Yes, there was one thing I agreed with Billy "Bubba" Clinton, when he said about then Senator Obama, that he was nothing more than a thug. See, I do agree with the other side (rarely at best). I keep waiting for the anointed one to start acting somewhat Presidential. I thought Clinton tarnished the office of the President with Monica. Obama has taken it to a "hol notha level." The other day, when Obama was making his 1,938,234,902nd speech (this year), he was calling out his hecklers., maybe for a Chicago style street fight? I suprised that Rahm "Twinkle Toes" Emanuel didn't jump into the crowd and "Cha Cha" with the hecklers. This Presidency is viewed by the world as an ineffective, novice and incompetent administration, lacking leadership and focus, where our foes feel emboldened. And some say it can't get worse. The President is constantly defending that he and his administration do not have socialistic policies and philosophies, however, hasn't the government taken over many private institutions and entities since his indoctrination? You be the judge. With his empyream administration in dire straits concerning polls and popularity, Obama achilles heel is the economy and unemployment. The economy is still faltering and the administration is focusing on singling out Goldman Sachs and Rush Limbaugh. I wonder if ObieOneKenobi will give back the millions of campaign donations he received from those evil Wall Streeters (Goldman Sachs)? Doubtful. I know it is just an untimely coincidence. You know the administration would never conspire with the SEC to go after Goldman Sachs? And this has nothing to do with the financial reform bill congress is trying to shove down our throats? Do you notice how our Community Organizer in Chief doesn't win the hearts and minds of the American people with his policies and ideology? It seems he has to use dishonest measures, backhanded deals, bribes his own party, bullies and utilizes that ol' Chicago style corruption to get things passed? Pathetic at best. This is what he knows, look at his past associations, the honorable Reverend Wright, Father Flagler, Bill (Domestic Terrorists R' Us) Ayers, Khalid and the Grand Daddy of them all, Saul Alinsky. What a patriotic collection that you can be proud of? (In the USSR). Our President does not like our country, plain and simple. His associations and ideology is to right all of the wrongs this country has perpetrated. Redistribution of wealth is a cornerstone of what Obama's major gameplan is for the new America. I really love the old America. I am not ready to become a western European country. Many people have contacted me how to get involved and what to read to "catch up" their knowledge on our Constitution and government. People are scared, incredibly upset and determined to not let these idiots destroy our way of life. I believe we need to fix so many things in America. I don't believe government is the answer, it is the problem. They regulate and make demands on private enterprises and then scrutinize them for the way things turn out. If private enterprise conducted business like our federal government, they would be out of business or in prison. Please get involved with a conservative organization and show that you care. Attend a Tea Party or rally and see what they are all about. It is incredible. I leave these events and feel truly inspired, that there is hope. People from all walks of life attend these events. They are not Black, White, Brown, Yellow or Purple, they are Americans. Don't believe the lame stream media propogating these are racist events with nothing but white folks. I have a question for the lame stream media. How many minorities are on your network productions? When I investigated this, there were hardly any. The pot calling the kettle black. My mistake, these rules do not apply to you. You are the proverbial eletists. They do not know how to quell the tea party phenomenom that is growing by the day. This is truly a grassroots movement without a noticable leader. This scares the hell out of the liberals because they can't stop it. Join the movement. "Don't tread on me."
Reverend Wrong:
Obama's Bill Ayers connection:
Obama and the New Civility
During the Bush years a dangerously heated rhetoric became commonplace. Now, lol, a new age has dawned.
It was sometime early this year that Americans finally learned the rules of proper political discourse — another dividend from the Obama administration. We can all be grateful for our new bipartisan protocols, which will go something like the following.
It will be considered childish to caricature a stressed president for mangling his words, whether “nucular” or “corpseman.” If, from time to time, the commander-in-chief flubs up and says something stupid like Bush’s “Is our children learning?” or Obama’s “Cinco de Quatro,” we have learned to accept that such slips are hardly reflective of a lack of knowledge. The old “gotcha” game is puerile and, thankfully, is now a thing of the past.
Nor should we ever refer to any elected administration as a “regime” — that unfortunate habit of the likes of Maureen Dowd, Chris Matthews, and various talk-radio hosts. Thank God, we in 2010 all recognize the pernicious effects of such near-treasonous rhetoric.
At last there is a return to civility. If we were confused in recent years as to whether “hate” was a permissible word in public discourse — as in the outburst of Democratic national chairman Howard Dean, “I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for,” or the infamous essay by The New Republic’s Jonathan Chait that began, “I hate President George W. Bush” — we now accept that such extreme language in the public arena is not merely uncivil, but is an incitement to real violence. The use of the word “hate” at last has become “hate speech.”
