Hubris

Hubris. Get to know that word. It's going to be a popular one in a few years for describing the Democrat party.

For several years, the Democrat party was in opposition. Republicans either held the legislative houses or the Presidency. However, the Democrat party has not been in opposition since 2006 and now are control both the executive and the legislative branch. The problem is that for the past few years they have continued to act as an opposition party, even after they gained Congress. Their main theme was not active government and leadership, but opposition. The 110th Congress was widely recognized for its inactivity, especially in the face of some dramatic difficulties in America. Yet their problems were always pinned on the Republican party, not the actual problems themselves. If only the Republicans weren't in the way, they could make things better. They should have been more careful about what they wished for.

The Democrats are now exceedingly in control and they must perform. There are no more excuses. However, they have not been acting as a governing party or practicing good governance. They are unschooled in the discipline of power. This is not the first time this has happened in politics. In 1979, Joe Clark and the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada rose quickly to power and gained control of the government for the first time in many years. Once in power, their actions were undisciplined and too drastic (slogan was "Short term pain for long term gain") and by 1980 were booted out and power firmly returned to the Liberal party for another four years. They were simply unprepared to actually govern as they were only prepared to oppose.

Today, in the Washington Post Eugene Robinson wrote about the backwardness of the Republican Party. He wrote,

"What I've been hearing from Republicans in both the House and Senate has been a kind of attenuated, distorted echo of the economic doctrine that the party has preached, if not always practiced, since the Reagan years. It's perfectly appropriate, of course, to ask whether a specific spending proposal would have the desired stimulative effect; indeed, some items were removed from the stimulus bill for that reason. But underlying the Republican criticism has been a familiar formula: more tax cuts, fewer spending initiatives.

But Americans know that this philosophy has already taken us as far as it could. Americans know that taxes can be cut by only so much before the federal government's effectiveness inevitably suffers."

He eventually concluded, "There is abundant evidence suggesting that we are in a new political era with new rules and a new lexicon." This is going to be the downfall of the Democrats.

Democrats have mistakenly identified their electoral victory as an absolute triumph of their ideas. They are not just the ones in power, they are morally, intellectually, and politically right. Republican ideas and criticisms are not to be heeded because they are from an entirely alien era.

In a January 17 article in the Washington Post, Peter Beinart wrote about how President Bush had been right about the surge and the Democrats needed to accept and acknowledge that for their own sakes. He wrote,

"Because Bush has been such an unusually bad president, an entire generation of Democrats now takes it for granted that on the big questions, the right is always wrong. Older liberals remember the Persian Gulf War, which most congressional Democrats opposed and most congressional Republicans supported -- and the Republicans were proven right. They also remember the welfare reform debate of the mid-1990s, when prominent liberals predicted disaster, and disaster didn't happen.
Younger liberals, by contrast, have had no such chastening experiences. Watching the Bush administration flit from disaster to disaster, they have grown increasingly dismissive of conservatives in the process. They consume partisan media, where Republican malevolence is taken for granted. They laugh along with the "Colbert Report," the whole premise of which is that conservatives are bombastic, chauvinistic and dumb. They have never had the ideologically humbling experience of watching the people whose politics they loathe be proven right."

Democrats are mistaking popularity for moral rectitude. This hubris will lead them into trouble. They will be lucky if it doesn't take them down by 2012. Beyond that, the response will be decisive. Lets just hope their irresponsibility doesn't cost us all.

For your further contemplation, I'll add yet another block quote.
“It is just like the case of a man who learns by heart the angers and desires of a great, strong beast he is rearing, how it should be approached and how taken hold of, when – and as a result of what – it becomes most difficult or most gentle, and, particularly, under what conditions it is accustomed to utter its several sounds, and, in turn, what sort of sounds uttered by another make it tame and angry….Knowing nothing in truth about which of these convictions and desires is noble, or base, or good, or evil, or just, or unjust, he applies all these names following the great animal’s opinions – calling what delights it good and what vexes it bad. He has no argument about them but calls the necessary just and noble, neither having seen nor being able to show someone else how much the nature of the necessary and the good really differ….So, does this man seem any different from the man who believes it is wisdom to have figured out the anger and pleasures – whether in painting, music, or, particularly, in politics – of the multifarious many who assemble?” Plato, Republic

A Change in the Wind

On Wednesday I felt a slight change in the wind. It was almost as if something deep within the earth's crust was shifting, but I noticed it. On Wednesday, the $819 billion stimulus was passed, but no Republicans voted for it. On Wednesday, the Republican party stood for principle again and stood up to the political-media establishment that does not want questions asked of their actions. This is the beginning of change to come.

