How to End the Obama Recession in One Easy Video Lesson

Wouldst that everyone in Congress understood free-market economics as well as this fellow.

I Like the Way This Cruz Fellow Thinks

Here's Senator Ted Cruz's response to the State of the Union speech.

I couldn't have stated it better myself. It's almost as if Senator Cruz reads this little blog.

252 Reasons Why You're An Idiot If You Voted For Obama

That's really not the title of this post from Danfromsquirrelhill.wordpress.com. That would be Obama supporters will go hysterical over this well sourced list of 252 examples of his lying, lawbreaking, corruption, cronyism, etc.

It's long but worth your time. Even better, if you show it to someone who voted for him (or any Dimocrat for that matter) and their head explodes, you get extra credit.

Chick-Fil-A Day and the Tea Party

By now, you've probably heard about the rousing success of yesterday's Chick-Fil-A Day show of support for the fast-food franchise and their right to free speech.

Here's a short round up of reactions I ran across this morning.

From Fox News,com - Mike Huckabee is a happy man.

Another Fox piece - Boycott about so much more than a chicken sandwich. This is notable for the author's nod to the displaced reality that is today's world of politics. "We live in a day when right is now wrong and wrong is now right." Gosh, you could almost name a blog after that, couldn't you?

From the Weekly Standard.com - New daily sales record for CFA.

Oh, and the Tea Party reference? That comes from Gay Patriot.com.

And the snark begins - At SooperMexican, Mitt Romney picks Chick-Fil-A Cow Mascot for VP!

Here's a roundup within a roundup from DaTechGuy. His analysis goes into a bit more detail, with good linkage throughout. Dimocrats, all of whom lined up to blast CFA with their brand of totalitarian hatred for traditional American values had better be afraid. Very afraid. "Even worse for the left what are the odds people willing to stand in line for hours to get a meal for the sake of principle will not stand in line to vote when November comes along?"


The Chick-Fil-A Trip Ben Howe never expected.



And then you've got this guy who wants the whole world to know just how big of a jerk he is.



Projection, thy name is Progressive. The guy that made this video needs to take a good look in the mirror. That's where he'll find hatred.

My take on the success of yesterday's buycott: this is the sleeping giant that the Left has awakened. It is the Tea Party. It is the Silent Majority. It is America.

As the Progressive Left tries to tear down the country, they have become more emboldened. Notice that not one Republican mayor or councilman has waded into this issue except to voice support for freedom of speech and Mr. Cathy's right to express it.

We're at the point that every great civilization reaches where the subversives gain voice, through deception and lying, and seek to destroy the very framework that allows them the freedom to dissent from society. No country can withstand an internal assault for long.

This is a universal truth: If we don't impose our values on them, they will impose their values on us. Rahm Emmanuel's display of anti-American sentiment, as well as his disregard for the Constitution he swore to uphold are but the latest examples of the intolerance of the Progressive Left. If left unchecked and unchallenged, we will be tyrannized. It is already beginning.

Do I have to say that Rahm and his Progressive buddies are unfit for office and should be removed as soon as possible?

There are many more of us than there are of them, as yesterday's long lines showed.

It's time for us to begin imposing our American values in the ballot booth and vote out every Dimocrat we can find.

Every single one.

ABC Must Fire Brian Ross and George Stephanopoulos

It certainly didn't take long for ABC News to try to pin the horrible Midnight Massacre shooting on the Tea Party. Brian Ross and George Snuffleupagus are both guilty of media malpractice in finding the first person with the name of the shooter in the area, seeing the words "Tea Party," then proceeding to smear their reputations and the movement itself by attempting to connect them.

There was no connection whatsoever. This is a clear case of libel, for which ABC, Ross and George should be sued, well and often, with the goal of bankrupting those responsible.
Here's some links to this:

ABC News Must Fire Brian Ross.

Brian Ross has pulled this shit before.

Enough is enough. Fire them and boycott ABC, ESPN, and Disney. Contact these companies at the phone numbers in this link and demand action.

Here's the clip of the Progressive Pravda and their false insertion of the Tea Party into this tragedy.



Instapundit weighs in.

Here's some truthful snark (with Spanish subtitles!)

(all links courtesy of BadBlue)

The wronged man speaks of his "surreal day."

The Tea Party speaks out.

“We call on ABC News to immediately stop all reckless and false reporting, and we are putting all media outlets on notice that false political attacks on the American people will no longer be tolerated,” said Jenny Beth Martin, the national co-founder of Tea Party Patriots.

While this is nothing new, that left-wing news organizations would adopt Pravda's method of mind-control to sway the weak, what is new is that we have a whole lot of people ready to counter their false smears and expose their anti-American agenda. And before you think, "This is just one incident, they just got it wrong," and that is correct, it's the pattern that matters. This is how they work.

It may appear (and will be explained away) as a simple mistake. Don't be fooled.

They think you're an idiot. That's why they do these things. That's why they don't value the truth, or the pillars of reporting: What, When, Where, and Who.

It's all opinion, all the time for these people, disguised as news. News is one thing, opinion is something else. Don't confuse the two, ABC.

The Lamentations of the Wisconsin Women

What is best in life?

After yesterday, Conan, you can also add Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's recall win.

And the lamentations, especially this one:

This poor girl can't even get the numbers right about campaign spending. And maybe, just maybe, a few public employee union members got just a bit fed up with their union dues money going towards a political candidate they don't support. Or maybe the Midol hasn't kicked in yet.

For me, this is the Official Beginning of the Conservative Preference Cascade. It will progress into a tsunami as the November general election approaches, and will sweep the first wave of Progressive/Communists from power in Washington. It'll take a while to complete, but it will be done. We will regain our national political sanity. There's nothing like a good dose of epic failure from dabbling with socialism to wake us up.

Outstanding! Good job, Wisconsin. Ride the Wave!

UPDATE! : Hitler finds out that Scott Walker won the Wisconsin recall election...

One Christian Value I’d Like to See in Government

If you frequent political sites on these here Interwebs as I do, you read a lot of comments from others. Some of them make sense, some don’t.

If you try to be an informed voter, you occasionally venture into hostile territory to read what’s going on. If you’re a conservative, this means bravely venturing to sites like Daily Kos and Huffington Post to find out what the extreme left wing pundits have to say about political life in these United States.