With Rep. Joe Wilson’s improper outburst to President Obama — “You lie!” — we also have at last come to appreciate that those in Congress have a special responsibility not to use incendiary language to defame our government officials. That’s why we now lament Rep. Pete Stark’s slur of George W. Bush from the House floor as a “liar” — the same Rep. Pete Stark who said of our troops that they had gone “to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president’s amusement.”
But since 2009 Americans have finally learned that our soldiers are sacrosanct and must not be smeared — as in Sen. Richard Durbin’s characterization of American military personnel as synonymous with Nazis, Stalinists, or Pol Pot’s murderers; as in the late Sen. Edward Kennedy’s comparison of American troops to Saddam’s lethal jailers; as in Sen. John Kerry’s smear of our soldiers as acting in terrorist fashion. Evocation of Nazi or Brownshirt imagery particularly coarsens the public discourse; it demonizes opponents rather than engage them in real debate. So we can all concur now that Sen. John Glenn, Sen. Robert Byrd, and former vice president Al Gore spoke quite improperly when they compared their president’s governance to that of the Third Reich.
Our military officers deserve special consideration. No senator should ever again accuse a wartime theater commander of telling an untruth (“suspicion of disbelief”). Major newspapers should not extend discounts to pressure groups that defame our officers with cheap slurs such as “General Betray Us.” All that is dangerous rhetoric. Indeed, it risks undermining our noble bipartisan efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
We now know that environmental terrorists of the sort that spike trees, torch forestry equipment, blow up people with letter bombs, or wage anti-globalization urban violence are engaging in the same sort of behavior as are the unhinged militias. Therefore we must all be careful, left and right, in criticizing our government — lest either another Ted Kaczynski becomes too inflamed by Al Gore’s accusatory furor about environmental desecration, or a Michigan militia member goes over the top after hearing a talk-radio rant about Barack Obama.
Ever since Dwight Eisenhower hit the back nine, critics have snickered at golf-playing presidents — as if their polo shirts, shades, and splashy caps were revelations of aristocratic disdain for the rest of us, or as if they were engaging in a sort of loafing amid world crises. Not now. We have come to realize that presidents should play golf — in fact, lots of it — both for needed relaxation and as a reminder that it is no longer a sport of the elite.
Wth the appropriate criticism of former vice president Dick Cheney’s public attacks on the Obama anti-terrorist protocols, we have established that vice presidents emeriti, by virtue of the dignity of their positions, should not engage in partisan hits on subsequent administrations. Cheney’s slights remind us why there was once media outrage when former vice president Al Gore said of President Bush, “He lied to us,” “He betrayed this country,” “He played on our fears” — or when he dismissed Bush’s Internet supporters with the slur of “digital Brownshirts.”
We have always been worried about presidential braggadocio. Just as we came to realize that George Bush’s “bring ’em on” and “dead or alive” were unnecessarily polarizing, so too talk of bringing a gun to a knife fight, or predictions that a supporter would “tear up” a talk-show host, or remarks about “fat cat” bankers are unnecessary presidential provocations.
In other words, with the presidency of Barack Obama, the nation has collectively established at last the proper parameters of political rhetoric and conduct. What was the norm in the past is now recognized as coarse, if not dangerous — and so won’t be repeated in our future.
— NRO contributor Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, the editor of Makers of Ancient Strategy: From the Persian Wars to the Fall of Rome, and the author of The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern.
Leaving Liberalism
By Chuck Rogér
With the classroom lights down low, our teacher Julie asked, "Feel that?"
I looked at my empty hands and, echoing the class, I responded, "Oh...yeah."
Julie whispered, "Move your hands closer together. Feels like you're squishing a ball."
Yep, an invisible purple ball. Assuming the I-know-this-to-be-true look common to enlightened teachers in enlightened schools, Julie informed us that we were sensing the "body's natural energy." We partnered with other students to feel their energy.
A very pleasant female student took an enthusiastic approach, and I felt energized. A guy sporting ear, nose, and lip rings headed my way, and my energy vanished.
By the end of the "Polarity Therapy" course, most students swore that they'd learned to detect people's energy with hand gestures resembling a priest giving absolution. Never did I experience anything that I couldn't explain. But people believe what people want to believe. Weak correlations prompt weak minds to preach weak theories to anyone who'll listen.
Observe.
