I had to laugh at the hypocrisy of Mr. Graef’s column when I read of his concern about conservative institutions attempting to drive a wedge in the country via his mailbox. In fact it is the entire Democrat Party that has used divisive tactics for the past 30 years to expand their power base.
Shall I start with class envy? They promote an agenda that tries to create the false impression that people who have the drive to make money have somehow deprived others of the same opportunity in their lives. They demonize any form of tax cut as a tax cut for the rich by ignoring the simple facts of mathematics. If the top 20 percent of wage earners pay 80 percent of the income tax of course they’re going to get more back from a tax cut. On the other hand if you give a tax cut check to the 40 percent who don’t pay taxes isn’t that the same as a welfare check? We are told by the leftist politicians that somehow allowing people to keep more of the money they’ve earned means that it disappears into some miser’s vault. Although I haven’t checked I’m pretty sure that buying a Bayliner yacht takes a fair amount of coin. There are probably several hundred people, maybe still in the area, who wish the ‘rich’ could keep a little more of their money to spend on luxuries.
One of the biggest wedges being driven by the left is hyphenated Americanism. A concerted effort is made to divide people into their racial and ethnic groups. They then create discontent among these groups by feeding resentment of past injustices, both real and perceived, to build their political power base. This serves only to balkanize the country creating strife and envy which undermines our unity as a nation. We are all Americans. Stop trying to divide us into interest groups to buy votes with false promises.
What really brought about my amusement at Mr. Graef’s indignation and made me wonder where he has been for the past eight years were thoughts of the unifying behavior demonstrated by the left. Peaceful supporters of Proposition 8 in California have been physically assaulted and verbally abused. Scientists who disagreed with the man-made global warming theory have been likened to holocaust deniers. Personal attacks on the character of the past president and members of our armed forces by groups such as MoveOn and Code Pink were commonplace. If you want an example of divisive you need look no further than the photos of past anti-war protests and the hateful messages displayed on the signs. In my opinion many of these groups stepped over the line of sedition and put our service members overseas in further jeopardy.
I too, like Mr. Limbaugh, hope this president fails. What Mr. Graef fails to point out in his editorial is that there is a second part of that message. We hope not for the failure of our nation but rather for the failure of this president to implement policies we believe will be disastrous for our country. I hope President Obama fails to borrow/print 1 trillion dollars to grow government into an inefficient leviathan that has control of our medical care, retirement, finances, and education. I hope he fails to degrade our military and intelligence agencies to the point where we invite another dastardly attack on our home soil. I hope he fails to implement FOCA which will further ensconce abortion and the culture of death it brings into our nation. I hope he fails to make us an energy basket case by jumping on the ‘green’ bandwagon to fight an unnecessary, costly, and unwinnable war on climate. I hope for what those who stood at Concord Bridge hoped for, a free nation we can pass on to our progeny so they can build their lives in liberty unencumbered by the shackles of an oppressive and omnipresent government.
Paul VanGinhoven
Arlington