This bill was a mistake and House Republicans had the wisdom to see it and the guts to stand against it. A stimulus plan is not a bad idea. THIS stimulus plan IS a bad idea. The way it is constructed and inspired is like an accumulation of pork barrel spending. Furthermore, there is no way that the government can retain any measure of satisfactory oversight on the spending. The government is not capable of spending money economically. It can only spend politically, meaning supporting some and freezing out others for political gain.

With debate, study, and discipline this bill could have been trimmed to a suitable size and a perhaps become more suitably targeted. However, the conduct of this bill has been highly polemicized by both the Democratic party and the media. The recovery of our nation's economy could have been a point of unification and a combined effort to carefully plan our steps forward. Instead, it has been turned into panic. The Democrats and the media have not stopped to question the bill, only to incite fear of it not passing. They worked up a scare and then demonized anyone who questioned them. This is not political leadership; this is mobocracy.

I think when 2012 comes around, Republicans will point back to this as one of their defining moments. They stood up against the scare tactics; they stood up against the demonization; they stood up against the establishment. Three years hence, this bill will be considered a mistake and will become an embarrassment to the Democrat party. The Republicans did the right thing and the American people will recognize that.

Back Where I Come From

Tomorrow morning I'm flying home. I'm not flying to my parents house, to my hometown, or my old place. I'm flying HOME. If there is one thing that I learned out here, and I suspect I will learn anywhere I go, I've learned that I know where my home is and who makes it home. I can't say I will always stay there and I probably won't, but wherever I go I know that there is one place where my heart is at rest.

Yet, I am torn. Basically, I love my home. I love my community. I love my friends. Most of all, I love my family. Can I ever leave these behind?

Coming up to my DC trip I was preparing myself, although half-heartedly, to be "home-less" and prepared to go wherever the wind would take me. Essentially, I was trying to keep myself personally and emotionally uprooted in order to move more easily. But it wasn't true. I am not homeless. Lynden will always be home and where my heart rests peacefully.

But it is not yet my time to rest in peace. My life is still before me and the more I see, learn, and develop here, the more I know that I must face and engage the world. I feel the responsibility of knowing. I wanted to look, but once I've seen I cannot go back. God gives us sight so that we may go and do. This is not my statement of intention to save the world or declaration of having figured it all out, but it is my acceptance of responsibility for what God gave me.

The more I learn, the more I realize I don't know. The more I know (as a verb, not a collection of truths), the more I must give of myself. I wished to know the world, but did not realize the cost. Knowing is not about static facts, but dynamic relationship. Relationship can only be and grow as each entity gives of itself. I wished to know the world from my tower and retreat from its harshness into the loving folds of northwest Washington life. I fear that I sacrificed this peace for the pursuit of my passions.

I cannot say that I fell into these pursuits or that they are bad. It has been the call of God. I do not mean the call of God as we popularly hope for and envision. There were no moments of revelations, "signs," or wet fleeces. Instead, I found the call of God written on my heart, as it is in everyone's. God created man in His image and so inscribed His heart upon all the hearts of men that in knowing our own hearts and the hearts of others we may know God more. Thus have I been drawn into the learning of the ways of the world in power and institutions, how they move and influence human life, and how God is revealed or denied in them.

The pursuit of our passions is hardly a happy occasion. When God reveals His interests and passions in ourselves and others, He will also then reveal His great sorrows. He opens our eyes not to the pain of others, but primarily to His pains, if we will see them honestly. There is so much that is broken in this world. You can imagine the pain of a potter discovering the shards of his pottery on the ground. The scariest and most sorrowful part is that these pains will continue. The world groans in the pains of childbirth and God mourns the pain as it does not end. We must accept that there are deep sorrows about the world that will always be present and to care about them is to ever be sorrowful along with our Master. It is only out of true sorrow that joy can come.

