Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Back from vacation, so much to do.
It will be a busy week but there are things that need to be discussed. Obama celebrated his 100 days with a glowing media circus that reflected more of the main stream media's slobering love fest despite over 100 gaffs and real problems of his 100 days that they would have skewered Bush for but they gave Obama a blind eye and an A+++ with big smiley faces and gold stars despite blinding evidance to the contrary. The H1N1 flu media scare is beyond reason as they try to keep themselves relevant by scaring the crap out of Americans, killing the pork industry, and setting the stage for rushed passage of a failed ideology of the past century farce of nationalized, or socialized for us intelligent people, health care in an attempt to keep the love fest going. All the while it has become taboo to talk bad about Obama. He is the second coming, he is the golden boy, he is the answer to all ills and troubles in our lives. This is not healthy to free speech, free thought, or freedom as a principle and ideal by which we Americans live our lives. The media refuses to hold Obama's feet to the fire, point out the inconsitencies, falicies, double talk, and utter hypocracy of what Obama says and does. This is too important to not address as only bloggers, right wing idiots and talk radio hosts, and those who realize Obama is a false profit are doing this. The NY Times, LA Times, USA Today, Network TV and Cable TV outlets fail to cover, well someone has to be a voice of reason, the more of us conservative who do this time and time and time and time again as it needs to be done as it was for the last 8 years. Where are the Obama daily calendars with Obamaisms? Where is the coverage showing his lack of speech when his teleprompter is off? Where are the hard and real questions about his policies that are impact of them on freedom and free market capitalism that the dismantle and threaten to distroy?
Rant of the Month - April 2009
Yes, its that time again, time for another rant of the month. Thanks to an early holiday break, Labor Day in the Communist world, this rant is coming before the end of the month.
Domestic issues – guns, guns, guns everywhere! It's the ‘shark attack’ tactic of 2009! You remember the shark attack news blitz of the 2001, every week it seemed someone was getting bitten by a shark, well by the end of the year shark attacks were down significantly from the previous year. This time its guns, and my friends this is no coincidence. The radical left is giddy over their political win and the left wing elite are taking notice. In a time when newspaper sales are slumping and news agencies dropping like flies we are seeing gun violence plastered on page one articles, lead stories in news broadcasts, and linked up to online news services everywhere. First ask why all the coverage. Columbine is holding its big 10 year anniversary since the horrid day of that true tragedy. A filibuster proof and leftist leaning executive branch can offer the best chance to repealing the 2nd amendment in decades. And lastly, in our modern times do we really need firearms? I believe yes. Hunting is a vital economic industry for many states, a good source of food for many citizens, and a way for families to bond with themselves and the land off of which they live. Firearms, when stored and used responsibly, offer property and personal protection until police can arrive, vital in rural, high crime, and suburban areas where it can take a long time for police to respond, or you can’t call them. Lastly, the FACTS about guns tell the real story. Over half of gun incidents, shootings, are self inflicted, yet the deaths from these are reported as gun violence, again ask yourself why. The next largest section comes from accidental discharge, the old unloaded gun cleaning thing. Then we get to gun crimes. You are more likely to get killed by a bee mowing grass then shot to death. You are more likely to get killed by food poisoning at the local restaurant then shot to death. You are more likely to die from medical errors at a hospital then shot to death. Yet the news is telling us all different, why is that? Remember the old cliché, guns don’t kill people, people kill people? Well, its true. If stored and used irresponsibly a gun can lead to a tragic accident or stolen and used to hold up a store, but so can a hammer, baseball bat, kitchen knife, ice pick, pair of sheers, pipe wrench, plumbing pipe, section of 2x4, you get my meaning. Kids will play with anything and everything, run with scissors and lollipops, and ride bikes without hands. Criminals will use anything threatening to commit their crimes. If a criminal wants to kill you access to a gun will not stop them. 90+% of criminals who use guns obtain them illegally, period. The few who use guns in the news lately obtained them legally and there was no way to stop their intent, if they did not have guns they would have used other means, knives, bludgeoning, fire, auto exhaust fumes, poison, people are creative when inspired to be, and the pain and grief people who kill their families or groups of others will just move to the next most lethal alternative. We just need to enforce the laws we have in place better instead of monkeying with the Constitution because of a cause.
Science – It's a Pandemic! So the news is trying to tell us, see above. The current swine flu going around is a major test to see how well the world lives in a post SARS and HN51 (Bird flu) world. What lessons were learned, will it follow the Hollywood script, how will nations and citizens react? Here is Asia is has hit New Zealand and Australia within 48 hours of first being reported in the US. It will be in mainland Asia in 12 hours I predict. China, Japan, and others are better prepared for this due to experience and practical realization. The US response was lethargic, unrealistic, and reminiscent of Katrina, too little too late. Why didn’t we start to monitor our borders better, our ports, get our metro hospitals into alert status quicker? The flu went from 2 locations to over 8 very quickly, why? Returning spring breakers. Of course if spring break had been used for its intended purpose, Easter break, then we would not be in the pickle but that is a different topic. The reality is kids went to Mexico, business men went to Mexico, and Mexicans came to the US. We are hearing the Democrats blaming the GOP for stripping funding, it was the Dems who offered to do this to ‘buy’ GOP support but that is little reported, but we are beyond pointing fingers (3 always point back at you!) and into reality. The US needs to use this opportunity to prove FEMA has learned from its Katrina debacle, the CDC has authority and power to protect the country, and we are better equipped and able to deal with a medical state emergency then others, sadly this is not the case. In China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan every passenger everyday is screened at the airport for fever, international especially. Here in Asia face masks are common year round, and I still see antiseptic gel dispensers in many locations where public gathering occur. In Mexico City public gatherings are postponed, why not in the US? Obama has pledged 3% GDP to science, that is good and well, but we should use more energy to prove we can cope with a global crisis when it occurs, from here it is looking like the news is trying to incite a panic, the president say to stay calm, and the DHS and CDC running in circles and politicians laying blame and not taking real tangible actions.
Sports – Enough with the madness, please! The NFL wants to expand the season 2 weeks now. Come on, give us fans a chance to catch our breath and relax, have some family time, and just gear up for a new season. Currently we have NBA and NHL playoffs going on, MLB season is a couple of weeks old, and the NFL just completed its draft weekend and already pre-season coverage is gearing up. Why, revenue! They all want more and more of our wallets. Cable TV packages, season tickets, parking fees, concessions, memorabilia sales, official licensing rights. Come on, we all know it's a business and people go into business just to make more money but can we stop this before it becomes pure insanity? What is wrong with a 12 game football season? Do we really need over a hundred baseball games to prove who has the best team? Can the atheist’s bodies really take these longer seasons plus harder competition seen these days? Sure, we can all choose to not watch but what fun is that? Sports for us is more then just watching people run around a field, it's a time honored tradition and way to connect with our neighbors and share a sense of belonging. Why must it be manipulated to such a degree? I want shorter seasons, shorter seasons put more emotion into each game because that game means more. Less games means the time is cherished more because it happens less often. It also means we get more opportunity to spend with family and friends outside of the sports area (we started a family because we liked them at one point, better to keep that feeling then the alternative). In design there is a field of thought that has a strong motto, less is more, its time we applied that to our professional sports.
Society – All the talk in the news is on Obama’s first 100 days. A media created event from FDR to measure the president’s progress. Realistically its much ado about nothing. Bush played a lot of golf and vacationed a lot in his first 100 days. Obama is busy shifting the country from free market capitalism to government controlled socialism. The media is continuing their slobbering love affair with Obama. From morning news programs praising inauguration paper dolls, cable news lauding his and his wife’s every move and appearance it is still an utter love fest. Why, how many negative news articles can you recall about Obama and his administration since November? Come on you can do it; 5, 10, 15, 20? Criticism of Obama in the main stream media is about as token as Jim Carey was on In Living Color. The media’s glancing over his blunders, they lauded Bush’s incessantly, miss steps, they made Bush’s them week long events, and his policy contradictions, Obama gets a free pass while Bush got grilled, all prove that Obama is their darling and he can do no wrong. The media has a fundamental responsibility to be fair, objective, and apply the same standards to all. Thus far Obama gets softballs, free passes, and allowances no GOP person ever got. From the grilling of Palin and McCain to the Bushisms of W., the media has only showered praise and accolades on Obama. He can do no wrong, from praying in a Muslim temple, smiling with Hugo Chavez and Raual Castro, to pulling a John Kerry on Bush administration memo concerning interrogation tactics he gets accolades and 5 big gold star reviews with smiley faces. Where is the media of 6 months ago? Where is the picking apart of each facet of everything we say 12 months ago? Where is the critique and criticism of all possible bad outcomes imaginable 2 years ago? Where is the ‘sky is falling because of the war’ crowd now? Ask yourself why, it isn’t because Obama is perfect folks, its because he is their perfect answer to their perfect world.
Continuing on the social issue category, Iowa in now proudly gay. Not that there is anything wrong with that, yes Seinfeld rip-off. Now the 3rd state to allow gay marriage the zaniness seen in California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, with Vermont joining the sisterhood in September. This is telling for American society and world events on many levels. First off, sexual alignment is now equal with age, race, religion, and gender. The debate is one of tolerance. How far is American society willing to go toward tolerance? Our Constitution states all men are created equal and free to pursue life, liberty, and happiness. The nation was founded out of flight from religious persecution, at first only Protestant Christians were allowed to own land and vote, then eventually Catholics, and then eventually Jews. The only religions never tolerated were my ancestors, not even during or after the Civil Rights movement. The first test of this was recognizing slavery as wrong and contrary to this great document. Next came women’s rights and eventually their right to vote. Then we had civil rights, which only applied to African Americans, Latino descendants had suffrage but not as blatant as others. Native Americans were not allowed many rights until the 1970’s which is the time equal pay for gender was instituted. Now LBGT peoples are achieving the last hurtle, marriage. But what is the meaning of this equality? Civil Unions, identical to Civil Marriages on the books for many decades, granted gays many if not all the same rights as marriage. Marriage is essentially a social contract between a couple explicitly stating sexual union and creating a path of survivorship and family bond as recognized by the church and the state, civil marriages are only recognized by the state as a justice of the peace marries the two, not a person of any church. So, in order for gay marriage to be actual marriage there has to be a church involved, and yes we have gay churches, not that there is anything wrong with that. In this drive for equality it is important to ask, where is the line? Is our discrimination against polygamy next? What about child marriage, both kinds? Sexting, is it to be a juvenile offense or child porn? What about nudists, sadomasochists, and the final big one… d-r-u-g-s. You see, all these fit the same reasons for gay marriage. It's a society question, not a legal one. As our society becomes more and more tolerant we need to step back and ask when does tolerance become deviance? Where is the line and when do you know when you crossed it? What lasting societies before ours has thrived and survived in such a tolerant atmosphere? The reason I ask is that the more we push the envelope the more we paint ourselves into a corner instead of freeing ourselves. Eventually something breaks if you push on it long enough, this could result in anarchy or outright rebellion, which is never good for those in the fringes of society. We need to slow the change bus down a tad to see where it is going, if we are on a cliff on a dark and winding road we may want to exercise a little more caution before turning up the radio and letting all our hair down. There is such thing as changing too fast, that creates a back lash and that ain’t good for anyone.
International – Pirates of the Caribbean they aren’t, scoundrels and a serious threat they are. The Somali pirates finally went and did it, attempted to hijack a US flagged and crewed ship and it did not turn out well for them at all. Since then the crew got publicity, the captain lauded as a hero, the US Navy a saint, and the pirates dejected and sore. The pirates just attempted to hijack a cruise liner, thwarted by onboard armed Israeli paid security forces, mercenaries. The pirates may just provide their own stimulus to the world economy, private navies and high sea mercenaries. Shipping companies refuse to arm their crews and vessels, for good reason, but the need is still there, with hundreds still being held for ransom and millions of tons of cargo and shipping held as well. The navies of the world can’t make a difference, the governments will fumble and stumble their way towards nothing as it is a local problem that can only be solved locally, as usual. Maybe they should all apply for asylum in Iowa. Seriously, this problem is going to get worse before it gets better. The more navies that deal with it as the US Navy did the higher the risk and less attractive the pirate profession becomes. This is only 1 prong in a multi-pronged effort needed. The next is to get security on the ground, with security comes stability and that begets opportunity as business takes root and people can make an honest living. I do not condone killing, but I do applaud consequences for actions, extreme actions call for extreme consequences and if done by the letter of the law. Now the ship’s cook is suing the shipping company for sending them into traitorous waters without proper training. Only in America can you be a hero one minute and then sue your employer for making you one the next, or having your employer fire you to save money, as former US Airways pilot hero Sully. This cook needs a judge to laugh his case out of court, but then again all he needs to do is file in Iowa, I am sure a judge there will treat his case with fairness and respect it deserves.
Culture – Counterculture was the term used to describe the extreme left wing liberals in the 1960’s. You know the type, hippies, college campus elites who rebelled against the system and the ‘man’. Well, here we are 40 years later and guess what, they grew up and got real jobs, well most of them anyway. These counterculture people have went from fringe to mainstream. They are now professors, industry leaders, media moguls, politicians, presidents, and policy drivers. The 60’s love children and anti-establishment types are now the man. They are doing their elders and teachers proud, passing socialists and communist policy left and right and dragging the country kicking and screaming into a new liberal nirvana. Those of us on the outside, conservatives, are now the counterculture. We don't know how to do what the lefties where doing for the past 40 years, until this year. The tea parties held across the country demonstrated that there is a groundswell of backlash brewing, pun intended, against the establishment. While the man is getting smitten in his new threads and digging on his rad new gig, we conservatives are picking up the dropped playbook and becoming surprisingly apt at using it. The tea parties were riled against on all fronts, mass media, celebrities, politicians, police, everyone. That goes to show how much fear organizing a dejected group can stir in the new guard. This counterculture is going to result in a new branded conservative group, hopefully not a new GOP. We conservatives need to shed the errors of our past and embrace the change and rise to the challenges of re-branding. Inclusion, tolerance, respect, and intelligence need to be the new ideals to build off of. We all know the liberal arguments for 90% of what they do is flawed, we only need to expose it for what it is, the rest will take care of itself. Stop the in-fighting and get rid of the GOP, where is the Bull Moose, Wigs, and past Sons of Jefferson now. The new counterculture will not be founded on drugs, sex, and rock & roll, but on values like; integrity, honesty, humility, and caring, on ideals like; tolerance, inclusion, intelligent debate, and issue driven policy, and on one last thing, approachability and empathy. We won’t be sticking flowers down gun barrels, we will be buying more guns for hunting and stress relief. We won’t be beating up those who oppose us, but use intelligent and honest debate to let them beat themselves. The greatest lesson we need to learn from them is humility, their lack of it will be their undoing, and if we grow from the grass roots the tea parties came from correctly, it will happen soon and then all things in the world with be right again, yes pun intended. Have a great month and God Bless America, even the lefty liberal insane part, because it shows us where we don’t want to be.
Domestic issues – guns, guns, guns everywhere! It's the ‘shark attack’ tactic of 2009! You remember the shark attack news blitz of the 2001, every week it seemed someone was getting bitten by a shark, well by the end of the year shark attacks were down significantly from the previous year. This time its guns, and my friends this is no coincidence. The radical left is giddy over their political win and the left wing elite are taking notice. In a time when newspaper sales are slumping and news agencies dropping like flies we are seeing gun violence plastered on page one articles, lead stories in news broadcasts, and linked up to online news services everywhere. First ask why all the coverage. Columbine is holding its big 10 year anniversary since the horrid day of that true tragedy. A filibuster proof and leftist leaning executive branch can offer the best chance to repealing the 2nd amendment in decades. And lastly, in our modern times do we really need firearms? I believe yes. Hunting is a vital economic industry for many states, a good source of food for many citizens, and a way for families to bond with themselves and the land off of which they live. Firearms, when stored and used responsibly, offer property and personal protection until police can arrive, vital in rural, high crime, and suburban areas where it can take a long time for police to respond, or you can’t call them. Lastly, the FACTS about guns tell the real story. Over half of gun incidents, shootings, are self inflicted, yet the deaths from these are reported as gun violence, again ask yourself why. The next largest section comes from accidental discharge, the old unloaded gun cleaning thing. Then we get to gun crimes. You are more likely to get killed by a bee mowing grass then shot to death. You are more likely to get killed by food poisoning at the local restaurant then shot to death. You are more likely to die from medical errors at a hospital then shot to death. Yet the news is telling us all different, why is that? Remember the old cliché, guns don’t kill people, people kill people? Well, its true. If stored and used irresponsibly a gun can lead to a tragic accident or stolen and used to hold up a store, but so can a hammer, baseball bat, kitchen knife, ice pick, pair of sheers, pipe wrench, plumbing pipe, section of 2x4, you get my meaning. Kids will play with anything and everything, run with scissors and lollipops, and ride bikes without hands. Criminals will use anything threatening to commit their crimes. If a criminal wants to kill you access to a gun will not stop them. 90+% of criminals who use guns obtain them illegally, period. The few who use guns in the news lately obtained them legally and there was no way to stop their intent, if they did not have guns they would have used other means, knives, bludgeoning, fire, auto exhaust fumes, poison, people are creative when inspired to be, and the pain and grief people who kill their families or groups of others will just move to the next most lethal alternative. We just need to enforce the laws we have in place better instead of monkeying with the Constitution because of a cause.
