We have been calling for impeachment of Obama for a long time for myriad reasons. He presents an unprecedented existential threat to the welfare and survival of America as we have known it in the past – founded on principles of liberty, freedom, equality, justice and individuality and with a non-intrusive government.
In fact, the primary motivation and impetus for the creation of this website was the realization of the threats and risks to a free America that Obama presented combined with a far-left radical Democrat juggernaut in the Senate and House of Representatives. Information needs to be disseminated so we can all be informed and aware of what is transpiring and act accordingly. As we have just recently learned regarding the media collusion in the Journolist scandal, such information has been egregiously manipulated, controlled and even suppressed to support a far-left agenda (and candidate in Obama). The “main stream” media has become a de facto political wing and propaganda source for the Democratic Party and hence, the functioning government.
This is an incredibly dangerous situation for us American citizens and for the survival of our Democracy.
In the following trenchant, thorough and convincing editorial written by Tom Tancredo, who was a five term member of Congress, he calls for the impeachment of Obama. He concisely sums up the immense danger that Obama presents to our country by stating that:
For the first time in American history, we have a man in the White House who consciously and brazenly disregards his oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution. That's why I say the greatest threat to our Constitution, our safety and our liberties, is internal. Our president is an enemy of our Constitution, and, as such, he is a danger to our safety, our security and our personal freedoms.
If we can vote in enough Republicans to take over the House and Senate in November, then we will have what it takes to impeach Obama's - though we may also need to coax our elected officials to pursue this course of action.
The case for impeachment Obama has violated his oath of office over immigration
Tom Tancredo July 22, 2010
Eleven years ago, like every citizen elected to serve in Congress or any person appointed to any federal position, I swore an oath to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic."
I've always thought it significant that the Founders included domestic enemies in that oath of office. They thought liberty was as much at risk from threats within our borders as from outside, and French political thinker and historian Alexis de Tocqueville agreed with that warning.
In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the greatest threat to our nation was clear - and foreign. While Islamic terrorism still represents the greatest external threat to America and American lives, the avowed program of the Obama regime has changed the picture in a fundamental way.
For the first time in American history, we have a man in the White House who consciously and brazenly disregards his oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution. That's why I say the greatest threat to our Constitution, our safety and our liberties, is internal. Our president is an enemy of our Constitution, and, as such, he is a danger to our safety, our security and our personal freedoms.
Barack Obama is one of the most powerful presidents this nation has seen in generations. He is powerful because he is supported by large majorities in Congress, but, more importantly, because he does not feel constrained by the rule of law. Whether he is putting up the weakest possible defense of the Defense of Marriage Act despite the Justice Department's legal obligation to support existing law; disenfranchising Chrysler and GM bondholders in order to transfer billions of investor dollars to his supporters in the United Auto Workers; or implementing yet a third offshore oil-drilling moratorium even after two federal courts have thrown out two previous moratoriums, President Obama is determined to see things done his way regardless of obstacles. To Mr. Obama, the rule of law is a mere inconvenience to be ignored, overcome or "transcended" through international agreements or "norms."
Mr. Obama's paramount goal, as he so memorably put it during his campaign in 2008, is to "fundamentally transform America." He has not proposed improving America - he is intent on changing its most essential character. The words he has chosen to describe his goals are neither the words nor the motivation of just any liberal Democratic politician. This is the utopian, or rather dystopian, reverie of a dedicated Marxist - a dedicated Marxist who lives in the White House.
Because of the power he wields over budgets, the judiciary, national defense and even health care, his regime and his program are not just about changing public policy in the conventional sense. When one considers the combination of his stop-at-nothing attitude, his contempt for limited government, his appointment of judges who want to create law rather than interpret it - all of these make this president today's single greatest threat to the great experiment in freedom that is our republic.
Yes, Mr. Obama is a more serious threat to America than al Qaeda. We know that Osama bin Laden and followers want to kill us, but at least they are an outside force against whom we can offer our best defense. But when a dedicated enemy of the Constitution is working from the inside, we face a far more dangerous threat. Mr. Obama can accomplish with the stroke of his pen what bin Laden cannot accomplish with bombs and insurgents.
Mr. Obama's actions, not just his words, show the threat he poses. A level of government deficit spending unheard of since World War II and trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see represent an unacceptable threat to our economic security and our children's future. Mr. Obama could be the first president to guarantee that the next generation of Americans has a lower standard of living than their parents.
Mr. Obama's most egregious and brazen betrayal of our Constitution was his statement to Sen. Jon Kyl, Arizona Republican, that the administration will not enforce security on our southern border because that would remove Republicans' desire to negotiate a "comprehensive" immigration bill. That is, to put it plainly, a decision that by any reasonable standard constitutes an impeachable offense against the Constitution. For partisan political advantage, he is willfully disregarding his obligation under Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution to protect states from foreign invasion.
There is no higher duty of the federal government and our elected representatives than to protect our nation from invasion. Multiple reports and testimony before Congress by U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials have stated that a porous border with Mexico is "a path" terrorists will use if they can. Some would-be terrorists, including at least one associated with Hezbollah, already have. Recent reports of contacts between Hezbollah and Mexican drug cartels make it all but certain that terrorists intent on destroying us will come across our southwestern border. Therefore, it is of utmost importance for the administration to do everything in its power to keep Americans safe. Our safety is not a bargaining chip for another amnesty - or for any other political objective whatsoever.
Mr. Obama's refusal to live up to his own oath of office - which includes the duty to defend the United States against foreign invasion - requires senators and representatives to live up to their oaths. Members of Congress must defend our nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Today, that means bringing impeachment charges against Mr. Obama.
Tom Tancredo is a former member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and five-term member of Congress from Colorado. He serves as chairman of the Rocky Mountain Foundation.
The following article examines various aspects of America today and postulates what the Founders of 234 years ago might think of their handiwork as it exists now. This is interesting and thought provoking.
What Would Our Founders Think About Independence In America Today?
Jane Hampton Cook FoxNews.com July 02, 2010
What would Sam Adams think of today’s tea parties? He would applaud them simply because they are free to do what he couldn’t — protest in the open without disguise or fake IDs.
If our Founding Fathers and Mothers were alive, what would they think about independence in America today? Though these architects of liberty placed the cornerstone with the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, would they recognize the country they first constructed?
How about Abigail Adams? This sharp-minded gal would have deep compassion and understanding for those struggling financially. She didn’t need unemployment rates to tell her how bad the economy was in her day.
“A hundred dollars will not purchase what ten formerly would” she moaned.
When husband John Adams joined the Continental Congress, he sacrificed half his family’s income. Abigail took over the other half — their farms. Her problems spouted faster than garden weeds. Inflation. Counterfeit cash. Labor shortages. Terse tenants.
