Have you ever noticed the day really don't get poppin' (and this ain't really "common sense America") until we get a column from Thomas Sowell? It's an amazing thing - he and I think so much alike, the man can practically read my mind (why, I betcha he wrote this column knowing I needed a reason to use this other two-headed baby shot. That's how the man's mind works, I'm telling you.) - check it out:"Just where in the Constitution of the United States does it say that a president has the authority to extract vast sums of money from a private enterprise and distribute it as he sees fit to whomever he deems worthy of compensation? Nowhere.
And yet that is precisely what is happening with a $20 billion fund to be provided by BP to compensate people harmed by their oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Many among the public and in the media may think that the issue is simply whether BP's oil spill has damaged many people, who ought to be compensated.
But our government is supposed to be 'a government of laws and not of men.'
If our laws and our institutions determine that BP ought to pay $20 billion — or $50 billion or $100 billion — then so be it.
But the Constitution says that private property is not to be confiscated by the government without 'due process of law.'
Technically, it has not been confiscated by Barack Obama, but that is a distinction without a difference.
With vastly expanded powers of government available at the discretion of politicians and bureaucrats, private individuals and organizations can be forced into accepting the imposition of powers that were never granted to the government by the Constitution.
If you believe that the end justifies the means, then you don't believe in constitutional government."
Isn't that wild? You don't get it, do you? "If you believe that the end justifies the means, then you don't believe in constitutional government."? Oprah? See, if you were Thomas Sowell, you'd already know I'm on a HUGE anti-NewAge kick and, since Oprah's the Queen of NewAge, Sowell's quote has to be followed by another from The New Republic's Lee Siegal, since it cuts to the quick so well (sorry - couldn't help it, T.):
"Every person and every ideology has its countertendency. With [James] Frey, Oprah's countertendency surged into public view. The reverse side of making your life your work is a life in which your actions become mere propulsions along the rails of self-advancement. You are not responsible for what you do because your truth as a person lies in the future as your 'goal.' You don't tell lies, because what might seem like a fabrication to other people is the expression of your genuine feeling, which is authorized by who you know you really are and can be in the future. We are taught that 'the end justifies the means' is a ruthless, amoral approach to life. But Oprah has taken that sword-like precept and beaten it into a benign ploughshare of planting, cultivation, and growth. She has made the sincerity of a statement more important than the content of it. Which is to say, she has made it virtuous to be amoral. After all you have been through, you deserve this. Oprah did it, and so can you.
Like Oprah herself, Winfreyism has an equally fraught countermotion. The reverse side of a democracy based on exchangeable feelings is the creation of a kingdom of mere sensations, in which no experience has a higher--or different--value than any other experience. We weep and empathize with the self-destructive mother, we weep and empathize with Sidney Poitier, we weep and empathize with the young woman dying of anorexia, we weep and empathize with Teri Hatcher, we weep and empathize with the girl with the disfigured face, we weep and empathize with the grateful recipients of Oprah's gift of a new car to every member of one lucky audience, we weep and empathize with the woman burned beyond recognition by her vicious husband. In the end, like the melting vision of tearing eyes, the situations blur into each other without distinction. They are all relative to your own experience of watching them. The fungibility of feeling is really a reduction of all experience to the effect it has on your own quality of feeling.
In fact, Oprah's universal empathy has an infinite flexibility. When critics complained that she focused too much on stories of physical and emotional horror, Oprah quickly responded, in the early '90s, by mocking that very format. Publicly vowing to start diversifying her show, she immediately incorporated lighter fare more frequently. Several months after Jonathan Franzen dissed her Book Club, an incident that gave rise to a heated debate over its true function and value, Oprah disbanded it. (It has returned, but in a more peripheral and occasional way.) The Frey incident sent her spinning in appeasement yet again.
One of Oprah's most powerful visual metaphors is how she utterly transforms her appearance--her hairstyle, mode of dress, type of jewelry, even her manner of speaking--from day to day. It is her clever, dramatic embodiment of the possibility of personal change and growth. But ability to change is also a capacity for accommodation. It hints at a personality that will 'stretch' itself in any rewarding direction, unconstrained by truthfulness or consistency. Unconstrained by the constraint of character, you might say.
The name Oprah gave to her production company--her business--is Harpo Productions, which is 'Oprah' spelled backward. That is exactly right. Winfreyism is the expression of an immensely reassuring and inspiring message that has, without doubt, helped millions of people carry on with their lives. And it is also an empty, cynical, icily selfish outlook on life that undercuts its own positive energy at every turn. On her way to Auschwitz, sitting in her hotel room in Krakow, thinking about the masses of people who were murdered in the death camp, Oprah wrote in O, 'I have never felt more human.' Her empathy and moral growth seem to require human sacrifice. Yet watching Oprah does fill you with hope. It also plunges you into despair. She has become something like America itself."
Do you see the continuity there? From America to Sowell, to Oprah, and then back to America? Or how about Oprah bringing us Obama? Now that's what I'm talking about! Let's have fun with that through James Taranto's thoughts from The Wall Street Journal - here's some of his quotes from yesterday:"The administration,...has poured great energy into remaking the country to deal with problems that are either far less urgent or nonexistent, such as health care and global warming.
The administration, that is, has set its priorities according to ideology rather than real-world contingencies.
And it's not just the administration. The yawning gap between ideology and reality is a defining characteristic of today's political left.
The environmental groups, like the administration, prioritize ideology over reality. There is actually no contradiction between their zeal for dealing with the hypothetical problem of global warming and their blasé attitude toward an actual ecological crisis; they simply have the wrong priorities."
And now, let's give him one of Oprah's "spiritual" make-overs, with some old links thrown in for glamor:"The cabal,...has poured great energy into remaking the country to deal with problems that are either far less urgent or nonexistent, such as ailments that require quack remedies and global warming.
The cabal, that is, has set its priorities according to NewAge rather than real-world contingencies.
And it's not just the cabal. The yawning gap between NewAge and reality is a defining characteristic of today's political left.
The environmental cultists, like the cabal, prioritize NewAge over reality. There is actually no contradiction between their zeal for dealing with the hypothetical problem of global warming and their blasé attitude toward an actual ecological crisis; they simply have the wrong priorities."
See? It all reads the same. As a matter of fact, it makes more sense Oprah's way - I mean, my and Thomas's way - seeing how American politics isn't supposed to "work" like alternative medicine "works". I don't know. Whatever it is, I'm sure Thomas thinks so, too:
He's my "SowellMate".
Now, if you'll please excuse me, this political warrior must be returning to his crystal ball,...and prayer:
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Quite useful material, thanks so much for the post.
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