I did not watch the President address the nation live the other night, but thanks to the good folks at C-SPAN, I just watched it online (by the way C-SPAN folks, it is time for you all to abandon Real media and switch to Windows Media for your streaming!).

The real impression I get is one that I have known for a long time. We all must accept that George W. Bush is not a conservative. Now, I voted for Bush, twice. I supported him. I contributed to him. He was more conservative than Gore and Kerry, but he is not A conservative (think Reagan or Goldwater). Bush is a neo-con, socially moderate to liberal. He campaigned as a “compassionate” conservative. Translate “compassionate” to mean “big government spending.” Bush, a Republican, has spent more and created more bureaucracy than our party should ever have allowed him. We Republicans came to power on a promise of lower taxes, less regulation, smaller government, less spending, etc. Now that Republicans control the Congress and the White House, you would think that our causes and ideals would be making progress. Our initiatives would be passing one after another. The liberal weasels like Ted Kennedy, Chuck Schumer, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, etc., would be reduced to a bunch of impotent piles of rubbish in the corner. But no, in the Congress the liberal good ole boys are still running the show. In the White House, the President spends and spends, creates more red tape and bureaucracy, nominates “stealth” candidates to the Supreme Court, and generally acts weak, which gives the liberals even more energy and ammunition. I hate to say that it might be possible that we, conservatives, have been weighed and found wanting. But I need to revise that. We conservatives in the country remain the same. We’re the ones upset that we have been betrayed. Let me restate that previous line: The Republicans we conservatives have empowered have been weighed and found wanting. I mean, Tom Coburn is awesome. But he cannot overrule the rest of the Senate. Anyway, I am getting on a tangent, so I need to get back to the point at hand.

When a President’s ratings go down, the quick and dirty solution to raising them is to spend money on something the country will view as important. That is what I heard the President do in his Katrina speech. I believe that the President is a man of faith, and I admire him for that. What I have a problem with, even from a man of faith, is the use fo the federal government as the means of our Christian duty. We Christians have a responsibility to be charitable, to seek the alleviation of pain and need, to respond to severe tragedies at home, in other states, and abroad. The federal government has a function too. That function is layed out in our country’s foundational documents. One function the federal government does not have is to be the great Nanny in the sky that is to sweep in and save us all from all problems, be they self-inflicted, natural disasters, or otherwise.

I have a man in my church that I love to death, and he is always a stalwart against “knee-jerk” reactions, and that shows his wisdom. Very often, in response to crisis, people need to do something. They may not know what, but they need to do something. For example, a church may have a pastor that has some misdeeds. A church may respond to those misdeeds by adopting a policy or removing some authority from the pastor’s office. The problem with that is, every other pastor to serve that church will then be constrained by that other pastor’s misdeeds and not his own actions. There are ways to respond to crises other than knee-jerk reactions. You can examine the situation adn reach better conclusions, but knee-jerk reactions make us all feel better. It feels like we have done something.

The same goes for Katrina. None of us will deny that it truly was a disaster. But does the knee-jerk response by the President fix the problems? His initiatives may make us feel better; but do they fix the problems? None of what the President has proposed woould have stopped the disaster or the badly carried out response. The only thing the President mentioned is that the feds will be looking at the disaster recovery plans for all major U.S. cities. Need I remind everyone that New Orleans and Louisiana had beautiful, written disaster plans. They have circulated widely through the blogosphere. It is entirely likely that the feds could have looked at those plans and said they passed muster. The problem is with the integrity and character of elected local and state officials. Local and State government has become so political that many of the figureheads elected to local and state positions have no skills or abilities. They are talkers only. What should happen, the non knee-jerk reaction here, is for the residents of New Orleans and the rest of Louisiana to use this as a wake-up call. Katrina should have alerted them to the stature of the persons they have empowered. The citizens who were affected should rise up and reject the leaders who have failed them so desperately, understanding that it is not the President of the United States’ job to deal with local or even state disasters (at least primarily). I mean, do people seriously want their first responders to have to fly in from Washington, DC?

As a country, we have seen a huge shift from self-reliance (under our God), community, and states rights (and responsibilities) to a culture in which we rely on the Great and Powerful Oz that is the federal government to be our savior. This is more so in some states and regions that others, but it is hugely widespread. But, if we were the have a knee-jerk reaction like this in response to what happened in Louisina, it would weaken and damage the local and state governments in the entire rest of the country. I guess what I am saying is, don’t judge us all based on how Louisiana messed it up. Hopefully, other state and local governments (including mine) will take the hint and know that if they are not effective in their positions of authority, those of us who put them there will remove them, and that the feds are itching to take over.

I am not uncharitable. I just believe the federal government is not the best-equipped entity to offer help. And the President agrees with me. He pledged in his speech that, becasue of the disaster, people wouldn’t have to navigate government bureaucracy, and they would be eligible for tax relief. Here’s a news flash, if the federal government can lessen bureaucracy in the aftermath of disaster, it should be lessened period. Root it out and eliminate it. No one should ever have to navigate bureaucracy. The same goes for tax relief. What the President is saying is that taxes stifle business and entrepreneurship. That is true all the time, not just in the wake of a hurricane. Lower the tax burden on all of America and see how the economy will grow. Or better yet, let’s all force the adoption of the Fair Tax. All in all, I guess I am saying I would like the President to be more conservative than compassionate, simply becasue he equates compassion with spending $60 Billion that is not his to spend. There’s an idea, all those who think the government should be more compassionate with my money, how about you give some of your own for a change? “Oh, but that’s why I pay taxes,” they will say. And I say, “No it’s not! Go look it up.”

And so, it is because so many people are dependent on the government these days that it has become their religion. Department heads and bureaucrats have become their apostles and disciples. In only such a terribly mis-guided system of dependence could Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden and others of thier ilk be viewd as saints. People will naturally acknowledge from whence their help comes. That’s why many used to thank God. In our modern governmental climate, they just thank the government, and that is the extend of their religion. Now do you understand why government, and especially liberals, are so hostile to God? They don’t want the competition.