The Quiet Conservative February 28, 2010
Potsdam on the Potomac.
In August of 1945 the Allied Powers met in Potsdam Germany to establish the borders of Europe after
the surrender of Nazi Germany. America was represented by President Truman. Britain was
represented first by Churchill, and then by Attlee as Churchill lost his election at home. The Soviet
Union was represented by Stalin. This conference set the stage not for peace, but for the advent of the
Cold War that lasted until the collapse of the Soviet Union. On one side you had individual freedom.
On the other you had state control over the individual, the building of the Iron Curtain, and the
enslavement of millions .
On Thursday that conference was repeated in the United States. On one side you had the proposed
enslavement of the nation and on the other you had the opposition to it. That isn't a hyperbolic
statement. If the modern day reproduction of Stalin's philosophy prevails, you will comply with the
state, or you will be imprisoned.
Several things were plainly evident from the meeting. The Republicans, for all their many past faults,
stood for the fact that this effort was ruinous and unconstitutional. The two bills that were passed, the
House version, and the Senate version, relied on gimmicks and accounting tricks to produce the lie that
the bills would reduce the deficit. The American people would be mandated to buy insurance by the
government. Special backroom deals were made to buy votes for the passage of the bills. The bills
would bankrupt the country.
The Democrats, who are promoting this at all costs, repeated their lies, defended or dodged answering
questions about the shady corrupt deals that got the bills past. They took what the Congressional
Budget Office said out of context, and pretended the Republicans had offered no alternatives. Any
hard or unavoidable fact of their party's perfidy was rebutted only by the charge that the Republicans
were engaged in "talking points." And finally, the President. Fully exposed without a teleprompter,
prepared speech, or shielding from questions, he was a snarky, condescending elitist. The title of
"President" did not convey any weight to his actions or bearing.
But how could I say this? If the Democrats along with the President were willfully lying about the
contents and effects of the bill, why would they be pushing it so hard? The present format of Health
Care Reform is so unpopular that the Democratic Party wonks know there is a rising tide of revolt
among the voters. This is tantamount to a suicide truck bomb for their party.
The reason is: they don't care. Just like Stalin didn't care what anyone thought when he closed access
to Berlin in 1948. He didn't care. The Soviet portion of Berlin had voted overwhelmingly
anti-Communist in the 1946 Berlin elections and the fact that people choose freedom over slavery and
the primacy of the state was enough for him to know that force trumps all. The passage of Health Care
is the tool to control a free nation. If the President initiates reconciliation, as at the end of the meeting
he implied he would, then the Democrats will have pulled the trigger on the destruction of personal
freedom here in the United States. The State will decide you health care. Welcome to the Collective,
comrade.
However, their thinking is flawed, just as Stalin's and his successors was flawed. While lying to the
American people is one thing, they have made the mistake of lying to themselves on what the bill will
accomplish. Yes they will have taken major steps to bankrupt the country. Yes they will have the final
say on whether you receive treatment or not. Yes they will have forced entitlements on people with the
presumption that once entitled, people will vote to maintain that entitlement even at the cost of their
own freedom. But it is a domination of cobwebs. This nation was designed for individual freedom, not
domination by the state or the elite. When the Russians were consolidated under Communism and
gobbled up the other Asian and Baltic states, those states did not have a long history of personal
freedom. They had a history of autocratic rule, whether by King or dictator. This allowed the Soviet
Union to function for as long as it did. It is interesting to note that the fall of the Soviet Union was
kicked off by the rise of Solidarity and the shrugging off of the Communist slave chains by Poland.
Poland was, in one form or another, Democratic since the 1500's. Invaded by other powers it regained
its freedom after the First World War, only to lose it again in the Second World War. Poland wanted to
be free because its people wanted to be free. They had the memory of being free. Poland is free now
because it cherished individual freedom in its soul even when suppressed by the state.
America has never been oppressed by the state. We have never known such tyranny and we won't
tolerate it now. America has been forged in the fight for individual liberty from the Revolution through
the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement, right up to this very fight I talk about. America has
survived and will survive this onslaught also. Because, America isn't just a nation or a form of
government, it is an ideal.
Progressives have tried to kill that ideal. They have the educational institutions, they have the press,
they have the publishing industry, they have the popular culture of Hollywood. But, they can't stamp
out our history, our principles, or our natural inclination for freedom any more than the Soviets could
stamp out the Polish desire for freedom. There is something in the Progressive human heart that loves
the slave chain. There is something in every human soul that loves freedom. The soul is stronger.