“Frugality, industry and economy are the lessons of the day. At least they must be so for me or my small boat will suffer shipwreck,” she determined.
Abigail kept her family afloat by persevering and employing some Yankee ingenuity. Eventually she sold dresses and household goods that John sent her from Paris, making her the “eBay-er” of her generation.
From Wall Street to Main Street, Abigail would applaud Americans’ unending pursuit of life, liberty and happiness.
Take the brash and brilliant Samuel Adams — the voice of the Sons of Liberty, Boston’s underground network that fought the king’s policies. What would Sam think of today’s Tea Parties? He would applaud them simply because they are free to do what he couldn’t — protest in the open without disguise or fake IDs.
Sam’s bold words, such as “LIBERTY, LIBERTY, is the cry” were carefully concealed behind clever nicknames. Instead of his real name, he used “Determinatus” or “Candidus” for his newspaper articles. The Sons of Liberty disguised themselves as Indians for that first Tea Party.
They didn’t dare show their faces as they dumped tea into Boston’s harbor. Sam would applaud today’s Tea Parties because they prove that the freedom to assemble is not only alive but thriving.
What about Ben Franklin, the scientist extraordinaire? He was too thrifty to be first in line for last month’s iPhone4 release, but this electricity chaser would have loved the Internet. If he could have, he would’ve tweeted on Twitter and showed off his spectacles on Facebook.
On July 4, 1776, this language lover would have posted this quip: “We must indeed all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
Franklin would be thrilled that freedom of press and speech are still vigorously enjoyed. After all he understood this truth: “Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom; and no such thing as public liberty, without freedom of speech.”
Take, too, Thomas Paine. “’TIS TIME TO PART” he declared in his best-selling pamphlet, "Common Sense," in 1776. Would the sheer size of the federal government today shock him? Would he be appalled at the alleged abuse of power in the Blagojevich trial in Illinois? The federal expansion of health care? Deficit spending? Yes to all.
Today’s problems would seem more glaring than the sun to Paine. However, one fundamental reality would make him smile. His common sense solution is still intact. Paine’s practical plan was to establish a new government with checks and balances among executive, legislative and judicial branches. His remedy for royalty was representation.
While often imperfect, that freedom hasn’t changed. Americans still have the power to vote for their local officials, representatives, president, and often, their judges. They can openly express their opposition to policies they oppose.
Paine’s description of independence still holds true: “The sun never shined on a cause of greater worth.” That reality is something to celebrate this Independence Day.
Jane Hampton Cook, is co-author of “Stories of Faith and Courage from the War in Iraq and Afghanistan” and author of “Stories of Faith and Courage from the Revolutionary War
In another example of unprecedented government intrusion and control in our life, Congressional Democrats have allowed the EPA to have unprecedented powers that would, in essence, regulate and control our lives and habits employing their specious claim that CO2 is a pollutant. This is a disingenuous, surreptitious and depraved means to enact Cap and Trade without the necessary votes and without the detrimental appellation.
This is a direct attack on our freedoms, wealth, and livelihoods and could cost the United States trillions of dollars.
It is just another example of why it is extremely imperative that Republicans take control of the House and Senate in November – to revoke the EPA’s unfettered powers.
Cap-And-Traitors
Investors Business Daily 06/11/2010
Politics: The Senate just claimed the title of the world's most delusional body by refusing to strip unelected EPA bureaucrats of the power to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. This was the day freedom died.
One wonders why we have a Congress at all. The 53 profiles in cowardice that could not get a cap-and-tax bill through the U.S. Senate voted Thursday to let the Environmental Protection Agency keep the unprecedented power Congress did not expressly give it. It is power that the EPA arrogated to itself through regulation to control every aspect of the American economy and our very lives.
This country was born over anger at taxation without representation. Regulation without representation may spark another revolt come November. The Tea Party movement began precisely because of such arrogant disregard for the wishes of the American people. Unlike health care reform, this time the cowardly lions of the Senate couldn't even do it themselves and ceded their authority to the EPA.
It was only a motion to proceed to consideration of Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski's resolution (S.J. Res. 26) which, under a forgotten provision of the Contract With America, lets legislators veto a "major rule" by any regulatory agency within 60 days of publication. It needed just 51 votes; it got 47.
All 41 Republicans, including newbie Scott Brown of Massachusetts, voted not to shred the Constitution. The motion attracted, for various reasons, the votes of six Democrats — Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln, Ben Nelson, Mark Pryor, the departing Evan Bayh and even Jay Rockefeller, who for once chose jobs over ideology.
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin accused the Republicans of choosing "political science over the real science," even after the EPA's junk science based on the manipulation of data by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been exposed as a manufactured fraud.
The case for climate change has collapsed — a fact recognized, finally, by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who, with Democrat John Kerry and independent Joseph Lieberman, once hoped to work out some kind of compromise legislation with a token nod to domestic energy production.
Last week, Graham told reporters he would vote against the climate bill he helped author. "The science about global warming has changed," Graham told reporters Wednesday on why he was backing an energy bill by Sen. Dick Lugar. "I think they've oversold this stuff, quite frankly. I think they've been alarmist and the science is in question."
Hardly a profile in courage, since the legislation wasn't going anywhere, but welcome aboard nonetheless. The science behind cap-and-trade is not only in question, it's nonexistent. The Earth is demonstrably cooling, and the trend will likely continue for decades, according to scientists who don't tamper with the data.
So delusional are Senate Democrats that California's Barbara Boxer, in trying to advance her own failed cap-and-tax bill, said on the Senate floor: "I'm going to put in the record ... a host of quotes from our national security experts who tell us that carbon pollution leading to climate change will be over the next 20 years the leading cause of conflict, putting our troops in harm's way." So, forget that Iranian nuke.
This is a Congress full of hypocrites who complain about executive branch power under Republicans but are willing to give the EPA unprecedented power because they don't have the votes for cap-and-trade. "Who elected the Environmental Protection Agency?" asked Wyoming Republican John Barrasso. It is a question we, and the voters, ask too.
The following editorial describes the deleterious effects that Obama’s aggressive remarks and rebukes toward Israel have had on that country. These, by themselves, are supremely important. However, if you look at the big picture, the damage that Obama has engendered by his lack of leadership and executive experience, his naiveté and disingenuous ideologies, and ill-advised commentaries, apologies and rebukes is incalculable.
In America, he has unleashed divisiveness and racism (ie. - incendiary comments on Arizona’s illegal immigration legislation with countless cities and organizations now attacking or boycotting Arizona- also pitting one state against another; his countenancing of Helen Thomas’ anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rants setting a poor example; dropping prosecution of the New Black Panther Party in the Philadelphia voter intimidation case; maintaining strong associations with black racists such as Cornel West, Henry Jones, Louis Farrakhan, Jay-Z, etc.)
