demanding a return to the democratic process and canceling a joint U.S.-Egypt military exercise.

Clearly President Obama has sided with the Muslim Brotherhood. Both Progressives and their Presidential leadership forget that if you added two zeros to the number of dead in Egypt you would still have far fewer dead than in Syria, where a hands-off policy was Obama’s choice. Yet with Christian churches burning and armed Brotherhood roaming the streets of Egypt, President Obama calls for talks and negotiations to restore the democratic process.

The Advisor mused. Doesn’t he know there are times when talk is impossible? A return to democratic elections would only mean the best organized and ruthless group, Morsi and the Brotherhood would win again. This time there would be no return. The Camp David agreement between Egypt and Israel would end. Morsi would align Egypt with Iran and attempt to establish an Islamic Empire, forcefully rejecting all Western influence. The war for Islamic dominance is on and our President is supporting the Islamists. His circle of advisors has several Islamists pressing their version of the future.

I must find a way to show the President a different vision. A war between Islam and Christianity is not in America’s interest. Islam weakness is its rejection of reality and the absence of love and forgiveness in its theology. There is nothing democratic about Sharia Law. It is a real war on women.

By the author of the Jack Brandon novels. http://www.factsandfictions.com. The author has 27 years of Government service, including two years serving President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s as an advisor. Considering today’s volatile political situation, you are encouraged to pass on this blog or parts of it to your contacts and friends. Comments and dialogue are welcome and helpful.

Meeting with President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Deputy National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and General Colin Powell in the Oval Office.

Related articles

1 Comment

Filed under Barry Kelly, Conservative views, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Obama

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

by | August 15, 2013 · 7:00 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSTIGHTS 69-ADVISOR

Safe in the Shadows

PROBLEMS

The Advisor sat slumped in his chair. For the first time in his life he felt inadequate.  His President and the nation needed help. There were so many problems, he wasn’t sure where to start or even if he should start.

Only one thing to do, he thought.  Pull out your journal and put down your problems. If you can’t help President Obama solve them, at least you can record them. The record may help another President and his Advisor.

He uncapped his Waterman fountain pen, dipped it in the open inkwell to get the flow started, and wrote in large printed letters at the top of a clean page, PROBLEMS. Wondering what to write next, he just started to write. The words flowed like they were pouring from a deep wound in the Nation’s body. 

Obamacare: Here’s an unpopular program that addresses a national need. Nearly everyone believes health care in America is broken and needs fixed. If this President could get over his revolutionary philosophy that pushes him to use every issue to destroy the opposition, it would be easy to pass a bipartisan bill that keeps the good parts of Obamacare and meets the nation’s needs without polarizing the populace. There is a constitutional process that could make this happen. President Obama has to take the lead. He shouldn’t worry about  the opposition. They are without leaders and nearly hopeless. Also the President and his Progressive supporters must accept constitutional limits on executive powers and the role of the states. This is not a hard problem. Ignoring it can lead to impeachment talk.

After health care, the sweeping ink trail took up the energy problem.

To start with, energy is too important to be left to spineless politicians and those progressives who believe humans can control climate and its worldwide effects. How can anyone trust politicians or executive department heads such as EPA who refuse to recognize that the world’s climate has and does change, almost constantly in historical terms? The changes are not caused by humans. Humans weren’t even present for many of the changes. How about the time when there were two miles of ice over the place now occupied by Chicago? How many emissions from cars and coal-fired plants did it take to warm up the Earth then?  Any objective person of science knows that minute changes in the Earth’s orbit, the energy put out by the sun, and the occasional meteorite might have been instrumental in changes in the world’s temperature.

Again, a bipartisan energy program would not be hard to accomplish if the President could bring himself to cast aside the misguided environmentalists and focus on an intelligent use of fossil fuels while investing modest sums in finding a cleaner form of energy in this century. In the meantime, I must help him recognize that the civilization we have today and may have tomorrow, is because of fossil fuel. Pipelines, drilling on- and off-shore for oil and natural gas and building refineries are good for the nation and cheap energy will bring manufacturing jobs back to America. Massive amounts of tax dollars, poured recklessly into solar cells and wind turbines, will not magically develop even ten percent of our energy requirements.

The Advisor liked to write and ponder problems by candlelight. The flickering light was a constant reminder of how close we are to the past. He felt we are much closer to the time of our founders than we are to the citizens of the next century. Of course, that is what history is all about. Knowing the past will help us get safely into the future. Maybe, that is the message I can get across to the President.

Even I have to get some sleep. I’ll leave National Security, overstepping of executive power, and the economy for another session. If the President comes back, I will have something for him.

By the author of the Jack Brandon novels. http://www.factsandfictions.com. The author has 27 years of Government service, including two years serving President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s as an advisor. Considering today’s volatile political situation, you are encouraged to pass on this blog or parts of it to your contacts and friends. Comments and dialogue are welcome and helpful.

Meeting with President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Deputy National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and General Colin Powell in the Oval Office.

