When being criticized, you have several options. You can directly cite it and fight back, and refute the criticism till you have won the argument. Another is to have surrogates fight on your behalf and attempt to have the criticism refuted without personally engaging in a one-on-one battle. You can also deflect the criticism by attacking the credibility of the attacker. Another strategy is to let the person continue to speak because they're making an ass out of themselves, and wait till they are done to point out their mistakes. Lastly, you can choose to ignore it.
Former President Clinton never ignored criticism. To his credit, he ran all 8 years of his presidency as if he were in a perpetual, never-ending campaign. For all the criticism he received, both just and unjust, Bill Clinton never backed down from a fight, gave up or allowed his enemies to define who he was. Despite low personal approval ratings, he was able to maintain high job approval ratings. He was successful in being able to promote the morally relativistic idea that just because someone was a liar, a cheat and had no character, that didn't mean he couldn't be a good President. For his success alone in promoting this new standard, I will always regard him as the ultimate grandmaster of politics.
When you ignore criticism, you are taking a risk. You are weighing people's ability to see the truth about you despite the criticism verses the potential damage that can be caused by refuting it, as doing so can only bring it to more attention than it's worth.
President Bush has made not personally defending himself a hallmark of his Presidency. For reasons that he alone keeps to himself, President Bush has allowed even the most unhinged, radical and ultra-kook moonbat fringe of the media and blogosphere to falsely accuse him, his closest advisers and senior members of his administration of orchestrating 9/11, doctoring evidence for the Iraq war, Nazism, Fascism, Treason, Murder, War Profiteering and Election Fraud, just to name a few.
Most people are able to see through these and other accusations, consider the source, look at the person being accused and subsequently dismiss them as being ludicrous. Eventually, however, if accusations continue to be made and not answered, people are going to question the accused. The longer the accused stays silent while the accusations become more unhinged, the more the accused supporters are going to look for a reason for their defense and a refutation to the attacks they are defending on someone else's behalf.
President Bush has been wrong on certain issues. He was wrong in his attempts to appease liberals with huge increases of entitlement spending on education and drug benefits. He should have overwhelmed Iraq with a larger number of troops instead of a smaller, fixed number and never have given the terrorists a moments rest by declaring any type of victory. He should have showed video clips of all the democrats who cited the same intel he used back during the Clinton administration when Clinton launched missile attacks on Iraq on the day of Monica Lewinsky's deposition. He should have decreased spending on entitlement programs, campaigned against earmarks on the House and Senate and focused on securing the border with Mexico. He should have come out swinging against Nagin and Blanco and compared the 4 day response time of FEMA to Hurricane Katrina to Bill Clinton's FEMA response time of more than three weeks to Hurricane Floyd. Had he made better decisions regarding just these issues mentioned, the Republicans would still have the House and Senate, have a greater majority and democrats would still be like the Jews wandering through the desert for 40 years after worshiping the Golden Calf.
Erring on these issues, and not defending himself against the lunatic fringe…left President Bush in a state of political paralysis. He became unable to lead or govern because he was no longer capable of even mustering support among his disaffected base
Consider the following breakdown of actual arguments made against the Bush Administration during the past few years:
- If the President cuts taxes then it's no good because the people who pay the most taxes reap the benefit the most, but if he doesn't he is ignoring the economic plight of poor people by not concerning himself with their tax burden.
- If the President has a diverse cabinet then he is guilty of pandering to minorities, if he doesn't then it is an example of his bigotry.
- If the President sides with Israel in a conflict then it is an example of Zionist-Pro-Israel/Anti-Arab bigotry, but if he doesn't then it is an example of the President's Christian Anti-Semitism.
- If the President wins an election without the majority and plurality of the vote (2000), then he has no mandate, but if he wins with both the plurality and majority of the vote (2004) then he has no mandate because 52% of the vote is not a mandate.
- If the President pushes for more refineries and domestic oil drilling to increase supply then he is pandering to Big Oil, but if he does neither and pushes for more efficiency and conservation then he is guilty of trying to keep the status quo by not increasing energy supplies, and is therefore pandering to Big Oil.
