Today's History Lesson

American Thinker

March 08, 2009

How the Great Depression brought Adolf Hitler to power

By James Lewis

Oh goody! Looks like we're having another Depression -- maybe just a little one, but who knows how long we can stretch it out, if we give it a good try?

So now we can play FDR and The Glorious New Deal.

If that sounds insane to you, well, it's what both Charles Krauthammer and David Broder -- the Burt and Ernie of the Washington Post -- have now concluded about the Obama White House.

The Great Depression certainly empowered FDR to make big changes in America over his four terms. In spite of all the hoo-hah the country didn't get out of the long, long slump until 1940 or so, with the huge mobilization of men and industrial resources for World War II. But FDR did get to play to his heart's content, through the NRA, the WPA, the AAA, the CCC, the TVA, the NLRB, the FDIC and the SEC. By comparison all we've got is a measly TARP. So far.

Trouble is, the Great Depression also brought Adolf Hitler to power. (Darn, I knew there had to be a downside somewhere.)

For those who have forgotten history or never bothered to learn it, here's is the sixty-second version.

1. Adolf Hitler started out as just another Bohemian intellectual, a sort of fire-breathing hippie, hanging around the coffee houses of Vienna after the big defeat of World War I. Just like Lenin, Mussolini and all the other psychopaths who rose to power around the same time. (Look it up, kids). His ilk can still be found in all the big city cafes of Europe, along with Berkeley, California, Madison, Wisconsin, and other college towns. They all profess peace. But in the right conditions, they are all happy to set off sociological or real dynamite. (Viz., Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn; the Rev. J. Wright and all the rest.)

Today the cafe intellectuals are more likely to be Islamic fascists, but what's the big diff? They all follow Hitler's big maxim, "Alles muss anders sein!" ("everything must change") or, in Obamalingo, "Change you can believe in." They all hate whatever is; it doesn't matter where they want to go.

They want a perfect world, every single one of them. Therefore they all hate freedom, electoral democracy, and the blood-sucking capitalists. They all demand justice and equality. And millions of suckers always fall for it. Some things never change; even the words don't change, much less the marching music.

2. When Hitler got out of the Kaiserliche Wehrmacht with burned-out lungs from mustard gas, Germany was broke. The Reich had started the war as the wealthiest, most industrialized, most highly-educated, and perhaps even the most arrogant nation in Europe. (Although that's a tough one to judge, there being so much competition in the arrogance sweepstakes in Europe.) Anyway, if you remember the goose-stepping soldiers with the funny helmets with the little spikes on top, and all the cheering people standing on the sidewalks going Hoch! Hoch!, that's the one.

3. As punishment for the war, the Versailles Treaty required the Germans to pay their victims, to handicap their military and heavy industries, and to be nice to their neighbors. They did pay some money for a while, but then they just lied about all those other things. None of the victorious nations dared to actually find out if the Germans were re-arming or not. Besides, the Germans and Austrians felt threatened by the new and militant Soviet Union, accidentally created when the old Reich helped Lenin to overthrow the Czar of Russia. (Lenin was another cafe intellectual who turned into a ruthless mass-murdering tyrant, except that he hung around Zurich rather than Vienna.)

4. After WWI the Weimar Republic brought parliamentary democracy of a kind to Germany. But it also saw a wave of corruption, degradation of middle class values, attacks on religion, promiscuity, and glorification of "alternative lifestyles" -- which all agreed on their hatred of the bourgeoisie (who happened to be their parents) -- along with lots of artistic expressions of the same Up Yours! attitude that has made government-funded artists so popular in our day.

(A lot of our avant garde is just the derriere garde of Europe's Weimar period. Nothing new there at all.)

5. Having the Soviets practically next door was a big help to the German Communists -- who still called themselves Communists rather than Black Liberation Theologians, as ours do today. But just like Rev. J-Wright, they all hated middleclassness, or as they called it, the bourgeoisie. (That was their parents, remember?) So did Mussolini and Hitler, who also rose to power as radical world-changers in the turmoil of the day. They were also big ecofreaks -- because Mother Nature was good, you see. They practiced a fair amount of nudity and gayety, celebrated sex and violence, got drunk and carried on riots, and whipped up giant hatreds against scapegoats -- the French, other racially inferior peoples, and of course ... . Yes.

They also swore to eliminate the handicapped, the retarded, and any organized religion. Both the Communists and the Nazis really really hated Christianity. Not just Judaism and the Jews. They were equal-opportunity haters, without fear or favor.

6. The whole Ship of Fools seemed to go sailing along until the economy went kaput. But why did it? You can point to hyperinflation, long and deep declines in industry and agriculture, unemployment, and shaky currencies. Europe had decades of troubles before the United States caught the bug. Stock markets dwindled, trade barriers went up, and on October 29, 1929, far away in New York City, Wall Street went into a tailspin. It was followed by the other big stock markets. People lost their jobs and their savings. No capital, no productivity, just despair.

7. Europe decided that democracy wasn't its thing after all, and looked for nice trustworthy generals to take over the hopelessly ineffective parliamentary governments -- like in Germany. But the President of Germany, General Paul von Hindenburg, was elderly and out of his depth, and after a while was forced to ask that nice Herr Hitler to organize a new government. Hitler's National Socialist Workers Party had never gotten a majority, but the time was ripe, and the Nazis never cared much for rules. So they took power.

