Has America Become Decadent?

Once Rome was the glory of the Western World. It created the largest and most prosperous empire Europe has ever seen. But then Rome fell. After centuries of decline, it was over-run by barbarian invaders and so thoroughly dismantled that it took over a millenium for the continent to recover.

For many years, historians contended that the cause of this debacle was “decadence.” They argued that the Roman people had abandoned their moral core and hence were unable to muster the resolve to fend off disaster. Sadly, there is much truth to this verdict.

In the case of Rome, the Republican virtues of steadfastness, patriotism, and honesty were forsaken in favor of luxury and selfishness. Rather than lead the legions to victory, its patricians preferred to recline on couches sipping wine and noshing on peacock’s tongues. Meanwhile, the plebeians were content to live off the dole, biding their time in a haze of free bread and circuses.

The question we must now face is has the United States come to this same pass? Have we too, after a century of political and economic dominance, succumbed to a similarly fatal decadence? The end is not yet upon us, but are the barbarians knocking at a gate that is no longer being defended?

It is certainly true that many Americans no longer subscribe to the values that made our nation great. They—especially the liberals—believe that our democracy is bankrupt and that our market system is inherently unfair. Instead, they would like us to emulate the West Europeans and embrace what they call “social democracy.”

To see what is happening, we need look no further than the last line of our national anthem. It proclaims that America is “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” But is this true? Are we as a people still living up to these values?

Our recent election argues otherwise. Thus, a majority of Americans voted for a president who rarely praises the virtues of liberty. To the contrary, he prefers to fly the standard of “social justice.” By this he means that our federal government has a duty to enforce his version of fairness.

Barack Obama and his supporters believe that the federal government must be our keepers. They are convinced that the rest of us cannot make good decisions unless they (our liberal leaders) guide us in the proper direction. This, of course, translates into ever more regulations and a larger burden of taxes.

The bottom line is that in exchange for safety ordinary citizens are asked cede their personal freedoms. Genuine freedom, it is assumed, inevitably leads to mistakes and unfairness, and therefore cannot be tolerated.

As to demonstrating courage, what greater failure of nerve can there be than voluntarily surrendering one’s right to decide to a bevy of strangers who insincerely claim to have our interests at heart? Free peoples do make mistakes, but they also have the intestinal fortitude to correct these without resorting childish helplessness.

Thankfully our military has not yet gone spineless. The bravery our soldiers and sailors have shown in defense of our liberties has been exemplary. And yet we have an administration intent on hollowing out our armed forces. Yes, there are words in tribute to their heroism, but then comes the budgetary ax.

A truly brave people, a truly free people, would be up in arms at these trends. They would be outraged by the lies they have been told and by the diminution in personal and national power they have suffered.

But no, many Americans are evidently more worried that the federal government has yet to provide them with free contraceptives. Nor were they willing to celebrate the business success of the truly good man who sought to lead them.

Amazingly, citizens who continue to assume that they are the hope of the free world have opted to be led by the nose by a false prophet and his ignoble disciples.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

Fighting the Good Fight

In his biography, My American Journey, Gen. Colin Powell tells us that a leader must go out and fight the dragon every day. He then adds and “sometimes the dragon wins.” Well, the dragon won Tuesday last.

Millions of Romney/Ryan supporters watched helplessly as millions of their fellow citizens—most, no doubt, well-intentioned—tore the moral heart out of our shared nation. When the dust settled, the dragon of unrepentant Liberalism had been provided another four years in which to trample over our lives, liberties and sacred honor.

My heart was broken as I witnessed the most sleazy, dishonest, and mean-spirited political campaign (since the drubbing of Barry Goldwater) prevail over decency and competence. The voters had been cheated, mislead, and manipulated; nevertheless many of them opted for ideological purity over common sense.

Now there will be hell to pay. Foolishness and naiveté have consequences. I know this sounds like sour grapes, but I am willing to go on record and predict another four years of economic stagnation, punctuated by a renewed recession, and diplomatic weakness, perhaps interrupted by a Middle-Eastern Holocaust.

