Decline or Decadence?

◼ America is suffering from a lack of mastery over its own riches. - Victor Davis Hanson/National Review Online

...An average American with an average cell phone has more information at his fingertips than did a Goldman Sachs grandee 20 years ago. Over the last half-century, bizarre new words have entered the American vocabulary — triple-dipping, Botox, liposuction, jet set, COLA (cost of living adjustment), three-day weekend, Medi-something compounds (Medicare, Medicaid, Medi-Cal) — that do not reflect a deprived citizenry. In 1980, a knee or hip replacement was experimental surgery for the 1 percent; now it is a Medicare entitlement.

American poverty is not measured by absolute global standards of available food, shelter, and medical care, or by comparisons with prior generations, but by one American now having less stuff than another.... Read the rest.

Does Obama really want to win?

◼ There are only two ways to look at the Obama re-election campaign right now: Either the upstart candidate who stunned the world when he defeated the Clinton machine to capture the Democratic nomination three years ago has lost every bit of that massive mojo, or the bruised and battered president, after three years in office, just doesn’t want another spin in the Oval Office. - Joseph Curl/The Washington Times

How else to explain the nonstop missteps, the stammering and stuttering campaign, not to mention the brazen attacks on American voters, who, he has said, have “fallen behind,” lost their “ambition and imagination,” gotten “lazy” and “a bit soft” - this is a guy seeking the support of America?!

...“Once having won the office,” the MSNBC cheerleader (Chris Matthews) said, “he seemed to think that that was the end of it in terms of his connection to the American people. … I think everybody feels an absence of communication from the time he’s been elected. And it’s not about not being left-wing enough or too left. That’s not his problem. It’s connection. And Mrs. Obama, she’s an amazing asset. And what has she done? Obesity? How about connecting with the American people about being Americans? I don’t think she’s happy. I don’t think they like being in the White House. The American people can tell that. They don’t seem thrilled at the fact the American people have selected them as our first family. I don’t sense the gratitude, the happiness level, the thrill of being president.”