Is America Ungovernable?

Did you ever meet one of those people who decides that something must be impossible because they weren’t able to do it? That’s a defense mechanism that keeps them from having to acknowledge a defect within themselves. Liberals are big on defense mechanisms, and this is one of their favorites. Indeed, every time one of their Presidents fails at something, they rush to warn us that this something is simply impossible. And when their Presidents fail utterly, we are treated to a whole slew of articles lamenting the fact that America is ungovernable.

Let me take you back to Jimmy Carter. When Carter was elected, liberals were elated. Things had not been going well for the country. Liberal John Kennedy botched foreign policy before he was killed. Liberal Lyndon Johnson botched the war in Vietnam, and his Great Society was worsening racial tensions and exploding poverty. Then, in collaboration with Satan, aka Nixon, the liberal Democrats in Congress passed a Soviet-style regulatory scheme to protect us from everything, and strangely the economy began to collapse.

But here was Carter. If anyone could fix our broken country, it was Carter. Why? Because Carter was a liberal-certified genius. Indeed, they called him the smartest man ever elected President. They pointed out that Carter was a former naval officer and a nuclear engineer (though Carter’s school records do not reflect this). They pointed to his supposedly incredible attention to detail, his legendary honesty (since dispelled by Bob Woodward), and his successful career as a Georgia State Senator and Governor of Georgia. Here was a man who was so smart that he could not possibly fail.

Yet fail he did. . . spectacularly.

He let the Soviets invade Afghanistan (a failure for which we are still paying today). He let inflation skyrocket and economic output collapse -- leading to a new term “stagflation.” Unemployment soared. The debt soared. He let the Arabs exploit American dependence on oil to dictate American policy. He let the military wither and the dollar collapse. And he went through an embarrassing hostage crisis.

Clearly the man was not up to the task of being President, right? No, not according to liberals. Instead, they “reasoned” that if the smartest man alive could not run the country, then the country must be ungovernable. Seriously. There was open talk in liberal ranks that “the Presidency is too big of a job for one man.” There was talk that “the economy had changed” and that 10%+ unemployment was the new natural state of our economy. And they talked about America needing to learn “to accept a diminished role in the world” because our superpower days were over.

It never dawned on them that the man they tagged as ultra-smart was simply not a good leader. It never occurred to them that he was weak, afraid, and that his economic policies (policies they believed in) were at fault for the nation’s problems. No, they chose instead to believe that these problems simply had no solution rather than accept the fact that the solutions they offered were wrong. Indeed, Reagan’s success in turning around each of these areas came as a great shock to them. In fact, they spent most of his first term waiting for their perceived reality to set in and the country to return to the “normal” state that Carter encountered.

Now fast forward to the present. George Bush and his liberal friends in Congress passed laws that caused bubbles to form and burst, blowing a huge hole in the economy. Our military was bogged down in failing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. American influence the world over was waning. Oil prices were soaring again.

Enter Barack Obama. Liberals described him as the smartest man to ever be elected President, despite the total lack of any proof (and in spite of significant contrary evidence). They pointed to his ghostwritten books, his time teaching, his Harvard education, and his “successful” career as a United States Senator. Here was a man who was so smart that he could not possibly fail.

Yet failing he is. . . spectacularly.

Afghanistan is a morass. He let unemployment reach and exceed Carter-like levels, and he has no idea how to turn this around. The economy is failing. He’s driven the deficit/debt to unprecedented levels, so high that he’s risking bankruptcy. He’s let China exploit his party’s dependence on deficit spending to dictate American policy. Iran is getting closer to building an atomic bomb. And so on.

So what are liberals saying now? Are they admitting that their ideas didn’t work? No. It’s 1979 all over again. We’re hearing that 9% unemployment may be “the new normal,” and that Americans need to accept that the days of a strong economy are gone forever. We’re hearing that America must accept that “there are limits on American power,” and we can no longer play the role of superpower. And we’re hearing that the country may be “ungovernable.”

The ungovernable charge comes from the fact that Obama had supermajorities in both House of Congress, devoted zombies ready to do his bidding throughout the country, and a level of genius never before seen when he entered the White House. Yet, he failed repeatedly. He was never able to get his policies in place as he wanted them, and more significantly, his policies didn’t seem to help. Since liberals cannot accept that their policies run counter to human experience and human nature, and they cannot (yet) accept that Obama isn’t the expert to end all experts, the only conclusion they are left with is that there must be some change in the country that has permanently driven up unemployment, permanently depressed economic activity, and permanently weakened our power and influence.

In other words, it’s not Obama who failed, it is simply impossible for this country to succeed. . . just as it was impossible for America to ever succeed again circa 1979.

So watch for more and more of these articles, until they enter the next phase of their grieving -- anger directed at the false messiah. ETA November.