Ideologue

ideologue n. an adherent to or advocate of some ideology
source: Webster Dictionary.org

My last US based location before my move was Wisconsin. Having lived there 6 years I have become connected with with it and its politics much more than I am with either Michigan or Alabama. The recent backlash against the progressive answer to our nation’s ills produced an unprecedented sweep of conservative minded leadership. The result of this has been placed on the national stage by a feverous battle of wills between fiscal conservatives and progressive pro union groups. As I have some inside insight and continue to keep abreast of the situation via various sources I find it amazing in this day and age of twitter, Facebook, 24/7 cable news, and instant publishing local newspaper websites that so much misinformation, misinterpretation, and outright lies were incubated and delivered with fervor not seen since the LA riots after the Rodney King police brutality verdict.

It is no secrete I am conservative minded, politically of course. I have passed another milestone lately the years and experiences have added another layer, or ring, to my life. As we age we tend to filter what we see and hear. This is a self protection mechanism really, one that selectively validates our world view therefore giving us comfort and psychological support we, and our views, are right and correct. As we have years invested on our particular paths we need this comfort in order to ensure our dividends will pay out a positive return. Every so often we meet cross roads that test and shake our world views and these are dangerous events as we tend to filter our views, see what we want to see, hear what we want to hear. The only real way to inoculate oneself from these pitfalls is to; A) identify the cross road B) approach the situation with healthy cynicism C) use logic and past experiences to check your initial conclusion D) view the alternatives before dismissing them. Sound complicated? Its easy, think of all the situations we use this process in our everyday life to survive. What to wear, what to eat, what tasks to undertake, what priority each event in our lives takes, when to go to bed. So why is it that this process has broken down and started to falter so much in the last 2 years in America?

Of course people will say this criticism of my culture and society is viewed through tinted glasses, perhaps, but I am aware of my slants and views and make no excuses for them… placing me ahead of those unaware of their views as I am more guarded to keep as much of an objective take as I can. Call it an “Emperor’s New Clothes” aversion, but surrounding yourself with “yes men”, even if they are in your head, only leads to disaster. So what does all this have to do with ideology or political gridlock? If you have to ask this you are a new reader or have forgotten my style of approaching a topic.

The Wisconsin Budget Repair Bill has widened the chiasm between the political left and right in the state. Passions overflowed like the waters over Niagara Falls, and just like the Falls, it overflowed in just one direction and from one side. Watching the players and theater over the last month has been frustrating and at time comical. From the 14 Democrat senators who fled the state to deny a quorum, for 3 weeks, to the tens of thousands of protesting teachers and doctors giving out notes so they could claim a sick day off work, it all made for a comedy of errors. Oh, and now one of the 14 is proposing a state constitution amendment to make it illegal to do this again, why??? The more troubling aspect was despite the tragic events of the beginning of the year with Democrat Repressive Giffords being shot along with numerous people at a local event, the rhetoric had again raised to soaring levels of hate and anger with death and violence taking center overt reoccurring themes against the governor and GOP members with no press scrutiny and that spoke volumes to what has been unfolding over the past 2 years. How can I exaggerate chalk outlines on the Madison square and live ammunition from a high powered rifle casually strewn over the capital grounds?

The larger picture is much more interesting than the smaller micro view of the bill’s dissolving of collective bargaining for public state employees or pension and healthcare benefit contribution levels. The problems with this political theater is it falls into the trap of losing the forest for the trees. The battle is not over union “rights” (a grotesque misnomer by every rational stretch of the definition) but over power and preserving the status quo. Despite all the hype, promise, and aspirations of our 44th president the reality is he and his administration are a rehash of the same old same old, just updated in a post millennium exterior. Has he instituted a new era of transparency within government that has restored faith in American politics? Has he created a new era of accountability that has restored pride and honor to American politics? Has he or his party delivered on anything substantive to correct the path of decades of debt and out of touch political processes separating the masses from the bedrock principles and foundations of American politics?

No, and that was evidence at the November thumping the DNC took ushering in one of the largest swings in political landscape in both federal and state/local governments. His policies, practices, and tactics gave birth to the largest and strongest grass roots political movement seen in generations. The proverbial sleeping giant of fundamental belief in the nation’s core founding principles has risen and taken charge of the political debate, to the chagrin of the main stream media and their political party of choice darling Democrats. So what does this have to do with anything? Follow the money. The macro view of the fight, and real fear of the DNC is a domino effect where public sector unions, the largest financial contributors to DNC campaigns, begin to lose their status quo power in numerous states. Its always about the money in politics.