Science – It's a Pandemic! So the news is trying to tell us, see above. The current swine flu going around is a major test to see how well the world lives in a post SARS and HN51 (Bird flu) world. What lessons were learned, will it follow the Hollywood script, how will nations and citizens react? Here is Asia is has hit New Zealand and Australia within 48 hours of first being reported in the US. It will be in mainland Asia in 12 hours I predict. China, Japan, and others are better prepared for this due to experience and practical realization. The US response was lethargic, unrealistic, and reminiscent of Katrina, too little too late. Why didn’t we start to monitor our borders better, our ports, get our metro hospitals into alert status quicker? The flu went from 2 locations to over 8 very quickly, why? Returning spring breakers. Of course if spring break had been used for its intended purpose, Easter break, then we would not be in the pickle but that is a different topic. The reality is kids went to Mexico, business men went to Mexico, and Mexicans came to the US. We are hearing the Democrats blaming the GOP for stripping funding, it was the Dems who offered to do this to ‘buy’ GOP support but that is little reported, but we are beyond pointing fingers (3 always point back at you!) and into reality. The US needs to use this opportunity to prove FEMA has learned from its Katrina debacle, the CDC has authority and power to protect the country, and we are better equipped and able to deal with a medical state emergency then others, sadly this is not the case. In China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan every passenger everyday is screened at the airport for fever, international especially. Here in Asia face masks are common year round, and I still see antiseptic gel dispensers in many locations where public gathering occur. In Mexico City public gatherings are postponed, why not in the US? Obama has pledged 3% GDP to science, that is good and well, but we should use more energy to prove we can cope with a global crisis when it occurs, from here it is looking like the news is trying to incite a panic, the president say to stay calm, and the DHS and CDC running in circles and politicians laying blame and not taking real tangible actions.
Sports – Enough with the madness, please! The NFL wants to expand the season 2 weeks now. Come on, give us fans a chance to catch our breath and relax, have some family time, and just gear up for a new season. Currently we have NBA and NHL playoffs going on, MLB season is a couple of weeks old, and the NFL just completed its draft weekend and already pre-season coverage is gearing up. Why, revenue! They all want more and more of our wallets. Cable TV packages, season tickets, parking fees, concessions, memorabilia sales, official licensing rights. Come on, we all know it's a business and people go into business just to make more money but can we stop this before it becomes pure insanity? What is wrong with a 12 game football season? Do we really need over a hundred baseball games to prove who has the best team? Can the atheist’s bodies really take these longer seasons plus harder competition seen these days? Sure, we can all choose to not watch but what fun is that? Sports for us is more then just watching people run around a field, it's a time honored tradition and way to connect with our neighbors and share a sense of belonging. Why must it be manipulated to such a degree? I want shorter seasons, shorter seasons put more emotion into each game because that game means more. Less games means the time is cherished more because it happens less often. It also means we get more opportunity to spend with family and friends outside of the sports area (we started a family because we liked them at one point, better to keep that feeling then the alternative). In design there is a field of thought that has a strong motto, less is more, its time we applied that to our professional sports.
Society – All the talk in the news is on Obama’s first 100 days. A media created event from FDR to measure the president’s progress. Realistically its much ado about nothing. Bush played a lot of golf and vacationed a lot in his first 100 days. Obama is busy shifting the country from free market capitalism to government controlled socialism. The media is continuing their slobbering love affair with Obama. From morning news programs praising inauguration paper dolls, cable news lauding his and his wife’s every move and appearance it is still an utter love fest. Why, how many negative news articles can you recall about Obama and his administration since November? Come on you can do it; 5, 10, 15, 20? Criticism of Obama in the main stream media is about as token as Jim Carey was on In Living Color. The media’s glancing over his blunders, they lauded Bush’s incessantly, miss steps, they made Bush’s them week long events, and his policy contradictions, Obama gets a free pass while Bush got grilled, all prove that Obama is their darling and he can do no wrong. The media has a fundamental responsibility to be fair, objective, and apply the same standards to all. Thus far Obama gets softballs, free passes, and allowances no GOP person ever got. From the grilling of Palin and McCain to the Bushisms of W., the media has only showered praise and accolades on Obama. He can do no wrong, from praying in a Muslim temple, smiling with Hugo Chavez and Raual Castro, to pulling a John Kerry on Bush administration memo concerning interrogation tactics he gets accolades and 5 big gold star reviews with smiley faces. Where is the media of 6 months ago? Where is the picking apart of each facet of everything we say 12 months ago? Where is the critique and criticism of all possible bad outcomes imaginable 2 years ago? Where is the ‘sky is falling because of the war’ crowd now? Ask yourself why, it isn’t because Obama is perfect folks, its because he is their perfect answer to their perfect world.
Continuing on the social issue category, Iowa in now proudly gay. Not that there is anything wrong with that, yes Seinfeld rip-off. Now the 3rd state to allow gay marriage the zaniness seen in California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, with Vermont joining the sisterhood in September. This is telling for American society and world events on many levels. First off, sexual alignment is now equal with age, race, religion, and gender. The debate is one of tolerance. How far is American society willing to go toward tolerance? Our Constitution states all men are created equal and free to pursue life, liberty, and happiness. The nation was founded out of flight from religious persecution, at first only Protestant Christians were allowed to own land and vote, then eventually Catholics, and then eventually Jews. The only religions never tolerated were my ancestors, not even during or after the Civil Rights movement. The first test of this was recognizing slavery as wrong and contrary to this great document. Next came women’s rights and eventually their right to vote. Then we had civil rights, which only applied to African Americans, Latino descendants had suffrage but not as blatant as others. Native Americans were not allowed many rights until the 1970’s which is the time equal pay for gender was instituted. Now LBGT peoples are achieving the last hurtle, marriage. But what is the meaning of this equality? Civil Unions, identical to Civil Marriages on the books for many decades, granted gays many if not all the same rights as marriage. Marriage is essentially a social contract between a couple explicitly stating sexual union and creating a path of survivorship and family bond as recognized by the church and the state, civil marriages are only recognized by the state as a justice of the peace marries the two, not a person of any church. So, in order for gay marriage to be actual marriage there has to be a church involved, and yes we have gay churches, not that there is anything wrong with that. In this drive for equality it is important to ask, where is the line? Is our discrimination against polygamy next? What about child marriage, both kinds? Sexting, is it to be a juvenile offense or child porn? What about nudists, sadomasochists, and the final big one… d-r-u-g-s. You see, all these fit the same reasons for gay marriage. It's a society question, not a legal one. As our society becomes more and more tolerant we need to step back and ask when does tolerance become deviance? Where is the line and when do you know when you crossed it? What lasting societies before ours has thrived and survived in such a tolerant atmosphere? The reason I ask is that the more we push the envelope the more we paint ourselves into a corner instead of freeing ourselves. Eventually something breaks if you push on it long enough, this could result in anarchy or outright rebellion, which is never good for those in the fringes of society. We need to slow the change bus down a tad to see where it is going, if we are on a cliff on a dark and winding road we may want to exercise a little more caution before turning up the radio and letting all our hair down. There is such thing as changing too fast, that creates a back lash and that ain’t good for anyone.
International – Pirates of the Caribbean they aren’t, scoundrels and a serious threat they are. The Somali pirates finally went and did it, attempted to hijack a US flagged and crewed ship and it did not turn out well for them at all. Since then the crew got publicity, the captain lauded as a hero, the US Navy a saint, and the pirates dejected and sore. The pirates just attempted to hijack a cruise liner, thwarted by onboard armed Israeli paid security forces, mercenaries. The pirates may just provide their own stimulus to the world economy, private navies and high sea mercenaries. Shipping companies refuse to arm their crews and vessels, for good reason, but the need is still there, with hundreds still being held for ransom and millions of tons of cargo and shipping held as well. The navies of the world can’t make a difference, the governments will fumble and stumble their way towards nothing as it is a local problem that can only be solved locally, as usual. Maybe they should all apply for asylum in Iowa. Seriously, this problem is going to get worse before it gets better. The more navies that deal with it as the US Navy did the higher the risk and less attractive the pirate profession becomes. This is only 1 prong in a multi-pronged effort needed. The next is to get security on the ground, with security comes stability and that begets opportunity as business takes root and people can make an honest living. I do not condone killing, but I do applaud consequences for actions, extreme actions call for extreme consequences and if done by the letter of the law. Now the ship’s cook is suing the shipping company for sending them into traitorous waters without proper training. Only in America can you be a hero one minute and then sue your employer for making you one the next, or having your employer fire you to save money, as former US Airways pilot hero Sully. This cook needs a judge to laugh his case out of court, but then again all he needs to do is file in Iowa, I am sure a judge there will treat his case with fairness and respect it deserves.
Culture – Counterculture was the term used to describe the extreme left wing liberals in the 1960’s. You know the type, hippies, college campus elites who rebelled against the system and the ‘man’. Well, here we are 40 years later and guess what, they grew up and got real jobs, well most of them anyway. These counterculture people have went from fringe to mainstream. They are now professors, industry leaders, media moguls, politicians, presidents, and policy drivers. The 60’s love children and anti-establishment types are now the man. They are doing their elders and teachers proud, passing socialists and communist policy left and right and dragging the country kicking and screaming into a new liberal nirvana. Those of us on the outside, conservatives, are now the counterculture. We don't know how to do what the lefties where doing for the past 40 years, until this year. The tea parties held across the country demonstrated that there is a groundswell of backlash brewing, pun intended, against the establishment. While the man is getting smitten in his new threads and digging on his rad new gig, we conservatives are picking up the dropped playbook and becoming surprisingly apt at using it. The tea parties were riled against on all fronts, mass media, celebrities, politicians, police, everyone. That goes to show how much fear organizing a dejected group can stir in the new guard. This counterculture is going to result in a new branded conservative group, hopefully not a new GOP. We conservatives need to shed the errors of our past and embrace the change and rise to the challenges of re-branding. Inclusion, tolerance, respect, and intelligence need to be the new ideals to build off of. We all know the liberal arguments for 90% of what they do is flawed, we only need to expose it for what it is, the rest will take care of itself. Stop the in-fighting and get rid of the GOP, where is the Bull Moose, Wigs, and past Sons of Jefferson now. The new counterculture will not be founded on drugs, sex, and rock & roll, but on values like; integrity, honesty, humility, and caring, on ideals like; tolerance, inclusion, intelligent debate, and issue driven policy, and on one last thing, approachability and empathy. We won’t be sticking flowers down gun barrels, we will be buying more guns for hunting and stress relief. We won’t be beating up those who oppose us, but use intelligent and honest debate to let them beat themselves. The greatest lesson we need to learn from them is humility, their lack of it will be their undoing, and if we grow from the grass roots the tea parties came from correctly, it will happen soon and then all things in the world with be right again, yes pun intended. Have a great month and God Bless America, even the lefty liberal insane part, because it shows us where we don’t want to be.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Associated Press: Report: US is ripe for recruiting by extremists
By EILEEN SULLIVAN – 14 April 2009
And so it begins... Our new Socialist People's Republic of America, lead by Marxists Pelosi, Ried, Frank, and out teleprompter and blunder in chief Obama have put together such a team that is galvanizing power and using their slobbering love affair in the US main steam media to push the country into a new Cuba or old China. Many of you may believe I have fallen off the deep end, drank too much kool-aid, or become so narrow minded and jaded that my views have narrowed to tunnel like fashion seeing only what I want to see. I really wish this were the case. I really wish this were so. I really wish I have become disillusioned and hardened so much that I was seeing things that were not there, the sad truth is that it is not the case. Our liberties, values, and freedoms are under attack now more then they were in the 1700's.
This Department of Homeland Security Report is 8 pages of paranoid, disorganized, and fear mongering drivel I have ever seen come out of our federal government (excluding cover and back page). On the week before massive conservative rallies to voice dissatisfaction and dissent in our leader's passage of massive spending, taxation, and expansion of government that would make Stalin, Mao, and Castro proud. The conservative movement is becoming mobilized and doing so successfully. The conservatives may now finally shed the yoke of the GOP and reshape or form a new party that is more accessible, tolerant of different views but similar ideals, and modernized. But in the light of our movement's reshaping we see the government becoming increasingly paranoid and initiating measures we have seen in previous countries slip into turmoil. Janet Napolitano seems to be laying out battle plans to offset the rising tide of conservative concerns the freedoms, securities, and rights we have enjoyed since 1776 are being eroded, sold, and buried under expanding government and tax burdens.
What is scary is that of all the left wing's noise and left slanted media coverage of the Patriot Act, warrantless wire taps, and excessive executive powers there is slightly a peep of noise over the potential restriction of freedoms suggested of this document. Why? The left only is concerned when 'their' freedoms are questioned, they seem to forget most of us conservatives were worried by these issues as well and voiced our opposition but they care not return the favor. Only the Rolling Stone reporter Tim Dickinson states the report "... is beyond sloppy. It irresponsibly conflates murderous hate-crime-committing white supremacists and homegrown terrorists like Timothy McVeigh with run of the mill right-wingers who, God love ‘em, have every right to vehemently oppose the federal government, abortion, and immigration." is the only voice of concern from the left since the April 7th publication of the report and its immediate release by conservative media outlets, 8 days of little to no coverage, why, because the left only cares about their rights, not the rights of Americans. Seems the ACLU should change their name to the DCLU.
American Legion's national commander David K. Rehbein, an Army veteran, so outraged that he had to send an open letter to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano explaining the obvious errors and dangers of using such a broad brush to paint a picture of 'right wing extremists' and suggest law enforcement needing to keep an eye on all right-wing minded individuals for possibility of domestic terrorist actions. As a conservative minded US Navy vet who owns and loves guns, believes in God, and holds strong Libertarian views I feel as though I am now an enemy of the state. The rights of assembly, politically opposition speech, and demands for access to their leaders and to let them know they represent more then just the left wing agenda of their party's affiliation seem to all be enemies of the state as well. Meanwhile the knights and warriors of free speech and demonstrations are curiously absent and silent over these reports. All the media can muster is to point out that the DHS had released a left wing extremist paper in January, that report only outlines the far left wings intent to use computers and computer systems to attack, or use environmental terrorism to mark their goals, all with the minimal of violence. That paper does not stoke the fires of worry and fear that this one does. It seems we were never invited to this free speech party, and are not welcome to use its themes and messages.
If you want to wage war there are a few things you have to accomplish before any actions begin. Define, demonize, and marginalize the enemy is one of them. Establish a propaganda campaign to achieve the messages needed to muster and keep support. According to DHS "Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration." So right wing extremists are in 2 camps, hate groups (right to life, defending religious inclusion in our society and lives, and anti illegal immigration groups) and antigovernment (concerned increasing sizes of government, increasing aid programs, increasing federal taxes and deficit spending). How is it that the obviously broken system of immigration control in our country and voicing concerns on it and fleshing out their views in public debate is now a right wing extremist lumped in with skinheads and the KKK? I and my fellow conservative minded Americans are NOT anti-government, we aganist the ideals and principles of: taxation without representation, ram-rodding extreme liberal agenda legislation without public debate and review, our government representatives ignoring and marginalizing 50% of the country with a first grader's attitude of 'nanny nanny boo boo your side lost so there, deal with it', the total whoring out of our security and future to the Chinese and others just so we can pass measuers, budgets, and plans that have been brewing for 40 years in the rotten minds of people like Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Ron Frank, and mostly we are concerned the MOST over an irresposible use of and abuse of power demonstrated in our government since November. No we are not anti-government, we want the government to work and to reflect on the ideals and values of the Constitution that guides it, not seeing the government try to reshape the Constitution into a bastardized rellic by plunging the country into Socialism.
The report states that the economy will help extremists recruit vets who are returning and not able to find satisfaction upon return to the country. Maybe if we didn’t try to spend our way out of debt, signal they want to get rid of guns, and vilify the military the left would not have to worry about vets. Maybe if the left were not trying to pass 40 years of legislation and socialization in 2 years then they would not have to worry about antigovernment sentiment. And as for lack of federal government control, that is what this country was founded on, and our states are sovereign, that is why they all have their own constitutions and we have state's rights in our constitution. As for immigration, we all know we need to do more, and more quickly. We need to open debate on this, and all issues for that matter, because the government is about finding a way forward through debate, not being dictated to by an intellectual elite isolated in Washington and feeling the masses are too ignorant and disinterested to have a voice in this government. This document only helps to paint and increasingly bleak picture of where the country is sliding into, socialism here we come! After 3 years in China I am getting pretty good at living in a totalitarian country. All hail Obama. Pelosi 2016!