Internationally, by denigrating America and apologizing for it, insulting and /or decreasing support and protection for our long-time allies (Great Britain, Israel, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Honduras, etc.), remaining silent in the defense of freedom and democracy (ignoring the Iranian people uprising against the theocratic repressive Islamic regime), talking loudly but carrying a very tiny stick (none to useless threats to Iran; loser in nuclear talks to Russia/Putin) and denying Islamic terrorist we are unquestionably witnessing the expected consequences.
Our enemies are emboldened and that spells death and disaster. There has been an explosion of terrorism attempts (fortunately they have thus far failed) in this country since he took office. Iran is progressing unimpeded in its quest for nuclear weapons which it will use – and which will precipitate a conflagration of unparalleled proportions. Turkey and other countries see a green light to be aggressive to Israel. Venezuela is saber rattling even more and upsetting the stability in South America.
And the list goes on.
Obama is not fit to be President. He must be removed from office to protect our country and the world!
Open Season On The Jewish State
Investors Business Daily 06/08/2010
In its latest slight, the White House temporarily withdrew an invitation to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu following Israel's killing of nine.
Israel: Of all the ironies of the Obama presidency, the strangest is now unfolding: The election to purge American racism somehow lowered the bar for anti-Semitism.
The 89-year-old Helen Thomas had been roosting in the front row of the White House press briefing room for decades. Yet her ugly feelings that Jews should get the hell out of Palestine and return "home" to Poland or Germany or America — or wherever it is the Jews belong — took this long to bubble up out of the cauldron of her gut in proximity to a camera.
The now ex-doyenne of the White House Press Corps was long known as no friend of the Jewish state, but somehow the intentional chill that the Obama administration has engineered in U.S.-Israeli relations has reduced the caution regarding attacking the state of Israel, and undoubtedly helped set her off.
It's almost like people sensing that the brawny big brother, America, has grown tired of going to the trouble of escorting his persecuted little brother, Israel, through the neighborhood. And all that long-suppressed resentment is beginning to burst out now that the protector is not on hand.
"Israel is finally getting its comeuppance" seems to be the perception of many of the critics of the Middle East's only democracy, save for U.S.-liberated Iraq.
In wondering how someone in public life, who was in her 20s when the Nazis were slaughtering millions of Jews in Germany and Poland, could act like the caricature of a bigot from an earlier era, it's impossible not to consider the disintegration over the past 16 months of our relationship with our staunchest Mideast ally.
The latest slight was the temporary withdrawal of an invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to come to the White House after Israeli forces killed nine aboard a Turkish-backed flotilla trying to break an Israeli blockade of Gaza last week.
It turns out, according to reports, that the administration's rejection of Israeli intelligence reports and consequent refusal to provide advanced weapons led to Netanyahu refusing to authorize the use of tear gas and other anti-riot measures. After Israeli commandos were soon outmatched by Turkish personnel, live fire was ordered by the Israeli naval commander.
The White House demand that Israel "exercise extreme caution and restraint," as a diplomat told WorldTribune.com, apparently ended up costing lives. Would this "Freedom Flotilla" have even attempted to break an Israeli blockade if Israel still had our strong backing? And would Iran be threatening to use its Revolutionary Guards to help smash the blockade with a naval escort?
Would the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency be placing Israel's nuclear weapons power status on its governing board's agenda this month for the first time in nearly two decades if the American-Israeli relationship wasn't deteriorating?
Would the likes of bush-league diplomatic players such as Turkey and Brazil be coming out of the woodwork with a deal to threaten even the tepid sanctions against an Islamofascist regime in Iran that will soon be able to launch a nuclear warhead against Israel?
A good case could be made that little or none of this would be happening if the U.S. had not let it be known, in various ways, that it wasn't going to be supporting Israel the way it used to.
With photos circulating of the president hugging Helen Thomas in the press room, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs scrambled to condemn her remarks as "offensive and reprehensible." And then the president followed with a personal condemnation.
But distancing itself from Thomas' bigotry doesn't allow the president to escape blame. Like former President Jimmy Carter, who used the flotilla incident to accuse Israel of "besieging Gaza" and claim that because of Israel, "the people of Gaza remain isolated and deprived of their basic human rights," this administration believes Israel should be blamed for defending itself from terrorism.
In fact, the Jewish state, surrounded by bloodthirsty enemies, should be lauded for its restraint over the decades, not subject to further persecution.
If it is possible that some Americans are still oblivious to Obama’s true allegiances, the recent events off the coast of Israel should clarify it further. Of course, one just has to examine his long, though intentionally suppressed (by him and the sycophantic news media) history of radicalism and associations with individuals of such ilk to understand that his actions comport completely with this ideology. Like his long friendships and reverence of Weatherman domestic terrorist William Ayers and Rashid Khalidi, the pro-Palestinian and erstwhile PLO spokesperson and supporter – just to name a few.
The first article below, written by Aaron Klein, reveals the duplicity of Obama and his close associates and friends in the Middle East situation. Their intentional provocation of Israel has provided Obama the story line to publicly rebuke that country and galvanize support for the Palestinians which is, of course, where his sentiments lie. This position contravenes that of a vast majority of Americans and the position that the United States has taken since that country’s founding in 1948.
This is another example Obama’s despicable and egregious treatment of our longtime Allies.
Noting this, we also need to look at the big picture, particularly his pattern of behavior.
Is this a President who we could trust to protect our rights and freedoms and who is there to serve us all?
Most definitely not!
Virtually everything that he has done points to a consolidation and aggrandizement of government powers with ever increasing restrictions of our rights, freedoms, choices and confiscation of the fruits of our labors. Furthermore, he has encircled our Constitutional government around 40 appointed radical czars who answer to no one but him. In the trenches among us are his ideological and corrupt armies comprised of ACORN and union members, especially SEIU, who serve as enforcers. Coverage, exposure and critical analysis of nearly all of this is being suppressed by the fawning but also unwittingly controlled news media.
Unless we all respond appropriately and thwart his (and others, of course) radical agenda, the future of a free America appears bleak.
All aboard! Obama pals back violent Gaza flotilla Activists from president's circle of friends top supporters of anti-Israel protest ships
By Aaron Klein May 31, 2010 WorldNetDaily
The group behind the Gaza flotilla that engaged in deadly clashes with Israeli commandos today counts among its top supporters the friends and associates of President Barack Obama, namely the founders of the Weather Underground terrorist organization, William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, as well as Jodie Evans, the leader of the radical activist organization Code Pink.
Obama pals, flotilla backers: William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn
Earlier today, Israeli navy commandos raided the six-ship flotilla, encountering heavy resistance and live fire from the activists. Several activists were killed and dozens of others were reportedly injured, as were several of the Israeli commandos.