In the end United States kind of lucked out, compared to Europe -- but don't try to tell that to anybody who managed to live through it. It's not just our habit of democratic governance that brought us out of it without tyranny and the devastation of Europe and Asia. FDR had a certain amount of demagogue blood in him.

Or as he proclaimed in accepting the Democratic Party nomination,

"Throughout the nation men and women ... look to us here for guidance and for more equitable opportunity to share in the distribution of national wealth... I pledge you, I pledge myself to a new deal for the American people... This is more than a political campaign. It is a call to arms." (Italics added.)

A better "opportunity to share in the distribution of national wealth? ... A call to arms?" Has the Obama crowd seen this speech? FDR naturally attacked greed and wealth, coming from a family of old wealth and long-forgotten greed himself. Greed is in the eye of the accuser.

What's the bottom line? Well, certain politicians thrive in times of trouble; and if they don't see enough trouble, they're always happy to add some more. They always practice the same kind of demagogy. They always promise radical change. And they often bring the opposite.

Historians have long pointed to the breakdown of Europe's middle class as the single biggest earthquake, the one that shook all the other pillars of society until it crumbled.

In the 21st century, you can kill the middle class by teaching kids to despise their parents and their traditions; you can tax them into poverty; you can whip up nationalistic fervor against the Frogs or the Boches; you can inflate the currency so that everybody is equally miserable; you can teach the poor, the black, the women, the young, to attack the middle class values that brought prosperity over generations of toil; you can torpedo the currency and destroy retirement plans; you can turn the Organs of Propaganda -- pahdon me, the "news media" -- to assault middle class values; you can unify the very wealthy with the very poor to try to squeeze and whack the middle; you can take historic wrongs like black slavery or Christopher Columbus to turn people against each other; you can easily turn bubbleheaded movie makers and starlets against George W. Bush; you can break the banks and turn the desperate against the malefactors of great wealth; or you can unify white liberals with poor blacks and militant feminists against all the Evil White Guys...

But it's all the same, you see. Nothing ever changes except the color of the flags and the uniforms. And it's always the militant idealists, the obsessional clerks and scribblers, who seize the moment to raise yet another Hero of Change and Hope to the peak of power. Because, you see, Adolf Hitler was not the exception. In the century of Mao Zedong and Pol Pot, of Lenin and Stalin, of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, of Robert Mugabe and Saddam Hussein, of Ahmadinejad and Khomeini, of genocidal little tyrants in the Sudan and Rwanda, Hitler was by no means the exception.

He was just brought down faster than the others.

Heigh-ho. Interesting times.

See what a little history can teach you?
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**** Betcha you didn't learn this in school****

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Gun-Grabbers Lose Bid To Infringe 2nd Amendment

Supreme Court refuses to revive New York City's suit against gun makers over illegal sales

By Associated Press
9:39 AM EDT, March 9, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has turned away pleas by New York City and gun violence victims to hold the firearms industry responsible for selling guns that could end up in illegal markets.

The justices' decision Monday ends lawsuits first filed in 2000. Federal appeals courts in New York and Washington threw out the complaints after Congress passed a law in 2005 giving the gun industry broad immunity against such lawsuits.

The city's lawsuit asked for no monetary damages. It had sought a court order for gun makers to more closely monitor those dealers who frequently sell guns later used to commit crimes.

But the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that federal law provides the gun industry with broad immunity from lawsuits brought by crime victims and violence-plagued cities. The Supreme Court refused to reconsider that decision.

The lawsuit was first brought in June 2000 while Rudy Giuliani was New York mayor. It was delayed due to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and because of similar litigation in the state courts.

The city refiled the lawsuit in January 2004, saying manufacturers let handguns reach illegal markets at gun shows in which non-licensed people can sell to other private citizens; through private sales in which background checks are not required; by oversupplying markets where gun regulations are lax, and by having poor overall security.

The city said a state nuisance law makes it a crime to knowingly or recklessly create a condition endangering the safety or health of a considerable number of people. But the appeals court said New York's law does not qualify as an exception to federal law. It agreed with U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein that the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, signed by President George W. Bush in 2005, is constitutional.

The cases are City of New York v. Beretta, 08-530, and Lawson v. Beretta, 08-545.

First Post Re-Visited

I am re-posting my first post, "Time To Roll" - in toto, as No Apology to show that a person even as naive as I was can get involved in what is happening on our watch here in America. My own awakening also shows what can be accomplished with due diligence, when the facts don't add up. You start where you are, and educate yourself. Then you pick your ass up, gather the necessary tools, and go to war. My first step was to put my television on the curb in front of my house. That was in Oct, 2006.

Now it's 2 1/2 years later, and the situation is even bleaker. My role is watchman, shining the light on the darkness, and trying to have a little fun in the process. I have also made many friends on the front line. - NA

"Time To Roll"

Hello, and welcome to my new blog!

