Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Liberty and Equality: Are They Compatible?

Of Thee I Sing 1776by Of Thee I Sing 1776 
 
Both represent ideals we Americans hold dear. But they aren’t really the same thing and as we have seen in the still acrimonious national debate over the issue of health care and the government’s proper role in providing it, the two concepts come into stark relief.  Moreover, a tension between the meaning of freedom and the meaning of equality will be tested further as President Obama and his newly muscular acolytes in Congress, still intoxicated by the success of their battering-ram legislative strategy, begin to eye other opportunities to (as our president likes to remind us) transform America.  And make no mistake about it; the transformation “party” the president is hosting has only just begun. Think card check, think cap and trade, think compensation control, think regulatory expansion and think, REALLY THINK, about the greatest search in the history of America, through every nook and cranny of our economy, for new sources of tax revenue to pay for the transformation.
liberty
To us the word “freedom” embodies the individual right of free choice. The word equality encompasses the bedrock principle that every person should have the same rights to all the protections and rights granted under our Constitution.  Thus, the rallying cry of Patrick Henry, “give me liberty or give me death” exists side by side with the proposition best enunciated by Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream speech where he envisioned a world “where people would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.”   In other words, the concept of  “equality” defined as Dr. King stated it can, and should, live side by side with the concept of “liberty (an individual’s right to personal choice as enunciated by the famous remark of Patrick Henry. But with regard to the expansion of government into the private sector the two words can run into conflict.
Those of us who were, and are, appalled by last week’s heavy-handed spectacle of one-party rule mandating the biggest expansion of government in the lifetime of almost everyone reading this essay are alarmed about the ramifications of almost tyrannical rule by a ruling class seeking to expand government into the furthest reaches of what has always been within the domain of the private citizen’s personal choices. Our friends on the left say that we are on the wrong side of history, but it is they who occupy that space.  It is they, including our president and his party, who are racing full speed backwards to emulate societies with entitlement systems that threaten to hobble one nation after another. Think Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain, Great Britain, France, Ireland, Japan and on and on.  The governments and economies of Greece, Portugal, Italy and Spain are hanging on by their finger tips, more or less, counting on the healthier members of the EU (e.g. Germany) to bail them out although “not so fast” say the Germans.  We could go back into history a little further and romanticize the failed egalitarian dreams of the Soviet revolutionaries or, perhaps, Chairman Mao’s People’s Republic of China.  But the Soviet Union crashed nearly a generation ago and China abandoned Chairman Mao’s dream as soon as he died (and they have had nothing but robust economic growth to show for it).  So exactly who is on the wrong side of history here?
Make no mistake; the transformation that the left has in mind for America is nothing more than a grab for the redistribution of wealth.

They disdain the creation and broadening of wealth. And that is where liberty and equality may very well come into conflict. The left wants to create a society based on some expanded notion of egalitarianism which has nothing to do with equal opportunity under the law, and throw under the bus the ordered liberty which has been the bedrock principle which every generation of Americans has enjoyed, and countless others around the globe have envied. It is what Ronald Reagan had in mind when he correctly described our country as the shining city on the hill. Unfortunately the leftists who now run this nation only know one hill and of course that is Capital Hill from which they dictate their ever-expanding mandates.
We believe that individual liberty, that radical Lockean idea which our founders bequeathed to us, has produced the greatest, most vibrant and most promising society man has ever known and, in fact, actually provides the greatest amount of equality for the greatest number of people.  Our society has prospered because so many Americans were willing to fully participate, to the best of their ability, in pursuing the proverbial American dream.  Wave after wave of immigrants who escaped oppressive regimes or societies that afforded no real hope of achieving their highest aspirations for their children have invigorated our nation and been an engine for constant economic growth and the creation and expansion of private wealth to the betterment of all our citizens. A national policy such as that which appears to be unfolding in America today, the cornerstone of which is the promotion of economic egalitarianism (as we said above, nothing more than a fancy term for the redistribution of wealth) can only be pursued by vastly limiting the personal freedom of individuals to chart their own course through life.
The radical 17th century thinker, John Locke, whose writing so influenced our founding fathers, advanced the notion that the role of government should, more or less, be confined to protecting the people…and their liberty.  His writing, Second Treatise Concerning Civil Government could have served as a template for our own Constitution (and it probably did) with its formulations of checks and balances and representative government. He equated government encroachment on individual liberty as tyranny.  To our founding fathers, that said it all.
Washington, Adams, Hamilton, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, George Mason and others enshrined the thinking and, indeed, the exquisite wisdom of Locke in our founding documents including the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. That radical thinking generated the energy that enabled a newborn country of mostly poor people to make a dash to freedom and prosperity the likes of which the world had never seen. The peoples and governments of Europe, much of Asia and even many in Latin America were quickly inspired by the American experience.
As we watched the well-orchestrated farce played out from the US House of Representatives last Sunday night, we couldn’t help but think of the choices being stripped from the people and their state governments throughout the land.  As has been frequently written in recent months, many healthy, young families choose to allocate their limited resources to other needs besides health insurance. Many of us would view that as a poor choice.  But the choice to buy or not to buy health insurance has always been theirs to make, and the argument that if the uninsured fall ill it is a burden on our economy is not nesessarily true. Friends, families, private charities often cushion the impact.  Not anymore. “You will buy and you will buy the coverage we say you must buy, or we will fine you,” our government will, in effect, soon tell them.  And just in case anyone thinks that might be an overstatement, the government is now authorized to hire nearly 17,000 new IRS personnel to monitor which individuals are, and are not, complying with these and a plethora of other new rules.
An individual or a small business making over $200,000 is now deemed to be wealthy, which is Obamacare speak for those who will find the government’s hand in their pockets to grab extra tax money to help fund this newest of entitlements.  And, if those same people have worked hard enough and have saved some money to invest in dividend or interest-bearing securities, well, thank you very much, the government will tax that income over and above the higher tax already to be paid on it under the now higher personal income tax they have now legislated for these wealthy citizens.  A variety of businesses will also be (pardon the term) shaken down to help fund the new health-care “entitlement”.  Pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies, tanning salons, medical cosmetic surgery practices, insurance companies and other industries who we presume will be added will be charged fees to help fund the program.  We will leave it for now to others to pick apart the new so-called health-care  “reform.” There is no end to the writers and commentators who are already doing that.  We do, however, wish to advance the thought that the reported 30 million Americans who are uninsured and are, therefore, according to the government’s case for taking control of the nation’s health care, denied adequate medical treatment, can be doctored up for a lot less than the trillions this enormous new medical entitlement is going to cost.  In fact, the government could hire 30,000 new doctors at $200,000 per doctor (more than the earnings of the average physician) each managing 1000 patients a year (less than the average number of charts per physician) and provide doctors for all of the uninsured for about $6 billion per year. And yes, we recognize there will a few billion more required for various tests and procedures, but the trillion-plus-dollar takeover, for the medical-care makeover is an enormous and irresponsible burden to place on the American economy.  We can’t afford it, just as Europe can’t afford it.  But as the President said, that’s what he came to Washington to do.
Perhaps the ubiquitous Reverend Al Sharpton who seems to insinuate himself into every high-profile controversy said it best on Fox as the infamous vote was being tallied. When rhetorically asked by the equally ubiquitous Geraldo Rivera whether he was concerned that the vote was a big step toward socialism, Reverend Al happily responded that when America voted for Barack Obama, America voted for socialism. And he was right…only most Americans who voted for Obama really didn’t know or believe that.
That is why, with this president and this Congress we are facing the possibility that the change Mr. Obama promised could be irreversible. Entitlements, once enacted, become taken for granted. Moreover, they become the baseline for future generations . To those in power, the thinking of John Locke, Adam Smith, not to mention, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison and virtually all of the founding fathers are clearly passé. Instead our leaders, seemingly blind to the wreckage caused by regimes which followed the discredited theories of economists who preached about the wonders of state-controlled economies, are blindly heading in the wrong direction in order to take over more and more of what has always been part of the private sector and our private personal responsibilities.  In their view, government knows best.
The president’s audacious but absolutely honest campaign promise that he was going to “fundamentally change America” couldn’t have been more candid.  And as last week’s House vote was evolving toward a nearly certain majority in his favor, he, again very candidly, told the Democratic caucus (and the American people) “this is what I came here to do,” not to simply make health care a government preserve, but to fundamentally change America. Watching all of the back patting taking place following the signing ceremony last Tuesday, it is evident that the President and his administration really believe that America wants him to fundamentally change the country.  As Vice President Biden, whispered to the President (and 300 million other Americans) “this is a big f——deal.”