It’s also an intellectual exercise to compare your beliefs against others. A testing, if you will, between what you know is right in your heart and the latest in leftist ideology.

I try to be as objective as possible, as I’m sure you do. I like being accurate in any personal assessment of an issue. Truth is what I’m looking for.

That’s why one comment I ran across the other day tends to stick with me. Since I do read quite a bit, I can’t remember where it was that I saw this comment. They all become one big blur after a few hours.

Anyway, that comment went something like this: “Republicans are evil because they want to impose a Christian theocracy on America. They want a preacher or a policeman on permanent duty in your bedroom to make sure you only do sex their way. They want America to become some Puritanical Utopia with them in charge, all the laws would be thrown out and replaced with Biblical law, women would all be barefooted, pregnant slaves of their husbands and children would all be mind-numbed robots lumbering in a trance to the Christian school/gulag where they would receive the latest lesson in how to hate everyone who’s not exactly like them, just like it says in the Bible.”

Really?

It’s a sad day when anyone in America thinks that way about their fellow countrymen and neighbors. I’d like to think that the commenter was merely using high snark, but I’m afraid I know better. I’ve seen far too many comments of this nature to think that’s the case.

The biggest problem with that isn’t the commenter’s apparent lack of knowledge of the Faith. It’s the fact that, like many Americans, they’ve been bamboozled into believing what someone else has told them instead of using their own experience. They’ve bought into a false image that someone else has concocted in order to elicit that exact response.

It’s the same thing that the leftist-controlled media has done with Sarah Palin, Dick Cheney and the Tea Party. We had a name for this tactic of making people believe things that aren’t true back when we had a common, identifiable, very real and present enemy named Russia: propaganda.

Propaganda was something we considered ourselves incapable of here in America. “That can’t happen here,” was the common belief thanks to our sense of national unity. However, that was then, this is now. As the line between opinion and reportage has been blurred over the past twenty years or so, it’s become more difficult to separate fact from fiction.

You really need to examine the validity of anything you read or hear for yourself. This requires an inner foundation of Truth, a standard separate from your emotions, that tells you the difference between bullshit and not-bullshit.

But, I’m digressing. Sorry.

You see where I’m going with this. You’re expected to swallow everything your betters in Washington and their lapdog media tell you without examining the truth of what they say. And if you disbelieve them, well, then there must be something wrong with you. After all, who doesn’t want to fit in with all the really cool people?

So, where was I? Oh yeah, Christian values in government.

There is one Christian tenet I would like to see those in Washington use: The Golden Rule. You know, the one that says to treat others the way you want to be treated.

I’d really like to see our elected officials use this just a bit more than they do, especially when it comes to my tax dollars. I don’t like to see my money wasted on things that have already proven to fail, like “green energy.” Or societal engineering. Or fundamentally transforming the country. Thanks, but I liked it just the way it was, especially when we had a good economy, full employment, cheap energy and groceries, sorta like we had just a few years ago.

I’d like to know how Warren Buffett would feel if I were to take a percentage of his money from him and use it in a way I knew he wouldn’t like, wastefully.

Simply because I could.

Friday Bits of Tid - Birth of the Ford Falcon Edition

On today's date in 1789, Congress founded the U.S. Treasury.

Today also marks a milestone in American automotive history. On this day in 1959, Ford Motor Company introduced the Falcon, America's answer to imported cars. I have some hood time with this model, it was solid, well built, and easy to work on. Those that came with the 289 c.i. engine were particularly peppy. IMO, the Falcon pre-filled the niche that the venerable Mustang would later occupy.

And speaking of Mustangs, Dear Santa Claus, I've been a very good Boy this year...

Which reminds me. If you're of a certain age and worked on cars, you can remember when most engines were designed with the distributor at the rear of the block. When you did a tune-up, you spent some time in the uncomfortable position of leaning into the engine compartment installing and adjusting the points.

It's some sort of cruel engineering joke that most modern cars have the distributor on the front of the engine in a very accessible position from which to perform maintenance. There's just one thing: no maintenance is required. Go figure.

Anywho, it's been a wild week. They're still cleaning up after Irene, which thankfully fizzled out and wasn't too big. The biggest political news was Obama scheduling his speech to a joint session of Congress on the night of a Republican presidential candidate debate that had been planned for months.

The British would call that "bad form."

Heh. The twelve NASCAR Chase drivers from last year have been invited to the White House to be honored. Five have scheduling conflicts and won't make it. BackwardsGal is tickled that her favorite driver, Carl Edwards, is among them.

Man steals tractor and drives it drunk. The next day, the tractor was unavailable for comments, as it was nursing a hangover. I'm here all week, try the veal.

Alcohol and politics rarely mix. Pennsylvania's wine kiosks have lost over $1 million taxpayer dollars. "It has shown that, with the aid of modern technology, the government can lose money while selling a highly popular product over which it has a monopoly."

Aging superheroes. (h/t to David Thompson)

Some good news about our current situation. It's in response to Mark Steyn's new book, After America: Get Ready for Armageddon, which Steyn notes as a caution, not a certainty, America is not the Titanic.


And finally, laser pointers aren't just for kittehs anymore...



Y'all have a good Labor Day weekend, y'all.

The Reply from Steven Denning

I almost forgot to tell you guys, but the author of the Forbes article I posted last Tuesday for your reading assignment, Steven Denning, graciously responded to my email. I had asked him if he knew whether or not foreign governments were actively subsidising industries in order to give an unfair advantage to our competitors.

The short answer is, while not ruling out the possibility, he couldn't be sure whether that had happened or not. Perfectly understandable, since many of those countries are pretty hush-hush about their policies and practices anyway. I had hoped that as a writer for Forbes, he would have access to a larger database of information than I do here.

Anyway, I wanted to thank Steve for his reply and also his great series about a subject that is near and dear to my heart, the manufacturing sector of our economy, the resurgence of which I firmly and passionately believe is in our best interest to nurture and promote.

Did the Tea Party Score a Victory in the Budget Battle?

It appears as though there’s finally a debt deal in Washington, although I can’t say for sure at this point. There’s only one way to tell, given the sclerotic nature of rhetoric that spills forth from career politicians: if both sides are grumbling, that means we have a deal.

Yay! I think.

