Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Dead Souls: The Denationalization of the American Elite

DAVOS MEN

**Davos Man refers to a global elite whose members view themselves as completely international. Davos is an Alpine town in eastern Switzerland which became famous in the 1990s for hosting the World Economic Forum, an annual gathering of international politicians and financiers who represented a transnational elite.

"The members of this class are people who have little need for national loyalty, view national boundaries as obstacles that thankfully are vanishing, and see national governments as residues from the past whose only useful function is to facilitate the élite's global operations. Huntington argues that Davos Man's global-citizen self-image is starkly at odds with the values of most Americans, who remain deeply committed to their nation. This disconnect creates a major cultural fault line In a variety of ways, the American establishment, governmental and private, has become increasingly divorced from the American people."


The following is taken from:


Dead Souls: The Denationalization of the American Elite


Samuel P. Huntington

...In today's America, a major gap exists between the nation's elites and the general public over the salience of national identity compared to other identities and over the appropriate role for America in the world. Substantial elite elements are increasingly divorced from their country, and the American public, in turn, is increasingly disillusioned with its government.

America in the World

How both America's elites and the rank-and-file define their country determines its role in the world, but how the world views that role also shapes American identity. Three broad concepts exist of America in relation to the rest of the world. Americans can embrace the world--that is, open their country to other peoples and cultures. They can try to reshape other societies in terms of American values and culture. They can strive to maintain their society and culture distinct from those of other peoples.


The first, or cosmopolitan, alternative involves a renewal of the trends dominating pre-September 11 America. America welcomes the world, its ideas, its goods and, most importantly, its people. The ideal would be an open society with open borders, encouraging subnational ethnic, racial and cultural identities, dual citizenship, diasporas, and would be led by elites who increasingly identified with global institutions, norms and rules rather than national ones. America should be multiethnic, multiracial, multicultural. Diversity is a prime value, if not the prime value. The more people who bring to America different languages, religions and customs, the more American America becomes. Middle-class Americans would identify increasingly with the global corporations for which they work rather than with the local communities in which they live. The activities of Americans would more and more be governed not by the federal and state governments, but by rules set by international authorities, such as the UN, the WTO, customary international law, and global treaties. National identity loses salience compared to other identities. In this cosmopolitan alternative, the world reshapes America.

In the imperial alternative, America reshapes the world. The end of the Cold War eliminated communism as the overriding factor shaping America's role in the world. It thus enabled liberals to pursue their foreign policy goals without having to confront the charge that those goals compromised national security and hence to promote "nation building", "humanitarian intervention" and "foreign policy as social work." The emergence of the United States as the world's only superpower had a parallel impact on American conservatives. During the Cold War America's enemies denounced it as an imperial power. At the start of the new millennium conservatives accepted and endorsed the idea of an American empire--whether they embraced the term or not--and the use of American power to reshape the world according to American values.


The imperial impulse was thus fueled by beliefs in the supremacy of American power and the universality of American values. Because America's power far exceeds that of other nations, America has the responsibility to create order and confront evil throughout the world. According to the universalist belief, the people of other societies have basically the same values as Americans, or if they do not have them, they want to have them, or if they do not want to have them, they misjudge what is good for their society, and Americans have the responsibility to persuade them or to induce them to embrace the universal values that America espouses. In such a world America loses its identity as a nation and becomes the dominant component of a supranational empire.

Neither the supremacy assumption nor the universalist assumption, however, accurately reflects the state of the early 21st-century world. America is the only superpower, but there are other major powers: Britain, Germany, France, Russia, China, India and Japan at a global level, and Brazil, Nigeria, Iran, South Africa and Indonesia within their regions. America cannot achieve any significant goal in the world without the cooperation of at least some of these countries. The culture, values, traditions and institutions of the other societies are often not compatible with reconfiguring those societies in terms of American values. Their peoples generally also feel deeply committed to their indigenous ways of life and beliefs and hence fiercely resist efforts to change them by outsiders from alien cultures. In addition, whatever the goals of their elites, the American public has consistently ranked the promotion of democracy abroad as a low-priority goal. The introduction of democracy in other societies also often stimulates anti-American forces, such as populist movements in Latin American states and violent, extremist movements in Muslim countries.

Cosmopolitanism and imperialism attempt to reduce or to eliminate the social, political and cultural differences between America and other societies. A national approach would recognize and accept what distinguishes America from those societies. America cannot become the world and still be America. Other peoples cannot become American and still be themselves. America is different, and that difference is defined in large part by its religious commitment and Anglo-Protestant culture. The alternative to cosmopolitanism and imperialism is nationalism devoted to the preservation and enhancement of those qualities that have defined America from its inception.


For almost four centuries, the Anglo-Protestant culture of the founding settlers has been the central and the lasting component of American identity. One has only to ask: Would America be the America it is today if in the 17th and 18th centuries it had been settled not by British Protestants but by French, Spanish, or Portuguese Catholics? The answer is no. It would not be America; it would be Quebec, Mexico, or Brazil.

America's Anglo-Protestant culture has combined political and social institutions and practices inherited from England, including most notably the English language, together with the concepts and values of dissenting Protestantism, which faded in England but which the settlers brought with them and which took on new life on the new continent. At the beginning, as Alden T. Vaughan has said,

"almost everything was fundamentally English: the forms of land ownership and cultivation, the system of government and the basic format of laws and legal procedures, the choices of entertainment and leisure-time pursuits, and innumerable other aspects of colonial life."

Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., concurs: "the language of the new nation, its laws, its institutions, its political ideas, its literature, its customs, its precepts, its prayers, primarily derived from Britain."22

With adaptations and modifications, this original culture persisted for three hundred years. Two hundred years after John Jay in 1789 identified six central elements Americans had in common, one of these, common ancestry, no longer existed. Several of the five others--language, religion, principles of government, manners and customs, war experience--had been modified or diluted. Yet in their fundamentals Jay's components of American identity, although challenged, still defined American culture in the 20th century. Protestantism has been of primary and continuing importance. With respect to language, the efforts of 18th-century German settlers in Pennsylvania to make German the equal of English infuriated Benjamin Franklin, among others, and did not succeed.23 At least until the appearance of bilingualism and large concentrations of Spanish-speaking immigrants in Miami and the Southwest, America was unique as a huge country of more than 200 million people virtually all speaking the same language.

During the 19th century and until the late 20th century, immigrants were in various ways compelled, induced, and persuaded to adhere to the central elements of the Anglo-Protestant culture. Contemporary cultural pluralists, multiculturalists, and spokesmen for ethnic and racial minorities testify to the success of these efforts. Southern and Eastern European immigrants, Michael Novak poignantly commented in 1977, were pressured to become "American" by adapting to Anglo-American culture: Americanization "was a process of vast psychic repression." In similar language, Will Kymlicka in 1995 argued that prior to the 1960s, immigrants "were expected to shed their distinctive heritage and assimilate entirely to existing cultural norms", which he labeled the "Anglo-conformity model."24

These critics are right. Throughout American history, people who were not white Anglo-Saxon Protestants have become Americans by adopting its Anglo-Protestant culture and political values. This benefited them and the country.

Millions of immigrants and their children achieved wealth, power and status in American society precisely because they assimilated themselves into the prevailing American culture. Hence there is no validity to the claim that Americans have to choose between a white, racist, WASP-ish ethnic identity, on the one hand, and an abstract, shallow civic identity dependent on commitment to certain political principles, on the other. The core of their identity is the culture that the settlers created, which generations of immigrants have absorbed, and which gave birth to the American Creed. At the heart of that culture has been Protestantism.

Religiosity distinguishes America from most other Western societies. Americans are also overwhelmingly Christian, which distinguishes them from many non-Western peoples. Their religiosity leads Americans to see the world in terms of good and evil to a much greater extent than most other peoples. The leaders of other societies often find this religiosity not only extraordinary but also exasperating for the deep moralism it engenders in the consideration of political, economic and social issues.

