BY CHRISTOPHER G. ADAMO – While the civilized world rejoiced at the amazing rescue of the thirty-three Chilean miners after they had spent sixty-nine days trapped in a pit a half-mile underground, some shallow American liberals sought to make a bit of political hay out of the event. And though the despicable effort had no discernable dampening effect on the joyous rescue of the miners, it did offer a glimpse into the murky thinking of those on the left, going deeper than their shameless opportunism and revealing a disturbing level of contempt for their fellow citizens.
Chris Matthews, host of the MSNBC political show “Hardball,” is known for his gratuitous advocacy of the liberal agenda, often groveling and fawning to an embarrassing degree in the presence of its major players. It was Matthews who described the effect of an Obama speech as causing “a thrill” to go up his leg. But his assessment of the Chilean miners and their ordeal of the past ten weeks proves that as sickening as his past commentary has been, he can always be counted upon to achieve new lows. More significantly however, in a juvenile effort to disparage the Tea Party movement, he inadvertently divulged the extreme condescension and arrogance that ultimately drives the liberals.
According to Matthews, if the miners had acted according to the philosophy of the tea parties “they would have been killing each other in about two days.” Forget, for the moment, that Matthews sought to apply a mindset that he wrongly characterizes as “every man for himself” to a situation which the Tea Party movement has never addressed, or that his mischaracterization was nothing but a transparent attempt to redirect the positive outpouring of emotion over the stunning escape of the miners into a jab at a wholly unrelated political movement. Of far greater significance was what Matthews actually divulged about his regard for the human condition in general.
Upon recognizing their dire straits in the immediate aftermath of the mine collapse last August, the miners had only one purpose and goal, and that was basic survival even though it required existence at the most meager level. While they might dream of what they would enjoy doing, on the day when they arrived back above ground, the immediate situation warranted rationing of any resources in order to merely stay alive. In the interim, they were totally helpless and dependent, unable to do anything other than exist and wait for something better from above.
As a result, they did indeed form a fully cooperative and collective effort to ensure survival, and nothing more. Everything from food to space was rationed, and indeed the result was their mutual cooperation and survival, albeit in an extremely dire condition. The contrast between this mere existence and the enormity of experience and opportunity available in America, even for the common folk, is a concept that obviously eludes Matthews and his kind. The Founders understood it, and recognized that the greatest threat to fulfilling such a destiny arose not from a lack of resources, but from the spirit killing effects of an excessively powerful and self-serving government.
The promise of America was not built upon subsistence-level government rations of food and water for those consigned to living in a hole in the ground. Had it been so, the writers of the Declaration of Independence would never have enumerated such lofty precepts as the God-given rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Mere survival had been the lot of humanity throughout most of history, with a few isolated exceptions in which an elite few enjoyed plenty, while the majority of the peasantry meagerly got by on whatever crumbs were left.
In contrast, most of this nation’s history has been an ongoing sequence of building a better life for each subsequent generation, with the promise and opportunity increased as a direct result of the hard work and commitment of the previous generations. Only in the last few decades has a serious effort been undertaken to thwart this blueprint, and replace it with a paltry offering of a government supplied “chicken in every pot,” regardless of the preferences of those receiving the trifle, or their willingness to work for something better for themselves and their posterity.
In the past few years, the grim reality of this scenario has become frighteningly obvious. Every aspect of life in America is under assault, and facing an eventual reduction to the level of the rations offered to the beleaguered miners. From employment to healthcare, to the ability of any individual to better his or her lot in this life, the boundaries are increasingly set in place by government edict, with every effort being made to prevent motivated individuals from advancing above the status to which they might be consigned.
In recognizing the consuming arrogance of the left, as well as its abject hatred for a people who have historically been willing to elevate themselves from such depths through talent, diligence, and self-sacrifice, it becomes obvious why Obama and his minions would see the country fail financially before ever considering a reduction in taxes. The $250,000 threshold is, form an economic standpoint, purely arbitrary. But it does represent a good milestone by which to differentiate between merely “getting by” and truly flourishing.
Fortunately for the people of America, their plight was not determined by an unexpected engineering disaster, nor is their recuperation from this present catastrophe predicated on being physically removed from an entrapped condition. They have merely to recognize the malignant nature of those supposed benefactors who would provide subsistence in exchange for liberty, and to throw off such shackles once and for all. The opportunity to begin this national regeneration will be upon us in less than two weeks.