Joy is a tragic love that never reaches its peaceful consummation of its love, but remains love triumphant. To love something not in spite of its ugliness, but in its whole brokenness is true joy. Only that can withstand the greatest powers this world can muster. It is not sweet; it is not pleasant; it is not easy. It is love and it is joy.

Suffice to say, the realization of our passions and the joy of God is the realization of great sorrows and the sacrifice of ourselves to the healing of these sorrows. This is where I am often finding myself these days, especially now as I review the beauty and peace of my home. I have found something beautiful to which I want to retreat and in which to hide myself and be at peace. Yet, I feel and I fear that I have already given myself away. I cannot hide away. I have seen and felt the passions God placed in me and seen and felt them in who He is. Therefore, I must live as my Master shows love in Christ. I must sacrifice my right to my peace if I am to love God.

Who knows where this may take me and how much or how little I will do by the world's standards, but I do know I cannot retreat; I cannot hide. I must heed the sign of Jonah. Contrary to what I thought earlier in this DC adventure with the "home-less" idea I do not have to stop loving my home and uproot that part of my heart. I must keep loving it as God loves it.

But I must learn to willfully deny myself the consummation of that love much the way Christ surrendered His place in heaven and connection to God to become a sacrifice for world. Not because the world was where He wanted to be, but because He loved His Father so much and His Father so loved the world. This is not to put me on par with Jesus or Lynden on par with heaven, but it is an expression of a desire to follow Christ more and more deeply. It's not very pretty, but it is beautiful. It's not very happy, but it is love.

I am torn, but in the tearing my life is being made whole. I'm flying home, but after that, who knows?

(Picture by Caitlin Honcoop. I included this picture because it focused in on something along the wayside that is usually passed by in light of more grand impressions. When the focus is placed on this thing, it shows the struggle and the beauty of life. In the harshest of places and bitterest of struggles, a rock at the alpine level, life springs forth and grows into something beautiful. It reflected some of the themes I was grasping at in my writing. Good pic, Cait.)

Antietam and Harper's Ferry

My roommate Ben escorted myself and the ASP program intern Abigail around Western Maryland on Saturday. The main features we visited were Antietam and Harper's Ferry.

Antietam, as in Civil War Battle of Antietam, was a large area, which is now preserved as a park. It was used for the movie Gods and Generals for good reason, because A. it was the actual site of the battle they filmed and B. it's very old and very beautiful. It is not extravagant or colorful, but instead sprawls in wizened grayness across the landscape this time of year. Old-style fences wind and cross all over. Monuments and plaques mark the many placements of regiments, divisions, and commanders. In places, a farm or a church still stand from that time.

We were all impressed by the size of the area. The battle clearly took place over a wide area and it was interesting to catch glimpses of what it must have been like here and there.

We swung through Boonsboro and Sharpsburg as well, both very small but very old towns. Ben took us through his town, Hagerstown, and past his church which was founded in 1770. The town was founded in 1774. Crazy.

The other main highlight was Harper's Ferry. That was the place where John Brown and his followers raided the armory and prepared to arm a slave revolt, but were thwarted by the US military. The historic part of town is tiny and is perched on a point where the Potomac splits into two directions. The buildings cling to their rocky perch with weathered resistance. A beautiful little church stands out. I wish I had a picture of the view of this, but the only view is from a busy bridge.

We went to a Christmas vocal performance in the church and walked around the town a little before heading home.

The West Coast just does not have these kind of things at all. There is history seemingly in the air here. Some of the fields, hills, and houses watched a new world revolt in war and still seem unfazed by the shaking and shifting of the world. This is a very special place.

National Christmas Tree Lighting

We were privileged to attend the National Christmas Tree Lighting on its 85th anniversary. President George W. Bush and the First Lady Laura Bush were in attendance. Everything was very organized and ran very smoothly. The US Army Band was the main source of music and accompaniment for the evening. Along with them was the Enterprise High School Encores, a very talented and energetic performance choir.

The first performer was Jon Secada, a very good singer and Broadway performer. The next was Rissi Palmer who was pretty good. The real magic was Kaitlin Maher. She's four years old and she sings. She debuted on America's Got Talent and she's become very popular since. I am usually unimpressed by child performers and their blatant and cheesy sentimentalities. But Kaitlin Maher was just too cute. I was dumbstruck by just how cute she was. So sweet and just plain magic. She sang really well, but she was tiny and still can't say r's. We were freaking out and the whole crowd was like putty in her hands. Brilliant.