Big Government

Yes, It Can Happen Here

Michael Zakby Michael Zak 
 
In 1935, Sinclair Lewis wrote a novel that envisioned a political tragedy akin to the Obama administration.  It Can’t Happen Here is the story of Berzilius Windrip, a Democrat senator nominated for the presidency.
2957086507_d19814ed82
A charming, charismatic demagogue, he is elected by promising lots of free goodies for everyone.  Once in power, President Windrip ruins the economy, neutralizes Congress and cracks down on dissent.  He makes himself dictator, with assistance from a civilian national security force.
Berzelius Windrip mmm mmm mmm!

Yes, it can happen here.  What are you going to do about it?

Big Government

Take Back Congress to Stop Obamacare

Dick Morrisby Dick Morris 
 
We don’t have to wait until we have a Republican in the White House to rid this nation of the shackles of Obamacare. We can do it next year if we win simple majorities in one or both houses of Congress.
The Obama health care bill was an authorization measure which established a program and set down its parameters. But authorization bills are not appropriations. Each year the Congress must act on appropriations for each department and agency in the government. If no funds are appropriated, nothing can be spent.
take back america
So if Republicans take the House (where appropriations have to originate) – and especially if they also take the Senate – they will have the capacity to zero fund Obamacare, appropriating not a dime for it in their spending bills. Indeed, they can and should include a specific amendment to their appropriations bills banning the expenditure of any of the funds on Obama’s health care program.
In the wake of the passage of the health care bill, states are filing lawsuits and talk of repeal is in the air. Both are useful efforts. But litigation takes time and the key challenge – to the constitutionality of the requirement that everybody buy insurance – cannot even begin until it takes effect in 2014. And repeal will obviously be impossible as long as Obama wields the veto from his Oval Office. It would be impossible mathematically for the Republicans to get a two-thirds majority in the Senate and unlikely in the House, so an override is out of the question. Repeal will have to wait until 2013, after Obama’s defeat in 2012.
But zero funding can happen immediately after the Republicans take Congress. All this makes the elections of 2010 critical. If we can stop this bill from getting off the ground, it will be possible to repeal it when we take over the White House. But if the Democrats keep their majorities, the program will be so entrenched by the time we defeat Obama that its repeal would be unlikely.
Article written with Eileen McGann.

Big Government

Hey, Steve Jobs — Boycott Beck At Your Own Peril

The Politically Correct Boycott Corp is on the march again!  If the show doesn’t fit within your political agenda, then just boycott it and try to “shut up dissent.”  According to the Washington Post, around two hundred companies are now boycotting Glenn Beck.
When a journalist who gets great ratings is being attacked for doing what he does (as in the case of Glenn Beck) by those who scream about Freedom of Speech and high journalism, it’s like they have an “I’m with Stupid” tattoo punched into their foreheads.  Aren’t progressives the same people who think it is okay to decry every alleged “impropriety” by conservatives while hiding behind the guise of “free speech” for themselves? Is it somehow less appropriate for Glenn Beck to espouse his opinions?  Why?  Because he might be onto something, and his ratings are high?
Newsflash!  Beck is but a reflection of an entire mass of people who believe what he has the platform to say!  They aren’t going away. In fact, they are growing in spades!
Fox News executives know that if they let advertisers bully them into booting Beck, he will get another job, and advertisers will next be pressured to abandon O’Reilly or Hannity to try to censor them. Why would they make such a self-defeating, bad business decision?
Liberal companies are all upset because Beck “called Obama a racist” and progressivism “a cancer.”  Though it bears no comparison to what less successful journalists have said about Palin, Bush, and other conservative icons and their families, it does beg a question—who decided they get to decide what is appropriate? Moreover, if they make Beck go away do they really believe his followers will just go back to their political obscurity?  He speaks for millions!
Why can’t the crybaby liberals who are so used to having it their way for so long realize that times have changed? If you take away our mouthpiece, more of us will rise up and find platforms to say what Beck was saying.  If you take Beck away, he becomes more of a hero to those who sense a therapeutic affect when tuning into his show. And if you pull your product from advertising, they stop buying your product.
glenn-beck2
At least they are consistent.  They boycotted John Mackey of Whole Foods because he publicly expressed his opposition to elements of Obamacare last year.  So free-market loving patriots did what they could do and responded with a BUYcott, spending 50,000 dollars in one night at one store in St. Louis, Missouri. The idea spread all over the country, and Whole Foods stock went up.
On the other hand, if Apple and the other 199 notable companies take exception to a journalist as popular as Beck, on a station as powerful as Fox News, they may not fare so well.
Will the Tea Party launch a BUYcott of Beck and the already popular Fox News? They just might!  If conservatives built the Fox News that is dominating now by default, can you imagine what they could do if they put in a little effort?  Did you see the crowds at last weekend’s Tea Parties?  Now imagine that they become the network and journalistic “king makers.”
With Oprah tanking and all networks except Fox News battling for ratings and audiences, maybe Apple ought to consider buying Beck his own network for those who think Fox News gets a little squishy now and then?  They could call it BeckNet, and they could have sole rights to advertise on their station.  That might be the best marketing tack they could take.  If not, conservatives will probably be content to look ahead to the scent of rotting apples wafting through the newly renovated office suite of Mr. Beck, while he opens his computer with a boyish grin and sells a million PC’s that day.  Which computer maker’s pitchman will look like an inept geek then?

Big Journalism

Monday, March 29, 2010

American Heroes Ready and Willing to Serve in Congress

America, if you love your freedom, thank a vet! And if you’re looking for leaders who believe in integrity, service, and country first, look to our veterans.

Last week I campaigned for a true American hero, John McCain, and this week I’d ask you to join me in supporting a new generation of heroes who are heeding their country’s call for leadership in Washington.

There are a number of great veteran candidates running for office this year, and there are some excellent organizations dedicated to helping them, including: Iraq Vets for Congress and Combat Veterans for Congress (please click on the links to visit their websites).

There are three veterans in particular I’ll be supporting this week.

