Victor Davis Hanson notes:

I think we are slowly (and things of course could change) beginning in retrospect to look back at the outline of one of most profound bait-and-switch campaigns in our political history, predicated on the mass appeal of a magnetic leader rather than any principles per se. He out-Clintoned Hillary and followed Bill’s 1992 formula: A young Democrat runs on youth, popular appeal and charisma, claims the incumbent Bush caused another Great Depression and blew Iraq, and then went right down the middle with a showy leftist veneer.

Second, we will come, through the Obama prism, to see that Bush’s sins were largely the absence of rhetorical skills, unfortunate shoot ’em braggadocio in 2003-4, the federal response to Katrina, and a certain administration haughtiness about the problems in Iraq between 2002-6, but not most of his policies that included prescription drugs, No Child Left Behind, AIDs relief in Africa, the removal of two odious regimes, and consensual governments in their places, a framework at home to stop 9/11-type terrorism, and good working partnerships with key allies abroad such as Britain, Germany, France, Italy, India, et al, and a pragmatism in handling rivals like Russia and China.

In short, given all that, Obama’s victory (predicated on painting Bush as a Hoover/Nixon redux), more so even than perhaps a John McCain’s, may do more for Bush’s reputation that anyone ever imagined. And the Mumbai mess (over there, not here) will only empasize all this, as an array of old 9/11-era experts who used to warn us about radical Islam, then, in the subsequent respite at home, screamed that Bush fabricated a war against terror against bogeymen, and now in their third manifestation are paraded once more out to warn us about?—why, yes, radical Islam!

Indeed – and, in fact, I’m sticking by my prediction that no matter who won in 2008, we will have cause to miss President Bush in the by and by, and probably not too long after he leaves office. Good, bad or indifferent, President Bush passed the main test of leadership: the ability to make a decision and carry it through. Most people like to dance around the edges when analyzing politics and power – as for me, I deal with the reality, and that mostly revolves around the supreme difficulty in making a decision, especially a decision upon which lives will be at risk.

The great leaders and captains of history are all those who made a decision – One has only to contrast the two British governments of the World Wars. The first had Churchill in it, but a man unwilling to make decisions at the top, and thus the British war effort of the First World War drifted into deadly failure only modestly redeemed by a victory of exhaustion at the end of the war. The second had Churchill at the top and able to make decisions and carry them through, and thus the British war effort in the Second World War had clear direction, much lower cost and eventual overwhelming victory.

If we had had a ditherer on 9/11/01, things would have gone a lot differently over the past 7 years, and almost certainly for the worse. It took courage to launch us into Afghanistan – that mattress grave of Empire; it took courage to secure our nation against outside attack; it took courage to liberate Iraq; it took courage to order the Troop Surge once the liberation of Iraq had transformed into an anti-insurrectionary struggle. Again and again President Bush has shown the courage to make decisions – and trust me on this, even if you think they were bad decisions, a bad decision is better than no decision.

Now we’re going to get Obama at the top – the man who voted “present” a very large number of times. The man who threw his whole early political life under the bus when it became a millstone ’round his political neck. The man who promised hope and change and has appointed the dregs of the worn out and corrupt Clinton Administration. It may be that Obama – blessed with youthful energy and a keen appreciation for politics – will rise to the occasion. It is to be prayed that he will – but, in the end, the only thing Obama may end up doing is making us long for President Bush.

While the Obamessiah may have been somewhat successful in selling the American electorate on the possibility of a neo-socialist government, the chances of a permanent left turn in American politics, if Chavez’ Venezuela is any kind of harbinger, are slim to none.

Frontline on PBS has an interesting show online called The Hugo Chavez show, which, wittingly or unwittingly, chronicles a host of paralells with and harbingers of what may come with an Obama administration.

In The Hugo Chávez Show, FRONTLINE producer Ofra Bikel and Ofra bike racks travels to Venezuela to offer an illuminating portrait of the Venezuelan president. Through interviews with former government officials, Chávez associates and ordinary Venezuelans, FRONTLINE chronicles Chávez’s ascent to power and his efforts to use the powers of the presidency to stay there.

The film also reveals the key role of the media—or, rather, Chávez’s savvy use of the media—in his rise to power.This report begins by introducing viewers to Aló Presidente—or “Hello, President“—a weekly televised show that often runs five to eight hours and features Chávez speaking directly to the people, explaining government policy and mixing in a smattering of songs, poetry and whatever else strikes his fancy.