"I believe what feels good to me," proclaimed Mr. Twenty-Something. A tiny bat darted from my physiology student's ear as he added, "The full moon's powerful gravity makes people behave weirdly." I explained that our moon's gravity is unaffected by how much we see lit by the sun. Briefly dazed, the student retreated to the protection of an air of superiority. "That's your science."
Suddenly, mini-bats filled the room. I saw students' eyes glaze and heads nod, all-knowing smiles filling self-assured faces. From basic enlightened swaggerers to lost wanderers, students and instructors in the alternative health care school where I taught for three years exhibited the most irrational thought process I'd ever encountered.
What drew me into "alternative" health care in the first place? Why did I take polarity classes? The answers -- perhaps another time. Suffice it to say that the polarity and moon gravity affairs were two of many odd encounters in the course of my journey through strangeness. I learned a great deal about liberals during my liberal period.
Imagine a worldview that licenses the student to claim to be "different" while hanging on every pronouncement by self-important gurus. The student (and the teacher) get to espouse "critical thinking" while succumbing to emotion. Neither can resist calling attention to contrived virtuousness and proclaiming, "I love new ideas. See how the echo-chamber embraces me?"
Picture yourself radiating intellectual and moral superiority. You burst with inspiration on how to run government and society -- or more accurately, how you should run society. Feel how easily you brush aside reality and seize moral high ground on issues about which you know nothing.
My insight into high ground-grabbing amoral liberals leaped when I studied eighteenth-century philosopher Immanuel Kant, who declared that "devils" can productively rule nations "so long as they possess understanding." The philosopher was right. Moral rascals make strong leaders. Kant reasoned that reality holds no relevance toward conceiving morals, which must evolve from pure thought. Only when we apply morals must we consider what's happening around us[1]. I know. Confused me too, until I nailed the liberal modus operandi: Ignore truth when spouting theory, but embrace truth that favors your agenda. Ah, the liberal "thought process."
During my liberal period, I accepted a thought process that it now pains me to admit: "I think, therefore I am...always right." I remember a teacher in the alternative health care school -- a psychologist, of course -- claiming that simply by choosing to attend the school, the men in class were "more evolved than most men." Yes, evolved. I felt proud, giddy -- which is what liberalism is about: finding a way to feel good about myself no matter what was happening around me.
Liberals vigorously guard the feel-good. And so we find that rational people who methodically weigh evidence are shouted down by virtue-flaunting ideologues. Take the global warming hoax. Pope Al, Bishop Boxer, and other Church of Global Warming officials still preach the doctrine even though their cathedrals are burning down. The grand scam marked a first: Mainstream media adopted a religion other than liberalism. The media and the Church perpetuated wacky beliefs based on bogus theories that created bogus projections derived from bogus studies. The world witnessed liberals playing in top form.
You've seen the liberal game face: anger suppressed by enlightened arrogance wrapped in confusion. Were you to try to live the liberal's hell, you'd seek relief the same way that liberals seek relief. You'd ignore reality and act as though your theories were reality. Clear thinking would serve no purpose because logically weighing data, facts, and evidence risks exposure to two nightmarish conclusions that liberals won't accept: There are bad people who do bad things, and most "victims" victimize themselves. Liberals cannot abide unpleasant realities.
My echo-chamber mates' inability to grapple with unpleasant realities startled me when I dwelled among liberals. I discovered that I wasn't supposed to let data, common sense, or a scheme's likely failure stop me from falling in love with the scheme. I was supposed to let the misplaced love make me feel good about myself.
I should expand the feel-good angle.
If during your youth you had gotten little worthwhile moral guidance from Mom and Dad but enjoyed plenty of marginally-deserved stroking, how would you behave as an adult? You'd flit from cause to cause, thriving on smiles and applause, groping for childhood's defining feeling. You'd push any scheme, speak any nonsense, and feign any emotion that might impress people with your wonderfulness -- and to hell with consequences.
Looking back, I know that I could have taken a heck of a ride had I not recovered from liberalism. Surfing the global warming scam's bow wave alone might have been worth relinquishing my respect for truth and giving up my sanity, my ability to judge right from wrong, good from bad, and success from failure. The wild time might have made up for sacrificing my integrity. I probably missed a lot of fun.
A physicist, former high tech executive, and writer, Chuck Rogér invites you to visit his website, http://www.chuckroger.com. Email Chuck at swampcactus@chuckroger.com.
Unusual Comparison:
Obama's campaign contributions from Goldman Sachs 7 times what Bush received from Enron.
