Robert G. Yetman, Jr.

God, Guns, and Obama

Sometimes I wonder if Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are in a contest to see who wants mainstream America’s vote the least.

Before I opined about them, I wanted to give Obama’s recent “elitist” comments (which is how they’ve come to be characterized) a chance to sink in, to see if they made any latent sense to me whatsoever.

All that happened as a result of my additional reflection is that I’m more convinced than ever that Senator Obama is completely unworthy of being elected President of the United States.

The comments at issue are significant for the Obama campaign, because they come on the heels of the publicity accorded his racist pastor, Jeremiah Wright; a 1-2 punch, of sorts.  For those who may have missed it, here are the comments at issue, which were noted while Obama was speaking to a room full of really rich donors in that bastion of Norman Rockwell Americana, San Francisco:

“You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them.  And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.  And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

Vile liberals can spin this stuff anyway they choose – it reads only one way to anyone with eyes, a functioning brain, and a semblance of objectivity: Mainstream citizens who heartily embrace traditional American values are ignorant.

Well, I do more than “cling” to the aforementioned – I fully wrap myself in the cocoon woven by the Second Amendment, Christianity, and a nationalism that is rightly at odds with this country’s current position of lunacy with respect to stemming the flow of illegal invaders.  It is clear that Senator Obama was speaking about me, and I know that he was speaking about most of you, as well.

In the end, comments like these help to illustrate that latter-day Democrats are the ultimate hypocrites.  Democrat politicians are supposed to be those people who are especially in touch with the “common man,” who represent everything that evil, capitalistic Snidely Whiplash Republicans do not.  The challenge for this disingenuous slime is to carry on, holding their noses while pretending to like the common man, which they, of course, do not.  Obama clearly regards those referenced in his comments as peasant-folk he finds himself frustratingly unable to win over, and we get to see why: He simply doesn’t like regular people.  We are beneath him; we are, in his mind, as well as in the minds of those assembled with him that day in San Francisco, merely the “Great Unwashed.”

It was the architect of communism, Karl Marx, who famously declared that religion was the opiate of the masses.  To me, the words Obama spoke at that San Francisco fundraiser were another way of saying the same thing.  Granted, I cannot recall as easily if Marx and Obama are also kindred spirits when it comes to guns and nationalism, but given the strong leftist tendencies of each, it would hardly be taking much of a leap to assume so.  What we do know, fellow peasant, is that one of the leading candidates for the office of the presidency views religion and its strongest adherents in the same way as the world’s most famous communist…and while I’ve already been toting around bundles of reasons why I was not going to cast my vote for Obama, it never hurts to have another.

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Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com        

 

Parental Misguidance

As my parents aged, they would each periodically lament about how they felt that they would be leaving the world in worse shape than that in which they found it.  They were primarily referring to America, of course, and I’ve long known of what they were speaking.  As members of what is now referred to as our “greatest generation,” my folks embodied everything to which we point when we talk about what made this country terrific.  Sadly, there is no shortage of evidence that proves we are no longer the country we once were, in any way, shape, or form.  The most recent bit of proof to this effect came to light just a few days ago, and wouldn’t you know it was to be found in my own home state… Florida…home of everything, well, nuts.  Sadly, nothing that follows here will change that perception, to be sure.

You’ve no doubt heard about the beating administered by six high school girls on another in the relatively netherworld city of Lakeland, which sits between Orlando and Tampa.  The details of the entire story are not crystal clear, as yet, but one thing on which everyone seems to agree is that a 16-year-old girl named Victoria Lindsay was subject to a surprise attack and severe beating by six female classmates from Mulberry High School, while two associated males, ages 17 and 18, served as lookouts.  The beating, recorded with the alleged intention of posting the video on YouTube and other similar Internet outlets, lasted roughly 30 minutes, in sum total.  Ms. Lindsay reportedly suffered a concussion as a result of the attack, as well as numerous other injuries to her head and face.