WASHINGTON (AP) — Homeland Security officials are warning that right-wing
extremists could use the bad state of the U.S. economy and the election of the
country's first black president to recruit members to their cause.
In an intelligence assessment issued to law enforcement last week,
Homeland Security officials said there was no specific information about an
attack in the works by right-wing extremists.
The agency warns that an
extended economic downturn with real estate foreclosures, unemployment and an
inability to obtain credit could foster an environment for extremists to recruit
members who may not have been supportive of these causes in the past.
Homeland Security spokesman Sean Smith said the report is one in a series
of assessments issued by the agency's intelligence and analysis unit. The agency
describes these assessments as part of a series published "to facilitate a
greater understanding of the phenomenon of violent radicalization in the United
States."
In February, the department issued a report to law enforcement that said
left-wing extremist groups were likely to use cyber attacks more often in the
next 10 years to further their cause. And in September, the agency issued a
report that highlighted how right-wing extremists over the past five years have
used the immigration debate as a recruiting tool.
And so it begins... Our new Socialist People's Republic of America, lead by Marxists Pelosi, Ried, Frank, and out teleprompter and blunder in chief Obama have put together such a team that is galvanizing power and using their slobbering love affair in the US main steam media to push the country into a new Cuba or old China. Many of you may believe I have fallen off the deep end, drank too much kool-aid, or become so narrow minded and jaded that my views have narrowed to tunnel like fashion seeing only what I want to see. I really wish this were the case. I really wish this were so. I really wish I have become disillusioned and hardened so much that I was seeing things that were not there, the sad truth is that it is not the case. Our liberties, values, and freedoms are under attack now more then they were in the 1700's.
This Department of Homeland Security Report is 8 pages of paranoid, disorganized, and fear mongering drivel I have ever seen come out of our federal government (excluding cover and back page). On the week before massive conservative rallies to voice dissatisfaction and dissent in our leader's passage of massive spending, taxation, and expansion of government that would make Stalin, Mao, and Castro proud. The conservative movement is becoming mobilized and doing so successfully. The conservatives may now finally shed the yoke of the GOP and reshape or form a new party that is more accessible, tolerant of different views but similar ideals, and modernized. But in the light of our movement's reshaping we see the government becoming increasingly paranoid and initiating measures we have seen in previous countries slip into turmoil. Janet Napolitano seems to be laying out battle plans to offset the rising tide of conservative concerns the freedoms, securities, and rights we have enjoyed since 1776 are being eroded, sold, and buried under expanding government and tax burdens.
What is scary is that of all the left wing's noise and left slanted media coverage of the Patriot Act, warrantless wire taps, and excessive executive powers there is slightly a peep of noise over the potential restriction of freedoms suggested of this document. Why? The left only is concerned when 'their' freedoms are questioned, they seem to forget most of us conservatives were worried by these issues as well and voiced our opposition but they care not return the favor. Only the Rolling Stone reporter Tim Dickinson states the report "... is beyond sloppy. It irresponsibly conflates murderous hate-crime-committing white supremacists and homegrown terrorists like Timothy McVeigh with run of the mill right-wingers who, God love ‘em, have every right to vehemently oppose the federal government, abortion, and immigration." is the only voice of concern from the left since the April 7th publication of the report and its immediate release by conservative media outlets, 8 days of little to no coverage, why, because the left only cares about their rights, not the rights of Americans. Seems the ACLU should change their name to the DCLU.
American Legion's national commander David K. Rehbein, an Army veteran, so outraged that he had to send an open letter to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano explaining the obvious errors and dangers of using such a broad brush to paint a picture of 'right wing extremists' and suggest law enforcement needing to keep an eye on all right-wing minded individuals for possibility of domestic terrorist actions. As a conservative minded US Navy vet who owns and loves guns, believes in God, and holds strong Libertarian views I feel as though I am now an enemy of the state. The rights of assembly, politically opposition speech, and demands for access to their leaders and to let them know they represent more then just the left wing agenda of their party's affiliation seem to all be enemies of the state as well. Meanwhile the knights and warriors of free speech and demonstrations are curiously absent and silent over these reports. All the media can muster is to point out that the DHS had released a left wing extremist paper in January, that report only outlines the far left wings intent to use computers and computer systems to attack, or use environmental terrorism to mark their goals, all with the minimal of violence. That paper does not stoke the fires of worry and fear that this one does. It seems we were never invited to this free speech party, and are not welcome to use its themes and messages.
If you want to wage war there are a few things you have to accomplish before any actions begin. Define, demonize, and marginalize the enemy is one of them. Establish a propaganda campaign to achieve the messages needed to muster and keep support. According to DHS "Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration." So right wing extremists are in 2 camps, hate groups (right to life, defending religious inclusion in our society and lives, and anti illegal immigration groups) and antigovernment (concerned increasing sizes of government, increasing aid programs, increasing federal taxes and deficit spending). How is it that the obviously broken system of immigration control in our country and voicing concerns on it and fleshing out their views in public debate is now a right wing extremist lumped in with skinheads and the KKK? I and my fellow conservative minded Americans are NOT anti-government, we aganist the ideals and principles of: taxation without representation, ram-rodding extreme liberal agenda legislation without public debate and review, our government representatives ignoring and marginalizing 50% of the country with a first grader's attitude of 'nanny nanny boo boo your side lost so there, deal with it', the total whoring out of our security and future to the Chinese and others just so we can pass measuers, budgets, and plans that have been brewing for 40 years in the rotten minds of people like Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Ron Frank, and mostly we are concerned the MOST over an irresposible use of and abuse of power demonstrated in our government since November. No we are not anti-government, we want the government to work and to reflect on the ideals and values of the Constitution that guides it, not seeing the government try to reshape the Constitution into a bastardized rellic by plunging the country into Socialism.
The report states that the economy will help extremists recruit vets who are returning and not able to find satisfaction upon return to the country. Maybe if we didn’t try to spend our way out of debt, signal they want to get rid of guns, and vilify the military the left would not have to worry about vets. Maybe if the left were not trying to pass 40 years of legislation and socialization in 2 years then they would not have to worry about antigovernment sentiment. And as for lack of federal government control, that is what this country was founded on, and our states are sovereign, that is why they all have their own constitutions and we have state's rights in our constitution. As for immigration, we all know we need to do more, and more quickly. We need to open debate on this, and all issues for that matter, because the government is about finding a way forward through debate, not being dictated to by an intellectual elite isolated in Washington and feeling the masses are too ignorant and disinterested to have a voice in this government. This document only helps to paint and increasingly bleak picture of where the country is sliding into, socialism here we come! After 3 years in China I am getting pretty good at living in a totalitarian country. All hail Obama. Pelosi 2016!
1694 redux, “A Time for Choosing” – Ronald Reagan, a must read in these times of rising socialism in America
Originally Aired October 27th, 1964 in Los Angeles California at the Republican National Convention, speaking Ronald Reagan to delegates.
Thank you. Thank you, and good evening.
The sponsor has been identified, but unlike most television programs, the performer hasn't been provided with a script. As a matter of fact, I have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks.
I have spent most of my life as a Democrat. I recently have seen fit to follow another course. I believe that the issues confronting us cross party lines. Now, one side in this campaign has been telling us that the issues of this election are the maintenance of peace and prosperity. The line has been used, "We've never had it so good."
But I have an uncomfortable feeling that this prosperity isn't something on which we can base our hopes for the future. No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income. Today, 37 cents out of every dollar earned in this country is the tax collector's share, and yet our government continues to spend 17 million dollars a day more than the government takes in. We haven't balanced our budget 28 out of the last 34 years. We've raised our debt limit three times in the last twelve months, and now our national debt is one and a half times bigger than all the combined debts of all the nations of the world. We have 15 billion dollars in gold in our treasury; we don't own an ounce. Foreign dollar claims are 27.3 billion dollars. And we've just had announced that the dollar of 1939 will now purchase 45 cents in its total value.
As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.
Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.
And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.
This is the issue of this election: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well I'd like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There's only an up or down: [up] man's old -- old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.
In this vote-harvesting time, they use terms like the "Great Society," or as we were told a few days ago by the President, we must accept a greater government activity in the affairs of the people. But they've been a little more explicit in the past and among themselves; and all of the things I now will quote have appeared in print. These are not Republican accusations. For example, they have voices that say, "The cold war will end through our acceptance of a not undemocratic socialism." Another voice says, "The profit motive has become outmoded. It must be replaced by the incentives of the welfare state." Or, "Our traditional system of individual freedom is incapable of solving the complex problems of the 20th century." Senator Fulbright has said at Stanford University that the Constitution is outmoded. He referred to the President as "our moral teacher and our leader," and he says he is "hobbled in his task by the restrictions of power imposed on him by this antiquated document." He must "be freed," so that he "can do for us" what he knows "is best." And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government."
Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government" -- this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.
Now, we have no better example of this than government's involvement in the farm economy over the last 30 years. Since 1955, the cost of this program has nearly doubled. One-fourth of farming in America is responsible for 85% of the farm surplus. Three-fourths of farming is out on the free market and has known a 21% increase in the per capita consumption of all its produce. You see, that one-fourth of farming -- that's regulated and controlled by the federal government. In the last three years we've spent 43 dollars in the feed grain program for every dollar bushel of corn we don't grow.
Senator Humphrey last week charged that Barry Goldwater, as President, would seek to eliminate farmers. He should do his homework a little better, because he'll find out that we've had a decline of 5 million in the farm population under these government programs. He'll also find that the Democratic administration has sought to get from Congress [an] extension of the farm program to include that three-fourths that is now free. He'll find that they've also asked for the right to imprison farmers who wouldn't keep books as prescribed by the federal government. The Secretary of Agriculture asked for the right to seize farms through condemnation and resell them to other individuals. And contained in that same program was a provision that would have allowed the federal government to remove 2 million farmers from the soil.
At the same time, there's been an increase in the Department of Agriculture employees. There's now one for every 30 farms in the United States, and still they can't tell us how 66 shiploads of grain headed for Austria disappeared without a trace and Billie Sol Estes never left shore.
Every responsible farmer and farm organization has repeatedly asked the government to free the farm economy, but how -- who are farmers to know what's best for them? The wheat farmers voted against a wheat program. The government passed it anyway. Now the price of bread goes up; the price of wheat to the farmer goes down.
Meanwhile, back in the city, under urban renewal the assault on freedom carries on. Private property rights [are] so diluted that public interest is almost anything a few government planners decide it should be. In a program that takes from the needy and gives to the greedy, we see such spectacles as in Cleveland, Ohio, a million-and-a-half-dollar building completed only three years ago must be destroyed to make way for what government officials call a "more compatible use of the land." The President tells us he's now going to start building public housing units in the thousands, where heretofore we've only built them in the hundreds. But FHA [Federal Housing Authority] and the Veterans Administration tell us they have 120,000 housing units they've taken back through mortgage foreclosure. For three decades, we've sought to solve the problems of unemployment through government planning, and the more the plans fail, the more the planners plan. The latest is the Area Redevelopment Agency.
They've just declared Rice County, Kansas, a depressed area. Rice County, Kansas, has two hundred oil wells, and the 14,000 people there have over 30 million dollars on deposit in personal savings in their banks. And when the government tells you you're depressed, lie down and be depressed.
We have so many people who can't see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one. So they're going to solve all the problems of human misery through government and government planning. Well, now, if government planning and welfare had the answer -- and they've had almost 30 years of it -- shouldn't we expect government to read the score to us once in a while? Shouldn't they be telling us about the decline each year in the number of people needing help? The reduction in the need for public housing?
But the reverse is true. Each year the need grows greater; the program grows greater. We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry each night. Well that was probably true. They were all on a diet. But now we're told that 9.3 million families in this country are poverty-stricken on the basis of earning less than 3,000 dollars a year. Welfare spending [is] 10 times greater than in the dark depths of the Depression. We're spending 45 billion dollars on welfare. Now do a little arithmetic, and you'll find that if we divided the 45 billion dollars up equally among those 9 million poor families, we'd be able to give each family 4,600 dollars a year. And this added to their present income should eliminate poverty. Direct aid to the poor, however, is only running only about 600 dollars per family. It would seem that someplace there must be some overhead.
Now -- so now we declare "war on poverty," or "You, too, can be a Bobby Baker." Now do they honestly expect us to believe that if we add 1 billion dollars to the 45 billion we're spending, one more program to the 30-odd we have -- and remember, this new program doesn't replace any, it just duplicates existing programs -- do they believe that poverty is suddenly going to disappear by magic? Well, in all fairness I should explain there is one part of the new program that isn't duplicated. This is the youth feature. We're now going to solve the dropout problem, juvenile delinquency, by reinstituting something like the old CCC camps [Civilian Conservation Corps], and we're going to put our young people in these camps. But again we do some arithmetic, and we find that we're going to spend each year just on room and board for each young person we help 4,700 dollars a year. We can send them to Harvard for 2,700! Course, don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting Harvard is the answer to juvenile delinquency.
But seriously, what are we doing to those we seek to help? Not too long ago, a judge called me here in Los Angeles. He told me of a young woman who'd come before him for a divorce. She had six children, was pregnant with her seventh. Under his questioning, she revealed her husband was a laborer earning 250 dollars a month. She wanted a divorce to get an 80 dollar raise. She's eligible for 330 dollars a month in the Aid to Dependent Children Program. She got the idea from two women in her neighborhood who'd already done that very thing.
Yet anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we're always "against" things -- we're never "for" anything.
Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.
Now -- we're for a provision that destitution should not follow unemployment by reason of old age, and to that end we've accepted Social Security as a step toward meeting the problem.
But we're against those entrusted with this program when they practice deception regarding its fiscal shortcomings, when they charge that any criticism of the program means that we want to end payments to those people who depend on them for a livelihood. They've called it "insurance" to us in a hundred million pieces of literature. But then they appeared before the Supreme Court and they testified it was a welfare program. They only use the term "insurance" to sell it to the people. And they said Social Security dues are a tax for the general use of the government, and the government has used that tax. There is no fund, because Robert Byers, the actuarial head, appeared before a congressional committee and admitted that Social Security as of this moment is 298 billion dollars in the hole. But he said there should be no cause for worry because as long as they have the power to tax, they could always take away from the people whatever they needed to bail them out of trouble. And they're doing just that.
A young man, 21 years of age, working at an average salary -- his Social Security contribution would, in the open market, buy him an insurance policy that would guarantee 220 dollars a month at age 65. The government promises 127. He could live it up until he's 31 and then take out a policy that would pay more than Social Security. Now are we so lacking in business sense that we can't put this program on a sound basis, so that people who do require those payments will find they can get them when they're due -- that the cupboard isn't bare?
Barry Goldwater thinks we can.
At the same time, can't we introduce voluntary features that would permit a citizen who can do better on his own to be excused upon presentation of evidence that he had made provision for the non-earning years? Should we not allow a widow with children to work, and not lose the benefits supposedly paid for by her deceased husband? Shouldn't you and I be allowed to declare who our beneficiaries will be under this program, which we cannot do? I think we're for telling our senior citizens that no one in this country should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds. But I think we're against forcing all citizens, regardless of need, into a compulsory government program, especially when we have such examples, as was announced last week, when France admitted that their Medicare program is now bankrupt. They've come to the end of the road.
In addition, was Barry Goldwater so irresponsible when he suggested that our government give up its program of deliberate, planned inflation, so that when you do get your Social Security pension, a dollar will buy a dollar's worth, and not 45 cents worth?
I think we're for an international organization, where the nations of the world can seek peace. But I think we're against subordinating American interests to an organization that has become so structurally unsound that today you can muster a two-thirds vote on the floor of the General Assembly among nations that represent less than 10 percent of the world's population. I think we're against the hypocrisy of assailing our allies because here and there they cling to a colony, while we engage in a conspiracy of silence and never open our mouths about the millions of people enslaved in the Soviet colonies in the satellite nations.
I think we're for aiding our allies by sharing of our material blessings with those nations which share in our fundamental beliefs, but we're against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world. We set out to help 19 countries. We're helping 107. We've spent 146 billion dollars. With that money, we bought a 2 million dollar yacht for Haile Selassie. We bought dress suits for Greek undertakers, extra wives for Kenya[n] government officials. We bought a thousand TV sets for a place where they have no electricity. In the last six years, 52 nations have bought 7 billion dollars worth of our gold, and all 52 are receiving foreign aid from this country.
No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. So, governments' programs, once launched, never disappear.
Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth.