The first is Major Vaughn Ward, a fourth-generation Idaho native who grew up on his family’s farm in Shoshone and is running in Idaho’s 1st Congressional District. Coming from a family with a proud military tradition, Vaughn joined the Marine Corps after college and was finishing up his service when the September 11th attacks occurred. He put his life on hold and heeded his country’s call – serving first as a CIA Operations Officer and later volunteering with the Marine Corps for a combat tour in Iraq, during which he was awarded the Bronze Star with Combat V. After returning from Iraq, Vaughn went to work for the McCain/Palin campaign. I was grateful for his support then, and I’m happy to support him now because I know that he believes in the same commonsense conservative ideals that we cherish. Vaughn knows that real job growth comes from the private sector, not government. He believes in free market reforms, tax relief for families and small businesses, and a return to a constitutionally limited government that lives within its means. He’ll carry the conservative banner to Washington and will rein in the reckless growth of government to get it back on our side. And remember, a vote for Vaughn is a vote to remove the gavel from Nancy Pelosi’s grip. Please visit Vaughn’s website here to make a donation to his campaign, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

The second veteran is Captain Adam Kinzinger, a decorated special-operations pilot who flew combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Adam is running for Illinois’ 11th Congressional District against a freshman incumbent congresswoman who seemed to pull a bait and switch on voters to get elected. She sounded like a blue dog on the campaign trail, but didn’t vote like one in Washington. Instead, she voted in lockstep with the Pelosi agenda – on Obamacare, the stimulus, cap-and-tax – and the list goes on. She’s part of the reason for Congress’ 11% approval rating. Adam is a strong fiscal conservative with a proven track record as a reformer from his years serving on his local county board. Adam started out in local office, and, like many of us, believes in making government more accountable to the people. When you serve in local office, your constituents truly are your neighbors. Adam understands this, and I know that he will listen to his constituents and work for us, not against us, in Washington. Please visit Adam’s website here to make a donation to his campaign, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

The third veteran is Lieutenant Colonel Allen West, a decorated war hero who’s served with distinction in combat zones in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many of you may have heard of Allen from a speech he gave last year that became a viral video on YouTube with over 2 million viewers. Allen’s personal story is a testament to the commonsense conservative belief that our nation’s greatness is rooted in freedom, because with freedom comes equal opportunity, and that, coupled with hard work, leads to success. Allen is a small government fiscal conservative running against a leftwing ideologue who’s marched to the beat of Nancy Pelosi on every issue from cap-and-tax to the stimulus, TARP, and, of course, Obamacare. It’s time to send Allen to Washington in his place. Please visit Allen’s website here to donate to his campaign, and follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

I believe that these great veterans will fight for us in D.C. to uphold and defend our constitution as courageously in the halls of Congress as they did on the field of battle. I’m so honored to offer my support to these American heroes, and I hope you’ll join me in helping them so that they can serve us all in Washington.

- Sarah Palin

Sunday, March 28, 2010

A Black President, the Progressive’s Perfect Trojan Horse

Lloyd MarcusPosted by Lloyd Marcus Mar 28th 2010 at 12:12 pm in Featured Story, Healthcare, Obama, Racism

Like millions of my fellow Americans, I am outraged, devastated and extremely angry by the Democrats’ unbelievable arrogance and disdain for We The People. Despite our screaming “no” from the rooftops, they forced Obamacare down our throats. Please forgive me for using the following crude saying, but it is very appropriate to describe what has happened. “Don’t urinate on me and tell me it’s raining.” Democrats say their mission is to give all Americans health care. They’re lying. Signing Obamacare into law against both our will and the Constitution is tyranny and step one of their hideous goal of having as many Americans as possible dependent on government, thus controlling our lives and fulfilling Obama’s promise to fundamentally transform America.
I keep asking myself. How did our government move so far from the normal procedures of getting things done? Could a white president have so successfully pulled off shredding the Constitution to further his agenda? I think not.
Ironically, proving America is completely the opposite of the evil racist country they relentlessly accuse her of being, progressives used America’s goodness, guilt and sense of fair play against her.
In their quest to destroy America as we know it, progressives borrowed a brilliant scheme from Greek mythology. They offered America a modern-day Trojan Horse, a beautifully crafted golden shiny new black man as a presidential candidate. Democrat Joe Biden lauded Obama as the first clean and articulate African American candidate. Democrat Harry Reid said Obama only uses a black dialect when he wants.
White America relished the opportunity to vote for a black man naively believing they would never suffer the pain of being called racist again. Black Americans viewed casting their vote for Obama as the ultimate Affirmative Action for America’s sins of the past.
Then there were the entitlement loser voters who said, “I’m votin’ for the black dude who promises to take from those rich SOBs and give to me”.
Just as the deceived Trojans dragged the beautifully crafted wooden horse into Troy as a symbol of their victory, deceived Americans embraced the progressive’s young, handsome, articulate and so-called moderate black presidential candidate as a symbol of their liberation from accusation of being a racist nation. Also like the Trojan Horse, Obama was filled with the enemy hiding inside.
Sunday, March 21, 2010, a secret door opened in Obama, the shiny golden black man. A raging army of Democrats charged out. Without mercy, they began their vicious bloody slaughter of every value, freedom and institution we Americans hold dear; launching the end of America as we know it.
Wielding swords of votes reeking with the putrid odor of back door deals, the Democrats landed a severe death blow to America and individual rights by passing Obamacare.
TROJAN HORSE Big Journalism
The mainstream liberal media has been relentlessly badgering the Tea Party movement with accusations of racism. Because I am a black tea party patriot, I am bombarded with interviewers asking me the same question: “Why are you siding with these white racists against America’s first African American president?”
I defend my fellow patriots who are white by stating, “These patriots do not give a hoot about Obama’s skin color. They simply love their country and oppose his radical agenda. Obama’s race is not an issue”.
Recently, I have come to believe that perhaps I am wrong about Obama’s race not being an issue. In reality, Obama’s presidency has everything to do with racism, but not from the Tea Party movement. Progressives and Obama have exploited his race from the rookie senator’s virtually unchallenged presidential campaign to his unprecedented bullying of America into Obamacare. Obama’s race trumped all normal media scrutiny of him as a presidential candidate and most recently even the Constitution of the United States. Obamacare forces all Americans to purchase health care,which is clearly unconstitutional.
obama scowl
No white president could get away with boldly and arrogantly thwarting the will of the American people and ignoring laws. President Clinton tried universal health care. Bush tried social security reform. The American people said “no” to both presidents’ proposals and it was the end of it. So how can Obama get away with giving the American people the finger? The answer. He is black.
OBAMA CARE Big Journalism
The mainstream media continues to portray all who oppose Obama in any way as racist. Despite a list of failed policies, overreaches into the private sector, violations of the Constitution and planned destructive legislation too numerous to mention in this article, many Americans are still fearful of criticizing our first black president. Incredible.
My fellow Americans, you must not continue to allow yourselves to be “played” and intimidated by Obama’s race or the historical context of his presidency. If we are to save America, the greatest nation on the planet, Obama’s progressive agenda must be stopped.

Big Journalism

The Wonderful Defiance of Sarah Palin




Friday, March 26, 2010


Politico reported yesterday that last week was a bad week for the Tea Party movement. I think considering the passage of the Obamacare bill, the dirty tricks and warped journalism conducted by the media to demonize regular American citizens for speaking their minds, and the other horrifying news about our economic troubles, that it was actually a bad week for the country.

Then there was Saturday...

Ten thousand patriotic American's gathered in the Nevada desert to take a stand for the Constitution and to tell Washington that they are not going to sit back quietly while the federal government continues it's power grab, it's wrong-headed economic plans, and it's backwards foreign policy. It was an act of pure defiance in the face of the media that just conducted an all-out campaign to marginalize the grassroots movement.

Governor Palin was the keynote speaker at the event in Searchlight. Her words rang true and hit a chord given the fact that she had been in the same line of fire by the media smear machine. The press used a Facebook statement she released highlighting congressional seats that her PAC is targeting in the November election. Horror of horrors, she used cross-hairs to mark places on the map. Last I checked, cross-hairs were used to mark a spot not entirely for shooting purposes. She also posted on Twitter an "insidious" metaphor,
"Don't Retreat, Instead - RELOAD!"

Watching the media and certain lawmakers twist Governor Palin's message would be comical if it didn't so clearly display the troubling relationship between the media and the current government. A relationship that needs to be called out for what it is and watched closely.

It's very troubling considering the media was repeating the ridiculous notion that Governor Palin had incited something (nothing documented) and that it was actually the media who were inciting their own left-wing base! Reported only in the right-of-center blogoshpere, were REAL death threats against Governor Palin and her family posted on Twitter by some lefty maniac. CNN's silence on these threats was expected considering their new role of being watchdogs OF the citizenry FOR the government.

Governor Palin's message to the media and to the left that she delivered at the Tea Party rally in Nevada was clear.


'We're not going to sit down and shut up!'