Related articles

1 Comment

Filed under Alinsky, Barry Kelly, centralization, Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, foreign policy, General, global warming, Intelligence & Politics, Obama, political solutions, Politics, Progressives

Tagged as , , , ,

by | July 22, 2013 · 7:30 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 65

Safe in the Shadows

LEADING FROM BEHIND–THE ADVISOR

The Advisor was thinking about how forceful he could be in advising President Obama. The subject for his next visit would be the consequences in foreign policy of leading from behind. The President wasn’t a stupid or a cruel man.   He was just a man who carried an enormous amount of baggage.

Could anyone walk away from the influences he was subject to in his earlier life? the advisor thought. Some he was personally responsible for, others he had no real choice. Parents from far to the left, several years in a Muslim Madrassi teaching Wahhabism. His father, an anti-colonialist Kenyan, whose family had been persecuted by the British Colonialists. For most of his formidable years he was exposed to radical leftist ideologies. Then, the influence of Ivy League progressives, Saul Alinsky and his radical plan for seizing power, Reverend Wright and his hate America sermons, William Ayers and his terrorist viewpoint and to top it off the ruthless and corrupt school of Chicago politics. The President never personally suffered from his associations and ideology. Therefore, he has no understanding of  the consequences of following a revolutionary ideology. It is probably too late now but I must try. I will never knowingly give him bad advice or try to manipulate him. My mission code does not allow it. After all, he was elected twice and could probably win a third term if it were permitted.

The advisor’s musing is interrupted when the flashing red light and soft chiming called him to the phone.

The President arrived a few minutes later at nine o’clock PM. The President strode into the room, greeted the advisor and said, “Let’s get started. I have some extra time and need a cup of your coffee.”

“Mr. President, you look like a man who doesn’t have a care in the world.”

“Today was good day. No one was asking me to do the impossible. Why do my supporters and staff think I should get involved in everything?”

“You are the ‘point of the spear.’ They count on you to give them what they want without understanding that doing nothing is also, at times, a good action plan. There, a perfect opening for my talk. Remember, you told me to pick the topic. So I’m going to talk about the concept of leading from behind. Please interrupt at any time. I’m going to use foreign affairs as a backdrop for my advice.

“You are in the fifth year of your Presidency. That is long enough for you to own America’s position in the world. You will not like some of my statements. But I will assure you, the the facts are correct. My analysis may be faulty because I project it into the future where no one can be absolutely sure they are right. First our main adversary, Russia. They are stronger now than they were before your election. Today their fleet is in the Mediterranean, something that was inconceivable in the last several decades. They have nearly secured a warm water port in the Med, a Russian goal going back to the czars. They failed in Afghanistan to find a corridor to warm water. Russia’s ability to project power has been limited for centuries because they lacked a port with year round operations capability. The Syrian port of Tartous is the payoff for their support to Assad. Sure, they enjoy threatening American and Israeli interests in the Middle East, but Tartous is the real goal.

“To see more clearly the Russian move into the Middle East, imagine a monopoly game where the winner gains areas of influence and the losers, well, lose. You failed to negotiate a status of forces agreement in Iraq where it was in no one’s interest for the U.S. to abandon the country. Certainly sectarian violence would be lessened if we had a seat at the table. Iran could not supply Syria forces through or over Iraq. Iran could not threaten Iraq if we had maintained a presence in Iraq. Iran would have a harder time supplying Hezbollah and using that force to control Lebanon, another possibility for Russia to exploit to acquire a warm water port. Our anti-ballistic missiles on the ground in Iraq could bring more defense against an Iranian attack on Israel or the Sunni Middle East. ‘Leading from Behind’ policies have resulted in our loss of space supremacy, ABM land-based systems, and talks about unilaterally cutting force size and our inventor of ballistic missiles that have kept us from a nuclear war since WWII.  Our loss of influence in Egypt, Libya, Iraq, and Pakistan is not a foreign affairs victory. Leading from behind means you are and will remain behind.

“Leading from behind does not win respect in the world. Your monopoly board does not look good. Putin has no respect for you as leader because he sees you weakening America and, therefore, believes you are not someone he should worry about. Most of the world respects power and distrusts weakness. To world leaders words don’t matter. Words without action are invisible. To start with I advise you to say less and do more. You can project American power without following the old colonial pattern you hate so much.”

The President puts his cup down, grinds out his cigarette.

The Advisor says, “Yes. I have known ever since you sent the bust of Winston Churchill back to England. Your constant concern is for the little nation, the poor people, the Muslim nations over the Colonial West. If you achieve your goal of leveling America and the world, you’ll destroy both and civilization of all will suffer. But that is for another time.”

The President gets up and strides to the door. He looks back as he leaves and says, “You can’t be right.”

The Advisor says, “Goodnight Mr.President,” to the sound of an automatic locking door.

He thought, that went well.

 

By the author of the Jack Brandon novels.   http://www.factsandfictions.com 

The author has 27 years of Government  service, including two years serving President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s as an advisor. Considering today’s volatile political situation, you are encouraged to pass on this blog or parts of it to your contacts and friends. Comments and dialogue are welcome and helpful.

  • Meeting with President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Deputy National Security Adviser Frank Carlucci and General Colin Powell in the Oval Office.

Leave a comment

Filed under Alinsky, Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Israel, Obama, political solutions, Politics, Putin, Russia

Tagged as , , , , , , ,