Religion and nationalism have gone hand in hand in the history of the West. As the historian Adrian Hastings has shown, the former often defined the content of the latter: "Every ethnicity is shaped significantly by religion just as it is by language. . . . [In Europe,] Christianity has shaped national formation."25 The connection between religion and nationalism was alive and well at the end of the 20th century. Those countries that are more religious tend to be more nationalist. A survey of 41 countries found that those societies in which more people gave a "high" rating to the importance of God in their life were also those in which more people were "very proud" of their country.26

Within countries, individuals who are more religious also tend to be more nationalist. A 1983 survey of 15, mostly European, countries found that "in every country surveyed, those who said they were not religious are less likely to be proud of their country." On average, the difference is 11 percent. Most European peoples rank low in their belief in God and their pride in country. America ranks with Ireland and Poland, close to the top on both dimensions. Catholicism is essential to Irish and Polish national identity. The dissenting Protestant heritage is central to America's. Americans are overwhelmingly committed to both God and country and see them as inseparable. In a world in which religion shapes the allegiances, the alliances and the antagonisms of people on every continent, it should not be surprising if Americans again turn to religion to find their national identity and their national purpose.[Perhaps why "The Passion of The Christ was so controversial for some,]

Significant elements of American elites are favorably disposed to America becoming a cosmopolitan society. Other elites wish it to assume an imperial role. The overwhelming bulk of the American people are committed to a national alternative and to preserving and strengthening the American identity of centuries.

America becomes the world. The world becomes America. America remains America. Cosmopolitan? Imperial? National? The choices Americans make will shape their future as a nation and the future of the world."

(Photos added)

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The above analysis presents a problem: who is looking out for those in the last picture? Answer: nobody in government today. We have effectively been shut out of the governing process. Elections are effectively controlled by those with money and power, whose interests lie in either a Cosmopolitan America, or an Imperial America. The media is controlled by same. Who will represent the "overwhelming bulk of the American people [who] are committed to a national alternative and to preserving and strengthening the American identity of centuries"?

Ordinary Americans, like you and me, will have to turn to the true source of spiritual strength which lies within ourselves. To defend our values, we must live those values, in defiance of, and in spite of all the power applied to reverse our course.

New York City's gun law is unconstitutional

Plaxico Burress is led to his arraignment in Manhattan.


















Wall Street Journal

DECEMBER 4, 2008

Free Plaxico Burress


New York City's gun law is unconstitutional

By DAVID B. KOPEL

New York Giants star receiver Plaxico Burress is facing a mandatory 3½ years in prison and the end of his football career. His crime? Not having a license, which New York City never would have issued him, for the exercise of his constitutional right to bear arms.

To be sure, Mr. Burress got caught because of what appears to have been stupid and irresponsible behavior connected with the handgun. But he does not face prison for shooting himself. His impending mandatory sentence highlights the unfairness and unconstitutionality of New York City's draconian gun laws.

Mr. Burress had previously had a handgun carry permit issued by Florida, for which he was required to pass a fingerprint-based background check. As a player for the Giants, he moved to Totowa, N.J., where he kept a Glock pistol. And last Friday night, he reportedly went to the Latin Quarter nightclub in midtown Manhattan carrying the loaded gun in his sweatpants. Because New York state permits to possess or carry handguns are not issued to nonresidents, Mr. Burress could not apply for a New York City permit.

At the nightclub, the handgun accidentally discharged, shooting Mr. Burress in the right thigh. He was not seriously injured, but he has been charged with criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree.

It appears that he put the unholstered gun in the waistband of his sweatpants, and when it slipped, he grabbed for it, accidentally hitting the trigger. To make matters worse, according to press accounts, he was seen drinking and may have been consuming alcohol -- which all firearms safety training (including the class he would have been required to take for his Florida permit) absolutely forbids for people handling guns. And of course Mr. Burress's handgun should have been holstered to prevent unintentional movement of the trigger. Fortunately, his negligent discharge did not harm anyone else.

Mr. Burress's behavior was bad. However, Mr. Burress is not facing prosecution for carelessness, but simply for carrying a weapon. This is unjust and perhaps unconstitutional. The legal issues are a bit tangled, but here is the background:

This summer, the Supreme Court ruled in District of Columbia v. Heller that the District's handgun ban, and its ban on use of any firearm for self-defense in the home, violated the Second Amendment, which guarantees the individual right to bear arms. D.C. is a federal enclave, and the Court did not rule whether the Second Amendment applies to state and local governments. But as other cases reach it in the wake of Heller, it will.

The Heller decision did not say that requiring a license to carry a gun was unconstitutional. But in New York State, nonresidents cannot even apply for the licenses to possess or carry a handgun. Unlike most other states, New York refuses to honor carry permits issued by sister states. Most observers believe that the Supreme Court will eventually make state and local governments obey the Second Amendment. If it does, New York's discrimination against nonresidents will probably be ruled unconstitutional.

And then there is the issue of the permitting process for residents. In 40 states, including Connecticut, law-abiding adults are issued permits once they pass a fingerprint-based background check and a safety class. In New Jersey, carry permits are virtually never issued. In New York City, carry permits are issued, but to applicants with some form of political clout rather than on the basis of his or her need for protection.

The Second Amendment might not require New Jersey or New York City to issue as liberally as Connecticut does. But with a population of several million and only a few thousand (consisting mainly of politicians, retired police and celebrities) able to get permits, New York City's licensing process is almost certainly unconstitutional on a number of grounds, including sheer arbitrariness.

Some commentators contend that Plaxico Burress should have hired bodyguards, instead of carrying a gun himself. Mr. Burress might now agree. But people who aren't as wealthy as he is also deserve to be safe, and they don't have the money for bodyguards. New York City needs to regularize its carry permit system so that law-abiding people can protect themselves, especially if their circumstances (such as being a witness to a gang crime) place them at heightened risk.

The Burress case also shows why mandatory sentences are a bad idea. He was careless but had no malign intent. Legislators and mayors like to appear tough by pushing through such draconian laws. Yet the victims are people like Mr. Burress whose conduct may have been improper, but who do not deserve the same sentences meted out to robbers and burglars.

Mr. Kopel is a policy analyst with the Cato Institute, in Washington, D.C., and research director of the Independence Institute, in Golden, Colo.

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Good post. Just wish he hadn't added: "...especially if their circumstances (such as being a witness to a gang crime) place them at heightened risk."

Why complicate matters? Unconstitutional is unconstitutional.

Thursday, December 25, 2008

The Spread of Happiness


The Spread of Happiness

If you have a smile on your face this holiday season, you may take the time to thank your friends. But new research shows if you want to give thanks for your happiness you need to look beyond your own friends to their friends and to their friend’s friends.

In a study done by researchers from Harvard Medical School and the University of California, San Diego, it was found that when an individual becomes happy the network effect can be measured up to three degrees. In other words, one person’s happiness is capable of triggering a chain reaction that extends beyond single person-to-person relationships. These effects can last up to a year.

On the flip side, sadness does not spread through social networks as robustly as happiness. On average, every happy friend increases your own chance of being happy by nine percent. Each unhappy friend decreases it by seven percent.

"One of the key determinants of human happiness is the happiness of others," Nicholas Christakis of Harvard Medical School was quoted as saying. "An innovative feature of our work was exploring the idea that emotions are a collective phenomenon and not just as individual one."

Researchers used data from the Framingham Heart Study to recreate a social network of close to 5,000 people whose happiness was measured for 20 years. Christakis and fellow study author James Fowler of UCSD observed social and family ties and analyzed the spread of happiness through this group.

Fowler noted the practical implications of this study may lie in the importance of taking responsibility for your own happiness because it seems to impact dozens of others. "The pursuit of happiness is not a solitary goal. We are all connected, and so is our joy," Fowler was quoted as saying.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

I Carry A Gun

I bought my first handgun, a S&W 649 revolver, about 18 months ago. After sufficient training and practice, I got my CCW, about a year ago. My first handmade holster, a silver dollar variation of the pancake holster, was made by Rob at Simply Rugged, a small custom holster company in Wasilia, Alaska.