Which is clearly the goal of the media and the left. They are trying to salvage the reputation of this administration in the eyes of the independents that helped put them in power. They obviously feel the best way to do that is to keep independent eyes and ears away from our message. Demonizing and marginalizing any messenger of that message. I do believe they are seriously undermining the intelligence of independent American's.Fool me once...

I had originally planned to write a piece today about the wonderful defiance of the Tea Party and of Sarah Palin. Before I could complete the write-up, proving to be on the same page with her base, Governor Palin posted yet another act of defiance to her Facebook page. A brilliant note regarding "March Madness" basketball, laced with metaphors sure to make the left's skin crawl.
Titled, "Warning: Subject to New Politically Correct Language Police Censorship"
She wrote:

March Madness battles rage! My family and I join millions of Americans enjoying college basketball’s finest through March Madness. Underdogs always get my vote as we watch intense competition bring out the best in these accomplished teams.

The Final Four is an intense, contested series (kind of like a heated, competitive primary election), so best of luck to all teams, and watch for this principle lived out: the team that wins is the team that wants it more.

To the teams that desire making it this far next year: Gear up! In the battle, set your sights on next season’s targets! From the shot across the bow – the first second’s tip-off – your leaders will be in the enemy’s crosshairs, so you must execute strong defensive tactics. You won’t win only playing defense, so get on offense! The crossfire is intense, so penetrate through enemy territory by bombing through the press, and use your strong weapons – your Big Guns – to drive to the hole. Shoot with accuracy; aim high and remember it takes blood, sweat and tears to win.

Focus on the goal and fight for it. If the gate is closed, go over the fence. If the fence is too high, pole vault in. If that doesn’t work, parachute in. If the other side tries to push back, your attitude should be “go for it.” Get in their faces and argue with them. (Sound familiar?!) Every possession is a battle; you’ll only win the war if you’ve picked your battles wisely. No matter how tough it gets, never retreat, instead RELOAD!
Right there is one of the key reasons I support Sarah Palin. Her complete unwillingness to back down in the face of the attacks and smears put out by the press and their masters in the Democrat party. She takes their attacks, turns them on their heads, and aims it directly back at her attackers. That's why it is usually the media and the left that end up looking bad at the end of the day.

Watching the massive distortion campaign by the media last week honestly gave me feelings of frustration on a level I had never felt before. It was such an apparent coordinated effort to demonize people for simply exercising their rights of free speech and an ability to think for themselves. The message back to the media attack machine from patriotic American's and from Sarah Palin is a loud resounding, NO! '
We are not going to sit down and shut up' and by the way, we are 'RELOADING' too!


Mighty Serf 

This Guy Nails It! - In Defense of Sarah Palin

Sunday, March 28, 2010 

In the WSJ, by Norman Podhoretz:

----------

Nothing annoys certain of my fellow conservative intellectuals more than when I remind them, as on occasion I mischievously do, that the derogatory things they say about Sarah Palin are uncannily similar to what many of their forebears once said about Ronald Reagan.

It's hard to imagine now, but 31 years ago, when I first announced that I was supporting Reagan in his bid for the 1980 Republican presidential nomination, I was routinely asked by friends on the right how I could possibly associate myself with this "airhead," this B movie star, who was not only stupid but incompetent.

They readily acknowledged that his political views were on the whole close to ours, but the embarrassing primitivism with which he expressed them only served, they said, to undermine their credibility. In any case, his base was so narrow that he had no chance of rescuing us from the disastrous administration of Jimmy Carter.

Now I knew Ronald Reagan, and Sarah Palin is no Ronald Reagan. Then again, the first time I met Reagan all he talked about was the money he had saved the taxpayers as governor of California by changing the size of the folders used for storing the state's files. So nonplussed was I by the delight he showed at this great achievement that I came close to thinking that my friends were right and that I had made a mistake in supporting him.

Ultimately, of course, we all wound up regarding him as a great man, but in 1979 none of us would have dreamed that this would be how we would feel only a few years later.

What I am trying to say is not that Sarah Palin would necessarily make a great president but that the criteria by which she is being judged by her conservative critics—never mind the deranged hatred she inspires on the left—tell us next to nothing about the kind of president she would make.
Take, for example, foreign policy. True, she seems to know very little about international affairs, but expertise in this area is no guarantee of wise leadership.

After all, her rival for the vice presidency, who in some sense knows a great deal, was wrong on almost every major issue that arose in the 30 years he spent in the Senate.

What she does know—and in this respect, she does resemble Reagan—is that the United States has been a force for good in the world, which is more than Barack Obama, whose IQ is no doubt higher than hers, has yet to learn.

Jimmy Carter also has a high IQ, which did not prevent him from becoming one of the worst presidents in American history, and so does Bill Clinton, which did not prevent him from befouling the presidential nest.

Unlike her enemies on the left, the conservative opponents of Mrs. Palin are a little puzzling. After all, except for its greater intensity, the response to her on the left is of a piece with the liberal hatred of Richard Nixon, Reagan and George W. Bush. It was a hatred that had less to do with differences over policy than with the conviction that these men were usurpers who, by mobilizing all the most retrograde elements of American society, had stolen the country from its rightful (liberal) rulers.

But to a much greater extent than Nixon, Reagan and George W. Bush, Sarah Palin is in her very being the embodiment of those retrograde forces and therefore potentially even more dangerous.

I think that this is what, conversely, also accounts for the tremendous enthusiasm she has aroused among ordinary conservatives. They rightly see her as one of them, only better able and better positioned to stand up against the contempt and condescension of the liberal elites that were so perfectly exemplified by Mr. Obama's notorious remark in 2008 about people like them: "And it's not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."

***

But how do we explain the hostility to Mrs. Palin felt by so many conservative intellectuals? It cannot be differences over policy. For as has been pointed out by Bill Kristol—one of the few conservative intellectuals who has been willing to say a good word about Mrs. Palin—her views are much closer to those of her conservative opponents than they are to the isolationists and protectionists on the "paleoconservative" right or to the unrealistic "realism" of the "moderate" Republicans who inhabit the establishment center.

Much as I would like to believe that the answer lies in some elevated consideration, I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the same species of class bias that Mrs. Palin provokes in her enemies and her admirers is at work among the conservative intellectuals who are so embarrassed by her.

When William F. Buckley Jr., then the editor of National Review, famously quipped that he would rather be ruled by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the combined faculties of Harvard and MIT, most conservative intellectuals responded with a gleeful amen. But put to the test by the advent of Sarah Palin, along with the populist upsurge represented by the Tea Party movement, they have demonstrated that they never really meant it.

Whether Buckley himself really meant it may be open to question, but it is certain that his son Christopher (who endorsed Mr. Obama) does not now and probably never did. Listen to the great satirist who blogs under the name of Iowahawk, writing in the fictional persona of T. Coddington Van Voorhees VII, son of the founder of The National Topsider, which he describe as a "once respected conservative magazine" now controlled by a bunch of "state college neanderthals."

"For more than a year," Van Voorhees tells us, "I have warned that . . . the conservative movement risked abandonment by its few remaining serious intellectuals"—"luminaries" like "the vivacious [Washington Post columnist] Kathleen Parker, Dame Peggy Noonan, and those two mighty Davids of conservative letters, Frum and Brooks"—and "being overrun by the unsightly hordes of Wal-Mart untermenschen typified by the loathesome 'Tea Party' rabble" with their "base enthusiasms and simian grunts. As is now obvious, events have proven me right."

I fear that the attitude satirically exaggerated here by Iowahawk is what underlies the rejection of Sarah Palin by so many conservative intellectuals. When push came to shove, they could not resist what Van Voorhees calls Mr. Obama's "prodigious oratorical and intellectuals gifts" and they could not resist attributing Sarah Palin's emergence as a formidable political force to "the base enthusiasms and simian grunts" of "the loathesome Tea Party rabble."