The reasoning for this is simple, and logically induced. For one collective bargaining is NOT a right. If it were then Federal employees would have it, and they do not. Why is there little to no mention or marching on the White House demanding Federal union workers have collective bargaining? Second, rights are guaranteed in the constitution, those that are deemed important enough are placed in the Constitution and they are granted to ALL citizens, not just some public sector union members in one state and not private sector unions or public sector unions in another state. Lastly collective bargaining has resulted in public sector unions establishing and maintaining legacy pensions and health care benefits long extinct in private sector jobs (except the auto industry and we all saw how well that is working out). Add this together with how public sector unions in the states that have them operate; statue union laws in many of the union states prohibit non-union workers, state payroll collects union dues and delivers to the union head office automatically, tenure rules keeps only longer serving and more invested union members in the rank and file, union leadership is drafted from pensioners and true believers to keep unwavering front office support, political clout and contributions are leveraged against local governmental board members who negotiate contracts. Horsepucky I hear, hogwash I reply! If this were not the case why is it public sector unions in Wisconsin are rushing to sign contract extensions for 2 years now while the WI Democrat Secretary of State delays and stalls the law publication giving unions and friendly local districts 10 days to get extensions in place knowing they can’t raise taxes or increase any local fees to make up the looming state aid cuts to education coming (resulting in all the new teachers not tenured to bear the brunt of the layoffs retaining the older and higher paid true believers)? The tactics are dirty, the money is dirty, and the power if corrupting. The progressive left rails against big corporation contributions and influence in the private sector, yet they turn a blind eye to the facts 36.2% of the work force comprising of public sector unions make up the largest groups of DNC donors with $87.5 million funds handed over in 2010 (by contrast outspending all RNC contributors by $31.5 million) . By contrast private sector unions make up only 6.9% of the work force and while slanted DNC they act more responsibly and conduct business more civilly (which yells volumes when the teamsters are tame compared to teachers, bus drivers, and janitors).

Speaking of money, do you know who the highest paid Wisconsin state employees are? If you think its the governor or elected official you are dead wrong. In 2009 the highest paid WI employees were buss drivers, coming in at $159,258 is John E. Nelson or which $109,892 was overtime pay. His co-worker, Greg Tatman, earned $125,598 putting them among the city’s top 20 earners in 2009. In fact 7 bus drivers made over $100,000 that year. Speaking of over time, just the Madison WI bus system alone drummed up $1.94 million in overtime. Who are the rich and who are the middle class in Wisconsin? When the highest paid public workers are bus drivers making more then 2.5 times his annual salary in overtime, well we have a problem. Don’t think the schools or other public sectors are any more sane. Given a choice to not be in the union, forcing the unions to collect their own dues, take a majority certification vote annually, therefore jeopardizing their largest political leverage, money. Yep, its all about the money, for money buys access and ensures favors for friendly and symbiotic relationships ensuring a friendly environment cementing the status quo. How does that look for the change ushered in with all fan fare in 08?

Who is wearing rose colored glasses now? Have I selectively filtered through all my fiscal conservative bias and out all the wimpy, hypocritical, and lily livered biases to validate my world view and self image? Have I shut down my objectivity or cynicism with prejudice? Actually that wouldn’t be any fun. Regurgitating bumper sticker talking points and nationally outlined emotional bullet points is rather boring and repetitive. In all honesty both sides are manipulating the 20% of the population that swings the election cycles from one extreme to the other. We are in a time when they will be most likely running from one extreme to the other. This is troublesome because it resembles a run away diesel engine. Anyone familiar will know unless you choke and slow down the cycles the engine will speed up to the point of tearing itself apart. I am smart enough to see through the GOP smoke and mirrors as well as the DNC set. Still the GOP side is much milder as its actually trying to fix the fiscal mess of Wisconsin with a real solution combating the real problem, high taxes and too much spending. Just as the UAW found out the GM and Chrysler union won gains during flush with cash times can’t be sustained forever. Seeing the public sector unions only grabbed more and more and never conceded or restrained themselves they set the stage for a radical and painful solution we see today.

As for the overall argument at the very kidney of the matter, remember money is the heart of this situation, the relevancy of unions in America. Most of the DNC propaganda concerning pro union relevancy is actually just the opposite, irrelevant. Oh, here come my politically slanted opinions again. Well, consider this. First, child labor laws nationally and in all 50 states prevent people under 16 from working without a permit and limit the hours and days they can work, so union protections against child labor is mooted. Second, 40 hour work weeks, overtime pay, holiday pay, and shift limitations are all outlined by labor laws both nationally and in all 50 states. Third, OSHA oversees workplace safety and laws ensure safe, productive, and standards for work place environments nationally and in all 50 states. Forth, national and state laws enforce equality in the work place by outlawing discrimination based on sex, age, religion, and even offer workers with disabilities avenues to work. Fifth, federal and state laws prevent environments where corporations set up environments where they own the factory, town, and company store setting up indentured servitude conditions. Lastly, if unions were the only thing standing in the way between freedom and oppressive working conditions, why do they only make up 6.9% of the private working sector? Remember union membership has been falling steady for 12 years, yet pay and benefits have not fallen, why is that? Why do companies provide company match for 401k, group medical plans, insurance options, vacation days, sick days, etc.? Because their competition does, not because the 7% of union work places (mainly factory, construction, and auto workers) do. In order to attract and retain top talent companies have to provide incentives, both financial and life quality.