Quote du jour:
"I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it."
Thomas Jefferson
2 Comico:
Writings of Our Founding Fathers
Federalist Papers
Federalist No. 45
The Alleged Danger From the Powers of the Union to the State Governments Considered
For the Independent Journal.
Author: James Madison
To the People of the State of New York:
HAVING shown that no one of the powers transferred to the federal government is unnecessary or improper, the next question to be considered is, whether the whole mass of them will be dangerous to the portion of authority left in the several States. The adversaries to the plan of the convention, instead of considering in the first place what degree of power was absolutely necessary for the purposes of the federal government, have exhausted themselves in a secondary inquiry into the possible consequences of the proposed degree of power to the governments of the particular States. But if the Union, as has been shown, be essential to the security of the people of America against foreign danger; if it be essential to their security against contentions and wars among the different States; if it be essential to guard them against those violent and oppressive factions which embitter the blessings of liberty, and against those military establishments which must gradually poison its very fountain; if, in a word, the Union be essential to the happiness of the people of America, is it not preposterous, to urge as an objection to a government, without which the objects of the Union cannot be attained, that such a government may derogate from the importance of the governments of the individual States? Was, then, the American Revolution effected, was the American Confederacy formed, was the precious blood of thousands spilt, and the hard-earned substance of millions lavished, not that the people of America should enjoy peace, liberty, and safety, but that the government of the individual States, that particular municipal establishments, might enjoy a certain extent of power, and be arrayed with certain dignities and attributes of sovereignty? We have heard of the impious doctrine in the Old World, that the people were made for kings, not kings for the people. Is the same doctrine to be revived in the New, in another shape that the solid happiness of the people is to be sacrificed to the views of political institutions of a different form? It is too early for politicians to presume on our forgetting that the public good, the real welfare of the great body of the people, is the supreme object to be pursued; and that no form of government whatever has any other value than as it may be fitted for the attainment of this object. Were the plan of the convention adverse to the public happiness, my voice would be, Reject the plan. Were the Union itself inconsistent with the public happiness, it would be, Abolish the Union. In like manner, as far as the sovereignty of the States cannot be reconciled to the happiness of the people, the voice of every good citizen must be,
Let the former be sacrificed to the latter. How far the sacrifice is necessary, has been shown. How far the unsacrificed residue will be endangered, is the question before us. Several important considerations have been touched in the course of these papers, which discountenance the supposition that the operation of the federal government will by degrees prove fatal to the State governments. The more I revolve the subject, the more fully I am persuaded that the balance is much more likely to be disturbed by the preponderancy of the last than of the first scale. We have seen, in all the examples of ancient and modern confederacies, the strongest tendency continually betraying itself in the members, to despoil the general government of its authorities, with a very ineffectual capacity in the latter to defend itself against the encroachments. Although, in most of these examples, the system has been so dissimilar from that under consideration as greatly to weaken any inference concerning the latter from the fate of the former, yet, as the States will retain, under the proposed Constitution, a very extensive portion of active sovereignty, the inference ought not to be wholly disregarded. In the Achaean league it is probable that the federal head had a degree and species of power, which gave it a considerable likeness to the government framed by the convention. The Lycian Confederacy, as far as its principles and form are transmitted, must have borne a still greater analogy to it. Yet history does not inform us that either of them ever degenerated, or tended to degenerate, into one consolidated government. On the contrary, we know that the ruin of one of them proceeded from the incapacity of the federal authority to prevent the dissensions, and finally the disunion, of the subordinate authorities. These cases are the more worthy of our attention, as the external causes by which the component parts were pressed together were much more numerous and powerful than in our case; and consequently less powerful ligaments within would be sufficient to bind the members to the head, and to each other. In the feudal system, we have seen a similar propensity exemplified. Notwithstanding the want of proper sympathy in every instance between the local sovereigns and the people, and the sympathy in some instances between the general sovereign and the latter, it usually happened that the local sovereigns prevailed in the rivalship for encroachments.
