Neal Boortz has some good comments on the Fairness Doctrine today:

Note, please, that whenever despots try to seize control of a government, and with it a country, they first seize control of the means of communication. How can you observe this in country after country with despot after despot engaged in coup after coup and not understand that this is exactly what our own politicians do when they try to increase their control over broadcasting? How will the Democrat's looming attempt to reign in talk radio be any different than Hugo Chavez' attempts to shut down opposition newspapers in Venezuela?

Any political attempt to silence political speech of your political opposition or to intimidate them is clearly against the intent of the first amendment - ensuring that opposition to politicians has a full right to be heard, including using the latest technology. Boortz also makes the observation that if the nonsensical idea of "public airwaves" is the basis upon which free political speech on radio stations can be regulated, newspapers are delivered on "public highways" and can also be regulated. I'd add that magazines use the "public postal system" and that even web sites use "public cyberspace." While certainly the government can regulate what is broadcast on radio, TV, etc., the idea of the Fairness Doctrine as a political weapon to silence your opposition is blatantly unconstitutional.

And guess which wing of the Supreme Court would be more than willing to accept the idea of the government having the power to regulate political speech over the airwaves?

As James Gattuso from the Heritage Foundation explained:

Arguments that the Fairness Doctrine is needed because certain types of media are too conservative, too negative, too partisan, or too anything actually strengthen the case against the regulation. Any law that is targeted at media based on the content of what is being said raises greater constitutional concerns and is much less likely to pass constitutional muster--and for good reason. Regulating speech in order to alter its content is exactly the sort of meddling that the First Amendment is meant to prohibit. It is simply not the job of politicians to "correct" the mix of opinions being expressed in the marketplace of ideas, even if--and especially if--they disagree with those opinions.

Liberals, if your basic commitment to the rights of citizens doesn't convince you the Fairness Doctrine is a bad idea, take note: the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations used the Fairness Doctrine to intimidate their critics in the media. You do not want to go down this path. Perhaps you'd like Obama's administration to have this power, but are you really that confident of success in 2012/2016?

Labels: politics

This election is not over for John McCain. The media likes to spin this as essentially over, but Republicans tend to do better than the polls indicate, and there are a lot of undecided voters in just about every poll. Many of these are undecided about both candidates, but overall, Obama represents the more radical departure and is not as likely to get those voters as McCain is. McCain would be, without question, a phenomenal commander-in-chief, and has been a model of bipartisanship for years. He is a moderate, and as undecided moderates make up their minds they will likely vote McCain. The only question is, will they actually go and vote, and will it be enough?

The other factor is Sarah Palin. The media isn't reporting very heavily, but she routinely attracts thousands to her rallies, while Biden attracts hundreds. I don't think the polling data is taking into account the attraction she has to women who do not regularly vote. If Obama is going to be turning out the African-American vote this year - a rather reliable voting block for Democrats, anyway - Palin will be turning out the "stay-at-home-mom" vote this year, a mixed voting block that can turn this election.

To be clear, many things have to go right for McCain for him to win tomorrow. But it is not impossible, and I'd venture to say that it is not even unlikely that he can win, especially with the polls trending towards him currently.

But with the way Obama's victory has been painted as a sure thing, be prepared for all hell to break loose if he loses. Riots, certainly. There are cities where riots happen when their sports team wins. But also the angry left will get a heck of a lot angrier, and they will (still) forget that the only Democrat to get elected President over the last 30 years campaigned as a conservative. The loss will be blamed on everything but the utter liberalness of their candidate.

An Obama win, however, could be even more devastating to the Democratic party. If Obama fulfills most of his promises - which will be likely given Democratic control of the house and senate - he will seriously erode the strength of the economy. The economy is weakening and on the brink for a full depression, and bad policies have a very likely tendency to just push it over the edge. They will still blame George W. Bush, of course, but after four years that will not resonate with voters.

Add any kind of serious foreign crisis - which Biden famously assured us will happen - and as Obama blunders it he will lose a lot of the luster he's built up for himself.

On top of that, I guarantee you that the Democrats will try to re-enact the Fairness Doctrine, in a move to silence conservative talk radio. Obama has said that he doesn't support doing this, but Pelosi and other congressional Democrats are big supporters of it, and will, at a minimum, try it. Doing so will ignite conservative opposition in a way the left has never seen, and will usher in huge changes in the election that follows (either 2010 or 2012).

In some ways, I'm interested to see how things would go with Obama as president. How nutty will the Democrats get, and how much will the media let them get away with? But in reality, I have to vote my conscience, and my conscience says this:

1) I will never vote for a candidate who supports partial-birth abortion, sucking babies brains out of their heads while they are halfway through the birth canal. Likewise I will not vote for a candidate who could not find it within themselves to take a stand and support the idea that healthcare must be provided to children born alive after a botched abortion. These issues speak volumes about the character of a person, even if they believe abortion should be legal.

2) I will vote for a candidate who has shown leadership in suggesting and supporting military strategies that result in more peace and stability, rather than the candidate who vowed to pull out troops, even if that meant chaos and instability in a country whose leaders we deposed after years of UN inaction. We do not need to prove Osama bin Laden right and act as a "paper tiger."

3) I will never vote for a candidate who believes that it is a proper role of government to "spread the wealth around."

4) I will not vote for a candidate who has a laundry list of radicals among his friends, mentors, and associates. Obama's frequent lies about his relationship to Jeremiah Wright, his refusal to release records during his college years, his shady dealings with convicted felon Tony Rezko, and his associations with radicals such as Ayers and Khalidi, all are sufficient reason to vote against him.

5) I will not vote for a candidate who thinks that unions should be formed without a private ballot - Obama's support for the (deceptively-named) Employee Free Choice Act is indefensible, and will encourage union organizer's intimidation of workers.

6) I will vote for the candidate who has promised to nominate judges whose desire is to uphold the rule of law, and interpret the Constitution and the laws of the land as they have been written, rather than the candidate who believes that the most important qualification for a Supreme Court justice is a "sense of fairness." If we continue to allow judges to rule as it seems fair to them, then none of our rights are safe.

As you can tell, most of my vote tomorrow will be against Barack Obama. I urge you to do the same.

Finally, there are many other races tomorrow that are worth watching out for, but there are two that I actually really, really hope for a Democratic defeat. First of all, if Al Franken is elected Senator that will represent, to me, the end of a sensible electorate. Second, John Murtha has still not been held accountable for his despicable verbal attacks on the Marines regarding the Haditha incident. Both of these races are close. If Obama wins and Franken and Murtha lose, I'll consider election day a draw.

Labels: politics

You absolutely must read this. Boortz expertly summarized the issues at stake in this election. After discussing some basic issues, he gets into the main concerns:

• Wright, Ayers, Rezko, etc. - "If Barack Obama was applying for a security clearance as a government employee, these associations would disqualify him. We are, my friends, about to have a president who doesn’t qualify for a security clearance."
  
  
• Tax Policy - "Obama didn’t wish to use the police power of the state to collect taxes necessary for the legitimate functions of government; he wanted to use his taxing power to promote some vaporous 'fairness' in our economy."
  
  
• Wealth Redistribution - "Just what percentage of voters out there do you think are going to vote for Obama simply because he is promising them someone else’s money?"
  
  
• Increasing Small Business Taxes - "It is not the percentage of businesses who will have to pay the increased taxes; it’s the percentage of the total of small business employees who work for those businesses." While 95% of small businesses have a revenue of less than $250,000 a year, those are largely the ones with 1 and 2 employees - they're also struggling, and quite often failing (many lasting less than four years). The other 5% with higher incomes are the "larger," more stable small businesses, and have many more employees. A large percentage of small business employees will be hurt by Obama's tax plan. When faced with increasing taxes, small businesses owners will typically cut expenses. And their employees are usually their biggest expense.
  
  
• Employee Free Choice Act - Obama wants to remove the secret ballot from union elections. "This is nothing less than Barack Obama and his Democrat pals legitimizing union intimidation in the workplace."
  
  
• The Supreme Court - "A recent and rather shocking survey showed that around 80% of people who support Barack Obama believe that the Supreme Court should base its decisions not on the Constitution, but on what’s 'fair.'" Supreme Court justices are supposed to uphold the law, according to the Constitution, not create new rights and judge on a vague sense of fairness.

Labels: politics

Yet another reason why I do not like Democrats...

Many people I know are upset with Saxby Chambliss (R) for voting for the bailout bill, and are prepared to vote for Jim Martin (D) for Senate as a punishment. I understand the desire to do this. The bailout bill went from a 2-page bad proposal to a 450-page bill full of junk, that still wouldn't work.

There's an ad out in support of Jim Martin that is attacking Chambliss' support for the FairTax. Every two years we get candidates on the Democrat side who have the bright idea of running ads against the FairTax. The problem is, they always misrepresent it. Watch the ad here.



The ad claims that Chambliss wants to add a new 23% national sales tax. Which is inaccurate in the sense that it is incomplete. Any mention of the FairTax that only mentions the new sales tax is inherently misleading and deceptive when it does not also mention that it removes all other federal income, payroll, inheritance, capital gains and business taxes, while at the same time providing a rebate for all taxes paid up to the poverty level consumption.

Denise Majette tried this four years ago when running against Johnny Isakson. Her actions four years ago turned me from a casual FairTax supporter into a die-hard one. It also turned me into a Boortz reader/listener. Democrats repeated similar attacks in 2006 to very limited success.

The problem with these types of attacks is that when someone finds out the truth, they will no longer trust you. This is not the kind of thing where you're cherry picking issues out of complicated votes, or parsing statements to make them sound worse than they are. These kinds of attacks are plainly false, as anyone who understands anything about the FairTax can tell you.

Most of these attacks on the FairTax, including this one, are actually paid for by the national Democrat committees. This one was paid for by the Democrat Senatorial Campaign Committee, led by Chuck Schumer. The Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee has been running similar ads - see the FairTax.org Hall of Shame.

Do me a favor. Send Democrats a message that these kinds of attacks will backfire, as they did four years ago. The FairTax needs Senators who will continue to support it. Vote for Saxby Chambliss, even if you have to swallow hard before you do it. The FairTax is that important.

And if you don't understand the FairTax, honestly, it's the simplest thing in the world to understand. Read about the basics of the plan (including answers to common criticisms), and if you're so inclined, read the full text of the FairTax bill. It replaces 7,500 pages of IRS tax rules with a simple 133 page document.

If you like, as a comparison, you can view the full current tax code here. Good luck with that. Apparently, Democrats like Jim Martin think that 7,500 pages of tax code is far more preferable to 133 pages of tax code.

Labels: politics

Yesterday, Obama spoke plainly about his agenda - "spread the wealth around." Watch it here.



Even just a few years ago, this kind of talk would have been front page news. And it would have been a major turn-off for the majority of voters. Today, though, our public is ready to accept socialism, even if they don't want to call it such.

Last night my dad sent out an e-mail titled "Wealth Redistribution is Neither Neighborly Nor Christian." It was a very simple and straightforward comparison of private charity to government redistribution. I'll let his e-mail speak for itself as a response to Obama's desire to "spread the wealth around."

It's time the prevarication of referring to a progressive tax structure (or other wealth redistribution scheme) as "neighborly" or "Christian" is addressed with some clarity and truth.

Let us assume two families, the Smith family and the Jones family, live in adjacent houses in Anywhere, USA, and are thus literally neighbors. Further, they are on good terms and have a long-standing friendly relationship. Their children play together, they get each other's mail during vacations, and they exhibit many other typical American neighborly behaviors. We would say, without question, these two families are neighbors.

Now, let's suppose that the Smith family falls on hard times. Mrs. Smith loses her job due to circumstances beyond her control, and Mr. Smith alone cannot support the family on his elementary school teacher's salary. Her car has mechanical problems, and they don't have the money to have it repaired. Fortuitously, the Jones family next door has a third (spare) vehicle.

Of their own free choice, Mr. and Mrs. Jones offer to loan (or give) their extra vehicle to their neighbors, so that Mrs. Smith can seek employment or "whatever you need," until "things get better." Note the government isn't involved in any way. This is an example of true neighborly acts (or acts of Christian kindness), initiated in the hearts of the givers, and which happen all over this nation on a daily basis.

In contrast, suppose the Jones family owns a small business that has proven very successful due to their hard work and endless hours. The government decides to further increase their income taxes "to help the less fortunate," in keeping with principles of "fairness," etc. The neighboring Smith family (or others in similar circumstances) may receive some of the money the government takes from the Jones family, by force of law (coercion). There is less money available to help the Smith family and others, after handling costs and paying salaries and expenses of the beaurocrats collecting and managing the money. And the government decides how to spend the money.

In this latter case, it's unavoidably true that the Jones family has less money available to help others or give to the charities of their choice. Maybe they even have to sell one of their vehicles to pay the extra taxes, so it's not available to help the Smith family. Secondly, there is no decision in the heart of the Jones family to help others – more likely they resent the government taking even more of their hard-earned income. Third, they may rationalize, "There's no need for us to help others out; let the government do it." Finally, there is no human connection between the actual neighbors or others who may benefit from the subsequent government spending. But the central actor is the nameless, faceless "government," except of course for the politicians who endlessly take credit for proposing the program, or supporting, co-sponsoring, or voting for it (often even when they didn't). An added benefit to them is that they get to buy votes with someone else's money (ours).

Who makes the decision makes all the difference. Only individuals can make neighborly or Christian decisions. There is nothing whatsoever that is neighborly or Christian about the government taking from some by force and giving to others. Make no mistake about it, and don't be misled. The only honest and objective term to describe this behavior by government is socialism.

Moreover, the politicians know it. But they will never say it. So one part of the big lie is that they have to find something else to call it. They also know that neighborly or even Christian principles are core values for most Americans. So another part of the big lie is to mask a heavy graduated income tax, not coincidentally one of the major planks of the Communist Manifesto, in neighborly or Christian terms. Perhaps you can recognize real "lipstick on a pig" when you see it.

The only thing I would add is the difference these two scenarios have in the Smith family.

As recipients of their neighbors' kindness, they are motivated to improve their situation, because they do not want to be a long-term burden on their friends. They are also touched by the kindness they have received, and are much more likely to help someone else in the future when they see someone else in need.

Compare that to receiving your rightful statutory assistance from the government. They would not feel as if they are imposing on anyone, because after all they are getting what is "rightfully" theirs, by law - they would even be able to sue the government for it if they did not receive it. Because they had never been truly touched by the kindness and generosity of others, they are that much less likely to respond with kindness and generosity in the future when they see someone in need - an extension of the "let the government do it" argument (which is exactly why liberals like Barack Obama and Joe Biden give very, very little to charity).

Socialist wealth redistribution may indeed, temporarily, assist someone economically. But it also results in a moral cancer, increasing our isolation from each other, bitterness, selfishness, and envy of others' success and accomplishments.

Remember Matthew 6. Those who blow trumpets to call attention to their righteous acts receive all the reward they will ever get here on earth. This would include those who favor socialist acts of wealth redistribution.

Labels: church, politics

You likely won't see this as news in the mainstream media, but rest assured that if Palin had made this kind of gaffe it would have been front page news.

When asked about the role of the vice presidency, Palin agreed that the vice presidency is a flexible position, and covers both the executive and legislative branches (since the VP is also the president of the senate).

Biden disagreed by criticizing Cheney as "the most dangerous vice president we've had probably in American history." I'll let historians debate that point, but he backed that up by saying:

He has -- he has -- the idea he doesn't realize that Article I of the Constitution defines the role of the vice president of the United States, that's the executive -- he works in the executive branch. He should understand that. Everyone should understand that.

First of all, Article I describes the legislative branch - as McCain's website says, "otherwise known as the branch in which Joe Biden has served for the last 36 years." The executive branch is described in Article II. Second, the ONLY duty ascribed to the vice president (other than counting the electoral college votes) is given in Article I as the president of the Senate, which indicates that he does indeed have a major role in the legislative branch. Some framers actually refused to sign the Constitution because they felt that the vice president's dual roles was a violation of the goal of separation of powers!

Rest assured, if Palin had screwed up like that, it would be covered far and wide, as proof-positive that she is unfit for the vice presidency. (More history on the power and role of the vice president can be found at senate.gov.)

The second gaffe, which is really more of an outright lie, was when Biden claimed that "This is simply not true about Barack Obama. He did not say sit down with Ahmadinejad." Obama himself tried to lie about this at the first presidential debate, as I mentioned last week.

This is so easily provably false that it's ridiculous. Here's just one video:



John McCain's site has a full report on Obama's statements in this regard, including quoting from interviews and press conferences:

Harry Smith: "You said, 'I will talk to so and so and Hugo Chavez and etc., etc.'"

Obama: "Exactly, and without preconditions." (CBS' "The Early Show," 10/15/07)

Obama: "There has been no confusion. I have been absolutely clear on this. I will meet not just with our friends but with our enemies. I will meet without preconditions." (CNN's "The Situation Room," 2/4/08)

If you don't believe all of this, how about Obama's website, even today?

Diplomacy: Obama supports tough, direct presidential diplomacy with Iran without preconditions.

Look, this should be no surprise to anyone who followed the primary process. Obama said repeatedly, unwaveringly, that he would meet with these leaders, personally, without preconditions. And Biden himself called this dangerous.

Biden: "Would I make a blanket commitment to meet unconditionally with the leaders of each of those countries within the first year I was elected president? Absolutely positively no." (Remarks At The National Press Club, Washington, DC, 8/1/07)

Clinton: "I thought that was irresponsible and, frankly, naive to say that you would commit to meeting with, you know, Chavez and Castro and others within the first year." (ABC News,' "Good Morning America," 7/25/07)

I'd love for some Obama supporters to try to defend this. But there's simply no way that you can. Not only was his original position dangerous and naive, but now he's making outright lies about it to try to win the election.

If all of that isn't enough for you, McCain's site details a list of 14 lies Joe Biden made during the debate. Topics include tax votes, offshore drilling, troop funding, clean coal, alternative energy, health insurance, oil taxes, General McKiernan's comments, regulation, and more. On just about every topic covered in the debate, really, Biden resorted to distortions and lies.

More of the same!

Labels: politics

The Matthew 25 Network has already revealed itself to be totally pro-Obama, "defending" him based on his statements alone and refusing to consider his record. In any case, they've gone and completely discredited themselves, by putting up this site:

http://www.prolifeproobama.com/

Huh? Obama is pro-life?

Well, I suppose if you think the answer to the question "when does life begin" is above your pay grade, then you can say you're pro-life, because you don't really know if there's life there or not.

In any case, they're not really trying to say that Obama favors restrictions on abortion, but the domain name and title of the site alone is extremely misleading, and a mischaracterization of Obama's entire record on abortion.

The idea of the site is actually to try to convince pro-life voters to vote for Obama. But by refusing to admit that he has voted against protections for babies born alive from botched abortions, that he wants to put justices on the Supreme Court who believe an abortion is a Constitutional right (I'll give $10,000 to the person who can find "abortion" in the Constitution), and who felt that the partial-birth abortion ban was "unconstitutional," we now have a group of well-respected Christians engaging in behavior that is downright misleading and deceptive.

(Actually, they were already characterizing Obama this way. Now they're just making their hypocrisy more explicit.)

All liberals want regarding abortion is to keep it from any kind of democratic debate. All the Matthew 25 Network wants to do is help the liberal media pull the wool over Christians' eyes as they work to elect the most liberal senator, one who has never, ever, not once in his entire political career, believed that any abortion restriction was appropriate. Even to the point of sucking a baby's brains out while they're halfway delivered. A brutality his wife called "a legitimate medical procedure."

Whatever you think, that is most certainly not a "culture of life."

And if you disagree with my assessment of Obama, I challenge you - show me one vote that contradicts me. You won't find it.

Think about that when you get ready to pull the lever for Obama in November.

Labels: church, politics

Overall, the debate was pretty good. McCain was consistent as I expected, and Obama backtracked on many of his primary positions as I expected.

There was something I really wish McCain had hammered Obama on, though.

Obama kept bringing up that we need to focus on why the financial crisis happened, and kept blaming it on Bush (and McCain). McCain did mention that he had warned about this a few years ago, but he should have more explicitly blamed the problem directly at the feet of the Democrats.

The following video does a great job of explaining this entire mess with the mortgage crisis (note, embedded video updated):



He could have easily pointed out the political pressure that the Democrats placed on the mortgage industry, dating back to the 70's and increased in the 90's, to provide loans to people who would normally not qualify for them. He could have pointed out Obama's relationship with ACORN (where he was a "community organizer"), suing and threatening banks into writing more and more risky loans and driving up home prices in the meantime. And he could have called Obama out on Jim Johnson and Franklin Raines.

I have a theory as to why he didn't, though - McCain is currently in the middle of working out a bailout deal and didn't want to jeopardize it by placing the blame so publicly in the Democrat's lap, where it belongs. Still, if Obama wants to analyze the reason for the crisis, McCain should have obliged him.

Another point he could have made easily is that Obama wants to raise taxes on businesses by closing loopholes. It would have been the perfect opportunity to point out that businesses don't pay taxes, Senator, their consumers pay the taxes, embedded in the cost of the product or service. We need politicians who are willing to point out basic economic principles when other politicians try to pander to American ignorance.

There were many other areas where McCain did hammer Obama, and I'm glad he did. Obama was definitely backing away from his position on direct presidential diplomacy. In the primary debates, he stated that within the first year he'd personally sit down with Ahmadinejad without preconditions. Tonight he tried to paint that as starting with low level ambassadors and working his way up, which is exactly what everyone else has always supported. McCain adequately explained why this is dangerous, because direct talks legitimizes the kind of behavior Ahmadinejad has been displaying. Obama then tried to make it sound like Henry Kissinger was supportive of his approach, which is absolutely ludicrous. Look for that one to be played over and over again.

The other thing McCain harped on was Obama's stance on the surge. Obama did not, and could not, adequately explain his opposition to the surge, and would not admit that he was wrong about it.