Federal employees -- federal employees number two and a half million; and federal, state, and local, one out of six of the nation's work force employed by government. These proliferating bureaus with their thousands of regulations have cost us many of our constitutional safeguards. How many of us realize that today federal agents can invade a man's property without a warrant? They can impose a fine without a formal hearing, let alone a trial by jury? And they can seize and sell his property at auction to enforce the payment of that fine. In Chico County, Arkansas, James Wier over-planted his rice allotment. The government obtained a 17,000 dollar judgment. And a U.S. marshal sold his 960-acre farm at auction. The government said it was necessary as a warning to others to make the system work.
Last February 19th at the University of Minnesota, Norman Thomas, six-times candidate for President on the Socialist Party ticket, said, "If Barry Goldwater became President, he would stop the advance of socialism in the United States." I think that's exactly what he will do.
But as a former Democrat, I can tell you Norman Thomas isn't the only man who has drawn this parallel to socialism with the present administration, because back in 1936, Mr. Democrat himself, Al Smith, the great American, came before the American people and charged that the leadership of his Party was taking the Party of Jefferson, Jackson, and Cleveland down the road under the banners of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin. And he walked away from his Party, and he never returned til the day he died -- because to this day, the leadership of that Party has been taking that Party, that honorable Party, down the road in the image of the labor Socialist Party of England.
Now it doesn't require expropriation or confiscation of private property or business to impose socialism on a people. What does it mean whether you hold the deed to the -- or the title to your business or property if the government holds the power of life and death over that business or property? And such machinery already exists. The government can find some charge to bring against any concern it chooses to prosecute. Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, unalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.
Our Democratic opponents seem unwilling to debate these issues. They want to make you and I believe that this is a contest between two men -- that we're to choose just between two personalities.
Well what of this man that they would destroy -- and in destroying, they would destroy that which he represents, the ideas that you and I hold dear? Is he the brash and shallow and trigger-happy man they say he is? Well I've been privileged to know him "when." I knew him long before he ever dreamed of trying for high office, and I can tell you personally I've never known a man in my life I believed so incapable of doing a dishonest or dishonorable thing.
This is a man who, in his own business before he entered politics, instituted a profit-sharing plan before unions had ever thought of it. He put in health and medical insurance for all his employees. He took 50 percent of the profits before taxes and set up a retirement program, a pension plan for all his employees. He sent monthly checks for life to an employee who was ill and couldn't work. He provides nursing care for the children of mothers who work in the stores. When Mexico was ravaged by the floods in the Rio Grande, he climbed in his airplane and flew medicine and supplies down there.
An ex-GI told me how he met him. It was the week before Christmas during the Korean War, and he was at the Los Angeles airport trying to get a ride home to Arizona for Christmas. And he said that [there were] a lot of servicemen there and no seats available on the planes. And then a voice came over the loudspeaker and said, "Any men in uniform wanting a ride to Arizona, go to runway such-and-such," and they went down there, and there was a fellow named Barry Goldwater sitting in his plane. Every day in those weeks before Christmas, all day long, he'd load up the plane, fly it to Arizona, fly them to their homes, fly back over to get another load.
During the hectic split-second timing of a campaign, this is a man who took time out to sit beside an old friend who was dying of cancer. His campaign managers were understandably impatient, but he said, "There aren't many left who care what happens to her. I'd like her to know I care." This is a man who said to his 19-year-old son, "There is no foundation like the rock of honesty and fairness, and when you begin to build your life on that rock, with the cement of the faith in God that you have, then you have a real start." This is not a man who could carelessly send other people's sons to war. And that is the issue of this campaign that makes all the other problems I've discussed academic, unless we realize we're in a war that must be won.
Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer -- not an easy answer -- but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right.
We cannot buy our security, our freedom from the threat of the bomb by committing an immorality so great as saying to a billion human beings now enslaved behind the Iron Curtain, "Give up your dreams of freedom because to save our own skins, we're willing to make a deal with your slave masters." Alexander Hamilton said, "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one." Now let's set the record straight. There's no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there's only one guaranteed way you can have peace -- and you can have it in the next second -- surrender.
Admittedly, there's a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson of history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face -- that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight or surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand -- the ultimatum. And what then -- when Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we're retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the final ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary, because by that time we will have been weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he's heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he'd rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us.
You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin -- just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard 'round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well it's a simple answer after all.
You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." "There is a point beyond which they must not advance." And this -- this is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said, "The destiny of man is not measured by material computations. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we're spirits -- not animals." And he said, "There's something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty."
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny.
We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.
We will keep in mind and remember that Barry Goldwater has faith in us. He has faith that you and I have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny.
Thank you, very much.
speech text taken from public domain sources, American Rhetoric website has copyright on their content
Thank you. Thank you, and good evening.
The sponsor has been identified, but unlike most television programs, the performer hasn't been provided with a script. As a matter of fact, I have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks.
I have spent most of my life as a Democrat. I recently have seen fit to follow another course. I believe that the issues confronting us cross party lines. Now, one side in this campaign has been telling us that the issues of this election are the maintenance of peace and prosperity. The line has been used, "We've never had it so good."
But I have an uncomfortable feeling that this prosperity isn't something on which we can base our hopes for the future. No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income. Today, 37 cents out of every dollar earned in this country is the tax collector's share, and yet our government continues to spend 17 million dollars a day more than the government takes in. We haven't balanced our budget 28 out of the last 34 years. We've raised our debt limit three times in the last twelve months, and now our national debt is one and a half times bigger than all the combined debts of all the nations of the world. We have 15 billion dollars in gold in our treasury; we don't own an ounce. Foreign dollar claims are 27.3 billion dollars. And we've just had announced that the dollar of 1939 will now purchase 45 cents in its total value.
As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.
Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.
And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.
This is the issue of this election: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well I'd like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There's only an up or down: [up] man's old -- old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.
In this vote-harvesting time, they use terms like the "Great Society," or as we were told a few days ago by the President, we must accept a greater government activity in the affairs of the people. But they've been a little more explicit in the past and among themselves; and all of the things I now will quote have appeared in print. These are not Republican accusations. For example, they have voices that say, "The cold war will end through our acceptance of a not undemocratic socialism." Another voice says, "The profit motive has become outmoded. It must be replaced by the incentives of the welfare state." Or, "Our traditional system of individual freedom is incapable of solving the complex problems of the 20th century." Senator Fulbright has said at Stanford University that the Constitution is outmoded. He referred to the President as "our moral teacher and our leader," and he says he is "hobbled in his task by the restrictions of power imposed on him by this antiquated document." He must "be freed," so that he "can do for us" what he knows "is best." And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government."
Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government" -- this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.
Now, we have no better example of this than government's involvement in the farm economy over the last 30 years. Since 1955, the cost of this program has nearly doubled. One-fourth of farming in America is responsible for 85% of the farm surplus. Three-fourths of farming is out on the free market and has known a 21% increase in the per capita consumption of all its produce. You see, that one-fourth of farming -- that's regulated and controlled by the federal government. In the last three years we've spent 43 dollars in the feed grain program for every dollar bushel of corn we don't grow.
Senator Humphrey last week charged that Barry Goldwater, as President, would seek to eliminate farmers. He should do his homework a little better, because he'll find out that we've had a decline of 5 million in the farm population under these government programs. He'll also find that the Democratic administration has sought to get from Congress [an] extension of the farm program to include that three-fourths that is now free. He'll find that they've also asked for the right to imprison farmers who wouldn't keep books as prescribed by the federal government. The Secretary of Agriculture asked for the right to seize farms through condemnation and resell them to other individuals. And contained in that same program was a provision that would have allowed the federal government to remove 2 million farmers from the soil.
At the same time, there's been an increase in the Department of Agriculture employees. There's now one for every 30 farms in the United States, and still they can't tell us how 66 shiploads of grain headed for Austria disappeared without a trace and Billie Sol Estes never left shore.
Every responsible farmer and farm organization has repeatedly asked the government to free the farm economy, but how -- who are farmers to know what's best for them? The wheat farmers voted against a wheat program. The government passed it anyway. Now the price of bread goes up; the price of wheat to the farmer goes down.
Meanwhile, back in the city, under urban renewal the assault on freedom carries on. Private property rights [are] so diluted that public interest is almost anything a few government planners decide it should be. In a program that takes from the needy and gives to the greedy, we see such spectacles as in Cleveland, Ohio, a million-and-a-half-dollar building completed only three years ago must be destroyed to make way for what government officials call a "more compatible use of the land." The President tells us he's now going to start building public housing units in the thousands, where heretofore we've only built them in the hundreds. But FHA [Federal Housing Authority] and the Veterans Administration tell us they have 120,000 housing units they've taken back through mortgage foreclosure. For three decades, we've sought to solve the problems of unemployment through government planning, and the more the plans fail, the more the planners plan. The latest is the Area Redevelopment Agency.
They've just declared Rice County, Kansas, a depressed area. Rice County, Kansas, has two hundred oil wells, and the 14,000 people there have over 30 million dollars on deposit in personal savings in their banks. And when the government tells you you're depressed, lie down and be depressed.
We have so many people who can't see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one. So they're going to solve all the problems of human misery through government and government planning. Well, now, if government planning and welfare had the answer -- and they've had almost 30 years of it -- shouldn't we expect government to read the score to us once in a while? Shouldn't they be telling us about the decline each year in the number of people needing help? The reduction in the need for public housing?
But the reverse is true. Each year the need grows greater; the program grows greater. We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry each night. Well that was probably true. They were all on a diet. But now we're told that 9.3 million families in this country are poverty-stricken on the basis of earning less than 3,000 dollars a year. Welfare spending [is] 10 times greater than in the dark depths of the Depression. We're spending 45 billion dollars on welfare. Now do a little arithmetic, and you'll find that if we divided the 45 billion dollars up equally among those 9 million poor families, we'd be able to give each family 4,600 dollars a year. And this added to their present income should eliminate poverty. Direct aid to the poor, however, is only running only about 600 dollars per family. It would seem that someplace there must be some overhead.
Now -- so now we declare "war on poverty," or "You, too, can be a Bobby Baker." Now do they honestly expect us to believe that if we add 1 billion dollars to the 45 billion we're spending, one more program to the 30-odd we have -- and remember, this new program doesn't replace any, it just duplicates existing programs -- do they believe that poverty is suddenly going to disappear by magic? Well, in all fairness I should explain there is one part of the new program that isn't duplicated. This is the youth feature. We're now going to solve the dropout problem, juvenile delinquency, by reinstituting something like the old CCC camps [Civilian Conservation Corps], and we're going to put our young people in these camps. But again we do some arithmetic, and we find that we're going to spend each year just on room and board for each young person we help 4,700 dollars a year. We can send them to Harvard for 2,700! Course, don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting Harvard is the answer to juvenile delinquency.
But seriously, what are we doing to those we seek to help? Not too long ago, a judge called me here in Los Angeles. He told me of a young woman who'd come before him for a divorce. She had six children, was pregnant with her seventh. Under his questioning, she revealed her husband was a laborer earning 250 dollars a month. She wanted a divorce to get an 80 dollar raise. She's eligible for 330 dollars a month in the Aid to Dependent Children Program. She got the idea from two women in her neighborhood who'd already done that very thing.
Yet anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we're always "against" things -- we're never "for" anything.
Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.
Now -- we're for a provision that destitution should not follow unemployment by reason of old age, and to that end we've accepted Social Security as a step toward meeting the problem.
But we're against those entrusted with this program when they practice deception regarding its fiscal shortcomings, when they charge that any criticism of the program means that we want to end payments to those people who depend on them for a livelihood. They've called it "insurance" to us in a hundred million pieces of literature. But then they appeared before the Supreme Court and they testified it was a welfare program. They only use the term "insurance" to sell it to the people. And they said Social Security dues are a tax for the general use of the government, and the government has used that tax. There is no fund, because Robert Byers, the actuarial head, appeared before a congressional committee and admitted that Social Security as of this moment is 298 billion dollars in the hole. But he said there should be no cause for worry because as long as they have the power to tax, they could always take away from the people whatever they needed to bail them out of trouble. And they're doing just that.
A young man, 21 years of age, working at an average salary -- his Social Security contribution would, in the open market, buy him an insurance policy that would guarantee 220 dollars a month at age 65. The government promises 127. He could live it up until he's 31 and then take out a policy that would pay more than Social Security. Now are we so lacking in business sense that we can't put this program on a sound basis, so that people who do require those payments will find they can get them when they're due -- that the cupboard isn't bare?
Barry Goldwater thinks we can.
At the same time, can't we introduce voluntary features that would permit a citizen who can do better on his own to be excused upon presentation of evidence that he had made provision for the non-earning years? Should we not allow a widow with children to work, and not lose the benefits supposedly paid for by her deceased husband? Shouldn't you and I be allowed to declare who our beneficiaries will be under this program, which we cannot do? I think we're for telling our senior citizens that no one in this country should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds. But I think we're against forcing all citizens, regardless of need, into a compulsory government program, especially when we have such examples, as was announced last week, when France admitted that their Medicare program is now bankrupt. They've come to the end of the road.
In addition, was Barry Goldwater so irresponsible when he suggested that our government give up its program of deliberate, planned inflation, so that when you do get your Social Security pension, a dollar will buy a dollar's worth, and not 45 cents worth?
I think we're for an international organization, where the nations of the world can seek peace. But I think we're against subordinating American interests to an organization that has become so structurally unsound that today you can muster a two-thirds vote on the floor of the General Assembly among nations that represent less than 10 percent of the world's population. I think we're against the hypocrisy of assailing our allies because here and there they cling to a colony, while we engage in a conspiracy of silence and never open our mouths about the millions of people enslaved in the Soviet colonies in the satellite nations.
I think we're for aiding our allies by sharing of our material blessings with those nations which share in our fundamental beliefs, but we're against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world. We set out to help 19 countries. We're helping 107. We've spent 146 billion dollars. With that money, we bought a 2 million dollar yacht for Haile Selassie. We bought dress suits for Greek undertakers, extra wives for Kenya[n] government officials. We bought a thousand TV sets for a place where they have no electricity. In the last six years, 52 nations have bought 7 billion dollars worth of our gold, and all 52 are receiving foreign aid from this country.
No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. So, governments' programs, once launched, never disappear.
Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth.
Federal employees -- federal employees number two and a half million; and federal, state, and local, one out of six of the nation's work force employed by government. These proliferating bureaus with their thousands of regulations have cost us many of our constitutional safeguards. How many of us realize that today federal agents can invade a man's property without a warrant? They can impose a fine without a formal hearing, let alone a trial by jury? And they can seize and sell his property at auction to enforce the payment of that fine. In Chico County, Arkansas, James Wier over-planted his rice allotment. The government obtained a 17,000 dollar judgment. And a U.S. marshal sold his 960-acre farm at auction. The government said it was necessary as a warning to others to make the system work.
Last February 19th at the University of Minnesota, Norman Thomas, six-times candidate for President on the Socialist Party ticket, said, "If Barry Goldwater became President, he would stop the advance of socialism in the United States." I think that's exactly what he will do.
But as a former Democrat, I can tell you Norman Thomas isn't the only man who has drawn this parallel to socialism with the present administration, because back in 1936, Mr. Democrat himself, Al Smith, the great American, came before the American people and charged that the leadership of his Party was taking the Party of Jefferson, Jackson, and Cleveland down the road under the banners of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin. And he walked away from his Party, and he never returned til the day he died -- because to this day, the leadership of that Party has been taking that Party, that honorable Party, down the road in the image of the labor Socialist Party of England.
Now it doesn't require expropriation or confiscation of private property or business to impose socialism on a people. What does it mean whether you hold the deed to the -- or the title to your business or property if the government holds the power of life and death over that business or property? And such machinery already exists. The government can find some charge to bring against any concern it chooses to prosecute. Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, unalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.
Our Democratic opponents seem unwilling to debate these issues. They want to make you and I believe that this is a contest between two men -- that we're to choose just between two personalities.
Well what of this man that they would destroy -- and in destroying, they would destroy that which he represents, the ideas that you and I hold dear? Is he the brash and shallow and trigger-happy man they say he is? Well I've been privileged to know him "when." I knew him long before he ever dreamed of trying for high office, and I can tell you personally I've never known a man in my life I believed so incapable of doing a dishonest or dishonorable thing.
This is a man who, in his own business before he entered politics, instituted a profit-sharing plan before unions had ever thought of it. He put in health and medical insurance for all his employees. He took 50 percent of the profits before taxes and set up a retirement program, a pension plan for all his employees. He sent monthly checks for life to an employee who was ill and couldn't work. He provides nursing care for the children of mothers who work in the stores. When Mexico was ravaged by the floods in the Rio Grande, he climbed in his airplane and flew medicine and supplies down there.
An ex-GI told me how he met him. It was the week before Christmas during the Korean War, and he was at the Los Angeles airport trying to get a ride home to Arizona for Christmas. And he said that [there were] a lot of servicemen there and no seats available on the planes. And then a voice came over the loudspeaker and said, "Any men in uniform wanting a ride to Arizona, go to runway such-and-such," and they went down there, and there was a fellow named Barry Goldwater sitting in his plane. Every day in those weeks before Christmas, all day long, he'd load up the plane, fly it to Arizona, fly them to their homes, fly back over to get another load.