The next performers were called Step Afrika!, a step group that involves an almost hip-hop tap-dance in a group with a lot of flair, creativity, and precision. The next performer was Phil Vassar, I was pleased to learn. He's a favorite of mine and he did not disappoint. Lastly, Santa came out and sang with Rissi Palmer and Kaitlin Maher. Then he performed a special number called "Christmas in Texas," I believe. The President loved it. Throughout the musical numbers you could see him bobbing his head to the music and really getting into it. After that number all the performers came out and sang together.

Then the Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne introduced the President who gave a brief message. Then Laura Bush and the daughters of two US soldiers in Iraq pushed the button to turn on the lights. The President and First Lady proceeded out onto the stage for a brief sing-a-long and the final fanfare.

It was a really fun show, even without the presence of the President of the United States. So much fun. We had great seats. We had seats about 20 rows back from the stage almost right in the middle. Overall, it was a very fun and festive occasion.

New York, Part II

Continued from previous post...

Right at the end of Wall Street there is Trinity Church and I swung through that pretty, old church. The church yard was full of old graves listing dates as late as the early 1700s. They looked almost like props from a movie. Trinity Church was featured in the movie National Treasure.

Then I went back to Times Square to meet up with my travel companions to get tickets to a Broadway show. Each day a store/place(?) in the middle of Times Square has day-of, reduced-price tickets to lots of shows. So my roommate waited in line for over an hour while I visited the Charmin bathrooms.

Right in the middle of Times Square there are huge signs advertising Charmin public bathrooms. I went in the place just to go to the bathroom. I didn't realize that I had signed up for an experience. Inside, an escalator takes you up to a floor that is pumping a song about Charmin that constantly loops while the music video accompanying it plays on screens all around. The rooms are all painted and decorated for Charmin, with a little stage for anyone who wants to do the Charmin dance, little swings, other playground type things, and a mini-store all centered around Charmin toilet paper. Once there, you wait in a line to go into the actual bathrooms room. It was a three-sided room with about 20 individual bathrooms. A guy with a microphone was chatting up each person in line and entertaining everyone as attendants checked each bathroom for cleanliness and then held the door for each person. Inside mine, it was a nice luxurious ski lodge look that was clean and stocked with every type of Charmin toilet paper possible. Only New York.

That night we went to Shrek the musical. It was a fun show. Not the typical Broadway show, but very fun and colorful. The special effects were especially impressive. I wish I could go to a Broadway show every night. So much fun.

Saturday we got up and went to Tom's Restaurant from Seinfeld for breakfast. Then we headed to the south of Manhattan to catch a ferry out to the Statue of Liberty. The wait to go to the Statue was very long so we opted for the cruise instead. That took us around the harbor while giving a good close look at the Statue of Liberty. She is beautiful and I thank God that we can enshrine such virtues at our entrances. The cruise also provided another perspective on just how expansive the city is. What an unbelievable place.

The shuttle bus to the subway took us right past Ground Zero and the construction that is going on there. Our next stop was Chinatown and Little Italy. Chinatown was really busy and all kinds of sketchy. There were blocks of people selling watches, designer purses, scarves, sunglasses, pirated DVDs, and other illegal things to sell. There were a lot of sketchy characters and sketchy deals going on. We caught lunch at one of the hundreds of little Italian restaurants in Little Italy. Then we worked our way past the Asian lady selling designer purses out of a van with garbage bags over the windows on a side street, the people chasing some lady who supposedly had their money, the cops searching another person for something. I was nervous and glad that we finally got out of there.

After killing some time, we hustled back to Penn Station for our ride back. Getting back into DC was refreshing and would have been more so were I not so tired and hungry. Things were so quiet and peaceful. Beyond Union Station there was hardly a soul to be seen and it was beautiful. It was really neat how familiar and homey everything looked here. For the first time since August I did not feel like I was living in the big city.