What is clear is that the issue of an ever-growing federal government is finally being brought to the nations’ attention. Maybe some of our friends who don’t normally pay attention to these things will start to notice that Washington long ago outgrew its britches and now plays a much larger part in our economy than it was ever intended to by the Founders. And for those that don’t, when they suddenly discover they can’t buy such innocuous items as 100-watt light bulbs in the stores starting next year, that might help them understand this whole government-has-become-way-too-big thingy.

Or so I hope.

Anyway, it appears as though the Tea Party made its presence felt on Capitol Hill and embarked on its quest to reduce the size and intrusion of the federal government. And no one felt it more than Speaker of the House, John Boehner. He submitted plan after plan and members of the Tea Party refused to back his capitulation to the big spenders up there.

Understand what the word “compromise” means in today’s political environment: radical, far-left Progressives (but I repeat myself) propose ever-increasing ways for the government to control our lives through legislation, and Republicans just try to slow it down with counter-proposals that still increase the size, scope and intrusion of Washington. That’s some compromise, huh?

For a quick review on how the right and the left view this deal, here are a couple of links. First, there’s this from Mark Thiessen at the Washington Post, “How the Tea Party “hobbits” won the debt fight.” And here’s the leftist view from Yahoo News, "How the Tea Party won the Deal.” Note that you will be dumber for having read that one, filled as it is with such stupidity as this,

Given how much the Bush tax cuts have contributed to the deficit (and how little they’ve spurred economic growth), it’s mind-boggling that they’ve apparently escaped this deficit-reduction deal unscathed.

And this nonsense,

Obama, like FDR, had a reasonably successful first two years: a stimulus package that while too small for the circumstances was still large by historical standards and a health care bill that while subpar in myriad ways still far exceeded the efforts of other recent Democratic presidents.

If by successful, you mean strangling the economy by growing government by over 30% and passing laws at a pace not seen since the Great Society days of the Johnson administration, then by all means Obama has been a success for big government advocates. For the rest of us, not so much.

I’m proud of the Tea Partiers for standing on principle. The midterms elections last November were just the start of what I hope will be a conservative revolution in Washington. I’d like to see such careerists as Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and others of their ilk removed from office. Along with them, I’d also like to see Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, and John McCain primaried and replaced with true fiscal conservatives who will actually think about the effects of their actions upon their fellow citizens.

That’s a lot, I know, but I think it can be done. After all, who had even heard of Marco Rubio and Col. Alan West two years ago? I keep up with these things and I had never heard of them.

Hope springs eternal. And this budget battle only serves to make it bubble even more.

And while I’m on the subject, I’d like to put to rest those of us on the right who think that we need a third party in the 2012 Presidential election. This is a supremely bad idea, one that saddled us with somebody named Bill Clinton thanks to Ross Perot’s third party candidacy. Although he didn’t wreak havoc on our economy, he would have had he been elected at any point in time other than right after the Great Ronaldus Magnus. There’s no doubt that he benefitted more from the policies and subsequent economic boom of the Reagan years more than any other leftist president.

And make sure, Bill Clinton was, and is, a radical leftist. Remember the photo of him signing a bill while both Cloward and Piven looked on? If that doesn’t give you pause, knowing today their strategy for collapsing our government and economy through wildly irresponsible spending is in full, I don’t know what would.

This fight over the budget is a small victory to be sure, but it has established a precedent in Washington. We’re no longer talking about how much government will grow, we’re not talking about cuts in the rate of increase of government (which is how those on the left define the word). We’re talking about real live cuts, cuts that you and I have made in our family’s budget, where there is a real reduction in spending.

Naturally we want more. I look forward to the day when we hear politicians start speaking of something called “baseline budgeting.” This radical concept (or radical in Washington, at least) starts the budget from zero, not last year’s budget. This small change is grand in scope. What it means is that each department is examined for what it really needs, not what is has received in the past.

We’ll know we’ve made the kind of true progress towards sanity in government when that day arrives. It’s coming, and it’s coming because no one is able to escape the results of not doing it.

It’s like that old saying, “You can ignore reality, but you can’t ignore the results of ignoring reality.” And career politicians have been ignoring reality for way too long.

Economy Monday – Obama Demands Concessions While Offering None

It’s Monday, boys and girls, and you know what that means when it comes to the wrangling over the Federal budget: not a lot got done over the weekend.

Oh, words were tossed about. President Obama continues to try to cast himself as the adult in the room, an image that the public is finding increasingly transparent. And by transparent, I mean that we can see right through it. Keith Henessey has a good post on the weekends’ lack of progress to solve our current fiscal crisis.

If you listened to the Sunday talk shows, particularly the ones on the so-called Mainstream Media channels, you’d just hear a recitation of all the White House talking points and very little in the way of real information. Personally, I can’t flagellate myself that way, especially when I know what needs to be done, as does everyone else.

I was reminded this weekend of a famous quote by former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher who once said that any British housewife could balance the budget. In that same spirit, any American could balance our budget. As I’ve stated before, Washington’s budget is no different from the budget of most American households, except there are a lot more decimal places and zeroes.

But you’d never know that if all you listened to were the MSM Sunday shows. Those alleged purveyors of knowledge leave out much more than they include when it comes to their reporting and their opinions on the budget battle. Bob Shieffer on CBS’ Face the Nation tried to corner Senator Marco Rubio on the issue yesterday. Rubio responded by saying this,

"The way the deal is currently structured right now, it gives the President the ability to raise the debt limit. But as I've said already on the problem; The debt limit is not really the problem here, the problem here is the debt.


"The debt limit is actually the easiest part of the problem. It's one vote away from being solved. But, if all we do is raise the debt limit and it's not accompanied by a credible solution to America's debt problem, we're in big trouble."

What you won’t hear from the MSM is the simple fact that the Democrat-controlled 111th Congress, led by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, is directly responsible for this crisis, along with President Obama. With Democrats in full control of the White House and Congress, they ran up our debt to stratospheric heights. We were told at the time that these increases were temporary. Now, President Obama is trying to make them permanent, all the while still managing to blame his predecessor for a problem that he created.

Not only that, his recent citing that some 80% of Americans favor tax increases has been proven false. In fact, Ace points this out rather adroitly in his dissection of an NPR poll where they gather one set of opinion statistics and report something completely misleading. Nice work, there.

Another voice of reason in this debate is Charles Krauthammer. He’s been making the rounds of the political talk shows with one question. When confronted with the false MSM talking point that it’s the Republicans who are blocking the path to negotiation of a budget solution, he now asks the liberals, “Where is Obama’s plan?”