During the hectic split-second timing of a campaign, this is a man who took time out to sit beside an old friend who was dying of cancer. His campaign managers were understandably impatient, but he said, "There aren't many left who care what happens to her. I'd like her to know I care." This is a man who said to his 19-year-old son, "There is no foundation like the rock of honesty and fairness, and when you begin to build your life on that rock, with the cement of the faith in God that you have, then you have a real start." This is not a man who could carelessly send other people's sons to war. And that is the issue of this campaign that makes all the other problems I've discussed academic, unless we realize we're in a war that must be won.
Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer -- not an easy answer -- but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right.
We cannot buy our security, our freedom from the threat of the bomb by committing an immorality so great as saying to a billion human beings now enslaved behind the Iron Curtain, "Give up your dreams of freedom because to save our own skins, we're willing to make a deal with your slave masters." Alexander Hamilton said, "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one." Now let's set the record straight. There's no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there's only one guaranteed way you can have peace -- and you can have it in the next second -- surrender.
Admittedly, there's a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson of history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face -- that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight or surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand -- the ultimatum. And what then -- when Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we're retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the final ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary, because by that time we will have been weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he's heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he'd rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us.
You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin -- just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard 'round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well it's a simple answer after all.
You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." "There is a point beyond which they must not advance." And this -- this is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said, "The destiny of man is not measured by material computations. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we're spirits -- not animals." And he said, "There's something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty."
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny.
We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.
We will keep in mind and remember that Barry Goldwater has faith in us. He has faith that you and I have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny.
Thank you, very much.
speech text taken from public domain sources, American Rhetoric website has copyright on their content
Rant of the Month - March
This has been a busy month, personally, professionally, and hobby wise as well. I have not had much time for my favorite activities but have been observing what is going on and unfortunately I can say I don’t like what I am seeing one bit. It would be nice to get a rant off that was positive or that was praising this or that, I will have to work on that one later.
Domestic Policy – It seems the honeymoon is beginning to lose its shine. 8,000 ear marks and tripling the US deficit spending and our GDP to budget ratio was not enough for the Democrat party. Reneging on campaign pledges, promises, and hype was not enough either. Nor was nationalizing the banking sector or using the crisis to subvert debate in passing the largest spending program in US history and his party stating it was not enough and they would need more. Monday President Obama marked the beginning of US socialism. The US government has effectively overtaken the US auto manufacturing industry by taking over 2/3 of the companies, only Ford is still run by the private sector but it seems their days are numbered too. The Ford F-150 and Chevy Silverado were the best selling vehicles in 2007 and this irritates the Democrats. The stimulus money Detroit received, hat in hand, had hooks the auto industry could not imagine. This goes beyond the firing of GM’s CEO and Board Director, they needed to go anyway and long ago, no it goes to the fact that Obama laid out his socializing of the companies after saying he was not doing so, the markets reacted with a huge plunge. Chrysler will now HAVE to merge with a foreign auto company or go under, what was it about keeping companies in American? GM will have to stop selling its most popular vehicle and instead start selling unpopular high fuel efficiency vehicles, the government is telling GM what to sell, how to make it, and how to restructure, not a bankruptcy court who is better able to deal with this, remember this, our government is one of the most wasteful and inefficient in the world when it comes to managing public funds and we are now trusting them to run GM, the worlds largest company? Buick is THE most popular car line here in China, that’s right, get rid of the one profitable division that was keeping the entire company afloat in the largest growing auto market in the world, way to go! You can expect higher taxes on gas now, and those incentives to buy the new cars GM is going to produce, government bribes to force people to buy what they say you should buy, the free market is dead. This is not the first time. Remember the naming of the new New York Stadium a certain bank funded and bought the naming rights to, well again the government steped in and said, you took bail out money, therefore we have the right to tell you what to do with ALL your money and ALL your business decissions.
Science – The space shuttle just returned from a successful mission with the ISS. Unfortunately the ISS had 2 near misses with space debris, thanks to China for blowing up one of their satellites and to us and the Russians for colliding two into each other. Now that we almost have the ISS completed guess what, it is almost at its projected end of life! Nasa wants to replace the shuttle with an Apollo looking capsule, no more Hubble or large payload articles, but with Obama and the Socialists Republic of America in charge I doubt that any real science is on the agenda, just what we can get form embryonic steam cells. With all the mess we have here we really need to have real hope in our ability to rise up above Earth bound strife, like the first lunar missions. Space will hold the key to getting more resources, understanding, and put us on the course of being a species able to expand beyond our home planet when the day comes that it is no longer able to support life.
On a second science related topic, Earth Hour. It seems I am better then a Noble Prize winner! That is right, for 1 hour I had all lights off and observed many Shanghai high rises do the same. I ran things on battery power, candles emit CO2 you know, and today I found out Al Gore had his home lit up like a Christmas tree the whole weekend. Even his CO2 absorbing trees in his front yard were alight to show their majesty when so many home across the planet went dark. Now unless the power plants cut production then Earth hour did not do much good. Those coal power plants were still burning coal. The only difference was that the grids across the world had a slightly less load then normal for a Saturday night, not a significant drop either. It is a good concept, but to make a real impact the power plants would all need to cut production for that 1 hour and have rolling brown outs, then we would have something to cheer about.
Sports – March madness is fully underway and I could care less. Baseball continues to get a black eye, Soccer is proving to be a deadly sport as in any sport held in Pakistan. The NFL wants to extend the season by 2 games. Congress is too busy turning the dial from free market capitalism to quasi communistic socialism to investigate the BCS, maybe we should be thankful. In this time of economic hardship we need a good diversion that people of all philosophies can enjoy. Sports allows us to passively project our aggressions on to those on the field. It demonstrates that team work and hard work can make the impossible possible. It gives us hope we can overcome impossible odds and succeed. Too bad we are in a sports funk. The NBA is losing its luster, baseball is tarnished, hockey is a Canadian sport, and only hicks and inbreeds watch NASCAR. At least we have bowling.
Social issues – Norte Dame got itself into hot water with the Church for extending an invite to Obama for a commencement speech. Now correct me if I am wrong, isn’t ND a private Catholic school? Inviting a politician who’s only legislative achievement in his state and federal legislative career was championing the passage of the Illinois law requiring survivors of abortion to be put to death by denying them any medical care and going to extreme methods if that did not do the job. Add that to the lifting of the embryonic stem cell ban essentially turning planned parenthood clinics into laboratory supply warehouses. All I can say is that the leaders at ND really want to buck the system and prove they are Americans first and Catholics second. I guess they are following the 2 guarantees in life literally, taxes and death. Where is the separation of Church and State on this one, oh yea, private college and public figure, my bad I thought it was only bad for the Church to get involved in the States’ business, not the other way around. While on the topics of religion, our Secretary of State, Hillary, went to Mexico recently and ended up at the site of the patron saint of Mexico’s site for a visit, in Guadalupe, when shown the sacred shroud she asked the priest ‘that is beautiful, who painted it?’ to which the priest stated ‘God’. Classic, you would think the Secretary of State would research a country a little and her route and itinerary to ensure no social or religious snafus would crop up, especially having that get caught on film.
International issues – North Korea… Here we go again. They have invaded Chinese territory to punish two Korean born US Citizens who had the audacity to film their country from the Chinese border. You know there were Americans because anyone who has lived here for more then a year knows that the border between the two is pretty porous and open and China will always turn a blind eye. I guess Al Gore will need to find 2 more recruits, and maybe this time he can tell them what they are getting into before they get paraded in the capital of a hostile state and tortured for treason. In a few days Kim, the Dear Leader, will launch a 3 stage rocket into space to put a communication satellite into orbit. We know this is a veil, because who is North Korea communicating with? They are completely cut off from the world because they can’t control what is out there. What do you want to bet this satellite will be a washing machine or something that will crash into another satellite and cause yet more space junk. The US of course is stating sanctions will be put into place, pttttt. We all know China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, will not allow the rouge nation to be punished. The South Koreans are scared to act, facing down the world’s largest army and knowing how the US has recently dropped support for its Eastern European allies I can’t blame them at all. North Korea needs real pressure placed on them from all 5 partners in ensuring their nuclear ambitions cease as quickly as possible, Russia, China, Japan, South Korea, and the US all need to unify and punish North Korea without the UN’s involvement. Once again the UN and our reliance in it is proving to be impotent and ineffective.
Cultural issues – For those who are not aware, there are numerous Tea Parties going on around the country on April 15th. These are to signal to the government we want representation for the taxes we pay by re-enacting the Boston Tea party that was a major event leading up to the creation of our nation. I suggest all seek out these events close you to and attend if at all possible. This is not a conservative only issue, we all pay taxes. Cigarette, gas, alcohol, sales, property, licensing fees, all the hidden little taxes we pay are the major issues. Add that to the porkulous spending and soon to be largest budget in the history of the world and I feel it is vital we send those who work in our names a message that we OWN THEM, they don’t tell us what to do, we tell them WHAT WE WANT and they do it. They represent US, not their party and its wacky ideals, right and left wackyness included. It is time we all READ the constitution and see where in it the government has the power to do what it is doing now. Read the Federalist Papers, our Declaration of Independence, and other founding works so we better understand what the term, We the People means and how the government belongs to US, not the people we send to do our dirty work. Oh, Mr. Obama… we OWN YOU, and your little Nancy Pelosi too, that goes for you Harry Reid and Barney Frank. We OWN all of you, we PAY your salaries, expense accounts, health insurance premiums, retirement savings, remember that. Not until you re-write the Constitution will you break the back of the nation. Here is one for you rich people out there. I challenge each American making over $3 million a year in income to work for only $1 in 2010. This gives you 9 months to save. If you accept this challenge the vast majority of tax revenue to pay for this liberal insanity will not exist! Think about if the richest 10% of the nation, who pay 80% of taxes, forego paying tax for 1 year. Sure it can not be coordinated, just like gas out days or Earth hour, but if all the CEO’s and corporate big wigs did this, the Dems would have no money to study pig farts or the 2010 census results. I also challenge the members of our elected state and federal governments to forgo their salaries for 1 year and cut their staff by 75%. Spend more time listening to the people who you represent and reading their letters and less time with lobbyists and fellow government employees so you are connected with the people to whom you ultimately answer. This will save hundreds of millions of tax dollars and will reconnect the elected to the electors and ensure only those who have a duty to serve will do so. Do that and I will eat my shoes, raw.
Domestic Policy – It seems the honeymoon is beginning to lose its shine. 8,000 ear marks and tripling the US deficit spending and our GDP to budget ratio was not enough for the Democrat party. Reneging on campaign pledges, promises, and hype was not enough either. Nor was nationalizing the banking sector or using the crisis to subvert debate in passing the largest spending program in US history and his party stating it was not enough and they would need more. Monday President Obama marked the beginning of US socialism. The US government has effectively overtaken the US auto manufacturing industry by taking over 2/3 of the companies, only Ford is still run by the private sector but it seems their days are numbered too. The Ford F-150 and Chevy Silverado were the best selling vehicles in 2007 and this irritates the Democrats. The stimulus money Detroit received, hat in hand, had hooks the auto industry could not imagine. This goes beyond the firing of GM’s CEO and Board Director, they needed to go anyway and long ago, no it goes to the fact that Obama laid out his socializing of the companies after saying he was not doing so, the markets reacted with a huge plunge. Chrysler will now HAVE to merge with a foreign auto company or go under, what was it about keeping companies in American? GM will have to stop selling its most popular vehicle and instead start selling unpopular high fuel efficiency vehicles, the government is telling GM what to sell, how to make it, and how to restructure, not a bankruptcy court who is better able to deal with this, remember this, our government is one of the most wasteful and inefficient in the world when it comes to managing public funds and we are now trusting them to run GM, the worlds largest company? Buick is THE most popular car line here in China, that’s right, get rid of the one profitable division that was keeping the entire company afloat in the largest growing auto market in the world, way to go! You can expect higher taxes on gas now, and those incentives to buy the new cars GM is going to produce, government bribes to force people to buy what they say you should buy, the free market is dead. This is not the first time. Remember the naming of the new New York Stadium a certain bank funded and bought the naming rights to, well again the government steped in and said, you took bail out money, therefore we have the right to tell you what to do with ALL your money and ALL your business decissions.
Science – The space shuttle just returned from a successful mission with the ISS. Unfortunately the ISS had 2 near misses with space debris, thanks to China for blowing up one of their satellites and to us and the Russians for colliding two into each other. Now that we almost have the ISS completed guess what, it is almost at its projected end of life! Nasa wants to replace the shuttle with an Apollo looking capsule, no more Hubble or large payload articles, but with Obama and the Socialists Republic of America in charge I doubt that any real science is on the agenda, just what we can get form embryonic steam cells. With all the mess we have here we really need to have real hope in our ability to rise up above Earth bound strife, like the first lunar missions. Space will hold the key to getting more resources, understanding, and put us on the course of being a species able to expand beyond our home planet when the day comes that it is no longer able to support life.
On a second science related topic, Earth Hour. It seems I am better then a Noble Prize winner! That is right, for 1 hour I had all lights off and observed many Shanghai high rises do the same. I ran things on battery power, candles emit CO2 you know, and today I found out Al Gore had his home lit up like a Christmas tree the whole weekend. Even his CO2 absorbing trees in his front yard were alight to show their majesty when so many home across the planet went dark. Now unless the power plants cut production then Earth hour did not do much good. Those coal power plants were still burning coal. The only difference was that the grids across the world had a slightly less load then normal for a Saturday night, not a significant drop either. It is a good concept, but to make a real impact the power plants would all need to cut production for that 1 hour and have rolling brown outs, then we would have something to cheer about.
Sports – March madness is fully underway and I could care less. Baseball continues to get a black eye, Soccer is proving to be a deadly sport as in any sport held in Pakistan. The NFL wants to extend the season by 2 games. Congress is too busy turning the dial from free market capitalism to quasi communistic socialism to investigate the BCS, maybe we should be thankful. In this time of economic hardship we need a good diversion that people of all philosophies can enjoy. Sports allows us to passively project our aggressions on to those on the field. It demonstrates that team work and hard work can make the impossible possible. It gives us hope we can overcome impossible odds and succeed. Too bad we are in a sports funk. The NBA is losing its luster, baseball is tarnished, hockey is a Canadian sport, and only hicks and inbreeds watch NASCAR. At least we have bowling.
Social issues – Norte Dame got itself into hot water with the Church for extending an invite to Obama for a commencement speech. Now correct me if I am wrong, isn’t ND a private Catholic school? Inviting a politician who’s only legislative achievement in his state and federal legislative career was championing the passage of the Illinois law requiring survivors of abortion to be put to death by denying them any medical care and going to extreme methods if that did not do the job. Add that to the lifting of the embryonic stem cell ban essentially turning planned parenthood clinics into laboratory supply warehouses. All I can say is that the leaders at ND really want to buck the system and prove they are Americans first and Catholics second. I guess they are following the 2 guarantees in life literally, taxes and death. Where is the separation of Church and State on this one, oh yea, private college and public figure, my bad I thought it was only bad for the Church to get involved in the States’ business, not the other way around. While on the topics of religion, our Secretary of State, Hillary, went to Mexico recently and ended up at the site of the patron saint of Mexico’s site for a visit, in Guadalupe, when shown the sacred shroud she asked the priest ‘that is beautiful, who painted it?’ to which the priest stated ‘God’. Classic, you would think the Secretary of State would research a country a little and her route and itinerary to ensure no social or religious snafus would crop up, especially having that get caught on film.
International issues – North Korea… Here we go again. They have invaded Chinese territory to punish two Korean born US Citizens who had the audacity to film their country from the Chinese border. You know there were Americans because anyone who has lived here for more then a year knows that the border between the two is pretty porous and open and China will always turn a blind eye. I guess Al Gore will need to find 2 more recruits, and maybe this time he can tell them what they are getting into before they get paraded in the capital of a hostile state and tortured for treason. In a few days Kim, the Dear Leader, will launch a 3 stage rocket into space to put a communication satellite into orbit. We know this is a veil, because who is North Korea communicating with? They are completely cut off from the world because they can’t control what is out there. What do you want to bet this satellite will be a washing machine or something that will crash into another satellite and cause yet more space junk. The US of course is stating sanctions will be put into place, pttttt. We all know China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, will not allow the rouge nation to be punished. The South Koreans are scared to act, facing down the world’s largest army and knowing how the US has recently dropped support for its Eastern European allies I can’t blame them at all. North Korea needs real pressure placed on them from all 5 partners in ensuring their nuclear ambitions cease as quickly as possible, Russia, China, Japan, South Korea, and the US all need to unify and punish North Korea without the UN’s involvement. Once again the UN and our reliance in it is proving to be impotent and ineffective.