While it’s easy to focus on the brutality of the assault, the aspect of this that remains the most concerning to me is that we see, once again, the apparent absence of any real parental authority or guidance in circumstances such as this.  Indeed, what we do seem to have in this case is some evidence that these parents are actually quite supportive of their daughters and sons – how nice.  To wit:

• Robert Schumaker, the father of lookout Stephen Schumaker, has accused Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd of showboating and generally blowing the whole thing out of proportion.
• Christina Garcia, the mother of suspect Mercades Nichols, has complained that the girls should not be charged as adults and that her daughter did not beat Lindsay (that said, she has, curiously, also offered some justification for the beating, citing some apparent negative/unflattering postings about the eventual suspects on MySpace by the victim – so which is it, Garcia? Is your daughter guilty of something, or isn’t she?).
• Charles Platt, a grandfather of suspect Brittni Hardcastle, has stated that his granddaughter has relayed a different version of events than that alleged by Lindsay.  

What stands out by their very absence are any statements from the parents that sound anything like, “My daughter (or son, in the case of the lookouts) did a horrible thing, and deserves whatever punishment the courts deem appropriate.  I can’t imagine what my child was thinking, but regardless, justice must be served.”  Have you heard or read anything like that?  I haven’t…nor do I expect to, sad to say.   

Look, these parents may actually have a point or two in their defensive pronouncements – perhaps Sheriff Judd is a bit of a showboat; perhaps the victim did do some “trash-talking” about these girls prior to the beating; and perhaps events did not play out exactly as Lindsay is alleging.  However, with all of that said, what overshadows each of those “objections” to the current story as we know it is that not one of these parents…or any others, to my knowledge…has publicly acknowledged anything even approximating remorse, regret, or shame for that which is plainly documented.  When any of these parents sees fit to open his or her mouth, it’s solely to make excuses, re-direct attention away from the suspects, or otherwise attempt to defend the indefensible. 

I’ll leave you with this: You can rest assured that had I done anything like this, it would have been my own parents who stuffed me in a car and drove me to the police station; and while they might have seen fit to bail me out after a few days of cooling my heels behind bars, you can be certain that life for me in my house from that point through the culmination of any trial (and beyond) would be far less pleasant than that endured in the local county lockup.  And therein lies the difference between our “greatest generation,” and that which is proving to be our sorriest.

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Robert G. Yetman, Jr.  Contributing Editor -  www.ChristianMoney.com

Charlton Heston, RIP

The death of Charlton Heston signals a lot more than the end of the man himself; it signals the end of an era.

Heston exhibited a grace and class that had a lot more in common with the Hollywood of yesteryear than the Hollywood of today.  Heston had long been out of place in the entertainment industry environment – married 64 years to his wife Lydia, he led a life characterized by decency, fidelity, and honor; once the hallmarks of greatness in people, they are now regarded as the enemies by today’s populace who so desperately want more examples…not fewer…of moral and ethical failings so that they may comfortably point to them in an effort to clear their own consciences.  Alas, Heston, for one, could not deliver to them what they seek.

Many of you might remember the illustrative clash of “new” Hollywood crassness versus “old” Hollywood style and decency that occurred on Heston’s doorstep.  Heston announced very movingly in 2002 that he had what his doctors believed was Alzheimer’s disease.  In January 2003, George Clooney, noted Tinseltown leftist, was receiving a special achievement award for filmmaking from the National Board of Review when he joked, “Charlton Heston announced again today that he is suffering from Alzheimer’s.”  When questioned about the remark by New York Newsday, Clooney said defiantly, “I don’t care.  Charlton Heston is the head of the National Rifle Association.  He deserves what anyone says about him.”

I remember thinking at the time that I wanted to punch Clooney dead in the face when he said that.  Actually, when reminded of it now, I am overwhelmed with the same feeling.  How completely classless, and yet, how perfectly the comment (and follow-up) demonstrated just how far we as a society, and our “heroes” in Hollywood, have fallen.

Clooney says he later apologized in writing to Heston, and received a cordial, positive response from Heston’s wife (no surprise there).  As for me, I’m not really a fan of apologies, and so I don’t accept his (while Heston was obviously the direct target of the comment, Clooney offended a lot of other people in the process, including me).  Apologies have long been those mechanisms to which public people turn only after they’ve been castigated for the thoughtless word or deed that engendered the need for the apology in the first place.  That Mr. Heston and his family saw fit to be generous enough with their forgiveness to be nice to George Clooney in the wake of his horrible remark just shows how much more evolved they are than Clooney…or me, for that matter.  Accordingly, let me say this: It’s nice to know that Clooney feels it’s OK that people who have committed the crime of standing firm in defense of the Second Amendment deserve what anyone says about them, because now I can, with clear conscience, say that those like Clooney, who stand against it, deserve what others say about them.  On that note, I hope Clooney, a filthy, anti-American, limousine-liberal, himself suffers a lingering, rotten, mind-stealing death.      