(h/t to Newsbusters.com)

That’s the best way to shut up liberals: confront them with facts. Works every time.

What’s needed is what I call The Neo Plan to reduce the budget. “Cuts, lots of cuts.”

There are plans out there. Curiously, President Obama chooses to ignore the recommendations of his own Simpson-Bowles Commission while he criticizes the Ryan plan. If you want to see a credible plan that imitates what you or I would do with our own budget mirrored at the federal level, be sure to check out this link from Financial Times, Lawrence Solomon: A Tea Party Budget.

I shall tease you with this,

First, scrap government departments that overlap with functions traditionally and primarily met at the state level, and that often do more harm than good. The country’s educational performance declined after the federal government imposed its educational priorities on the states, which have the prime responsibility for education. Scrap the Department of Education, a failed Carter-era experiment that had its roots in president Dwight Eisenhower’s desire to imbue the education system with Cold War thinking, and out goes a US$77-billion annual expense. Likewise, scrap all or parts of the Department of Energy, the Small Business Administration, the Federal Transit Authority, Federal Highway Administration, Housing and Urban Development and other federal areas that intrude on state and local responsibilities. Apart from the dollar savings from eliminating duplication and cancelling perverse projects, the quality of public services is likely to rise when the former federal functions move closer to home in state or local government, or become privatized and are delivered in the private sector.

It should be noted that the Department of Energy has one useful function: there’s a lot of military research and development that goes on there that shouldn’t be cut. That’s the part we need to keep.

One important thing to remember in any budget talks is this: when liberals and even so-called moderate politicians speak of cuts to federal programs, what they call a cut is actually a cut in the rate of increase of funding. That’s built in to the budget, sometimes to allow for inflation, sometimes for population increases. It doesn’t take much to see that an ever-growing federal budget is a given, and is a big part of why it’s out of control.

What’s needed are drastic cuts, meaning real, live reductions in staff, salaries, and benefits for these bloated bureaucracies and, at a minimum, a moratorium on any new regulations combined with a thorough review of the effectiveness of those regulations. Just like President Obama promised, but hasn’t done. It's almost like he has no idea how the economy works.

Also, note that President Obama has not offered up one single concession of his own. At no time has he suggested even one of his signature programs for cuts. Not the Stimulus, not ObamaCare, not the bailouts of the auto companies, not the student loan takeovers, nothing. All of his programs must remain in place unaltered.
Who’s being the rigid ideologue now?

A Tale of Two Flag Burnings - A Watershed Moment for America

Something happened Wednesday that you should know about. Before I show y’all the videos, I need to relate the whole story to you as best I know it.

It began when a Columbian student enrolled in Louisiana State University, upset at the death of Osama bin Laden, decided to protest the United States early on May 2 by defacing the LSU War Memorial, cutting down the American and LSU flags and setting fire to the American flag. From Gateway Pundit.

An LSU student wanted as a suspect in connection with the damage of the school’s war memorial, which included the burning of an American flag, has turned himself in to school police, according to the university.


Isaac Eslava, 23, a resident of Baton Rouge was being sought for two counts of simple damage to property, one count of arson, one count of theft and one count of resisting an officer.


Eslava holds dual citizenship for the United States and Colombia. During the early morning hours of May 2, the LSU War Memorial was damaged. The flag mast rope was cut down, the United States flag set afire and the LSU flag stolen. An LSU staff member alerted LSU Police, who responded to the area. LSU Police located the suspect nearby, but was unable to detain him.


During this initial response, police recovered a stolen vehicle, which was used by the suspect. The LSU flag was recovered from inside of the vehicle along with drug paraphernalia, a clothing item belonging to the suspect, and red and black spray paint.


LSU Police Detectives later identified the suspect and recovered the knife suspected to have been used to cut the rope. The knife still had flag mast rope fibers along the blade. Detectives also learned that on the same morning The Venue Apartments located north of campus were vandalized by graffiti using red and black spray paint and were able to connect the suspect to the crime.

He is shown here shortly after his arrest.




This incident prompted graduate student Benjamin Haas to stage his own protest of Eslava’s arrest by attempting to burn yet another American flag.

This is what Haas had planned to say during his protest (from lsureville.com),

"I initially began this flag burning protest to define due process for students and suspected terrorists alike, to call on LSU and universities across the country to defend basic human rights and avoid putting students into the criminal justice system when it can be taken care of internally," the pre-written text of Haas's speech read. "In the name of peace, there will be no flag burning today. This country and the flag that flies over it stands for freedom, democracy, love, peace and the ability to question our government.”

Haas seems oblivious to the facts surrounding Eslava’s arrest. Eslava did not burn his own flag. He was arrested for destruction of property, vandalism, arson, and theft. Due process was carried out in accordance with the law. Note that Haas wants to “define due process.” He needn't worry his pretty little head about that: wiser souls have already done that for him.

His concern for suspected terrorists is oh so compassionate. Too bad he doesn’t hold such compassion for the innocent victims of terrorism.

As a staunch Alabama fan, I’m contractually obligated to say, “Is this what they teach at LSU?”

Anyway, in a massive show of patriotism and non-violence by the student body and others, Haas’ protest didn’t quite go as planned, as the following video shows.



Bill Ayers was unavailable for comment.

This is a watershed moment for the country. This demonstration shows just how badly outnumbered the radical left is, despite their seeming prevalence on the major news outlets of the MSM and in academia. I detect one of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals being revealed, “Rule 1: Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have. If your organization is small, hide your numbers in the dark and raise a din that will make everyone think you have many more people than you do.”

As the videos show, the crowd of counter-protesters was vast, vocal and raucous. And also non-violent. And indicative of the left’s true numbers.

They're also aware of their rights. (language warning)



This is all kinds of good. The Formerly-Silent Majority has found its voice, thanks in no small part to the Tea Party movement. Personally, I’d like to see more of this type of protest where the radical left is shouted down as the poseur hypocrites that they are. If they’re so disillusioned with the US that they feel moved to protest yet they take full advantage of the freedoms and opportunities that abound here, then they should be shouted down, loudly and non-violently. If they find America not to their liking, they are free to leave us in peace and relocate to another country that’s more in line with their decidedly anti-American views.

Remember that it was Socrates who originally said, “America, Love It or Leave It.”

Or words to that effect.