Cultural issues – For those who are not aware, there are numerous Tea Parties going on around the country on April 15th. These are to signal to the government we want representation for the taxes we pay by re-enacting the Boston Tea party that was a major event leading up to the creation of our nation. I suggest all seek out these events close you to and attend if at all possible. This is not a conservative only issue, we all pay taxes. Cigarette, gas, alcohol, sales, property, licensing fees, all the hidden little taxes we pay are the major issues. Add that to the porkulous spending and soon to be largest budget in the history of the world and I feel it is vital we send those who work in our names a message that we OWN THEM, they don’t tell us what to do, we tell them WHAT WE WANT and they do it. They represent US, not their party and its wacky ideals, right and left wackyness included. It is time we all READ the constitution and see where in it the government has the power to do what it is doing now. Read the Federalist Papers, our Declaration of Independence, and other founding works so we better understand what the term, We the People means and how the government belongs to US, not the people we send to do our dirty work. Oh, Mr. Obama… we OWN YOU, and your little Nancy Pelosi too, that goes for you Harry Reid and Barney Frank. We OWN all of you, we PAY your salaries, expense accounts, health insurance premiums, retirement savings, remember that. Not until you re-write the Constitution will you break the back of the nation. Here is one for you rich people out there. I challenge each American making over $3 million a year in income to work for only $1 in 2010. This gives you 9 months to save. If you accept this challenge the vast majority of tax revenue to pay for this liberal insanity will not exist! Think about if the richest 10% of the nation, who pay 80% of taxes, forego paying tax for 1 year. Sure it can not be coordinated, just like gas out days or Earth hour, but if all the CEO’s and corporate big wigs did this, the Dems would have no money to study pig farts or the 2010 census results. I also challenge the members of our elected state and federal governments to forgo their salaries for 1 year and cut their staff by 75%. Spend more time listening to the people who you represent and reading their letters and less time with lobbyists and fellow government employees so you are connected with the people to whom you ultimately answer. This will save hundreds of millions of tax dollars and will reconnect the elected to the electors and ensure only those who have a duty to serve will do so. Do that and I will eat my shoes, raw.
Talking about: "Natural forces stalling global warming, UWM pair say" - JSOnline
Today I was amazed to learn my alma mater, UW-Milwaukee, is beginning to make the news over a very controversial publication in a scientific journal. In the late February edition of Geophysical Research Letters and later picked up by Discovery Channel News but has just now began to get circulated on major news outlets. So why am I bringing this up, and it is not to shamefully plug my far left-wing university? The paper, titled “Has Climate Recently Shifted?” authored by Kyle Swanson and Anastasios Tsonis. The research paper, if you care to read it, outlines how the climate temperatures of the past decade mathematically indicate the planet is actually cooling, not warming as Al Gore and the rest of the global warming, I mean climate change, crowd insist. Now these two are not trying to debunk or disprove climate change, to the contrary they are stating their findings only state the climate is equalizing now, but their mathematical models do explain what I and many others have been stating for the past 5 years, the Earth heats and cools naturally and human intervention most likely has little impact on this, i.e. age of dinosaurs being tropic, ice age being, well, ice.
Before some of the radical left try to skewer these two please note this. They have been published 11 times since 2007 and referenced numerous times in citations, very important in advancing in the academic world. They used a complex advanced mathematical model called synchronized chaos which has been under study since the 1970’s, of course scientists then believed we were entering another ice age too. This pair has been working on and publishing papers on this since 2007 and their research is funded by the National Science Foundation and cited by major science publication organizations. The pair has not anticipated being drawn into the eye of the storm of climate change debate however. Their findings are based on sound and proven techniques and show that global warming peaked and waned at the turn of the century and we are now in a state of cooling as the oceans and atmosphere are equalizing.
While it is true there are glaciers retreating and breaking off into the oceans, sea levels are rising, and we need to better use our energy resources and stop depending on technology of 100 years ago we also neet to look for better ways to fuel out energy needs (use more nuclear power), this much is true and observed. However the science behind Gore’s Nobel Prize winning fiction piece and other’s distorted views colored by mass media agenda driven propaganda is not 100% clear. The debate is not over. We have seen divesting cold winters for the past 3 years in Asia, Europe, and North America with documented falling temperatures globally since 2005. Yes we need to change, but as I have stated before, we should not presume to be so arrogant as to believe our existence on this planet can actually destroy the climate. Science is proving the climate has changed radically and for unknown reasons in the past. Pole shifts, ash clouds, mass floods, expanding and contracting deserts, yo-yoing ocean levels, all of this happens every few thousand years. We have only just begun to record climate for the what, 200 years at best? The model the two authors use accurately tracks the temperatures of the last 100 years and clearly points out the current seen phenomena of global cooling and predicts continued cooling followed by another cycle of warming.
These two took some of the same classes I took at UWM. I know the professor who explained that all this global warming talk is premature until we can understand the effect of our axis wobble, planet wobble, orbit wobble, and sun’s expansion, contraction, and solar storms on our climate and track it for long enough to predict it, at least 3 full cycles (about 30,000 years). The core ice samples, sandstone layers, peat bog cores, are all good but they do not paint a complete picture. This study is not complete either, but it goes a long way in stating what many of us have been saying but were ignored and shouted down by the main stream media, global warming, I mean climate change, is sexy, normal weather patterns is not. Those taking advantage of and pushing the hysteria are left wing fruit cakes hell bent on destroying our current society (based on manufactoring, fossil fuels, plastics, and anything produced since the 1800's). Their agenda is clear, fear and loathing, and those buying into it need to sit down and seriously look at the facts, not the science fiction.
So now the major press is getting wind of this story, Wisconsin is all abuzz about it and scientists who want to prove the case with science and facts before crying wolf are going to ensure this message gets out. So before we get all huffy and puffy about this and draw lines in the sand, we need to make sure what is what and what isn’t. Yes we need to pollute less, yes we need to use less electricity (hang clothes out the window like here in China and not use dryers), yes Earth Hour this weekend is important (I am participating), and yes we need to develop better and more efficient energy production and transmission, but we don’t need to cause a panic to push a hair brain agenda that is not proven and based off of incomplete science. The reason for the fear and hype is to get the public at large to support the destruction of industrialzation and set back social development thousands of years. Odds are Yellowstone will blow its top and plunge half the world into a ‘nuclear winter’ before we kill off all the ocean fish and foliage on the planet with our carbon emmissions. People for the most part are basing 99% of their opinions on emotional propaganda produced by ratings driven mass media and agenda driven left-wing idealists who are now taking over America. Real science strips emotion out of the process and used facts, logic, and math to show the reality of it all. Lets finish the science before we go back to living in caves and hunting for a living. My ancestors were doing that just 100 years ago so it would be easy for me to revert, except my country is invaded by Europeans and they killed off nearly all my food source, the buffalo. There is an old saying that applies here, don't go off half cocked.
Sources, resources, and sites full of science and facts
http://www.wisn.com/weather/18935841/detail.htmlhttp://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/03/02/global-warming-pause.htmlhttp://www.uwm.edu/~kswanson/publications/2008GL037022_all.pdfhttp://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/41870692.htmlhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070801175711.htmhttp://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=266711http://www.topix.com/news/global-warming/2009/03/uw-milwaukee-study-could-realign-climate-change-theory
Before some of the radical left try to skewer these two please note this. They have been published 11 times since 2007 and referenced numerous times in citations, very important in advancing in the academic world. They used a complex advanced mathematical model called synchronized chaos which has been under study since the 1970’s, of course scientists then believed we were entering another ice age too. This pair has been working on and publishing papers on this since 2007 and their research is funded by the National Science Foundation and cited by major science publication organizations. The pair has not anticipated being drawn into the eye of the storm of climate change debate however. Their findings are based on sound and proven techniques and show that global warming peaked and waned at the turn of the century and we are now in a state of cooling as the oceans and atmosphere are equalizing.
While it is true there are glaciers retreating and breaking off into the oceans, sea levels are rising, and we need to better use our energy resources and stop depending on technology of 100 years ago we also neet to look for better ways to fuel out energy needs (use more nuclear power), this much is true and observed. However the science behind Gore’s Nobel Prize winning fiction piece and other’s distorted views colored by mass media agenda driven propaganda is not 100% clear. The debate is not over. We have seen divesting cold winters for the past 3 years in Asia, Europe, and North America with documented falling temperatures globally since 2005. Yes we need to change, but as I have stated before, we should not presume to be so arrogant as to believe our existence on this planet can actually destroy the climate. Science is proving the climate has changed radically and for unknown reasons in the past. Pole shifts, ash clouds, mass floods, expanding and contracting deserts, yo-yoing ocean levels, all of this happens every few thousand years. We have only just begun to record climate for the what, 200 years at best? The model the two authors use accurately tracks the temperatures of the last 100 years and clearly points out the current seen phenomena of global cooling and predicts continued cooling followed by another cycle of warming.
These two took some of the same classes I took at UWM. I know the professor who explained that all this global warming talk is premature until we can understand the effect of our axis wobble, planet wobble, orbit wobble, and sun’s expansion, contraction, and solar storms on our climate and track it for long enough to predict it, at least 3 full cycles (about 30,000 years). The core ice samples, sandstone layers, peat bog cores, are all good but they do not paint a complete picture. This study is not complete either, but it goes a long way in stating what many of us have been saying but were ignored and shouted down by the main stream media, global warming, I mean climate change, is sexy, normal weather patterns is not. Those taking advantage of and pushing the hysteria are left wing fruit cakes hell bent on destroying our current society (based on manufactoring, fossil fuels, plastics, and anything produced since the 1800's). Their agenda is clear, fear and loathing, and those buying into it need to sit down and seriously look at the facts, not the science fiction.
So now the major press is getting wind of this story, Wisconsin is all abuzz about it and scientists who want to prove the case with science and facts before crying wolf are going to ensure this message gets out. So before we get all huffy and puffy about this and draw lines in the sand, we need to make sure what is what and what isn’t. Yes we need to pollute less, yes we need to use less electricity (hang clothes out the window like here in China and not use dryers), yes Earth Hour this weekend is important (I am participating), and yes we need to develop better and more efficient energy production and transmission, but we don’t need to cause a panic to push a hair brain agenda that is not proven and based off of incomplete science. The reason for the fear and hype is to get the public at large to support the destruction of industrialzation and set back social development thousands of years. Odds are Yellowstone will blow its top and plunge half the world into a ‘nuclear winter’ before we kill off all the ocean fish and foliage on the planet with our carbon emmissions. People for the most part are basing 99% of their opinions on emotional propaganda produced by ratings driven mass media and agenda driven left-wing idealists who are now taking over America. Real science strips emotion out of the process and used facts, logic, and math to show the reality of it all. Lets finish the science before we go back to living in caves and hunting for a living. My ancestors were doing that just 100 years ago so it would be easy for me to revert, except my country is invaded by Europeans and they killed off nearly all my food source, the buffalo. There is an old saying that applies here, don't go off half cocked.
Sources, resources, and sites full of science and facts
http://www.wisn.com/weather/18935841/detail.htmlhttp://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/03/02/global-warming-pause.htmlhttp://www.uwm.edu/~kswanson/publications/2008GL037022_all.pdfhttp://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/41870692.htmlhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070801175711.htmhttp://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=266711http://www.topix.com/news/global-warming/2009/03/uw-milwaukee-study-could-realign-climate-change-theory
Vast right-wing conspiracy… part 2
Ah, the good old days of the Clinton administration. Bill was constantly under investigation for shady real estate deals, girl friends or interns, or renting out the Lincoln bedroom and Hillary was shot down in flames over socializing health care. It was at this time that she stated there was a vast right wing conspiracy to bring the Clintons down. This was a defining moment in showing the Clintons as bitter and slightly kooky. There is a reason why you can’t convict a capital crime on circumstantial evidence alone, ask OJ about that one.
I am not going to fall into the obvious trap of implying the same thing madam president was doing at the time of Billy’s impeachment. Instead I am going to outline the circumstances slowly coming into view like the jagged rocks of a cliff in the fog on a shipwreck inlet.
I could go on for thousands of words on Obama’s lack of experience, ignorance, stupidity, and incompetence but that will achieve nothing more then ire from liberal minded ones who are still basking in the glow of electing the first half black man who was raised by whites in Hawaii and attended Harvard and Harvard Law becoming president of Harvard Law Review (as far from being black as an Irishman raised in Alaska) to president of our fair republic. I could write for pages about Pelosi, Reid, Frank and the rest of the government insane clown posse better known as the Democrat controlled Congress but again pointing out the worst approval rating governmental body in US history, worse then GWB over the past 3 years, will only incite the left to cry fowl and say I am part of the problem and not the solution. I will save that for another blog on another day because all that stuff is just too good to resist writing about.
I will talk about the utter hypocrisy revelation of the month. that of Obama’s go to financial wizard, remember the new head of the IRS who was a habitual tax cheat, was the author of the loopholes allowing AIG to issue and pay bonuses to top executives. I can go one better, the very Congressional Democrats who were loudest against the bonuses were the ones who also authored the initial bailout package to AIG and the lack of intelligent controls of the money, most of which evaporated. Who were the largest contributor to 4 out of 5 Democrats railing against AIG’s bonuses, you guessed it AIG, check it out, its public record. That is how the initial bailout funds were given, and lost, and how the second round ended up going to bonuses and such, now its a big deal.
Puppet master Pelosi. If Obama is not in Washington who is running the government, I will give you 2 guesses and Joe Bidden is not one of them. The problem in Pelosi and the DNC’s plan is that Obama is a little too arrogant and gaff prone to pull off the empty suit role effectively. The years of cultivation and planning are now jeopardized because the perfect pansy who could razzle and dazzle and divert attention is under the assumption he is actually in charge and calling the shots, the gaul and audacity of him! Obama has scolded and chided the Democrats on the 8,000 earmark stimulus bill, wink wink, nod nod and passed it anyway saying while not perfect it had to be passed. His role as diversion tactic eye candy worked as he stated we HAD to pass now worked well, but not well enough. Pelosi, off the win of her insane SCHIP package does not know when to cool it, she is getting greedy and impatient and is pulling back the curtain so we can see the wizard behind the machine. Now she is calling for a second stimulus, and all this when Obama’s budget is 13% GDP, GWB’s war time only got up to 5%, and the GAO is stating his calculations are now almost $2 trillion short! Where will all this money come from, tax the rich! tax the rich! tax the rich! Redefine who is rich.
Obama needs a “thinking on your feet” upgrade. First he insults mentally impaired people and gets a pass Ben Stiller wishes he got for Tropic Thunder. Then he makes light and jokes about the economy on 60 minutes, getting light press. Follow all this up with his performance in the staged circus the White House calls a press conference (pre selected reporters and questions only please) and he states 2 items that hare lighting up the conservative blogsphere, first 1 out of 50 children in America are homeless and many are living under bridges, wow that is a lot of kids living like trolls. Second he says that it isn’t fair for rich people to get a 39% tax deduction on charities, home mortgages, etc. and should only get a 28% deduction like the lower tax brackets, oh and no tax itemizations for the rich. So if it isn’t fair to get the tax cut, why is it fair to pay the higher tax rate? Fair is fair, people who pay higher taxes would get higher tax breaks in an equal proportion. Raising the rate of taxes rich people pay but lowering the deductions they can claim is the opposite of fair. The only thing that is more bazaar is his answer to the follow up question, you know, if the rich don’t get to deduct charitable contributions Obama thinks they will continue to donate at their existing levels. Rich people give money to get the deduction, take away the incentive and they will pay less, there is no real motivation to give more, oh and conservative are proved to contribute more to charity then liberals, unless it was on purpose so the government can take over the running and operations of the charities. Should rich people pay more taxes, of course, should they get proportionate deductions, of course because this encourages them to donate more or pay a higher mortgage, which provides more property tax revenue for the local community.
Obama is a lousy magician. The first thing they teach you in magician school is to distract people’s attention with one hand while you do the trick with the other. Obama was going to bring bi-partisanism back to D.C, then did nothing with Pelosi and Reid locked out Republicans from stimulus bill and omnibus spending bill authoring, resulting in the infamous 8,000 earmarks. He was going to bring hope and faith in our government back, now more and more people are skeptical of socialism, taxes, deficit spending, and inflation. Obama was going to rebuild our international reputation, closed GITMO, sort of, sparked a trade war with Mexico, was talked down to by Canada, Great Britain, and now the EU over our protectionism and isolationism legislation. He was going to rebuild confidence and strength in America, now his brilliant tax dodging Treasury Secretary is agreeing with China in establishing a new international currency because confidence in the US dollar is at an all time low. Obama was going to bring integrity to Washington, well 13 tax cheats, numerous lobbyists, beltway Clinton administration insiders, and Chicago machine cogs later we have an administration that echoes “the more things change the more they stay the same”, that is change we can believe in. Transparency, well the 5 day review policy has already been blogged on by yours truly. How about accountability, call Obama the president of a 1000 czars. The administration’s usage of the unofficial official czar role, the most of any administration, is anything but accountable, no Senate confirmations, no elections, no committees, the president’s ear, this is so bad Democrat senator Robert Byrd has sent Obama a letter stating grave concern and outlining Obama’s historic overuse of the position that czars “inhibit openness and transparency, and reduce accountability” and later added “The rapid and easy accumulation of power by White House staff can threaten the constitutional system of checks and balances”, harsh words of abuse of presidential powers, something Obama always pinned on GWB. Partial list of czars; health reform, energy and climate change, urban affairs, economic, AIDS, Drug, Stimulus (VP Biden), tech, education, copyright, intelligence, and all working directly for the president, bypassing existing channels and having no checks or balances. While this seems like a good idea it provides a new layer of governance to move through and they have to share power with confirmed cabinet members. Accountability.