New York is incredibly dense, intense, and expansive. The city actually never sleeps and I think it has a glandular condition. I was apprehensive going into the trip and many of my apprehensions proved true. New York is an exhausting and crazy place. There were times when my only concern was just getting through to Saturday. But once you are placed into that roiling sea of machines and humanity a funny thing happens - you learn how to swim. There were moments in the city when I felt like a kid the first time up on skis. "Look, Dad, I'm really doing it. I'm living in the big city." It was a challenging experience, but a broadening one.

Being the city also led me to consider those that grow up and live there. What would the world look like to me if I grew up there? Would I just accept that that is the way life is supposed to be? Would I ever see beyond the city limits? After being there for just a short time, I could easily tell who was a New York native and who was not. Something in their faces, the grim set of their mouths and the hard look of their eyes, set them apart. They are very helpful and friendly, but in a distant sort of way. They can go out of their way to help out a random tourist and not display any sort of warmth or any care in the doing. I think that they have learned to be guarded and the constant exposure to masses of people numbs them a bit to other people. They go out of their way to help people because they know that's how to survive in the City.

Being of a political bent, I also see how this can shape a person's political and societal values. Life in the City is a lot less free. Freedom as we know it in the country is not a reality for those in the City. Everything those in the City do, everything they see is part of the City structure. Life in the country is decidedly unstructured. Therefore, those in the country seek to gain and maintain their personal freedom, while those in the City are more concerned about building up and strengthening the structure that orders life. They are two different realities and without understanding the lifestyle of the other, one may never understand the other's politics or come to any agreement.

Laying my political musings aside, I have to say that I am very glad to be back in DC. I never thought it would feel so much like home, but after the tornado of New York it feels like I'm back in Kansas again. I wish I had a little dog, too. I also know now, more than ever, just how beautiful Lynden is -- the Last Homely Home.

New York

I returned last night at 11:30 pm from my Thanksgiving trip to New York City. I left DC on Wednesday morning and after a six and a half hour (normally five hour) drive my two friends and I arrived in New York.

First of all, I must say that if you want to appreciate Lynden, go to New York. I was apprehensive about the trip, having heard the warnings of my roommate who made the trip before and those New Yorkers I met that told me DC was a "small town." Thus, I came into the trip expecting intensity and busy-ness. New York does not disappoint.

From the minute we got off our bus, it was crazy. We disembarked at Penn Station and proceeded to the subway, or at least tried to. Being accustomed to the easy and streamlined DC metro system, we found the New York system to be more complicated and not as nice. It would have been confusing enough on our own, but we had to figure it out while navigating an ocean of humanity. There were masses of them everywhere and all on a desperate mission to get wherever they needed to go.

Finally, we managed to get on the subway in the right direction and then went through the process of checking into the hostel. The hostel is apparently the biggest in the world and is really pretty nice. Things were mostly clean and organized and they had a lot of special programs going on at the hostel or in connection with it. I was in an eight person room. The first night I went to bed with only one other person in the room and woke up with four others. Had similar experiences the other nights. The hostel was interesting, but not a problem.

Since it was not that late, we decided to go out and do some exploring, and so we got to see Times Square for the first time. Times Square is unbelievable. There are an unbelievable number of billboards, lights, and giant screens all flashing logos, products, and videos. It's really quite stunning and I guess I never thought about going there until I was in the middle of it. I wish I could paint a picture with words to describe the buzz and excitement of it all, but there are no words to describe it. It's a can of worms; it's Pandora's box with broken hinges; it's a circus without walls; it's a storm of lights and people. It's way too much. I understand now why so many movies and TV shows depict New York with the camera circling the person in the middle of it. It sums up the madness of the conglomeration of humanity that it New York.

After Times Square, we got on the subway thinking we were going somewhere else, but ended up at Grand Central Station. So we checked that out. Thinking we were near the Empire State building we walked around until we thought we found it, but then realized it was the Chrysler building when we went in. Then we went back to the hostel to get a good night's rest before getting up early for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Bright and early Thanksgiving Day we went to between 50 and 51st on Broadway and claimed our spot for the parade and then waited for two and half hours in just above freezing weather for the parade to start and arrive at us. Yes, it was worth it. I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to be in New York for Thanksgiving again, so I was glad I got to see it. It did not disappoint. I got to see a bunch of giant balloon characters, cool floats, marching bands, and several celebrities, some of whom I recognized (Miley Cyrus, Trace Adkins, Idina Menzel). I would need to watch the Disney channel to recognize some of them. I also got to see Santa, but it wasn't the same guy as on Miracle on 34th Street, so I don't think he was real. We were standing by the families of the first marching band, which was from South Dakota. Nice people. I couldn't believe I was right there watching it all float by. Me and about three and a half million other people. I wish I was kidding. Then we had to fight the crowds more. Later we realized that it would be that full all weekend.