When Heston’s visage appears during the annual “In Memoriam” montage at next year’s Academy Awards telecast, it will be interesting to note if there is simply a smattering of applause that greets the image, rather than the thunder of hand-clapping that it richly deserves.  Despite all that he was as an actor and as a human being, I fear his sin…persisting in Hollywood as a conservative…will cause him to be enthusiastically dismissed by his acting brethren.  The values that Heston represented…everything that is good and decent…are spat upon, both literally and figuratively, by the Hollywood C-loonies with such ferocity and regularity that what remains is ugliness, and with the passing of Mr. Heston, Hollywood just became a little uglier still.  RIP.

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Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor -www.ChristianMoney.com

A Message for John McCain; a Message for You

Do you know the name Kevin Cosgrove?

Six and a half years ago, Kevin Cosgrove died.  On the day of his passing, Kevin…46 years old and in good health…rose from bed, kissed the family goodbye, and hurried off to work like so many Americans do each and every morning.  Kevin worked hard in his life, took his responsibilities seriously, and was rewarded with a good job – he was a vice president for insurance giant Aon Corporation.  Unfortunately for Kevin, and thousands of others, his work address on this day…the South Tower of the World Trade Center…was the target of what most consider to be the worst terrorist attack in the history of mankind. 

Kevin Cosgrove became individually famous on that horrible day for a 9-1-1 call he made while he and two co-workers were stranded on the 105^th floor of Tower Two.  The planes had struck, but these men were alive, and it seemed as though it would simply be a matter of time before they were eventually rescued.  Alas, it was not to be; although Cosgrove indeed survived the initial plane crashes, he could not escape the building before it fell.  Cosgrove’s telephone call lasted several minutes, and concludes with a bloodcurdling scream as Tower Two collapses underneath him.  There are several recorded versions of Cosgrove’s last minutes; I have included a link to one below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbOzSeu6sJA

If I am John McCain, and I really want to win in November, I would take clips like this and play them over and over again.  I would do everything I could to remind people about the horrors of 9/11, and then I would keep reminding them.  I would not stop.

Many would be quick to refer to such a tactic as exploitation, and would scream about it far and wide.  But when it comes time to walk into the privacy of the voting booth and cast that ballot, I know that many of those complainers will hear, in their mind’s ear, the screams of Kevin Cosgrove as he perished in what can only be considered an unimaginably terrifying death, and will cast their ballots as they should. 

It is precisely in this area where President Bush has made a huge mistake.  Defense against Muslim terrorists has been the Achilles’ heel of the Democrats, but this administration, quite inexplicably, has allowed the sense of urgency we should all feel about this issue to subside.  Although I was never in favor of an invasion of Iraq (based on what we appeared to know/not know at the time), I was always very much in favor of ruthlessly and relentlessly going after the terrorists, to include a strong incursion into Afghanistan.  While the Iraq war may no longer be an easy sell to many Americans, the specific war against terror is, and yet, curiously, we aren’t seeing much of an effort to remind Americans about the importance of the conflict.  If I was the president, I would do everything I could to rise above the debacle in Iraq and keep the American citizens’ focus on the constant dangers presented by Osama and his minions, to include endlessly showing the sights and sounds of what happened on September 11, 2001.  Speaking for myself, I can tell you that whenever I spend time revisiting news clips or 911 calls or anything related to what happened that day in New York City, I am filled with dread, with sadness, and with great anger.  It does not matter if I happen to be in a positively euphoric mood at the outset – once I begin reacquainting myself with the direct evidence of those horrors, I head right into a tailspin. 

The central problem is that too few of us are capable of recalling, at will, just what things felt like for us Americans on that day, and we have suffered for it.  Until the battle against Islamo-fascist terrorism is won, we should always endeavor to feel what we felt on that day, and allow our acute sadness and anger to play an enormous role in picking our leaders.      

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Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com                                                

It is Time to Move on from Obama

OK, folks; fun is fun, but now it’s time to get serious.  We’ve reached the point where, in this year’s pathetic Presidential Little League tryouts, we “cut” Senator Obama from further consideration so that we can go back to the business of at least pretending to judiciously select the next leader of the free world, and he can go back home to play with his racist buddies in the ‘hood.