Recently, I decided I wanted a strong-side belt holster, for potential car-jackers when I'm
traveling. When I went onto their site, I discovered we share more than an appreciation for well-made leather holsters: On one of their pages, called Gear Ready to Go, were some poignant sidebar comments about life and liberty. One of the sidebars, "I Carry a Gun", expresses my attitude better than I can. I have seen variations of this theme, but this one nailed it down for me. - NA

http://simplyrugged.com/gear/

I Carry A Gun

August 14th, 2008

I carry a gun. I don’t carry a gun to kill people. I carry a gun to keep from being killed. I don’t carry a gun to scare people. I carry a gun because sometimes this world can be a scary place. I don’t carry a gun because I’m paranoid. I carry a gun because there are real threats in the world. I don’t carry a gun because I’m evil. I carry a gun because I have lived long enough to see the evil in the world. I don’t carry a gun because I hate the government. I carry a gun because I understand the limitations of government.

I don’t carry a gun because I’m angry. I carry a gun so that I don’t have to spend
the rest of my life hating myself for failing to be prepared. I don’t carry a gun because I want to shoot someone. I carry a gun because I want to die at a ripe old age in my bed, and not on a sidewalk somewhere tomorrow afternoon. I don’t carry a gun to make me feel like a man. I carry a gun because men know how to take care of themselves and the ones they love. I don’t carry a gun because I feel inadequate. I carry a gun because, unarmed and facing armed thugs, I AM inadequate.

I don’t carry a gun because I love it. I carry a gun because I love life and the people who make it meaningful to me. “Police Protection” is an oxymoron. Free citizens must protect themselves. Police do not protect you from crime, they usually just investigate the crime after it happens and then call someone in to clean up the mess. I carry a gun because I’m too young to die and too old to take a beating. Anon.
As the saying goes, "When seconds count, the police are minutes away."

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Anarchy without Fear

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.” - William Butler Yeates

The Memory Hole

October 17, 2002

by JOE SOBRAN

These, you might say, are bleak days for libertarians, except that libertarians never have a nice day. Experience keeps proving them right, but still, after the “Reagan Revolution” and the final flop of the Socialist Motherland, alias the Soviet Union, they can’t make a dent in the political duopoly dedicated — right here in America! — to saving the welfare state.

All one can say is that libertarians’ days used to be even bleaker; a lot bleaker. They can remember when socialism, and the Soviet Union, used to look like the “wave of the future,” and opposing the trend was known as “trying to turn back the clock.”

Actually, libertarians’ ideas have had an influence their political weakness doesn’t reflect. Many conservative Republicans would vote for the Libertarian Party if they thought it had any chance of winning, rather than helping the Democrats win.

Libertarians are divided between conservatives and anarchists. The former think there must be some minimal state, or “limited government.” The anarchists think the state is evil in principle and must be totally eliminated. A radical position, to be sure, but an interesting one.

The first great American anarchist was Lysander Spooner, who died more than a century ago. His argument was simple. There is a natural and unchangeable moral law, which forbids slavery. No man has the right to force others to do his will. The state not only claims such a right, but claims a monopoly of force — the right to force its subjects to accept its laws as morally binding, no matter how arbitrary and unjust those laws may be.

That is, the state claims that its commands supersede the moral law. It claims it can add to, and subtract from, the eternal law of God. It never actually says this, but the claim is implicit in its supposed authority. If it has a legitimate, limitless monopoly of force, we all have a limitless duty to obey it. And this, Spooner says, is absurd. It amounts to saying that the state has the right to violate all our rights. Once we grant the principle, we are already slaves of the state.

Conservatives have tried to rein in the state with constitutions confining it to a few specific powers, but these constitutions have never worked for very long. The reason is simple. The state itself “interprets” the constitution in such a way as to broaden its own powers constantly — or it simply disregards the constitution as soon as it’s powerful enough to get away with it.

There is no getting away from it: at bottom, the state is nothing but organized force. Its only abiding rule is this: “Obey, or we will hurt you.”

What is force? Simone Weil defined force as that which turns a person into a thing — a corpse or a slave — with no will of its own. Of course even a slave exercises his own will to some degree, but only by sufferance of his master. The state itself has to allow its slaves some latitude, but its permissions aren’t genuine rights. Even the Soviet rulers had to permit some degree of the economic freedom it had abolished in principle; otherwise the socialist state would indeed have “withered away” — through famine. If the slaves don’t eat, the master starves too.

Most men today can hardly imagine living without the parasitic force-systems we call states. However bad the state may be, they assume that anarchy would be somehow even worse, even after a century of world war, mass murder, and general waste and destruction claiming hundreds of millions of lives and creating poverty where there might have been plenty.

By now, if men learned from experience, they would talk about the state in the same tones in which Jews talk about Nazis. Instead, they continue to imagine the state as their savior and protector, and as the natural solution to all their problems. Yet it’s self-evident that the bigger the state, the larger the ratio of force in human life, and the smaller the scope of free action.

The measure of the state’s success is that the word “anarchy” frightens people, while the word “state” does not. We are like those African slaves who believe that their master is their benefactor, or those Russians who still believe that Stalin was their guardian.

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Tuesday, November 04, 2008

GO VOTE



Today's the day...

Monday, November 03, 2008

(Forced) Consent Of The Governed

FOOD FOR THOUGHT...Better keep your eye on Obama's idea for a civilian national security force.

Obama: We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.

Thanks to: The Western Rifles Shooters Association

From the archives of The Memory Hole
Individualist Anarchism: The Brass Tacks

In this item from the December 1873 issue of The Word (Vol.2, No.8) edited by Stephen Pearl Andrews, Lysander Spooner summarizes for the reader his principal case against the American government in the wake of the Civil War reviewing the implications as well as the consequences of actions that establish beyond a shadow of a doubt its close kinship to the worst examples in history of despotism.

Forced Consent


"Abraham Lincoln did not cause the death of so many people from a mere love of slaughter, but only to bring about a state of consent that could not otherwise be secured for the government he had undertaken to administer. When a government has once reduced its people to a state of consent—that is, of submission to its will—it can put them to a much better use than to kill them; for it can then plunder them, enslave them, and use them as tools for plundering and enslaving others. And these are the uses to which most governments, our own among the rest, do put their people, whenever they have once reduced them to a state of consent to its will. Andrew Jackson said that those who did not consent to the government he attempted to administer upon them, for that reason, were traitors, and ought to be hanged. Like so many other so-called "heroes," he thought the sword and the gallows excellent instrumentalities for securing the people's consent to be governed. The idea that, although government should rest on the consent of the governed, yet so much force may nevertheless be employed as may be necessary to produce that consent, embodies everything that was ever exhibited in the shape of usurpation and tyranny in any country on earth.

It has cost this country a million of lives, and the loss of everything that resembles political liberty. It can have no place except as a part of a system of absolute military despotism. And it means nothing else either in this country, or in any other. There is no half-way house between a government depending wholly on voluntary support, and one depending wholly on military compulsion.

And mankind have only to choose between these two classes—the class that governs, and the class that is governed or enslaved. In this case, the government rests wholly on the consent of the governors, and not at all on the consent of the governed. And whether the governors are more or less numerous than the governed, and whether they call themselves monarchists, aristocrats, or republicans, the principle is the same. The simple, and only material fact, in all cases, is, that one body of men are robbing and enslaving another. And it is only upon military compulsion that men will submit to be robbed and enslaved, it necessarily follows that any government, to which the governed, the weaker party, do not consent, must be (in regard to that weaker party), a merely military despotism. Such is the state of things now in this country, and in every other in which government does not depend wholly upon voluntary support. There never was and there never will be, a more gross, self-evident, and inexcusable violation of the principle that government should rest on the consent of the governed, than was the late war, as carried on by the North. There never was, and there never will be, a more palpable case of purely military despotism than is the government we now have." Lysander Spooner.