As for me, after more than a year of seeing how those "prodigious oratorical and intellectual gifts" have worked themselves out in action, I remain more convinced than ever of the soundness of Buckley's quip, in the spirit of which I hereby declare that I would rather be ruled by the Tea Party than by the Democratic Party, and I would rather have Sarah Palin sitting in the Oval Office than Barack Obama.

God, Guts, & Sarah Palin

Deadly Obamacare Kills Businesses, Jobs

Pamela Gellerby Pamela Geller
You think Obama has been a nightmare? You ain’t seen nothing yet. That was just the preview.
American business, the motor of the global economy, was dealt a deathblow by the Marxist putsch that the Democrat Party delivered in the form of the healthcare bill. Why wasn’t this made public before the vote? The numbers are staggering. It was revealed Friday that AT&T, the largest telephone company in the country, will take a one-billion-dollar hit in the current quarter as a result of this economic attack on America. The farm-equipment company Deere is looking at $150 million in new healthcare-related charges this quarter, and Caterpillar is facing  $100 million.
obama
Who do you think will pay for this? We will pay. According to Reuters, “Verizon Communications, the second biggest U.S. phone company, told employees that tax burdens under the new law would likely filter down to employees.” Business is not something in the abstract, or the evil force the leftists and the communists deceptively smear it to be — business is work, business is people, it is jobs, it is production. When business pays, we pay. Jobs pay. Consumers pay.
And we will pay for more than that as well. Have you seen the commercials yet for people who have maxed out their credit cards, and have loans over ten thousand that they can’t pay back, urging them to apply for stimulus dollars? Are you one of those who played by the rules, worked hard, did the right thing? If so, you’re screwed. The man has you and your wallet and your kids’ wallet by the throat. Welcome to the era of the degenerate: they will be sucking your blood and your children’s blood and your children’s children’s blood for decades to come, or however long America lasts.
Notice how Obama bad news always drops on Friday nights. But the Democrats will not forever be able to keep quiet the reality and the consequences of Obama rule.

Meanwhile, as the health care putsch continues, the world goes to hell in handbasket. The sinking of the South Korean warship near the North Korean border Friday was almost certainly an act of war, even as South Korean officials played down that possibility. Nonetheless, it reeks of the North Koreans. North Korea never would have pulled something like this under Bush. Never. But they know Obama will do nothing and that South Korea is on her own. Barack Hussein Obama ain’t Harry S Truman.
With Obama at the helm, expect hell to break loose. Iranian nukes? Yawn. Pakistan jihadis with nukes? Crickets chirping. Abandonment of Israel? Check! Socializing healthcare? Job 1!
And as they take over seventeen percent of the American economy, how cocky the Democrats are — full of contempt for the hard-working American. In order to fund Obama’s counter-insurgency in America, the enemy must be cut off of supplies, succor and support. And who is the enemy? He is us. The U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, has ordered the closing of numerous fast-food outlets on bases. Command Sgt. Maj. Michael T. Hall explained that “some of the morale, welfare and recreation facilities throughout Afghanistan” for troops would be cut: “In the coming weeks and months, concessions such as Orange Julius, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Dairy Queen and Military Car Sales will close their doors.”
Trillions on the backs of our kids, but no cheezboigers for the troops. But there is plenty of money for Kobe steaks for King O. Date nights in Manhattan with Michelle for a million. $600 sneakers for her as well. And remember that taxpayers footed the $101,000 bill for in-flight parties on Air Force jets arranged by Nancy Pelosi: according to journalist Bob Unruh at WorldNetDaily, “it reads like a dream order for some wild frat party: Maker’s Mark whiskey, Courvoisier cognac, Johnny Walker Red scotch, Grey Goose vodka, E&J brandy, Bailey’s Irish Crème, Bacardi Light rum, Jim Beam whiskey, Beefeater gin, Dewars scotch, Bombay Sapphire gin, Jack Daniels whiskey … and Corona beer.”
This is so off the charts. There is no decency on the left. They are hypocrites who are destroying American businesses and stealing from hard-working, struggling Americans.
Could the parties be more different, the differences more stark? Say what you will about the Republicans, but they were disciplined. The Democrats are increasingly fascist in their tactics, statist in their policy, anti-Israel, anti-America, and anti-military. The Republicans are pro-small government, pro-Israel, pro-individual rights, pro-business, pro-America.
I don’t know how any clear-thinking, rational, decent human being could vote in November 2010 for the corrupt statist collectivists.

Big Government

Democrats threaten companies hit hard by health care bill

By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent 
March 28, 2010

Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, has summoned some of the nation's top executives to Capitol Hill to defend their assessment that the new national health care reform law will cost their companies hundreds of millions of dollars in health insurance expenses.  Waxman is also demanding that the executives give lawmakers internal company documents related to health care finances -- a move one committee Republicans describes as "an attempt to intimidate and silence opponents of the Democrats' flawed health care reform legislation."On Thursday and Friday, the companies -- so far, they include AT&T, Verizon, Caterpillar, Deere, Valero Energy, AK Steel and 3M -- said a tax provision in the new health care law will make it far more expensive to provide prescription drug coverage to their retired employees.  Now, both retirees and current employees of those companies are wondering whether the new law could mean reduced or canceled benefits for them in the future.
The news is an embarrassment for Democrats. As President Obama and congressional leaders tout the purported benefits of the new health care law, some of the nation's biggest companies are saying it will mean higher costs and fewer benefits -- not exactly what Democrats want to hear in the days after their historic victory.
So Waxman has ordered the executives to explain themselves at an April 21 hearing before the Energy and Commerce Committee's investigative subcommittee.  That subcommittee just happens to be chaired by Rep. Bart Stupak, the Michigan Democrat who held out his vote on health care reform until a few hours before final passage on March 21, giving the bill's opponents the unfounded hope that he might vote against it.
Waxman's demands came Friday in letters to several executives. "After the president signed the health care reform bill into law, your company announced that provisions in the law could adversely affect your ability to provide health insurance," Waxman wrote to Randall Stephenson, chairman and CEO of AT&T.  A few hours before Waxman sent his letter, AT&T announced it will take a $1 billion charge against earnings because of the tax provision in the new health bill. AT&T also said it will be "evaluating prospective changes" to its health care benefits for all workers.
Waxman's letter suggests he does not accept the company's decision. "The new law is designed to expand coverage and bring down costs, so your assertions are a matter of concern," Waxman wrote to Stephenson, in addition to letters to Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg, Caterpillar CEO James Owens, and Deere & Company CEO Samuel Allen.  The companies' decisions, Waxman wrote, "appear to conflict with independent analyses."
Waxman's demands for documents are far-reaching. "To assist the Committee with its preparation for the hearing," he wrote to Stephenson, "we request that you provide the following documents from January 1, 2009, through the present:
(1) any analyses related to the projected impact of health care reform on AT&T; and (2) any documents, including e-mail messages, sent to or prepared or reviewed by senior company officials related to the projected impact of health care reform on AT&T. We also request an explanation of the accounting methods used by AT&T since 2003 to estimate the financial impact on your company of the 28 percent subsidy for retiree drug coverage and its deductibility or nondeductibility, including the accounting methods used in preparing the cost impact statement released by AT&T this week.
Waxman's request could prove particularly troubling for the companies.  The executives will undoubtedly view such documents as confidential, but if they fail to give Waxman everything he wants, they run the risk of subpoenas and threats from the chairman.  And all as punishment for making a business decision in light of a new tax situation.
The particular problem for the companies involves the prescription drug coverage they offer retired workers.  In 2003, when President Bush and the Republican Congress passed the Medicare prescription drug entitlement, they offered a tax break to companies that continued to provide drug coverage for their retirees, rather than forcing them into the Medicare system.  The new national health care bill ends that tax break, making it more expensive for the companies to continue offering the coverage. Ultimately, some analysts believe, the companies will stop covering the retirees, pushing them into the government system.
Waxman's action took Republicans on the Energy and Commerce Committee by surprise.  Contacted Saturday, Texas Rep. Michael Burgess, who is the ranking Republican on the investigations subcommittee, said, "The timing of the letters and the hearing and the scope of information requested looks an awful lot like an attempt to intimidate and silence opponents of the Democrats' flawed health care reform legislation, which is unfortunately the law of the land."
Burgess added, "I heard from several businesses back home in North Texas that the Democrats' health reform would be bad for business, so I am not surprised that companies are beginning to announce that it will cost them…I look forward to hearing more from the officials at these companies about the adverse effects of the Democrats' health reform will have on their business."
In coming days, Republicans are likely to emphasize the costs, both financial and human, of the new law.  In an interview Thursday, Rep. Tom Price, head of the House Republican Study Committee, said his party's first priority will be to "identify as often as possible the detrimental and remarkably consequential effects of this bill on communities."  Price specifically pointed to the Caterpillar and Deere announcements as examples of what GOP lawmakers will cite as the adverse effects of the law.  (At the time Price spoke, AT&T had not yet announced its decision.)
Given that, it's no wonder Democrats are planning an aggressive campaign against the businesses involved.  Elections are coming up, and Democratic leaders are in no mood to hear discouraging words about what they regard as their signature achievement.