The novelty has officially worn off.

The reality is that while neither Obama nor Clinton are deserving of a major party nomination, one will assuredly get it, and that is itself absurdly surreal.  Democrats seem to do this to themselves with great frequency - they are too quick to allow their party to be hijacked be leftists and other associated fringe idiots in such a way that their eventual presidential nominees usually end up to be considerably underwhelming people.  It’s like they can’t help themselves.  I fully expected that the first post-George W. Bush president was going to be a Democrat, and it still might, but the likelihood of that seems to be diminishing by the day.  Why?  Because the once-shipshape alternative (for Democrats) to Hillary is developing so many leaks that she’s going to shortly look like Old Ironsides by comparison.  Honestly, if Democrats can’t beat Bush after this abysmal presidency, they might as well disband the party and come up with something new.

The tiresome, too-consistent answer I receive when I challenge Obama supporters about their allegiance to him is that “anything’s better than what we’ve had.”  Really?  Is that really true?  I certainly understand frustration over the Bush administration, but when we say anything, do we really mean just that?

I asked an Obama-phile the other day to name one meaningful, significant contribution he’s made as a US senator, and you know what I received for a response?  “Well, what has Senator Clinton done?”  I howled with laughter.  In one motion, Democrats who respond in that fashion…and there are a lot of them…simultaneously shed light on both Obama’s and Clinton’s woeful dearth of qualifications; well done. 

Any regular reader knows how I feel about Clinton.  At the very least…and I mean very least…however, Clinton has had some presence on the national political scene for decades now.  I agree, and even heartily point out with great frequency, that said presence accounts for next-to-nothing….but come on, now; at least it’s not absolutely nothing.

Of course, I’m not voting for either, but the continuing emergence of Obama’s ethnocentric-socialist agenda is becoming more troubling by the day.  While just about every candidate moderates his position as general elections approach so as to limit the distaste felt by others to their historically left or right-leaning positions, Obama’s attempts at conciliation are looking to be in demand of a Herculean effort.  While most know by now that Obama’s biggest problem in this regard is that which is posed by his obviously racist and anti-American pastor, Jeremiah Wright, there are other issues, including many that lie within the realm of Obama’s long history of sympathies to staunchly leftist ideals.  Obama himself has admitted to attending socialist conferences, and there are even allegations, yet to be denied or even addressed by the senator, that the mentor to which he so cryptically refers in his book Dreams From My Father is a former member of the Communist Party USA, Franklin Marshall Davis.  Thus, in addition to his painfully brief resume as a weighty political presence, we have to deal with more and more evidence that suggests he is anything but a die-hard patriotic American. 

We’ve all heard it said that “anyone can grow up to be president.”  Of course, that sentiment has always meant to express the best sense of the notion, wherein this great country of ours, any appropriately qualified person can become President of the United States.  However, should Obama really succeed in his long, strange trip to the White House, that saying will, with great justification, be officially allowed to stand permanently corrected as “just anyone can become president,” and then God help us all.

Agree or disagree, click on comments below.

Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com

First Spouse – An Official Cabinet Position?

Hillary Clinton has been getting some unwanted attention as of late from those who feel she has been taking too much credit for perceived successes during her husband’s administration.  She has made claims of helping brought peace to Northern Ireland, negotiating open borders in Macedonia to allow refugees from Kosovo to flee, and standing up to the Chinese government on issues related to women’s rights, among others; oh, please… 

Actually, this is not much of a surprise.  It is probably the natural evolution of a temptation too great to resist from a former First Lady-turned-presidential candidate.  She was not, of course, an official cabinet member as First Lady, but having been First Lady for so long, one with political aspirations of her own, probably makes it easier to tell herself it’s OK to claim official decision-making experience that’s not rightfully hers.

I’ll let other people debate the veracity of her claims.  That’s not really what matters to me in this discussion; as it is, I’ve never granted her any respect or legitimacy as a politician, nor will I, even if the American people are collectively insane enough to vote her into office in November; accordingly, I don’t much care what she says at all.  No, the issue that matters the most to me, and one that surprisingly isn’t being discussed, is the proper role of a First Spouse when it comes to the work of the president. 

