{"id":42483,"date":"2013-03-01T00:44:45","date_gmt":"2013-03-01T07:44:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/?p=42483"},"modified":"2014-12-30T00:31:36","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T07:31:36","slug":"thing-that-used-to-be-conservatism-cheers-for-despotism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/03\/thing-that-used-to-be-conservatism-cheers-for-despotism.html","title":{"rendered":"Thing that Used to Be Conservatism Cheers for Despotism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

In our current state of political discourse, the idea of thinking before reacting is getting rarer and rarer.\u00a0 The Thing that Used to be Conservatism, being almost entire a creature of the Conservative Infotainment Complex, seems to never give much thought to its positions these days beyond, \u201cDoes this have a chance of ginning up the mob against Obama?\u201d\u00a0 If so, then they run with it, even if its stupid and totally counter to what conservatism used to actually believe.<\/p>\n

Case in point: the current hoopla over Bob Woodward.\u00a0 All that it is necessary for the Thing that Used to be Conservatism to know is that Woodward dissed the Prez.\u00a0 All of a sudden he is a hero martyr and FOX and Drudge are issuing the appropriate directives and cues to the faithful:<\/p>\n

\nWHITE HOUSE THREATENS WOODWARD: \u2018YOU WILL REGRET DOING THIS\u2019\u2026<\/a>
\nWatergate reporter blasts Obama \u2018madness\u2019\u2026<\/a>
\nPOLITICO: Exclusive Details\u2026 <\/a>
\nWill Washington Stand Up for Woodward?<\/a>
\nPlouffe: He\u2019s getting old\u2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Only here\u2019s the thing:\u00a0 the \u201cmadness\u201d Woodward is protesting is the \u201cmadness\u201d of Obama not just sweeping aside the rule of law and doing whatever the hell he feels like because he\u2019s King.\u00a0 Glenn Greenwald, who is actually honest, has the scoop<\/a>:<\/p>\n

That the Obama administration might actually honor the budget cuts mandated by a law enacted by Congress and signed by Obama infuriates Bob Woodward, Washington\u2019s most celebrated journalist. He appeared this week on the \u201cMorning Joe\u201d program to excoriate Obama for withholding a second aircraft carrier in the Gulf, saying<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cCan you imagine Ronald Reagan sitting there and saying \u2018Oh, by the way, I can\u2019t do this because of some budget document?\u2019 Or George W Bush saying, \u2018You know, I\u2019m not going to invade Iraq because I can\u2019t get the aircraft carriers I need\u2019 or even Bill Clinton saying, \u2018You know, I\u2019m not going to attack Saddam Hussein\u2019s intelligence headquarters,\u2019 as he did when Clinton was president, because of some budget document.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnder the Constitution, the president is commander-in-chief and employs the force. And so we now have the president going out because of this piece of paper and this agreement, I can\u2019t do what I need to do to protect the country. That\u2019s a kind of madness that I haven\u2019t seen in a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Brian Beutler points out<\/a>: \u201cthe obscure type of budget document Woodward\u2019s referring to is called a duly enacted law \u2014 passed by Congress, signed by the President \u2014 and the only ways around it are for Congress to change it. . . . or for Obama to break it.\u201d But that\u2019s exactly what Woodward is demanding: that Obama trumpet his status as Commander-in-Chief in order to simply ignore \u2013 i.e. break \u2013 the law, just like those wonderful men before him would have done. Woodward derides the law as some petty, trivial annoyance (\u201cthis piece of paper\u201d) and thus mocks Obama\u2019s weakness for the crime of suggesting that the law is something he actually has to obey.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But what about Obama\u2019s lawlessness with drone strikes? Yes.\u00a0\u00a0I\u2019m aware of that.\u00a0 So is Greenwald, who has been one of Obama\u2019s\u00a0most persistent critics on this point.\u00a0 Nobody\u2019s trying to pretend that Obama isn\u2019t comfy with ignoring the law when it gets in the way of his Royal Will.\u00a0 However, the point\u00a0here is that Woodward\u2013and his temporary champions in the Conservative Infotainment Complex at FOX and throughout Talk Radio agitprop arm of the Thing that Used to be Conservatism\u2013also care nothing for the rule of law.<\/p>\n

But whatever Obama\u2019s motives might be, the fact is that what we call \u201claw\u201d really does require some cuts in military spending. To refuse to do so would be to assert powers not even most monarchs have: to break the law at will. Woodward is right about one point: not only would prior presidents have been willing to do this, this is exactly what they did. Indeed, George Bush\u2019s entire presidency was explicitly predicated on the theory<\/a> that the president has the power to break the law at will whenever he deems that doing so promotes national security. That America\u2019s most celebrated journalist not only supports this, but demands that all presidents follow this model of lawlessness, is telling indeed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Our Ruling Class\u2013and the liars and demagogues who constitute the Conservative Infotainment Complex\u00a0that is currently faking concern about Woodward as some sort of valiant hero for speaking truth to power\u2013are in fact all about the lawless use of power just as Obama is when the Constitution gets in the way.\u00a0 Of course the TTUTBC isn\u2019t in favor of *total* lawlessness.\u00a0 But as is typical for the\u00a0War Party,\u00a0they crave the\u00a0lawless use of power in order to throw military might about.\u00a0 They love that stuff, even when Obama does it.\u00a0 But the main issue is: they crave the lawless use of power.\u00a0 And that by Obama, whom they gin up the base to believe is Hitler, Stalin and Mao all rolled up together, while cheering\u00a0for Woodward\u2019s demand that he ignore the rule of law.<\/p>\n

Why anybody\u00a0would trust any of these mooks is beyond me.\u00a0 They are a joke.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In our current state of political discourse, the idea of thinking before reacting is getting rarer and rarer.\u00a0 The Thing that Used to be Conservatism, being almost entire a creature of the Conservative Infotainment Complex, seems to never give much thought to its positions these days beyond, \u201cDoes this have a chance of ginning up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[26,49],"class_list":["post-42483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-our-ruling-class-vs-the-rest-of-us","tag-the-thing-that-used-to-be-conservatism"],"yoast_head":"\nThing that Used to Be Conservatism Cheers for Despotism<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In our current state of political discourse, the idea of thinking before reacting is getting rarer and rarer.\u00a0 The Thing that Used to be Conservatism,\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/03\/thing-that-used-to-be-conservatism-cheers-for-despotism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Thing that Used to Be Conservatism Cheers for Despotism\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In our current state of political discourse, the idea of thinking before reacting is getting rarer and rarer.\u00a0 The Thing that Used to be Conservatism,\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/03\/thing-that-used-to-be-conservatism-cheers-for-despotism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catholic and Enjoying It!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" 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