McCain also pointed out Obama's initial response to Russia's invasion of Georgia was weak and unequivocal. Obama denied it, but it's true. His initial statement was "I strongly condemn the outbreak of violence in Georgia, and urge an immediate end to armed conflict." McCain, on the other hand, called Russia out by saying "Russia should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgian territory." The differences are rather huge.

Labels: politics

Stanley Kurtz (the guy Obama tried to silence on issues surrounding Ayers) has been pouring through the details of Obama's time at the Chicago Annenburg Challenge, where Obama served as chairman of an organization created by the 60's radical and unrepentant terrorist, Bill Ayers. Kurtz wrote a good column today detailing some of what the CAC was about, how it was tied to ACORN (where Obama did his "community organizing"), and how it went about it's radical agenda.

There is a reason why Obama isn't talking about his time there, and doesn't want anyone else to, either.

The Obama campaign has cried foul when Bill Ayers comes up, claiming "guilt by association." Yet the issue here isn't guilt by association; it's guilt by participation. As CAC chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle. That is a story even if Mr. Ayers had never planted a single bomb 40 years ago.

Read the full column for details.

Labels: politics

Well, I guess when you've attended Trinity United Church of Christ, and listened to Jeremiah Wright for 20 years, you learn a thing or two.

Still, somehow, this amazes even me, given how we're supposed to be "elevating" the level of discourse in this election and not playing the "politics of the past."

Obama ran an ad, in Spanish, attacking McCain on immigration for things that they claimed Rush Limbaugh had said:

"They want us to forget the insults we’ve put up with, the intolerance," the television ad's announcer says in Spanish as a picture of Rush Limbaugh appears onscreen with quotes of him saying, "Mexicans are stupid and unqualified" and "Shut your mouth or get out."

First of all, Rush Limbaugh is no close policy friend of John McCain. Particularly on immigration issues, Rush has been a huge critic of McCain's proposals (along with most other conservatives). Just the whole idea of Rush and McCain being buddy-buddy is funny by itself.

But further, it turns out the the two quotes they took for the ad were COMPLETELY out of context. Well, if there's one guy Obama can't intimidate, it's Rush. He wrote a column for the Wall Street Journal today, titled Obama is Stoking Racial Antagonism (emphases mine):

I understand the rough and tumble of politics. But Barack Obama -- the supposedly postpartisan, postracial candidate of hope and change -- has gone where few modern candidates have gone before.

Mr. Obama's campaign is now trafficking in prejudice of its own making. And in doing so, it is playing with political dynamite. What kind of potential president would let his campaign knowingly extract two incomplete, out-of-context lines from two radio parodies and build a framework of hate around them in order to exploit racial tensions? The segregationists of the 1950s and 1960s were famous for such vile fear-mongering.

Here's the relevant part of the Spanish-language television commercial Mr. Obama is running in Hispanic communities:

"They want us to forget the insults we've put up with . . . the intolerance . . . they made us feel marginalized in this country we love so much."

Then the commercial flashes two quotes from me: ". . . stupid and unskilled Mexicans" and "You shut your mouth or you get out!"

And then a voice says, "John McCain and his Republican friends have two faces. One that says lies just to get our vote . . . and another, even worse, that continues the policies of George Bush that put special interests ahead of working families. John McCain . . . more of the same old Republican tricks."

Much of the media that is uninterested in Mr. Obama's connections to unrepentant 1970s Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers and Rev. Jeremiah Wright have so far gone along with the attempt to tie me to Mr. McCain. But Mr. McCain and I have not agreed on how to address illegal immigration. While I am heartened by his willingness to start by securing the borders, it is no secret that we have fundamental differences on illegal immigration.

And more to the point, these sound bites are a deception, and Mr. Obama knows it. The first sound bite was extracted from a 1993 humorous monologue poking fun at the arguments against the North American Free Trade Agreement. Here's the context:

"If you are unskilled and uneducated, your job is going south. Skilled workers, educated people are going to do fine 'cause those are the kinds of jobs Nafta is going to create. If we are going to start rewarding no skills and stupid people, I'm serious, let the unskilled jobs that take absolutely no knowledge whatsoever to do -- let stupid and unskilled Mexicans do that work."

My point, which is obvious, was that the people who were criticizing Nafta were demeaning workers, particularly low-skilled workers. I was criticizing the mind-set of the protectionists who opposed the treaty. There was no racial connotation to it and no one thought there was at the time. I was demeaning the arguments of the opponents.

As for the second sound bite, I was mocking the Mexican government's double standard -- i.e., urging open borders in this country while imposing draconian immigration requirements within its own borders. Thus, I took the restrictions Mexico imposes on immigrants and appropriated them as my own suggestions for a new immigration law.

Here's the context for that sound bite: "And another thing: You don't have the right to protest. You're allowed no demonstrations, no foreign flag waving, no political organizing, no bad-mouthing our president or his policies. You're a foreigner: shut your mouth or get out! And if you come here illegally, you're going to jail."

At the time, I made abundantly clear that this was a parody on the Mexican government's hypocrisy and nobody took it otherwise.

The malignant aspect of this is that Mr. Obama and his advisers know exactly what they are doing. They had to listen to both monologues or read the transcripts. They then had to pick the particular excerpts they used in order to create a commercial of distortions. Their hoped-for result is to inflame racial tensions. In doing this, Mr. Obama and his advisers have demonstrated a pernicious contempt for American society.

We've made much racial progress in this country. Any candidate who employs the tactics of the old segregationists is unworthy of the presidency.

I don't listen to Rush much at all anymore - I'm rarely in the car when he's on the radio. But I listened to him enough in the past to understand his use of humor, satire, and sarcasm, and that is exactly what the quotes were lifted out of the middle of. Rush is absolutely right that the Obama campaign had to know exactly what they were doing when they lifted two quotes out of context, and put them out in a Spanish language ad in an attempt to stoke racial tension.

Obama doesn't represent any new kind of politics. And when you consider the kind of associations and mentors he has had, this kind of thing shouldn't be all that surprising.

Labels: politics

I saw this a few years ago, actually, but I had forgotten about it! It's making the rounds lately due to Steisand's support for Obama, of course, but it's funny no matter what your persuasion is.



Gotta love a candidate with a sense of humor!

Labels: fun, politics

Obama has been trying to soften his stance on abortion by trying to talk about reducing the number of them. But he can't hide from his record.

Since Roe v. Wade, nearly 50 million babies have been murdered in the womb. Abortion is awful in general, but partial-birth abortion represents humanity at it's worst. In this "procedure," a baby is brought a out of the birth canal, except for the head, and then the "doctor" sucks that baby's brains out while their arms and legs are wiggling, so that they are dead before they are "born."

The idea of partial-birth abortion reminds me of capital punishment by having someone drawn and quartered, which was the most likely influence of the phrase "cruel and unusual punishment" found in the bill of rights. It is reminiscent of the kind of techniques used by Vlad the Impaler in the 15th century, who enjoyed coming up with more and more brutal ways of slow, torturous ways of killing people.

Bill Clinton vetoed a federal partial-birth abortion ban, twice. Bush signed one into law in 2003. It was upheld by the conservative wing of the Supreme Court in 2007, very narrowly. Guess which type of justices Obama would nominate, and which type of justices a Democrat senate would confirm - those who would uphold such a ban, or those who would strike it down as "unconstitutional," even though no "right to abortion" exists anywhere in the constitution?

Beyond just his support for relativist judges, Obama's record of support for abortion is on the extreme liberal side of politics. Obama voted against an Illinois partial-birth abortion ban in 1997. He voted to preserve state-funded abortions in 2000. He voted against parental notification when taking teenagers across state lines in 2006. He has received a 100% rating from NARAL, indicating that his voting record is completely consistent with someone who supports unrestricted, government-funded access to abortion, INCLUDING for teenagers.

Michelle Obama once described partial-birth abortion as a "legitimate medical procedure." Their support for and defense of abortion has few equals in the history of presidential candidates.

To make matters worse, Obama voted against the Born Alive Infant Act in Illinois, which would have required doctors to provide medical care to babies who survived an abortion. Today he tries to spin this and make it sound respectable, but the reality is he voted to kill the bill in committee and spoke against it on the senate floor. His claims today that he supported the federal version of the bill are provably false.

I understand why someone wouldn't vote on abortion alone. But we're not talking about voting for someone who supports abortion in a *moderate* sense. We're talking about someone who has, 100% of the time, voted against any abortion restrictions, who has indicated his support for Supreme Court justices who take a dynamic, relativist view of the Constitution (which is required to support the continued existence of the Roe v. Wade decision), and, in particular, who has defended the most brutal, violent practice ever devised by mankind against a child.

If you can, in good conscience, vote for someone who supports a mother's right to bring a baby out of the birth canal, except for the head, and then suck that baby's brains out while their arms and legs are wiggling, so that they are dead before they are "born", or worse, to deny that child medical care if they happen to survive an abortion, then so be it. Personally, if a candidate can't even find these two things so heinous, so brutal, and so depraved as to say that they should be illegal in any and all circumstances, then that candidate will never, EVER get my vote. And they (including Obama) shouldn't get yours, either.

Labels: church, politics

I covered this last year, and I'm glad it's getting press again.

Despite Obama's claims that it's all lies cooked up by McCain, it's all true. One of the few "accomplishments" Obama has while a Illinois state senator was voting to Teach Sex Ed to Kindergartners. Topics covered from K5 to 3rd Grade include:

• Puberty
• Intercourse
• Sexual Orientation
• Masturbation
• Abortion
• STDs

These are all "Level 1" topics to be taught from ages 5 through 8. Go here to see more. Or download the full PDF. Disturbing.

Labels: politics

I wholeheartedly reject the notion that tax cuts shouldn't be made across the board. Liberals have turned "trickle-down economics" into something you're not allowed to say, even though it works. Even on an anecdotal level, this is obviously true. As an example, if your taxes were cut enough or if you got enough of a raise, you might have enough money to pay someone else to cut your grass so you could spend your weekends with your kids rather than with your yard. That kind of thing fuels job creation.

But this is a hard thing to prove in an anecdotal fashion. But there is some data to back this up. This column is one I've been hoping to see.

Since 1983, living standards for the lowest fifth has increased 25%.

The column also lists several reasons why income gains are commonly underreported. One reason is that more poor people are filing tax forms today than 25 years ago, due to increases in the Earned Income Tax Credit program. In 1983, 19% of filers had no tax to pay. In 2005, that number was 33% - and it is expected to be 40% in 2008. When you offer people free money, they'll fill out a tax form. The side effect is that the IRS has more data on low income households - not because there are more of them, but because they end up getting paid to fill out a tax form.

The other issue is one of mobility. People move in income ranges over time - and usually people move up. Only one-third of filters who paid zero tax in 1987 were still in the zero tax income bracket in 1996.

When you hear liberal politicians talk about the "poor getting poorer," question how they measure this. Because there are many measurements that show the poor are doing much better now than they were 25 years ago.

Labels: politics

I blogged about the awful treatment of Gov. Palin the other day. Now ABC News joins in the fray, taking a Palin quote completely out of context and trying to pin her down on it. SHAMEFUL.

Here's the quote Charlie Gibson kept repeating:

Our national leaders are sending U.S. soldiers on a task that is from God

And here's the full quote:

Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God. That’s what we have to make sure that we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God’s plan.

So now ABC News joins the AP in taking on the style of DailyKos and Huffington Post. SHAMEFUL.

Labels: politics

Obama is appealing to many voters, originally unlikely to vote Democrat, on a couple of things. Most notably, government charity and war.

Britt has posted some history lessons (see part 1 and part 2), dealing with government charity and its roots in socialism. There's a lot more detail that we could go into, but I think his treatment was the right approach to summarize it. I'm still seriously thinking about a Matthew 6 parody site of the Matthew 25 Network. If I had a lot of spare time I probably would have taken it on by now.

On the war, there's a great article at American Thinker by James Lewis called Would Obama have given up after Pearl Harbor? In it, he does a great job comparing the similarities between all of America's most challenging moments.

The United States has experienced devastating setbacks in every major war. Washington, Lincoln, FDR, Truman, and Reagan were all told to quit and cut our losses. They didn't -- even when the newspapers and their political enemies screamed and yelled, walking a fine line near treason. George W. Bush's experience with Iraq has been absolutely straight down the mainstream of American history, including all the setbacks, the gut-punching pain of losing good soldiers, the military turnaround once we found the right leaders, the betrayals by our political class, and the victory we are seeing today.

Judging by his words Obama would have given up at all the crisis points in the past: Pearl Harbor, the Battle of the Bulge, the Berlin Airlift, Bull Run, the British burning the White House in 1812, and Valley Forge.

While it is possible that Obama could develop this kind of leadership, the way he talks about foreign affairs, and the way he has approached Iraq and his desire to simply pull out without considering the consequences (and until Friday, never even admitting that the surge worked in Iraq), makes me believe otherwise.

"Leadership" is not some mystical quality that only highly educated WaPo journos can spot. Leadership is what allows you to win against huge opposition from all the Bob Woodwards of the media, from the Demagogue Party, from al Qaida, from Saddam and his minions, the Iraqi militias, the opportunists and corrupt Iraqi politicians, the worldwide Left, the academics, the demoted generals, the do-nothing CIA chairwarmers, and all the other saboteurs.

Leadership is what George W. Bush has demonstrated in spades. And he's been abused for it just like Truman was, and Lincoln and all the others.

What would Barack Obama have done? Obama just thought it was all a miracle. "I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated ... I've already said it succeed beyond our wildest dreams."

But it wasn't a miracle. It wasn't beyond our wildest dreams. It was just the same grueling learning process that Lincoln had to go through, and FDR and all the others. The Petraeus strategy didn't just happen. It was the product of years of hard, slogging, bloody, and finally victorious efforts. It was extremely painful, but in the end, it worked.

For McCain, the success of the surge was not beyond his "wildest dreams." He had been fighting for the right strategy, and was the most vocal supporter of a surge, against the advice of political strategists, for years. Obama claimed that it would make things worse. Even today, when he finally admits that it has worked (and only because he has to), he refuses to admit that he was wrong about it.

When Russia invaded Georgia, Obama's first statement was ambiguous. McCain's first statement condemned Russia for their actions, and stood with Georgia, who was being trounced. It took Obama three days to come up with a statement that looked a lot like McCain's.

America can't afford to have a president that takes three days to figure out the right answer about Russia invading Georgia. America can't afford a president that refuses to admit that he was wrong about whether a surge of troops would make a huge difference in Iraq.

Now compare the great presidents of American history, who successfully navigated America through difficult times - Washington, Lincoln, FDR, Truman, Reagan - and tell me which candidate today has demonstrated the ability to assess the situation and accurately come up with solutions that will make a difference. Obama comes up awfully short in that comparison.

Labels: politics

Take care! Don't do your good deeds publicly, to be admired, because then you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven. When you give a gift to someone in need, don't shout about it as the hypocrites do – blowing trumpets in the synagogues and streets to call attention to their acts of charity! I assure you, they have received all the reward they will ever get. But when you give to someone, don't tell your left hand what your right hand is doing. Give your gifts in secret, and your Father, who knows all secrets, will reward you.

And now about prayer. When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I assure you, that is all the reward they will ever get. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father secretly. Then your Father, who knows all secrets, will reward you. When you pray, don't babble on and on as people of other religions do. They think their prayers are answered only by repeating their words again and again. Don't be like them, because your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him! (Matthew 6:1-8, NLT)

Kind of puts Matthew 25 into a different perspective, doesn't it? I ask you - how does campaigning for public charity fit with the private, secret approach to charity commanded us in Matthew 6?

Labels: church, house church, politics

I've had many conversations with liberal friends over the past year about war. Many of these friends are Christians, though not all of them. But I'm hearing a common theme about war and violence - the idea that it is never appropriate to respond to violence with violence, and particularly that it is never right to kill someone to prevent violence, for the basic belief that "killing people is wrong." For Christians, it is usually rooted in the example of Jesus' nonviolence, his exhortation to "turn the other cheek," etc. Sometimes it includes variations on the "war cannot produce peace" argument. In many ways, this is the new pacifism, though it is really not that different from the old.

My response to this is usually that I can totally understand, appreciate, and even identify with this on a personal level. But that applying that kind of mentality towards government is dangerous and suicidal.

I usually try to take the argument towards this one question: why do cops carry guns?

I have had people refuse to discuss that point - outright claiming that it was silly of me to ask the question. But I bring it up because it is crucial to understanding the effects of pacifism.

Cops carry guns because without the credible threat of authorized, deadly force, it would be impossible to keep society from descending into anarchy. To understand this, you have to have a basic understanding of the sinfulness and depravity found in a fallen world. That while most people will obey most of the laws, there are always some who will disregard as many of society's rules as they possibly can.

Take your typical hostage scenario, for instance. If the police do not have the authorization to use deadly force, then what is to prevent the criminal from shooting all the hostages, and then come out with guns blazing and shoot all of the cops? Nothing. It is the credible threat of deadly force, coupled with the desire on the criminal's part not to die, that prevents the worst-case scenario.

Note that it is not enough that deadly force is authorized. It must also be credible. That means that the criminal must believe that he will be killed if he comes out with guns blazing. In order to believe that, he must have a basic understanding of police that they will fire if fired upon. And that if hostages are seriously endangered, they will do what they can to neutralize the person responsible, including killing them.

The exact same logic applies to global affairs. It is not enough that other countries have the power to stop an imperialist from invading another country. They must believe that other countries (and particularly, their leaders) have the will to do so if necessary. That means the possibility of a response must be credible.

The only reason Hitler felt able to pursue his imperialism was because he judged the nations of Europe to be too weak to stop him. The threat of other countries stopping him was not credible. He had rightly judged that few nations in Europe could withstand his attacks, and he had rightly judged that America would stay out of it (until Japan tipped us over the edge).

Bin Laden saw America's response to issues in Somalia in the 1990's and judged us to be weak. He felt that he could attack, and stay safe in Afghanistan because he judged us to be a "paper tiger." So plans were prepared to attack targets on US soil. The threat of force was not credible to him.

The UN had authorized the use of military force on Iraq if Saddam did not comply with the weapons inspections, based on the cease-fire from the 1991 Gulf War. But this threat was not credible - the UN was incapable of action. So Saddam threw the inspectors out.

More recently, Russia watched as the world, and particularly America, debated these issues in the aftermath of Iraq. Russia sensed America's growing pacifism, and knew that there was little an American president could do to stop them.

Do you think Russia would have invaded Georgia if America had been showing a more unified sense of support regarding sticking it out in Iraq? Personally, I think not.

Now take a look at this year's presidential election. You have two men, neither of whom want to go to war with anybody. But one represents a position of strength, the other represents a position of weakness. My pacifist friends prefer the weaker candidate, as far as how our enemies would view him.

Now let me ask you - based on the understanding of the credible threat of force, which president would prevent enemies from attacking us, just because of their presence in the oval office?

You can stick to your pacifism out of a sense of principle, but you should do so understanding the inevitable result. If cops without guns leads to anarchy, countries led by pacifism leads to fascism. History gives us plenty of proof for that.

Labels: politics

From J.R. Dunn at AmericanThinker.com:

The situation today involving the Palin family is a High Noon moment, a moment where you must make a choice. A choice between taking a stand or remaining with head forever bowed. You will not find a line drawn clearer -- you can stand with the Governor Palin and her family (and only secondarily with John McCain, who almost despite himself represents the political aspects of decency in our time), or you can join the other side, the side that excuses the public destruction of a young girl for the sake of political power.

I don't care whether you're liberal, conservative, or something else. There's one thing you should agree with me on.

The media's treatment of Sarah Palin, and her family, has been outright shameful.

And while Obama himself rightly declared Palin's family as "off-limits," he has encouraged shameful attacks against Palin (making disparaging remarks about her experience as a mayor, without any reference to her experience as a governor), and his campaign has been making some outrageous arguments against her. But his die-hard supporters - those who brought him to where he is now, including the left-wing bloggers - have been perpetrating some of the worst smears and lies ever thrown at a major political candidate. And this is saying a lot, given their hate and contempt for George W. Bush.

If you're voting for Obama this year, you need to understand the kind of awful stuff found on the left that is being used in support of him. Read the kind of stuff the DailyKos has and then compare it to the truth. And whatever you do, don't go over to the Huffington Post and poke around. Some of the worst blog posts I've ever read were posted over there, about Sarah Palin - including things taking existing sexual innuendo about moms and turning them into sexual innuendo about vice presidents.

My overall point it is - conservatives have their wackos, but they are quite marginalized. When have you ever heard of an immensely popular conservative blog, full of comments from people who wanted to bomb abortion clinics, make fully automatic weapons legal, or arrest homosexuals? It just doesn't happen. But if you pay attention to the left, they are truly angry, and they are truly vindictive. They are truly ready to push for massive tax increases, stoke wealth envy, eliminate corporate profits, and use fear of global warming as a tool to destroy capitalism.

Most importantly, they will save their most vile vindictiveness for any Jew, African-American, or woman that stands in their way. If you understand the history of Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas, and now see the parallel with Sarah Palin, you need to understand the devilish liberal wing that Obama is reliant upon to have any life in the political arena.

Then, when you understand the nature of Obama's relationships and dealings with figures such as Bill Ayers, Tony Rezko, Jeremiah Wright, and others - DailyKos and Huffington Post are on the Obama campaign's official Google Reader list of sites, by the way - you start to understand that Obama is perfectly comfortable with such atrocious human behavior.

It's high noon. Will you do the research to understand this, and make an informed decision based on character, as well as ideology? Or will you vote for the uninformed, nebulous vision of "change?"

Labels: politics

I knew this would be a great election year - lots of good stuff to look forward to. But even I underestimated this, in particular, I underestimated John McCain.

I think Palin is a phenomenal choice for VP. And that is true regardless of gender. Her record of being the outsider and confronting corruption is the perfect pairing for McCain's "maverick" image.

The other great thing is how foolishly the Obama campaign walked right into McCain's trap - and started scrutinizing Palin's experience.

On Hannity & Colmes last night, there was this little gem:

Alan Colmes: Do you believe that Sarah Palin is ready, Day One, if God forbid something happens to John McCain?

