Reflections II - American History

 Bill Clinton was the last genuine liberal Democratic Party President of the United. He balanced fiscal conservatism, with a pragmatic social liberalism that was described as the Third Way. In doing so held back the radicalism of the progressives delaying it by a full decade until the Obama Presidency. This was his greatest achievement that supersedes the multiple flaws in his personal character.

If Al Gore would have talked to the people instead of down to them he would have been the 43^rd President in the United States. Unfortunately for him it wasn’t in his DNA and no matter how much he tried the more so it became apparent. Gore felt that the country needed a philosopher king forgetting that the nation was built on a disdain of any type of monarchy.

Clinton lived a charmed life in that he was destined to lead the nation during a time of relative political solitude. This afforded him the luxury of underestimating both the demise of the Soviet Union and its Russian offspring as well as the rise of Islamism.

Every US Administration since Richard Nixon (with the possible exception of Donald Trump) has worked tirelessly with short-sighted traded policies to transform China into an economic superpower.

The tragedy of the United States is that the very elements of tolerance and respect for freedom of thought and action will eventually be used to destroy it.

I have never understood why Americans from both sides require inspiration from so obvious a tainted figure as a politician. The absurdity of elevating these debauched souls to spiritual or emotional heights of standing can only lead to eventual disappointment as it frequently does.

Both George Washington and John Adams demonstrated great characters traits by their personal actions. Washington saw to it that the Presidency didn’t evolve into a monarchy while Adams, in his defence of the soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre, made the pertinent case that the accused deserves the best defence possible regardless of public opinion. In doing so they alternatively laid the bedrock for the executive and the judiciary.