Now Its Obamas Turn - Road to the Middle Class

That’s been the story of the McCain campaign. It came to near death a year ago, and they were measuring him for his political shroud. But John McCain never gave up. Now he’s the Republican Party’s nominee for president.

Two years ago, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) set out on Barry’s Excellent Adventure. Against all the odds he beat the favorite in the early primaries and managed to eke out a win against a surging Hillary Clinton. That was Barack Obama out hunting.

But now it’s clear that the Obama campaign is in trouble. Against all the odds, what with the war, the economy, the housing mess, the gas price explosion, John McCain is just behind in the polls, and we haven’t seen the full convention bounce yet.

Today, on the day after the Republican National Convention it is Barack Obama who is being hunted.

Obama supporters should be glad of this.

Up to now, Sen. Obama has been a candidate with a good organization and a great style on the stump. He has introduced the age-old themes of Hope and Change in a new vernacular to a new generation. So far so good. But we don’t elect organizations to office, and we want to know a bit more about what’s on offer than the gauzy vision of Hope and Change. We’d like to know if Obama can lead.

Now that the Obama campaign is in trouble, we are about to find out. How good a leader is Sen. Obama when the going gets rough? Can he revise his tactics? Can he retire broken formations without the tactical retreat turning into a rout? Can he deploy new units into the gaps and advance?

Stay tuned. We are about to find out.

If Obama demonstrates an ability to learn from mistakes and come back stronger than ever he will deserve to be elected president.

If not? Well John McCain and Sarah Palin just spent three days in St. Paul, MN demonstrating that they are ready to rule if Obama isn’t.

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Christopher Chantrill blogs at www.roadtothemiddleclass.com. His Road to the Middle Class is forthcoming.

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Faith & Purpose

“When we began first to preach these things, the people appeared as awakened from the sleep of ages—they seemed to see for the first time that they were responsible beings...”
Finke, Stark, The Churching of America, 1776-1990

Mutual Aid

In 1911... at least nine million of the 12 million covered by national insurance were already members of voluntary sick pay schemes. A similar proportion were also eligible for medical care.
Green, Reinventing Civil Society

Education

“We have met with families in which for weeks together, not an article of sustenance but potatoes had been used; yet for every child the hard-earned sum was provided to send them to school.”
E. G. West, Education and the State

Living Under Law

Law being too tenuous to rely upon in [Ulster and the Scottish borderlands], people developed patterns of settling differences by personal fighting and family feuds.
Thomas Sowell, Conquests and Cultures

German Philosophy

The primary thing to keep in mind about German and Russian thought since 1800 is that it takes for granted that the Cartesian, Lockean or Humean scientific and philosophical conception of man and nature... has been shown by indisputable evidence to be inadequate.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Meeting of East and West

Knowledge

Inquiry does not start unless there is a problem... It is the problem and its characteristics revealed by analysis which guides one first to the relevant facts and then, once the relevant facts are known, to the relevant hypotheses.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Logic of the Sciences and the Humanities

Chappies

“But I saw a man yesterday who knows a fellow who had it from a chappie that said that Urquhart had been dipping himself a bit recklessly off the deep end.” —Freddy Arbuthnot
Dorothy L. Sayers, Strong Poison

Democratic Capitalism

I mean three systems in one: a predominantly market economy; a polity respectful of the rights of the individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and a system of cultural institutions moved by ideals of liberty and justice for all. In short, three dynamic and converging systems functioning as one: a democratic polity, an economy based on markets and incentives, and a moral-cultural system which is plural and, in the largest sense, liberal.
Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

Action

The incentive that impels a man to act is always some uneasiness... But to make a man act [he must have] the expectation that purposeful behavior has the power to remove or at least to alleviate the felt uneasiness.
Ludwig von Mises, Human Action

Churches

[In the] higher Christian churches� they saunter through the liturgy like Mohawks along a string of scaffolding who have long since forgotten their danger. If God were to blast such a service to bits, the congregation would be, I believe, genuinely shocked. But in the low churches you expect it every minute.
Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm

Conversion

“When we received Christ,” Phil added, “all of a sudden we now had a rule book to go by, and when we had problems the preacher was right there to give us the answers.”
James M. Ault, Jr., Spirit and Flesh

Living Law

The recognition and integration of extralegal property rights [in the Homestead Act] was a key element in the United States becoming the most important market economy and producer of capital in the world.
Hernando de Soto, The Mystery of Capital

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