Is Scripture Statist?


In a speech at Georgetown University on April 14, President Obama spoke in defense of his administration’s massive expenditures. He cited the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, where he refers to the importance of building one’s house on the rock instead of sand. The president took these words as a parable for America’s economic woes and his own expensive solutions:
We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand. We must build our house upon a rock. We must lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity — a foundation that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest; where we consume less at home and send more exports abroad.
Like most presidents, Barack Obama is fond of weaving biblical language into his rhetoric, obliquely suggesting that the Bible endorses his policies. His supporters — and Christian religious leaders — are often more direct in urging statist interpretations of the Bible.
Jim Wallis is a prominent Christian speaker and activist. He is the editor of the magazine Sojourners and author of the 2005 bestseller “God’s Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It.” This book, enormously influential among Christian leaders, argues for confiscatory taxation in order to fund wealth redistribution programs. Basing his argument on Isaiah 65, Wallis writes:
The government’s budgets are a disaster for the poor, a windfall for the wealthiest, and thus directly conflict with biblical priorities. Budgets are moral documents. It may be controversial, but it is not inappropriate to name the federal budgets being passed as ‘unbiblical.’ And it is time for religious people to clearly and prophetically respond. We need a ‘faith-based initiative’ against budget priorities that neglect poor people.
Leaving aside the highly dubious proposition that one’s personal religious beliefs should be directly translated into public policy — including laws governing citizens who do not share those beliefs — the notion that the Bible supports government redistribution of wealth should be firmly challenged.
The fundamental question for those who consider the Bible authoritative is not whether it advocates charity or helping the poor. Obama, Wallis, and other statist Christians are not arguing for charity. They are arguing for government appropriation of property. The issue isn’t charity, but property rights. If the Bible rejects the notion of a right to property, then these people may have a basis for their perspective. But if the Bible supports a right to own property, safe from government redistribution to others, then their policy proposals are unbiblical.
What follows is an analysis of what the Bible says, in both the New and the Old Testaments, on the subject of property rights. Whether the Bible, or parts thereof, should be considered authoritative or useful for Christians I will leave to theologians. My concern is with the text itself.
I would like to be able to report that the Bible argues firmly for an absolutist view of property rights. I would like to be able to write that the Bible is a strictly libertarian document. It is not. Yet in the balance and taken as a whole, the Bible support the individual’s right to own property and hold onto it. Briefly summarized, the Bible’s teachings are that humans are stewards of God’s property in a rental relationship and are accountable to him, not to the state, for the disposition of that property. The Bible advocates charity for the poor and condemns the parsimonious, but it does not grant authority to the state to act on God’s behalf to redistribute wealth. It is mostly a laissez-faire system of ideas, which libertarians should not forfeit to statist misinterpretations.
The Bible suggests three central principles regarding property rights. One is the prohibition against theft, enshrined in Exodus 20:15 “You shall not steal.” The second is the idea that the world ultimately belongs to God (not to the state), as exemplified by Psalm 24:1: “The earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains, the world and those who dwell in it.” The third is a corollary: humans are temporary tenants upon God’s property, as King David said in 1 Chronicles 29:15: “For we are but sojourners before You, and tenants, as all our fathers were.”
Let’s examine these principles. The first, that theft is morally wrong, is stated in the Old Testament and repeated in the New, as in Matthew 19:17–19 and Romans 13:9–10. One particular form of theft that the Bible addresses specifically and at length is withholding wages from workers who have earned them. Leviticus 19:13 establishes that doing so constitutes robbery. Deuteronomy 24:15 and James 5:4 describe this act as one that infuriates God.
Of all the passages of the Mosaic Law, Exodus 22:1–15 most directly addresses propertarian relationships. It describes violations of property rights and the legal remedies for them. For example, if a person steals an ox or a sheep and kills it, he must make restitution in the amount of four to five times the value of the stolen and destroyed property. If the thief is caught with the property alive, the compensation is only double. If a person holds the property of another in safekeeping, and it has been stolen from him, then he must make restitution; but if a court determines that the trustee has actually stolen the property, he must provide double the value. If the property was destroyed through natural causes, no restitution is necessary. The two variables determining penalties are the degree of criminal intent and the amount of harm absorbed by the victim.
Of particular note are the laws governing the right to defend one’s property. One may kill an intruding thief in the confusion of the night, but to kill a thief in the clarity of the day is an act of murder; a thief has not necessarily forfeited his life as a result of his crime. The right to defend one’s property is not absolute, but it is quite strong, much stronger than many contemporary Christians understand or desire.
If theft is a crime, then by logical necessity there must be a right to property. Where there is no property, there can be no theft. Before Christians endorse confiscatory economic policies, thinking that the Bible mandates them, they should consider what limitations the Bible places and does not place, on property rights.
The primary limitation comes from the idea that the whole world belongs to God. Although a secular libertarian view of property rights begins with self-ownership and personal ownership of both physical and intellectual property, a biblical view begins with God’s ownership of the world. It is interesting that John Locke, the ultimate source for much libertarian property theory, began at the same place: see Locke’s “Second Treatise,” section 25. The idea is repeatedly established in Scripture. Psalm 24:1 and Exodus 19:5 quote God directly as making this assertion. In 1 Corinthians 10:26, Paul quotes the Psalms and argues that Christians shouldn’t worry about whether or not the meat they purchase in the marketplace has been used to make idolatrous sacrifices because the whole world belongs to God, including the meat presented to idols. But the divine ownership premise cannot be taken as grounds for government seizure of property.
The preface to my argument is the third principle: humans are tenants on God’s land or stewards of his property. But how can there be thievery against other people if God owns all the property? The answer is simultaneous ownership. The idea of tenancy establishes that there are two levels of property ownership: God at the higher level and humans at the lower, but both can possess the same property at the same time.
It is important to examine the nuances of this view of property rights, lest Christian statists misuse the notion of divine ownership of the world to justify their notion that there is no individual right to property. That interpretation assumes that human and divine ownership cannot coexist — yet it would be totally inconsistent with the Bible’s many injunctions against theft and requirements for compensation for lost and stolen property. If there were no right to private property, these provisions would be pointless.
The Biblical view of property is something akin to leasing. All property is leased from God, the ultimate possessor, but the human lessees are the immediate owners. God may step in and lay claim to his property, but no humans besides the lessees have any such rights. Third parties have no legitimate claim of authority. A practical example: a person rents an apartment from someone else. The rental owner may reserve the right to enter it, as the ultimate holder of the property — but no one else has any right to do so, without the consent of the renter. This tenant relationship is a close parallel to God’s claim on property and the lessee’s simultaneous but noncontradictory claim.
To apply this idea to today’s political scene, one might say that God may intervene in the property ownership of individuals, but other people may not. To seize the property of other people is to usurp the authority of God.
Christian statists are fond of justifying the state’s usurpation of property rights on a complex sacred and legal event known as the Year of Jubilee, outlined in Leviticus 25. Wallis accurately refers to it as “a periodic economic redistribution in which slaves are set free, land is returned, and debts are forgiven.” This would seem to give some grounds for a looser view of property rights than libertarians would countenance.
But a candid assessment of the biblical portrait of property rights should address the subject directly. At the end of 50 years, certain property transactions had to be reversed, but the reversal had to include compensation for the temporary owners of the land. It was like the modern practice of subletting real estate. Should complete compensation not be provided to the current resident within one year, then the property was permanently deeded to him. In the Year of Jubilee, the tenants switched roles, but God remained the ultimate property owner (Leviticus 25:23). A person could not sell real property permanently, any more than a person renting an apartment can sell it outright to a third party. Further, with the Jubilee cycle embedded in law, people who made loans or purchased property would have the opportunity to reduce any losses they feared at the end of the cycle, by charging a higher price up front. There was no capricious action by government.
Contrast the redistributionist plans of Obama and other statist Christians, who are intent on taking property from some people and giving it to others, who never owned it or invested in it, without a hint of compensation. This is not a return of lost property but a seizure of property that is legally owned. The Bible never authorizes such brazen theft.
In “God’s Politics,” Wallis argues for a Christian effort “to bring the Word of God to bear on the moral issues of the American economy.” He asserts that the Bible advocates charity for the poor and offers condemnation to the ungenerous. That is correct. It is, however, an enormous leap of logic to assert that it is task of government to take the place of Christians in giving to the poor, or to assume that Christians can use the force of government to compel others to “give” to the poor. This, really, is the central issue, the central area in which statist Christians have mistaken injunctions about what they should do for others for injunctions about what they should do to others.
One would think, listening to President Obama or reading statist Christians, that the Bible authorized a government regime of constant forced sharing. There is one passage in the Bible, Acts 4:32–35, that apparently depicts a communal sharing of property, in aid of the poor. The passage describes one particular episode of voluntary sharing in the life of the early Christian church — not a program of coercive taxation, set in stone by the Roman government. It should be read in the noncoercive context in which it was written. Jesus preached about living a holy, virtuous life, and unhesitatingly rebuked sinners. But at no point did he suggest that it was acceptable to use force to compel virtue. Christ commanded the rich young ruler to sell all he had and give to the poor (Luke 18:22). But he did not rob the rich man’s house and redistribute his goods. Although he drove the moneychangers out of the Temple (Matthew 21:12–13), Christians may conclude that this was the act of the Son of God, disposing of his own property. For statists to do likewise, with other people’s property, would be to usurp the power of God. And the teachings of Christ themselves provide no endorsement whatsoever for state redistribution. The earliest Christians understood this. The Apostolic-era church never forced people to acknowledge Jesus as Lord, and nothing in the New Testament suggests that the church used force to take property from those unwilling to give. Certainly it did not suggest that the Roman state, its savage enemy, had the right to do so.
To the contrary, Jesus implicitly endorsed the right to property in his parable of the laborers in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1–16), which symbolically represents God telling workers to “take what belongs to you” (verse 14). The parable would make no sense if there were no property rights. In another parable, Jesus used two investors of property as exemplars of morality, rather than thieves or reactionaries (Matthew 25:14–30). Jesus had plenty of opportunities to condemn property ownership, but he never did.
One response to calls for a more minimal state, one that cannot appropriate property at will for the “common good,” is to cite Romans 13:1–7, perhaps the most statist passage in all of Scripture: “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities for there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.” Here Paul asserts that governments derive their authority from God and resistance to government authority is rebellion against God, for “whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God.” This is because government “is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.” This would seem to burn a path for statists to begin government redistribution of wealth as a divinely-delegated authority. Wallis uses it for precisely that purpose, writing that “it suggests a clear role for the government in ensuring the common good.”
I gladly invite statists to make this argument, once they explain how the most oppressive regimes in world history can also claim divine authority, using exactly the same reasoning. Romans 13 is a far too complex passage to unpack in this article. I think the best explanation is that Paul was attempting to avoid accusations of sedition by the Roman government. He himself was persecuted by the Romans and other governments. He knew that government wasn’t empowered by God to do anything it pleased. To accept Romans 13:1–7 at face value requires that Paul contradict himself at every other point in his writings where he mentions persecution by local officials. To use the passage as justification for any government activity whatever induces so many logical problems that Christian statists will never get through explaining themselves before proceeding with redistributionist plans.
The truth is that there is no biblical warrant for redistributionist economic policies. It simply is not there. The closest the Bible comes to supporting such policies is the Year of Jubilee, which proposes something entirely different from the programs advocated by Christian economic statists. A careful, rather than cursory, examination of the biblical text shows that confiscatory taxation and redistribution have no traction.
Quite the opposite: there are solid biblical grounds for the right to property — far stronger grounds than for President Obama’s call to “spread the wealth around.” Until Christian statists can persuasively argue to the contrary, their redistributionist plans must be pronounced unbiblical.