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Friday, October 31, 2008

Dennis Prager On "changing America"

h't to Allah Pundit at HotAir

Dennis Prager doesn't want America to "change". Nor do I want America to change. I want America to stay true to what made her great in the first place: core values based on Acknowledgment of a Creator, Reason, Individual Rights - which includes the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, and the Pursuit of Science and Technology. Aggressive government interference is hindering the manifestation of these core values.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

EXPERTS AGREE: BILL AYERS WROTE OBAMA'S BOOK

h't to The Sisyphus Files

WND
Experts affirm: Ayers wrote Obama's memoir

Scientific analyses independently find radical's mark on 'Dreams From My Father'

Obama has perjured himself to the American people. Here's the proof:

The B-Cast on Breitbart TV - Jack Cashill Analyses Obama's Book


The Fiction Fixer Evaluation of Dreams From My Father

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

ACORN TOP OFFICIAL ADMITS FRAUD

Bertha Lewis, Acorn's Chief Executive Shrugs It Off. "Catch us if you can..."


Nation-wide fraud

More Voter Registration Doubts Plague Democrats

This presidential election is less and less about the candidates themselves, and more about the registration/election process itself. And that spells trouble. Should John McCain/Sarah Palin win the election, the democrats are not going to accept that their candidate lost. And Should Barack Obama win, given the accusations of nation-wide voter registration fraud, the courts will likely decide the outcome. Either way, it's going to be nasty.

Obama does not have it within himself to bring together a divided nation. But creating further racial divide, not bringing together a nation, has been his goal all along. All those years of sitting at Rev Wright's feet has forever scarred his psyche. Obama is a man who knows in his heart he is not up to the job of "leader of the free world". He is a man who was "selected" by the radical Left to be a convenient wedge in their drive to divide our nation in order to create a socialist state. But legitimacy has never been a goal of the Left. So the question becomes, not whether we can pull together as a nation, but whether we can survive as a nation.

If the power-mad who represent us in government no longer hold true to the concept of a constitutional republic, then we are a constitutional republic in name only - and the federal government becomes a sham which violates the social contract of all sovereign citizens. If a democractic majority gets to decide the fate of a nation, and they want a totalitarian system of government, then the tyrants win.

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Thursday, October 23, 2008

Nope, Nothing Racial Goin' On Here

This is hilarious. Howard Stern reports on interviews with Obama's Harlem (NYC) supporters - and proves, once and for all, that Obama's followers really are issue oriented, and back him even in his excellent choice for Vice-President, er, one Sarah Palin.

Nothin' racial about these choices - strictly a matter of examining, and supporting the man's policies regarding stem-cell research, abortion, and staying the course in Iraq.

Yup, we are truly a nation of idiots.

It would have been even more interesting, had the interviewer tried to see just how far Obama's supporters could have been led down the yellow brick road of absurdity- say, by attributing (less government is the answer) libertarian views of Bob Barr to Obama...

Power to the people!



John McCain should be proud. Ah, If only he were dark-skinned. And young. And a pin-headed socialist. And
Muslim. Maybe he would have a chance with Obama supporters. Hell, they already agree with his policies. Sort of.

Newt Gingrich Excoriates Liberal Press and TV Networks



On a lighter note, NewsBusters brings us up to speed...

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

The Third Jihad: The Movie


"The Third Jihad" is a movie about the on-going cultural Islamic jihad in America. Narrated by Dr. Zudhi Jasser, it is a chilling account of radical Islamic activity, on campuses, in mosques, and prisons here in the United States.

Dr Jasser is a devout, American-born Muslim medical doctor, based in Phoenix Arizona. Jasser founded the AIFD, the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, and has been out-spoken in his fight against the insideous Islamic organization known as CAIR, The Council on American-Islamic Relations. Liars, all.

If anyone would qualify as a "moderate Muslim", it would be Zudhi Jasser. But I do not believe there is even such a thing as "moderate Muslims". For speaking out against the radicalization of Islam, the Muslim community has shunned him, marginalized him. While he is on our side, being an American and sharing Western Values, his own Muslim community, if there is such a thing, is unlikely to listen to him.

We cannot afford to ignore his message.

Radical Islam will rule the day for Muslims. Western Values are antithetical to radical Islam. Saudi Arabia supplies all the financial support needed. Youthful guile in the Islamic world provides the fodder.

The question is: will it rule the day for us Americans as well? In Western Europe, aided by the Multicultural ideology of cultural relativism, a whole bloc of countries are poised to fall to the Islamists.

In spotlighting the problems and causes of radical Islam, Jasser has involved himself in a most needed wake-up call to Americans, who have no idea of the coming onslaught. This is one video everyone needs to watch, and take to heart.

"We all know about terrorism. This is the war you don't know about."

I would like to embed the video, but Blogger can't/won't do it. This is a 30-minute free version of the film. Go here to view the video.

Obama is said to be a Muslim, even though he denies it. That has to be troubling to a lot of of people. Even if he weren't a Muslim, his executive policies would be disastrous in our cultural war with Islam.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Monday, October 20, 2008

Playing The Race Card - Obama Style

As the saying goes..."Don't piss on my leg, and tell me it's raining."


Photo courtesy of the Kuwaitis

IBD EDITORIALS

Obama's Label As Race Healer No Longer Fits


By CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER
Posted Friday, October 17, 2008

Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association — with total strangers, mind you — but worse: guilty according to The New York Times of "race-baiting and xenophobia."

But should you bring up Barack Obama's real associations — 20 years with Jeremiah Wright, working on two foundations and distributing money with William Ayers, citing the raving Michael Pfleger as one who helps him keep his moral compass (Chicago Sun-Times, April 2004) and the long-standing relationship with the left-wing vote-fraud specialist ACORN — you have crossed the line into illegitimate guilt by association.

Moreover, it is tinged with racism.

The fact that, when John McCain actually heard one of those nasty things said about Obama, he incurred the boos of his own crowd by insisting that Obama is "a decent person that you do not have to be scared (of) as president" makes no difference. It surely did not stop John Lewis from comparing McCain to George Wallace.

The search for McCain's racial offenses is untiring and often unhinged. Remember McCain's Berlin/celebrity ad that showed a shot of Paris Hilton? It was an appalling attempt to exploit white hostility at the idea of black men "becoming sexually involved with white women," fulminated New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. He took to TV to denounce McCain's exhumation of that most vile prejudice, pointing out McCain's gratuitous insertion in the ad of "two phallic symbols," the Washington Monument and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Except that Herbert was entirely delusional. There was no Washington Monument. There was no Leaning Tower. Just photographs seen in every newspaper in the world of Barack Obama's Berlin rally in the setting he himself had chosen, Berlin's Victory Column.

Herbert is not the only fevered one. On Tuesday night, Rachel Maddow of MSNBC and Jonathan Alter of Newsweek fell over themselves agreeing that the "political salience" of the Republican attack on ACORN is, yes, its unstated appeal to racial prejudice.

Orwell Times Two

This about an organization that is being accused of voter registration fraud in about a dozen states. In Nevada, the investigating secretary of state is a Democrat. Is he playing the race card too?

What makes the charges against McCain especially revolting is that he has been scrupulous in eschewing the race card. He has gone far beyond what is right and necessary, refusing even to make an issue of Obama's deep, self-declared connection with the race-baiting Jeremiah Wright.

In the name of racial rectitude, McCain has denied himself the use of that perfectly legitimate issue. It is simply Orwellian for him to be now so widely vilified as a stoker of racism. What makes it doubly Orwellian is that these charges are being made on behalf of the one presidential candidate who has repeatedly, and indeed quite brilliantly, deployed the race card.

How brilliantly?

The reason Bill Clinton is sulking in his tent is because he feels that Obama surrogates succeeded in painting him as a racist. Clinton has many sins, but from his student days to his post-presidency, his commitment and sincerity in advancing the cause of African-Americans have been undeniable. If the man Toni Morrison called the first black president can be turned into a closet racist, then anyone can.

Fool Me Once . . .

And Obama has shown no hesitation in doing so to McCain. Just weeks ago, in Springfield, Mo., and elsewhere, he warned darkly that George Bush and John McCain were going to try to frighten you by saying that, among other scary things, Obama has "a funny name" and "doesn't look like all those other presidents on those dollar bills."

McCain has never said that, nor anything like that. When asked at the time to produce one instance of McCain deploying race, the Obama campaign could not. Yet here was Obama firing a pre-emptive charge of racism against a man who had not indulged in it. An extraordinary rhetorical feat, and a dishonorable one.