“Chávez is easily caricatured because he can be funny; he can seem buffoonish on his Aló Presidente,” journalist Jon Lee Anderson tells FRONTLINE. “He sings; he gets involved in wordplay. … He’s probably the world’s first virtual president in the age of the communication revolution.”

Given the press’ coronation of “The One,” allowing him to amble about the campaign trail without delivering anything more than a softball, I believe that Barack Hussein Obama may well be the world’s second virtual president.

FRONTLINE investigates beyond the boundaries of the president’s show, discovering grand schemes that remain unfinished and a host of public officials blamed for any dissent. FRONTLINE interviews Nelson Mora, a committed community organizer who dared to raise questions about a government relocation plan and was subsequently humiliated by the president on live television. “At that moment, I felt bad. I closed my eyes and felt tears,” says Mora. “And I said, ‘My God, why does the president treat me like this, the commander in chief, the leader of this process?'”

Joe the Plumber, anyone? WGN Radio, anyone?

More paralells in the piece abound:

Yet it was Chávez’s keen grasp of the power of the media that propelled him to power, observers say. FRONTLINE recounts how Chávez got his first taste of the media limelight when he participated in a failed 1992 coup. Much to his military compatriots’ surprise, Chávez—who was commanding the group’s forces in Caracas—agreed to surrender in exchange for a chance to go on the air and address his comrades and the people. The failed coup would send Chávez to prison for two years, but the media exposure planted the seeds of a folk hero in the making.

“Chávez failed militarily, totally,” says Alberto Barrera, author of the international best seller Hugo Chávez. “But he triumphed in terms of public relations. The public Chávez who was born was born not out of a military or political victory, but out of the ratings.”

And the paralells get even more creepy:

Upon his release from prison in 1994, Chávez began laying the groundwork for his eventual rise to the presidency in 1998. The Hugo Chávez Show recounts the highs and lows of Chávez’s 10-year tenure. His political successes included pushing through laws that sent Venezuelan society veering to the left and injecting billions of dollars in oil revenue into socialist government programs.

But here’s where the rays of hope start coming in:

Cracks are also showing in Chávez’s much-vaunted revolutionary programs. In The Hugo Chávez Show, FRONTLINE speaks with workers in various socialized cooperatives who say Chávez’s government has failed to provide needed resources, or even to pay them for the work they have done.

“I am among the poorest people in Venezuela,” says cooperative worker Maria Rengifo. “The president has to know, in order to form a cooperative, we have to have income. … He has to know what’s going on. Why aren’t they functioning? Why aren’t they producing? Why isn’t there anything to produce?”

Welcome to Socialism/Communism 101, Maria. And welcome to Obama’s vision for America, my fellow Americans (whether or not you voted for him).

With frustration building and food shortages common, Venezuela’s crime rate has soared, with murders, robberies and kidnappings for ransom occurring frequently. “It’s shocking to come nearly a decade on and see that most of what Hugo Chávez was railing in anger about being left with—a failed society, misery, insecurity, unequal distribution of wealth—is still here,” Anderson tells FRONTLINE.

Obama voters (and unfortunately, the rest of us) are about to suffer a similarly painful lesson as Captain Candyman maneuvers the U.S.S. United States on a decidedly port-wise list.

Hopefully the American electorate’s tolerance for sea-sickness will be decidedly more short-lived than a decade, and a righting of the ship will take place in four (or perhaps even only two) years.

Meanwhile, sit back, and enjoy the “show.”

They wanted to have a baby seal clubbing tour, but liberals got outraged over the inhumanity of that:

In what could easily become the most offensive Christmas offer ever a Planned Parenthood affiliate is offering Christmas gift certificates. Purchasers can use them to give the gift of abortion even though the group claims that’s not its purpose or intent.

“Looking for an unusual, yet practical gift this holiday season? Planned Parenthood of Indiana (PPIN) is now offering gift certificates for services or the recipient’s choice of birth control method,” the abortion business says.

The gift certificates can be purchased in increments of $25 online at the group’s web site or for any amount at some of PPIN’s 35 statewide facilities.

While PPIN president and CEO Betty Cockrum says they can be redeemed for contraception, birth control and legitimate medical services like breast exams and Pap tests, they can also be used to pay for abortions.