Note: This should have been posted yesterday, but got eaten by the Interwebs.

False Characterizations of the Tea Party and Why They’re Inaccurate

I’ve been wondering about something lately (there’s that damned curiosity thingy again). Why is there so much criticism of the Tea Party when the facts consistently prove otherwise? Rush kind of touched on this Monday when he talked about conservative critics of Sarah Palin. Ace sort of did the same yesterday, but from a slightly different angle. After all, SarahCuda and the Tea Party are pretty much inseparable.

Just as America gets a pretty bad rap worldwide, as do Christians, we’re in pretty good company. So there’s that. I can understand why America receives criticism from the rest of the world. The only thing they have to gauge us by is our TV shows, movies and music, which all generally suck. Hollywood seemingly ran out of ideas for good movies some years ago. TV shows about responsible Americans who love their families and go to work each day are about as engaging as watching grass grow. Shows have to be about things we don’t normally see or else why watch. As for our music, someone needs to explain to me how we got from “You Can Make It If You Try” to “Cop Killer" (language warning) in the span of one generation.
Oh, and politics. CNN, MSNBC, and the alphabet stations’ news reports paint a very different picture of the country that the one I see every day, for the same reason I stated above. If that’s all they have to go by, then their low opinion of us is warranted.

But that’s the rest of the world.

When it comes to our own national news coverage of the Tea Party, I can also understand the MBM’s criticism. They have dropped all pretense of objectivity and lean solidly to the left (if they don’t fall all the way over), and since they’re now the official Progressive Pravda, their attitude merely serves their interests. The Tea Party threatens their power. This is also the prevailing attitude of the self-appointed Republican elite for the same reason. To them I say “Dede Scozzafava.”

And they all say pretty much the same things when they criticize: TP’ers are dumb hicks, gun-toting, Bible-clingers who can’t think much beyond their next six-pack. Anti-intellectual. Racists.

And they all smell of elderberries.

Of course, those of us on The Inside know differently. Just as those who routinely pounce on Glenn Beck have never seen his show, these detractors sound more like one of the five blind men who grope at different parts of an elephant, thinking they know the whole animal. A well-reasoned critique is beyond them due to their preconceived notions.

The most recent charge leveled at TP’ers is that they aren’t very smart. Well, all I can offer up is myself. I do claim to speak up for the party. What do you think? If you’ve poked around in the archives here, you’ve seen a wide range of subjects along with some ideas for solving problems. I certainly don’t consider myself an intellectual in the traditional sense: I don’t have a degree from a fancy university and I certainly wasn’t born to a prominent family, although my folks have been here since before there was an America.

I identify with Mrs. Palin because I see in her many of the same qualities. She has street smarts. She’s what I call a “real world” person, grounded in reality, aware of what works out here. She doesn’t spend her time inside an office surrounded by lackeys. She hunts and fishes alongside her husband, loves her kids and thinks government should be run by average Americans. That’s how she entered politics, as a regular citizen. And for that, she is roundly regarded as stupid. As Rush points out, the same charge was leveled at one Ronald Reagan. Again, good company.

And we’re Bible-toters. Hmm, OK, guilty as charged on that one. But how is that out of the American mainstream when over 90% of us claim to believe in a Higher Power? And what’s wrong with having a strong moral foundation with which to measure the world and the people in it? It certainly serves me well, as I’m certain it does you. But there’s something wrong with that according to some. I hold no animosity towards others who believe differently as long as they do as I do and allow me to live my life in peace.

Here’s the one that really puzzles me: Tea Partiers are racists.

Really? Then how do you explain the election of Colonel Alan West? He’s black you know. Same for Tim Scott. How about Marco Rubio? His folks are from Cuba. Nikki Haley? She’s only the first Indian-American ever elected to a governorship. Maybe it’s just me, but if the Tea Party was so full of racists, as some contend, these candidates wouldn’t have even been considered for office, much less elected. So that pervasive argument falls flat on its little face like a drunken leprechaun. They all do under a bit of scrutiny.

Yeah, we get lied about a lot, but just a couple of facts show the detractors how wrong they are.

Random Observations on a Monday

I had a chance to visit downtown this past Friday evening. I hadn’t been there in a while, preferring instead to conserve finances. I found that I’m not alone in that desire.

Downtown was a literal ghost town compared to three years ago.

Back then, the sidewalks were full of mostly youngsters sporting the latest in fashion, real or imagined. Music blared from every other door, most of it from live bands. Wide-eyed tourists, eager for a taste of the real nightlife asked for recommendations, where are the best bands/drinks/food. The local constabulary was in constant view lest the human cauldron overheat and begin to spill over into the night. Despite signs prohibiting cruising, it was the place to cruise, with ridiculously expensive vehicles pawing the pavement at speeds they were never designed for. All of us out for a good time, to see and be seen.

Not this weekend.

Having lived here for over twenty years, I’ve learned this city’s rhythm. Once, there was literally no difference in traffic: it was horrible all the time. You were as likely to encounter a traffic jam at 2:30 am as you were at 2:30 pm. Now, even on a Friday night, the roads are nearly empty. As soon as rush hour concludes, traffic subsides dramatically. The city becomes yours.

Which is fine, if you’re an introvert.

America’s party is over.

Was it that long ago that we’d find an excuse to go out on a Thursday evening? In these parts, you’d hear the rumblings of motorcycles as they headed to their favorite watering hole for bike night, the preamble to a weekends’ revelry, to warm up the old liver.

If there’s one thing that the Obama Depression has done, it’s stopped our partying.

I also had the opportunity to talk to a friend of mine who owns a bar last week. She was near tears wondering if the bar she recently bought could make it through these times. Although I tried to give her some encouragement, I’m not sure I succeeded. Times are tough all over.

Many of my friends have noticed the same thing. They all mention the same haunting phrase, “I’ve never seen anything like this before.” Indeed, this is the longest and worse economic downturn that many who are younger than I am have ever witnessed. I remember other recessions, but because I worked in manufacturing, I always had a job. The demand for the hardware of modern life wasn’t as prone to the natural fluctuations of a capitalistic economy. People still needed cars, and TV’s, and computers, and dishwashers, and the odds of everyone running out of money at once were remote.

However, this is a different time. While I can’t speak for the rest of the country, it appears for all the world as though nearly everyone down here is out of money. One can easily picture an old western with tumbleweeds blowing down a deserted street.