Mike Huckabee: I think she’s far more ready to be President if something happens to McCain than Barack Obama would be if something doesn’t happen to McCain.

I already liked Huckabee. But that retort just put him off the map.

Comparisons between Palin and Obama are just awesome. If you read nothing else about Palin, make it Sarah Palin vs. Barack Obama by Jeff Emanuel at redstate.com. It's actually quite factually accurate. Which is what makes it all the more hilarious.

Labels: politics

The Obama campaign has no class. Their reaction to McCain's choice of Sarah Palin to be VP this morning:

Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency. Governor Palin shares John McCain's commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade, the agenda of Big Oil and continuing George Bush's failed economic policies. That's not the change we need, it's just more of the same.

Wait, did you hear the birds chirping? No congratulations in that statement, at all.

Hmm, let's respond to each of these points:

1) "Former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency." Or how about a "community organizer," originally elected in one of the most corrupt districts in the country, who had barely been in the US Senate long enough to take a breath before being pushed on the public as presidential material? This is an argument Obama does not want to enter into.

That Palin comes from a small town means she is an outsider. That plays well, especially when all the other candidates are Senators. If Obama wants to stay away from being attacked as elitist, he better stay away from begrudging Palin's political background from a small town.

Further, she's a governor as well as a mayor, Senator Obama. That means she has executive experience. And she got there by taking on the corrupt politicians in her own party. Americans like that kind of experience, and she's been at it longer than Obama has (since Bill Ayers hosted Obama's first fundraiser). I've never heard of Obama ever taking on the corruption in Chicago - because he has specifically benefitted from it.

2) "...commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade..." Good. Because last time I checked, the "right to an abortion" isn't found anywhere in our Constitution, and if there is ONE Supreme Court decision that deserves to be overturned, it's the one that says people have a constitutional right to murder their unborn children.

3) "...the agenda of Big Oil..." This is the biggest stretch of the bunch, and reveals how desperate Obama's campaign is. Her husband is a blue collar worker in the oil industry, from what I understand. The corruption she took on was specifically linked to oil companies.

4) "...George Bush's failed economic policies..." Trying to describe McCain/Palin as a 3rd Bush/Cheney term simply isn't going to work. In any case, if you think cutting wasteful spending, attacking corruption, and lowering taxes is a "failed" economic policy, then that's one more reason for me to not vote for you.

Later in the afternoon, Obama made some comments of congratulations. He tried to excuse the earlier lack of class by saying:

I think that, you know, campaigns start getting these hair triggers.

Yeah, these are people picked by Obama that work for him. And he tries to pass the buck.

That his campaign immediately went into attack mode, and distorted her record and belittled her experience, reveals how little class Obama and his campaign has.

More of the same, I guess.

Labels: politics

Yes, I watched the speech last night. It was a good speech, and if you're a liberal, I can understand that you're more energized now than ever. For the first time in 16 years, the Democrats have a found someone who can give a stump speech without boring you to tears.

But the speech has issues. Mostly, the classic problem liberals have - that things are just awful and only the government can make them better.

There's a lot of good response to the speech today, but this response from Pejman Yousefzadeh over at redstate.com is one of the best.

I am not hard-hearted to those who suffer. I just am outraged that politicians feel they have to constantly and consistently appeal to our worst fears by making it seem as if suffering is everywhere and just around the corner from your home, barreling towards you to consign you to the depths of Hellish misery and that the only way to escape is to actually be reassured and grateful when Bureaucratic Man comes around and tells us "I am from the Government and I am here to help." We ought to know by now that governmental "help" is nothing of the kind. The same people that screw up your day while you are waiting in line at the Post Office, while you are waiting at the DMV or while you are dealing with the recalcitrant IRS gnome who is impervious to reason are the ones who will be put in charge of your health care, will administer tax policy and will usurp your right and the right of your community to raise and educate your children. All the pretty words in the world can't hide that ugly fact.

Just like global warming (of which there has been none for 7-8 years), I'm tired of hearing how awful the economy is. Even last night, Obama talked about the economy being in such bad shape, ignoring the report yesterday that the GDP grew at 3.3%. Just like how the Democrats are ignoring the progress in Iraq, Democratic victory this year is dependent upon voters believing everything is awful. Even when it isn't true.

Labels: politics

The Obama link with Bill Ayers has been heating up lately in the press, and for good reason. That Obama has been a close friend of Ayers, and that Ayers is a huge political supporter of Obama (including helping him get his start in politics), is an important piece of information that the public should be made aware of.

Or, if you're Obama, you surely believe that the public should not be made aware of it. Reading how Obama's campaign has been trying to handle this issue reminds me heavily of the Clinton years. That is, when your opposition is trying to push out information that can destroy your political power, you do everything you can to shut them up.

Last week, the group American Issues Project released a commercial clearly outlining the links between Obama and Ayers.



Obama's initial response was to blame the whole thing on McCain - whose campaign wasn't a part of this commercial at all. But Obama's response only highlighted the issue further, and the media picked it up that much more. So Obama's campaign filed a complaint with the Justice Department against the American Issues Project, claiming that they violated FEC rules by running the ad.

Recently, Stanley Kurtz wrote an article for the National Review outlining the Obama-Ayers links, and his efforts to get access to archives at the Univsirty of Illinois at Chicago (where Ayers is a professor) that would further provide evidence of their close association while Obama served on a board of a group that Ayers founded at the university.

These records were only recently released a couple of days ago - after a lot of suspicious runarounds with the University (detailed in Kurtz' article, which was written before the University finally agreed to release the documents). Thus, Kurtz has a lot of light to shed on this issue as he has been pouring over this material over the last couple of days.

Kurtz was to be on WGN radio in Chicago last night to discuss this, but Obama sought to have all discussion of the topic removed from the station:

"WGN radio is giving right-wing hatchet man Stanley Kurtz a forum to air his baseless, fear-mongering terrorist smears," Obama's campaign wrote in an e-mail to supporters. "He's currently scheduled to spend a solid two-hour block from 9:00 to 11:00 p.m. pushing lies, distortions, and manipulations about Barack and University of Illinois professor William Ayers."

The Obama campaign also urged supporters to flood the radio station with complaint calls. The Milt Rosenburg show asked the Obama campaign to send someone to appear on the show to respond, but that didn't happen. Obama has steadfastly refused pretty much any talk radio appearance requests.

This is Obama's playbook - any time serious criticism is leveled against him, you do what you can to shut them up. Tell them your wife is off-limits (though she's campaigning heavily for you). Characterize them as as "right-wing hatchet man," a "smear-merchant," pushing "fear-mongering terrorist smears." Oh, and of course, you have to accuse them of "lowering the standards of political discourse." Then for good measure, file a complaint against them with the Justice Department, and hope that an investigation will either cost them a lot of money, or hopefully shut them down altogether.

This is the kind of tactic any typical politician would take - when you can't argue against a position, demonize the opposition and if possible, shut them down. If you seriously think that Obama, who was been handed multiple elections by a corrupt Chicago poltical machine, represents any "new kind of politics," you're going to be very, very disappointed.

This is the kind of tactic Obama uses while a candidate. Imagine what would happen if he becomes the president. Given that Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats want to re-enact the Fairness Doctrine, it would be easy for Democrats to squelch this kind of opposition using new FCC rules once they have full control of the government.

More of the same.

UPDATE: more links on this story: Michelle Malkin includes some comments from people who listened to the show and how some of Obama's supporters were trying to disrupt it.

Labels: politics

Somebody sent me a link to this YouTube video today. It does an awesome job highlighting Obama's shifting positions on Iraq.



This video includes the following quotes from Obama:

"I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse." (January 10, 2007, MSNBC)

"And I said at the time, when I opposed the surge, that given how wonderfully our troops perform, if we place 30,000 more troops in there, then we would see an improvement in the security situation and we would see a reduction in the violence." (January 5, 2008, Democratic debate)

The video provides this "translation:" You're never wrong if you pretend you gave the right answer all along.

Also:

"It is clear at this point that we cannot, through putting in more troops or maintaining the presence that we have, expect that somehow the situation is going to improve." (October 22, 2006, Meet the Press)

"My assessment is that the surge has not worked and we will not see a different report eight weeks from now." (July 18, 2007, Today)

"Finally, in 2006-2007, we started to see that, even after an election, George Bush continued to want to pursue a course that didn't withdraw troops from Iraq but actually doubled down and initiated a surge and at that stage I said very clearly, not only have we not seen improvements, but we're actually worsening, potentially, a situation there." (November 11, 2007, Meet the Press)

This is important because Obama will be coming back from Iraq, and he will have to radically change his tune. In fact, he already has - the Obama website has removed portions that claim the surge is not working. Why? Because the surge has been working. Violence is way, way down. Which means that McCain was right all along. And Obama will shift his position on Iraq, again. As he has done with so many things. But in doing so, he will upset his angry left base, and to the center he will reveal himself as a man with no principles.

Bill Clinton could get away with stuff like this. For one thing, he was a better liar. But far more importantly, Obama has to contend with the internet, which is a vast archive of all of his previous positions. He can't plausibly claim now that he thought the surge would work, despite the fact that he opposed it, because when he originally opposed it he said (quite eloquently, I might add) that the surge would make the situation worse. But he likewise can't tell the truth and say that he was against it all along, because doing so removes any credibility that as commander-in-chief he could make the right decision.

Perhaps the best part about this video, that is so hard-hitting against Obama, is that it comes from the McCain campaign. This is a good sign - that they have the gumption to call Obama out on his lies, and that they will use the internet to get this message out.

The center has always belonged to McCain, for good or ill, and he doesn't have to "shift" to get there at all. But as Obama tries to shift to the center, he will meet the same problems that Kerry did in 2004. His record is far too liberal to survive the shift. The only variable left is how tough McCain will get. If this video is any indication, McCain is ready to pull if off.

Labels: politics

Several Supreme Court decisions came down in the last couple of days. As is the case with many Supreme Court decisions, you have the conservative wing (Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito) opposite the liberal wing (Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer). Therefore, Justice Kennedy seems to hold the key to what the court will decide, and he did in each of these cases.

District of Columbia v Heller - The Supreme Court finally analyzed whether or not the "right to keep and bear arms" applies to the government or to individuals. Of course, no other right in the Bill of Rights was applied to the government. The Bill of Rights essentially either places restrictions on government by securing to rights to individuals. Liberals have been arguing for years that the "right to keep and bear arms" wasn't on par with freedom of speech, press, or religion. The conservative wing of the court was joined by Justice Kennedy to provide a sensible, plain interpretation of the 2nd amendment.

Kennedy v Louisiana - The Supreme Court decided that states cannot provide the death penalty as an option for punishment of those convicted of child rape, saying that this violates the "cruel and unusual punishment" clause. Look, either the death penalty is cruel and unusual or it isn't. The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the death penalty (even as recently as two months ago!), but it seems like the court (at least the liberal wing of it) wants to micromanage exactly how it can be used. Justice Kennedy joined the liberal wing of the court.

Boumediene v Bush - The Supreme Court said "just kidding" (according to Scalia's dissent) and required the executive branch to grant all detainees at Guantanamo Bay full habeas corpus rights. (Previously, the court instructed Congress to outline a process for the military to apply to consider a detainee's request for release, which was passed as the Military Commissions Act of 2006. This ruling basically makes that act of Congress worthless.) Essentially, the judicial branch is now determining how the executive branch should wage war, including what rights it must grant upon enemy combatants captured in the field of war. Judicial activism at it's finest. Justice Kennedy again joined the liberal wing of the court.

The point isn't whether you personally agree with the liberal or conservative view of any of these decisions. The question is whether the decision was based on a principle of the separation of powers, and whether a right is explicitly defined by the Constitution or not.

For instance, the "right to keep and bear arms" is explicitly in the 2nd amendment, and residents of Washington, DC have been denied that right for some time. The liberal wing of the court wanted to continue to deny them of that right. The conservative wing of the court sees that the 2nd amendment was passed by legislative and democratic processes, and that it is outside of the government's power to completely deny them a right specifically guaranteed to them.

In terms of capital punishment, a case could be made that the death penalty is "cruel and unusual" - however, the court has repeatedly upheld this as a form of punishment. In what circumstances a punishment should be applied is open to interpretation, but it is exactly this kind of interpretation that was destined for legislatures to debate through democratic processes. Instead, the liberal wing of the court likes to look for "evolving standards," "national consensus," and making their own decisions about what is an acceptable "proportional punishment." These types of decisions were never meant to be decided by unaccountable judges, only by elected officials.

With regards to enemy combatants, the power to wage war is vested in one individual, the commander-in-chief. Congress declares war, but the president wages it. And the president is accountable, as an elected official. As the Supreme Court enters into the issue, our ability to wage war must now be held against standards set by an unaccountable, unelected branch of government. Congress is given the power to set the jurisdiction of the courts, which is what it did in the Military Commissions Act of 2006. But for some reason the Supreme Court can just decide that this law is worthless, and instead of allowing the president to wage a war that was declared by the Congress, it has stepped in and declared that enemy combatants have the same rights as citizens under the Constitution (at least with respect to habeas corpus).

The liberal wing of the court likes to accomplish by judicial fiat what cannot be accomplished through legislative means. Protecting judges from political pressure is not supposed to be a blank check to enacting whatever changes they desire. But in a world where the Supreme Court is the most politically active and most politically powerful institution in the land, we should not be surprised that nominations and confirmation hearings are as politically charged as they have become since the Democrats made a mockery of the process with Robert Bork. (The slanderous accusations made by Ted Kennedy led to Bork's defeat, and to today's situation of Justice Kennedy as the swing vote.)

Conservatives desire justices who read the laws, interpret, and apply them. Liberals desire justices who will continue to uphold the court's liberally activist past, while forging ahead into new frontiers of liberal activism impossible to pass legislatively.

All of this becomes extremely important when deciding who to vote for this November for president.

UPDATE: Larrey Anderson dealt with this same topic in Justice Anthony Kennedy and Our Schizophrenic Supreme Court, and summed the problem up well: "Your personal right to firearms was one vote away from being thrown on the ash heap of history. And it still is. Cities, like New York, with strict gun control laws, will be sued in federal court using the holding from Heller. Justice Kennedy could change his mind tomorrow." Ann Coulter also handled this topic mightily in last week's column, Justice Kennedy: American Idle.

Labels: politics

In 10 Concerns about Barack Obama, Bill Bennett and Seth Leibsohn outline ten reasons to be very concerned about Obama. Head over to the article for the full reasoning, but here's the list, with my comments:

"Barack Obama’s foreign policy is dangerous, naïve, and betrays a profound misreading of history." He likes to compare his desire to meet with our enemies to Reagan meeting with Gorbachev - which only happened after Gorbachev began making changes and revealed himself as a different kind of leader. And also only happend AFTER Reagan called the Soviet Union out as an "evil empire." Reagan's views were best summed up as "peace through strength" and "trust but verify."

"Barack Obama’s Iraq policy will hand al-Qaeda a victory and undercut our entire position in the Middle East, while at the same time put a huge source of oil in the hands of terrorists." With all the progress made in Iraq in the past several months, Obama still hasn't changed his tune on this. Obama will simply hand Iraq to al-Qaeda on a silver platter.

"Barack Obama has sent mixed, confusing, and inconsistent messages on his policy toward Israel." Saying one thing to AIPAC one day and quickly backtracking from it the next, he's confused both supporters of Israel and those who desire to destroy it (Obama did receive an endorsement from Hamas).

"In the primary campaign, Barack Obama consistently campaigned against NAFTA, but has now changed his tune, as he has with other issues." They also point out his switch on public campaign financing. Along with his switches on support for Israel, it looks like the Democrats have picked another flip-flopper.

"Barack Obama’s judgment about personal and professional affiliations is more than troubling." Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers were bad enough, but the list keeps getting longer. These types of affiliations represent the types of people he will appoint for positions in his administration, as ambassadors, as judges, etc.

"Obama is simply out of step with how terrorists should be handled; he would turn back the clock on how we fight terrorism, using the failed strategy of the 1990s as opposed to the post-9/11 strategy that has kept us safe." Obama considers it no big deal that captured terrorists will have to be granted habeas-corpus rights under the recent Supreme Court ruling. He considers the first World Trade Center bombing to be a shining example of battling terrorists - wait until they bomb us, then arrest them and keep them in prison. That mentality didn't protect the country on 9/11, and a break from that mentality has kept us safer over the past seven years. Obama would return back to the "law enforcement" strategy that gave us a false sense of security.

"Barack Obama’s economic policies would hurt the economy." Obama wants to increase taxes on income, payroll, capital gains, dividends, and inheritance. His proposals would have a devastating affect on the economy, which is currently struggling. Add tax hikes on top of that, and you can bet that the economy will go into a full-blown recession.

"Barack Obama opposes drilling on and offshore to reduce gas and oil prices." Despite the way Democrats like to blame oil companies, the only way to reduce the price of a limited resource is to either reduce demand or increase supply. Better yet, do both. And while you're at it, keep money away from terrorist-sponsoring countries. That's not going to happen under Obama.

"Barack Obama is to the left of Hillary Clinton and NARAL on the issue of life." Like all liberals, Obama has a very weak argument for his position on abortion, voting against any abortion restriction he's had in front of him.

"Barack Obama is actually to the left of every member of the U.S. Senate." Kerry's heavy (and lengthy) liberal voting record hurt him greatly in 2004. Obama doesn't have that long of a voting record in the Senate, yet the record he does have has earned him the title of "the most liberal Senator in 2007." He received a score of 95.5 from the National Journal, higher than any other Senator.

So what good is inspiration if it is accompanied by all of this? If you're a liberal through and through, I can see why you're excited about Obama. For the first time since 1996, you have a presidential candidate that represents your views who is more expressive than a doorknob. But for the rest of you Obama supporters out there, why does a candidate's inspirational voice mean that you can gloss over all of these serious problems?

Labels: politics

There are so many lessons of the failure of socialism during the 20th century that the left refuses to learn from. 120 years ago, socialism was a bright idea that many wanted to try out and experiment with. America weathered that storm, in some ways, despite the socialist influences present in the New Deal and the entitlement programs that followed. But liberals still crave more and more socialism, believing that while every nation to try socialist principles has failed, they will be the ones to finally get it right.

There was an awesome opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal today about Argentina, titled From Breadbasket to Basket Case. In it, Mary Anastasia O'Grady describes Argentina's "ballooning entitlements, class warfare, hostility toward producers, capital and private property, protectionism and subsidized central-planning." Argentina has been going through political upheaval in the past decade, repeating the benefits of nearly 90 years of of socialist experimentation.

If America is not cautious, we will be in a similar problem. The dollar is already having trouble on the world market. Democrats find it easy to get the spotlight by blaming just about any problem on companies that are turning a profit. Entitlements are already out of control - Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are all in serious danger and are growing at unsustainable rates, but all Democrats want to talk about is adding a huge new entitlement in the form of "universal health care." Just this past week some congressional Democrats expressed their desire to have the government take over oil refineries. The sad thing is, 37% of Democrats think the oil industry should be nationalized.

Socialists knew that this would happen in America.

The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name of "liberalism," they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened. -- Norman Thomas, U.S. Socialist Party presidential candidate 1940, 1944 and 1948

This situation should not be surprising to us. In a climate where few people understand the basic principle of supply and demand, because of the lousy state of government education, it is easy for an eloquent, inspiring speaker to come along and talk about "change" and pull on people's heartstrings, while promoting what is, more or less, a socialist agenda. Few people understand the principles behind this inspiration, and what the long-term effects on the government and our economy could very well be.

In many, many ways, it's 1976 all over again. My mom recently admitted to me that she voted for Jimmy Carter in 1976. My mother is no fool, but she was convinced that this was a really nice man who would be a great president. She was wrong. And it took the mistake of Jimmy Carter for us to get Ronald Reagan (who my mother voted for twice).

Does America have to make a mistake again in 2008? Or will it learn from the thousands of mistakes made by socialist governments and leaders with socialist leanings over the past century?

We'll know the answer to that in November.

Labels: politics

From NASA:

For about 300 years Jupiter's banded atmosphere has shown a remarkable feature to telescopic viewers, a large swirling storm system known as The Great Red Spot. In 2006, another red storm system appeared, actually seen to form as smaller whitish oval-shaped storms merged and then developed the curious reddish hue. Now, Jupiter has a third red spot, again produced from a smaller whitish storm. All three are seen in this image made from data recorded on May 9 and 10 with the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. The spots extend above the surrounding clouds and their red color may be due to deeper material dredged up by the storms and exposed to ultraviolet light, but the exact chemical process is still unknown. For scale, the Great Red Spot has almost twice the diameter of planet Earth, making both new spots less than one Earth-diameter across. The newest red spot is on the far left (west), along the same band of clouds as the Great Red Spot and is drifting toward it. If the motion continues, the new spot will encounter the much larger storm system in August. Jupiter's recent outbreak of red spots is likely related to large scale climate change as the gas giant planet is getting warmer near the equator.

First Earth, then Mars. Now Jupiter. There are other reports of warming on Saturn, Neptune, Pluto, and various moons of other planets. When will the madness end? Pretty soon "global warming" (oh, I'm sorry, "climate change") will affect all of the planets in our little corner of the universe.

Of course, you'd think some people would make the connection about what is common between all these planets warming up.

Government education at work.

Labels: politics

This is one of Bush's best speeches ever:

There are good and decent people who cannot fathom the darkness in these men and try to explain away their words. It's natural, but it is deadly wrong. As witnesses to evil in the past, we carry a solemn responsibility to take these words seriously. Jews and Americans have seen the consequences of disregarding the words of leaders who espouse hatred. And that is a mistake the world must not repeat in the 21st century.

Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is--the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

Some people suggest if the United States would just break ties with Israel, all our problems in the Middle East would go away. This is a tired argument that buys into the propaganda of the enemies of peace, and America utterly rejects it.

Why is it that in the best speeches Bush has ever given, he sounds almost exactly like Reagan? Actually, come to think of it, that's not really a surprise at all.