“Why not buy a loved one a gift this holiday season that they really need,” Cockrum says in a press release LifeNews.com obtained. “The gift certificates are also a wonderful idea for that person in your life who puts everyone else first.”

“Please join Planned Parenthood of Indiana and give the gift of health this holiday season,” she adds.

According to Chrystal Struben-Hall, PPIN’s vice president, buyers of gift certificates can give the gift of death, too.

She confirmed to WISH-TV that they can be used for abortions, even though that’s not the intended purpose.

“They really are intended for preventative healthcare. We decided not to put restrictions on the gift certificates so it’s for whatever people feel they need the services for most,” she said.

Is someone you know about to be, in President-Elect Obama’s phrasing, “punished” with a baby? Well, here’s you chance to put a little hatred and death under their Christmas tree…

Get the picture? Have at it, boys and girls.

Want to go the way of Russia?

Authorities in the southern Russian city of Novorossiysk have scheduled a “week without abortion” in an effort to combat the country’s extremely high abortion rate.

During the weeklong event that began on Monday, doctors will not perform abortions in all but “the most extreme cases,” RussiaToday.com reports. The city’s maternity welfare center will hold open houses with information seminars on family planning as psychologists and gynecologists work with pregnant women to help prepare them for motherhood.

A hotline for pregnant women will also operate during the week, putting them in contact with gynecological experts in Novorossiysk.

“Doctors will do everything they can to stop women from doing the irreparable,” a city administration representative told RussiaToday.com.

The city’s universities will also screen films demonstrating the detrimental effects of abortion.

Russia’s abortion rate is among the highest in the world, with nearly 70 percent of pregnancies ending in an abortion. The Western Europe abortion rate is about 12 per 1,000 women per year, while in Russia that figure is 54 per 1,000, according to U.N. records on abortion rates.

In 2004 there were 100,000 more abortions than births.

Further, about 10 to 15 percent of abortions in Russia have complications, leaving about 8 percent of women sterile.

Right now, the pro-abortion fanatics are plotting their misbegotten and fraudulently named “Freedom of Choice Act” for President Obama’s signature. They hope to slip it through the legislative process and allow Obama to quietly keep his pledge to sign it. FOCA, as its known, will codify “federally funded abortion on demand” – a position held by only a tiny minority of Americans, but by using the word “choice”, the pro-abortion fanatics hope to impose their sick, anti-human worldview upon all of us.

FOCA means lots of things – it means that every Catholic hospital in America (about 1/3 of the total) will close their doors (no, not sell out to others, but actually close because we Catholics cannot materially aid evil); it means that doctors and nurses who refuse to participate in abortion may be held liable; it means that tax payers will be forced to perform abortions because abortion, under FOCA, is considered a basic human right…it means, in the end, that we’ll become a nation more in line with aborting children than bringing them into the world…much as Russia has been for the past couple decades, and now a desperate Russian government seeks expedient after expedient to stop the slow-motion suicide of the Russian people.

Abortion is the crowning evil of our age of legalized murder and lies. It is the only genuinely important issue we face, because if we cannot even see our way to welcoming new life into our society, then what worth is anything else we do? It must be stopped, and it will be stopped – and it is what we will fight on here and now and for ever, until victory goes to the cause of life.

Barcepundit is keeping close tabs on developments in this horrible crime.

It really is time that all people of good will band together to destroy this scourge of terrorism.

UPDATE: A Night Out in Mumbai is a frightening, first hand account.

This much, O heaven—if I should brood or rave,

Pity me not; but let the world be fed,

Yea, in my madness if I strike me dead,

Heed you the grass that grows upon my grave.

If I dare snarl between this sun and sod,

Whimper and clamour, give me grace to own,

In sun and rain and fruit in season shown,

The shining silence of the scorn of God.

Thank God the stars are set beyond my power,

If I must travail in a night of wrath,

Thank God my tears will never vex a moth,

Nor any curse of mine cut down a flower.

Men say the sun was darkened: yet I had

Thought it beat brightly, even on—Calvary:

And He that hung upon the Torturing Tree

Heard all the crickets singing, and was glad.

GK Chesterton

Lord, I thank you for your faithfulness and love.

I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all of my heart,

for you have heard the words of my mouth;

in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise;

I will worship at your holy temple.

Lord, I thank you for your faithfulness and love.

I will give thanks to your name,

Because of your kindness and your truth.

When I called, you answered me;

you built up strength within me.

Lord, I thank you for your faithfulness and love.