I am a concerned citizen, trying to make sense of the current dangers within our shores, in our political institutions, in our bastions of "higher education". America's current plight, of an unrelenting stream of illegal immigrants, and the rise of Islam's sword, can be characterized by a lack of perception of danger to our way of life, and a disinclination to stand up and resist the multi-cultural Marxists' persistent whittling away at our political will. Over-simplifying perhaps, but it'll do for a start. The Multiculturalists, hammering away at our right of free speech (thanks ACLU, you're now in my sights, too.), dumbing down our educational systems, plus the real dangers of using speech which is not Politically Correct (a hold-over from the Civil Rights Movement) have made us fearful and vulnerable.
In the 50's, when Pogo made his famous declaration about who the enemy is, we all smiled and said, "good one". Well here it is, fifty years later, and things haven't changed all that much. I confess, until a few months ago, I was mostly unaware of the forces of evil at work. I read MSM, like a lot of Americans, shook my head at the Mindless Muslim Rage, and figured someone, eventually would fix it.
As I prepared to retire to the Arizona desert with a couple of donkeys (yes, really) for companions, I made the decision to start a blog about my adventures. In preparation, I began to look online at the climate, demographics, etc., and to try to pick a logical place to drop anchor in Arizona. My first look was at the deserts, animals, flora, and.….the seemingly unending trash and human waste of the illegal immigrants coming across the Mexican border. I thought WTF? So I began to research the situation. What I found on the physical level in the desert and wilderness of the Tohono O'Odham and the Huachuca Highlands and mountains was certainly cause for concern. What I subsequently found residing in the mind-set of the current crop of politicians who should be protecting our borders was even more disturbing. Here's what I wrote at the time:

...for whatever reason, and I don’t believe in coincidences, I picked the southeast corner of Arizona to plan my retirement around (I’m 65 years old). And it wasn’t so suddenly – I have been looking into this for the past 6 months. Anyway, I like the desert, plus the sky islands (mountains) of southeast Arizona, and a small town like Bisbee or Patagonia both have small populations with a goodly number of artists living there. Also, the Tumacacori Highlands, with its vast high roadless prairie appealed to me. As I continued to research the SE corner of Arizona though, I discovered it also has something I hadn’t counted on - it also is appealing to drug cartels and coyotes (human kind), for very different reasons than my own. And who are even now, exploiting a very porous Mexican border, facilitating rampant illegal immigration, and drug running. I began to read various ranchers’ descriptions of life on the border for the past 20 years, tales of stolen property, fences being regularly cut, or simply driven over by the very busy and resourceful coyotes, who are bringing thousands of illegal immigrants and drugs across the border. And generally, making the ranchers’ lives hell. I saw photographs of the huge amount of garbage left in the Sonora Desert, the desperate lives lost every year in the unforgiving desert.

Curious, I began researching the border policies of both the US and Mexican government. What I found was a quagmire of failed immigration policies on the US side, a thoroughly corrupt political network, and failing economic policies on the Mexican side. Can’t fault the Mexicans who need work. It isn’t to be had in Mexico. Certainly not for the wages they can earn here. Of course, they head Norte. They need work, and the Gringos are hiring. On the US side, politicians have been unwilling for several administrations to deal with border control, and illegal immigration. Throw in the so-called “war on drugs” (supply is tight, price is high), and everybody has a reason to head north of the border. On our side the US employers are just, as President Bush put it, hooking up willing workers with undesirable jobs. (* note – show Big Bush Smile here) That is to say, they attract and flood the labor market with workers who have entered the country illegally, and are willing, desperate, to work for less than our American workers, thus depressing the prevailing wage, and keeping it depressed. None of this is news, of course. But the unions are going the way of the horse and buggy. Nobody to stand up for the American workers. We all are American workers. And believe me, there are no jobs Americans are unwilling to do. That’s a lie. But how do they compete with the illegals, who are flooding the labor market? Whatever the going rate for any job, when the Mexicans, in this case, show up, the rate will go down. Employers simply exploit the situation, because THE US GOVERNMENT allows them to. No real penalties to speak of. A wrist slap, a small fine, that is, when they are actually caught and prosecuted. Again, I’m not against the business community. They play the hand they are dealt, too. Now, to slide their way out of a hopeless situation, amnesty in various flavors is the politician’s answer. I’m not against the Mexicans. It’s not their fault. The corrupt Mexican government has languished for generations on the largess of Americans. I think it’s time it stopped. Cork up the friggin’ border and watch what happens. They will be truly f****d. Anarchy will prevail south of the border. Is that good dharma on the part of Americans? Who knows? It’s a rhetorical question, anyway. See, here’s the thing. I’m going out on a limb here, but I believe none of that is about to happen. Bush apparently definitely has this lofty plan to eliminate the border altogether, north and south. Yep, Canadian border, too. All that business about NAFTA, just the first pass, folks. Does everybody remember the words to Kumbayah?

"…man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.” - Ronald Regan

Where does that leave America? America? Sorry, my fellow Americans, but that’s a concept going the same way as the unions, and of course, the borders. I don’t believe within 25 years, there will even be a fight. The process went from protecting other’s civil rights, to political correctness, to “fear of offending”. It’s become a kind of cultural sickness. Making people afraid of "offending" is also making them hesitant to stand up and be counted. No flags, no prayers, Christmas is on a watch list. But no, we have Kwanza now, so maybe Christmas will live another season. Look into the origin of Kwanza, if you want a good laugh. What a joke.

It's right up there with the origin of Alex Haley's, Roots.