This doesn’t need to happen.

There are reasons for everything. Not to get too philosophical, but there are economic laws and principles that just can’t be ignored. When we do (and by “we,” I mean our national leaders), we do it at our peril. Moreover, when we ignore those laws and principles, we create unnecessary misery and suffering. We’ve ignored them by proxy, by electing leaders who have no understanding of our economic system.

In a strange turn of the tale, we’ve been taken advantage of by our own trusting nature. We’ve trusted our leaders to have the same sort of values and principles that we hold in our hearts. We’ve assumed that those we’ve sent to Washington to act in our place wanted the same things that we wanted for our families.

We’ve been fooled.

As I’ve pointed out previously, we have in place today a ruling elite whose value system is not the same as ours. We value honesty, integrity, truthfulness, empathy, straightforwardness, and an ability to understand reality and deal with it in a mature way.

They, obviously, don’t.

I’m somewhat optimistic that things began to change for the better in last month’s midterm elections. American’s aren’t used to imposed and structured decline. How we managed to elect to the highest office a guy who thinks America’s best days are behind her and that she should retire while still in her prime is a mystery for the ages.

Why waste a perfectly good country?

We still have in place the framework for greatness. We still have the infrastructure with which to elevate ourselves and the world, to reduce poverty and disease, to find new medical treatments and cures, to add to the quality and quantity of our short time here on God’s Earth. All that is missing is leaders who want that for everyone, who will abandon their insane lust for power that infests the halls of our Capitol.

We need to recapture the essence of our country and restore the soul of America.

I have every confidence that we will.

The New Compromise in Congress

In the spirit of the coming conservative tsunami that is about to hit Washington, I’d like to suggest a new meaning of the word “compromise” in the American political dictionary.

For the past forty years or so, this word has meant, as Arizona congressional Republican candidate Jesse Kelly put it, "Bipartisanship in Washington means Republicans selling out their conservative principles in order to appear nice on MSNBC."

He has a very valid point.

The word conjures up an image of two political opponents hammering out details, first one and then the other, reaching some sort of middle ground acceptable to both, with the underlying supposition that what results is in the best interest of the country. However, candidate Kelly is quite correct to point out the reality of what actually happens: radical, big-government leftist lay out a plan to spend more of our money in order to make themselves look good to the people back in the home district so he or she is better able to be reelected. The conservative then must give in to whatever the liberal wants or else be smeared as “partisan” or “obstructionist” or some other name so the people back in the home district will reelect the radical, big-government leftist.

This is about to change.

The rise of the Tea Party in American politics is about the formerly “Silent Majority” speaking up to demand that our representatives in Washington start doing what we ourselves are being forced to do, namely "tighten their belt" and reduce spending. The days of wasting taxpayers’ dollars are nearing an end. Today’s voters are more engaged than ever and have more means at their disposal to monitor what Washington is doing. So the word “compromise” must change to accommodate the will of the people to reduce federal spending and cut out waste, fraud and the abuse of power.

So, here is the new meaning of the word.

In the future, liberals will be giving up their priorities to conservatives, who will start crafting common-sense allocations for programs. The compromise will now come from the left to the right side of the aisle, not from the right to the left, as is now currently done. Liberals will start cutting their budgets and justifying the remainder in an honest accounting of where the money will be spent. Budgets will no longer be based on the previous fiscal year, but will start from scratch to determine how much is actually needed. Zreo-based accounting, I believe, is the proper term for this.

Compromise will now mean that any government expenditure must be fully justified and meet a real need, or else it will be reduced or eliminated. The conservation of tax dollars will be the rule, not the increase. Big-spending, big-government liberals will begin to pare down their requests for funds in accordance with the new paradigm of a smaller, more responsible Federal government.

This new definition of compromise will also include a new twist on the words “partisan” and “obstructionist”. These terms will now be used to describe anyone on the left who wants to squander tax money. Things like the waste of taxpayer dollars on the study of ants will be brought into the light and those who propose such insults to the American people will be derided as the irresponsible spenders that they are.

The attitude of the American people is changing. Politics in Washington will change as a result. Business as usual will no longer be tolerated. We’ve tried the vapid promise of hope and change and it has been shown to be a gigantic failure, resulting in record high levels of unemployment, poverty, and federal debt, things that should never happen in the worlds’ number one economy. It's time to halt this very dangerous veer towards the radical left that Obama and his cronies in Congress have engineered.

As a reminder, if you haven’t already, pick a day to vote and let your voice be heard in Washington. And be sure to tell all your Democrat friends to vote on November 3rd.

Send an undeniable message to the corrupt elitists that we are coming to take back our nation. Bend to our will or get out of the way.

Tea Party Calling Thurston Howell III…Hmm, The Line’s Busy Again

UPDATED*

Last nights’ Republican primaries resulted in upset wins for Tea Party candidates running against established incumbents, with Christine O’Donnell being the biggest surprise, winning over long-time Delaware Representative Mike Castle. Other Tea Party nominees also won in New York and New Hampshire.

Heh heh, not too shabby for a party that technically doesn’t exist.

No official national spokeshuman. No official Political Action Committee. No money, at least compared to the national GOP and Dems.

Just ideas, and simple ones at that: Reduce the size and scope of government, be fiscally responsible, keep our friends close and our enemies within visual range, drastically reduce Washington’s footprint on our daily lives by sticking to a strict interpretation of our Constitution. You know, all that knuckle-dragging, far-right-wing-nut radical stuff that’s so old and worn out.

If there’s a down side to last night’s latest Red Wave, it’s the news that the GOP won’t be helping Christine O’Donnell in her battle for the Delaware Senate seat formerly held by the Democrat’s version of Forrest Gump, Joe Biden, proving once again that the American public is far ahead of the Washington establishment.

Why can’t Michael Steele and company catch up to mainstream conservative/American thought?

For years, conservatives have been told that they need to establish a “big tent” strategy to include as many folk as possible. Republican party leaders admitted that they'd allowed themselves to be mischaracterized as a tight clique of blue-blooded, aristocratic snobs for generations. Despite GOP support for such groundbreaking human rights legislation as the Civil Rights Act and the abolition of slavery, Democrats managed to portray everyone in the GOP as Thurston Howell III. This enabled them to appeal to a wider demographic as the party of the little guy and it worked for a long time, particularly in the South where I grew up as the product of a Dixiecrat. “There are always good times when a Democrat is in office” was a phrase I heard often from my mother.