In any marital relationship, it is perfectly natural for husbands and wives to talk about what’s going on at their respective workplaces when they are at home together.  Fair enough.  That said, is there a line that should be respected which separates private in-home conversation about another spouse’s job from the expectation of spousal input in the actual workplace?  I’ve worked in many companies over the last 30 years, and will confess to wincing a bit when I hear things like, “I told my wife about what’s going on with so-and-so, and she thinks it would be a good idea if…,” or, “I mentioned what was going to my husband, and he can’t understand why we don’t just fire the client.  He said that in his company…”  It’s one thing when a suggestion is presented as an occasional and passing “Oh, by the way…” kind of comment, but quite another when the frequency and manner of the remarks demands that they be considered with much greater significance.  

I think it’s terrific when you can access a good idea.  I’ll take a good idea from just about anywhere.  That said, there’s a feeling of, “Hey, wait a minute…” that seems to creep in whenever you are hearing from a co-worker’s spouse so frequently you think he or she is on the payroll. 

The stakes, of course, are a lot higher when you’re speaking about the office of the Presidency of the United States.  If a highly-qualified politician successfully ascends to that office, what role should an unelected spouse have in policymaking and decision-making?  Laura Bush seems like a very nice, bright person, but I don’t really want her to enjoy the same influence and regard on policymaking as a bona fide cabinet member when she and President Bush climb into bed each night or sit down to breakfast. 

The aforementioned stakes are even higher this time around, where we have the possibility of a former two-term president assuming the role of First Spouse.  Not only is Bill Clinton a former president, he is well known to us all now as someone who remains very interested in world politics.  What should his role be?  Will he view his role as an ex-president/First Gentleman as something that delivers to him the right to be an activist within his wife’s administration?  Will she ultimately prove to be little more than a president by proxy, with Bill effectively serving a Constitutionally-disallowed third term as president through his wife’s election? 

What of Cindy McCain?  The prospect of her becoming First Lady brings up an interesting twist to this discussion.  Cindy McCain previously suffered from an addiction to painkillers, stole the drugs she needed, and reportedly still suffers some lingering effects from the near-fatal stroke that hit her in 2004. If these unfortunate features were characteristic of an active presidential candidate, would he or she not be dismissed outright?  If that’s true, then how much weighty input should that same person have as a First Spouse? 

Look, it’s been tough enough to swallow the lousy presidents we’ve had for some time now with the knowledge that they are, at least, the actual intended officeholders.  What we don’t need are First Spouses being accorded any sort of legitimacy as cabinet members, policy makers, or official decision makers in a president’s administration.  When I hear Hillary Clinton’s claims of “moving and shaking” in her husband’s administration, I concern myself not with how precisely accurate each statement is, but rather with the basic idea that it’s highly inappropriate for her to have an involvement at that level, anyway.  

What do you think?  Should the First Spouse be “seen and not heard” when it comes to the president’s most serious and official responsibilities, or do you think that the title of First Lady or First Gentleman affords the bearer the right to play an intrinsic part in the machinations of world politics as a representative of the administration?  Register your comments below.

Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com              

William F. Buckley, Jr. - RIP

In the world of conservative thought, William F. Buckley, Jr. was like that girl after whom all who follow never seem to quite measure up.  Buckley, the architect of modern conservative thinking in America, died last week, and my feeling has long been that once you finished reading anything written by him, you’ve sort of been ruined for anyone who may follow.  He was, for me, one of a select few who do what it is they do in so mesmerizing a fashion that it is impossible to like them in any less than the most complete way.  I’ve often said about actor Anthony Hopkins that I would be OK with spending two hours watching him do nothing but sleep on film, such is my admiration for his skills; in very much the same way, Buckley’s intellect and command of the wonderful and rich English language were such that I might have been tempted to read a grocery list if I’d known it to be his work.

Buckley always struck most around him as a bit of a privileged snob; indeed, he would likely agree with that characterization, to some extent, but there were differences from others in that regard.  Both during and following his college years, he enlisted in the US Army and went to Office Candidate School, becoming a lieutenant, and also spent time in the CIA.  Additionally, he was not in any way above thrashing about, as appropriate: In what may be regarded as his most famous debate, that contra Gore Vidal at the 1968 Democratic National Convention (actually a series of fairly brief debates spread out over four nights), Buckley lashed back at Vidal’s reference to him as a “pro-crypto-Nazi” by testily responding, “Now listen, you queer, stop calling me a crypto-Nazi or I’ll sock you in the goddamn face and you’ll stay plastered.” 

How can you not pine away for the days before sanitized, politically correct television…?     