Warning: Subject to New Politically Correct Language Police Censorship


March Madness battles rage! My family and I join millions of Americans enjoying college basketball’s finest through March Madness. Underdogs always get my vote as we watch intense competition bring out the best in these accomplished teams.

The Final Four is an intense, contested series (kind of like a heated, competitive primary election), so best of luck to all teams, and watch for this principle lived out: the team that wins is the team that wants it more.

To the teams that desire making it this far next year: Gear up! In the battle, set your sights on next season’s targets! From the shot across the bow – the first second’s tip-off – your leaders will be in the enemy’s crosshairs, so you must execute strong defensive tactics. You won’t win only playing defense, so get on offense! The crossfire is intense, so penetrate through enemy territory by bombing through the press, and use your strong weapons – your Big Guns – to drive to the hole. Shoot with accuracy; aim high and remember it takes blood, sweat and tears to win.

Focus on the goal and fight for it. If the gate is closed, go over the fence. If the fence is too high, pole vault in. If that doesn’t work, parachute in. If the other side tries to push back, your attitude should be “go for it.” Get in their faces and argue with them. (Sound familiar?!) Every possession is a battle; you’ll only win the war if you’ve picked your battles wisely. No matter how tough it gets, never retreat, instead RELOAD!

- Sarah Palin

Friday, March 26, 2010

Is a D.O.D. Insider Leaking Classified Information to CNN?

Brad ThorPosted by Brad Thor Mar 26th 2010 at 11:43 am in CNN, Featured Story, Military 