The flotilla was organized by the Free Gaza Movement, a coalition of leftist human rights activists and pro-Palestinian groups engaged in attempts to break a blockade imposed by Israel on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.
Ayers, Dohrn and Evans' Code Pink have led several recent Free Gaza Movement initiatives, including attempted marches into the Gaza Strip. Dorhn was in the Middle East just last month on behalf of the movement.
Ayers and Dohrn were close associates for years with President Obama, while Evans was a fundraiser and financial bundler for Obama's presidential campaign.
In January, WND reported Ayers, Dohrn and Evans were involved in provoking chaos on the streets of Egypt in an attempt to enter Gaza with the Free Gaza Movement to join in solidarity with the territory's population and leadership.
The three helped to stir riots after the Egyptian government refused to allow a large number of protesters to enter neighboring Gaza. Eventually, the protesters accepted an Egyptian offer of allowing about 100 marchers into Gaza. Once in the territory, those marchers were reportedly met on the Gaza side by Hamas' former Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.
At the time of the march, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., wrote a letter in support of a "humanitarian delegation from Massachusetts" to Gaza. Members of Ayers', Dohrn and Evans' group documented on their blogs how Kerry's letter was used at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo while attempting to pressure Egypt to let their group into Gaza.
Images of the letter were also posted on the Electronic Intifada website run by Ali Abunimah, who was with Evans' group in Egypt and who, WND previously reported, spoke at pro-Palestinian events in the 1990s alongside Obama. In one such event, a 1999 fundraiser for Palestinian "refugees," Abunimah recalled introducing Obama on stage.
Kerry's office previously met with Code Pink members, WND has learned. Sarah Roche-Mahdi of Code Pink also is a member of the United for Peace and Justice Palestine Task Force, which met with Kerry's staffers.
Kerry last year became the most senior U.S. politician to visit the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, although at the time he did not meet with Hamas leaders.
Dohrn later wrote on a blog that she was briefly detained at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo following the January protests there by her group: "Bill and I went to the American Embassy at 10 a.m. and asked to see the ambassador. We were ushered into a holding pen a block away from the embassy building where we joined 35 people already there, surrounded by Egyptian soldiers," she wrote.
Deadly clashes
Israeli Naval Forces intercepted the flotilla today attempting to break the maritime closure of the Gaza Strip.
An Israel Defense Forces spokesperson told WND commandos boarded the ships after numerous warnings from Israel requesting the ships redirect toward the Israeli port of Ashdod, where they would be able to unload their aid supplies, which could then be transferred to the Gaza Strip after undergoing security inspections.
During the boarding of one of the ships, the Marmara, activists onboard attacked IDF naval personnel with live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs, the IDF spokesperson said.
"The demonstrators had clearly prepared their weapons in advance for this specific purpose," said the spokesperson. "As a result of this life-threatening and violent activity, naval forces first employed riot dispersal means, followed by live fire.
"IDF naval personnel encountered severe violence, including use of weaponry prepared in advance in order to attack them," said the spokesperson.
The IDF released a YouTube video clearly showing activists attacking Israeli commandos, including attacks with live fire.
Close Obama associates
Evans formed Code Pink, a far-left activist organization, in 2002 to protest America's war in Iraq. The group previously met with Hamas and with leaders of the Taliban. Evans was a fundraiser and financial bundler for Obama's presidential campaign.
Abunimah traveled in some of the same political circles as Obama in the 1990s. Abunimah previously described meeting with Obama at a fundraiser at the home of Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi, reportedly a former PLO activist. Khalidi was also a close associate of Obama.
"[Obama] came with his wife. That's where I had a chance to really talk to him," Abunimah recalled. "It was an intimate setting. He convinced me he was very aware of the issues [and] critical of U.S. bias toward Israel and lack of sensitivity to Arabs. ... He was very supportive of U.S. pressure on Israel."
According to quotes obtained by Gulf News, Abunimah recalled a 2004 meeting in a Chicago neighborhood while Obama was running for his Senate seat. Abunimah quoted Obama telling him "warmly" he was sorry that "I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race."
"I'm hoping when things calm down, I can be more up front," Abunimah reportedly quoted the senator as saying.
Abunimah said Obama urged him to "keep up the good work" at the Chicago Tribune, where Abunimah contributed guest columns that were highly critical of Israel.
Ayers, meanwhile, became a name in last year's presidential campaign when it was disclosed the radical worked closely with Obama for years.
Ayers helped launch Obama's political career with a fundraiser in his home. Obama served on the board of a Chicago nonprofit alongside Ayers. The terrorist later hired Obama to serve as chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a job Obama later cited as experience that helped qualify him to run for public office.
While at the CAC, Obama and Ayers both granted funds to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.
WND columnist Jack Cashill has produced a series of persuasive arguments that it was Ayers who ghostwrote Obama's award-winning autobiography, "Dreams from My Father."
Ayers and Dohrn were two of the main founders of the Weather Underground, which bombed the New York City Police headquarters in 1970, the Capitol in 1971 and the Pentagon in 1972. The group was responsible for some 30 bombings aimed at destroying the defense and security infrastructures of the U.S.
Characterizing the Weather Underground as "an American Red Army," Ayers summed up the organization's ideology: "Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents."
"Everything was absolutely ideal on the day I bombed the Pentagon," Ayers recalled in his 2001 memoir, "Fugitive Days." "The sky was blue. The birds were singing. And the bastards were finally going to get what was coming to them."
Ayers brandished his unrepentant radicalism for years later, as evidenced by his now notorious 2001 interview with the New York Times, published one day after the 9/11 attacks, in which he stated, "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough."
Ayers posed for a photograph accompanying the New York Times piece that showed him stepping on an American flag. He said of the U.S.: "What a country. It makes me want to puke."
Why Didn't Obama Order Veto Of U.N. Security Council Resolution Condeming Israel?
Hugh Hewitt June 01, 2010
The president's hostility to Israel flared again yesterday, with his concurrence in a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel.
There is simply no way the United States or the other members of the Council are in a position to know what happened with sufficient detail to allow for such a resolution except for reflexive anti-Israeli sentiment. Peter Beinart can proclaim with certainty that the guilt lies with Israel's leaders and Israel's U.S. supporters, and there are plenty of voices inside Israel blasting the decision to stop the convoy.
But it is the job of the United States to prevent the Security Council from becoming just another "bash Israel" forum and make sure that all of the facts are known and that Israel --our most reliable ally in the region and the front line against the mullahs in Iran and their operatives in Lebanon and Gaza-- is not unfairly pummeled with the aftermath of an intentional provocation that ought not to have occurred in the first place given the embargo. Israel's response is just beginning to emerge, but already the U.S. has joined with the usual enemies of Israel to denounce the country.