Speaking of television, in my childhood home, the watching of it as a pastime was frowned upon.  We had one TV in the house when I was a boy, which meant that when television could be watched, I was invariably viewing the preferred selections of my parents.  One of those few, acceptable offerings from the “boob tube” was Buckley’s Firing Line, which ran for 33 years and became the longest-running program with a single host.  His Firing Line conversations, often debates, with such giants of American history like John Kenneth Galbraith, Benjamin Spock, and Ronald Reagan (to name just a ridiculously small sampling) were weekly love songs to the realm of intellectual discourse.

Buckley’s brand of commentary was always disinclined toward the lowbrow and the base, and that’s one of the things that made him so great.  Oh, sure, he could get angry, as he did in the above-referenced “moment of passion” with Vidal, but that’s not the same as being grotesque or boorish as a matter of course; his intellect, his humor, and his sesquipedalian tendencies (I couldn’t resist – this is, after all, a column about William Buckley) would never allow for such.  My grandmother used to say that profanity was a strong way of expressing a weak mind, and if we were to create a measuring stick from that idea, we’d be left with no conclusion about Mr. Buckley other than that his was the strongest mind of all.

There are those people about whom it is said that the world is just a bit more diminished with their passing.  So it is with William F. Buckley, Jr., who, in addition to all for which he is publicly known, was one who lived it as he spoke it; there was never even a hint of scandal that ever arose around the man, and when you consider how many throughout American politics and media surely salivated at the thought of Buckley falling to his knees in the face of some sort of impropriety, that none was even whispered about by anyone speaks volumes.  Buckley, American conservatism's best friend and greatest tactician, who was also the finest of men in his personal existence, has permanently ridden off into the sunset, which means that the sunlight in all the days that follow will be just a bit dimmer.  RIP.

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Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com

Duke Lacrosse Hits Back

38 unindicted players on the now-infamous 2006 Duke University lacrosse team are suing the university, and I am thrilled.  In announcing the suit, lead attorney Chuck Cooper said that the “lawsuit is born out of Duke and Durham’s sustained wrongdoing and callous conduct against the players.”  That’s putting it mildly, which is, I suppose, how things have to be put when you’re an attorney announcing a lawsuit against a university like Duke.  More appropriate wording might be to say that the lawsuit is born out of Duke and Durham’s ignorant, stupid, and dangerous enabling, and even prosecution, of radical leftist thought against young men who were guilty of nothing more than being white males.  Alas, I didn’t get to draw up the paperwork…

The three young men who were indicted are suing the despicable former prosecutor Mike Nifong, the city of Durham, and the police detectives who were involved in the case.  To that end, all decent people can only hope that Nifong, the detectives, and Durham city employees are all driven into homelessness as a result of that litigation.  The young men and their families apparently reached a settlement with the university last year, but it clearly was not for enough money; had it been, the school would be in receivership right now.

Actually, my target in this piece is not Mike Nifong, who, if he had done to my son what he did to Dave Evans, Collin Finnerty, and Reade Seligmann, would have a lot more to worry about than disbarment or declaring bankruptcy, nor is it the accusers, who are barely worthy of discussion at all.  Instead, it is Duke University and a culture of liberalism and insane political correctness that has been allowed, for far too long, to take root and flourish in vile ways at Duke and at campuses all across the country.

Put simply, Duke University…the administrators, the teaching staff…should be made to pay as much as possible for their recklessness, as well as made to serve as an example of what can and should happen when campus liberalism and politically-correct zealotry is allowed to become dangerous to the young people who attend school.   

When I was a young man in pursuit of my BA degree, I split my time between two universities.  My first two years were spent at Boston University, and my second two years were spent at Stetson University.  At both schools I had teachers who exhibited some overt expressions of personal liberal thought in the classroom, but in neither case was it anything I couldn’t block out with relative ease.  In no case were the expressions of such magnitude that the moments of leftist ideological expression trumped the inherent value of the subjects being taught.  Upon reflection, I now realize I was lucky; for too long, America’s children have had instructor-espoused radical liberal thought crammed down their throats, and it is frequently at such a volume that it becomes impossible to divorce such messages from the legitimate classroom instruction on which they’re piggybacked. 

