2016 Feb 5^th

George Will, in his column today, claims that “One person who left Iowa having earned the nation's gratitude is Nebraska’s Senator Ben Sasse. He campaigned for Cruz, Fiorina and Rubio… and to…remove the Trump distraction.” As you know George Will is a fierce opponent of Donald Trump so he is naturally most impressed by anyone, particularly a Republican anyone, who opposes Trump; Senator Sasse’s views fall right in there. Will’s phrase, “having earned the nation’s gratitude,” is hyperbole of course, unless Will is confusing himself with “the nation.”

Will’s column was obviously written after the results of the Iowa caucuses were in and after the skullduggeries pulled by the Cruz campaign were well known. Cruz’ attempt to bully and frighten supporters into going to a caucus and voting for him by using a mailing stamped “Election Violation” in big red letters is not even mentioned by Will; it surely contributed to Trump’s low vote total and Cruz’ surge. Then there is the curious email by Congressman Steve King of Iowa that informed folks that Dr. Carson, another popular evangelical, was dropping out of the race and hoping that his fans would vote for Cruz. Will never mentioned that fraud either. The unexpected Cruz surge, according to Will, must be the result of young Nebraska freshman Senator Sasse’s efforts.

Further on in his column Will has this to say: “Distributional conflict is written into the arithmetic of economic sluggishness.” (Perhaps Will could include a brief concordance at the end of each column.) He goes on to cite the surging debt and the “entitlement state” without ever suggesting an increase in taxes to reduce the debt. He cites Steve Jobs who became a billionaire by producing “Apple products that make Americans happy” while ignoring Sheldon Adelson who became a billionaire by owning and pandering to less family friendly gambling interests.

Cal Thomas also has a column in the paper today. Thomas is a 73 year old white evangelical and quite opposed to the changes in the heterosexual culture that began over the past dozen or so years. Thomas also cites a right wing conservative think tank in his column today. He claims that the Gatestone Institute is “non-partisan;” If that’s true then so is John Bolton, the former Bush recess appointment as US Ambassador to the United Nations. Bolton is an enthusiastic and vigorous right winger whose appointment as Ambassador to the UN had to be a recess appointment if it had any chance of succeeding; so much for Cal Thomas citing this outfit as “non-partisan.” Thomas joins Pat Buchanan in his rejection of what he calls multi-culturalism. We have seen this before in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 which prohibited any immigration of Chinese and was not repealed until 1943. The Chinese were also very different from the rest of us. Of course the new immigrants are reviled because they are Muslim. Whether or not they pose a risk to democratic society because of their religion or whether they pose a risk disproportionate to their numbers because of their lack of education and wealth remains to be seen. Thomas and Buchanan have already decided the issue…and who is surprised?