So, no profiling either. Nope, sorry. Not even in the case of Islamic terrorists who, parenthetically, are alive and well in Tucson. Another reason for me to avoid Arizona. But that’s another installment. That ties the hands of the police, even the border control guards. The sky falls on the State Police, if they are caught profiling. “Racists!”, cries Al Sharpton. Ever notice how he just seems to materialize out of nowhere? At least up here in my neck of the woods, NY, Northern NJ. Then why do they profile? (Ans: to catch the bad guys.) Duh. The police are not stupid. Their job has just been made so much more difficult. Look out, or the ACLU, that snake pit, will be filing, have already filed class action suits before breakfast.

What are we teaching our children? They are paying attention, you know. It’s amazing what you discover, when you look. Do I know what I’m talking about? Why don’t you do your own research? Let me know what you find.

What’s important to me is being free to live my life simply, make art, help take care of disabled kids, become friends with a donkey or two. Unless my government is willing to protect it’s borders and work out sound fiscal policies, both at home and abroad, all that could be taken away. I don’t intend to stand idly by, and say nothing. I have eyes, ears, and a computer. I intend to use them as long as I can.

So. I also learned of the EC/EU-type political license GW has granted himself, along with Vicente Fox, and the boys North of the border. You know, the um, Superhighway that's been planned, without bothering to check with the folks unwarshed. It goes under the high-sounding name of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or as we like to say, the SPP. Apparently, this thing is pretty far along. Money's been allocated, and plans have already been laid to start building. You didn't know about this? Don't feel too bad, even some politicians weren't aware of it. It's the first step toward eliminating our national identity. Yeah, that's how the EU got started, too. Quietly, behind the scenes, slowly eating away at the concept of national borders in Europe. Getting wind of the SPP is about when I discovered the world of blogging, and things which the MSM don't talk about. Theodore Roetke said: "I learn by going where I have to go." Well, yeah that, too. Mostly, I learn by doing what I have to do. Even Especially when I don't want to do it, whatever "it" happens to be at the time. I would still like to walk away from what I've learned, but find that I cannot.. Early on in my first tentative attempts at blogging, I had decided I would go to Wyoming instead, and said so on my blog. I got a comment from Jake Jackobson, of Freedom Folks who told me flat-out, you can run, but you can't get away from the problems. Now I find that he's right. Because now I know there's a big problem, I can't run. I don't like it, but I can't just walk away. I know now what that H.L. Mencken quote means: "Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats." And I would do that, if I thought it would change anything. Instead, I will find others like myself, hopefully more versed in solutions, and try to make myself useful.

I don't want to get caught up, as many in the blogging world seem to do, in worrying about what the Left is doing. I know what they're doing, and don't need to be reminded every day. I need to stay connected with with warriors like, Dymphna and Baron Bodissey over at Gates of Vienna and Fjordman, who writes commentary like Vivaldi wrote music: he puts one, with almost frightening clarity, in the present moment. It's heartening to learn that so many people are willing to stand up and fight the good fight. I will be building a blogroll in the days to come. Time to work.

-No Apology

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Are You A Member of The Peter Pan Generation?

If so, then the image below should probably be very appealing. Yup, it's Peter Pan disguised as Robin Hood.



The Baby Boomers belong, not to Generation X, but rather to what I think of as the "X-Box" generation.

And Generation Y is evolving into a multicultural, multi-tasking, culture-less group of souls oblivious to the dangers within. It is a generation which has had everything pre-packaged for them: What to think, what not to think, and and awash with tasteless, unoriginal entertainment.

The power of Socialism is now fed by a democratic process designed to perpetuate and protect a sleeping populace, and that's a problem.

Listen to this 90-second clip:

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The Weekly Standard

Barack Obama's America
A timeless critique from Tocqueville
by Alexis de Tocqueville

03/09/2009, Volume 014, Issue 24

It seems that if despotism came to be established in the democratic nations of our day, it would have other characteristics: it would be more extensive and milder, and it would degrade men without tormenting them.

When I think of the small passions of men of our day, the softness of their mores, the extent of their enlightenment, the purity of their religion, the mildness of their morality, their laborious and steady habits, the restraint that almost all preserve in vice as in virtue, I do not fear that in their chiefs they will find tyrants, but rather schoolmasters.

I want to imagine with what new features despotism could be produced in the world: I see an innumerable crowd of like and equal men who revolve on themselves without repose, procuring the small and vulgar pleasures with which they fill their souls.

Above these an immense tutelary power is elevated, which alone takes charge of assuring their enjoyments and watching over their fate. It is absolute, detailed, regular, far-seeing, and mild. It would resemble paternal power if, like that, it had for its object to prepare men for manhood; but on the contrary, it seeks only to keep them fixed irrevocably in childhood; it likes citizens to enjoy themselves provided that they think only of enjoying themselves. It willingly works for their happiness; but it wants to be the unique agent and sole arbiter of that; it provides for their security, foresees and secures their needs, facilitates their pleasures, conducts their principal affairs, directs their industry, regulates their estates, divides their inheritances; can it not take away from them entirely the trouble of thinking and the pain of living?

So it is that every day it renders the employment of free will less useful and more rare; it confines the action of the will in a smaller space and little by little steals the very use of it from each citizen.