Campuses will always be replete with irresponsible loudmouths like Karla Holloway and Houston Baker, two of the faculty members (Baker is now at Vanderbilt) who signed the now-famous “ad” in the Duke Chronicle that, for all intents and purposes, encouraged the lynching (figuratively, at least) of the lacrosse team before the investigation, such as it was, had barely begun.  It is, therefore, incumbent upon the universities…including the trustees, who, at Duke, seemed to be shamefully absent throughout all of this…to maintain order and ensure that a semblance of common sense permeates their campuses.

College has always been the home of an often-confusing juxtaposition of personal life stages – it is the quintessential middle ground in which young people leave home as kids, spend some time as both kids and adults, and emerge simply as adults.  The lines that divide each of those changing maturity stages are impossible to discern precisely, so it’s not out of the realm of expectation that young people who are more kids than adults should find themselves dealing at times with situations normally reserved for the exclusively-adult world.  That said, under what circumstances should our college-attending kids justifiably find themselves to be the targets of mob justice orchestrated and supported by the very faculty and staff that students expect to regard as mentors and sources of guidance at their home away from home? 

Responding to the suit filed by the unindicted players, Pamela Bernard, Duke’s vice president and general counsel, said that “we have not yet seen the lawsuit, but if these plaintiffs have a complaint, it is with Mr. Nifong.  Their legal strategy – attacking Duke – is misdirected and without merit.”  Wrong, Ms. Bernard.  While it may be fair to say that all of the players…especially the three indicted…have a highly-legitimate claim against Mr. Nifong, the behavior displayed by the university at its own behest…which included canceling the team’s season and doing nothing while the team members were openly abused and harassed…was way out of bounds and entirely its own responsibility.

To the wronged members of the Duke lacrosse team, I say, “Go for it.”  Go get ‘em; get every last person who even indirectly allowed the events related to this mess to occur (I haven’t heard about any suits filed against any of the 88 faculty members who signed the aforementioned open letter, but any such considered suits enjoy my heartiest endorsement).  Please excise as many pounds of flesh as you can…and maybe, just maybe…other schools and their associated communities will be much less inclined to stand by idly when the forces of campus idiocy conspire to compel dangerous behavior against students, particularly students who are guilty of nothing besides being born a race and gender that, at least for now, seems incapable of receiving even a modicum of acceptance from the liberal intelligentsia.

Agree or disagree, click on comments below.

Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com

Blacks, Women, and the Presidency

Not terribly long ago I wrote a column about the dishonesty of liberals who, when making lists of the black presidential candidates that existed B.O. (Before Obama – and isn’t that an appropriate pair of initials?), would very obviously fail to name Alan Keyes.  The reason for this “oversight,” I said, is that the primary determinant of blackness in American politics remains ideology, and not skin color: The more liberal you are, the blacker you can claim to be (to be fair, the standard seems to be applied in a somewhat colorblind fashion, as Bill Clinton was deemed to be America’s first black president, nominated as such by afro-centrist author Toni Morrison and seconded by the Congressional Black Caucus).  On the other hand, if you are at all conservative, not only are you not black, you are, in fact, white…regardless of skin pigment; hence the unmentionability of Dr. Keyes, noted conservative and former African-American.

The same is true when it comes to the matter of gender.  If you find yourself to be a “valued” or “respected” woman in politics, the significant likelihood is that you are a liberal.  This is, again, because liberal values are to be valued and respected, while conservative values are to be spat upon.   

Like many conservative columnists, I’ve been accused of being a racist, bigot, homophobe, Nazi, hatemonger, extremist, etc.  The list of names goes on and on, and frankly, I love it.  The bottom line as a conservative is that you know you’re making sense and striking chords that need to be pounded when you are branded as any of the aforementioned.  That said, let’s get one thing straight:

I have never had a problem with someone other than a white male serving as president, nor does any true conservative that I know and respect.

I honestly don’t care what gender and/or race may characterize a candidate.  To make such elements a material factor in the decision-making process is to be a moron.  What I do care about…a LOT…is both the ideas and values that candidates espouse currently, as well as those they have espoused (and lived) historically.  They shall always serve as the only relevant components to all of this. 