And when Obama complained that this was a political attack against him, he misunderstood who Bush was criticizing, I think. If you read Bush's words carefully, he's obviously criticizing Jimmy Carter. That Obama misunderstood it as a criticism of himself just further entrenches my belief that an Obama presidency would be as much of a disaster as a Carter presidency (and worse, that an Obama ex-presidency would be just as bad as a Carter ex-presidency). Which might be unavoidable, and it actually might be necessary for the country before we can turn to another Reagan-quality president. But still disconcerting nonetheless.

I think it is truly a proud position to believe that one can carry some type of "ingenious argument" that will "persuade them they have been wrong all along." Any would-be president who doesn't understand the principle here -- the problem with "the false comfort of appeasement," needs to take a few more history lessons.

Labels: politics

This is from a letter from Senator McCain to Senator Obama, dated February 6, 2006, on the issue of developing a bipartisan plan for lobbying reform:

Dear Senator Obama:

I would like to apologize to you for assuming that your private assurances to me regarding your desire to cooperate in our efforts to negotiate bipartisan lobbying reform legislation were sincere. When you approached me and insisted that despite your leadership's preference to use the issue to gain a political advantage in the 2006 elections, you were personally committed to achieving a result that would reflect credit on the entire Senate and offer the country a better example of political leadership, I concluded your professed concern for the institution and the public interest was genuine and admirable. Thank you for disabusing me of such notions with your letter to me dated February 2, 2006, which explained your decision to withdraw from our bipartisan discussions. I'm embarrassed to admit that after all these years in politics I failed to interpret your previous assurances as typical rhetorical gloss routinely used in politics to make self-interested partisan posturing appear more noble. Again, sorry for the confusion, but please be assured I won't make the same mistake again.

...the American people do not see [lobbying reform] as just a Republican problem or just a Democratic problem. They see it as yet another run-of-the-mill Washington scandal, and they expect it will generate just another round of partisan gamesmanship and posturing. Senator Lieberman and I, and many other members of this body, hope to exceed the public's low expectations. We view this as an opportunity to bring transparency and accountability to the Congress, and, most importantly, to show the public that both parties will work together to address our failings.

As I noted, I initially believed you shared that goal. But I understand how important the opportunity to lead your party's effort to exploit this issue must seem to a freshman Senator, and I hold no hard feelings over your earlier disingenuousness. Again, I have been around long enough to appreciate that in politics the public interest isn't always a priority for every one of us. Good luck to you, Senator.

Sincerely,

John McCain

Ouch.

My respect for John McCain just went up tremendously. This reads like something Reagan would have written. Read the full letter here.

Labels: politics

From The Democrats' Ex-Presidents at AmericanThinker.com:

Carter was indirectly responsible for putting the mullahs in power in Iran (kicking off the violent confrontation between Jihadism and the West in the process). He was directly responsible for handing Nicaragua to the Sandinistas (Carter refused to sign off on a plan to replace the dictator Somoza with a government of moderates) and Zimbabwe to Robert Mugabe. (Abel Muzorewa, the centrist opposition figure first elected president, was pushed aside with Carter's acquiescence and a new election arranged that Mugabe was guaranteed to win.)

Carter's weakness for goons has had horrendous historical consequences. Khomeini's takeover of Iran led to a major war in which millions died, the birth of two terror organizations dedicated to the annihilation of Israel, the deaths of thousands of others across the world -- including hundreds of Americans -- and the encouragement of the Jihadi terror movement. The Sandinista takeover resulted in chaos across Central America for over a decade and the slaughter of thousands of Nicaraguans, including a large number of Miskito Indians in a process indistinguishable from genocide. Zimbabwe, once one of the richest states in Africa, is today an economic basket case suffering chronic famine and one the lowest life expectancies in the world. The end game is being played out now, with a distinct possibility of a climax to rival in horror and blood those of Rwanda and Cambodia.

Carter learned nothing from this, nothing even from his own unprecedented humiliation by the mullahs he helped put into power, who waited until the exact hour of Ronald Reagan's inauguration to release the American hostages they had held for the better part of Carter's last two years in office. To this day, he continues embracing killers, repeating the process endlessly as if, eventually, it'll come out the way he pictures it in his heart of hearts, in some impossible lion-and-lamb reconciliation. But it always ends otherwise, in disgrace for himself and misery for third parties. Yet he cannot see it.

Labels: politics

Carter: Hamas is willing to accept Israel as its neighbor (12:16 ET - April 21, 2008):

Former President Carter said Monday that Hamas — the Islamic militant group that has called for the destruction of Israel — is prepared to accept the right of the Jewish state to "live as a neighbor next door in peace."

Meanwhile: Hamas leader says militant group won't recognize Israel (12:00 ET - April 21, 2008):

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal says his militant Islamic group will not recognize Israel. But Mashaal says Hamas will accept a Palestinian state on Palestinian territories occupied by Israel in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Not sure what Carter is reading, but it sure isn't the Associated Press.

People like to blame Israel for all of this. I hear people characterize Israel's actions against Hamas to be terrorism. But consider this AP article from this morning, Hamas says it's willing to accept Gaza Strip cease-fire:

Hamas has softened its position and is willing to accept a cease-fire in just the Gaza Strip, dropping a demand that the truce immediately include the West Bank, the group's senior representatives said Tuesday.

The move marked a significant concession by Hamas as Egyptian mediators try to halt fighting between Palestinian militants and the Israeli army in Gaza. For weeks, Hamas insisted on a mutual cease-fire in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip....

Israel regularly carries out airstrikes and military incursions against Palestinian rocket squads in Hamas-controlled Gaza, a strip of land bordering southern Israel. While Israel is conducting peace talks with the rival Palestinian government in the West Bank, the Israeli army continues to carry out arrest raids in that territory as well...

Israel has repeatedly said it isn't negotiating with Hamas, a group that has carried out numerous suicide bombings and remains committed to Israel's destruction. A government spokesman said Tuesday that Israel would keep up its military pressure on Hamas as long as the group threatens Israeli civilians.

"Israeli defense measures are necessary because of the ongoing terrorism launched by Hamas-controlled elements in Gaza. If there were no terror activities there would be no need for Israel's military activity," spokesman David Baker said...

Hamas has softened its position and is willing to accept a cease-fire in just the Gaza Strip, dropping a demand that the truce immediately include the West Bank, the group's senior representatives said Tuesday.

The move marked a significant concession by Hamas as Egyptian mediators try to halt fighting between Palestinian militants and the Israeli army in Gaza. For weeks, Hamas insisted on a mutual cease-fire in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip...

Mashaal said Hamas would accept a peace deal with Israel, provided it is approved in a referendum of all Palestinians, and also offered a 10-year truce if Israel withdraws from the West Bank and Jerusalem. He offered no recognition of Israel and turned down a request from Carter for a halt to rocket fire.

Amos Gilad, a senior Israel Defense Ministry official involved in the negotiations with Egypt, said Tuesday that Mashaal had offered nothing of significance and that his comments were meant only to give Hamas time to rearm.

There's a lot to that article that is very telling -- I tried to get the main points quoted. But notice several things.

First, that Hamas has no intention to recognize Israel. Perhaps Carter has had some positive influence on their shift this week to offer a cease-fire, but for Carter to go around and mischaracterize this in the press is counterproductive, at best. At worst, the statement is designed to make Carter look good, and to make Israel look bad when this deal falls apart. Which it will (see points #3 and #4). It seems that most of the leaders Carter tries to influence only abuse the opportunity and seek their own tactical advantage.

Second, the most important thing to determine here is this - who is the aggressor? Hamas squads fire rockets indiscriminately into Israel (just as Hezbollah did). Israel fights back, targeting the rocket squads. The easiest way to determine the aggressor is to figure out what would happen if one side stops fighting. If Israel stops fighting, they would be destroyed (pretty easy to determine since this is Hamas' stated goal). If Hamas stops fighting, Israel has stated that their military actions would cease.

Third, the Palestinians are still playing by the same playbook that Arafat played by. That is, to attack until Israel bumps up the pressure, then cry foul, negotiate a cease-fire, get the borders open again, and resupply for the next round. And remember, Carter was in the middle of all of the deals with Arafat as well. This is a classic example of how diplomacy can easily fail, especially when the aggressors are very motivated, and very patient. Ten years to re-arm isn't a bad deal for Hamas at all.

Fourth, the offer includes a demand that Israel simply won't accept - complete control of Jerusalem. I believe this is intentional - Hamas can say "we offered peace but Israel rejected it!" It's a political move that ensures that Israel will reject the offer and look like the bad guy. These guys are more ruthless than you might think. And they use the meeting with Carter (and Carter's press statements) to further push Israel's reputation in the mud. All while Hamas is the true aggressor.

Finally, many liberals will complain about the U.S. support of Israel and how this encourages their "terrorism." I think the opposite is true - that one of the few restraints on Israel is the support of the U.S. Without our support, I believe that Israel would take a much harder line against the Palestinians and these terrorist groups, and other mideast nations in general. If you're being told daily by foreign governments, and the terrorist groups they support, that you're going to be wiped off the map, your response is not going to be measured. Support from the U.S. means that they know that they have an ally if anything really bad were to happen, so they can take a more measured response to the "smaller" terrorism issues that they face daily. And they know that if they just wiped the Palestinians out of the West Bank and Gaza (which I'm pretty sure many Israelis would love to do) they'd lose U.S. support in a heartbeat. So in the interest of peace, we should be thankful that the U.S. has supported Israel.

The moral of the story? Don't trust terrorists. Like snakes, they're patient and cunning. And it's hard to trust politicians (including ex-presidents) who go around trying to put a positive spin on them, too.

Labels: politics

Happy tax day, once again. And remember: with the FairTax, today could be just like any other spring day.

By the way, over at the FairTax site they have a little petition going on that they're sending to Congress today. Head on over to sign it if you're tired of the overly complicated way the federal government taxes you.

Now that's change I can believe in...

Labels: politics

I just think that this is too darn funny:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or antitrade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

Not that it's surprising to hear a liberal presidential candidate talk this way, honestly. It's just funny because Obama is supposed to be this post-racial, post-partisan, savior-of-the-free-world messiah of a presidential candidate. And like how he stepped in it recently over Jeremiah Wright and proved that he's a liar just like all the other politicians out there (just not as good of one), now he shows that he's just as disdainful of the regular folks your run-of-the-mill liberal.

Surprise, surprise, Obama. Not everyone wants sex education for five-year-olds. "Post-racial" candidates shouldn't even use terms like "typical white person" and talk about how they are inherently racist for being concerned when passing someone on the street. Not everyone believes you when you say you've been going to a church for 20 years and had no idea that your pastor was so anti-American. And most of the country doesn't agree with you that support for gun rights or devotion to a religion are products of bitterness over economic conditions. (Both specifically mentioned in the Bill of Rights, the last time I looked, so they must have been pretty bitter way back in 1791!)

For all the promise of the Obama campaign, it looks indeed to be all fluff. When you finally get past all the talk about coming together and believing in change, as I believe we are beginning to, what you really find is your run-of-the-mill liberal.

The only Democrat to be elected president in the last 30 years did so by pretending he was a conservative. I don't consider 2008 to be a sure-win for conservatives in any way, but one thing is for sure - liberals have a lot to learn.

Labels: politics

From Who's Right? by Neal Boortz:

Among the rights guaranteed (not “given” as Bill Clinton believes) to you in our Constitution are:

• Freedom of religion
• Freedom of speech
• The right to peaceably assemble.
• The right to petition the government
• The right to keep and bear arms
• The right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures
• Protection from double jeopardy
• Due process
• A speedy and public trial by jury
• The right to legal counsel when charged with a crime

With one exception, the right to representation in court and a trial by jury, these rights require nothing of any other citizen but that they recognize your rights and not interfere with them.

Your “right to health care” would require some other person to give up a portion of their life or their property to either treat you or to provide you with drugs or medical implements. The Constitution does not provide for another individual to be indentured to you in this manner.

Therefore, you have no “right” to health care.

Even in the case of representation in court, and a trial by jury, these rights only have to be provided by society if society charges you with a crime. Quite a different thing from indenturing other individuals to meet your basic, everyday needs.

Why has our society dwindled into such an entitlement mentality? Why is it the government's job to provide? And why do some Christians support the idea of the government using the police power of the state to do the job they're neglecting?

Labels: politics

OK, just watch this and tell me that Obama isn't lying. Watch him stumble and try to explain his way out of this mess.



You mean you've been attending this guy's church for nearly 20 years and you had no idea this guy was so incendiary?

At least Clinton was a believable liar. Talk radio hosts (like Hannity, including on his TV show) have been covering this issue for months. Obama didn't publicly denounce this stuff until the major media outlets began covering it.

Give me a break.

The good news? Right now Zogby has McCain leading Clinton or Obama, when factoring Nader into the race. Should be a fun seven months.

Labels: politics

Boortz and Linder recently came out with another FairTax book, called FairTax: The Truth: Answering the Critics.

It's been billed as their effort to "answer the outspoken and misinformed critics" of the FairTax. The main disappointment I have with the book is that it really only does that for about two chapters.

The book is still good, though, including more history about how the FairTax developed. The book does a good job of dealing with criticisms, even if it's a little short on explanations here and there. It does not assume that you've read their first FairTax book, nor does it assume you're familiar with all of the aspects of the FairTax. Between giving some history on the FairTax, and explaining most of its basic concepts, it's not until about halfway through the book before they really take on the critics.

Perhaps the best stuff in the book is towards the end, though. There's a great section where they describe what it would be like to have lived under the FairTax all of your life - receiving your entire paycheck. No payroll taxes. Knowing exactly what government is costing. Not having to base business or investment decisions on their tax consequences. And then they describe a politician trying to come and sell the current system as an improvement. Taxing your income. Taxing business profits, so there's a hidden tax cost in everything you buy. Taxing investments. Even taxing death.

It's a very interesting way to look at it, and it really helps to make it clear how much simpler the FairTax is, and how it removes government from more day-to-day business and personal decisions.

If you've been suspicious of the FairTax, I highly encourage you to pick this book up. It's less technical than the first one, in some ways, and more visionary in tone. And many of your questions and concerns about the FairTax are probably dealt with in this book.

One criticism I felt like they should have dealt with better is the progressive nature of the FairTax. They explain the prebate well, and how that prevents anyone from paying taxes on the basic necessities of life (defined by the poverty level), and they explained how this makes the FairTax progressive. They also talked a good bit about net effective tax rates under the current tax system. But I think they could have talked more about net effective tax rates under the FairTax. I've left comments about this over at FairTaxBlog.Com, and I'll probably work on a post about this particular issue in the future. It's really important to consider net effective rates when people initially react to the idea of a 23% inclusive consumption tax.

(Actually, if you have serious questions or concerns about the FairTax, check out FairTaxBlog.Com. There are a lot of supporters and critics that can support their points very well there.)

I think this quote does a good job of describing the overall goals of tax reform, and what the FairTax will enable.

Under the FairTax Vision for Tomorrow, every time an American buys a loaf of bread or a new car, he'll know, to the penny, how much of that money is going to the federal government.

Our vision for tomorrow sees a government that's a partner with the business community and the people, not an adversary; a government with a tax system that encourages economic development and the creation of the new business, rather than a government and a tax system that chases valued businesses to foreign shores.

Our vision for tomorrow is one where governance returns to the local level; were communities are allowed to make the important decisions regarding their government and their schools. No longer will politicians be able to hide regulations and programs that control every aspect of our lives in 9 million words of confusing and draconian codes and regulation. The FairTax will demand political honesty...

Our vision for tomorrow sees an America where jobs are insourced, not outsourced... sees America becoming the safest and most secure tax haven for trillions of dollars currently languishing offshore... sees an America that will enjoy a virtual $400-billion-per-year tax cut... an exporting powerhouse, selling goods and services into a global economy unburdened by the 22 percent tax component now burdening our price system...

People see all of this and say, "how can a different tax system do that?" One point that I haven't seen made clearly enough, is that the FairTax wouldn't be responsible for any of this. The truth is that these "benefits" would not be due to enacting the FairTax, they would be due to completely getting rid of all of the oppression of the current tax structure on our economic decisions, while still funding our government. It is not the FairTax that would produce such wonderful results - it would be the American people, unencumbered by an oppressive tax system. How can you disagree with that?

Labels: books, politics, reviews

From Temperature Monitors Report Widescale Global Cooling:

All four major global temperature tracking outlets (Hadley, NASA's GISS, UAH, RSS) have released updated data. All show that over the past year, global temperatures have dropped precipitously... The total amount of cooling ranges from 0.65C up to 0.75C.

So first we heard that global warming had nothing to do with carbon emissions. Now this. Can someone please explain to me why it's wrong to be skeptical of "science" that's pushed onto the public by politicians?

And can someone explain to me how long the mainstream media can possibly avoid covering this accurately?



I just can't wait for Al Gore to do a sequel and include all of the updated figures into another movie. Then again, maybe I shouldn't hold my breath.

Labels: politics

From John Stossel in Guns Save Lives:

How many shootings at schools or malls will it take before we understand that people who intend to kill are not deterred by gun laws? Last I checked, murder is against the law everywhere. No one intent on murder will be stopped by the prospect of committing a lesser crime like illegal possession of a firearm. The intellectuals and politicians who make pious declarations about controlling guns should explain how their gunless utopia is to be realized.

While they search for -- excuse me -- their magic bullet, innocent people are dying defenseless.

That's because laws that make it difficult or impossible to carry a concealed handgun do deter one group of people: law-abiding citizens who might have used a gun to stop crime. Gun laws are laws against self-defense.

Criminals have the initiative. They choose the time, place and manner of their crimes, and they tend to make choices that maximize their own, not their victims', success. So criminals don't attack people they know are armed, and anyone thinking of committing mass murder is likely to be attracted to a gun-free zone, such as schools and malls.

Why do liberals insist on creating gun-free zones? Do they not see that this creates an obvious place for criminals to go on mass murder sprees?

It's actually quite typical of the liberal mindset - focus on ideas that sound good. And implement them without any thought to the ramifications. "Ban all the guns! They're evil!" You know, if you could really ensure that all of the guns in the universe were destroyed, and that nobody could ever create another one, then sure, it'd be a good idea. But liberals neglect the fact that criminals will always have the ability to secure lethal weapons, including guns. And the most efficient way to stop a crazy gunman is with a law-abiding citizen carrying a gun.

Labels: politics

I do a lot of commenting around the web, but really mostly on Josh Brown's blog. Something about the discussions there just sucks me right in.

So I decided to start quoting myself every now and then. Kind of vain, I know. But every now and then I just say something that I think, "I should write a blog post about this." Due to my laziness, I'll just give you the back-of-the-book quotes.

If people were half as worried about babies getting their brains sucked out of their head while being halfway through the birth canal, I’d take liberals a little more seriously in their concerns about waterboarding. (from Huckabee Is An Idiot)

The whole process of picking a president was never supposed to be this way. Presidents, initially, were chosen by electors who were chosen by state legislatures. So none of this beauty contest type of thing. Presidents (and senators, for that matter) were chosen by the states. I would really love to see someone push for a more simple system like that again. It would give the national news media a LOT less to talk about. (from Oh Politic Where Art Thou?)

I think the ideas of transforming culture, and us redeeming the world, are very appealing. But therein lies their danger. They make us important. Following what Christ personally did, and what He commanded His followers to do, will not really help us transform the world. It’s too radical. Too crazy. Too dismissive of worldly systems. When we become followers in God’s kingdom, we’re aliens here. I don’t know, I just see so much in scripture that goes against the idea of us redeeming the world, whereas I think you have to try really hard to read those ideas into scripture.

Look, we have a hard enough time following Christ’s explicit commands. Trying to obediently serve my place in the kingdom of God is simple, yet really, really hard to do. I don’t think Christ burdened the entire church with the transformation of the world into God’s original vision of it - something that is described in scripture, but something that is described as God doing, not the church. (from Oh Politic Where Art Thou?)

Compassion means “to suffer with.” If our efforts are based on funneling money from the “evil rich” to the poor with no interaction between them except for a cold, soul-less government, it’s very little service to anyone. I think it’s perhaps the most heartless form of ministry imaginable. (from The Politics of Heaven)

When Jesus is telling us to sell our possessions and give to the poor, I don’t think he was suggesting that we encourage the government to do so by force. To me, that sounds like a joke - if I could only figure out how to turn it into a punchline. (from The Politics of Heaven)

Good comments from the other side on each of those posts as well, lots of stuff to think about.

Labels: church, politics

Check out this article by David Evans: Are Carbon Emissions the Cause of Global Warming? This is very revealing, but I can guarantee that you won't see much of this research in the media.

Ice Core Data Reverses — 2003

It was the early, low resolution ice core data first gathered in 1985 that convinced the world that CO₂ was the culprit: CO₂ levels and temperature rose and fell in lockstep over the last half a million years, to the resolution of the old ice core data (results from 1985–2000, data points over a thousand years apart). It was assumed (bad assumption #1) that CO₂ levels controlled the world's temperature.

After further research, new high-resolution ice core results (data points only a few hundred years apart) in 2000–2003 allowed us to distinguish which came first, the temperature rises or the CO₂ rises. We found that temperature changes preceded CO₂ changes by an average of 800 years. So temperature caused the CO₂ levels, and not the other way around as previously assumed. The world should have started backpedaling away from blaming carbon emissions in 2003.

Greenhouse Signature Missing — 2007

Second crucial point, August 2007: There are several possible causes of global warming, and they each warm the atmosphere at different latitudes and altitudes — that is, each cause will produce a distinct pattern of hot spots in the atmosphere, or "signature." The greenhouse signature is very distinct from the others: warming due to greenhouse would cause most warming in the tropics at about 10 km up in the atmosphere:

Theoretical Greenhouse Signature (UN climate models)

As of August 2007, we've measured where the warming is occurring in a fair bit of detail, using satellites and balloons. The observed signature is nothing like the greenhouse signature. The distinct greenhouse signature is entirely missing:

Observed Warming (Hadley Centre radiosonde observations 2006, confirmed by more measurements published in 2007)

There is no hotspot in the tropics at 10 km up, so now we know that greenhouse warming is not the (main) cause of global warming — so we know that carbon emissions are not the (main) cause of global warming.