Thus, after taking each individual by turns in its powerful hands and kneading him as it likes, the sovereign extends its arms over society as a whole; it covers its surface with a network of small, complicated, painstaking, uniform rules through which the most original minds and the most vigorous souls cannot clear a way to surpass the crowd; it does not break wills but it softens them, bends them, and directs them; it rarely forces one to act, but it constantly opposes itself to one's acting; it does not destroy, it prevents things from being born; it does not tyrannize, it hinders, compromises, enervates, extinguishes, dazes, and finally reduces each nation to being nothing more than a herd of timid and industrious animals of which government is the shepherd.

I have always believed that this sort of regulated, mild, and peaceful servitude, whose picture I have just painted, could be combined better than one imagines with some of the external forms of freedom, and that it would not be impossible for it to be established in the very shadow of the sovereignty of the people.

--Alexis de Tocqueville

From Democracy in America, volume two, part four, chapter six: "What Kind of Despotism Democratic Nations Have to Fear"
(translated by Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop)

Hollywood Slumber Parties Are A Drag Now...Here's Why

BIG HOLLYWOOD

Is Hollywood’s Hard Left Lost in Victory?

by John Scott Lewinski

Politically speaking, it’s quiet in Hollywood. Too quiet.

It’s not a foreboding kind of stillness like the sunrise on a battlefield before the ranks are formed. It’s not an anticipatory breed of shush as “jocund day stands tiptoe” before a big game or the opening of Christmas gifts.

It’s a boring silence — a befuddled, anti-climactic, sighing void that took hold of this town not long after Barack Obama stormed into the White House. With George W. Bush retired to Texas and the most enlightened leader in the history of bipedal evolution taking his place, all problems are fixed, all debates are over, and the supremacy of everything hippie is assured forever. What fun is that?

With Obama as supreme leader, there’s just nothing remaining for Hollywood’s hard left to complain about now. And, you get the feeling they miss the old days.

For a short while after Obama’s win, the self-righteous activist types had gay marriage to keep them occupied. They possessed a cause to keep them chanting and picketing. But, as such causes go, the Prop 8 hooting and hollering lacked a certain clarity.

First, libertarian-leaning types like this commentator also opposed Prop 8 — hoping to keep the government and courts out of marriage issues. And nothing makes a cause less satisfying for progressives than sharing the position with non-liberals.

Then, the Prop 8 protestors started clashing with minority groups — presenting a brand of crippling irony certain to drain all of the tingly, pretentious thrill out of stomping around with a sign and a chant. Just imagine it: You’re on the hard left and you reside in the international multimedia capital of everything warm, fuzzy and superior. Then you realize the minority groups you’re sworn to protect — but don’t want living anywhere near you (Right, Santa Monica and West Hollywood?) — oppose your cause of the month.

The coalition that keeps California in the hands of Democrats broke down as those two-timing minority groups voted against gay marriage in keeping with their cultural and religious views. Hollywood’s enlightened types must’ve been disgusted: You give those folks jobs as your pool cleaners and groundskeepers, and they don’t have the courtesy to obey and follow the progressive agenda.

So, Prop 8 goes off the boil, and Bush is still gone. All Hollywood’s most dedicated complainers have to show for it is some faded “I Voted!” stickers and a squadron of Prius(es) covered in “Endless This War!” bumper stickers. Perhaps you would argue that they have their savior in the command chair, but that same silence spoke of whispers of a little buyer’s remorse.

Taking the oldest trick out of the tyrant’s manual, Obama ran on “Hope” to seize power. Then once he had it, he changed the message to “Fear” to keep expectations low and the masses in line. Maybe that strategy was necessary, since between the unpaid taxes, failed cabinet appointments, the Blago scandal, raging debate over the “spend-u-lous” package and the continued decline of the markets, World War I had a more inspiring first 100 days.

Obama will decisively close Guantanamo (maybe — in a year or so). He’ll promptly get the troops out of Iraq (right around the time they were scheduled to leave anyway — except for the 50,000 he’ll keep there to train combat units). And, he’ll up the ante with more boots on the ground in Afghanistan. It’s enough to transform the Obama-forged screams of adulation to a collective sense of “hm.”

In the end, it’s becoming clear that Hollywood’s progressive crowd had more fun criticizing authority figures than owning authority. Maybe it just felt sexier to attack the old administration free of responsibility than to lead and face the consequences of failure. After all, what’s the point of being smarter, more sensitive and more sophisticated than those crude Republicans if you actually have to submit to performance standards?

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And, just so we remember who's actually in charge, there's this:


Video: Clueless Democrats

Straight Eye for the Queer Guy

BIG HOLLYWOOD

Gay Marriage By Any Means, Except Democracy

by John Romano

It was clear everyone at the Oscars got the memo: “No Obama, no Iraq, but gay, gay, gay, all day.” It’s depressing the Oscars must always have an agenda. What will it be next year?

The people of California exercised democracy twice over the gay marriage issue. Whether you agree or not, at this time, Californians do not want gay marriage, period. As for Proposition 8, I abstained, yet I deplore the tactics Leftists have used since the election. I put forth that gays should be allowed to marry, but it must be accomplished by democratic means.

Legalizing gay marriage will not turn a string of people gay. You either is or you isn’t. Why shouldn’t two committed people have the right to join up fully in the eyes of the state? I get all that. In addition, I’m pretty much for anything that fundamentalist Islam is against. And most of Islam hates gays, so let the cave dwellers add gay marriage to their list of reasons to hate us.