Then we wandered off to try to find the Empire State building again. For some reason we thought it was on the 50 streets, so we wandered that way. The goal of the Empire State building eventually took the back seat as we found more and more to see on each block. You know how in most cities there will be maybe five or six blocks of cool, old, or really big buildings, then it peters out? New York isn't one of those cities. In comparison to everything I've seen before, New York seems to be the only real city. Again I am at a loss for words or pictures to communicate the size of the city. Block after block of soaring skyscrapers, interspersed with nice old buildings and the odd giant cathedral.

We passed the Rockefeller Center and the famous outdoor skating rink. It's not that big and it was full of people with a lineup of hundreds just waiting to get in. We moved on down 5th avenue and the famous shopping district there. Way out of our leagues. Went past Tiffany's and De Beers. Eventually we came to the end of it and realized we were at Central Park. So we walked into and around the park. It was amazing to seek how distinct the line between the park and the city was. There are massive skyscrapers on one side of the street and a quiet pond, trees, and winding paths on the other side. After wandering through there for a while, we learned that the Empire State building was on 34th Street, so we went that way.

On 34th street we walked past Macy's (THE Macy's, all nine stories of it), to finally get to the Empire State building. We had debated about when would be the best time to go up to the observation deck. During the day we could see more, but at night things would be all lit up. It just so happened that we chose the perfect time. We got up there while it was still light, but the sun was quickly fading and thereby got the best of both worlds because in the matter of about 20 minutes we got to see it in the light and the dark.

That has to be one of the most amazing sights in the world. New York city is huge, but you don't fully comprehend it until you see the vast expanse of it from above. It was the first time I had ever seen city as far as the eye can see in every direction. It was amazing and scary. You could actually imagine that you were actually on top of the world and it had all gathered at your feet. What a name mankind has made for itself with that building! It was a truly thrilling view.

Not having any Chinese checkers game to play, we went to a movie and went back to get to bed for another early morning for the two shoppers of the group who wished to dare Black Friday in New York. After I thought about it, I realized it couldn't be that much more crazy than what we were experiencing everywhere we went, all the time. Madness seems less mad when you're living in a madhouse.

We each went our own ways on Friday. I headed for the United Nations. I was immediately struck by the artwork within and without the UN. Right in front of the visitor's entrance there's a sculpture of a revolver with the barrel tied in a knot. Wow! Take that warmongers! The barrel was tied in a knot...so it couldn't shoot! If people everywhere could just see this art, then maybe finally we would all lay down our arms and have a worldwide hug. Thanks, Mr. Sculptor. You just blew my mind. Uh, I mean, you just respectfully and peacefully related with my mind.

Once I got there I realized I wasn't really all that thrilled about the UN. I didn't want to take the time to go on a tour of it, so I looked around the visitor center and bookstore, eventually deciding that the UN is built on a hyper-internationalist, anti-American, and pacifist sub-culture that seems distant from the real world. It has potential, but it has been made into the project of a certain group of people, not all people. I then planned to go to Wall St., but the subway I chose stopped at the Brooklyn Bridge. So I went out on the Brooklyn Bridge, which is cool by itself, but also offers amazing views of the city and the Statue of Liberty.

I finally made it to Wall St. and walked around the financial district a bit. Saw the New York Stock Exchange, Federal Hall (where George Washington took his oath of office), and the other impressive and important buildings there. I didn't see any of those "fat cats" walking around Wall Street with their golden parachutes strapped to their backs, but I'm sure they were inside taking money from Main Street, 'cause that's all they do. Grumble grumble fat cats mumble bail out grumble groan Main Steet Wall street ("Yes, I will have a side of sarcasm with my sarcasm, please."). I did see the NYPD walking around with partial riot gear and M4's. I just realized that it was probably because of the events in India. Hm.

To be continued...