For the public sector unions, they make up 5 times the number of employees but still are restricted to less then half of the US states. Do public employees in the majority of the US States suffer or have worse working conditions then the minority working in states like Wisconsin? Besides the tax payer funded plush fringe benefits no. Remember, all because of payroll, pension, and lavish healthcare (sold by the unions) and role over sick days with insane overtime (remember the Madison bus driver), it takes several private sector employees to pay for just 1 public sector employee. How much? Good questions and it varies from state to state and city to city. State and local taxes are small compared to FICA and income tax rates. These state and local taxes pay for all services, including civil servant payrolls and benefits. Property taxes pay for schools and other city services (renters have this tax added into their monthly rent so they pay it too). While the Federal government does help pay for roads, schools, medical and safety through matching or granted funds the majority comes from tax payers. Civil servants collected taxes are a wash as they can’t really count their taxes due to their pay it comes from is actually collected from their private sector neighbors. If your total state and local taxes come to 14% of gross pay you can bet the majority covers civil servant payroll and pension funding. Speculation would state 5%, so it would take 20 tax payers to fund 1 employee’s pay with the remaining taxes to pay for the building, lights, vehicles, mass transit, sewer, garbage, parks, etc. (remember property taxes pay for schools, police, and fire). At least private sector unions costs are held in check with company health, if the costs spiral out of control the company goes bankrupt and fails or re-structures. Government does not go bankrupt.

We have laws protecting workers and ensuring their real rights, you know the ones in the constitution, are protected. The laws force fair and balanced working environments and go well beyond fairness unions tolerate. Unions have tenure rules forcing a last in, first out policy instead of merit. Speaking of merit, you don’t get paid based on work performance but on years in service. Unions do not allow non-union workers in the same work place. If you no longer want to be in the union you have to quite and most likely move to another state. You have to pay the dues, of which proved above go towards political action campaigns, and if you don’t agree with what your dues go to, well you have to pay anyway and your voice is oppressed. Unions reward loyalty as only those who support and mirror their stance advance and progress up the ranks. Unions have transcended from quasi mob affiliate to full blown legalized mobs ripe with extortion, intimidation, oppression, assaults, and cohesion as well as conspiracies the mob never reached financially. For these reasons unions need to be flushed and allowed to regroup only when they can demonstrate they can operate in similar manners to their private sector brothers and sisters and government spokesmen actually negotiate with the unions instead of being their patsies and giving them what they ask for. The Wisconsin union’s stance is thin, tissue paper thin on all fronts of its arguments. I have not seen 1 articulate and valid point over 3 weeks of heated emotional rhetoric. Notice I didn’t state debate, because just as I learned in the Navy, you can’t rationalize with a drunk, and it seems to apply to liberals as well. They shout, yell, and sound bite and prevent real and honest debate. They can’t stand to hear an opposing view and only wish to restrict free speech, free flow of ideas, alternatives to the status quo, and offer no viable alternative to closing the multi-billion dollar budget gap their own party created over 4 budget cycles. If they would be honest and just state they want to tax corporations (the very vehicles they use to invest their current pension fund pools, IRAs, and receive the overall majority of the tax revenue collected from), the overtime laden rich bus drivers and other with personal income above 100,000/year, small business owners (who’s taxes are based off of gross income before payroll and internal business re-investment), and yes, the poor tax payers and citizens through sales tax, license fees, and other nickel and dime fees. They can’t state this because that 20% of the voting block who decide elections would run from them back into the GOP camp in an instant.

No, my eyes are wide open on this. I admit my biases but can back up my positions. I can offer proof and logically derive my conclusions from facts and unbiased information. I see where the other side is coming from and understand their position and why it is they are doing what they are doing and saying what they are saying. I dare one of those foaming at the mouth teachers to do the same and will compare their argument to mine to see which is more sound and able to stand the test of scrutiny. Their arguments are riddled with half truths and fallacies including straw man, slippery slope, and ad homonym. The telling contrast is the southern neighbor, Illinois. Wisconsin has pledged to close the budget shortfall without raising taxes and improving the tax climate to attract more employers with a target of 250,000 private sector jobs that will bay for the public sector spending (including payroll), and finally to cut state spending. By contrast Illinois has maintained the status quo, raised taxes, issued more bonds taking on more debt (putting off the repayment for years), and increasing state spending. Time will tell which state will be closer to fiscally sound standing and health. I am afraid the only one with blinders on are the ones refusing to talk through the issue, and that includes running away from the state for 3 weeks to grand stand and give the union puppet masters extra time to out maneuver coming budget plans (hamstringing the local communities and forcing them to lay off teachers creating a perceived political plus for them as they can stand the laid off teachers before the crowds and state it was the GOP who caused it). Who has blinders on, time will tell.

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.

Associated Press: Report: US is ripe for recruiting by extremists

By EILEEN SULLIVAN – 14 April 2009

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

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.

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