The Most Dangerous Man in America

Well, I've just finished reading the various posts on Hugh Hewitt's weekend symposium.

Amongst many there is a common theme. Those posts express a theme that Kerry's worldview is sufficiently off-base that he could be diagnosed as psychotic. I once read that "schizophrenics build castles in their minds, psychotics live in them". But alas, I don't think we are that lucky. I don't believe Kerry is psychotic. He is ambitious and willing to either discard or disregard his principles in order to get elected. The scariest thing for me, is that he has done this by choice. By his own admission in the debate when asked about abortion, he indicated that a politician must set aside his own personal strongly held beliefs and vote to support his constituency.

Aside from the fact that this statement is unstable under further reflection, he is almost certainly not alone with this belief on the left. But, if you don't stand for your principles, what do you stand for? Do you just stand and swing with the currents of public opinion. Historically, what great man has ever felt that was the correct course of action? Many not so great men have been swept along with the currents of public opinion. Some of them were walking disasters like King Stephen.

Kerry, as King Stephen before him, wants the prize. Like the King, he is almost certainly a "good" man. But, like the King, he lacks the willingness to stand for his own principles. King Stephen's great flaw was that although a terrible King, he was a great leader in War, so unseating him was not the easiest affair (And this was an age when Kings led on the battlefield from the front). But if elected perhaps we, as the English then, may bemoan an era when disaster was so prevalent that people said "Christ and his Saints Slept" (the link by the way is an excellent informative and entertaining read).

However, Kerry is not alone in his supporters. He can make bland statements to the crowd on the left and say, "I cannot legislate based on my personal beliefs", and get applause. This crowd is applauding because either:

1. They cannot parse what he said clearly enough to see the fallacies inherent in that statement.
2. They are ignorant of history.
3. They just have so great an animus against GW that they would applaud him if he told them, "If elected, I"I'll throw all the Christians to the lions (who didn't vote for me)", "I'll bring back chattel slavery", or a real whopper like "I'll balance the budget, triple spending, but I won't raise taxes, except for the rich".
   
4. Or they figured out 1, know 2, and still believe it anyhow. (This category, I fear, is largely populated with those stalking/teaching in the halls of our great institutions of higher learning.)