All the kings of the earth shall give thanks to you, O LORD,

when they hear the words of your mouth;

And they shall sing of the ways of the LORD:

“Great is the glory of the LORD.”

For all of here in the United States, the first thing we should thank God for is the fact that we are here – there are so many places of extreme suffering in this world, and we are almost entirely spared such things. Even the poorest among us has far more than most people in the world – think of it: a person of Darfur would gladly trade places with the most decrepit street person here in the United States. Remember as you gather with family this day that you are exceptionally blessed – and also remember that those who are given much are expected to give much in return.

After gratitude for that, I wish to thank God for my wife, my father, my in-laws and all my family, near and far. I wish to thank those who stand guard over me this day and every day, ready to do hard tasks on my behalf. I wish, also, to thank those whom I work with and for – in labor of all kinds there is dignity, and my gratitude for having a place of work, especially in these hard times, must impel me to do my best at all times. And, finally, I wish to thank you, dear readers, for your kindness and patience with my many errors – I pray you will continue to show me your kind attention now and in the future.

We conservatives, of course. It is my contention that when you are beaten in a political fight, you usually deserve it. John Hawkins notes:

Edmund Burke once said, “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”

The corollary to that statement here in the United States could be, “All that was necessary for the Democrats to triumph was for conservatives to do nothing.”

It’s fashionable to blame George W. Bush, the Republicans in Congress, and the out of touch, inside-the-beltway pundits for the ascendancy of Barack Obama and the left — and they certainly deserve the largest portion of the blame.

However, it’s worth taking the time to ask: what responsibility does the conservative movement — you, me, and all our conservative friends — have for this disaster?

Quite a bit actually.

We were too slow to challenge Republicans in D.C., including George Bush, when they veered from a conservative course. Yes, we complained, but not loudly enough and too late in the game.

We were also too complacent and too willing to stand pat on an out of date agenda. Consider the irony, for example, of conservatives using an income tax cut as a primary selling point for our domestic agenda when more than a third of the American public doesn’t pay income tax.

Along the same lines, we’ve been too content to advocate policies like the Fair Tax that couldn’t be gotten through Congress, or to merely poke holes in the Democratic agenda on issues like socialized medicine without truly pushing viable alternatives.

Conservatism needs to adapt to changed circumstances, that is for sure – we can’t go forward with the quiet dogmas of the past but must think anew and act anew. Conservatism has been, is and always will be the answer – but the applicability of conservatism changes as circumstances change. As a for-instance, we’ve won the tax battle – leftist Obama campaigned on a promise of tax cuts and hammered McCain very hard on the claim that his health care plan amounts to a tax increase. It is now time (and, indeed, has been time for years) for us to move beyond the mere debate over keeping taxes low and get into a debate on what should be taxed and when.

On and on down the conservative agenda, it is time to recast our efforts in light of the fact that we by and large won the battles of 20 years ago – we live in the economic and political house Reagan built for us and even the most ardent of liberal Democrats really propose no more than tinkering around the edges of it, plus socialized medicine. But we can bring the fight to them – provided we learn to be insurgent, and get fresh blood into our senior ranks, and propose bold, new initiatives to increase freedom, faith, family and prosperity.

I’m up for this debate about the future of conservatism, but I do issue one warning: let us not get into backbiting about who did what to whom. Such internecine battles only please our liberal opponents – clean slate, and lets start building a new conservatism for the 21st century.

The sad facts of life in Gaza:

As Palestinians stranded in Gaza face a humanitarian disaster due to blocked borders, Christians there also face beginning Advent without Mass.

Israeli authorities Sunday refused to allow the papal nuncio in Israel, Archbishop Antonio Franco, and two priests of the Latin patriarchate to enter Gaza to celebrate Mass.

The refusal came despite previous coordination with Israeli officials. The nuncio intended to celebrate Christ the King Mass with the faithful there. The parish in Gaza is vacant since the parish priest, Monsignor Manuel Mussallam, was allowed to leave Gaza last week after eight years to visit his family in West Bank.

Too many people hating, not enough people loving – and the problem confounded by people who refuse to see evil where it is. This is the result of decades of blindness – a Mass can’t be held because hatred and fear have masked human decency. The enemy laughs with delight. There is plenty of blame to go around in that area of the world, but the primary blame goes to those who fan the fires of hate – who delight in war and destruction.

God in heaven, grant us peace.