My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.
2004-11-06
Pivotal Times
Consider the confluence of events over the last week or so: President Bush gets reelected, as well as a strong majority in both houses expands; the jobs report for October shows more than double the expected growth; the stock market has shot up some 3% in the last 3 days; Yassar Arafat is on the brink of death; and the US military is poised for the big assault on Fallujah and Ramadi.
It is conceivable that by Christmas the insurgency in Iraq could be largely supressed, which would lead to free elections in an Arab country; there may be new leadership in Palestine and hope for peace in Israel; and the reality of a growing economy could be breaking through the news embargo and dawning on the American public. All this, combined with a sympathetic congress, could give THE PRESIDENT (I still enjoy saying that with emphasis) the momentum to drive through the ambitious agenda he has laid out. On top of that, I expect enough news to come out of the Oil-for-Food investigations to cripple the Franco-German ability to block the American international agenda.
Obviously, for everything to line up just right would take more than strategy and execution--it will require some level of Divine Providence. So, pray. But more. . .
Howard Gardner has written that there are times and circumstances in history that have quantum effects--the most recent was in the early part of the 20th century when Freud, Einstein, Stravinsky and many other very influential thinkers did their most important work--work that influenced their fields for decades. It is possible that this is just such a time.
So we should all take the President's lead, and stop thinking about Tuesday to turn our attention to the opportunity at hand to truly change the world. Nobody likes analyzing numbers and vote tallies more than I, but Tuesday is gone. The future beckons.
Prayer is not enough, though it is a necessary component. Such a critical time begs of us to redouble our efforts. Unfortunately, I'm poorly equiped to know what such efforts might look like. I welcome any thoughts along these lines, though I'll let you know what I've come up with.
First, I'm going to call/write Senator Allard to ask him to exert whatever influence he may have to assure that the Senate Republicans push for strong majorities on the Senate Judiciary, Senate Armed Forces, and Senate Foreign Relations Commitees.
Then I'll be writing letters to the editor on the subject of the Oil-for-Food Scandal and the media failure to cover it adequately.
I'll also be writing/calling Congressman Beauprez to ask him to work with the President and the House Leadership to reform the tax code.
I don't want to get carried away with this line of thought, but I also don't want to miss an opportunity. I welcome any thoughts or suggestions. | |
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