The evidence that Barack Obama and his minions have misgoverned this nation has long been visible to those willing to open their eyes. Many, however, evidently preferred to be lulled into an ideological siesta. For them, unpleasant truths have no allure; hence these are driven from consciousness.

But that is no reason for those of us who care about the future to give up the fight. Yes, we have sustained a devastating setback, but no, it is not fatal. One thing I have learned in the course of living many decades is that, as Powell implies, loses are part of life. They must be endured, and, if at all possible, reversed; that is, if one is to maintain one’s integrity.

Nonetheless, it must also be acknowledged that victory is never ensured. However worthy a cause, it may not triumph. But that does not mean that we should give up. Moral uprightness and an allegiance to the truth matter. They are so important that a bloody nose sustained in their defense is worth the pain.

So how long will the fight go on? How long will Liberalism be allowed to grind our shared fate into the dust? No one can be sure, but some crucial struggles have persisted for centuries. Unfortunately, this means that many of us will never witness the conclusion.

In the meantime, the battle must be joined. There are many more clashes ahead and if they are to be won, they must be entered with a clear head and a firm resolve. This is no time for recriminations or Monday morning quarterbacking. Rather, it is a time for planning and organizing.

As I am sure Powell would also acknowledge, if you wish to defeat an enemy, you must know that enemy. It is not enough to cast aspersions on those with whom you disagree. We who have been defeated this time around must understand, and counter, the reasons so many folks were attracted to the other side.

It is also essential to understand our own strengths and weaknesses. Winners do not allow themselves to be deceived by rose-colored glasses. Nor do they over-estimate the comparative resources of their opponents. Instead, winners seek to make the truth their ally.

And so I say to readers who are as disappointed as I: It is time to gird our loins. There is work to be done and tactics to be rethought. The good news is that those who have snatched an unwarranted victory from a hard-fought fight tend to be over-confident. Assured of their superiority, they frequently double-down on their mistakes.

If this is what Obama and his allies are about do, they are sure to alienate many of the people who helped them to victory. What I am hoping—indeed, what I am counting on—is that there remains a reservoir of integrity and sanity in the American public that can be tapped in future contests.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

Political Conservatism: Liberal Style

Last week my wife and I attended a sociological conference in North Georgia. Along the way there we drove past innumerable lawns bedecked in Romney/Ryan signs. When we arrived at our destination, however, the political climate abruptly changed.

As many MDJ readers may know, academics, and especially sociologists, are notoriously liberal. For sociologists, the percentage leaning left is upwards of 95%, whereas for college faculty in general, it hovers between 80 and 90% (depending on how the measurements are taken).

What was different this time around was that enthusiasm for our current president was notably lacking. Most of the participants still intended to vote for Obama, yet no one—not a single soul—attempted to persuade my wife or me that he was superior to Romney.

One of our colleagues epitomized the prevailing attitude. He told a group of us that he had been scandalizing his associates by telling them that he was not going to vote for Obama. He just couldn’t. So whom was he going to support? Why it was the Green Party candidate.

In fact, nobody in our circle was faintly outraged by this. Even those who were strong Obama supporters sympathized his decision. After all they too could not personally imagine voting for a Republican under any circumstances.

As it happened, one of the conference presenters provided survey data on the voting preferences of North Georgians. Her respondents were primarily young—typically college students—but the results confirmed what other researchers have found.

It seems that most people vote as their parents do. This tendency is so robust that they frequently support candidates who do not share their values—that is, as long as they come from the correct party. This is true for both liberals and conservatives, so it is safe to say that in this respect both factions are conservative.

What also came out of the research is that a majority of voters do not follow the campaigns. Most do not know what the candidates represent because they don’t pay attention. They certainly do not engage in fact-checking to determine if what is promised bears any resemblance to what is liable to be delivered.

It turns out that large numbers of people, including otherwise sophisticated professionals, depend on what they think they already know. This was apparent in an exchange I had with a senior colleague. When I suggested that our society needed to move toward greater decentralization, he strongly demurred.

According to my challenger, we need further centralization because the federal government is the most “efficient” provider of social services. Only it, said he, can do the job. When pressed for evidence of this, he swiftly cited the Social Security system.

