Consequences

Though he professed neither faith nor disbelief in God, Civil War veteran and famed orator Robert Ingersoll was certain about man’s relationship with nature. “In Nature,” he once said, “there are neither rewards nor punishments: There are consequences.”

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Is this true of politics? Maybe so, but political consequences often manifest themselves only after the ruse of blaming a previous politician has survived in the beating-a-dead-horse stage for so long that putrefaction’s stench repulses even the most prevaricating beaters. Before and after the 2008 presidential election, conservative commentators were demonized, their integrity excoriated, character trashed; they were called racist and unpatriotic, mental and moral poison for young people who might innocently consider —and (God forbid!) even accept — their viewpoints. The media listened, and in most cases, illustrated their belief in freedom of speech by silencing the voices of those the left-wingers skewered, or letting them continue voicing their conservative opinions, but in a more tepid manner — either way a victory for the skewers, whose speech freedoms weren’t skewered. If Ingersoll’s comment on nature can be applied to politics, the American people may be wearying of the fallacy of beating dead horses, and are visualizing future consequences. In nature, weakness is always eliminated. There is no Kumbaya live-and-let-live state. The strong survive. If an entity is organic, it’s predator or prey. There is no neutrality option. In nature, idealistic philosophies that espouse multiculturalism, diversity, political correctness, affirmative action, and entitlements would amount to no more than a satiated burp by a killer whale, having just ingested a harmless, innocent, baby harp seal. But because human beings are rational, they aren’t like those savage beasts in the unending feast-famine, survival-of-the-fittest, flesh-bone-to-fecal matter cycle. They aren’t? Weakness is weakness — in all spheres. In the same quick manner that a vicious, hungry natural predator senses weakness, it is identified and seized upon by human beings whose rationality is subservient to baser, glandular, quasi-instinctual urges that, if necessary, will be satiated by the worst sort of savagery.

Perceiving that the USA is becoming impotent, weaker nations are gravitating toward rising powers

Until recently, in global relations verifying that only the strong survive, America scorned appeasement, compromise, unilateral agreements, passivity, and timid acquiescence. Weaker players on the world scene recognized her strength and resolve, and allied themselves accordingly. But now, the consequences of weak leadership are eroding those alliances. Not too many months ago, a photograph flashed around the world provided impetus to the global repositioning of weaker nations. In the photo, three men are joining their hands above their heads in a victory salute. The man in the middle, Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is a savage beast whose virulent hatred of America is surpassed by no one. With him are two leaders whose allegiance to America is rapidly evaporating: the president of Brazil and the prime minister of Turkey. Perceiving that the USA is becoming impotent, weaker nations are gravitating toward rising powers, hedging their positions in what may become a post-America world. They may be seeing what America’s leaders refuse to see, but what Americans are beginning to see: consequences.