Hope and Change

First of all, I have to congratulate Mitt Romney on his victory in Michigan. This means the race will come down to the wire and I'm probably still not going to like the candidate, as there's no one yet with a victory that's a clear conservative. Makes me wish I was running in it myself.

The two points I have been hearing repeatedly from the Democrats on the campaign trail, as well as Romney last night, are hope and change. Since a large portion of the electorate seems to salivate over these terms, thrown out blithely by the candidates, I will share with you my thoughts on them, as well as how they figure into my vision for America.

First of all, let me address change. This is what happens every two, four, six, or eight years in various elections. However, rarely do we get a politician who is a true agent of change. Generally, when they say change, they mean adjusting the status quo to benefit their buddies. So I will not tell you I will change a damn thing in Washington. I will do what I say I am going to do, and afterwards, you can judge whether I've changed anything. Simply put, the idea of change is as hollow as the heads of Dennis "Recount" Kucinich and Ron "Gulf of Tonkin" Paul.

Then there's hope, as in, "I hope the government gits me my check." It's fine to hope for things that you have absolutely no control over like the weather. But don't waste your time hoping when you could be doing. I was up late Saturday night with insomnia, and found a show full of recordings from 9/11. The 911 operators were telling people to stay where they were and wait, which was standard procedure. But this is the danger of hope. Were these people to do whatever it took to get out, more people might have escaped. The fact is, we all have the ability within us to make things happen. And while living in this world means relying on others, there is no reason to hope other people will solve your problems for you. It is this dependency on the government specifically, this hope that government can fix the problems, that cripples personal initiative.

There will always be people who refuse to take care of themselves. For them I reserve a mixture of pity and disdain. There are also those who cannot take care of themselves. For them, there are charities, there are neighbors, there are communities. For too long, we have hoped the federal government would help us, and we've looked to people who we elect to give us stuff. So they use that stuff to buy election after election. We need to stop this. We need to stop electing people who promise us stuff, then say they'll change things. Because then we send them to Washington, hope for change, get our pittance paid for by us, and go further down the road to socialism.

Finally, to clarify my point from yesterday's blog, as Rush Limbaugh was going on about this today: Reagan is dead. The Reagan Era is over. But Conservatism lives on. It is time for the new leaders to rise up, take on the mantle of the cause, and continue to fight the war against liberals everywhere. We are in a new era, but with the very same principals. So as a public service, I will begin to find the voices of this principle and point you to them here. So get to clicking.

Today's link to conservatism is ChatterboxChronicles. Check her out.