Hillary is one smart politician. By taking the Secretary of State job she has isolated herself and cemented her foreign policy experience and contacts. She is no longer a Senator so she is not accountable to the citizens of New York State. She does not have to defend or explain her voting record anymore. If the Obama administration continues to self destruct and bring backlash to the party, she will be positioned as a golden candidate. She is racking up the experience and contacts on the world stage. She has gotten Obama and his groupies to pay off her campaign debt. Man, those Clintons are smart. Oh, and giving Obama most of their people for his administration and they can destroy if from the inside, and if you don’t believe they are above such dirty tricks, you don’t know politics.
I am pointing out the double speak of the administration and our Congress. If you want solutions, real and not invented (all I can provide) well, we will have to wait until balanced budgets are realized and leprecons riding unicorns are seen on K street chasing out the lobbyists. I can Monday morning QB the administration, but that is merely an exercise in futility, much like training for a week on the ISS. Some things are obvious from the get go, a slow PC, a bad TV, shoddy craftsmanship, others take a while, the lemon of a car, bad furniture to bad clothing. This administration is proving to be the latter, no need to take it back for repairs, its obviously broken. We now have North Korea readying their second test of an ICBM, Iran exposed supplying terrorists in Palestine, Hugo Chavez mouthing off, Mexico setting tariffs over a trucking row, China submitting a vote of no confidence in the US dollar, and of course there is still Russia out there too, oh yea and a domestic disaster that was built and nourished by the Democrat lead Congress in place now and recent revelations and policies of ACORN and HUD that created the housing mess that sparked it all, and Obama was a cog in that wheel too. The evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy is not there, but it we conservatives were like Hillary we would call it so.
I am not going to fall into the obvious trap of implying the same thing madam president was doing at the time of Billy’s impeachment. Instead I am going to outline the circumstances slowly coming into view like the jagged rocks of a cliff in the fog on a shipwreck inlet.
I could go on for thousands of words on Obama’s lack of experience, ignorance, stupidity, and incompetence but that will achieve nothing more then ire from liberal minded ones who are still basking in the glow of electing the first half black man who was raised by whites in Hawaii and attended Harvard and Harvard Law becoming president of Harvard Law Review (as far from being black as an Irishman raised in Alaska) to president of our fair republic. I could write for pages about Pelosi, Reid, Frank and the rest of the government insane clown posse better known as the Democrat controlled Congress but again pointing out the worst approval rating governmental body in US history, worse then GWB over the past 3 years, will only incite the left to cry fowl and say I am part of the problem and not the solution. I will save that for another blog on another day because all that stuff is just too good to resist writing about.
I will talk about the utter hypocrisy revelation of the month. that of Obama’s go to financial wizard, remember the new head of the IRS who was a habitual tax cheat, was the author of the loopholes allowing AIG to issue and pay bonuses to top executives. I can go one better, the very Congressional Democrats who were loudest against the bonuses were the ones who also authored the initial bailout package to AIG and the lack of intelligent controls of the money, most of which evaporated. Who were the largest contributor to 4 out of 5 Democrats railing against AIG’s bonuses, you guessed it AIG, check it out, its public record. That is how the initial bailout funds were given, and lost, and how the second round ended up going to bonuses and such, now its a big deal.
Puppet master Pelosi. If Obama is not in Washington who is running the government, I will give you 2 guesses and Joe Bidden is not one of them. The problem in Pelosi and the DNC’s plan is that Obama is a little too arrogant and gaff prone to pull off the empty suit role effectively. The years of cultivation and planning are now jeopardized because the perfect pansy who could razzle and dazzle and divert attention is under the assumption he is actually in charge and calling the shots, the gaul and audacity of him! Obama has scolded and chided the Democrats on the 8,000 earmark stimulus bill, wink wink, nod nod and passed it anyway saying while not perfect it had to be passed. His role as diversion tactic eye candy worked as he stated we HAD to pass now worked well, but not well enough. Pelosi, off the win of her insane SCHIP package does not know when to cool it, she is getting greedy and impatient and is pulling back the curtain so we can see the wizard behind the machine. Now she is calling for a second stimulus, and all this when Obama’s budget is 13% GDP, GWB’s war time only got up to 5%, and the GAO is stating his calculations are now almost $2 trillion short! Where will all this money come from, tax the rich! tax the rich! tax the rich! Redefine who is rich.
Obama needs a “thinking on your feet” upgrade. First he insults mentally impaired people and gets a pass Ben Stiller wishes he got for Tropic Thunder. Then he makes light and jokes about the economy on 60 minutes, getting light press. Follow all this up with his performance in the staged circus the White House calls a press conference (pre selected reporters and questions only please) and he states 2 items that hare lighting up the conservative blogsphere, first 1 out of 50 children in America are homeless and many are living under bridges, wow that is a lot of kids living like trolls. Second he says that it isn’t fair for rich people to get a 39% tax deduction on charities, home mortgages, etc. and should only get a 28% deduction like the lower tax brackets, oh and no tax itemizations for the rich. So if it isn’t fair to get the tax cut, why is it fair to pay the higher tax rate? Fair is fair, people who pay higher taxes would get higher tax breaks in an equal proportion. Raising the rate of taxes rich people pay but lowering the deductions they can claim is the opposite of fair. The only thing that is more bazaar is his answer to the follow up question, you know, if the rich don’t get to deduct charitable contributions Obama thinks they will continue to donate at their existing levels. Rich people give money to get the deduction, take away the incentive and they will pay less, there is no real motivation to give more, oh and conservative are proved to contribute more to charity then liberals, unless it was on purpose so the government can take over the running and operations of the charities. Should rich people pay more taxes, of course, should they get proportionate deductions, of course because this encourages them to donate more or pay a higher mortgage, which provides more property tax revenue for the local community.
Obama is a lousy magician. The first thing they teach you in magician school is to distract people’s attention with one hand while you do the trick with the other. Obama was going to bring bi-partisanism back to D.C, then did nothing with Pelosi and Reid locked out Republicans from stimulus bill and omnibus spending bill authoring, resulting in the infamous 8,000 earmarks. He was going to bring hope and faith in our government back, now more and more people are skeptical of socialism, taxes, deficit spending, and inflation. Obama was going to rebuild our international reputation, closed GITMO, sort of, sparked a trade war with Mexico, was talked down to by Canada, Great Britain, and now the EU over our protectionism and isolationism legislation. He was going to rebuild confidence and strength in America, now his brilliant tax dodging Treasury Secretary is agreeing with China in establishing a new international currency because confidence in the US dollar is at an all time low. Obama was going to bring integrity to Washington, well 13 tax cheats, numerous lobbyists, beltway Clinton administration insiders, and Chicago machine cogs later we have an administration that echoes “the more things change the more they stay the same”, that is change we can believe in. Transparency, well the 5 day review policy has already been blogged on by yours truly. How about accountability, call Obama the president of a 1000 czars. The administration’s usage of the unofficial official czar role, the most of any administration, is anything but accountable, no Senate confirmations, no elections, no committees, the president’s ear, this is so bad Democrat senator Robert Byrd has sent Obama a letter stating grave concern and outlining Obama’s historic overuse of the position that czars “inhibit openness and transparency, and reduce accountability” and later added “The rapid and easy accumulation of power by White House staff can threaten the constitutional system of checks and balances”, harsh words of abuse of presidential powers, something Obama always pinned on GWB. Partial list of czars; health reform, energy and climate change, urban affairs, economic, AIDS, Drug, Stimulus (VP Biden), tech, education, copyright, intelligence, and all working directly for the president, bypassing existing channels and having no checks or balances. While this seems like a good idea it provides a new layer of governance to move through and they have to share power with confirmed cabinet members. Accountability.
Hillary is one smart politician. By taking the Secretary of State job she has isolated herself and cemented her foreign policy experience and contacts. She is no longer a Senator so she is not accountable to the citizens of New York State. She does not have to defend or explain her voting record anymore. If the Obama administration continues to self destruct and bring backlash to the party, she will be positioned as a golden candidate. She is racking up the experience and contacts on the world stage. She has gotten Obama and his groupies to pay off her campaign debt. Man, those Clintons are smart. Oh, and giving Obama most of their people for his administration and they can destroy if from the inside, and if you don’t believe they are above such dirty tricks, you don’t know politics.
I am pointing out the double speak of the administration and our Congress. If you want solutions, real and not invented (all I can provide) well, we will have to wait until balanced budgets are realized and leprecons riding unicorns are seen on K street chasing out the lobbyists. I can Monday morning QB the administration, but that is merely an exercise in futility, much like training for a week on the ISS. Some things are obvious from the get go, a slow PC, a bad TV, shoddy craftsmanship, others take a while, the lemon of a car, bad furniture to bad clothing. This administration is proving to be the latter, no need to take it back for repairs, its obviously broken. We now have North Korea readying their second test of an ICBM, Iran exposed supplying terrorists in Palestine, Hugo Chavez mouthing off, Mexico setting tariffs over a trucking row, China submitting a vote of no confidence in the US dollar, and of course there is still Russia out there too, oh yea and a domestic disaster that was built and nourished by the Democrat lead Congress in place now and recent revelations and policies of ACORN and HUD that created the housing mess that sparked it all, and Obama was a cog in that wheel too. The evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy is not there, but it we conservatives were like Hillary we would call it so.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Note to liberals: Actions speak louder then words…
I have been running into more and more Americans here overseas who are grateful to be out of the country in this time of uncertainty. Why, they all cite the economy and the direction of the country. For all the white washing, name calling, and blame shifting the media is screaming at the public to such a deafening volume, the reality is just not in synch. I am not saying this as a sore loser conservative or doom and gloom nay-sayer but as an American who is watching the ship sink as it catches fire and burns on the way down. This is the reality of what is going on. Despite the love affair from all corners of the liberal community towards this new ‘golden age’ of American politics we are witnessing the total collapse of our free market economy and the beginnings to nationalization of all things to all people in the country.
The more the US government acts the more the markets go down. Pelosi ramrods a bill, the market tanks. Pelosi and Reid hold closed door stimulus deals, the market tanks. Obama signs a bill into law, the market tanks. Obama and his tax dodging economy geniuses make comments and testimony, the market tanks. Obama tries to calm down the markets, yep it tanks. Day in and day out I have seen my modest retirement savings plummet to near initial investment levels, despite pumping in more money to take advantage of low mutual fund and stock prices. Since Obama has been sworn in we have seen little if any impact on the markets from any newly identified source. We have had full knowledge of what has been going on since January; AIG, Citi Group, Bank of America, GM and Chrysler, all of it has had no shocking new or damaging revelations announced since January. Global markets and currencies are not falling dramatically and for the most part are declining in a steady yet stable glide down. Despite all this the markets have shed 23% of its value in this time, why?
I have stated on this blog I would give Obama a chance and some opportunities to show himself and his true colors before I began criticizing his leadership and administration. That time is now officially over. In less then 100 days Obama has taken a bad situation and made it drastically worse. The levels of incompetence, ignorance, and sheer lunacy going on in Washington DC is making me seriously consider the unthinkable, that my beloved country will only emerge from this crisis as a pale shadow of its former self. Obama, Pelosi, and Reid’s vision of America through their actions has done more damage and destroyed more progress in our country then Al Qaida has with all its attacks on our country, combined. I am not exaggerating, look at the results since November and where we are today and look at the same amount of time from the USS Cole, African embassy bombings, and both WTC attacks.
I am not going to back down or sugar coat this criticism under the hopes and desires to have the Obama dream presidency turn a corner and we are all delivered to the liberal promised land. Obama’s lack of real job experience is showing and this is being reflected by the confidence in our economy to recover and our country to return to a leadership position on the world stage. We Americans vote in many ways on many things everyday. The stark reality to the liberal dream is that nobody is buying it. The more Obama does and the more information that is released on the direction he is leading the country into is being voted against every day in the Stock Exchanges, Corporate employment departments, local governments, and households across the nation. Lack of confidence is causing the money to be saved and squatted on by all those who really matter in our economy, the ones who run our businesses. If Obama is trying to break the back of the free market system and establish a nanny state or a society solely dependant on the government for survival then congratulations, its working.
The armature dealings go far beyond our economic mess, to secret letters to Russia leaked to the NY Times (a liberal mouthpiece so we know it came from the White House itself), to protectionism legislation despite calls from around the world it will result in trade wars and even England’s Prime Minister coming to DC and saying directly not to do it, to their lack of response to North Korea on its attention getting remarks on saying it wants a war with us, to Iran who must be laughing at us for the Russian back door policy disaster with the very country who is building Iran’s enrichment facilities, to his lack of showing China the respect and gratitude he needs to for the help we will need from them over the next 2 years, to his top officials engaging in a media war with conservative talk show hosts for no other reason then to posture for the next election to help make more gains in mid term elections, to Obama’s sour grapes response to Republican opposition to his policy and legislation when he does not even need their votes or support to pass these things because his party controls everything anyway, the Republicans are irrelevant and impotent in the government so just let them speak out and scream because it will not matter at the end of the day because they don’t have the votes to stop anything.
Barack Obama has not had a real job in his life, much less a real leadership job in any facet of the definition of the word and we wonder why the world is crumbling down around us despite all the wonderful words and platitudes Obama spews from his golden tongued font. Talk is cheap, actions speak louder then words, if you talk the talk you better be able to walk the walk, proof is in the pudding, a bird in the hand is better then 2 in the bush. No matter how you want to put it the leadership of the nation is NOT happening. The direction the country is being steered in is NOT working. Confidence in our country is NOT there. Throwing money into the abyss in hopes it will fill is NOT working. Saying a single company is too big to fail is NOT the right answer. The Democratic vision of how to fix this mess is NOT resulting in anything coming close to the neighborhood of success. Yes it has been only 4 months since Obama won the election and 2 months since him taking office but how far are we willing to let things drop before we demand a different direction? Guess what, by the time Obama hits 100 days we are dangerously close to seeing some of the largest companies in US history fail which will cascade far beyond what anyone can imagine. Here is something else for you, George W. Bush is not to blame. His administration fell asleep at the switch over lending regulations, this stimulus plan authored proudly by Pelosi and Reid and signed into law by Obama will be judged by its real impact.
Obama’s eloquent public speaking skills have not steemed the tide of unemployment as over 1,000,000 jobs have been lost since Obama took office in January. That is the reality. Nationalizing healthcare talk and banks have not loosened up lending or instilled confidence in companies to stop laying off people. Delaying tax cuts and promising to bailout irresponsible homeowners who bought more home then they could afford has not spurred investment in small business expansion, creation, or investment into the very companies who are cutting back expansion and laying off workers left and right. Obama’s public charm and intoxication of inspiration has not worked on those very groups who employ or create jobs in our country. Obama’s building bridges and rebuilding our international reputation has not paid any dividends or promises of partnerships but has drawn warnings and promises of retaliation for his Buy American pledge from our staunches allies to at arm length partners. Canada, England, and Asian countries have all lectured Obama on this policy and yet, he is still going down this road. No, word are truly cheap, the cost of taking the wrong actions appear to be the wealth and economic power of our country. If Obama does not stop this insanity and Pelosi and Reid stopped with losing the majority of seats in Congress then is seems we will see the real cost of all these wrong actions. Talk is cheap, the actions taken are showing no way of fixing the mess we are in. There is something worse then inaction, the wrong action and that is what the far left liberals have pushed for and achieved at this particular moment. Our governments actions are causing much more harm then good and as the liberals sing songs of praise the ship is continuing to sink, but now the fires are beginning to burn and it may be too late to save the mess now.