An acquaintance of mine once accused me of being the "type" who would never vote for a woman.  I asked why she said that.  She responded by spewing out an absurd list of female politicians, who, she claimed, would never get my vote.  I fired back, “Well, of course they would never get my vote…they are stark-raving lunatic socialists!”  And therein rests the point.  Don’t use as the litmus test for any perceived candidate gender biases my unwillingness to vote for Hillary Clinton, or expect my disdain for Senator Obama to serve as proof that I would “never” vote for a black presidential candidate.  There are several noted American conservatives who happen to be something other than white males, and if any of them was engaged in the process as a serious candidate, I would be a most enthusiastic voter this year.  Sadly, Dr. Keyes’ candidacy is little more than blip on the radar screen this time around, and Jeane Kirkpatrick, the former Reagan cabinet member and intellectual extraordinaire, who remained a virulent anti-communist to the end of her life and who, incidentally, pondered running for the presidency in 1988, is no longer with us.  If there was a magical way to pair them and run them together, I would be privileged to both vote for a ticket that registers higher on the all-important diversity scale than anything the Democrats have heretofore assembled, and also watch with glee as liberals persist in a state of misery that one can only hope would drive them to suicide.

Agree or disagree, click on comments below.

Robert G. Yetman, Jr. - Contributing Editor www.ChristianMoney.com 

A Thankless Fight for the Children

America continues to demonstrate that in the battle for the soul of its nation, good still has a long way to go to overcome evil.  There are, of course, countless pieces of evidence to this effect, but few more disturbing than the alarming rates at which children are being harmed by their own parents.  It turns out that children under the age of 5 are more likely to be murdered by their parents than by anyone else.  If it seems as though you’re hearing about this ugliness more and more, you are; the rates are epidemic.  Just this week, my local paper ran the story of another baby who perished at the hands of a father.

There are, I believe, some very understandable reasons as to why these atrocities continue to grow in number and severity.  In short, we have cultivated for ourselves a society that is simultaneously and symbiotically selfish, impatient, and devaluing of human life.  I could go on about that aspect of this crisis, and perhaps I will in another column, but the simple, immutable truth is that we’ve found it very easy to seriously injure and kill our own children.  That said, the disturbing rise in violence toward children has shined a brighter spotlight on to the multitude of child welfare agencies in every state that are charged with the responsibility for doing what they can to keep the little ones safe from the negligence (or much worse) of the adults around them.  Workers in these agencies always find themselves under intense scrutiny whenever it is learned that parents with whom they’ve been dealing on behalf of a child endangerment case proved ultimately to be their offspring’s executioners.  The story I mentioned above was less about the fact that a dad had allegedly murdered his daughter, and more about the fact that county child welfare investigators had known about problems in this household for some time; in other words, the article seemed to be pointing blame at said investigators.  Invariably, the discussion of whether child welfare investigators were “doing their jobs” always comes up in cases like the aforementioned, and I hate it, because it focuses on the wrong thing.  Sadly, it is the very existences of child welfare agencies that prove to be the albatrosses around their necks; in the same way that cops become scapegoats when crime rates soar, these folks are held as the responsible party by the misguided when a child is harmed by an abusive parent.       

The reality is that the good people who toil away at protecting kids have a horribly thankless job – they are overworked, underpaid, and perpetually open to the worst kind of criticism, that which stems from being judged with the use of hindsight to which they were not privy when forced to make their difficult decisions.  To boot, the stakes for these folks are painfully high – do you make the unpopular and devastating decision to remove a child from his parents when an environment appears that it may be unsafe, or do you allow him to stay with his parents in that same apparently-unsafe environment?  We all know that we can’t confirm that horrible things will happen until they actually do, but then it’s too late; how do you walk that line? 

Even sensible libertarians agree that government regulation has its place in society.  It cannot and should not, however, keep up with all of the stupid things that people do to themselves (or their children), and, despite its best efforts it will fail a lot – accept it.  We will never be able to hire enough child protection investigators to keep up with all of the dunderheads running around having babies – it’s much too tough to do the former (given the required qualifications, constraints, and demands), and way too easy to do the latter.  When I examined my local county’s employment website to see if they were hiring child protection investigators, I learned not only that they are, but that the ad will not “close” – in other words, they plan to try to hire them now and forever.  No surprise there. 

I’m glad there are people within these agencies working on behalf of the wee people, and of course I believe that they should be subject to regular and ongoing performance evaluations, especially given the great responsibilities they must bear.  In the end, however, let’s all be intellectually honest enough to admit that when a parent injures or kills a child, the only real responsible party is the vile subhuman who actually commits the deed.

Agree or disagree; please leave your comments below.

Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Contributing Editor - www.ChristianMoney.com