How would the U.S. respond to an overland convoy of aid material to the heart of Taliban-controlled Afghanistan that is intended for the benefit of the forces carrying out war against the government of Afghanistan and their U.S. and western allies? Would Beinart urge that we allow such convoys to simply enter the area? If the convoy refused to stop at checkpoints, would he shrug his shoulders and say fine?
Beinart says the embargo of Gaza isn't working. But there are far fewer rockets falling on Israel today than there were before the Gaza incursion last year. There are still occasional attacks and fatalities, so there is no basis for claiming that Hamas has reformed or is evolving into something other than a terrorist organization.
Of course the world would prefer that Israel be able to interdict resupply of terrorists without loss of life, and the ship should have gone to the Israeli port for inspection. It is a complicated, dangerous situation.
But President Obama advances resolution of the situation not one inch by joining in the pounding of Israel. The unprecedented level of hostility to Israel from an American Administration continues, and Israel and its supporters must recognize that President Obama is not a reliable supporter when the going gets very tough indeed.
Obama sees America not as it was intended and how it has been the paradigm of prosperity over its first 232 years. Instead, he envisions and wants to impose a Marxist philosophy that is the antithesis of our values and work ethic. Terry Paulson assessed his mindset as "America must go beyond equal rights and responsibilities to guarantee equal outcomes and entitlement programs to ensure that".
He sums up this approach of Obama’s by noting that:
"As a result, if you work hard, save, postpone gratification, and take care of yourself and your family, you lose. Not only must you support your family; you’re “forced” to support many others."
This is, in essence, legislated servitude or legalized theft. It’s a government shakedown – and consummately repulsive.
“Give Me Individual Liberty Not Government Dependence”
Terry Paulson April 12, 2010
Dennis Prager has recently added a pearl of wisdom to his repertoire of truths—“The larger the government, the smaller the individual.” The biggest danger from President Obama’s march to bigger government rests in what this means to the grounding principles that have made America great. Will America renew its commitment to individual liberty and personal responsibility or give in to government dependence and control?
As current Tea Party demonstrators would agree, Benjamin Franklin criticized King George’s high taxes to pay for the welfare entitlements of his time, “I affirm that there is no country in the world in which the poor are more idle, dissolute, drunken, and insolent. The day you passed that act (taxes for welfare), you took away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence on someone else than a careful accumulation during youth and health, for support in age or sickness. In short, you offered a premium for the encouragement of idleness, and you should not now wonder that it has had its effect in the increase of poverty.”
Franklin preferred “responsible” caring, "I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it…. Repeal that law (taxes), and you will soon see a change in their manners. Labor…will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them."
Thomas Jefferson concurred, "A wise and frugal government...shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government." Abraham Lincoln stressed common sense, “The worst thing you can do for those you love is the thing they could and should do for themselves.”
Our free-enterprise economy has served for over 200 years as the greatest anti-poverty program in human history because it encouraged work, and discouraged idleness, more than any other. Citizens have been free to pursue their American Dream based on the principle that men are created equal in their rights and their responsibilities.
President Obama finds such values outdated. America must go beyond equal rights and responsibilities to guarantee equal outcomes and entitlement programs to ensure that. As a result, if you work hard, save, postpone gratification, and take care of yourself and your family, you lose. Not only must you support your family; you’re “forced” to support many others. Americans have no trouble providing temporary help, but they expect most to bounce back and lift their own weight.
When caring for your neighbor becomes a compulsory obligation imposed by government instead of voluntary, charity turns to confiscation and freedom to achieve to involuntary servitude. To liberals, compassion seems to be defined by how many people are dependent on the government; to conservatives, it’s defined by how many people no longer need help. One promotes dependence, the other freedom, responsibility and achievement.
There is no moral or Constitutional justification for taking money honorably earned from a neighbor to pay for what some citizens can’t afford. With one half of American voters no longer paying income taxes, wealth redistribution has turned envy into legitimized confiscation.
America has always been known for its national optimism--that sense of unlimited possibility. Only a society that allows individuals to secure the rewards from applying their unique talents will ever reap the benefits of human greatness. It’s a tragedy that so many Americans today no longer believe they can realistically achieve their dreams without electing politicians who will take from other citizens to pay for what they can’t provide for themselves.
Incentives matter. You’ll never strengthen the weak by weakening and taking from the strong. Our messy but free republic works because people are free to create value instead of becoming perpetual burdens.
In the midst of a recession, Ronald Reagan said to Americans, “I’m not taking your time this evening to ask you to trust me. Instead, I ask you to trust yourself. That is what America is all about… It’s the power of millions of people like you who will determine what will make America great again.”
Our commitment to individual freedom and responsibility is one of the anchors that has held our country together through our history’s worst economic storms. President Obama would be wise to reaffirm that anchor if he wants our economy to turn around with the resilience that only freedom can produce.
The following outrageous comment by Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) just confirms the mind set of many of the far-left Democrats (Obama, Pelosi, Reid, et. al.) and not just regarding healthcare and why we need to be ever vigilant in protecting and fighting for our rights and freedoms. This is an ideology that will relentlessly seek to abrogate our rights, creating an omnipotent, intrusive, and authoritarian Central Government not unlike the Soviet Union or China.
What can and should we do? Fight back. Resist. Remove these Democrats from office in November. Provide support for organizations, agencies, individuals and even states that are trying to rein in and reduce the ever increasing power of the Federal government.
Rep. Dingell: It's Taken a Long Time to 'Control the People'
From American Thinker: Rep. John Dingell (D-MI), the Dean of the House of Representatives for being the longest serving member of the body (he was first elected in 1955, succeeding his father, Rep. John Dingell, Sr.), made an amazing admission during a live telephone interview with Detroit WJR News/Talk 760 radio talk show host Paul W. Smith on Smith's show Monday morning, March 22, 2010. The night before, Dingell had been a featured speaker at the Democrat Congressional leadership victory press conference after Obamacare passed the House. In response to a question posed by Smith, Dingell said:
Let me remind you this [Americans allegedly dying because of lack of universal health care] has been going on for years. We are bringing it to a halt. The harsh fact of the matter is when you're going to pass legislation that will cover 300 [million] American people in different ways it takes a long time to do the necessary administrative steps that have to be taken to put the legislation together to control the people.
As many people are beginning to realize and what we have been warning about for a long time, Obamacare is not truly about healthcare or healthcare reform. That is the liberal pretense used for its passage. This legislation is all about the transfer of wealth, expropriation of 17% of our economy by the Federal government, and unfettered control and intrusion by the government into our private lives including access to our medical records.
There are no cost savings nor will there be a reduction in our national debt. We don’t think that adding in excess of 170 new federal agencies enumerated within this bill will accomplish this trick. Nor will the planned hiring of 16,500 new IRS agents (we don’t think that they have your interest at heart) to monitor compliance save us money. These actions tell you all you need to know about Obama’s and the Congressional Democrats’ true agenda under the guise of healthcare reform.