Nowhere was this more evident than in George McGovern’s presidential campaign in 1972 when he famously lamented that fat-cat businessmen could deduct the cost of their three-martini lunch while Joe Six-Pack couldn’t deduct the price of his ham sandwich.

However, in recent years, the pendulum has swung in the other direction and Democrats are now the party of Big Money. Curiously, they still push the image as being a friend of the working man, even when the anti-Christ, billionaire George Soros, famous for his radical left-wing views and history of destroying entire country's monetary systems, is funding the Democrat machine. Think Progress and Media Matters are but two of his organizations committed to turning America into one of his holding companies with every American as a minimum-wage-slave, along with the aid of somebody called Barack Obama.

Our current recession/depression has had a profound effect on the national psyche, due in equal parts to the alarm of working folks losing half their retirement accounts overnight and all the spare time the large numbers of unemployed find on their hands. Everybody’s suffering in one form or another and this has led to a conservative awakening of epic, nay, Biblical proportions. The “big tent” theory wound up being a sort of Democrat-Lite version of the GOP where we were offered RINOs in large numbers in an effort to capitalize on the growing number of Americans who called themselves Democrats. The GOP was after the soft, chewy center of independent voters who just can’t seem to find their own set of values and tend to follow the crowd right off the cliff.

Today’s American voter has been the recipient of this Republican moderation, good and hard. Going along to get along with a Democrat party that has no interest in the little guy is what got us into this mess. The so-called “ruling class” is overwhelmingly left-liberal while the country leans to the right. This disparity has led to the outright political revolt that has become the Tea Party movement where RINOs are no longer welcome.

The issues are now what matters. The candidates’ track record is on display instead of their rhetoric. The nation wants action, not promises. We want a government that actually acts on our behalf, benefitting the majority and ignoring the delusional screams of the various left-wing radical groups and their manufactured outrage.

We want the tide to rise so everyone’s ship can get off this reef.

*UPDATE - John Cornyn pledges NSRC support for O'Donnell. Yay!

Dems Finally Give Up, Help Spread Tea Party Message

In a startling reversal of policy, the Chairman of the Democrat Party Tim Kaine will announce a new advertising strategy aimed at helping the Tea Party promote its agenda of smaller government initiatives.

From the Talking Points link above:

The Democratic official insisted it's "not a gimmick or just a creative way to mock Republican ideas." The official said the point is to teach voters "what Republicans really believe and what their blueprint for governing is."

It's really heartening to see someone come to their senses. We knew it was only a matter of time.

Oh, and thank you, Tim Kaine. You're doing the country a big favor.

It's not hard to understand the reasoning that went into this decision. The Democrat-controlled Congress is looking up to see the bottom with an 11% approval rating, among the lowest on record. Democrat candidates trail in poll after poll. And what was only a pipe dream two years ago now appears to be a possibility, that Republicans could regain control not only of the House of Representatives, but also the Senate too.

And it only took eighteen months of one-party rule for the country to decide it's had enough. You could argue that Obama had a mandate to "fundamentally transform" the country, but you'd be wrong. What the Dems and this President failed to realize is that their supporters are a rabid, radical, fringe of society who don't hold American values such as freedom and honesty in high regard. Another thing that was missed in the mad rush to turn America into a third-world banana republic was that there are rules laid out in our Constitution that are specifically designed to restrain excess power grabs by any one branch of the government, rules that are currently being ignored.

The examples of mismanagement and failure are embodied in the Gulf oil spill. The initial reaction took weeks to formulate, and when it finally was implemented, there was confusion and chaos. We found out, for example, that the emergency spill response plan of the Clinton administration after the Exxon Valdez spill had not been executed, nor even tested for readiness. Numerous offers from foreign governments were refused, the Jones Act was not waived, oil skimming equipment was not to be found, badly needed skimming boom sat unused in warehouses, the list goes on.

Add to this the voluminous bills passed against the will of the people like the Healthcare Bill, TARP, the Financial Overhaul bill and others that now have Washington in control of some 70% of the economy, and it's little wonder that the American people are fed up with the Obama administration and the Pelosi-Reid Congress.

And so, we welcome the Democrats over to the Light Side of the Force. Here's their ad -



As with many fresh efforts, their message needs just a bit of tweaking. Here, I'll help.

1. Repeal the Affordable Care Act (Health insurance Reform)

This about right. We had a perfectly good method of healthcare that only needed some minor adjustment, not a gigantic new government bureaucracy. This is already negatively affecting small businesses and should be repealed and replaced with a free market solution that includes tort reform and interstate competition.

2. Privatize Social Security or phase it out altogether

Social Security will become insolvent much sooner than anticipated. We need a viable alternative that has the ability to be financially self-sufficient. President Bush tried to tackle this problem, but was denied and demonized by the Dems. It cannot and will not be phased out altogether.

3. End Medicare as it presently exists

Doctors are already turning away Medicare patients because they're losing money. See the solution at No. 1 above.

4. Extend the Bush tax breaks for the wealthy and big oil

Democrats are currently debating this very idea. Common sense tells you that you don't raise taxes during a recession/depression unless you want to damage the economy even further. And the phrase "big oil" is just there as the old anti-establishment saw that paints big companies as automatically evil and wicked, so drop that. Anyone who has a private retirement account probably has oil stock in their plan, so if you want to make retirees suffer, go right ahead.

5. Repeal Wall Street Reform

This is another power grab by Washington. This bill has far too many hidden goodies like racial quotas and government "oversight" and should be repealed. Didn't we have enough financial regulation already? It would be better to repeal this bill along with the Community Redevelopment Act that created the housing crisis. This idea just doesn't go far enough.

6. Protect those responsible for the oil spill and future environmental catastrophes

Sorry, Tim, this phrase is just plain, old bullshit. Hit the delete key on this one.

7 ,8, 9. Abolish the Departments of Education, Energy and the EPA.

Now you're talking. Keep these ideas, they have real merit.

10. Repeal the 17th Amendment which provides for the direct election of senators

This is also good. As we continue to rediscover our history, we're slowly finding out just how much of our Constitution has been perverted. This is one of the most egregious abuses of power during the beginning of the Progressive Era in the early 20th century. The Senate was previously elected by state assemblies to assure that the states' interests were properly represented in Washington. As we are finding out to our great dismay, Washington seeks to override the states at every opportunity. A prime example is the illegal immigrant problem in Arizona.

