However, if you are not exactly thrilled with the results of our public school system but you think Huckabee is your man, I encourage you to (as Moderates are prone to suggest) keep an open mind and give me a chance to make my case. As a refugee from the public school system and having mastered the 12 Step Program of "Catcher in the Rye Syndrome" the attempt to save our culture one remedial reader at a time, I believe I have the credentials to challenge your populist love affair with Mr. Huckabee.
A good populist, as defined by Merriam-Webster is "a believer in the rights, wisdom, or virtues of the common people." And as Rush Limbaugh likes to point out, we common people know who we are. Common people are authentic and genuine and expect it in others. However, as evidenced by our failing public schools we might want to consider that the great guy sitting next to you singing "Bringing In The Sheaves" with robust enthusiasm who also serves as principal at the local zoo of a school might not be a living saint. A thoughtful consideration of the parable about the tree and good fruit and bad fruit might be your assignment for tonight. (Okay, so I haven't fully recovered from my teacher status.)
The point I want to make is that a person can be an authentically shallow person voicing the right platitude at the required time like the proverbial typing monkeys. Given time, an authentic commoner who needs real action in solving a problem can recognize trite platitudinous drivel for what it is: WORTHLESS.
Welcome to the school campus run by Mr. Fluffy. We teachers call our principal, Mr. Fluffy because we never know what's going to happen because emotions guide our helmsman. Parents may wonder how young girls cutting their "mystery meat" with a knife brought from home or boys who draw a gun on a piece of paper are arrested and then suspended from school. But yet a troubled student can walk into a class and shoot at will. The answer to your query is a local Mr. Fluffly who agonizes over everything petty while also extending Christian forgiveness to serious infractions or problems.
When a teacher has had it up to her French twist with a disrespectful student, Mr. Fluffy strives to prove he's more Christian than she is, forgiving our dear student of all his sins and infractions. Mr. Fluffy twists the golden rule sideways by loving the enemies of others. Mr. Fluffy grins and joshes with the classroom's little hellion, making said hellion promise to not cause Miss French Twist anymore trouble, and then Mr. Fluffy pats him on the back and sends him on his way. Mr. Fluffy then continues on down the hall with the air in his head making a whistling noise come out his mouth. This is your local zoo school and one prime reason of how it got that way.
But, how does this connect to Huckabee you might be asking yourself. Read the "brilliant" foreign policy thoughts of Huckabee and think not of foreign policy but of the state of our public schools.
The United States, as the world's only superpower, is less vulnerable to military defeat. But it is more vulnerable to the animosity of other countries. Much like a top high school student, if it is modest about its abilities and achievements, if it is generous in helping others, it is loved. But if it attempts to dominate others, it is despised.
Huckabee just gave truth to the upside-down world of our failing public schools by supporting the notion that successful students are to be despised. This is prime Mr. Fluffy territory. Do you know of a situation where the campus thug bully attacked the good and righteous student and both students were punished? Have you heard murmurs of a good and righteous student being lectured to not be so good and righteous because it only antagonizes the bad and unrighteous?
Well consider this: if the achieving student is urged to downplay his natural ability and the underachiever is not only forgiven his predatory tendencies but actually rewarded by seeing the gifted student degraded, then how on earth can worthwhile education be happening on that campus? Mr. Fluffy firmly believes the righteous will be persecuted by the unrighteous, but he mistakes his religion for his job assignment, which is to foster an environment of learning and safety on his campus - NOT to allow his religious beliefs foster a sort of fatalism that allows the big ones to eat the little ones with impunity. That's not Christianity, that's Christian/Nihilism!
To apply Mr. Huckabee's standard of public school principal to American foreign policy would be disastrous. Imagine Mr. Fluffy as President of the world's lone super-power; agonizing over the petty issues and good o'l boy-ing tyrants and dictators. Listen carefully to Huckabee's silly meaningless platitudes and realize that to a fluffy Principal/President, those brave students in Iran with the "Live Free or Die" banners are the same as the gifted student striving to succeed according to his God given ability. While professing that it "grieves his heart", a fluffy President knows it is the protesting students who must be quiet for the greater good.
This is simply the application of Huckabee's top high school student example put into practice on the world stage. A Fluffy President knows best and it's the bad guys with the weapons that must be pardoned for their sin, because a Fluffy President is able to love our enemies more than he respects his own common citizen.
If Mr. Huckabee never considered this application of his foreign policy statement, then I suggest his shallow introspection is not the quality of a great man much less that of a potential President of the United States of America. If you did your aforementioned homework assignment you now understand why you can't pick a ripe juicy fig from a thistle because there is a difference between benevolence - the desire to do good things - and beneficence - the actual accomplishment of something useful and good for another common man.
Class dismissed.
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