We all must vigorously thwart implementation of Obamacare by also providing verbal and financial support to our Senators, Representatives, Tea Party Groups, organizations and States who will be fighting this despicable legislation.
Enacting A Lie
Investors Business Daily 03/22/2010
Health Overhaul: Sunday's vote exposed the ugly truth that ObamaCare is not really about health care at all. It's all about who pays for it and who controls it — in effect a massive wealth-redistribution scheme.
Those who believe this will lead to some medical nirvana will likely be disappointed. Fact is, this poorly designed monstrosity will lead to lower-quality care, higher costs, fewer practicing physicians, higher taxes and fewer jobs.
We've done more than 150 editorials in the past year or so documenting these problems. Democrats surely understand them.
Yet, despite a recent CNN poll showing that 59% of Americans oppose ObamaCare, Congress approved it anyway.
Why? Because it's not really about health care. It's the largest wealth grab in American history, masquerading as health care "reform," another step in the socialization of Americans' income in the name of "fairness" and "spread(ing) the wealth around," as Obama himself has put it.
That's why we call the program a lie.
The idea behind all this, simply put, is control. This is a vast expansion of government that will require as much as $3 trillion in added spending over a decade. All claims of deficit neutrality are a joke.
This is socialization through the tax code. That $3 trillion has to be paid for. As we showed last week, the health care bill levies $569.2 billion in new taxes over the next 10 years alone.
At the same time, as noted by Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former head of the Congressional Budget Office, it will increase U.S. budget deficits by $562 billion.
Who'll pay all these taxes? Those deemed "rich" by Democrats, and businesses. Specifically, the bulk of the money comes from a special 3.8% Medicare tax on 5 million people earning more than $200,000 a year. That tax is imposed on capital gains, dividends, rents, royalties and interest — that is, investment income.
Obama already has proposed boosting these taxes in his budget. So the top tax take on dividends and cap gains will rise to 23.8% from 15%, an increase of nearly 59%, while top rates on interest and rents will soar from 15% to nearly 44%, a 193% jump.
About 50% of this higher-taxed group reports small business or partnership income. So don't be fooled: These aren't taxes on the "rich," but on small businesses and jobs.
In ObamaCare, the taxes will be ruinous. Unlike real insurance, where individuals pay to cover their risks, this program covers everyone — including 32 million uninsured — and pays for it by a "mandate" ( read: "tax" ) and by taking money from other people to subsidize those who can't pay. And this just scratches the surface of the new taxes — we literally don't have room to list them here.
Hmm. Taking money from one group, and giving it to another. That's called welfare — or, perhaps, health-fare. It's not insurance.
Once the new program is finished wrecking what remains of the private health insurance industry — as it ultimately will — we'll be stuck with the government declaring that "the market doesn't work" and forcing all of us into a single-payer government plan.
That's what those Democrats who back "Medicare for all" want — to kill what's left of the private market for health care, which has created the best medical system on earth, and use "reform" to expand an already-bankrupt Medicare system.
The math behind this is ugly. Medicare's long-term liabilities now total $89 trillion, according to the Government Accountability Office. Based on projected deficits, the just-passed health reform will take that to $136 trillion.
It will take a lot more than the "rich," as defined today, to make up such unfathomable tax shortfalls. That's when they'll come for the rest of us — poor, middle-class and rich alike — and we all will be paying vastly higher taxes for vastly inferior medical care.
Unfortunately, the degree of adherence to baseless ideology by Obama is only exceeded in magnitude by his ignoble narcissism that passage of healthcare reform will cement a deified legacy. As a consequence and facilitated by other far-left, corrupt, like minded elitist individuals like Pelosi and Reid, America’s economy in addition to its healthcare will suffer irreparably. We will all pay the immense price in freedom, rights, choices and ability to advance from our individual efforts.
We need to fight to overturn or annul this legislation.
Let the second revolution by the American people begin …
Health Overhaul's Assault On Business
Investors Business Daily 03/19/2010
Taxes: If ObamaCare becomes permanent, no one will suffer more than U.S. businesses. They'll face higher taxes, more regulations and a higher cost of capital. But don't take our word for it. Go ask Caterpillar.
The heavy-equipment giant reckons its insurance costs will go up 20%, or $100 million, the first year after the health care system is overhauled, and may go even higher. Multiply that by literally tens of thousands of companies nationwide, large and small, and you can see how costs will soar.
"We can ill-afford cost increases that place us at a disadvantage versus our global competitors," said Greg Folley, a Caterpillar vice president. "We are disappointed that efforts at reform have not addressed the cost concerns we've raised throughout the year."
If you don't care how this affects businesses, you should. Some 15 million people in this country don't have jobs — and another 12 million work part-time but want full-time positions.
If America's major employers are hit with huge, government-mandated cost increases during an economic downturn, do you really think they'll hire more when the economy starts growing on its own again? Of course not.
Despite this, the White House predicts its plan will "cut costs" for businesses. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi even makes the bizarre prediction that passage of health reform will lead to 400,000 new jobs "immediately," and millions more down the road.
Such claims don't hold water because health reform includes $569.2 billion in new taxes, at last count 160 new bureaucracies and regulations, and 16,500 new IRS agents to collect all those taxes. Tax hits on businesses and industries include:
• $52 billion on companies that do not provide what the government deems "acceptable" or "affordable" insurance for workers.
• $60.1 billion on health insurers.
• $27 billion on drugmakers and importers.
• $20 billion on makers and importers of medical devices.
• $2.7 billion on the tanning industry.
And of course the companies themselves don't pay. You do — both as a consumer, through higher prices, and as an employee, through lower wages.
As the Tax Policy Center, a center-liberal think tank, noted recently, "Economists generally believe that the burden of payroll taxes is borne by workers in the form of lower wages, regardless of whether the tax is levied on the employer or employee."
But that's not the end of it.
A new Medicare tax on capital gains, dividends and other investment income has been raised from 2.9% to 3.8%. Supposedly, this is a tax on the "wealthy," those with $200,000 or more in income. It's really a tax on small business, entrepreneurs and investors.
This provision will push the top cap-gains rate from 15% to almost 24%, while the dividend rate will rise from 35% to 43.4%.
This amounts a big new tax on the very people who are most likely to own or start a new business and hire workers. Health reform will tax large numbers of job creators out of business — and no one in the White House seems to know, or even care.
But it will have an enormous impact. As a result of the Obama-Care taxes on successful individuals and companies, investment in new companies will slow, and old companies will face a higher cost of capital. New jobs will be created offshore in places such India and China.
Economist Steve Entin of the Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation estimated the Medicare tax would reduce GDP by 1.3%, capital formation by 3.4% and after-tax incomes of those who don't pay the tax directly by 1.2%.