- If the President takes an aggressive stance towards North Korea then he is guilty of inciting more war and violence, if he seeks international support then he is guilty of assuming a weak posture in international affairs.
- If the President does not appear at the NAACP, then he is guilty of writing off the black community, but if he appears at the NAACP he is guilty of insincere pandering to the black community.
- If the President has hired a team made up of intelligent people, then it is because he himself is not intelligent, but if the President succeeds on his own merits then it is because he has surrounded himself with intelligent people.
- If the President stays the course and remains in Iraq till the job is finished then he is guilty of being stubborn, but if the President talks of eventual troop reduction then he is guilty of giving in.
- If the President takes a tough stance on illegal immigration then he is guilty of anti-Hispanic bigotry, if he does not then he is guilty of failing to look out for the American citizenry.
- If the President does not send in the National Guard to Katrina ravaged New Orleans right away he does not care about black people, if he does then he is sending in an occupational force against US citizens.
- If the President uses executive powers during a time of war then he is guilty of violating the constitution, but if he does not use his powers and authority then he is guilty of not leading or maintaining control.
- If the President uses military action against terrorists he is guilty of inciting more terrorism and putting lives on the line for the sake of oil, but if he doesn't then he is guilty of dropping the ball and neglecting his duty in protecting the country.
- If the President's policies in preventing terror attacks catch terrorists and yield vital information, then he is guilty of infringing on freedom and human rights, but if his policies fail then he is guilty of not doing enough to protect American citizens.
- If the President stays silent in the face of critics then it is because his critics are right, but if the President speaks out and defends his positions then it is a sign of stubbornness and his attempt to "silence" critics with fascist threats.
- If the President appeals to foreign nations to assist in Iraq but goes in with less than everyone who is approached, he is accused of being a unilateralist, but if he appeals to foreign nations who have a stake in North Korea, then he is criticized for not being a unilateralist.
Look at where we are now:
- We have an inexperienced, junior Senator running for President from the corrupt Illinois/Chicago political machine who's state has one of the largest unemployment percentages in the country, has direct ties to a racist pastor, an unrepentant domestic terrorist, a corrupt community organization being investigated for wholesale voter fraud, an ultra-leftist voting record and openly expressing socialist wealth redistribution.
- We have a democrat Vice Presidential candidate who is the Binford Gaffo-Matic 7000, a man who cannot keep his mouth shut to save his life. A man who not only has been caught lying through his teeth and plagiarizing in national debates, but is documented on the written, spoken and video record of dismissing the ability, truthfulness and experience of his own running mate during the democrat primary, a primary where he admitted that he would endorse John McCain himself over his own running mate...and...most recently admitted on national television that enemies of the US would seek to test his running mate and that their response would not appear to be initially correct.
- We have an ultra-left democrat controlled House and Senate who have an approval rating less than half than that of President Bush, led by the two most inept leaders either party has ever had, additionally burdened with documented proof of their own direct culpability and guilt in promoting the policies and practices that led to the Subprime mortgage meltdown.
Yet, despite the democrat party being rank with absolute ineptitude, lack of leadership, scandal and lockstep ties with the most radical kook fringe of society, they are WINNING because the political paralysis caused by President Bush's liberalism and unwillingness to engage in the politics of a one-on-one fight...has demoralized the base, radicalized and emboldened the democrats and has left the Independents who are liberal leaning, indecisive and generally spineless to their mercurial natures of going with whichever side that appears to be on the current winning end of the political spectrum (i.e. Colin Powell). In any other political scenario that would have come about by the President governing like a conservative and not as a liberal douche-bag, democrats would be melting down and running in circles with abject panic.
The lesson from all of this is a simple one: When it comes to politics, conservatives can never, ever, EVER let our enemies get away with defining who we are or wax eloquent on the lofty idea of leaving judgment to history, because history is written and defined by the people who win, not the people who are right.
1 comment:
The part that the mainstream media has played in this current mess cannot be overestimated. They have abandoned any pretense of truth seeking to unabashedly root on the democratic mess making machine. They have become the public relations machine for the party of donkeys.
Check out this article from a dyed in the wool democrat.
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