Evans then goes on to describe why the original models were wrong - it was assumed that higher temperatures would mean more rainfall, and more high cloud cover that would intensify the warming effect. Instead, observations reveal that this cloud cover has actually lessened.

He also presents data that shows that the warming trend has waned since 2001. I have heard this from other sources as well, including climatologists who have predicted a natural cooling period will occur within the next 10 years.

To those who believe that the currently predominant global warming hysteria is accurate: please consider that there is more scientific evidence coming out that is contradicting the old evidence that the global warming hysteria is based on. The scientific landscape surrounding this is changing, despite Gore's claims that it is "settled."

Labels: politics

I can't seem to have time to do a lot of blog writing, but it ends up I'm still contributing to the web at large. James Taranto (WSJ's Best of the Web, one of my daily reads) has been criticizing the FairTax lately, as well as Mike Huckabee (who is a strong, vocal supporter of the FairTax). On Tuesday he finally gave a list of reasons why he's critical of the FairTax, and over at the FairTax blog I posted a comment about it that they ended up reposting as a post all in itself. I'm flattered. You can read my response and well as take a peek at the original post that quotes Taranto's criticism.

Just about any criticism of the FairTax can be met with a reasoned, logical response. Maybe that's one of the reasons I like it. All Taranto needs is some time with some FairTax supporters who can answer his criticisms.

Labels: politics

If there's a running theme to these quotes, it's that modern-day liberals are basically socialists who don't believe in personal freedom, unless it involves not removing someone who has committed perjury from the office of the presidency.

John Stossel: Control Your Own Health Care

If people paid their own bills, they would likely buy high-deductible insurance (roughly $1,000 for individuals, $2,100 for families) because on average, the premium is $1,300 cheaper. But people are so conditioned to expect others to pay their medical bills that they hate high deductibles: They feel ripped off if they must pay a thousand dollars before the insurance company starts paying...

Whole Foods puts around $1,500 a year into an account for each employee. It's not charity but part of the employee's compensation. It's money Whole Foods would have otherwise spent on more-expensive insurance. Here's the good part for employees: If they don't spend the money on medical care this year, they keep it, and the company adds more next year...

Most important, since employees control the money, their behavior changed. Whole Foods workers started asking "how much things cost," Mackey said. "They may not want to go to the emergency room if they wake up with a hangnail in the middle of the night. They may schedule an appointment now."

There was no need to ask about costs before because the insurance company seemed to pick up the tab. But that drove up costs for everyone. Now, saving money makes sense to employees because the money belongs to them.

HSA critics ask whether individual accounts will encourage people to save money at the expense of their health.

Mackey has the right response. "The premise in those kinds of questions is that people are stupid. They're not smart enough to make these decisions for themselves. It's sort of an elitist attitude. The individual is the best judge of what's right for the individual."

Well, of course, liberals (and socialists) always believe those in power know better than you do, as long as they're the ones in power. They have no concept of true freedom. They have no concept of the free market. They believe that if a situation is to improve, the government must intervene. The idea of individuals taking control of their healthcare frightens them.

John Stossel rules, by the way. John Stossel for president!

C.S. Lewis on Government Education:
OK, it's not specifically about government education, but our current government education exactly matches what C.S. Lewis was complaining about. Boortz quoted this earlier this week, and it's worth re-quoting.

What I want to fix your attention on is the vast overall movement towards the discrediting, and finally the elimination, of every kind of human excellence -- moral, cultural, social or intellectual. And is it not pretty to notice how 'democracy' (in the incantatory sense) is now doing for us the work that was once done by the most ancient dictatorships, and by the same methods? The basic proposal of the new education is to be that dunces and idlers must not be made to feel inferior to intelligent and industrious pupils. That would be 'undemocratic.' Children who are fit to proceed may be artificially kept back, because the others would get a trauma by being left behind. The bright pupil thus remains democratically fettered to his own age group throughout his school career, and a boy who would be capable of tackling Aeschylus or Dante sits listening to his coeval's [of the same age] attempts to spell out A CAT SAT ON A MAT. We may reasonably hope for the virtual abolition of education when 'I'm as good as you' has fully had its way. All incentives to learn and all penalties for not learning will vanish. The few who might want to learn will be prevented; who are they to overtop their fellows? And anyway, the teachers -- or should I say nurses? -- will be far too busy reassuring the dunces and patting them on the back to waste any time on real teaching. We shall no longer have to plan and toil to spread imperturbable conceit and incurable ignorance among men.

It is quite amazing how accurate his analysis was.

Coulter on Why She Doesn't Support Fred Thompson:

In 1999, Sen. Fred Thompson joined legal giants like Sens. Jim Jeffords, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins to vote against removing Bill Clinton from office for perjury.

Thompson, whom President Nixon once called "dumb as hell," claimed to have carefully studied the Constitution and determined that perjury by the president of the United States did not constitute "high crimes and misdemeanors." He must have been looking at one of those living, breathing Constitutions we've heard so much about.

When the framers chose the phrase "high crimes and misdemeanors" for the Constitution, they were using a term taken from British parliamentary impeachments. There's a 600-year history of what this phrase means -- and Clinton met it about a dozen times before he gave a single statement under oath or suborned a single witness's testimony...

But, as The New York Times recently said, Thompson "agonized over what he saw as two 'bad choices...'"

So Thompson could either: (1) Follow the Constitution and make his constituents happy or, (2) disregard the Constitution and make his Hollywood friends happy...

This isn't the time to be toying with any Republican who had a Clinton in his sights and ended up shooting himself in the foot.

Speaking of Ann Coulter, I just got her new book. There are a few choice quotes from that book that I'll be sharing once I'm done with it.

Boortz on Hillary:

Watch this woman. All she seems to be doing lately is coming up with ideas for government entitlement programs ... and government entitlement programs are nothing more than wealth redistribution programs. Check your scorecard we have:

* Nationalized Health Care.
* The Baby Bonus
* American Retirement Accounts
* Hillary's idea of government involvement in our children's education even before kindergarten!

In the meantime ... have you heard one single idea from Hillary that would increase your personal freedom? Have you heard one single idea that would decrease the intrusiveness or the power of the Imperial Federal Government? How about one idea that would promote competition in the free market?

You're right ... you haven't.

You haven't because Hillary Clinton worships the God of Government. This is a woman who feels that there are only a select few in this country who are capable of ordering and living their own lives without guidance from those smarter and more capable than they. This is a woman who believes to the depth of her soul that you can't exist without embrace of government guiding your every step and picking you up every time you stumble.

The further we get into the presidential race, the more I'm sure that Hillary will get the nomination. Why, then, is she making this so easy for the Republicans? She keeps offering new entitlement programs, hoping to buy more votes. If the Democrats' type of pandering is successful, our form of government cannot withstand much longer. Most of the voting public is intelligent enough to see through her desparate attempts to buy votes. Let's just hope that it stays that way.

It's interesting that as socialism is receding throughout the world (with the notable exception of Cindy Sheehan's best friend, Hugo Chavez), Democrats are still trying to get Americans to participate in a bold socialist experiment. They are patient, though, and are more than willing to expand the socialist ideal one step at a time.

Labels: politics

There's been so much going on, and I've read a lot of stuff I've wanted to link to and make some comments about. I figured I'll just rattle a bunch off and get on with it...

Sun still main force in climate change:

Over the past 20 years, however, the Danes argue, the solar cycle remains fully apparent in variations both of tropospheric air temperature and of ocean sub-surface water temperature.

"When the response of the climate system to the solar cycle is apparent in the troposphere and ocean, but not in the global surface temperature, one can only wonder about the quality of the surface temperature record," Svensmark and Friis-Christensen say.

The surface air temperature, they argue, is "a poor guide to sun-driven physical processes that are still plainly persistent in the climate system."

The researchers explained it's "customary to attribute to greenhouse gases any increase in global temperatures not due to solar changes."

"While that is reasonable," they say, "one cannot distinguish between the effects of anthropogenic gases such as carbon dioxide and of natural greenhouse gases."

Increased evaporation, for example, means "infrared radiation from water vapor, by far the most important greenhouse gas, will tend to provide positive feedback for any global warming, whether driven by anthropogenic or solar forcing."

Come on, people. The sun provides all the energy for our planet. Without it, our temperature would drop rather drastically. Surely anyone would have to admit that variance in solar output would result in changes in temperatures on earth (among other planets, as studies are also showing). Why do proponets of the man-caused global warming theory simply want to dismiss this?

And when they say that they "wonder about the quality of the surface temperature record," you can take a look at a site like this surfacestations.org to see examples of stations recording temperatures that are located in areas that are nowhere near giving an accurate temperature reading. Located by air conditioners, in parking lots, beside a lightbulb, all sorts of stuff. And these are the readings that are contributing to the data that makes everyone believe that "global warming" exists.

Questioning 20th Century Warmth:

Gerd Bürger of Berlin’s Institut für Meteorologie decided to revisit the work of Osborn and Briffa, and his results raise serious questions about the claim that the 20th century has been unusually warm. Bürger argues that Osborn and Briffa did not apply the appropriate statistical tests that link the proxy records to observational data, and as such, Osborn and Briffa did not properly quantify the statistical uncertainties in their analyses. Bürger repeated all analyses with the appropriate adjustments and concluded “As a result, the ‘highly significant’ occurrences of positive anomalies during the 20th century disappear.” Further, he reports that “The 95th percentile is exceeded mostly in the early 20th century, but also about the year 1000.”

In other words, this whole idea of the 20th century being quite an anomoly is quite possibly total bunk. Why? Because proponets of the man-caused global warming theory fail to use the right statistical methods when doing their research, and the media laps up the results regardless of the methods, since the result promotes hysteria.

CNN Meteorologist: ‘Definitely Some Inaccuracies’ in Gore Film:

CNN Meteorologist Rob Marciano clapped his hands and exclaimed, "Finally," in response to a report that a British judge might ban the movie "An Inconvenient Truth" from UK schools because, according to "American Morning," "it is politically biased and contains scientific inaccuracies..." Marciano also sarcastically said, "the Oscars, they give out awards for fictional films as well."

It must be getting a little cool down in the eternal dungeon, if someone at CNN is being critical of Al Gore. And on that note...

Boortz Responds to Al Gore's Peace Prize:

With few exceptions, the Nobel Peace Prize has always been awarded to someone with both feet firmly planted in the world of liberalism. I know a lot of leftists and anti-capitalists around this country and the world will be celebrating, but when you consider that this prize was once awarded to that murderous Muslim Yassir Arafat, it's hard to be impressed.

The peace prize has been a joke for years. Giving it to Yassir Arafat simply made it official. After that, giving it to Al Gore just gives you a good chuckle.

Labels: politics

The website I'm about to tell you about is extremely important. I've talked about abortion before, and it's even the topic of one of my critical posts. But this time it's a little different, and much more extreme.

The website is Abort73.com, and they are basically reaching out, primarily to teens, to educate about the violence and horror of abortion.

I can't sum up their site in a sentence or two, other than just to say you should view it. If you're against abortion, viewing their videos and reading their literature will only strengthen your courage to take a stronger stand against abortion. If you're "pro-choice," you simply have to watch their videos. If you're still "pro-choice" after viewing them, then you have no heart and are morally bankrupt. Sorry to be blunt, but it's the truth.

Abortion is simply the extension of America's propensity for violence. Not violence around the world, but violence against our own members. Those who have the least legal status get the most brutal treatment. And it continues today, all under the banner of "choice."

Take some time at Abort73. Most of all, if you look at one thing, view the video at The Case Against Abortion. WARNING: it is extremely graphic. But if you've never seen anything like it before, then all of your opinions about abortion are based on ignorance. It's take to take responsibility and understand what it is that America is willingly turning a blind eye to.

Labels: church, politics

I've spent some time developing a defense of the FairTax against common criticisms, in How FairTax Critics are Always Wrong. Head on over to the Conservative Rant to check it out.

Labels: politics

There's a great article in Christianity Today this month by Mark Galli titled On Not Transforming the World. The subtitle is "we have better and harder things to do than that."

We are certainly responsible for going to the ends of the earth and making disciples from people of every nation. There is plenty in Scripture about doing justice and loving mercy and feeding the hungry and caring for the widow and orphan. But I find little or nothing about us having the task of transforming the culture.

Britt has talked about how Changing the World is something that isn't found in scripture. At least not something that is assigned to us.

Galli's article touches on how service is our number one task, in terms of transforming the world:

Servants aren't about world-changing initiatives as much as about washing the dirty feet of the travelers sitting at their kitchen table. Jesus never tells us to do anything because it will transform the culture. Surprisingly, he didn't seem interested in transforming the Roman Empire, one of the most oppressive and unjust cultures in history. He seemed rather to think that society would always have economic disparity, and that not only should changing Rome not be a priority, but also we should not even object to underwriting it with our taxes...

I remain puzzled as to why we're so bored with the very things Jesus asks us to do, like picking that foreigner up out of the ditch, giving away our goods to the poor, going to court with a young man who's being railroaded by the system, taking an orphan into our home, going the extra mile with the oppressive and manipulative, forgiving the offender, baptizing, and witnessing. I find these things really, really hard to do. I fail all the time. If I can't even do these things well, why would I believe that I could transform my culture, let alone change the world?

Despite my political rants and opinions, I've been learning more and more that it is not our job to make political systems reflect the church. Does that mean we should be apathetic towards politics? I don't think so. But it makes it all the more difficult to discern when we are pushing our own religious agenda into politics.

People tend to think that Christ's mission was about transformation, and that in today's culture, we should redeem the culture (by keeping it sanitary), transform social politics (by enforcing charity), or other high ideals. But by doing so, we are trying to place a significance onto ourselves that simply isn't rooted in scripture. Galli says "we all face the common temptation of Adam and Eve. We want to feel significant."

Scripture is clear that Christ's mission was about service, and that this is our mission also. In today's culture, I think the targets of that service are clear. While it is hard, it is not a complicated thing to fulfill what the scriptures have required of us. And it is about doing it ourselves, not about creating a governmental structure to force everyone else to do it our way.

Labels: church, politics

Church - I led worship and teaching at house church Sunday night, which was fun. I did a few songs I had never led before, including "Salvation is Here." You wouldn't think it would work in a more intimate setting, but actually it was great.

Baby Watch - We're nearly there on a name. I think we're down to two middle names. Amy had her final baby shower on Saturday, so now we're getting the last few things we know we'll need. Including furniture. We have our crib (actually, I'll be getting it back from my brother soon), but we need a dresser, and we're also thinking about getting a daybed so the baby's room can still double as a guest room.

Home Improvements - That shower door did get installed, but it was two inches lower than what we ordered, so the new one will be installed on Wednesday. Figures. This project has taken longer to wrap up than we anticipated!

Conservative Rant - I forgot to mention my post last week, called Obama Wants Sex Education for Five-Year-Olds. Another great example why I won't trust the government to educate my children.

Labels: life, politics

I decided to start a new series of posts, just wrapping up every week the major things that have been going on in the past week. This is partly to just share with folks what's up with the Mooneys, but also because I often have smaller thoughts to share that just don't warrant an entire post.

Fourth of July - we hosted a big family event for the 4th. Took the kids out for fireworks afterward. They loved it! I also got to try to explain to McKenna what "Independence Day" means.

Worship - I got to play bass today for the first time in a LONG time. My bass is showing some neglect - it desperately needs new strings. I was asked to fill in today on bass at a church where I've been leading worship occasionally for the last couple of months. I had a blast!

Movies - we took the kids to see Ratatouille yesterday. They loved it, though it didn't keep their attention as much as some of the other Pixar movies do. It was Jeremiah's first time seeing a new big screen movie. Amy tried taking him to see a free movie last summer and it was an awful experience. But he did pretty well yesterday, especially considering the movie was almost two hours. And for those who are budget conscious, the AMC Theaters around here have all shows at $5 before noon on weekends.

I also saw Transformers last Monday. I was a big Transformers fan as a kid, and this movie did not disappoint. But I think even folks who weren't Transformers fans as kids would enjoy it. Just don't take your little kids to go see it - the violence wasn't bad, but there were a few jokes that were not appropriate.

And while this isn't news about the past week, I'm currently taking part in Conservative Rant, a political blog started by my good friend Andy. My goal is to contribute to that site once a week, but it'll probably only be twice a month for the next couple of months. My first post there was Why I’m Conservative (or, Why I’m Not Liberal) and my most recent post is How Pacifism Leads to War. I plan on using that site for most of my political-oriented posts from now on, but I'll mention them here from time to time.

Labels: church, life, movies, politics

You know the line. Doomed to repeat it and all of that. Personally, I'm not interested in the idea of the United States getting involved in another war. Yet the parallels between Iran today and Germany before World War II are nothing but stunning. And the parallels between the "diplomacy first" crowd today and the appeasement crowd in the 1930's are equally stunning. How can you not look at the similarities and see tragedy looming on the horizon?

From The Case for Bombing Iran:

By 1938, Germany under Adolf Hitler had for some years been rearming in defiance of its obligations under the Versailles treaty and other international agreements. Yet even though Hitler in :"Mein Kampf" had explicitly spelled out the goals he was now preparing to pursue, scarcely anyone took him seriously. To the imminent victims of the war he was soon to start, Hitler's book and his inflammatory speeches were nothing more than braggadocio or, to use the more colorful word Hannah Arendt once applied to Adolf Eichmann, rodomontade: the kind of red meat any politician might throw to his constituents at home. Hitler might sound at times like a madman, but in reality he was a shrewd operator with whom one could--in the notorious term coined by the London Times--"do business." The business that was done under this assumption was the Munich Agreement of 1938, which the British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain declared had brought "peace in our time."

It was thanks to Munich that "appeasement" became one of the dirtiest words in the whole of our political vocabulary. Yet appeasement had always been an important and entirely respectable tool of diplomacy, signifying the avoidance of war through the alleviation of the other side's grievances. If Hitler had been what his eventual victims imagined he was--that is, a conventional statesman pursuing limited aims and using the threat of war only as a way of strengthening his bargaining position--it would indeed have been possible to appease him and thereby to head off the outbreak of another war.

But Hitler was not a conventional statesman and, although for tactical reasons he would sometimes pretend otherwise, he did not have limited aims. He was a revolutionary seeking to overturn the going international system and to replace it with a new order dominated by Germany, which also meant the political culture of Nazism. As such, he offered only two choices: resistance or submission. Finding this reality unbearable, the world persuaded itself that there was a way out, a third alternative, in negotiations. But given Hitler's objectives, and his barely concealed lust for war, negotiating with him could not conceivably have led to peace. It could have had only one outcome, which was to buy him more time to start a war under more favorable conditions. As most historians now agree, if he had been taken at his own word about his true intentions, he could have been stopped earlier and defeated at an infinitely lower cost.

Which brings us back to Ahmadinejad. Like Hitler, he is a revolutionary whose objective is to overturn the going international system and to replace it in the fullness of time with a new order dominated by Iran and ruled by the religio-political culture of Islamofascism. Like Hitler, too, he is entirely open about his intentions, although--again like Hitler--he sometimes pretends that he wants nothing more than his country's just due. In the case of Hitler in 1938, this pretense took the form of claiming that no further demands would be made if sovereignty over the Sudetenland were transferred from Czechoslovakia to Germany. In the case of Ahmadinejad, the pretense takes the form of claiming that Iran is building nuclear facilities only for peaceful purposes and not for the production of bombs.

If one thing is true about George Bush, it is that he has recognized how the war on terrorism has changed everything, and how countries like Iran represent a serious threat. Yet he cannot act alone. The current political climate regarding Iraq has weakened his ability to act. Some say that's appropriate, and perhaps it is. Yet history will judge us not based on the validity of a single piece of information - whether the US intelligence was right about Iraq's capabilities - but history will judge us based on our ability to forsee grave threats and our willingness to preempt them.

History does not remember Neville Chamberlain in a positive light. Because if those who disagreed with him had been able to direct things, Hitler's plans of conquest, destruction, and genocide would have been averted. How will history remember us today? Even if George W. Bush's approval rating is the lowest ever, that has nothing to do with how history will remember him.

Indeed, (President Bush) has gone so far as to say that if we permit Iran to build a nuclear arsenal, people 50 years from now will look back and wonder how we of this generation could have allowed such a thing to happen, and they will rightly judge us as harshly as we today judge the British and the French for what they did and what they failed to do at Munich in 1938.

Labels: politics

Yesterday's shootings at Virginia Tech were a horrible tragedy. One thought remained in my mind the entire time I learned more about it.

What if students, faculty, or administrators at Virginia Tech had been allowed to carry firearms using a concealed weapon permit?

Predictably, the gun control lobby was out in full force yesterday, calling for stricter gun control laws. But this is a great case in point of how gun control makes people vulnerable.

Just a few months ago, the Virginia General Assembly considered a bill that would have allowed students, faculty, and administrators who have a concealed weapon permit to carry weapons on state university campuses. It died in subcommittee. The state of Virginia ensured that no one on that campus would have the ability to defend themselves with lethal force when confronted with yesterday's assault.

Cho Seung Hui, the 23-year-old senior who killed 32 people yesterday, didn't bother to follow the law. But the fact is, all of his victims did. If one of his victims, or any of the other people within hearing range of the gunshots, had been in possession of a gun the massacre could have ended much sooner. It only takes one criminal with a gun to cause a massacre. It only takes one hero with a gun to end it.

When the bill that would have allowed concealed weapons on campus was defeated, the Roanoke Times reported that Larry Hincker, spokesman for Virginia Tech, announced that "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus." No word yet from Larry Hincker that he wants to retract that statement.

Read more:
Boortz' Comments Today: He rightly takes to task the gun control lobby, the "blame and fire" crowd, and the Virginia legislature. He also points out that "Do you know, for instance, that at least three shootings in high schools were stopped by civilians with guns? Civilians, not law enforcement."