What makes this all the more dismaying is that it comes from Barack Obama, who has consistently presented himself as a healer, a man of a new generation above and beyond race, the man who would turn the page on the guilt-tripping grievance politics of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

I once believed him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Joe The Plumber Abducted By Aliens: Gets Dreaded Anal Probe

Correction Update: It was the Obama Camp goons, not the aliens, who administered the anal probe. My bad.

Joe was rumored to have said: "Hey, that wasn't so bad. I see much worse on the job every day."

The Left Declares War On Joe The Plumber: "It's the Obama way."

By MICHELLE MALKIN
IBD Editorials

Posted Friday, October 17, 2008

Six-term Sen. Joe Biden's got some nerve going after citizen Joe the Plumber. But the entrenched politician from Delaware, who fancies himself the nation's No. 1 Ordinary Joe, had no choice.

Obama-Biden simply can't tolerate an outspoken citizen successfully painting the Democratic ticket as socialist overlords. And so a dirty, desperate war against Joe Wurzelbacher is on. Joe Wurzelbacher has been probed more deeply than Barack Obama.

The left's political plumbers are attacking the messenger, rummaging through his personal life and predictably wielding the race card once again. It's standard operating procedure for the Obama thug machine.

Wurzelbacher is the small-business man from Ohio who during a Toledo campaign swing last weekend questioned Obama about his tax plan. The revealing exchange was caught on tape and broadcast widely across the Internet and TV airwaves.

In response to Wurzelbacher's question about why he should be "taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream," Obama sermonized that he needed to "spread the wealth around" because "it's good for everybody."

John McCain flung that chilling Marxist mantra back in Obama's face during Wednesday night's presidential debate and repeatedly cited Joe the Plumber's plight.

Obama squirmed. The dirt diggers started Googling. And the next morning, six-term Sen. Biden launched the first salvo against the Ohio entrepreneur on NBC's "Today" show," challenging the veracity of his story:

"I don't have any Joe the Plumbers in my neighborhood that make $250,000 a year."

Under an Obama-Biden administration, they'll make sure no Joe the Plumbers ever earn such a salary. "It's good for everybody," after all.

Biden, as is so often the case, twisted the facts about Wurzelbacher. No surprise there. Slick Joe Biden is the one who tells fables about visiting a diner in Delaware that hasn't been open in years; spins yarns about getting "forced down" in a helicopter over Afghanistan because of perilous conditions that turned out to be weather related, not al-Qaida related; and continues to slander the family of the man involved in his wife and daughter's fatal car accident (crash investigators cleared the now-deceased driver of drunken driving, despite Biden's insinuations). But I digress.

Wurzelbacher never claimed to be making $250,000 a year. He told Obama that he might be "getting ready to buy a company that makes about $250,000, $270,000" a year. His simple point was that Obama's punitive tax proposals would make it harder to realize his dream.

Obama's followers couldn't handle the incontrovertible truth. Left-wing blogs immediately went to work, blaring headlines like "Not A Real $250k Plumber!"

Next, they falsely accused Wurzelbacher of not being registered to vote — he's registered in Lucas County, Ohio, and voted as a Republican in this year's primary.

Next, they called him a liar for identifying himself as undecided. Only registered Democrats and fake Republican tools used in mainstream media stories and YouTube debates can use that label, you see.

Next, liberal blogger Joshua Marshall cast Wurzelbacher as some kind of rabid freak for calling Social Security a "joke" — as if no working-class Americans could believe the federal government's entitlement programs were a rip-off unless they were bought and paid for by the McCain campaign.

Then, suddenly, the journalists who wouldn't lift a finger to investigate Obama's longtime relationships with Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright sprang into action rifling through citizen Joe Wurzelbacher's tax records.

Politico.com reported breathlessly: "Samuel J. Wurzelbacher has a lien placed against him to the tune of $1,182.92. The lien is dated from January of '07."

Press outlets probed his divorce records. The local plumbers union, which has endorsed Obama, claimed he didn't do their required apprenticeship work and didn't have a license to work outside his local township. Hang him!

After Wurzelbacher told Katie Couric that Obama's rhetorical tap dance was "almost as good as Sammy Davis Jr.," inevitable cries of "bigotry" followed. (There are now tens of thousands of Internet hits for "Joe the Plumber racist.")

Welcome to Joe the Plumber Derangement Syndrome. If you can't beat him, smear him.

It's the Obama way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yes, it's the Democratic way. But don't worry: what goes around, comes around. If the Leftist believe that they can force this arrogant charlatan down our throats, without payback, they truly are in a Utopian dream.

Friday, October 17, 2008

John McCain on John McCain

John McCain:

I know what fear feels like. It's a thief in the night who robs your strength. I know what hopelessness feels like. It's an enemy who defeats your will. I felt those things once before. I will never let them in again. I'm an American. And I choose to fight.

Don't give up hope. Be strong. Have courage. And fight.

Fight for a new direction for our country. Fight for what's right for America. Fight to clean up the mess of corruption, infighting and selfishness in Washington.

Fight to get our economy out of the ditch and back in the lead.

Fight for the ideals and character of a free people.

Fight for our children's future.

Fight for justice and opportunity for all.

Stand up to defend our country from its enemies.

Stand up, stand up, stand up and fight. America is worth fighting for. Nothing is inevitable here. We never give up. We never quit. We never hide from history. We make history.

McCain Defends Joe: Shouldn’t Be ‘Smeared’ for Asking Obama ‘Tough Question’



MCCAIN DEFENDS JOE THE PLUMBER REMARKS IN MIAMI, FL


Fri Oct 17 2008


It's great to be here in Miami. Florida is a must-win state on November 4th, and with your help, we're going to win Florida, and bring change to Washington, DC. We had a good debate this week. You may have noticed-- there was a lot of talk about Senator Obama's tax increases and Joe the Plumber. Last weekend, Senator Obama showed up in Joe's driveway to ask for his vote, and Joe asked Senator Obama a tough question. I'm glad he did; I think Senator Obama could use a few more tough questions.

The response from Senator Obama and his campaign yesterday was to attack Joe
. People are digging through his personal life and he has TV crews camped out in front of his house. He didn't ask for Senator Obama to come to his house. He wasn't recruited or prompted by our campaign. He just asked a question. And Americans ought to be able to ask Senator Obama tough questions without being smeared and targeted with political attacks.

The question Joe asked about our economy is important, because Senator Obama's plan would raise taxes on small businesses that employ 16 million Americans. Senator Obama's plan will kill those jobs at just the time when we need to be creating more jobs. My plan will create jobs, and that's what America needs.

Senator Obama says that he wanted to spread your wealth around. When politicians talk about taking your money and spreading it around, you'd better hold onto your wallet. Senator Obama claims that wants to give a tax break to the middle class, but not only did he vote for higher taxes on the middle class in the Senate, his plan gives away your tax dollars to those who don't pay taxes.

That's not a tax cut, that's welfare. America didn't become the greatest nation on earth by redistributing wealth; we became the greatest nation by creating new wealth.

This is the choice that we face. These are hard times. Our economy is in crisis. Americans are fighting in two wars. We face many enemies in this dangerous world, and many challenges here at home.

The next President won't have time to get used to the office. He won't have the luxury of studying up on the issues before he acts. He will have to act immediately. And to do that, he will need experience, courage, judgment and a bold plan of action to take this country in a new direction. We cannot spend the next four years as we have spent much of the last eight: waiting for our luck to change. We have to act immediately. I said it at the last debate: I'm not George Bush; if Senator Obama wants to run against George Bush, he should have run for President 4 years ago. We need a new direction now. We have to fight for it. I've been fighting for this country since I was seventeen years old, and I have the scars to prove it. If I'm elected President, I will fight to take America in a new direction from my first day in office until my last. I'm not afraid of the fight, I'm ready for it.

I'm not going to spend $700 billion dollars of your money just bailing out the Wall Street bankers and brokers who got us into this mess. I'm going to make sure we take care of the people who were devastated by the excesses of Wall Street and Washington. I'm going to spend a lot of that money to bring relief to you, and I'm not going to wait sixty days to start doing it.

