If
you could submit just one question to be asked of President Obama
during a televised presidential debate, what would it be? Once you have
formulated your best idea, ask yourself this: do you think any of this
year's line-up of debate hosts and moderators would ever actually ask
your question, as you framed it? Your answer, I am sure, is almost as
self-evident as is the importance of your imaginary debate question.
The questions that matter most are precisely the ones that will not be asked, and for that very reason.
For all the analysis that has been, and will be, devoted to explaining why so many Americans -- and not only knee-jerk liberals, but also a lot of self-described moderates and conservatives -- fail to see the primal menace in Barack Obama's presidency, one simple fact probably explains it all: most people pay no attention to such "analysis" and instead get all their political information from mainstream sources (from 60 Minutes to The Daily Show to the morning coffee klatch programs) that will never broach the issues that seem most vital to those who actually think.
To clarify, when I say "think," I mean it in the strict sense of using one's rational faculty to seek understanding -- i.e., to dig through the rough rock pile of transient "facts" and words in search of the firm ground of principle and purpose that lies beneath. That difficult work is what leads people to a knowledge of ultimate causes, or at least to formulating trenchant questions that might take us to a more fundamental layer of the rock pile.
For all the analysis that has been, and will be, devoted to explaining why so many Americans -- and not only knee-jerk liberals, but also a lot of self-described moderates and conservatives -- fail to see the primal menace in Barack Obama's presidency, one simple fact probably explains it all: most people pay no attention to such "analysis" and instead get all their political information from mainstream sources (from 60 Minutes to The Daily Show to the morning coffee klatch programs) that will never broach the issues that seem most vital to those who actually think.
To clarify, when I say "think," I mean it in the strict sense of using one's rational faculty to seek understanding -- i.e., to dig through the rough rock pile of transient "facts" and words in search of the firm ground of principle and purpose that lies beneath. That difficult work is what leads people to a knowledge of ultimate causes, or at least to formulating trenchant questions that might take us to a more fundamental layer of the rock pile.
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