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Obama Term 2: A Cascade Of Consequences

The post-election dominoes are starting to fall.  The nation made choices writ large this November 6 that are the culmination of decisions it has been making on a smaller scale for the last forty years.  What began as small rivulets of erosion in the moral and structural fabric of American society has ultimately become a raging river of change that is marring and reshaping the entire landscape.  Like any deluge, this one is tearing loose and carrying away things that used to be firmly anchored and dependable. 

Among the flotsam collecting in the eddies of this flood can be found the tattered remnants of Constitutional conservatism, Judeo-Christian morality, American exceptionalism, and the tangled, lifeless remains of self-restraint.  Our nation has spoken loud and proud, and the vote is “Me and Mine “.  Any thoughts to the future consequences of contemporary self over-indulgence have been banished, as though they will never materialize.  Considering how the decisions of the last forty years have deposited us literally on a precipice over which we are about to plunge, this full-throttled denial is inscrutable. 

Small wonder that some states are now legalizing recreational narcotics – we have been on a profligacy  high for generations.  Why should a few herbal pharmaceuticals not be invited to the party? 

Back to the aforementioned dominoes.  The reality that ObamaCare will not be repealed is resulting in large layoffs, as employers around the country make necessary cost reductions in order to pay for the plan.  More people will be applying for jobless benefits going forward, making further tax increases mandatory to cover those benefit costs.  Employers who face rising costs of doing business will not be hiring or expanding their operations in such an economy, prolonging the problem.  Hardest-hit by big layoffs this week are battleground states Ohio and Pennsylvania, who both went for Obama.  The irony is stark.

When unemployment increases, so do home foreclosures.  The housing market has been on life-support for almost a decade.  Although the Obama campaign touted “an improving housing market” in their ads, that domino is about to fall as well.  A fresh wave of foreclosures will eradicate whatever miniscule uptick may have been occurring. 

Wall Street will react unfavorably to a failing housing market.  The Street is already in retreat as investors dump their holdings to avoid the administration’s new round of capital gains taxes.   Without influxes of cash, the Market is likely to be bearish for a long time, impacting retirees and the AARP crowd (which supported a second Obama term).   

The current administration’s “policy” to try and borrow our way out of debt, cater to unsustainable entitlement programs, increase taxation on the entire populace while at the same time rewarding ever more non-producers can only lead to national bankruptcy.  The end of this financial trail is a cliff, and our only option is either to step back from the edge or plunge over into oblivion.  Just ask the Greeks, who are finding out the hard way that rioting against austerity measures produces neither jobs nor paychecks. 

American exceptionalism is another domino to fall.  This is the idea that we are unique among the nations of the world.  The concept springs from the founding ideal that all men are created equal by their Creator (higher authority), and endowed with certain inalienable rights.  Our government derives its power from the people, and not the other way around. 

This unique design restrains the powers of our government from following the same spiral of abuse that all preceding ones have.  The vulnerability of this system is its utter dependence upon the people maintaining their individual and collective duty to remain vigilant against such abuses.  It also depends on the tacit acknowledgment that there is a higher authority, which many Americans are loathe to do. 

When they abdicate their responsibilities as citizens in favor of some type of preferential treatment or benefit, they not only empower the government beyond its rightful scope but betray their fellow citizens in the process.  We have arrived at that point, by majority vote.

Our heritage of Judeo-Christian morality has nearly been washed away by the deluge.  Whether “progressives” like it or not, it’s historically factual that our founders were men of strong character forged in the furnace of rigorous Judeo-Christian tradition.  Revisionists have hijacked the public education system to erase as much of this truth as possible, and now we have at least two generations of ignorant voters who have no idea how we got where we are. 

Without such a crucial roadmap, how can they then be good stewards of their own system of government?  Our philosophical pillars have been severed from the contemporary conscience, so citizens are left to their own random instincts on how to choose leaders and whom to empower.  This domino tumbles the next one, which is deciding what policies will become law and why.  Is it any wonder that this cacophony of randomness has produced so many bad laws and legal conundrums?  In abandoning our national heritage, we have no cohesive vision of who we are or what we want to accomplish anymore. 

That scenario topples the last domino holding us together at all – our Constitution and Bill of Rights.  These two documents cement our identity, bind our loyalty, and secure our collective freedoms.  They have withstood assault from all quarters of our society since the day they were ratified.  The inherent wisdom that went into their conception has been proven over time.  Yet, even these cannot long endure the current situation, as their new caretakers are the very ones threatening a palace coup.

Even a little kid can figure out beforehand what happens next when you tip the first domino in a standing series.  How do so many Americans fail to see it?

Image: Cornischong at lb.wikipedia; Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 1.0 Generic license.

Nathan Clark

Nathan Clark is a conservative commentator who resides with his wife in New Hampshire. He is passionate about preserving the vision of our nation's Founders and advancing those tried and true principles deep into America's future. His interests range broadly from flyfishing, cooking and shooting to pro sports, gardening, live music and fine-scale modeling.

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