And those estimates came when the tax was "only" 2.9% — not the 3.8% it is in the current bill. So the economic losses would in fact be even larger than Entin estimated.
Because of these taxes and other faults in the plan, a group of 130 economists last Thursday sent President Obama a letter imploring him not to sign the bill, saying that it would be a job-killer.
"In our view," the economists wrote, "the health care bill contains a number of provisions that will eliminate jobs, reduce hours and wages, and limit future job creation."
Health reform's taxes and huge new costs will lead to semi-permanent stagnation in the U.S. economy, marked by higher unemployment and lower standards of living.
Is this how Americans see their future? Based on the Tea Party movement and growing anger at the government for seizing control of the economy's high ground, we doubt it.
The only real question is, are the White House and Congress listening?
It is difficult if not impossible to find a period of time in our history where our government is as corrupt and hell-bent on abrogating the freedoms and rights of its citizens. This is the anathema of a one party rule without countervailing opposition. What we are witnessing is a revolution by corrupt and unconstitutional legislation perpetrated by “our” government which must be stopped.
The next few days are the most critical for all of us. We urge you to call, e-mail and fax Senators and Representatives across the country and give them a piece of your mind. Then in November, these corruptocrats need to be ousted wholesale.
Not Even A Vote?!
Investors Business Daily 03/16/2010
Health Reform: Using a parliamentary trick ironically known as the "self-executing rule," Democrats plan on passing their massive health bill without voting. In November, they'll learn just how "self-executing" it was.
Just when you thought Washington couldn't get more corrupt, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi this week seems intent on trampling representative government itself. Unable to get the votes to pass their U.S. health care revolution, she and her fellow Democratic leaders have figured out a way to pass it without a vote.
The "self-executing rule" has been "used to adopt concurrent resolutions correcting the enrollment of measures or to make other technical changes to legislation," according to the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress.
It's "a two-for-one procedure," as the CRS describes it, because the House of Representatives always must pass a rule, written by the House Rules Committee (where Democrats hold a 9-to-4 majority), setting the terms of debate on a particular piece of legislation. In this case, it's been rigged so that if the rule passes, the legislation passes too.
The trick has been used before, as cited by the CRS, on obscure measures like the prohibition of smoking on airline flights in 1989, an employee verification program regarding illegal aliens in 1996, the blocking of the use of statistical sampling for the 2000 census until federal courts could determine its constitutionality, and an IRS overhaul in 1997.
But never on anything approaching such landmark legislation.
Amy Ridenour, president of the National Center for Public Policy Research, is among a number of legal scholars who believe this Slaughter Solution, named after House Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., "would stand a very good chance of being tossed out by the U.S. Supreme Court."
In the 1998 Clinton v. City of New York ruling on the line-item veto, liberal Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for a 6-to-3 majority, "laid a likely road map for how the court might rule on a challenge to the constitutionality of the Slaughter Solution," according to Ridenour.
Stevens made note of "three procedural steps" that must be taken before a bill becomes law: The "exact text" must be "approved by a majority of the members of the House of Representatives"; the Senate must approve "precisely the same text"; and the same text must be "signed into law by the president. The Constitution explicitly requires that each of those three steps be taken before a bill may become a law."
Indeed, Article 1, Section 7 of the Constitution couldn't be clearer: "The votes of both Houses shall be determined by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for and against the bill shall be entered on the Journal of each House respectively."
Michael McConnell, a former federal judge and director of Stanford University's Constitutional Law Center, writing in the Wall Street Journal this week, declared the trick unconstitutional because "this means that no single bill will have passed both houses in the same form." Talk radio host and Landmark Legal Foundation President Mark Levin warned of its use sparking "the greatest constitutional crisis since the Civil War."
The president, the speaker and the rest of those involved in one-party rule in Washington may think they know what's good for the American people better than the people do.
Do they also think they know better than the framers of the Constitution and their naive ideas of one man, one vote?
If anything could swell the ranks of the populist Tea Party movement and make it friendlier to Republican candidates this November, it's executing the "self-executing rule."
We are now seeing some more sensible politicians speaking out against the Federal government's illegal tactics of attempting to impose legislation on Americans and against their will. This is essentially a clarion call to action in order to prevent the government from abrogating our rights and freedoms.
We all must act. Call, write and e-mail your Representatives and Senators again, again and again...
Steve King Calls For Revolution In The Streets Of Washington To Stop Health Care Bill
Eric Kleefeld March 16, 2010
Rep. Steve King (R-IA)
Rep. Steve King (R-IA) is calling for a new procedural solution to stop the health care bill: Have an angry mob of citizens storm Washington and prevent Congress from acting, in imitation of the Velvet Revolution that overthrew communist rule in Czechoslovakia!
The Huffington Post interviewed King after his speech at today's "Code Red" anti-health care bill rally, a speech in which he called upon the crowd to "Storm this city, fill up Washington D.C., jam this capital so they can't move."
Speaking to the Huffington Post shortly after his speech, King declared that a peaceful uprising, a la the successful overthrowing of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia on the streets of Prague in 1989 "would be fine with me."
"Fill this city up, fill this city, jam this place full so that they can't get in, they can't get out and they will have to capitulate to the will of the American people," he said.
"So this is just like Prague under communist rule?" the Huffington Post asked.
"Oh yeah, it is very, very close," King replied. "It is the nationalization of our liberty and the federal government taking our liberty over. So there are a lot of similarities there."
The Democratic leadership has not ruled any tactics off limits in its quest to obtain enough votes necessary to pass their healthcare reform legislation. They have resorted to ad hominem attacks even on fellow Democrats, slander, threats, bribes, illegal or questionable parliamentary maneuvers and other corrupt deals.
All of this is being perpetrated despite a furious and rejecting American public who oppose Obamacare by nearly a 3:1 margin. The contemptuousness, elitism and arrogance of Obama, Pelosi, Reid and others is essentially unparalleled in American History.
These individuals must be stopped and Obamacare should never see the light of day. What these politicians are doing is facilitating a legislative theft of our rights, freedoms and wealth that may be permanent. It is a heinous scheme that is leading us closer to an ideological totalitarian regime under the guise of a “representative” government.
House Democrat Takes On Party Leaders
Lee Ross March 13, 2010
In a surprising and fascinating look at the behind-the-scenes negotiations of proposed health care legislation on Capitol Hill, a prominent Democrat says the actions of his party's leaders in recent days represents a "pretty sad commentary on the state of the Democratic party."
If House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is holding out hope that Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) will replicate his "yes" vote on health care reform she can probably forget it. In a wide-ranging swipe at his party's leaders, Stupak told an interviewer that he is a definite "no" vote on a health care bill that is expected to reach the House floor next week.