On Wednesday, CNN’s Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr reported on multiple, highly sensitive documents that had been “provided” to CNN and which detail valuable, strategic intelligence gathered by the Department of Defense in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
It should come as no surprise that Starr made sure to highlight all of the juicy details.  She not only revealed U.S. knowledge of a covert meeting between Hamid Karzai’s brother and Mullah Baradar (a top Taliban leader who was later arrested in Pakistan), as well as a secret audio message played to Taliban commanders from reclusive Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, but she went on to inform the entire world that the United States has a safe house in Kabul (used by members of the Haqqani terror network) currently under surveillance.  Great work Barbara!
barbara starr
Would anyone care to wager that within hours of Starr’s story being published on the Internet that the Haqqani network began sanitizing and abandoning all of its safe houses in Kabul?
How about a wager on whether or not Taliban operatives are now actively triangulating the information from Starr’s reporting in order to find out how the United States came by it?  What about a wager on whether or not once the Taliban discover who’s responsible on their end, that person or persons will be murdered?
For such intrepid, show-our-cards-to-the-enemy-journalism, I have to say, “Brava, Ms. Starr!”  Three cheers for you and your fellow travelers in the lamestream media.  Once again you have aligned yourselves with disgruntled, America-hating, liberal intelligence insiders, who will do anything (even once again leaking classified intelligence because they don’t like how the game is being played) in order to take America “down a few pegs.”
I have a little piece of advice for Ms. Starr and other journalists like her: just because someone leaks, excuse me, “provides” classified information to your “news” organization, it doesn’t mean you should go public with it, especially if the information will endanger the lives of Americans, the lives of American intelligence assets, and will severely cripple ongoing intelligence operations.
But of course this isn’t just limited to Ms. Starr.  The even bigger question raised by the article is who leaked the information to CNN in the first place?
the-pentagon
According to confidential sources familiar with ongoing Department of Defense operations in the Af/Pak theater, there are several disgruntled players who are unhappy with how the D.O.D. has been gathering its intelligence and is providing force protection for our troops.
Reluctantly at the center of the fray, is a distinguished American warrior named Michael Furlong.  Suffice it to say that Furlong has been unjustly turned into a modern-day whipping boy.  Those with intimate knowledge of his operations not only resolutely stand behind him and his assertion that everything he has done is aboveboard and was conducted with the full support of his superiors, but that his efforts to secure for our troops the best force protection available has resulted in countless American lives being saved every single day.
So was it one of the aforementioned disgruntled players who leaked classified information to Barbara Starr and CNN?  Word out of D.C. and Kabul is that suspicion is now falling upon someone within Furlong’s chain-of-command itself.  The reason?  The person in question is allegedly unhappy with how he believes in-theater intelligence is being gathered.
More to the point, the group Furlong brought in to provide atmospherics and force protection for our troops was too good, too fast.  But rather than embrace the exceptional work the group was doing, petty jealousies ruled the day and, despite having done nothing wrong, Furlong was defenestrated.  (Whether the Central Intelligence Agency was on the sidewalk yelling, “Jump,” or they were in the office helping give him a push, will all come out in due time.)
For the moment, the most troubling aspect for all Americans should be that someone above Furlong, someone within the D.O.D. (who should be committed to the safety of American troops above all else) appears to not only be taking shots at his own agency’s efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but to be using the most highly-sensitive information to do it.
Much more as this story develops.

Big Jounalism

How the Left fakes the hate: A primer

By Michelle Malkin  •  March 26, 2010 10:40 AM


I’m still on semi-vacation, but the Left never takes a break from falsely accusing the Right of fomenting hatred and violence through political speech. The MSM never takes a break from whitewashing leftist intolerance, death threats, and extremism — and engaging in selective reporting (or rather, non-reporting) of the long history of leftists’ manufacturing of hatred for political gain. My syndicated column fills in the missing context. In related developments, Glenn Reynolds takes a look at a new dubious report of rock-throwing. Erick Erickson shreds Josh Marshall’s specious incitement accusations. Patterico reports on the latest Twitter death threats against the Palin family. (Here’s a reminder about the one a Toronto Star columnist posted about me, which was laughed off by her editor and ignored by her colleagues). Here’s Mary Katharine Ham’s reminder that 7 of the 10 violent incidents during the summer town hall protests were brought to you by Obama-bots and union thugs. And in case you need a quick refresher on the routine liberal ugliness that will never be decried by the civility police, see here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here here. For starters. See also: Unhinged.
How the Left fakes the hate: A primer
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2010
If you can’t stand the heat, manufacture a hate crime epidemic.
After years of covering racial hoaxes on college campuses and victim sob stories in the public arena, I’ve encountered countless opportunists who live by that demented mindset. At best, the fakers are desperately seeking 15 minutes of infamy. At worst, their aim is the criminalization of political dissent.
Upon decimating the deliberative process to hand President Obama a health care “reform” victory, unpopular Beltway Democrats and their media water-carriers now claim there’s a Tea Party epidemic of racism, harassment, and violence against them. On Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a tepid, obligatory statement against smearing all conservatives as national security threats. But her lieutenants had already emptied their tar buckets. Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman Chris Van Hollen blamed Republican leaders of “stoking the flames.” Democrat House Whip James Clyburn accused the GOP of “aiding and abetting” what he called “terrorism.”
Yet, the claims that Tea Party activists shouted “nigger” at black House Democrats remain uncorroborated. The coffin reportedly left outside Missouri Democrat Rep. Russ Carnahan’s home was used in a prayer vigil by pro-life activists in St. Louis protesting the phony Demcare abortion funding ban in President Obama’s deal-cutting executive order. Videotape of a supposed intentional spitting incident targeting Missouri Democrat Rep. Emanuel Cleaver at the Capitol shows no such thing. Cleaver himself backed off the claim a few days later. He described his heckler to the Washington Post in more passive terms as “the man who allowed his saliva to hit my face.” Slovenliness = terrorism!
The FBI is now investigating the most serious allegation – that Tea Party activists in Virginia are somehow responsible for a cut gas line at the home of Democrat Rep. Tom Perriello’s brother. But instead of waiting for the outcome of that probe, liberal pundits have enshrined the claim as conclusive evidence of the Tea Party reign of terror.
Need more reasons to treat the latest Democrat hysteria with a grain of salt the size of their gargantuan health care bill? Remember:

*In November 2009, Kentucky Census worker Bill Sparkman was found dead in a secluded rural cemetery with the word “Fed” scrawled on his chest with a rope around his neck. The Atlantic Monthly, the Huffington Post, and liberal media hosts stampeded over themselves to blame Fox News, conservative blogs, Republicans, and right-wing radio. Federal, state, and local authorities discovered that Sparkman had killed himself and deliberately concocted a hate crime hoax as part of an insurance scam to benefit his surviving son.
*In mid-October 2008, news outlets from Scranton, Pa., to ABC News, to the Associated Press and MSNBC reported that someone at a Sarah Palin rally shouted “Kill him” when Barack Obama’s name was mentioned. In fact, the Secret Service (which was at the event in full force) couldn’t find a single person to corroborate the story – other than the local reporter for the Scranton Times-Tribune who made an international incident out of the claim. Agent Bill Slavoski “said he was in the audience, along with an undisclosed number of additional secret service agents and other law enforcement officers and not one heard the comment,” the paper reported in a red-faced follow-up. Maybe the shouter is hiding with Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman’s real killer.
*In late October 2008, a gaggle of liberal blogs spread the rumor that a Republican supporter of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s had shouted that Barack Obama was “a nigger” during a campaign rally in Iowa. Video and first-hand accounts showed that the protester did not shout “he’s a nigger,” but “he’s a redistributor.” A lefty activist at the “progressive” Daily Kos blog confirmed the truth – but to this day, the crisis-manufacturing smear lies uncorrected and unretracted across the Internet.
*In September 2009, supporters of Colorado Democrat Rep. John Salazar falsely accused a town hall protester of hurling a death threat at the congressman. Liberal blogs again disseminated the angry Tea Party mob narrative. A week later, the local press quietly reported that Grand Junction police had investigated the incident – and determined the claim was “unfounded.” A police spokeswoman revealed that “[p]eople who witnessed the interaction between the man who made the complaint and the suspect confirmed they never heard any direct threats made regarding Congressman Salazar; the witnesses included a Grand Junction cop “in close proximity when the interaction took place.”

*In late August 2009, as lawmakers faced citizen revolts at health care town halls nationwide, the Colorado Democratic Party decried a vandalism attack at its Denver headquarters. A hammer-wielding thug smashed 11 windows and caused $11,000 in property damage. The perpetrator, Maurice Schwenkler, turned out to be a far Left nutball/transgender activist/single-payer anarchist who had worked for a SEIU-tied 527 group and canvassed for a Democrat candidate. Nevertheless, State Democrat Party chair Pat Waak continued to blame “people opposed to health care” for the attack.
Then, as now, being a Democrat Party official means never having to say you’re sorry for smearing conservative dissent.

Michelle Malkin