The gay lobby must come to realize that changing hearts is the only true path to equality, not employing fascist tactics and judge shopping. The left have overturned democracy in California before and are quite skilled at it. Another win might embolden them to a point where they no longer fight initiatives until after voted on. Why bother? It’s much easier to get a leftist judge to overturn democracy than it is to win in the marketplace of ideas.

Many think the fight over gay marriage is an attack on the church, and I tend to agree. In California, gay couples already have the same rights as married couples, but if gay marriage becomes legal a church’s tax exempt status could be threatened were they to refuse to marry a same-sex couple. If that comes to pass, I dare same-sex couples to insist on marriage in a mosque. Now that would take courage.

Is equality or “special status” the goal? For instance, if a gay man physically attacks me and calls me a “straight white douche bag,” he’s charged with assault. If I do the reverse, I’m charged with assault and a hate crime. Is that equality?

To channel a little Gary Cole as Mike Brady: ”Sometimes when you win you lose and that makes everyone a loser including you. So Jan, in order to win you must occasionally lose, this way everyone wins. And by losing you become a winner’s winner.”

Where is the gay Gandhi or Dr. King - someone to chill the gay lobby out and inspire the democratic process? 50% + 1 is all you need.

Family Responsibility

We, as a nation, better wake up to the fact that our government, through it's social engineering agenda, is destroying our sense of family, and replacing the concept of family with government control of our children. Families are willingly allowing this take-over, because they do not understand the consequences of giving over their children to state-sponsored schools. One only has to take the time to evaluate the curricula being fostered in today's public schools to realize the danger to our children's mental health and well-being.



This is not paranoia speaking. It's real, and it's happening now.



Everywhere the government intrudes into our lives. And we are allowing this to happen, through ignorance. Better take heed, Americans. It's late in the game, but it's not too late to reverse the political arrogance of big government.

Obama Stumbles Out of the Gate

The Weekly Standard

Geithner Lays an Egg
And that's only one of the problems with the Obama economic strategy.

by Lawrence B. Lindsey
02/23/2009, Volume 014, Issue 22


Elections have consequences. That is what democracy is about after all. Barack Obama is correct when he states that his victory last November gives him the right, or more specifically the power, to have things his way when it comes to handling the nation's economic challenges.

The country, moreover, could use some decisive economic action. The financial system is a mess, unemployment is rising and will keep increasing. The government will likely run a deficit of 10 percent or more of GDP both this year and next--roughly twice the share of the Reagan deficits and roughly three times the size of President Bush's deficits. To fight the credit contraction, our central bank is expanding its balance sheet at a pace that might lead a visitor from another planet to confuse the United States with Argentina.

This makes it all the more frustrating that less than a month into his presidency, Obama has made a complete hash of economic policy, utterly squandering his mandate in a series of missteps that suggest he has not made the transition from campaigning to governing. This, even as Obama never stops reminding us in his constant televised appearances that the economy is slipping fast and time is of the essence.

The problems began with the inexplicable decision by the administration not to submit its own economic stimulus package, but instead delegate the job to Nancy Pelosi and the barons on the House Appropriations Committee. Appropriations is the reptilian brain of the political process. It is where all the back scratching, logrolling, and pork barreling gets done. Macroeconomic coherence is just not part of the skill set of House Appropriations members. So even rebuilding the nation's infrastructure got short shrift. Instead, the package was loaded with largesse for fellow politicians and civil service employees back home. The standard was not the proclaimed "shovel-ready" but "social-worker ready."

This package was marginally improved by the House Ways and Means Committee. Ways and Means gave money directly to workers as opposed to local politicians. It also ramped up the various medical spending conduits, which will push more money to health care providers--though not necessarily provide more health care. But there was no improvement in the tax system, which might, say, encourage job creation and retention by lowering the tax burden on employment or investing.

So the package the House produced was not "stimulus" in any normal understanding of the word. Of the $820 billion package that emerged from the House, only 20 percent would be spent in fiscal 2009 and only another 40 percent in 2010. That left 40 percent of the package to be spent in 2011 or later, when even the more pessimistic forecasters (of whom I am one) expect the economy to be in full recovery. This plan delivers the stimulus at precisely the wrong time.

The package was so bad that it made criticism of the new president socially acceptable, a rare development for the first initiative of a president elected with a large mandate. Alice Rivlin, doyenne of Democratic party policy economists, criticized the lack of macroeconomic benefit in the plan. Her sentiments were echoed by just about every leading economist in both parties who was not employed by the administration.

The new administration fell into this hole by belatedly discovering the fiscal realities of the country. Government spending takes time to get going, and, once flowing, is difficult to stop. During the transition, Team Obama surveyed the agencies for "shelf ready" spending needs and found them woefully inadequate as a credible stimulus package. The incoming Obama policy-makers had been focused on spending, not tax cuts, because they wanted to draw a line between themselves and their predecessors. But, faced with the facts, they made a virtue out of necessity by having the president call for taxes to be 40 percent of the package. This annoyed the more left-leaning Democrats of Congress, who were then appeased by being given the power to craft the spending.