I have a plan to protect the value of your home and get it rising again by buying up bad mortgages and refinancing them so if your neighbor defaults he doesn't bring down the value of your house with him.

I have a plan to let retirees and people nearing retirement keep their money in their retirement accounts longer so they can rebuild their savings. I will protect Social Security so that retirees get the benefits they have earned, and I will bring both parties together to fix Social Security so that it is there for future generations.

I have a plan to hold the line on taxes and cut them to make America more competitive and create jobs here at home.

Raising taxes makes a bad economy much worse. Keeping taxes low creates jobs, keeps money in your hands and strengthens our economy.

The explosion of government spending over the last eight years has put us deeper in debt to foreign countries that don't have our best interests at heart. It weakened the dollar and made everything you buy more expensive.

If I'm elected President, I won't spend nearly a trillion dollars more of your money, on top of the $700 billion we just gave the Treasury Secretary, as Senator Obama proposes. Because he can't do that without raising your taxes or digging us further into debt. I'm going to make government live on a budget just like you do.

I will freeze government spending on all but the most important programs like defense, veterans care, Social Security and health care until we scrub every single government program and get rid of the ones that aren't working for the American people. And I will veto every single pork barrel bill Congresses passes.

If I'm elected President, I won't fine small businesses and families with children, as Senator Obama proposes, to force them into a new huge government run health care program, while he keeps the cost of the fine a secret until he hits you with it. I will bring down the skyrocketing cost of health care with competition and choice to lower your premiums, and make it more available to more Americans. I'll make sure you can keep the same health plan if you change jobs or leave a job to
stay home.

I will provide every single American family with a $5000 refundable tax credit to help them purchase insurance. Workers who already have health care insurance from their employers will keep it and have more money to cover costs. Workers who don't have health insurance can use it to find a policy anywhere in this country to meet their basic needs.

If I'm elected President, I won't raise taxes on small businesses, as Senator Obama proposes, and force them to cut jobs. I will keep small business taxes where they are, help them keep their costs low, and let them spend their earnings to create more jobs.

If I'm elected President, I won't meet unconditionally with the Castro brothers, while they keep political prisoners in jail, stifle free media and block free elections in Cuba. When I am President, we are going to pressure the Cuban government to free their people. The day is coming when Cuba will be free. I will open new markets to goods made in America and make sure our trade is free and fair.

And I'll make sure we help workers who've lost a job that won't come back find a new one that won't go away.

If I'm elected President, I won't make it harder to sell our goods overseas and kill more jobs as Senator Obama proposes. I will open new markets to goods made in America and make sure our trade is free and fair. And I'll make sure we help workers who've lost a job that won't come back find a new one that won't go away.

The last President to raise taxes and restrict trade in a bad economy as Senator Obama proposes was Herbert Hoover. That turned a recession into a depression. They say those who don't learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. Well, my friends, I know my history lessons, and I sure won't make the mistakes Senator Obama will.

If I'm elected President, we're going to stop sending $700 billion to countries that don't like us very much. I won't argue to delay drilling for more oil and gas and building new nuclear power plants in America, as Senator Obama does. We will start new drilling now. We will invest in all energy alternativesÊ-- nuclear, wind, solar, and tide. We will encourage the manufacture of hybrid, flex fuel and electric automobiles. We will invest in clean coal technology. We will lower the cost of energy within months, and we will create millions of new jobs.

Let me give you the state of the race today. We have 18 days to go. We're 6 points down. The national media has written us off. Senator Obama is measuring the drapes, and planning with Speaker Pelosi and Senator Reid to raise taxes, increase spending, take away your right to vote by secret ballot in labor elections, and concede defeat in Iraq. But they forgot to let you decide. My friends, we've got them just where we want them.

What America needs in this hour is a fighter; someone who puts all his cards on the table and trusts the judgment of the American people. I come from a long line of McCains who believed that to love America is to fight for her. I have fought for you most of my life. There are other ways to love this country, but I've never been the kind to do it from the sidelines.

I know you're worried. America is a great country, but we are at a moment of national crisis that will determine our future. Will we continue to lead the world's economies or will we be overtaken? Will the world become safer or more dangerous? Will our military remain the strongest in the world? Will our children and grandchildren's future be brighter than ours?

My answer to you is yes. Yes, we will lead. Yes, we will prosper. Yes, we will be safer. Yes, we will pass on to our children a stronger, better country. But we must be prepared to act swiftly, boldly, with courage and wisdom.

I know what fear feels like. It's a thief in the night who robs your strength. I know what hopelessness feels like. It's an enemy who defeats your will. I felt those things once before. I will never let them in again. I'm an American. And I choose to fight.

Don't give up hope. Be strong. Have courage. And fight.

Fight for a new direction for our country. Fight for what's right for America. Fight to clean up the mess of corruption, infighting and selfishness in Washington.

Fight to get our economy out of the ditch and back in the lead.

Fight for the ideals and character of a free people.

Fight for our children's future.

Fight for justice and opportunity for all.

Stand up to defend our country from its enemies.

Stand up, stand up, stand up and fight. America is worth fighting for. Nothing is inevitable here. We never give up. We never quit. We never hide from history. We make history.

Now, let's go win this election and get this country moving again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And now a word from Senator Barack Hussein Obama:


OBAMA CAUGHT SAYING ACORN AND FRIENDS WILL SHAPE HIS PRESIDENTIAL AGENDA



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Michelle Obama - Still A "Victim"

OH, BROTHER

WND Exclusive

Michelle Obama calls Corsi 'evil'


She tells foreign news agency 'to support Africans and African-American view'

October 14, 2008

WASHINGTON – Michelle Obama placed a surprise call to an African news agency to protest its coverage of WND investigative stories about her husband – characterizing the source of the material as "racist" and Jerome Corsi as "evil."

The call was placed to African Press International, according to a report in the publication today. It said Michelle Obama accused API of "colluding with American Internet bloggers in an effort to bring down her husband."

The report said Mrs. Obama had hoped the African media "was mature enough to be in the front to give unwavering support to her husband, a man Africans should identify themselves with."

API's account said it was "only relaying what the American bloggers and other media outlets had discovered through their investigations." This, according to the story, angered her.

WND senior staff writer Jerry Corsi

"African Press International is supposed to support Africans and African-American view," she reportedly said. "It is strange that API has chosen to support the racists against my husband. There is no shame in being adopted by a stepfather. All dirt has been thrown onto my husband's face and yet he loves this country. My husband and I know that there is no law that will stop him from becoming the president, just because some American white racists are bringing up the issue of my husband's adoption by his stepfather. The important thing here is where my husband's heart is at the moment. I can tell the American people that my husband loves this country and his adoption never changed his love for this country. He was born in Hawaii, yes, and that gives him all the right to be an American citizen even though he was adopted by a foreigner."

The Obama campaign immediately denied the telephone call happened. [naturally]

Tommy Vietor, a campaign spokesman, told Byron York on the National Review Online blog "The Corner," the conversation didn't happen.

"The answer is no, it's not real, the report is made up. She did not speak to the organization," Vietor said.

However, in an e-mail to WND, a man who identified himself as API's "Chief Editor Korikr" confirmed the exchange.

"API hereby confirms to you that the story is true and if the huge interest on this particular story continues, we will post the recording on our website in the next immediate days.

"When we published the story we did not intend to cause any chaos but we are shocked by the huge interest the story is receiving from the Americans and the American media," he continued.

"Mrs. Obama called us just to ask API to stop joining the mainstream hate online media that is trying to destroy her husband's opportunity to get the presidency," he wrote.

He said his editorial board would meet to discuss how best to release the audio.

AFI asked Michelle Obama to comment on the detention of Corsi during his visit last week to Kenya, where he was investigating the presidential candidate's links to a controversial strongman serving as prime minister.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I think Sarah Palin and Michelle Obama should just wrestle for the job. My money is on the pit bull with lipstick.

If the campaigns can't pull that together, how about a Sarah Palin/Michelle Obama debate? At Princeton. Free beernuts.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

President Reagan On Freedom

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same." - Ronald Reagan

Look around you. Where will Americans get a sense of patriotism now?