Had no external dangers enforced internal harmony and subordination, and particularly, had the local sovereigns possessed the affections of the people, the great kingdoms in Europe would at this time consist of as many independent princes as there were formerly feudatory barons. The State government will have the advantage of the Federal government, whether we compare them in respect to the immediate dependence of the one on the other; to the weight of personal influence which each side will possess; to the powers respectively vested in them; to the predilection and probable support of the people; to the disposition and faculty of resisting and frustrating the measures of each other. The State governments may be regarded as constituent and essential parts of the federal government; whilst the latter is nowise essential to the operation or organization of the former. Without the intervention of the State legislatures, the President of the United States cannot be elected at all. They must in all cases have a great share in his appointment, and will, perhaps, in most cases, of themselves determine it. The Senate will be elected absolutely and exclusively by the State legislatures. Even the House of Representatives, though drawn immediately from the people, will be chosen very much under the influence of that class of men, whose influence over the people obtains for themselves an election into the State legislatures. Thus, each of the principal branches of the federal government will owe its existence more or less to the favor of the State governments, and must consequently feel a dependence, which is much more likely to beget a disposition too obsequious than too overbearing towards them. On the other side, the component parts of the State governments will in no instance be indebted for their appointment to the direct agency of the federal government, and very little, if at all, to the local influence of its members. The number of individuals employed under the Constitution of the United States will be much smaller than the number employed under the particular States.
There will consequently be less of personal influence on the side of the former than of the latter. The members of the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments of thirteen and more States, the justices of peace, officers of militia, ministerial officers of justice, with all the county, corporation, and town officers, for three millions and more of people, intermixed, and having particular acquaintance with every class and circle of people, must exceed, beyond all proportion, both in number and influence, those of every description who will be employed in the administration of the federal system. Compare the members of the three great departments of the thirteen States, excluding from the judiciary department the justices of peace, with the members of the corresponding departments of the single government of the Union; compare the militia officers of three millions of people with the military and marine officers of any establishment which is within the compass of probability, or, I may add, of possibility, and in this view alone, we may pronounce the advantage of the States to be decisive. If the federal government is to have collectors of revenue, the State governments will have theirs also. And as those of the former will be principally on the seacoast, and not very numerous, whilst those of the latter will be spread over the face of the country, and will be very numerous, the advantage in this view also lies on the same side.
It is true, that the Confederacy is to possess, and may exercise, the power of collecting internal as well as external taxes throughout the States; but it is probable that this power will not be resorted to, except for supplemental purposes of revenue; that an option will then be given to the States to supply their quotas by previous collections of their own; and that the eventual collection, under the immediate authority of the Union, will generally be made by the officers, and according to the rules, appointed by the several States. Indeed it is extremely probable, that in other instances, particularly in the organization of the judicial power, the officers of the States will be clothed with the correspondent authority of the Union.
Should it happen, however, that separate collectors of internal revenue should be appointed under the federal government, the influence of the whole number would not bear a comparison with that of the multitude of State officers in the opposite scale.
Within every district to which a federal collector would be allotted, there would not be less than thirty or forty, or even more, officers of different descriptions, and many of them persons of character and weight, whose influence would lie on the side of the State. The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over the federal government. The more adequate, indeed, the federal powers may be rendered to the national defense, the less frequent will be those scenes of danger which might favor their ascendancy over the governments of the particular States. If the new Constitution be examined with accuracy and candor, it will be found that the change which it proposes consists much less in the addition of NEW POWERS to the Union, than in the invigoration of its ORIGINAL POWERS. The regulation of commerce, it is true, is a new power; but that seems to be an addition which few oppose, and from which no apprehensions are entertained. The powers relating to war and peace, armies and fleets, treaties and finance, with the other more considerable powers, are all vested in the existing Congress by the articles of Confederation. The proposed change does not enlarge these powers; it only substitutes a more effectual mode of administering them. The change relating to taxation may be regarded as the most important; and yet the present Congress have as complete authority to REQUIRE of the States indefinite supplies of money for the common defense and general welfare, as the future Congress will have to require them of individual citizens; and the latter will be no more bound than the States themselves have been, to pay the quotas respectively taxed on them. Had the States complied punctually with the articles of Confederation, or could their compliance have been enforced by as peaceable means as may be used with success towards single persons, our past experience is very far from countenancing an opinion, that the State governments would have lost their constitutional powers, and have gradually undergone an entire consolidation. To maintain that such an event would have ensued, would be to say at once, that the existence of the State governments is incompatible with any system whatever that accomplishes the essential purposes of the Union.
PUBLIUS.
References:
http://www.hotair.com/
http://www.wnd.com/
http://www.drudgereport.com/
http://www.americanthinker.com/
http://www.nro.com/
http://www.weeklystandard.com/
http://www.biggovernment.com/
http://www.newsmax.com/
David Victor Hanson
Chuck Roger
http://www.quotationspage.com/
http://www.youtube.com/
http://www.americanspectator.com/
Tanner
Library of Congress/Federalist Papers