The legislation was written by Democratic committee chairmen with no Republican input. The president covered this up by going to the Hill and meeting with the Republican caucus. But, since Obama had no direct role in writing the package, the signal to congressional Republicans was twofold: Bipartisanship was just a façade the president needed to maintain his approval ratings, and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid were the ones with the power, not Barack Obama.

The shreds of comity on which Washington depends were saved by Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who drafted a compromise that eliminated some of the most wasteful spending and sped up other parts. The bill that emerged from conference is close to the Collins compromise and is better than the House one at moving spending into the present. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that a quarter of the spending in the conference agreement would leave Washington this year and a total of 75 percent by the end of 2010, a substantial improvement. But it is still not "stimulus," and that fact is going to become apparent later this year. Money leaving Washington for state capitals is different from money actually entering the economy and creating jobs.

The administration released a report by its top economists saying that passage of the stimulus bill would mean that national unemployment would peak in the third quarter of 2009 at about 8 percent and start going down thereafter. Let's just say that we should all hope they are right. The economy will get a pop from the start of stimulus just as the economy got a pop in 2008 from the one-time checks that were sent out. Growth in the second quarter of 2009 is likely to be positive as the first round of stimulus hits the economy. As the rate of new stimulus slows in subsequent quarters, growth will turn negative again. The odds are high that unemployment will still be rising on the first anniversary of the Obama presidency next January with the prospect (but not a certainty) of double-digit unemployment at the time of the midterm elections.

As the stimulus bogged down, a new word crept into the administration's economic policy vocabulary--"comprehensive." The problems would not be easy to solve, and stimulus alone was insufficient. Bank recapitalization and housing mortgage issues would also have to be dealt with. The task for announcing these was delegated to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. But the scripting of the message and indeed the whole "rollout" of the issue was tightly controlled in the West Wing.

Like so much of what happens in Washington, the reasons for this odd locus of decisionmaking authority are less nefarious than meets the eye and more a matter of simple necessity. The first problem is a lack of personnel at Treasury. Geithner is the only confirmed appointee in the department. No deputy secretary, no undersecretaries of either domestic or international finance, no assistant secretaries, no deputy assistant secretaries. The West Wing is the only place where the personnel reside who can make decisions.

The second problem is political. There are no easy answers when facing a trillion-dollar hole in the banking system. Either the banks will fail, or money is going to have to be given to the banks to fill the hole, or the proverbial can will be kicked down the road with enough money being slowly injected into the system to keep it going. The first option is a nonstarter. This brings the essential choice down to writing a big check now to the banks or writing a lot of little checks over time, and bankers are not the most politically sympathetic recipients of federal largesse at the moment.

So there is a political incentive to create a focus on issues that are tangential to the trillion-dollar problem. Make sure that bankers sell their corporate jets! No more bonuses!

The sale of 50 corporate jets in today's market might fetch you $1 billion if you're lucky. End all the bonuses on Wall Street and you get real money--another $18 billion. Put the two together and a $1 trillion problem shrinks to a mere $981 billion one. The administration's hope was that such measures plus the group flogging of the CEOs of the big banks on the Hill last Wednesday would focus the media, Congress, and the public away from the fundamental enormity of the task at hand.

But Geithner still had to say something, and none of the various options available was attractive. Buy the assets from the banks? Set the price high enough to bail out the banks and you have a trillion-dollar overpayment. Set the price at current market prices and you have to come up with the same trillion as a bank capital injection. Do what Bill Seidman and the George H.W. Bush administration did during the S&L crisis by nationalizing the banks and then reselling the pieces into the market? Might work, but while Seidman disposed of the thrift industry by selling them to the basically healthy commercial banks, there aren't any basically healthy banks left on the planet to buy an institution like Citibank or Bank of America. Combined, those two institutions have 14 percent of the deposits in the American banking system, and there are plenty of other banks that need help as well.

The Geithner announcement was repeatedly put off while each of the options was publicly discussed. In the end the political decisionmakers decided there was no politically acceptable decision. But expectations had been building, stoked higher with each postponement of the speech. When Geithner finally spoke and by omission essentially admitted that the Obama administration hadn't come up with a solution, the stock market plummeted.

But it wasn't only the stock prices of America's publicly traded companies that collapsed. So did the stock of the Obama administration. A discredited stimulus package followed by an overly hyped but largely vacuous bank-rescue speech proved to be too much. The mainstream media, which had given Obama a free ride since the election, turned on their choice. In the space of just over three weeks, Obama and company squandered the greatest stock of political capital any president since Lyndon Johnson had inherited from an election.

It is certainly not too late for Obama to create a sensible government policy and assist in an American economic recovery. But he has to stop campaigning and start governing. This means fewer speeches (his strong point, and something he evidently enjoys) and more noodling through wonky decision trees and detailed analyses in concert with expert advisers on both the inside and the outside. All presidents in my experience--and I have served four different administrations--have to learn the difference between campaigning and governing. Obama, whose vita contains lots of campaigning for high offices but remarkably little tenure in such offices, has a bigger challenge than most in making this transition. But he is a smart and well-intentioned fellow. Most important, he has a strong survival instinct. Perhaps he'll sense that unless he makes a rapid transition, he will be a one-term president as the economic catastrophe he warns against so often comes to pass.