Overall, though, this is a move in the proper direction. Tim Kaine is to be applauded for his efforts to inform the American public and make us all more engaged in our political process.

Tom Friedman, Snark Does Not Become You

The New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman says he's been trying to understand the Tea Party.

Um, Tom, you have a bit more work to do.

His understanding of Tea Partiers leaves much to be desired. He thinks the movement should Go Green. He thinks we need an energy manifesto that he has so graciously offered to supply us.

How nice.

It's really sad when someone who isn't well versed on a subject attempts to write cute little things about it. Friedman advances the notion of a "Patriot Fee" of $10 dollars per barrel of imported oil.

If we put a Patriot Fee on all of those imported barrels, we would use less, cease enriching bad regimes, strengthen our own dollar, make the air cleaner and the climate more stable, foster the exploitation of domestic and renewable energy sources, promote electric vehicles, help bring down the global price of oil (which hurts Iran and helps poor Africa), and we could use the revenue to shrink the deficit. It’s win, win, win, win, win, win ...

Really? Is this what passes for intelligence within the halls of the Grey Lady, or has someone spiked the water cooler with hallucinogens again? Does not common sense tell him that our modern mode of living involves energy? And that a growing population requires ever-increasing amounts of energy to make and maintain that lifestyle?

Tom, try this as a solution: Free the market to explore and refine oil. You know, let energy companies do their jobs. It's what they do best, unlike politicians. Think of the jobs that would be created. Think of the tax money that could be made instead of spent. Think of the low energy prices we could have and how that would be reflected in our national cost of doing business with other countries in this global economy

He then goes on to tout the benefits of the job-killing Cap-and-Trade legislation that was supposed to be introduced today, but has been shelved due to the withdrawal of one of it's key sponsors, Lindsey Graham.

Friedman thinks the Tea Party should be all about supporting yet another multi-trillion dollar bill that would do nothing to improve our energy development. He quotes Joe Romm, author of "Straigh Up";

The reason a Green Tea Party should coalesce to support this bill, argued Romm, is because it will set a price on carbon pollution and help foster commercialization of clean technologies — like hybrids, batteries and solar — at sufficient scale to enable the U.S. to rapidly ramp up when the seriousness of climate change becomes inescapably obvious to all.

In other words, both Friedman and Romm support the government imposition of massive taxes in order to force the development of technology that doesn't yet exist, unless you count nuclear and hydro-electric power, which have been resisted tooth and nail by radical environmentalists for over thirty years. This misguided bill will only reult in the loss of capital and American jobs to other countries who have far less restrictive regulations, thus defeating the stated purpose of the bill.

Ask yourself if anything the Obama administration has implemented worked as advertised. Cash for Clunkers, anyone? We're only now finding out the true costs and real-world effects of the Obamacare bill. What we're discovering isn't good, and certainly not what was promised by its supporters in Congress.

Also lost on these two is the news that the theory of man-caused climate change has been thoroughly disproven. Yet they persist in continuing as though climate change was real.

Sorry, Tom.

As for your next column, please try to keep up with current events and write about something you know. Your condescention towards your fellow countrymen is costing your company a great deal of money.

Sunshine State Pols - Desperate and In Denial

Two of Florida's political figures are in the news today: Alan Grayson and Charlie Crist. Do we hear about them because of their goals for America and Florida? Do they have plans to solve the many problems that beset us, like record high unemployment, the soaring debt, or a nuclear-armed Iran?

Sadly, no.

In fact, the reason we're hearing about them is sorta the polar opposite. In Grayson's case, what we hear is his disregard for the people he claims to represent by calling them mentally ill. Psychological projection, thy name is Grayson. He stopped by the Ocala Star-Banner newspaper just long enough to disparage Tea Partiers this way,

It's an entirely incoherent message manipulated largely by the right-wing media," Grayson said. "I can tell you that they should be glad that Health Care Reform has mental health coverage, because some of them need it.

As one of his constituents, I'm extremely insulted by his inane comments. I've attended a Tea Party rally and found many kindred spirits: folk who (accurately) think that our government is unresponsive to the will of the people. And the evidence supports the Tea Partiers. Poll after poll show an overwhelming majority of the public disapproves of the direction Congress and the Obama administration is taking the country.

Grayson seems to think that we're just a bunch of brain-dead hicks. And in a way, he's right. We voted him into office, didn't we?

The other train wreck is Charlie Crist's Senate campaign. Now that polls show him still losing to Marco Rubio badly in the Republican primary after going negative in his ad campaign, Crist is looking not at what the people of Florida want (a conservative voice in Washington), or what's best for the country, but how he can finagle his way to a victory. Switching parties? No problem for someone who's out for his own gain, especially after he said in no uncertain terms that he was running as a Republican just a few weeks ago. If he does switch parties, he'll have damaged his reputation beyond repair.

Ask yourself if you can truly trust him in light of his willingness to contradict himself. Will he do what he says he will do? Sure doesn't look that way. If he can't keep his word on the little things like remaining loyal to the Republican party, how can we trust him in Congress?

It's truly sad that politics in our great country is populated with the likes of Grayson and Crist. They are prime examples of the type of people we don't want in Washingon.

If we are to right this mighty ship of state, these two must be left ashore.

Heh. 4 Out of 5 Americans Don't Trust Big Government

This is heartening and helps to explain the rise in popularity of the Tea Party movement. A Pew Research Center poll shows the distrust that everyday Americans have for a large, invasive government. According to the results, this doesn't bode well for incumbents of either party up for reelection in the next few election cycles. Only 22 per cent of Americans say they trust government almost always or most of the time. Congressional approval numbers have fallen by half in one year, down from 50% to 25%.

And this little statistic directly refutes former President Bill Clinton that if you don't like the current administration, then you are automatically on the verge of exploding into a blind rage at the next public gathering:

Despite the attention captured by demonstrations and other expressions of anti-government sentiment, Americans’ feelings about the federal government run more toward frustration rather than anger. In the current survey, 56% say they are frustrated with the federal government, 21% say they are angry and 19% say they are basically content.

(Emphasis mine, for those in the LSM who have trouble reading)

Hmmm, could someone be advancing a false notion of the Tea Partiers? I wonder...