The more the US government acts the more the markets go down. Pelosi ramrods a bill, the market tanks. Pelosi and Reid hold closed door stimulus deals, the market tanks. Obama signs a bill into law, the market tanks. Obama and his tax dodging economy geniuses make comments and testimony, the market tanks. Obama tries to calm down the markets, yep it tanks. Day in and day out I have seen my modest retirement savings plummet to near initial investment levels, despite pumping in more money to take advantage of low mutual fund and stock prices. Since Obama has been sworn in we have seen little if any impact on the markets from any newly identified source. We have had full knowledge of what has been going on since January; AIG, Citi Group, Bank of America, GM and Chrysler, all of it has had no shocking new or damaging revelations announced since January. Global markets and currencies are not falling dramatically and for the most part are declining in a steady yet stable glide down. Despite all this the markets have shed 23% of its value in this time, why?
I have stated on this blog I would give Obama a chance and some opportunities to show himself and his true colors before I began criticizing his leadership and administration. That time is now officially over. In less then 100 days Obama has taken a bad situation and made it drastically worse. The levels of incompetence, ignorance, and sheer lunacy going on in Washington DC is making me seriously consider the unthinkable, that my beloved country will only emerge from this crisis as a pale shadow of its former self. Obama, Pelosi, and Reid’s vision of America through their actions has done more damage and destroyed more progress in our country then Al Qaida has with all its attacks on our country, combined. I am not exaggerating, look at the results since November and where we are today and look at the same amount of time from the USS Cole, African embassy bombings, and both WTC attacks.
I am not going to back down or sugar coat this criticism under the hopes and desires to have the Obama dream presidency turn a corner and we are all delivered to the liberal promised land. Obama’s lack of real job experience is showing and this is being reflected by the confidence in our economy to recover and our country to return to a leadership position on the world stage. We Americans vote in many ways on many things everyday. The stark reality to the liberal dream is that nobody is buying it. The more Obama does and the more information that is released on the direction he is leading the country into is being voted against every day in the Stock Exchanges, Corporate employment departments, local governments, and households across the nation. Lack of confidence is causing the money to be saved and squatted on by all those who really matter in our economy, the ones who run our businesses. If Obama is trying to break the back of the free market system and establish a nanny state or a society solely dependant on the government for survival then congratulations, its working.
The armature dealings go far beyond our economic mess, to secret letters to Russia leaked to the NY Times (a liberal mouthpiece so we know it came from the White House itself), to protectionism legislation despite calls from around the world it will result in trade wars and even England’s Prime Minister coming to DC and saying directly not to do it, to their lack of response to North Korea on its attention getting remarks on saying it wants a war with us, to Iran who must be laughing at us for the Russian back door policy disaster with the very country who is building Iran’s enrichment facilities, to his lack of showing China the respect and gratitude he needs to for the help we will need from them over the next 2 years, to his top officials engaging in a media war with conservative talk show hosts for no other reason then to posture for the next election to help make more gains in mid term elections, to Obama’s sour grapes response to Republican opposition to his policy and legislation when he does not even need their votes or support to pass these things because his party controls everything anyway, the Republicans are irrelevant and impotent in the government so just let them speak out and scream because it will not matter at the end of the day because they don’t have the votes to stop anything.
Barack Obama has not had a real job in his life, much less a real leadership job in any facet of the definition of the word and we wonder why the world is crumbling down around us despite all the wonderful words and platitudes Obama spews from his golden tongued font. Talk is cheap, actions speak louder then words, if you talk the talk you better be able to walk the walk, proof is in the pudding, a bird in the hand is better then 2 in the bush. No matter how you want to put it the leadership of the nation is NOT happening. The direction the country is being steered in is NOT working. Confidence in our country is NOT there. Throwing money into the abyss in hopes it will fill is NOT working. Saying a single company is too big to fail is NOT the right answer. The Democratic vision of how to fix this mess is NOT resulting in anything coming close to the neighborhood of success. Yes it has been only 4 months since Obama won the election and 2 months since him taking office but how far are we willing to let things drop before we demand a different direction? Guess what, by the time Obama hits 100 days we are dangerously close to seeing some of the largest companies in US history fail which will cascade far beyond what anyone can imagine. Here is something else for you, George W. Bush is not to blame. His administration fell asleep at the switch over lending regulations, this stimulus plan authored proudly by Pelosi and Reid and signed into law by Obama will be judged by its real impact.
Obama’s eloquent public speaking skills have not steemed the tide of unemployment as over 1,000,000 jobs have been lost since Obama took office in January. That is the reality. Nationalizing healthcare talk and banks have not loosened up lending or instilled confidence in companies to stop laying off people. Delaying tax cuts and promising to bailout irresponsible homeowners who bought more home then they could afford has not spurred investment in small business expansion, creation, or investment into the very companies who are cutting back expansion and laying off workers left and right. Obama’s public charm and intoxication of inspiration has not worked on those very groups who employ or create jobs in our country. Obama’s building bridges and rebuilding our international reputation has not paid any dividends or promises of partnerships but has drawn warnings and promises of retaliation for his Buy American pledge from our staunches allies to at arm length partners. Canada, England, and Asian countries have all lectured Obama on this policy and yet, he is still going down this road. No, word are truly cheap, the cost of taking the wrong actions appear to be the wealth and economic power of our country. If Obama does not stop this insanity and Pelosi and Reid stopped with losing the majority of seats in Congress then is seems we will see the real cost of all these wrong actions. Talk is cheap, the actions taken are showing no way of fixing the mess we are in. There is something worse then inaction, the wrong action and that is what the far left liberals have pushed for and achieved at this particular moment. Our governments actions are causing much more harm then good and as the liberals sing songs of praise the ship is continuing to sink, but now the fires are beginning to burn and it may be too late to save the mess now.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
After the dust settles, its beginning to look a lot like class warfare
Obama’s 5 day pledge will not be used on this legislation because it is deemed ‘emergency legislation’, not that that seems to be stopping him from upholding that pledge anyway. The corrected, consolidated and merged House and Senate bills were online the evening of Friday the 13th, Obama will sign it Monday morning. The documents are HUGE, Section A is 496 pages – 5Mb and Section B is 575 - 2Mb. Going through it to find all the hidden earmarks, pork, and wasteful spending would take a week or longer! You can’t trust the summaries or press as they are so slanted it is unbelievable. The point is this, this bill is shaping up a clear cut class war. The payouts and provisions are all aimed at aiding those dependant on government aid, buying more of their loyalty, forcing the middle class into dependency on the government for sustainability, and undermining the upper class in an attempt to redistribute their wealth completely (much the same way as happens in all revolutions where rich people’s properties are taken and given to the poor). This is becoming more and more clear as I analyze the flapping head talk show hosts, blogs, and what the media is leaving out of the discussions on what is going on in this country now. As I stated earlier, good thing I am in China, now I can apply the living in an authoritarian communist society to my home country.
Just breezing through the first 20 pages I came across a $400 million provision for WIC, the women, infant, and children for providing nutriesous and free foods necessary for development (milk, orange juice, cheese, cereal, etc.). Working for a grocery store in rural Alabama for 6 years and I know about it all too well. The provision states clearly that $100 million is only to be used for funding the program, the remainder is to be used when it is expanded to enroll more people. This expansion is used to hook people on dependency on government aid, little by little. One of my favorite talk show hosts said it best, its like what a drug dealer does to get new clients, he gives away free drugs to get you hooked and then he starts charging when you need it. This package, while some is necessary and needed, is government crack handed out to hook us all. $100 million to expand free lunch programs, provided the schools only use it for new equipment and have a population of students eligible for the program at 50% or higher. Seeing public school enrollment is declining, as our population is, and school districts are having to close down schools would it not be a better use of funds to use it to; hire staff, buy better quality food, or expand the program to charter schools and alternative schools?
Increasing social services does not stimulate the immediate needs of our economy! Increasing social programs does nothing to fix the problems of job loss, frozen credit, home value increases, or spur domestic spending which all the Democrats have acknowledged is what the real problem is! All these programs are long term spending programs. They all require local taxes to fund. Where do you suppose this funding will come from in October, when this budget plan expires? Oh, you did not know this bill is just for this fiscal budget year? Surprise, we will get a peek at Obama’s wish list for the next fiscal year at the end of the month. Back to the point, the funding for all this expansion of WIC, school lunch, Medicare/Medicaid, unemployment benefits, etc, will be coming out of local tax bases. Yep, local communities will have to hike up property, sales, and income taxes to pay for the new expanded services. This will bog down local economic growth and make the case for federal funding grants to the local communities cementing their dependency on and influence by federal government into local communities across the nation. California and Wisconsin are already using their portion of the bill to supplement their deficit spending (remember all states are required by law to have balanced budgets). This financial crack being handed out will make communities and people dependant on the government. Once you do that the government will tell you how to spend that money.
What was Bill Clinton’s crowning achievement as president? Come on, you know you can name it. Letting Bin Laden go, Kosovo, White Water, the tech bubble, Monica Gate, Socialized Medicine, NAFTA, getting impeached? Nope, it was workfare, the reform of welfare to make people who could work work to receive assistance. Well that was just erased. This bill, soon to be law, now allows tens of millions sit at home and collect a check with no job searching provisions or minimum hours of work at a job to receive. Welfare is there as a supplement to allow you time to get another job. If you don’t have to get another job and they expand it from 6 months to 10~12 months then what incentive do you have to look for work? It is encouraging laziness and dependency on government aid. What was lauded as a success under Clinton’s 8 years of hell was now killed by the very party that created it. Making the middleclass slaves and then slowly turning them into lower class will help swell the ranks of those for an impending class warfare.
Remember the good old days of president Bush when the Democrats were screaming about raising the deficit spending from 3% to 4% of our GDP to fund the war? Remember when Regan created a recession and deficit spending of 3% of our GDP to fix Carter’s catastrophe? You will now because this bill puts our deficit spending at 13~14% of GDP based off of pre-recession GDP figures! That is like having a sub-prime mortgage loan with a teaser rate of $900 a month and after 4 years jumps to $3,600 a month… oh wait many can relate to that because that is what cause the housing melt down that tripped off this whole mess in the first place! We have increased our deficit spending 3 to 4 times! Why were the Democrats screaming at Bush for increasing it a measly 0.5% 4 years ago and happily going with these gross increases now? We are putting ourselves on a collision course and the reasons are eerily pointing toward a new class war in the country.
How can all this spending be paid for. If you take all the war spending since it began 6 years ago, throw in the homeland security spending for good measure, you still don’t match the spending in this bill! The Democrats seem to hate spending money on war, but spending it on re-analyzing the results of the 2010 census findings and other things that don’t fix our economic problems outlined above is totally fine. Just as SCHIP was lauded by Pelosi and she defended its birth control measure by saying it was a stimulus provision, no cost saving provision, no, well she blew it off anyway. The Democrats love to spend money and could care less about oversight. Case in point. Obama’s ridicule of a bank’s planned annual event to Las Vegas, for an employee recognition and senior executive meeting to review and plan the next year’s strategies, and his fervor against another bank’s marketing budget at the Superbowl, to gain more clients, deposits, and loan candidates. Because these banks took TARP funds he want to tell them what they can’t spend money on. Its their fault for taking the funds, but if they take federal funds does the government have the right to tell them how to spend their money? Really? If so I want to tell all the unionized school teachers in America where, when, and how to spend their paychecks, vacations, and personal expenses. They receive tax dollars. How about the Post Office. With this new 2 cent increase I don’t want to see them spend anymore on advertising, overtime, use 30% less fuel, and get rid of all unhealthy foods on government property because I fund their healthcare too! See, when the shoe is on the other foot it feels different.
Our deficit spending is funded by; taxes received over the next fiscal year, treasury bonds sold to private, public, and sovereign wealth funds (countries), and deals involving trade and currency exchanges. This tripling of deficit spending pushes the bonds down to historic lows eroding the confidence they can even be repaid! Private investors are not going to buy them, they just lost 50% of their wealth when the markets collapsed (if they were lucky) and the bond rates now are less then 0.6% return on 10 years! Businesses won’t be getting any bonds for the same reasons. Japan and China (#2 and #3 economies respectfully) are hurting and can only buy a small fraction of bonds as they are in recessions and problems of their own. Global markets are all down and digging in by spending less as investments. Some want to see the dollar fall as it will increase their currency or GDP rates. So the only other option is to just print money. Without a value based on it the value of the currency will fall, simple supply vs demand. As demand for US dollars falls supply will skyrocket, making inflation and possible devaluation a stark reality. The US dollar may become just like the Mexican peso, worth less 24 hours after it was printed. All that money will mean little if prices go up to match the realistic value of the currency. Remember the good old days of Carter and his triple doubles, double digit inflation, unemployment, and national debt increases? Well, get used to it because here we go again. Funny thing here. This bill is trying an old formula that has failed in every communists and socialists country over the past 60 years yet we feel we can make it work this time around. China abandoned government run businesses 30 years ago and adopted a more capitalistic approach, the results… from 3rd world to 3rd largest economy and still growing in a global recession all in 30 years, it has never happened before. It seems China and American are two passing ships in the night, each going to where the other has just came from.
All this circles back to the positioning of class warfare in the country. The Democrats, drunk off of their huge wins this past fall, have placed a 40 year in the making wish list up before a president who is going to sign it into law after the public, who will be paying for it, gets less then a weekend to review and inform their Congress members how to vote on it. 40 years of far left wing ideas, philosophies, and scams will become a reality, all with smiles and pats on the backs while the president told the nation, with a straight face, that this was necessary and had to be done now, because waiting another week or two would doom us all to, well whatever the Democrats version of a non-religious Hell would be. These measures will place the yoke of dependency on the middleclass. These measures are aimed at going after the rich. While not rich, a fan of the rich, nor a believer that rich people are anything besides scum, I feel in out country that if you work hard and are persistent you should get rewarded accordingly. What about Paris Hilton? I would love to see her on WIC and food stamps, but only as a result of her family disowning her or cutting her off permanently. There is a gambler’s saying that applies here, scared money don’t make no money. The reward of a high payout is worth the risk, this is what created the rich people in the first place, they were willing to go it alone when it looked worst. Are we saying now that they are bad for being successful? Are we no longer rewarding success? Are we now going to say that those with money have to support a system that has declared war on it for no other reason then what they make in a year? Sounds pretty un-American to me.
The investments of this package do 3 things. It boosts popularity by those stead fast loyalist who already receive entitlement and feel their plight is the fault of others. It purchases the loyalty of the middleclass under the guise of short term assistance until things improve. It sets up a system so bloated and large the amount of resources required to maintain it exceed what we can afford and this will push the middleclass into the rank of the entitlement receivers. That will leave just the large companies and the rich to fund the rest. Of course the government counts on them staying where they are out of some sense that America at that time is still better then Dubai, China, Vietnam, Brazil, India, hell even Canada, Australia, and others. Not only will pay caps on top executives create brain drain in those companies, the top tier talent going where the pay and benefits match the work, class warfare and assaults on our elites will create wealth drain faster then the government can take it. Rich people are smart in one area and one area alone, retaining wealth. If they can’t do that here there is nothing preventing them from jumping ship. They employ the smartest people to manage their money, loyalty and nationalism only goes so far. Unlike France during their revolution, the world is smaller and easier to navigate in today. This year celebrates the 30th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. Other countries have blood soaked shifts of power or wealth throughout their recent histories too. The US, and to some extent Russia, do not operate this way. This war will not include poor peasants running into mansions and looting them, no that will be left up to the government. Tax increases, road blocks for investments and business operations, death taxes, luxury taxes, and the like. This war will backfire on the Democrats and cause a mass exodus where other countries will get the tax dollars we will miss. Then we all are left holding a very big and heavy bag. Remember that little war at the turn of the last century? They passed and implemented a ‘rich’ person tax to pay for that war, on telephones that at the time only rich people had, well, we still pay that tax today each month.
As I have stated earlier. Liberals tend to be very short sighted with their ideals. All this stuff looks like it was cooked up in the 1960’s and now has the chance to see the light of day, however over that time they never got past the ‘would it be radical and cool if we did “x” – never thinking through what would happen next or because of it. Those of us who are left will look around and wonder how it all happened, well this is it. Remember Mr. ‘it’s patriotic to pay taxes’ Bidden kept lowering his definition of rich from $250,000 household income to $200,000 and then to $150,000, well you should because it may have to go lower, meaning all those nice taxes above could be coming your way. That is how class warfare is conduced, full frontal assaults on the supply lines and resources used. It may be bloodless but the effects are just as devastating. Pelosi and Reid have rammed 40 years if unfilled X-mas wish lists into the first real legislation Obama will sign and doing so as to ‘not let a good crisis go to waste’, yep that sounds like this is on the up and up and we have all that hope of change and transparency happening here. Just as Wisconsin found out when their ‘tax Hell’ drove thousands of tax payers to Florida and Arizona (who were grateful in receiving new tax bases) and are now left with a $3 billion deficit, you can only tax so much before those getting taxed will leave. A strategy to take down ‘the man’ and stick it to ‘the rich’ is getting underway, power to the people and those ‘the man’ has held down for too long, we are with you brothers and sisters, our time has come, we will get all we deserve now, follow us to the promised land of equality, harmony, lollipops, unicorns, and chocolate rivers.
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