NEW YEAR'S WISH LIST: AN INITIAL SIX

The sole condition which is required in order to succeed in centralizing the supreme power in a democratic community is to love equality, or to get men to believe you love it.  Thus, the science of despotism, which was once so complex, is simplified, and reduced ... to a single principle.
                                                                            
                                                                                                              Alexis de Toqueville

A VIEW FROM BRANCO

With the end of another year, one not only is prone to take stock of the past but also tends to entertain certain hopes for the future.

Emerging from 2013, a year which was marked by scandalous developments at the highest levels of the Republic, the wish list coming out of Two for Texas is fraught with hope for further disasters for the statist cabal now in power in the District of Columbia.

For an administration that promised transparency but practiced deception, it was transparently obvious that an inept president, advised by even more inept underlings, had determined to throw the political dice toward a duplicitous diversion based on  ginning up that old totalitarian standby issue of income inequality.  That poor people in the U.S. are the envy of the greater part of the world doesn't count when despotic urges prevail.  Keeping this in mind, here is an initial Two for Texas installment of wishes for 2014:

1.  Our fondest hope is that Obamcare will continue to flounder and eventually fail.  Enrollment figures continue to lag, and approximately half of those enrolled have not forked over any money. Marked by inordinately expensive rates and astronomical deductibles, sticker shock is the order of the day.  Combined with the billions of dollars the government is now taxing insurance companies, the cost of health insurance is going to skyrocket.  Coupled with upcoming changes slated for employer-provided plans, further disenchantment with Obama and his ACA will be growing in 2014.  And it looks like there will be no rush to enroll on the part of young people, whose participation is crucial to the ACA's survival.

2.  The tragedy of Benghazi is still a boil on the government derriere.  Hopefully, it will be lanced in 2014, and those whose thoughtless and careless political correctness led to needless loss of life will be singled out for disdain.  With Mrs. Hillary Clinton as seemingly the only viable Democratic presidential candidate for 2016, those who advocate her cause are even now compiling rationalizations to retrieve the former secretary of state's reputation.  However, Mrs. Clinton has a scandal-plagued past, dating from the early 1970's, and when all is said and done the opposition will do well to roll out all of her dirty laundry.  This wish, then, might turn out to be a "twofer," inasmuch as the deadwood in the Department of State may be removed, and Mrs. Clinton's dream of occupying the Oval Office may be shattered.

3.  "Hard tyranny,"  as opposed to the soft variety, is marked by midnight visits from such agencies as the Gestapo and the NKVD, arbitrary imprisonment and wholesale executions. Fortunately, we in the U.S. have had little to no experience with hard tyranny; however, we are becoming more and more familiar with the softer sub-species of the practice that has turned up with the IRS and other agencies used for the punishment of political opponents.  After all, why go through all the muss and fuss of hard tyranny when you can more easily discredit, bankrupt and run your foes into the ground through the efforts of "public servants" in the bureaucracy.  For 2014, we earnestly hope that complete revelations will be made of how the federal government resorted to extra-legal methods in an effort to quash alternative political views.

4.  Western civilization, and especially that part of it that we know in the U.S., is predicated on freedom of expression.  Nevertheless, disturbing trends have evolved in the last 5 years that would limit our 1st Amendment rights.  Sadly, these trends would so alter our culture that history would be tainted and certain elements of society would be given  privileged positions immune from criticism.  If freedom of expression is ever gutted from the corpus of our culture, the rest of the traditions that we have held near and dear are sure to follow.  In this regard, it would be a boon for our Republic if the repressive hand of political correctness would begin to wither away.  

5.  That a government should play fast and lose with the truth is an absolute indicator of power gone awry.  Although there were several egregious instances of this during the preceding time period, none was so shocking as Fast and Furious.  With publication of ATF Agent John Dodson's Unarmed Truth, we are beginning to see how government did not deign to reveal the idiocy of its policies and, even worse, sought to cover several trails of wrongdoing through the sleight of hand of the attorney general and the Department of Justice.  An untold number of human beings died as a result of these crimes, and those responsible should be made to pay the price demanded by justice for their rash and negligent behavior.  

6.  Finally, with this installment, it is the wish of Two for Texas that our country, whose history is marked by its willingness to serve as a safe haven for the oppressed, should begin to speak out against the evil persecution of Christians taking place primarily in the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa.  Daily, those that are our Christian brothers and sisters pay for their faith by suffering the indignities of abuse, discrimination, rape and even death.  We must not be fooled by those who would twist the truth to craft "anti-blasphemy" laws that, instead of protecting religious minorities, facilitate their maltreatment.  Despite ample proof of the desires of Muslim nations to restrict freedom of expression throughout the world, our spineless "leaders" too often go along with such designs in the United Nations, forgetting that we are a 21st century Republic, not an oriental despotism.  President Obama has yet to figure out that he is not just the president of a  land that he is attempting to form into a Third World country, he comes from a long line of chief executives who at one time or another were beacons of hope for the oppressed of the world.  

For further wishes for 2014, don't miss a single posting from Two for Texas!

Deo Vindice!

God bless Texas, and may the Lone Star State remain forever red!