Just a funny line from The Gipper...(19 secs)



I wonder what President Reagan would think about the government's latest move: nationalizing US banks

Sunday, October 12, 2008

A Black American Who Doesn't Like Obama

I noticed this video yesterday on YouTube, but passed it by because I figured it was just another 'Obama, Obama" chant. Man, was I wrong. It wasn't until I was perusing the latest post at The Breda fallacy and saw it up on her site, that I watched the video. Glad I did.

A black American, cut from the same cloth as Bill Cosby, speaks to his democratic brothers (and sisters). Why does it matter? It matters in the same way that a ray of hope dispels gloom. Or when Reason won't stand down, even under fire.

Thursday, October 09, 2008

ACORN STINKS (See Videos)

tip o' the hat to Michelle Malkin for the Image



There ain't nothin' more powerful than the odor of mendacity...You can smell it. It smells like death. - TW

OBAMA IS IN BED WITH ACORN

Acorn is the antithesis of "I pledge allegiance to the flag, and to the republic for which it stands."





Democrats Trying To Pull A Fast One, As Usual...





Everywhere you turn, there's the obnoxious odor of MENDACITY







LA RAZA IS STINKIN' UP THE JOINT, TOO



Thanks also to Michelle Malkin for the La Raza connection, via Babalu

It's about time to take out the garbage.

Wednesday, October 08, 2008

Obama feted By The New Party

Human Events

Obama and the New Party

by Erick Erickson
Posted 06/10/2008


Two weeks ago at RedState, we documented Obama’s 1996 endorsement by the New Party. A review of the New Party establishes that not only was the party an amalgamation of far left groups, but Barack Obama knew that when he sought the party’s endorsement.

Most of the New Party’s history has been lost in the digital age. It was established in 1992 and started to die out in 1998, well before Google and the modern web were established. But through lengthy searches of the Nexis archive and microfilm at the local university library, I’ve been able to piece this together.

The New Party was established in 1992 “by union activist Sandy Pope and University of Wisconsin professor Joel Rogers,” USA Today reported on November 16, 1992. The paper wrote that the new party was “self-described [as] ‘socialist democratic.’”

The seeds, however, had been sown all the way back in 1988. Quoting John Nichols in the March 22, 1998 issue of In These Times, “The roots of the New Party go back to the aftermath of Jesse Jackson’s run for president in 1988. At that time, Dan Cantor, who had served as labor coordinator for the Jackson campaign, and University of Wisconsin sociology professor Joel Rogers began talking about how to formulate an alternative between the increasingly indistinguishable Democratic-Republican monolith.”

Joel Rogers sought to use the idea of “fusion” as a way to get the New Party into power.

Fusion is a pretty simple concept. A candidate could run as both a Democrat and a New Party member to signal the candidate was, in fact, a left-leaning candidate, or at least not a center-left DLC type candidate. If the candidate -- let’s call him Barack Obama -- received only 500 votes in the Democratic Party against another candidate who received 1000 votes, Obama would clearly not be the nominee. But, if Obama also received 600 votes from the New Party, Obama’s New Party votes and Democratic votes would be fused. He would be the Democratic nominee with 1100 votes.

The fusion idea set off a number of third parties, but the New Party was probably the most successful. A March 22, 1998 In These Times article by John Nichols showed just how successful. “After six years, the party has built what is arguably the most sophisticated left-leaning political operation the country has seen since the decline of the Farmer-Labor, Progressive and Non-Partisan League groupings of the early part of the century …. In 1996, it helped Chicago’s Danny Davis, a New Party member, win a Democratic congressional primary, thereby assuring his election in the majority-black district …. The threat of losing New Party support, or of the New Party running its own candidates against conservative Democrats, would begin a process of forcing the political process to the left, [Joel] Rogers argued.”

Fusion, fortunately for the country, died in 1997. William Rehnquist, writing for a 6-3 Supreme Court, found the concept was not a protected constitutional right. It was two years too late to stop Obama.

On December 1, 1994, after the Gingrich revolution swept the Democrats from congress and forced Bill Clinton to triangulate, the Chicago Tribune ran an article by Steve Mills entitled “Looking for the Left: The Old Progressives and Marxists Still Breathe Idealist Fire, but They’re Too Splintered to Generate Any Heat.”

“‘The Left is in crisis, and it has been for some time,’ said Carl Davidson, the former national secretary for the radical Students for a Democratic Society. ‘I don’t know if it’s even bottomed out yet,’” he reported to Mr. Mills. Mills continued, “The Socialist Workers Party is in this corner; the International Socialist Organization is in this one. The [communist group Committee of Correspondence] is in another. The radicals, or even the liberals with some radical leanings -- so-called ‘soft radicals’ -- seem to find it hard to abandon individual issues for a broader movement.”

But, Mills reported, “It is amid this political confusion that The New Party would like to step in. ‘If there’s anything that defines the American Left, it’s fragmentation,’ said Dan Cantor, the party’s national organizer.… The New Party aims to change that. By uniting the progressives behind a cohesive ideology, one that, in theory at least, will have room for all the factions that now litter the landscape of the Left, The New Party is confident progressives can again be strong.”

In 1995, the New Ground, the newsletter of the Chicago Chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, noted, “In Chicago, the New Party's biggest asset and biggest liability is ACORN.

“Like most organizations, ACORN is a mixed bag. On one hand, in Chicago, ACORN is a group that attempts to organize some of the most depressed communities in the city. Chicago organizers for ACORN and organizers for SEIU Local 880 have been given modest monthly recruitment quotas for new New Party members. On the other hand, like most groups that depend on canvassing for fundraising, it's easy enough to find burned out and disgruntled former employees. And ACORN has not had the reputation for being interested in coalition politics -- until recently and, happily, not just within the New Party.”

Naturally, Barack Obama was an active part of ACORN at the time, helping it legally in court and helping it organize voters. By 1996, ACORN and the New Party were essentially the same body. Along with the Democratic Socialists of America, the New Party endorsed Barack Obama in his State Senate bid.

Obama began seeking the New Party endorsement in 1995. He had been running in a four way primary against his former boss, Senator Alice Palmer, herself a far left radical, and two other individuals. But an election law quirk gave Obama the upper hand. In order to get on the ballot, candidates had to collect signatures of voters. Printed names were not allowed. Obama challenged the petitions of his rivals and was able to get every one of them thrown off the ballot. By the time the ballot was drawn up for the 1996 election, Obama’s was the only name in the race.

Nonetheless, Obama still coveted the New Party endorsement. The New Party required candidates who received the endorsement sign a pledge of support for the party. Obama did not need to support a party that was, in effect, a front group for communists; yet he still chose to. The July issue of the New Ground noted that 15% of the New Party consisted of Democratic Socialists of America members and a good number of Committee of Correspondence members.

Barack Obama, not needing to, chose to affiliate himself with this band of quasi-communists. As the nation moves closer to the election, it is clear that Obama chose to affiliate with assorted anti-American radicals. Machiavelli once noted that we can know a leader by the people he surrounds himself with. What does that say about Barack Obama, who chose to surround himself with people committed to overthrowing the United States and capitalism?


Trackposted to
Cao's Blog, Faultline USA, Democrat=Socialist, Right Voices, and Shadowscope, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

Barack Obama - Who Is He, Really? A Picture Emerges...

CNN Finds Extensive Ties Between Barack Obama and ‘Terrorist’ Bill Ayers

An Obama-Ayers link? Oh, yes.

CNN's Drew Griffin on links between Barack Obama and a founder of the 1960s terror group Weather Underground, Bill Ayers.



Is this a big deal? Well, Obama obviously has played down the connection with terrorist William Ayers. Obama hasn't been truthful about his relationship with Rev Wright, either. The truth is coming out about what this "community organizer" Obama was up to as chairman of the 100 million dollar Chicago Annenberg Challenge project, and the Woods Fund, which gave money to Rev Wright's church. The man won't come clean. He just won't. He is not truthful.

Liar, Liar Pants on fire!!

Anita Dunn, Obama senior advisor, looks like an idiot on the video.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Oct 7, 2008

LAS VEGAS (AP) - Nevada state authorities are raiding the Las Vegas headquarters of an organization that works to get low-income people to vote.