Gun Bans Are The Problem, Not The Solution: "When will we learn that being defenseless is a bad defense? All the school shootings that have ended abruptly in the last ten years were stopped because a law-abiding citizen -- a potential victim -- had a gun."

A Disarmed Campus: "Perhaps some school administrators still think that declaring a 'gun-free zone' makes a campus safer; that was what legislators thought when they started passing gun bans at high schools in response to the late-'80s youth-crime spike. But it's likely that at the college level, fear of litigation plays a large role in shaping such policies."

Labels: politics

An excellent column today on OpinionJournal.com, Climate of Opinion: Why we believe in global warming.

In any case, evidence of warming is not evidence of manmade warming.

It would surprise the public, and even the Supreme Court, to know how utterly the science of global warming offers no evidence whatsoever on the central proposition. What fills Mr. Gore's film, books, speeches and congressional testimony are scientific observations and quasi-scientific observations, all right. They concern polar bears, mosquitoes, hurricanes, ice packs and everything but whether humans cause global warming.

Some of this evidence may suggest, weakly or strongly, the existence of warming trends in particular parts of the world (such local trends, both cooling and warming, have been observed in many places and many times). More dubiously, some may indicate a generalized warming. But none offers any evidence that carbon dioxide is causing warming. Mr. Gore's method is the equivalent of trying to prove that Jack killed Jane by going on and on about how awful it was that Jane was killed.

Polemicists in favor of human-caused global warming liken skeptics to tobacco lobbyists who denied the link between smoking and lung cancer. In fact, it makes a useful analogy.

Suppose the world consisted of exactly one smoker who could be observed only from a distance to test the theory that smoking causes lung cancer. If he died of cancer, it wouldn't prove smoking causes cancer. If he failed to die of cancer, it wouldn't prove smoking doesn't cause cancer.

The link between smoking and cancer is made by observing millions of smokers and nonsmokers. Indeed, what led scientists to seek systematic evidence of a link in the first place was anecdotal evidence that smokers, of whom there have been millions, appeared to die in unusual numbers from lung cancer.

Nothing remotely similar has been involved in developing the hypothesis that carbon dioxide creates warming. The relevant observations are a mess: Measured global temperature has both risen and fallen for considerable periods during the past century, even as CO2 has risen steadily. The geologic record suggests the world was much cooler in the past despite CO2 concentrations higher than today's. Unlike smoking and cancer, there's no anecdotal observation for the hypothesis that CO2 causes planetary warming. It may or may not be true, but to believe it is a "scientific truth" is to make a leap of faith, not science.

The consensus that human activities are causing global warming is purely a social invention--there's no way of showing it to be so, and no self-evident reason for preferring to believe it's so. The "consensus" is, in truth, a product of itself.

I'm becoming more and more encouraged by the amount of rational, reasoned discussion that is going on about global warming, despite the number of alarmists there are out there. It is very true, as the column says, that "many people believe in manmade global warming because many people believe in manmade global warming." It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. The "consensus" is that "everybody" knows it is true. That's a complete fallacy. The fact that most people can't spot it as such is likely the byproduct of another favorite topic of mine, the failure of government-led education.

Labels: politics

From National Geographic News:

Mars, too, appears to be enjoying more mild and balmy temperatures.

In 2005 data from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor and Odyssey missions revealed that the carbon dioxide "ice caps" near Mars's south pole had been diminishing for three summers in a row.

Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of the St. Petersburg's Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia, says the Mars data is evidence that the current global warming on Earth is being caused by changes in the sun.

"The long-term increase in solar irradiance is heating both Earth and Mars," he said.

Abdussamatov believes that changes in the sun's heat output can account for almost all the climate changes we see on both planets.

Mars and Earth, for instance, have experienced periodic ice ages throughout their histories.

"Man-made greenhouse warming has made a small contribution to the warming seen on Earth in recent years, but it cannot compete with the increase in solar irradiance," Abdussamatov said.

By studying fluctuations in the warmth of the sun, Abdussamatov believes he can see a pattern that fits with the ups and downs in climate we see on Earth and Mars.

CO₂ constitutes a small percentage of atmospheric air - less than half of a percent. Which do you think is more probable - that a minor increase of a minor atmospheric gas would cause global warming, or that increased solar activity would cause global warming? Given that climate change is a reality, and has been a reality for all of earth's history, which do you think is more likely to have been a factor in climate change in the past, and is more likely to be a factor in climate change right now?

And if it's probable that solar activity is the primary cause of global warming, why would we not want to comprehensively study that before making sweeping government-mandated changes that would adversely affect billions of people?

Labels: politics

There's a documentary set to air in the UK on Thursday called The Great Global Warming Swindle, which promises to show that "climate change is natural, has been occurring for years, and ice falling from glaciers is just the spring break-up and as normal as leaves falling in autumn." The article has a lot of interesting information, and is worth a read. But perhaps the most interesting piece is that instead of rising levels of C0₂ being the cause of global warming, it just might be the other way around:

"Al Gore might have won an Oscar for ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, but the film is very misleading and he has got the relationship between CO2 and climate change the wrong way round."

One major piece of evidence of CO2 causing global warming are ice core samples from Antarctica, which show that for hundreds of years, global warming has been accompanied by higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere.

In ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ Al Gore is shown claiming this proves the theory, but palaeontologist Professor Ian Clark claims in the documentary that it actually shows the opposite.

He has evidence showing that warmer spells in the Earth’s history actually came an average of 800 years before the rise in CO2 levels.

Prof Clark believes increased levels of CO2 are because the Earth is heating up and not the cause. He says most CO2 in the atmosphere comes from the oceans, which dissolve the gas.

When the temperature increases, more gas is released into the atmosphere and when global temperatures cool, more CO2 is taken in. Because of the immense size of the oceans, he said they take time to catch up with climate trends, and this ‘memory effect’ is responsible for the lag.

The article also refers to the vast sums of money politicians throw at research to prove man-caused global warming, political bodies claiming scientific consensus, information about changes in solar activity being related to changes in climate, and of the fact that "the greenhouse effect is seen as a religion and if you don’t agree, you are a heretic."

Will it air in the US? I can only hope so. The only way global warming alarmists will be countered is with science. The alarmists won't listen, of course, but at least those of us who remain skeptical won't be seen as lone voices in the wilderness.

Labels: politics

There's just too much good stuff going around this week around global warming and Al Gore, but perhaps the best quote of the week is from James Taranto from Thursday's Best of the Web, in the piece titled "The Color of Money:"

So, let's sum this up: Here we have a major American politician who is calling for policies that would impose huge costs on society but appears to be profiting handsomely himself; who is leading an extravagant lifestyle while demanding sacrifices from ordinary people; and who is calling on the media to suppress the views of those with whom he disagrees, while at the same time urging more government regulation in the name of "fairness" to his partisan and ideological allies.

Make no mistake - there is a segment of our society who greatly desire to silence all skepticism about global warming, and who would also love to see conservative talk radio silenced. While I think Taranto is right that this is inconsistent in terminology, it is quite consistent in that they simply want to silence their critics.

Labels: politics

Ann Coulter takes on global warming in Let Them Eat Tofu!:

Our lives depend on fossil fuel. Steel plants, chemical plants, rubber plants, pharmaceutical plants, glass plants, paper plants -- those run on energy. There are no Mother Earth nursery designs in stylish organic cotton without gas-belching factories, ships and trucks, and temperature-controlled, well-lighted stores. Windmills can't even produce enough energy to manufacture a windmill...

"Global warming" is the left's pagan rage against mankind. If we can't produce industrial waste, then we can't produce. Some of us -- not the ones with mansions in Malibu and Nashville is my guess -- are going to have to die. To say we need to reduce our energy consumption is like saying we need to reduce our oxygen consumption.

Liberals have always had a thing about eliminating humans. Stalin wanted to eliminate the kulaks and Ukranians, vegetarian atheist Adolf Hitler wanted to eliminate the Jews, Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger wanted to eliminate poor blacks, DDT opponent Rachel Carson wanted to eliminate Africans (introduction to her book "Silent Spring" written by ... Al Gore!), and population-control guru Paul Ehrlich wants to eliminate all humans.

But global warming is the most insane, psychotic idea liberals have ever concocted to kill off "useless eaters." If we have to live in a pure "natural" environment like the Indians, then our entire transcontinental nation can only support about 1 million human beings. Sorry, fellas -- 299 million of you are going to have to go.

Proving that the "global warming" campaign is nothing but hatred of humanity, these are the exact same people who destroyed the nuclear power industry in this country 30 years ago.

If we accept for purposes of argument their claim that the only way the human race can survive is with clean energy that doesn't emit carbon dioxide, environmentalists waited until they had safely destroyed the nuclear power industry to tell us that. This proves they never intended for us to survive.

Labels: politics

It seems that everywhere you turn, people are convinced that global warming is real, and that man is the definitive cause of it. It's kind of like a quasi-religion, and if you're skeptical of all the doom and gloom then you're labeled a heretic. At least skeptics aren't being burned at the stake, I guess.

There are plenty of great things to read if you want to understand why a global warming skeptic is a skeptic. Most global warming alarmists don't care - you could present them with irrefutable emperical evidence and it wouldn't shake their faith that if we don't do something now, the whole world is going to end.

A big hat tip to blogger Heath W. Casey for the following links - he tracks stuff like this from time to time.

Global Warming: The Cold, Hard Facts? - Dr. Tim Ball, who has a PhD in climatology, brings a refreshing perspective to the debate (February 2007):

I was as opposed to the threats of impending doom global cooling engendered as I am to the threats made about Global Warming. Let me stress I am not denying the phenomenon has occurred. The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on.

Since I obtained my doctorate in climatology from the University of London, Queen Mary College, England my career has spanned two climate cycles. Temperatures declined from 1940 to 1980 and in the early 1970's global cooling became the consensus. This proves that consensus is not a scientific fact. By the 1990's temperatures appeared to have reversed and Global Warming became the consensus. It appears I'll witness another cycle before retiring, as the major mechanisms and the global temperature trends now indicate a cooling.

Global Warming Gag Order - Senators John D. Rockefeller and Olympia Snowe sent a letter to ExxonMobil (December 2006, full text here), basically trying to bully them into their way of thinking. As the editorial states:

The Senators aren't dumb enough to risk an ethics inquiry by threatening specific consequences if Mr. Tillerson declines this offer he can't refuse. But in case the CEO doesn't understand his company's jeopardy, they add that "ExxonMobil and its partners in denial have manufactured controversy, sown doubt, and impeded progress with strategies all-too reminiscent of those used by the tobacco industry for so many years." (Our emphasis.) The Senators also graciously copied the Exxon board on their missive.

Aliens Cause Global Warming - a speech given in 2003 by Michael Crichton (author of the excellent book State of Fear, which has more information on global warming than Al Gore's movie), in which he explains how the famous Drake equation - an "approximation" of the likelihood of intelligent alien life in the universe - led to the dubious science that led to wild claims about nuclear winter, second-hand smoke, and finally, global warming, all without testable hypothesis and factual basis:

And so, in this elastic anything-goes world where science - or non-science - is the hand maiden of questionable public policy, we arrive at last at global warming. It is not my purpose here to rehash the details of this most magnificent of the demons haunting the world. I would just remind you of the now-familiar pattern by which these things are established. Evidentiary uncertainties are glossed over in the unseemly rush for an overarching policy, and for grants to support the policy by delivering findings that are desired by the patron. Next, the isolation of those scientists who won't get with the program, and the characterization of those scientists as outsiders and "skeptics" in quotation marks-suspect individuals with suspect motives, industry flunkies, reactionaries, or simply anti-environmental nutcases. In short order, debate ends, even though prominent scientists are uncomfortable about how things are being done.

When did "skeptic" become a dirty word in science? When did a skeptic require quotation marks around it?

Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future? And make financial investments based on that prediction? Has everybody lost their minds?

Stepping back, I have to say the arrogance of the modelmakers is breathtaking. There have been, in every century, scientists who say they know it all. Since climate may be a chaotic system - no one is sure - these predictions are inherently doubtful, to be polite. But more to the point, even if the models get the science spot-on, they can never get the sociology. To predict anything about the world a hundred years from now is simply absurd.

Look: If I was selling stock in a company that I told you would be profitable in 2100, would you buy it? Or would you think the idea was so crazy that it must be a scam?

Hot & Cold Media Spin: A Challenge To Journalists Who Cover Global Warming - Senator James Inhofe takes on Global Warming (September 2006). A great read:

Since 1895, the media has alternated between global cooling and warming scares during four separate and sometimes overlapping time periods. From 1895 until the 1930’s the media pedaled a coming ice age.

From the late 1920’s until the 1960’s they warned of global warming. From the 1950’s until the 1970’s they warned us again of a coming ice age. This makes modern global warming the fourth estate’s fourth attempt to promote opposing climate change fears during the last 100 years. Recently, advocates of alarmism have grown increasingly desperate to try to convince the public that global warming is the greatest moral issue of our generation. Just last week, the vice president of London’s Royal Society sent a chilling letter to the media encouraging them to stifle the voices of scientists skeptical of climate alarmism.

During the past year, the American people have been served up an unprecedented parade of environmental alarmism by the media and entertainment industry, which link every possible weather event to global warming. The year 2006 saw many major organs of the media dismiss any pretense of balance and objectivity on climate change coverage and instead crossed squarely into global warming advocacy.

Don't buy into the hype. Be a proud skeptic of anything any politician tries to sell you. Especially if a policy's proponents act particularly religious about their belief that they're trying to squelch any dissent on.

Labels: politics

It is often said that Newt Gingrich and I "nationalized" the election in 1994, but what the Contract with America really did was establish a national (as opposed to a parochial) vision for the Republican Party. When we took control, that positive Reagan vision of limited government and individual responsibility provided a great deal of discipline and allowed us to govern accordingly. Our primary question in those early years was: How do we reform government and return money and power back to the American people?

Eventually, the policy innovators and the "Spirit of '94" were largely replaced by political bureaucrats driven by a narrow vision. Their question became: How do we hold onto political power? The aberrant behavior and scandals that ended up defining the Republican majority in 2006 were a direct consequence of this shift in choice criteria from policy to political power...

I've always wondered why Republicans insist on acting like Democrats in hopes of retaining political power, while Democrats act like us in order to win.

If there was only one positive outcome for the Republicans in their defeat this week, I hope it will be that they will listen to people like Gingrich and Armey. We need more Reagan Republicans - those who are interested in limited government, personal responsibility, and returning power back to the people. Just as I think the Republican defeat in 1992 led the way for a revolution in 1994, I hope that a Republican defeat in 2006 leads the way for a revolution in 2008. There may be only one way for the Fairtax to get any traction - in the midst of a new revolution.

Labels: politics

I really liked what Perry Noble had to say this morning:

Jesus was not a conservative republican who watched Fox News.

Jesus was not a liberal democrat who wanted social reform.

If you are depending on the Republicans and/or the Democrats to get the world out of the mess we are in... you're screwed.

Overall, did the Republicans deserve this? You bet. Though not for the Iraq war. The deserved to lose yesterday because, overall, they were acting like Democrats. The growth of government has only increased under Republican control of the House, the Senate, and the Presidency. If anything, when the next election comes, Republicans might remember that they're supposed to be the party of limited government.

Labels: politics

"Socialism was supposed to have died with the Soviet Union, but it is making a comeback under the guise of coping with global warming." - from Climate Non-Conformity, today's featured editorial at OpinionJournal.com.

Labels: politics

For my parents' generation, the question every single one of them can answer is where they were when they found out John F. Kennedy was assassinated. A generation before that, the major event was Pearl Harbor.

For my generation, the question every single one of us can answer is where we were when we found out that the World Trade Center and Pentagon had been attacked.

Amy and I were on vacation in the North Georgia mountains, at a bed and breakfast not far from Ellijay. Amy was pregnant with our first child, due in January. This was to be our last little vacation as a married couple with no kids.

We had gotten up about 8 or 8:15 in the morning to get ready to go to breakfast downstairs. There were about two TV channels available in our room, so while Amy was finishing up I was watching the Today show on NBC.

They suddenly interrupted whatever was going on - not surprising that I completely don't remember what they were originally talking about - and showed a shot of the smoke coming out of the north tower. They soon talked about a small plane hitting the tower. Amy came over and we watched as they tried to speculate about what had happened.

Then we, like so many other millions, saw the plane strike the south tower, live on TV. Everyone who saw that live on TV knew immediately: this was no accident. This was intentional. And this was huge.

We were glued to the TV for what seemed like hours. I remember at some point we went downstairs to eat breakfast, primarily motivated by the fact that Amy was pregnant and that the kitchen closed at 10am.

But we saw both towers collapse live on TV as well.

It was a shock to us, knowing that our child would be born, in a matter of months, into a world very different from the one we expected.

I honestly feel that many people have forced themselves to forget the feelings they felt that day - that we were under attack, that this was war, and that this was something our generation would have to rise up against if we were to have any hope of our children living in a free society.

Two movies were released in theaters this year that help to remind us of the human side of this attack and destruction. The first was United 93, which told the story of the passengers who stopped terrorists from flying a fourth plane into an additional high-profile target, either the capitol or the white house. The second was Oliver Stone's World Trade Center, about two New York Port Authority officers who were rescued from the rubble of the collapse.

Discovery Channel ran a new two-hour documentary Saturday, with re-enactments, called Inside the Twin Towers. It tells the story of several people inside both buildings, some who survived and some who did not.

I believe these movies, and documentaries, are an important thing for us to experience. They help us see the event from different angles. You better understand the scope. You better understand the nature of those who desire nothing more than to kill us.

I personally find it difficult to understand how anyone cannot support positions that allow the government to locate, apprehend, and detain the sorts of people that would zealously pursue similar attacks in the future. By this, I mean the types of opposition we see towards a program to monitor calls between people inside the US with suspected terrorists abroad (the NSA surveillance program, which its critics misleadingly refer to as a "domestic spying program"), attempts to analyze mass logs of calling data, holding enemy combatants in military prisons, intense interrogations of known terrorists, and even deposing leaders who are known, active supporters of terrorism.

Any American who would have opposed such measures in the days that followed September 11, 2001 would have been completely ignored. Yet now, five years later, opposition to these policies are popular, and even required in some political parties, if one has any hope of becoming that party's nominee for president.

The question for our generation, as it was in the 1940's, is not whether or not we will experience war. The question is how we will experience war. We could have concentrated on Japan in World War II, only to find ourselves with the Nazis on our doorstep when we had our attention turned somewhere else. Should we have waited for Hitler to attack us first? Or was the fact that he had attacked our good friends and allies not reason enough?

I agree with President Bush that the only way do defeat this enemy is with liberty. Not only freedom here at home, but liberty across the globe. To the degree that America has exported and protected liberty around the world in the past sixty years - from turning Japan from a suicidal empire to a productive and innovative economic powerhouse, to protecting western Europe from Nazi domination, to aiding eastern Europe in their escape from Soviet domination, to providing Iraqi and Afghan citizens the opportunity to form their own freely elected democratic societies - the world is a better place.

Pearl Harbor inspired our grandparents' generation to defeat the evil in their time. The assassination of John F. Kennedy inspired our parents' generation to remain steadfast against Soviet oppression. We have an enemy that has risen up to challenge our generation. The question is, will we have the courage to defeat this enemy? Will the attacks of September 11, 2001, inspire us to defeat our enemy?

Labels: politics

So I heard on the Neal Boortz show yesterday that there was a question on the Republican primary ballot in three Georgia counties, including where I live, about support for the FairTax. I've been a major supporter of the FairTax for quite a while. I had not been planning on voting in the primary, but as soon as I heard about it I made plans to drop by my polling place (which just happens to be my previous church) and add my vote to support the FairTax.

The results are very encouraging. In Fayette County, the FairTax was approved by 85.33% of the Republican primary voters. In Cobb County, the FairTax was approved by 85.15% of the Republican primary voters. And in Gwinnett County, the FairTax was approved by 86.89% of the Republican primary voters. (I was one of the 31,068 voters who signaled their support for the FairTax in Gwinnett County.) Between these three counties in the Metro Atlanta area, 74,494 Republican voters showed up at the primary polls and voiced their support for the FairTax.

Keep in mind, these were only the responses of the Republican primary voters in three Metro Atlanta counties. I had expected strong support in Gwinnett County, which is John Linder's home district. (John Linder is the author of The FairTax Act and the co-author, with Neal Boortz, of The FairTax Book). But I did not expect it to be nearly 87% in Gwinnett, and I certainly did not expect it to be as high in other counties.

To me, this signals a couple of things:

People are ready to ditch the IRS. Certainly, some of these voters don't know anything, or know very little, about the FairTax. But they read "abolishing the Federal Income Tax and replacing with _____" and they support it. To some people, it doesn't matter what replaces the Income Tax and the IRS: anything would be an improvement.

The Repbulican base is ready to support the FairTax. Notwithstanding my comment above, most of the Republican primary voters will know enough about the FairTax to voice their support without just responding negatively to the IRS. The Republican base wants the FairTax. These are the people who choose who will run as a Republican in the general election. Republican candidates will have to start appealing to FairTax supporters in order to win nominations.

Given those two things, I'm certainly hoping that the FairTax will be a much bigger campaign issue this year than it was even two years ago. Between FairTax.Org and The FairTax Book (including the paperback edition), there are plenty of sources where people can learn about this "FairTax" thing they're hearing about. I get a lot of comments whenever I wear my FairTax shirt. This movement is growing, folks. If you're not on board yet, read the book. Read the websites. You can even read the bill itself, it's a relatively easy bill to read. But the more you learn about it, the more you'll like it. And the more you'll spread the word. This tax revolution will be the largest restructuring of our government since it's inception. It will take a huge amount of power away from politicians and place it back into the hands of the voters.