Lawrence B. Lindsey, a former governor of the Federal Reserve, was special assistant to President Bush for economic policy and director of the National Economic Council at the White House. His most recent book is What a President Should Know .  .  . but Most Learn Too Late (Rowman and Littlefield).

Geithner Unwittingly Stumbles Onto Causal Plane - Quantum Physicists Puzzled

February 11, 2009

Geithner Warns His Talking Could Cause Depression

Markets Plunge on Treasury Secretary’s Latest Statement

In testimony before Congress today, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner warned that by continuing to talk he might plunge the nation into a depression.

"The nation's economy is in a crisis that could easily turn into a catastrophe," the Treasury Secretary said. "In this precarious state, it is highly vulnerable to my talking."

Mr. Geithner pointed to the Dow Jones Industrial Average's 300-point drop during his previous day of Congressional testimony as proof that his amorphous policy statements posed a serious threat to the nation's economy.

"What further damage could my vague remarks do?" he asked. "The truth is, I don't know."

Overseas markets plunged on the news that Mr. Geithner was talking again, with both the NIKKEI and the FTSE shedding over eight percent of their value.

At a town hall meeting in Indiana, President Barack Obama heard from a housewife, Carol Foyler, 47, who pleaded with the President to make Mr. Geithner stop talking.

"Every time he opens his mouth, I'm afraid I'm going to lose my house," she said.

President Obama hugged Mrs. Foyler and said he would "see what I can do" about the Geithner problem.

"I will do everything in my power to get Tim to stop talking," the President said. "Quite honestly, I already have my hands full with Biden."


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Speaking From The Left

Salon.com

By Camille Paglia

Feb. 11, 2009 |

Money by the barrelful, by the truckload. Mountains of money, heaped like gassy pyramids in the national dump. Scrounging packs of politicos, snapping, snarling and sending green bills flying sky-high as they root through the tangled mass with ragged claws. The stale hot air filled with cries of rage, the gnashing of teeth and dark prophecies of doom.

Yes, this grotesque scene, like a claustrophobic circle in Dante's "Inferno," was what the U.S. government has looked like for the past two weeks as it fights on over Barack Obama's stimulus package -- a mammoth, chaotic grab bag of treasures, toys and gimcracks. Could popular opinion of our feckless Congress sink any lower? You betcha!

Why in the cosmos would the new administration, smoothly sailing out of Obama's classy inauguration, repeat the embarrassing blunders of Bill Clinton's first term? By foolishly promising a complete overhaul of healthcare within 100 days (and by putting his secretive, ill-prepared wife in charge of it), Clinton made himself look naive and incompetent and set healthcare reform back for more than 15 years.

President Obama was ill-served by his advisors (shall we thump that checkered piñata, Rahm Emanuel?), who evidently did not help him to produce a strong, focused, coherent bill that he could have explained and defended to the nation before it was set upon by partisan wolves. To defer to the House of Representatives and let the bill be thrown together by cacophonous mob rule made the president seem passive and behind the curve.

Most mainstream American voters are undoubtedly suffering from economist fatigue these days. This one calls for tax cuts; that one condemns them. One says we're wasting hundreds of billions of dollars; the other claims that sum falls pathetically short. A plague on all their houses! Surely common sense would dictate that when Congress is doling out fat dollops of taxpayers' money, due time should be delegated for sober consideration and debate. The administration's coercive rush toward instant action, accompanied by apocalyptic pronouncements of imminent catastrophe, has put its own credibility on the line.

But aside from the stimulus muddle, Obama has been off to a good start. True, I was disappointed with the infestation of the new appointments list by Clinton retreads and slippery tax-dodgers. Nevertheless, I was very impressed by Obama's relaxed, natural authority with military officers on Inauguration Day, in contrast to the early Bill Clinton's palpable unease and exaggerated posturing. I applauded the signal Obama sent to the world by starting the closure of the Guantánamo detention center. Contrary to the rote claims of conservative talk radio, there is as yet no public evidence that every individual being held at Guantánamo is a proven "terrorist"-- whom we would all agree should be severely punished. That is the entire point of a rational process of indictment and trial. If Guantánamo became a symbol of un-American repression, it is the procrastinating, paralyzed Bush administration that should be blamed.

Speaking of talk radio (which I listen to constantly), I remain incredulous that any Democrat who professes liberal values would give a moment's thought to supporting a return of the Fairness Doctrine to muzzle conservative shows. (My latest manifesto on this subject appeared in my last column.) The failure of liberals to master the vibrant medium of talk radio remains puzzling. To reach the radio audience (whether the topic is sports, politics or car repair), a host must have populist instincts and use the robust common voice. Too many Democrats have become arrogant elitists, speaking down in snide, condescending tones toward tradition-minded middle Americans whom they stereotype as rubes and buffoons. But the bottom line is that government surveillance of the ideological content of talk radio is a shocking first step toward totalitarianism.

One of the nuggets I've gleaned from several radio sources is that Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, who has been in the aggressive forefront of the campaign to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine, is married to Tom Athans, who works extensively with left-wing radio organizations and was once the executive vice-president of Air America, the liberal radio syndicate that, despite massive publicity from major media, has failed miserably to win a national audience. Stabenow's outrageous conflict of interest has of course been largely ignored by the prestige press, which should have been demanding that she recuse herself from all political involvement with this issue.

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