This reminded me of a conversation I had with another liberal professor several years ago. When asked to identify the chief benefits liberalism provided, he too mentioned Social Security. The other benefit he named was free public education.

The irony here is that these are very old ideas that are both now in deep trouble. Thus, Social Security is running out of money as the population ages and those who are working are unable to contribute enough to keep it solvent. Meanwhile, public education has remained stagnant despite our having more than tripled the resources poured into underwriting it.

These programs have indeed demonstrated their worth, yet the time has come for serious reforms. Nevertheless, most liberals refuse to entertain the idea that modifications are necessary. As symbols of their success, they insist that these remain unchanged.

But what is this other than “conservatism.” Liberals like to describe themselves as “progressives.” Yet this evidently does not mean they are prepared to embrace genuinely novel agendas. Like almost everyone else, they prefer to stand by the familiar and comfortable.

The same applies when they vote. When the time arrives to cast their ballots, most follow the pathways they always have—no matter what they say. This election will be no different.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University

The Picture of Dorian Gray--Obama Style

Stephanie Cutter, a pivotal member of the Obama campaign team, is an attractive woman. Fresh faced and corn-fed, she appears to have stepped out of a movie extolling the virtues of the American heartland.

But then she opens her mouth and the illusion is shattered. As one of the president’s most visible surrogates, she is routinely required to tell the most egregious untruths—a task she seems to perform with relish. Whether denying that she knew the man who accused Romney of murdering his wife or declaring that Mitt politicized the Benghazi scandal, her words and visage are sharply at odds.

This disconnect is reminiscent of Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. In the book, Gray is a man so physically handsome that an artist infatuated with his beauty decides to immortalize it for the ages. Dorian then sells his soul on the condition that this portrait age rather than himself.

Subsequent to this, Dorian lives a dissolute life of extreme hedonism. And sure enough, instead of his visage reflecting this gross immorality, the picture ages and becomes grotesque. Only in the end, when he resolves to reform, does he resume his actual exterior. But sadly this occurs after he stabs the portrait in the heart and in the process dies.

Dorian’s story strikes me as being paralleled by the unfolding saga of Barack Obama. Our president is also a physically appealing person who has sold his soul, in his case, for the sake of power. Only rather than seducing and destroying the lives of a string of individual conquests, he has seduced and injured an entire nation.

This, to be sure, is a harsh judgment. But there can be no doubt that Obama’s physical presence has beguiled millions of people. His radiant smile, his easy-going demeanor, and his “cool” persona have convinced many onlookers that he is the very incarnation of what a chief executive should be.

On top of this, Barack is unquestionably intelligent and has the rare gift of giving a compelling speech, despite the fact that what he says is often pedestrian. He can even get away with telling conflicting untruths in the same address because his listeners frequently respond to his spellbinding style rather than his substance.

But now Obama seems to have met his match. Mind you, unlike Dorian Gray, he shows no signs of having decided to reform. To the contrary, he continues to propagate untruths at a rate that beggars all of his predecessors. What has changed, however, is that these have become more visible.

The comparison between Barack and Mitt Romney has been devastating to the president’s image. Standing together, on the same stage, as they have during the debates, has revealed Obama’s shallow, mean-spirited, and dissimulating essence. In other words, his real self is being exposed.

During the debates it has also become clear that Romney is the genuine article. His knows his facts and is an accomplished problem solver who is comfortable in his own skin. Voters may disagree with him, but he is obviously a mature adult who means what he says. In other words, he is someone who can be trusted.

Once a person as intelligent as himself, but someone with actual achievements challenged him, Obama’s carefully crafted façade began to crumble. His honeyed words were unmasked as mere talking points. They might sound good to the uninformed; nevertheless they did not betoken a genuine understanding.

Far from it; they laid bare the sleaziness of the campaign run on his behalf—and with his sanction. Lest it be forgotten, Cutter’s excesses have been a reflection of his wishes.

Where this will end is not yet clear. Obama may still win re-election. But he will never again be seen as a knight in shining armor. His pretense of honesty and competence has been pierced. As a mere mortal, his warts are showing. Indeed, for many, he has begun to look ugly.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University