Labels: politics

-- posted by Derek at 7/19/2006 12:41:00 PM

1 comments

The first chapter of Coulter's latest book, Godless, is available online for free at Townhall.com. Here are some highlights:

If a Martian landed in America and set out to determine the nation's official state religion, he would have to conclude it is liberalism, while Christianity and Judaism are prohibited by law. And not just in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where it's actually on the books, but throughout the land. This is a country in which taxpayers are forced to subsidize "artistic" exhibits of aborted fetuses, crucifixes in urine, and gay pornography. Meanwhile, it's unconstitutional to display a Nativity scene at Christmas or the Ten Commandments on government property if the purpose is to promote monotheistic religion.

The whole panoply of nutty things liberals believe flows from their belief that man is just another animal. (And not just Kanye West—they're talking about all men.) Only their core rejection of God can explain the bewildering array of liberal positions: We must save Tookie Williams, while slaughtering the unborn. We must eat natural foods, but the right to acquire disease in casual hookups is a holy ritual. We must halt human development so that the Furbish lousewort can be fruitful and multiply, but humans are multiplying too much and threatening the biosphere of the Furbish lousewort. Women are no different from men, but we need a library of laws and codes to protect women from sexual harassment.

In 2003, reporters hounded British prime minister Tony Blair about whether he had prayed with George Bush—as if they were asking whether the world leaders had shot heroin together or shared a hooker. There was so much negative publicity over Blair praying with Bush that Blair's handlers forbade him to attend church with Bush later that year. It's hard to imagine an activity Bush and Blair could have shared that would have been more scandalous, short of taking an SUV to an all-men's club that allowed cigar smoking.

The moment self-righteousness takes over, you are dealing with dangerous psychopaths. Liberals are constantly accusing Christians of monumental self-righteousness for daring to engage in free speech or for voting in accordance with their religious beliefs. Compare that with the behavior of practitioners of the liberal religion. Liberals felt entitled to excuse Stalin's murderous regime on the grounds that he was simply trying to build a Communist paradise. Because they passionately believed in Marxism, liberals thought they had a right to lie about being Soviet spies. Yeah, well, some people passionately believe in white supremacy. How about George Clooney making a sympathetic movie about true-believing white supremacists and the evil prosecutors who forced them to name names?

If liberals could cut Stalin slack, there is no behavior they cannot excuse as justified by their passion. A president who was credibly accused of rape and displayed a pervasive pattern of what used to be known as "sexual harassment" was above reproach in liberal eyes. He had saved partial birth abortion! (Thus the charming tributes.)

Labels: books, politics

Just a quick reminder that your taxes are due on April 15th. If you were fortunate enough to get a "refund", make sure you look at that line on your 1040 about the taxes you actually paid. Make sure you take a peek at your paystub, and see how much the government confiscates each time you get paid.

Of course,if we could make more progress on the FairTax, things would be a lot simpler and fairer. And April 15th would be just another day.

If you haven't ready The FairTax Book yet, you should. It comes out on paperback in May. But if you ask nicely, I might just let you borrow mine.

Have any of you read the book? Have any questions or comments about the FairTax?

Labels: politics

I don't talk often about stuff on Boortz' site -- mainly because Nealz Nuze should be on your daily reading list anyway -- but today's was just too potent to pass up, on the topic of Muslim Outrage.

A little background. Muslims are outraged over editorial cartoons depicting Mohammed, particularly in countries like Denmark with significant Muslim populations.

Boortz had this to say:

Muslim outrage huh. OK ... let's do a little historical review. Just some lowlights:

Muslims fly commercial airliners into buildings in New York City. No Muslim outrage.

Muslim officials block the exit where school girls are trying to escape a burning building because their faces were exposed. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims cut off the heads of three teenaged girls on their way to school in Indonesia. A Christian school. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims murder teachers trying to teach Muslim children in Iraq. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims murder over 80 tourists with car bombs outside cafes and hotels in Egypt. No Muslim outrage.

A Muslim attacks a missionary children's school in India. Kills six. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims slaughter hundreds of children and teachers in Beslan, Russia. Muslims shoot children in the back. No Muslim outrage.

Let's go way back. Muslims kidnap and kill athletes at the Munich Summer Olympics. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims fire rocket-propelled grenades into schools full of children in Israel. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims murder more than 50 commuters in attacks on London subways and busses. Over 700 are injured. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims massacre dozens of innocents at a Passover Seder. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims murder innocent vacationers in Bali. No Muslim outrage.

Muslim newspapers publish anti-Semitic cartoons. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims are involved, on one side or the other, in almost every one of the 125+ shooting wars around the world. No Muslim outrage.

Muslims beat the charred bodies of Western civilians with their shoes, then hang them from a bridge. No Muslim outrage.

Newspapers in Denmark and Norway publish cartoons depicting Mohammed. Muslims are outraged.

Dead children. Dead tourists. Dead teachers. Dead doctors and nurses. Death, destruction and mayhem around the world at the hands of Muslims .. no Muslim outrage ... but publish a cartoon depicting Mohammed with a bomb in his turban and all hell breaks loose.

Labels: politics

Recently, Senator Ted Kennedy (D-Mass) had this to say regarding the Judiciary Committee's vote to recommend approval of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court:

This is the vote of a generation. If confirmed, this nominee will have an enormous impact on our basic rights and liberties for years and even decades to come....

After all, the Supreme Court is the guardian of our most cherished rights and freedoms. They are protected by the most solemn promises of the Constitution and symbolized in four eloquent words inscribed above the entrance to the Supreme Court: "Equal Justice Under Law."

Those words are meant to guarantee that our courts will be an independent check against abuses of power by the other two branches of government. It is a commitment that our courts will always be a place where the poor and the powerless and the underprivileged can stand on equal footing with the wealthy and the powerful and the privileged.

Let's consider these words in light of some Supreme Court decisions:

Kelo vs. New London (Property Rights)

If you're not familiar with last year's case, Kelo vs. New London, you should be. Fifteen property owners (out of 115 lots) did not want to sell their property to the New London Development Corporation, who wanted to build a hotel and new residences on the site. So the city of New London used the power of eminent domain to condemn the property, and turn it over to the private developer.

This is a clear and obvious violation of the fifth amendment, which limits the power of eminent domain for "public use" only. This has always been considered for direct use by the public -- things like roads, bridges, schools, and government buildings. But in this case, the term "public use" was expanded by judicial fiat to include "economic development." The government forcibly takes property from one individual, and puts it in the hands of a private development company, for new residences, hotels, etc. If there was ever a clear violation of the Constitution, this is it. But the liberal wing of the Supreme Court voted in favor of New London.

Who dissented in this case? The dissent consisted of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, along with the justices most feared by liberal Senators such as Kennedy -- Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Justice Antonin Scalia, and Justice Clarence Thomas. The conservative wing of the court wanted to protect the explicit promise of the Constitution -- that the government does not have the power to take your property, except for public use. But the liberal wing of the court simply gave the government a free pass, and effectively removed the last phrase of the fifth amendment from the Constitution. As O'Connor wrote, "Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms."

Kennedy doesn't seem to be too worried about how the "poor and the powerless" fared under the Supreme Court in the Kelo case, where the liberal wing of the court sided with the "powerful and privileged."

McConnell vs. Federal Election Commission (Freedom of Speech)

If you're not familiar with the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance bill, you should be concerned about it as well. It was challenged in the Supreme Court in 2003 (the bill passed in 2002). In the case, McConnell vs. Federal Election Commission, McConnell argued that the bill amounted to an unconstitutional infringement on first amendment speech. The Supreme Court upheld the legislation.

Liberals have already been pushing to apply McCain-Feingold to political talk radio and Internet blogs (I'm sure mine would apply). As Brian C. Anderson wrote in his recent column, Shut Up, They Explained, "the Founders would have seen in the reformers' utopian schemes, in which the power of government makes all equally weak, the embodiment of tyranny." Of course, liberals have little to worry about, because McCain-Feingold gives the traditional media (which are overwhelmingly liberal) a free pass.

Who dissented in this case? The dissent consisted of Justice John Paul Stevens, along with the justices most feared by liberal Senators such as Kennedy -- Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Justice Antonin Scalia, and Justice Clarence Thomas. Thomas wrote that this was the "most significant abridgment of the freedoms of speech and association since the Civil War."

The reality is that every campaign finance reform passed in the last 30 years has benefited incumbents. Those challenging incumbents need to spend money to mount an effective campaign. The McCain-Feingold bill makes it more difficult for challengers to unseat incumbents.

How can liberals claim to want to protect "our most cherished rights and freedoms," and not be outraged at the eroding of our freedoms in terms of property rights and freedom of speech?

While liberal senators like to claim that the recent judicial appointments would turn back the clock on things like civil rights for minorities, it is rights such as freedom of speech and peaceable assembly that opened the door for figures like Dr. Martin Luther King to have the ability to impact the country the way they did. These are the freedoms we should hold the most dear. Democracy cannot survive without them.

Roe vs. Wade (Abortion)

For some reason, liberal Senators like Kennedy are more worried about imagined rights than they are about actual ones. If they have any indication, whatsoever, that a candidate to the Supreme Court (or any court, for that matter) might not hold the belief that abortion is a "right" they will oppose that candidate to no end. As Ann Coulter puts it, liberals believe abortion is an absolute right "up until the moment the baby's head is through the birth canal." But the very candidates they champion, that are sitting on the court, are eroding rights that are specified in the Constitution. Property rights? Big deal. Freedom of speech? Who cares? But abortion? Don't mess with it!

The fact is that Democrats have been consistently on the wrong side of every major moral issue that's ever faced this country. It was a Republican president who had the courage to sign, and enforce, the Emancipation Proclamation, while Democrats were split over how to maintain slavery in Southern states. It was Democratic senators who attempted all-night filibusters (when filibusters actually required constant debate), trying to prevent civil rights legislation from passing. (And for those of you who don't know, one of the most famous orators fighting against civil rights legislation was Robert Byrd from West Virginia, who is still in the Senate!) It is Democratic senators who continue to wail and moan over any possible restrictions on abortion. They've been consistently wrong in the past, and they will continue to be wrong.

Abraham Lincoln said that you can "repeal the Declaration of Independence -- repeal all past history -- you still cannot repeal human nature. It will still be the abundance of man's heart, that slavery extension is wrong; and out of the abundance of his heart, his mouth will continue to speak." Replace the words "slavery extension" with "abortion", and it wouldn't be any less true. Those who frame every debate, every judicial nomination, and every issue around their requirement of supporting unrestricted access to abortion, only make their own moral depravity more and more clear as they continue. And as they support those who would erode our basic Constitutional rights, and reject those who would uphold our basic Constitutional rights, they only reveal their own hypocrisy.

Further...

I haven't even touched on the freedom to bear arms or the freedom of religion, both rights that liberals do not champion. Liberals would be more than happy to take away everyone's guns, and have repeatedly pressured to have religion taken completely out of the public arena.

Kennedy is correct in saying that "the Supreme Court is the guardian of our most cherished rights and freedoms. They are protected by the most solemn promises of the Constitution." The problem with liberals is that they don't know what "cherished rights and freedoms" are actually guaranteed by the Consistution. They ignore the ones that are explicitly stated, and invent others out of thin air.

Labels: politics

If you haven't read any of John Stossel's columns on education, here's a few for you to enjoy:

From Trapped in the Wrong Government School (25 Jan 2006):

In public education, our land of the free is now a bunch of local fiefs, where petty-bureaucrats-turned-lords-of-the-manor decide whether you can get a decent education, and parents must go to them, begging for their children's future. Meanwhile, in Belgium and much of the rest of the world, students and their parents have the freedom to choose their schools -- and the opportunity that comes with that freedom.

From Myth: Schools Need More Money (18 Jan 2006):

The truth is, public schools are rolling in money. If you divide the U.S. Department of Education's figure for total spending on K-12 education by the department's count of K-12 students, it works out to about $10,000 per student.

Think about that! For a class of 25 kids, that's $250,000 per classroom. This doesn't include capital costs. Couldn't you do much better than government schools with $250,000? You could hire several good teachers; I doubt you'd hire many bureaucrats. Government schools, like most monopolies, squander money.

From Public Schools Are Cheating the Children (11 Jan 2006):

Remember when the Postal Service said it couldn't get it there overnight? Then companies like FedEx were allowed to compete. Private enterprise got it there absolutely, positively overnight. Now even the Post Office guarantees overnight delivery sometimes. Competition works.

Why can't education work the same way? If people got to choose their kids' school, education options would be endless.

Government monopolies routinely fail their customers.

Labels: politics

John Stossel has quickly become one of my favorite columnists. His recent column, Government: The Real Thug in New York, provides a refreshingly different view about the transit workers' strike in New York last month:

Suppose you want a raise. Your boss offers you less than you think you're worth, so you tell him you won't work unless he makes a better offer. He responds that if you stop working, he'll force you to pay him thousands of dollars -- and maybe he'll send you to prison.

Who's the thug, you or your boss?

The analogy between a union and an individual should not be missed -- unions should have the same rights as individuals, but should also be taking the same risks:

A strike is simply an organized refusal to work for less than the strikers think they're worth. The principle is the same whether one individual or a union walks off the job: It's the principle of self-ownership, the underlying principle of the whole capitalist system, the principle that we are all free individuals dealing voluntarily to mutual advantage...

Of course, just as workers have a right to strike, employers -- morally, at least -- have a right to fire them. Under President Reagan, the federal government dismissed striking air-traffic controllers and let eager new employees take the jobs. That might have been a good response to New York's transit strike.

But, of course, most government unions are prohibited from striking, and most politicians are afraid of doing what Reagan did -- fire them all -- for fear of the political backlash. But if the primary tools of both the employer and the employee are taken out of the equation, what's the point of the union at all?

The New York transit strike illustrated two of the dangers of an overgrown government. When you let government monopolize something, you invite stifling disruption when government fails, and you invite it to try to force people to work -- and call them thugs for acting on their freedom.

Labels: politics

In Why We Don't Trust Democrats With National Security, Coulter sums up the wiretapping "scandal" quite well:

The Democratic Party has decided to express indignation at the idea that an American citizen who happens to be a member of al Qaeda is not allowed to have a private conversation with Osama bin Laden. If they run on that in 2008, it could be the first time in history a Republican president takes even the District of Columbia.

On this one, I'm pretty sure Americans are going with the president.

If the Democrats had any brains, they'd distance themselves from the cranks demanding Bush's impeachment for listening in on terrorists' phone calls to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. (Then again, if they had any brains, they'd be Republicans.)

To the contrary! It is Democrats like Sen. Barbara Boxer who are leading the charge to have Bush impeached for spying on people with Osama's cell phone number.

That's all you need to know about the Democrats to remember that they can't be trusted with national security. (That and Jimmy Carter.)

Labels: politics

From James Taranto's column, Best of the Web Today on Thursday: Great Moments in Liberal Economics:

"The purchasing power of minimum wage is at an historic low. Coupled with the relatively high cost of living in New Jersey, the state's lower income workers are being pushed to the brink. Acting Governor [Richard] Codey believes all New Jerseyans deserve the fair proposition that an honest day's work should garner a living wage. Moreover, there is strong evidence that increasing the minimum wage also significantly improves quality of life--reducing hunger and increasing healthcare."--"State of the State Highlights," New Jersey government Web site, Jan. 11

"Several senior citizens working in non-profit and public organizations in Salem, Cumberland and Gloucester counties will face layoffs in December. Chris Davenport, executive director of Salem Main Street program, said the federally funded non-profit company Experience Works, which assists low-income senior citizens with job training and placement, has been forced to lay off seniors due to the increase in minimum wage."--Today's Sunbeam (Salem, N.J.), Nov. 17

The biggest effect of minimum wage laws is that jobs are eliminated when they're not worth the minimum wage. The biggest effect of price controls (to stop those pesky price gougers) is that you quickly run out of supply. Economics is pretty simple, folks. But rarely do politicians have the ability to understand the negative consequences of their actions.

Labels: politics

Walter E. Williams tackles windfall profits in his latest column.

Our US Senators, led by the likes of Republican Pete Domenici (NM) and Democrat Charles Schumer (NY), are investigating the oil companies' recent profits and whether or not they are justified.

Domenici says "they better come prepared, they better bring their charts, they better show us what they're doing with this money." Schumer says "the least they can do is give some back... we ought to force it to happen." Guess who they want the comapnies to "give back" the money to?

Talk is of a new excise tax, or a windfall profit tax, or some kind of tax to hit the companies hard.

Walter Williams explains why this is an awful idea:

Suppose there's a disaster wiping out food resources in Harrisburg, Pa., and I live in Philadelphia. Prior to the disaster, bread prices in both cities were $2 a loaf. I buy a truckload of bread, cart it to Harrisburg and sell it for $20 a loaf, earning huge windfall profits. When the word gets out that there are profits to be made, what do you think happens? If you said other people will start carting bread to Harrisburg, bakers will start working overtime to produce more bread, people who formerly used their oven to bake cakes and pies will switch to baking bread, there'll be bread conservation in Philadelphia and elsewhere and eventually bread prices will start to fall in Harrisburg and windfall profits would vanish, go to the head of the class. While some might find people earning windfall profits objectionable, the result of their actions, getting more bread to Harrisburg, is precisely what's desired.

What if politicians said, "People are profiting from the misery of others, and we're going to impose a bread windfall profits tax"? Say they legislated a 100 percent tax, taking all of the $18 of windfall profits. Would you expect to see people making all those efforts to get bread to Harrisburg? Suppose there were huge startup costs for companies to expand their operation or onerous regulations for people to get into the bread business, would that be good news or bad news for people in Harrisburg?

What kind of facism are we getting ourselves into, where the government can investigate an individual company's profit, and determine that it's too much and has to be given back? This is yet another example of politicians' ignorance disrupting the economic system. As Williams suggests, large profits are a signal that more production, more supply, and more research are needed in a specific area. And the profits are what provide the motivation, but profits also provide the resources necessary for that expansion.

In this particular example, our politicians have learned nothing from the oil crisis of the 70's, which resulted in higher prices, low supply, and increased dependence on foreign sources of oil. I'm not surprised to see Democrats want to make the same mistakes. But Republicans should know better. The more and more Republicans act ignorant of basic economics, and there is less and less of a difference between Republicans and Democrats, the more and more I'm becoming Libertarian.

Labels: politics

Ann Coulter does it again:

The sickness of what liberals have done to America is that so many citizens – even conservative citizens – seem to believe the job of a Supreme Court justice entails nothing more than "voting" on public-policy issues. The White House considers it relevant to tell us Miers' religious beliefs, her hobbies, her hopes and dreams. She's a good bowler! A stickler for detail! Great dancer! Makes her own clothes!

That's nice for her, but what we're really in the market for is a constitutional scholar who can forcefully say, "No – that's not my job."

We've been waiting 30 years to end the lunacy of nine demigods on the Supreme Court deciding every burning social issue of the day for us, loyal subjects in a judicial theocracy. We don't want someone who will decide those issues for us – but decide them "our" way. If we did, a White House bureaucrat with good horse sense might be just the ticket.

Admittedly, there isn't much that's more important than ending the abortion holocaust in America. (Abortionist casualties: 7; Unborn casualties 30 million.) But there is one thing. That is democracy.

Democracy sometimes leads to silly laws such as the one that prohibited married couples from buying contraception in Connecticut. But allowing Americans to vote has never led to creches being torn down across America. It's never led to prayer being purged from every public school in the nation. It's never led to gay marriage. It's never led to returning slaves who had escaped to free states to their slavemasters. And it's never led to 30 million dead babies.

We've gone from a representative democracy to a monarchy, and the most appalling thing is – even conservatives just hope like the dickens the next king is a good one.

Labels: politics

So it looks like Georgia Senator Johnny Isakson recently got to spend some time on Air Force One:


But wait, let's look a little more closely at that book on the President's desk:


Does that look anything like this?


Hmm... looks like President Bush might just be reading The FairTax Book! Have you gotten your copy yet? It does a great job explaining the system, as well as giving a great history of how the income tax was developed and passed, and why it needs to be scrapped.

Labels: politics

In my previous post, I discussed price gouging a little bit. In particular, I commented on John Stossel's column last week In Praise of Price Gouging. Two more recent columns do an excellent job explaining the economics behind the situation.

Walter E. Williams discusses price gouging in his column this week, The role of prices. "Rising prices get people to voluntarily economize on goods and services rendered scarcer by the disaster." Great column, check it out.

Now read Larry Elder's column, 'Gouging' and 'dumping'. In it, he reports:

For example, the city of Baton Rouge, almost 80 miles from New Orleans, saw its population double as a result of the people displaced by the hurricane and flood. Practically overnight, housing prices in Baton Rouge increased some 20 percent. Yet one reporter explained, "In a phenomenon familiar to Southern California's housing market, prices are rising not so much because sellers are gouging, but because buyers are bidding up the prices." "Not so much"? Apparently, the reporter's keen, psychic instincts recognized that the home seller perhaps only "gouged" to a small degree, because "buyers are bidding up the prices." But doesn't this describe exactly what happens when -- in the case of a natural disaster -- the price of gas climbs rapidly?

If you don't get it after reading these three great columns, then I don't know how to communicate it otherwise. What's obvious is that politicians don't get it - or more likely, that they know most voters don't get it, and are tinkering around with economics in order to appeal to voters. Politicians don't really care about hurting the economy (or the environment, or education, or other things that may be really important) if it means they'll get re-elected.

Labels: politics

John Stossel writes in his column, In praise of price gouging, why raising the price on items that will be in huge demand will ensure that there is enough supply for everyone. His point is first made by discussing bottled water, and the difference between what happens when the price is held low, versus allowed to go up to coincide with the demand:

At $1 a bottle, they stocked up. At $20 a bottle, they bought more cautiously. By charging $20, the price gouger makes sure his water goes to those who really need it.

This is exactly what happened last week with gasoline here in Atlanta. Suddenly, everyone expected that Atlanta was going to run out of gas by the end of the week, and hysteria was created. Everyone (well, not me) went out to fill the tanks of all of their cars, which immediately created a shortage. Before Katrina, gasoline was in the $2.50-$2.70 range here in Atlanta. Immediately most stations raised prices, some to as high as $5.00 or even close to $6.00 a gallon.