A Nevada secretary of state's office spokesman said Tuesday that investigators are looking for evidence of voter fraud at the office of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, also called ACORN.

No one was at the ACORN office when state agents arrived with a search warrant and began carting records and documents away.

Secretary of State spokesman Bob Walsh says ACORN is accused of submitting multiple voter registrations with false and duplicate names.

The raid comes two months after state and federal authorities formed a task force to pursue election-fraud allegations in Nevada.
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Trackposted to
The Virtuous Republic, Blog @ MoreWhat.com, Leaning Straight Up, and The World According to Carl, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

Monday, October 06, 2008

A De-Evolution of Leadership - The Quiet Takeover of America

America needs to wake up.

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. - CS Lewis
With Obama at the helm, the likelihood of this scenario grows exponentially. With McCain leading, we will have at least a temporary buffer between the sovereign citizens of America and those who would torture us FOR OUR OWN GOOD.

The social progressives will literally take everything, unless we fight for our rights. Unless we are willing to fight for our first and second amendments, we had best prepare ourselves for a mind-set which includes being thankful for being allowed to exist in a political reality where the individual is always sacrificed for "the greater good". That rubs against the grain for me.

The silencing of our voices masquerades as "hate speech", hate crimes" - as "multicultural" dogma. The goal is to induce self-censorship, and if that doesn't work, the madmen will impose penalties for our transgressions. What do they want? POWER. Nor do they give a fig if you and I are destroyed in the process.

History provides us with numerous examples of such unbridled tyranny: Stalin's USSR, Communist China under Mao, Hitler's Nazi Germany, Pol Pot's Cambodia - and the list grows now to include countries where the Islamists have gained control of the government. Darfur and Somalia come to mind. The list grows to include many African and Indonesian countries, and unless checked, you can add the most East and West European countries as well. Gun control and confiscation were among the very first policies carried out by the Islamic governments.

Indeed, that has always been the case.



(Previously posted in March) From the Eggman...

(Emphasis added)

Leaders lead, tyrants rule and servants serve. When did we lose sight of the distinction?

Place yourself in this hypothetical situation.

You are very successful and your time is in constant demand. It is no longer cost effective (or very much fun,) to shop, cook, register the car, pick up the cleaning, pay the bills and hunt for parking spaces.

Your situation DEMANDS you hire or contract the following:


* Personal Assistant
* Accountant/Business Manager
* Lawyer
* Housekeeper/Home Manager
* Family Nutritionist/Cook
* Tutor/Home School Teacher
* Driver/Cheauffer

All is well in your life. Your children are happy and well adjusted. Jimmy is very bright, eager to learn and enthusiastic about every new experience. His rampant curiosity is occasionally annoying, but you recognize it as an indication of genius. Your spouse and children often accompany you on your trips. There is always time for sightseeing and camping, which the family enjoys. Life is certainly good.

One day your doctor looks at your genetic profile and decides you have a marginally higher risk for high blood pressure than average. He orders you onto a low-fat, low-cholesterol diet. When you fail to follow his orders he instructs your housekeeper to stop allowing you certain foods. It is, after all, for your own good.

The housekeeper forbids the cook to prepare any food with more than 1% fat. Therefore, no more bacon and eggs for you, even in your own home. When you try to bring some home and cook them for yourself, the housekeeper confiscates them and makes you go to your room. It is, after all, for your own good.

Your accountant informs you that you can't afford to take a trip to Bali next year because he has given himself a raise. Your lawyer says you can't afford to take a trip to France next month because she has given herself a raise.

They need the additional money so that they can hire more staff and build bigger offices to better take care of you.

You are either too busy or too preoccupied with your perfect life to pay much attention. Besides, you hired them to look after things so you could have a life in the first place. They are trusted professionals and know what is in your best interest.

Jimmy's tutor loses patience because Jimmy won't sit still and be quiet. The tutor calls the doctor and they medicate Jimmy to calm him down. When you attempt to intervene they threaten to take away all of your children. It is, after all, for the good of the children.

Your doctor decides that your afternoon cigar is not good for you, and tells you to quit. The next week smoke detectors are installed throughout your house. It is, after all, for your own good.

All agree that your ownership of guns is far too dangerous. What if Jimmy should find one? Jimmy, however loved to shoot at cans on the family camping trips. He's a crack shot and has serious Olympic ambitions. When your personal assistant learned of this, however, she decided you must be an unfit parent. Jimmy was drugged even more deeply into submission because of his 'special needs' and placed in foster care. It is after all, in his best interest.

They hired a security guard, one deputy Barney Fife, Jr., to restore your feeling of security since they took away your firearms. Of course Barney soon made it clear that he really wasn't under any obligation to protect you. He also worked for a few thousand other people so he couldn't even promise to come if you did call.

Last week the spy software they installed on your computer alerted them that you had been visiting dangerous and subversive Websites. Today, you find your access to the NRA, ACLU, The Washington Times, National Review, and many of your favorite sites blocked, for your own good.

Your doctor, lawyer, accountant and tutor have a secret meeting and make a few more decisions. They don't like your driver. He has been your best and most trusted friend for 30 years. He has 1 Medal of Honor, two phD's, a wife and three kids and works cheap. He is loyal to you, however, and not to them. They decide it would be in the best interests of all if they fired him and replaced him with one of their 'professionals.' Your new driver will have strict orders about where you may and may not travel.

You finally reach your breaking point. You don't know how you let it get this bad, but enough is enough. How did these one-time servants become your so-called leaders? Your lawyers, accountants and doctors were once bound by a strict contract. Now, however, they are acting outside that contract and you are supposed to accept it because it is for your own good.

You tell them, you, "aren't going to take it any more," and, "they are all fired!"

They then inform you that they control all of your assets, and most every other aspect of your life.

Thanks to them your once prosperous accounts are deeply in debt.

If you don't like it, too bad, they won't give you any more of your money. They might even lock you in your room for a long time. They do, after all, know what's in your best interest. Isn't that why you hired them in the first place?

It's your own fault for letting them get this deeply entangled in your daily affairs.

Now please sit down, shut up and act like the mindless lemming they want you to be.

Besides, they have guns and you don't!

If this sounds like nightmare fiction or extremism talking, wake up and taste the tyranny.

The 'you' in the story is you, me, and every other law-abiding citizen, tired of watching our natural and Constitutional rights erode one paragraph at a time. 'Them' in the story, are what our so-called 'servants in government' have become.

We were once a noble example of the future that the founders envisioned in their Great American Dream.

Today, however, we huddle defenseless in glass boxes. We have to ask permission to spend what little allowance they give us from our own earnings.

We have never committed a crime, lied to them or given them any reason to mistrust us, yet they question our every action. We are searched when we travel, they read our e-mails, tap our phones, confiscate our nail clippers invade our private lives from bedroom to nursery, and generally treat us like the criminals they swore to protect us from.

Once great masters of our own domain, we have become mere pawns on someone else's political chessboard. And they are doing it all for our own good.

Is America still the greatest country in the world? You bet your Stars and Stripes she is!


We fought and will continue to fight to defend her.

It's unfortunate that many of our once loyal and trusted servants did not evolve into leaders. Instead they 'devolved' into slaves to their own lust for power and control. It's more unfortunate, however, that we allowed it to happen.

Take back your country by getting involved. Run for office, help someone you support get elected, vote, drive people to the polls, join a grassroots movement, volunteer, write a post-card a week, send an e-mail a day. Do whatever it takes to be heard over the din of political spin and media misinformation. Let's put some common sense back into government, put the servants back into office and expose the tyrants for the impotent cowards they are.

It all starts at the local level. Get involved in your town, city or county government today!

The noisy minority would drown in a sea of their own insignificance if only 50% of the elegible voters would merely exercise their right to vote! (While they still have it)

"If Thomas Jefferson were alive today he'd be spinning in his grave."

JMHO,
Egg
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Trackposted to Woman Honor Thyself, The Pink Flamingo, Cao's Blog, third world county, Democrat=Socialist, Right Voices, The World According to Carl, and DragonLady's World, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.