Governor Purdue signed an executive order enacting Georgia's price gouging statute. But this statute "does not prevent price increases that accurately reflect an increase in the cost of the goods or services to the retailer, an increase in the cost of transporting the goods or services into the area, or an increase due to the market forces of supply and demand."

Was demand high last Wednesday? I'd say so. Lines formed out onto highways. People bought out gasoline containers at hardware stores to fill them up. People pulled their boats up to fill them up. If you want to apply pressure to artificially keep prices low (which was a staple of communism), you also have to apply pressure to keep people from hoarding, by rationing (which was also a staple of communism). We don't want to go down that road.

Basically, when you can't raise the supply to meet the demand, you have to raise the price. This has the effect of reducing the demand. Others understand economics much better than I, but I understand this basic idea pretty well.

The net result of last Wednesday's fiasco is that some people ended up buying dozens of gallons of gasoline at artificially low prices, while others were stuck with no gas at all. One woman we know was trapped in the Atlanta area, unable to return home to Lake Hartwell, because all of the gas stations were out of gas. Had the price risen due to the demand, hoarders would not have bought dozens of gallons. They would have done what I did -- my sedan was full of gas, and I knew we could move the kids out of the van and into that if we really needed to, so we were OK for the week. Then there would have been gas available for people who really needed it - and though it certainly would have been more expensive, they would have been able to get home.

The reality is this -- when resources, such as water, are scarce, the free market dictates the price. When you have water and I don't, and I want to buy it from you, if it's scarce then you're only going to part with it for a lot of money, or something else that has a lot of worth, such another scarce resource. The reason why capitalism works is because it models this approach. And when a resource is scarce and prices go up, you encourage more suppliers to come in and bring the price down. When the government steps in and meddles with price or supply, it will only mess things up. Last Wednesday's gasoline fiasco is a testament to that.

Labels: politics

I got another "Social Security Statement" in the mail yesterday. These things come out every few months, to let you know your earnings history, as far as Social Security is concerned, and to give you an estimate of what you'll receive when you retire or become disabled, and what your survivors will receive if you die.

With all of the hoopla around Social Security lately, I think it's important to note a disclaimer that's been in the Social Security Statements for years:

Your estimated benefits are based on current law. Congress has made changes to the law in the past and can do so at any time. The law governing benefit amounts may change because, by 2042, the payroll taxes collected will be enough to pay only about 73 percent of scheduled benefits.

Basically, what you're going to get when you retire is based on the whims of Congress. Do you trust your politicians with your retirement? If anyone in the private sector ran a pension plan like the politicians have been managing Social Security, it would be criminal.

The other aspect people don't see in writing enough is how much you've paid in Social Security taxes versus how much your employers have paid in Social Security taxes. How Social Security taxes are set up, you pay 6.2% of your income to Social Security tax, and your employer pays 6.2% of your salary in a payroll tax.

So if you make $40,000 a year, you're personally paying $2,480 a year out of your paycheck towards Social Security. Your employer is also paying an additional $2,480 a year in the form of payroll taxes. Some would like you to believe that this is coming out of your employer's pocket, but in reality this is simply considered as part of the total package of what it costs them to hire you. It also affects decisions of when to give you a raise, and how much. For instance, if your employer wants to raise your income $10,000 a year, they are also considering that it will cost them an additional $620 a year to provide you that raise.

The kicker, though, is how much this costs over time. Let's say you've been making $40,000 a year for 10 years. Over that time, you have paid $24,800 in Social Security taxes. Your employer has paid an additional $24,800 in payroll taxes, for a total of $49,600.

Let's suppose that instead of going into a failing government pension program, you and your employer both contribute 6.2% of your $40,000 a year income to some type of managed, low-risk retirement plan that returns a annual rate of return of just 6%. If you started this at age 25, over the course of 40 years, you'd have a whopping $822,485.67 saved for retirement at age 65. If you planned on spreading that retirement income out over 30 years to age 95, you'd be getting $4,931.22 a month.

Based on an income of $40,000 a year, that's way higher than what Social Security currently promises on a similar income.

If I factor in my Social Security contributions, from my age now until age 67, assuming my income never gets any higher (which is very unlikely), my retirement income would be nearly 4 times what my current projected benefits are. This is why creating private accounts inside Social Security is so viable -- it would take about a fourth of my current contributions to fund my currently projected Social Security benefits, leaving the other three-fourths to fund the current recipients. And over the long haul, as more and more recipients receive their benefits from their own accounts rather than from the Social Security and payroll taxes, the taxes can be scaled back to a less dramatic level, which will give our children and our grandchildren a better opportunity for a better life.

Why people are fighting against Social Security is difficult to understand, but why people are apathetic to it is even more difficult to understand. Social Security represents a huge chunk of our income that is being sent to a system that cannot sustain itself. I encourage you to open up and read your Social Security statement next time you receive one, and play with the numbers yourself -- see what those numbers could represent for your future if you could control even a small portion of it.

Labels: politics

Have you done your taxes yet? Did you get a refund? Even if you did, do you still realize that you still paid a lot in taxes?

In today's Nealz Nuze, Boortz quotes T. Coleman Andrews, commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service from 1953 until 1955.

Congress went beyond merely enacting an income tax law and repealed Article IV of the Bill of Rights, by empowering the tax collector to do the very things from which that article says we were to be secure. It opened up our homes, our papers and our effects to the prying eyes of government agents and set the stage for searches of our books and vaults and for inquiries into our private affairs whenever the tax men might decide, even though there might not be any justification beyond mere cynical suspicion.

The income tax is bad because it has robbed you and me of the guarantee of privacy and the respect for our property that were given to us in Article IV of the Bill of Rights. This invasion is absolute and complete as far as the amount of tax that can be assessed is concerned. Please remember that under the Sixteenth Amendment, Congress can take 100% of our income anytime it wants to. As a matter of fact, right now it is imposing a tax as high as 91%. This is downright confiscation and cannot be defended on any other grounds.

The income tax is bad because it was conceived in class hatred, is an instrument of vengeance and plays right into the hands of the communists. It employs the vicious communist principle of taking from each according to his accumulation of the fruits of his labor and giving to others according to their needs, regardless of whether those needs are the result of indolence or lack of pride, self-respect, personal dignity or other attributes of men.

The income tax is fulfilling the Marxist prophecy that the surest way to destroy a capitalist society is by steeply graduated taxes on income and heavy levies upon the estates of people when they die.

As matters now stand, if our children make the most of their capabilities and training, they will have to give most of it to the tax collector and so become slaves of the government. People cannot pull themselves up by the bootstraps anymore because the tax collector gets the boots and the straps as well.

The income tax is bad because it is oppressive to all and discriminates particularly against those people who prove themselves most adept at keeping the wheels of business turning and creating maximum employment and a high standard of living for their fellow men.

I believe that a better way to raise revenue not only can be found but must be found because I am convinced that the present system is leading us right back to the very tyranny from which those, who established this land of freedom, risked their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to forever free themselves...

Realize that it can be different. The FairTax can change all of it, to a system that satisfies the attributes of a good tax system. I, for one, completely support the FairTax.

Labels: politics

"It's been a tough year for the secularist crowd," Ann Coulter wrote in her column this week. She starts by discussing liberals' problems with Catholicism, including the Catholic church's views on abortion, homosexuality, and female priests.

Then she takes a turn towards Brian Nichols:

The escape and capture of Brian Nichols shows women playing roles they should not (escorting dangerous criminals) and women playing roles they do best (making men better people).

Nichols' murderous rampage began when he took the gun from a 5-foot-tall grandmother who was his sole guard at the Fulton County Courthouse. It ended when an otherwise unremarkable 26-year-old woman appealed to the Christian conscience of this same violent killer holding her hostage.

Recounting how Ashley Smith read portions of "The Purpose Driven Life" (by Rick Warren), as well as "from another popular book that's been dropped from all news accounts of this incident: the New Testament," she wonders what a liberal might have done in the same situation:

Heaven help the average liberal if this ever happens to him! What would an urban secularist do? Come sit down and let me read to you from Michael Moore's "Stupid White Men." Or maybe he could put a SpongeBob video in the VCR. WE ARE FAM-I-LEEEEE! At least before he killed again, the dangerous fugitive would have warm feelings toward homosexuals.

Labels: politics

Jack Kemp shares in his column at Townhall.com about the Institute for Policy Innovation's benchmark for sound tax policy, in a paper titled A Framework for Tax Reform, written by Stephen J. Entin and Larry A. Hunter.

Basically, the paper shares three principles of a sound tax system:

• Economic Efficiency: inflict as little damage as possible on the economy.
• Technical Efficiency: impose the smallest possible compliance and preparation burdens, as well as minimize administrative and enforcement costs.
• Political Efficiency: distorting a little as possible voters' choices regarding the amount and composition of public goods and services. Further, the ability to shift the tax burden from one group (those in power) to another group (those not in power) should not be possible. "At a minimum, political efficiency requires the adoption of super-majority voting rules to apply to changing the definition of income subject to taxation or to alter the rate(s) at which that income is taxed."

The paper also shares the four attributes of a sound tax system:

• Neutrality: measuring capability correctly, and levying taxes evenly.
• Visibility: transparent to the taxpayers, so it is clear how much the government costs and who is paying for it.
• Fairness: equal treatment under the law.
• Simplicity: not complicated beyond what is necessary.

While neither the IPI document nor Kemp use this to endorse the FairTax, there are no other tax proposals anywhere that fit these definitions. Only the FairTax has economic, technical, and political efficiency. Only the FairTax has neutrality (by shifting the tax base to consumption), visibility (everyone will know the tax rate), fairness, and simplicity.

The reason Kemp brings this IPI document to light is because the president's Tax Advisory Panel chose to hear from Stephen Entin in their first session. This meeting is being held today, and Entin will most likely be presenting these principles of a sound tax policy. If the panel finds that these principles and attributes are a good standard of measure for alternative tax proposals, they will find that the FairTax satisfies all of them.

Labels: politics

From the Opinion Journal's Best of the Web, James Taranto, writes in Iraqis Fight Back--and Dance about a little story this where some Iraqis in a village just south of Baghdad fought back when some terrorists came to punish them for voting -- five terrorists dead and eight more wounded. Taranto says:

It's quite understandable that Iraqis would be bolder about standing up to the terrorists now than they were last year. Just over three months ago, after all, there was a possibility, no matter how remote, that John Kerry would be elected president, which could have led to an American retreat from Iraq. Iraqis naturally kept their heads down, lest they suffer the same fate as the Vietnamese allies America abandoned at Kerry's urging three decades earlier.

Labels: politics

News stories circulated yesterday about an American solder captured by terrorists in Iraq, but certain aspects of the photo were immediately considered dubious by the Pentagon.

But OOPS! It turns out it's just a "Special Ops Cody" doll!

(CNN - Full Story)
(FOX News - Full Story)

Labels: politics

Bill Roggio says in 0 for 6:

There was a time when liberals would cheer at the prospect of freedom and democracy in places long under the stench of oppression. Today, any attempts to right past wrongs and free men from tyranny are looked on with scorn. Yesterday’s idealistic liberals are today’s realists; preferring the ‘stability’ of dictators to the spread of democracy. They are fearful of asserting themselves on the world stage without the approval of the United Nations. They refuse to judge other cultures but are quick to judge American actions as immoral.

This has become increasingly obvious to many of us as we watch Senators Kerry and Kennedy talk about a "quagmire", while at the same time hearing stories from those we know in serving in Iraq about how much the US military is appreciated by the Iraqis and how much good we are doing there. Every prediction of doom and gloom has proved false, going all the way back to our entry into Afghanistan. The latest round has proved the point even more: 8 million Iraqis voting and telling the terrorists to go home. When it becomes difficult to distinguish between the rantings of the American Left's most prominent Senators and Iraq's most prominent terrorist, you know something isn't right.

Losing has brought the worst out in the American Left. Their hatred of anything remotely Republican has driven them to conspiratorial thinking and knee-jerk opposition to any and every policy put forth by their 'enemies'. They have been reduced to shilling for tyrants, defending terrorists and opposing freedom.

Labels: politics

I was reading information about the Dred Scott case (1857) recently, and I was amazed at how similar the arguments were to arguments from pro-choice advocates. Speaking for the majority, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney said:

We think they are... not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word "citizens" in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States....

In a nutshell, the Supreme Court said that Dred Scott had no legal standing in the court system simply because he was black, and that he was considered "property" under the Fifth Amendment. At the time, blacks were considered inferior, or not fully human, and thus were not guaranteed the same protections under the constitution.

The entire basis for the pro-choice position is that it's "the woman's body", and therefore, "her choice". Legal justifications for this are predicated on the fetus as not fully human, and therefore have no legal status or protection under the constitution. The Roe v. Wade decision phrased this as an issue of the fetus reaching a "viable" stage of development in order to be granted constitutional protection, but went so far as to say that:

The law has been reluctant to endorse any theory that life, as we recognize it, begins before live birth or to accord legal rights to the unborn except in narrowly defined situations and except when the rights are contingent upon live birth... In short, the unborn have never been recognized in the law as persons in the whole sense.

Then I found this article today -- The Peculiar Morality of Secession.

Shocked that "moral values" was the issue that defeated them and re-elected President Bush, the LibDems are bleating on every air wave they can ride that they have moral values too. Yes, they certainly do - it's just that some of those values are immoral. Not all. Confederate Southerners held many decent values - but on slavery they were morally wrong. No relativistic morals here, no "that's just your opinion" situational ethics, no wiggles, hesitations, or qualifiers. Slavery is immoral, period - even the LibDems agree.

Thus the teachable moment - for abortion is morally no different than slavery, the claim that one human being may own another as personal property to be disposed of if the owner so chooses.

Thus we need to refer to abortion as "the peculiar institution," and Roe v. Wade as disgracefully unconstitutional as Dred Scott. Watch for this to happen. Watch for abortion advocates to be increasingly on the defensive as they are made to understand the moral equivalence between abortion and slavery.

The day is not that far off when schoolkids will be asking their history teacher puzzled questions as to how there was a time in America when people passionately defended the morality of a mother killing her own baby.

This mirrors my own thinking on the subject, and I'm encouraged that there are others who share the same idea.

Labels: politics

Two excellent columns at http://www.townhall.com/ today. The first is by Linda Chavez, Schools are Distorting Thanksgiving.

Apparently some school officials worry that the religious overtones of Thanksgiving might represent a chink in the wall secularists insist separates church and state, so they proscribe any mention of Who it is the nation thanks on this day.

George Washington had no such qualms when he proclaimed the first day of
thanksgiving in 1789: "It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the
providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits,
and humbly to implore His protection and favor."

Many public school systems have removed Christianity from Thanksgiving, by focusing more on the Wampanoag traditions and belief in Kiehtan, their name for the Creator, and completely omitting any information on the Pilgrims' spiritual beliefs.

Michelle Malkin, in Grace, Gratitude, and God, says that "Once an unabashedly pious land, we have been transformed into a nation of historically clueless ingrates -- embarrassed about our heritage, afraid of offending all newcomers, and more committed to inculcating a sense of entitlement over a culture of gratitude."

It seems that, in the name of multiculturalism, we are destroying our own culture. In the name of "separation of church and state," we are watering down our own history. In the name of religious diversity, we are allowing lawyers and the judicial system to make us afraid of mentioning anything related to Christianity in a public context.

If you're a little town in rural USA, with no real ability to fight it, national pressure can be exerted to remove any display of the Ten Commandments from any government property. Nevermind that the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC has numerous displays of the Ten Commandments.

In Abraham Lincoln's 1863 Thanksgiving proclamation, he said:

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have been preserved, the many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to God that made us!

But we certainly can't make reference to that God now, not even in historical context. One nation "under God" has already been attacked. I have no doubt that it will soon be "In God We Trust" that will receive the national attention. Then it will be the presidential custom of ending speeches with "God bless America". Once there are no current targets left, they're likely to be culling old famous speeches, removing any reference to God from our culture.

Labels: politics

The Media Research Center is a great place to compare Media coverage of important issues, and to see how different networks cover the same story. In particular, note how CBS' coverage of the issue, as late as Thursday, lacks anything that indicates their original story could have been wrong. Of course, they originally wanted to air the report this Sunday, a mere two days before the election. Rathergate, indeed.

http://www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/2004/cyb20041028.asp#1

In L. Brent Bozell's column, They're Not Referees, he says:

If anyone is still being sold the civics-book baloney that our national press corps is just the referee of our democracy, the disinterested moderator of our national debate, the media’s performance in this election year has just blown that concept to smithereens in their collective and transparent desire to deny George W. Bush another four years.

And they all wonder why they are losing their market share to FOX News.

Labels: politics

Well, not me, actually, though I agree with just about everything Britt said in his article, Why I Voted for George W. Bush.

Labels: politics

Teddy Roosevelt said the following regarding motherhood in a speech in 1905:

No ordinary work done by a man is either as hard or as responsible as the work of a woman who is bringing up a family of small children; for upon her time and strength demands are made not only every hour of the day but often every hour of the night. She may have to get up night after night to take care of a sick child, and yet must by day continue to do all her household duties as well; and if the family means are scant she must usually enjoy even her rare holidays taking her whole brood of children with her. The birth pangs make all men the debtors of all women. Above all our sympathy and regard are due to the struggling wives among those whom Abraham Lincoln called the plain people, and whom he so loved and trusted; for the lives of these women are often led on the lonely heights of quiet, self-sacrificing heroism.

Quite a different take than would-be first lady Teresa Heinz Kerry: (Fox News story)

In an interview published Wednesday in USA Today, the newspaper asked the wife of Democratic candidate John Kerry if she would be different from Laura Bush as a first lady.

"Well, you know, I don't know Laura Bush. But she seems to be calm, and she has a sparkle in her eye, which is good," Heinz Kerry said. "But I don't know that she's ever had a real job — I mean, since she's been grown-up. So her experience and her validation comes from important things, but different things."

Campaigning for her husband in Pittsburgh on Wednesday, Heinz Kerry said she forgot Mrs. Bush had a career.

"I had forgotten that Mrs. Bush had worked as a school teacher and librarian, and there couldn't be a more important job than teaching our children, I appreciate and honor Mrs. Bush's service to the country as First Lady, and am sincerely sorry I had not remembered her important work in the past," she said in a statement.

Important work? So I suppose that, to our "enlightened" would-be first lady, raising children isn't "important." Even in her "apology" she can't help but display her disdain for the stay-at-home mother.

Labels: politics

You have to hear this...

The Ultimate John Kerry Ad

Labels: politics

From the AJC Ad Watch on Tuesday:

ELECTION 2004: AD WATCH
An occasional look at the credibility of campaign ads
Anna Varela - Staff
Tuesday, October 19, 2004

'Johnny Isakson's Tax Plan: You Pay a 23% Sales Tax'
Denise Majette's campaign says the ad is running statewide.

Sponsor
Denise Majette for Senate.

The ad
The ad shows Majette standing in a kitchen, holding a copy of legislation sponsored by Republican opponent Johnny Isakson. The DeKalb County Democrat tells viewers: "He wants a new 23 percent sales tax on nearly everything you buy --- cars, groceries, even prescription drugs --- 23 percent. Does that sound fair to you? And corporations end up paying nothing."

Accuracy
Isakson was one of 54 co-sponsors of the House version of the Fair Tax Act of 2003. Majette's ad does not mention that the bill would repeal the federal income tax, estate and gift taxes, and that it would abolish the IRS. She is correct that it would enact a new national sales tax on goods and services, and that it would not tax corporations on goods and services that they buy for business purposes, according to Clint Stretch, director of tax policy for accounting firm Deloitte & Touche.

The bill also states that property purchased for investment purposes would not be taxed. Stretch said the measure's language would actually create a sales tax rate of 29.9 percent. Many current tax benefits, such as the income tax deduction on mortgages, would disappear. Used items, including used cars, would not be taxed, said Stretch, who has co-authored studies on tax reform.

The bill also would create a Family Consumption Allowance, which would provide people with monthly checks meant to offset the higher sales taxes. The allowance is intended to keep people below the poverty level from being harmed.

Isakson's political consultant, Heath Garrett, said the ad is unfair because it doesn't address the bill's elimination of the income tax. He called the ad "fundamentally false and intellectually dishonest. In Johnny's 30 years of public service, he has never voted for a tax increase."

Kudos to the AJC for printing this, now they just need to put it on the front page of a section and not bury it on page B4!

Labels: politics

I finally saw the ad today... it features Denise Majette (D) criticizing Johnny Isakson (R) regarding his support for FairTax.

Majette shows how she will stoop to lies and deception in order to get elected. "Twenty-three percent! Does that sound fair to you?" she asks, after she holds up a copy of H.R. 25 (the FairTax bill), which looks like a 3/4-inch thick booklet. Is she implying that it's complicated or something?

She neglects to mention in her 30-second commercial that the 23% tax replaces all other sources of Federal Revenue. That everyone receives a tax credit that would cover the taxes spent on the bare necessities of life. That all individuals are free from the burden of complying with a tax code that Majette wouldn't be able to hold up with both hands, let alone pick up with two fingers.

This will seriously backfire for Majette. Comments on Majette's blog are full of FairTax supporters. Anyone curious about FairTax can do a google search and get www.fairtax.org as the first hit. Anyone who looks on the opening page of that site will realize that Majette's ad is extremely deceptive.

Even if it doesn't backfire for her now, and she somehow gets elected to the Senate (not likely given recent poll numbers), her ads will be fodder for those who will use them to attack her no matter what political office she runs for in the future. I hope Isakson responds with a new ad within days, and attacks her with the truth, which is always more effective than deception.

For my part, this has prompted me to contribute to www.fairtax.org, put a banner for FairTax on this site, and I'm seriously considering contacting John Linder (R) to see what I can do to support him beyond my vote (he's our representative here in the 7th district, and he originally introduced the FairTax bill). Soon you'll see me sporting a FairTax bumper sticker and t-shirt. Not bad for $10.

I like Neal Boortz' comment on the subject, Denise Majette is a Knowing Liar.

Labels: politics