A single vote could make the difference in the fate of the legislation but Stupak says other pro-life Democrats who had been part of his coalition fighting for specific language on abortion funding have given up the fight. "It's almost like some right-to-life members don't want to be bothered. They just want this over," Stupak told National Review's Robert Costa in an article [1]published on-line Friday. If that's the case, Democratic leaders may be able to prevail without Stupak's support.
The Michigan Democrat's vitriol for House leaders shines a bright light on the normally secret negotiations. "They're ignoring me," Stupak asserts while concluding that the final bill will not have the stronger abortion-related language that he's long supported and was able to force in the first bill the House passed late last year.
"[E]ven if they don't have the votes, it's been made clear to us that they won't insert our language on the abortion issue," Stupak says. "I really believe that the Democratic leadership is simply unwilling to change its stance. Their position says that women, especially those without means available, should have their abortions covered."
Stupak offers an interesting take on why party leaders don't want his effort to succeed. "If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more. That's one of the arguments I've been hearing," Stupak says. "Money is their hang-up. Is this how we now value life in America? If money is the issue - come on, we can find room in the budget. This is life we're talking about."
Stupak believes that if a final health care bill passes without strong language on abortion funding, it will effectively freeze out pro-life Democrats in the future. He says he will remain a Democrat but predicts that any effort to change the abortion language would have to wait "until the Republicans take back the majority to fix this." You read that right, a Democrat looking forward to a Republican take-over of Congress!
Stupak's prominence and apparent resolve on this issue has increased the political heat on the nine-term Democrat. "This has really reached an unhealthy stage," Stupak says. "People are threatening ethics complaints on me. On the left, they're really stepping it up. Every day, from Rachel Maddow to the Daily Kos, it keeps coming. Does it bother me? Sure. Does it change my position? No."
A Friday posting on Daily Kos has this headline: "Women ROAR BACK against Stupak/Pitts!" It targets Stupak and Congressman Joe Pitts (R-PA) and is a fundraising appeal for Stupak's primary challenger. "If you were pissed when Joe Wilson shouted YOU LIE at President Obama I want you to channel that same sort of anger and aim it in support of Connie Saltonstall..."
Earlier this week, MSNBC's Maddow took direct aim at Stupak saying his efforts were designed to do nothing more than get him on television. "Abortion rights only for rich ladies. That's Bart Stupak's principled crusade," Maddow said.
Stupak does not name names in his attack on party leaders but in a radio interview Thursday, Stupak recounted a conversation he had with House Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA), a central figure in the health care debate. Stupak said Waxman told him that Democratic leaders "want to pay for abortions." In a statement to Fox News, Waxman said “My position has been clear and consistent. I do not believe health reform should be used to change current law, which prohibits federal funds from paying for abortion.”
The Second Amendment to the Constitution, the right to bear arms, should not require much interpretation yet it has been challenged on numerous occasions. It is shocking that circuit court judges and even Supreme Court Justices provide variant interpretations. The fact that the Supreme Court decision in the Heller v. District of Columbia case in 2008 regarding Washington’s strict gun prohibition was overturned by only a 5 – 4 margin, should give pause to freedom loving Americans.
Our freedoms can be ephemeral – they can be taken away in a flash. The “progressives” and the far-left in our country are relentlessly attacking our innate rights and freedoms, often in incremental and stealth ways. The Second Amendment not only allows us to protect ourselves from others who aim to harm us but as Thomas Jefferson noted, it also is what can protect us from a tyrannical, overreaching government.
We must be ever vigilant in protecting and defending these rights and freedoms.
'Right To Bear Arms' Means Just That
Investors Business Daily 03/03/2010
Gun Rights: Otis McDonald, 76, an Army vet who lives in a high-crime area of Chicago, thinks the Constitution gives him the right to bear arms to protect himself and his wife as he protected his country. We think so too.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard arguments on behalf of four Chicago residents led by homeowner McDonald, the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association to overturn Chicago's three-decade-old ban on owning handguns.
In a 5-4 decision in 2008, Heller v. District of Columbia, written by Justice Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia's draconian, 32-year-old ban on the private ownership of handguns. Scalia wrote that an individual right to bear arms is supported by "the historical narrative" before and after the Second Amendment was adopted.
The joy of Second Amendment defenders was short-lived. A three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, led by Judge Frank Easterbrook, rejected subsequent suits brought by the National Rifle Association against the city of Chicago and its suburb of Oak Park, Ill.
According to Easterbrook, the Revolution was fought and independence won so that the Founding Fathers could write a Constitution with a Bill of Rights that applied only to the District of Columbia.
"Heller dealt with a law enacted under the authority of the national government," he wrote, "while Chicago and Oak Park are subordinate bodies of a state."
We're all for federalism, but the U.S. Constitution is the U.S. Constitution. Surely he can't be serious.
Alan Gura, the Alexandria, Va., lawyer who won the Heller case, has expanded the argument to include the 14th Amendment, adopted in 1868 to prevent infringement on constitutional rights by states and others concerned about newly freed slaves owning firearms.
Introducing the 14th Amendment to Congress, Sen. Jacob Howard of Michigan referred to "personal rights" such as "the right to keep and bear arms, " explaining that his amendment would compel the states "to respect these great fundamental guarantees."
In 2008, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott filed an amicus brief on behalf of 32 states that also challenged the constitutionality of the D.C. ban. Now he represents a group of 38 states fighting the Chicago ban. "The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is a critical liberty interest, essential to preserving individual security and the right to self-defense," Abbott explained.
Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass wrote in 2008 that in Chicago only two classes of people can possess firearms: "The criminals and the politicians."
City politicians, he noted, used their influence to "become deputized peace officers so they can carry" or "often go around surrounded by armed bodyguards on the city payroll."
Otis McDonald wants the same right to defend himself and his family. To deny him that right, city officials argue that repealing the ban will bring carnage in the streets. Yet in the forthcoming third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime," John Lott points out that the Windy City's murder rate fell relative to America's other 50 largest cities before the ban and rose afterward.
In an essay Monday for FoxNews.com, Lott noted that after the D.C. gun ban was ruled unconstitutional, murders in Washington plummeted 25% from 2008 to 2009. D.C.'s murder rate, he reports, is down to 23.5 per 100,000 people, its lowest since 1967.
More guns do seem to mean less crime. And as Mr. McDonald insists, those who gave us liberty gave us the means and the right to defend it.
As predictable as the sun rising in the east, Obama will pursue reconciliation in order to facilitate passage of his radical bill which will steal our freedom and rights, fiscally bankrupt our country and destroy the best healthcare system in the world.
We must stop Obama and his radical, elitist minions from this government take over of our healthcare system that a large majority of Americans oppose ... and which Obama and Congress will never have to be subject to.
We urge you to call and email your Senators and Representatives, voicing your vehement opposition to this legislation.
Unreconciled
Investors Business Daily 03/03/2010
Health Reform: As promised, the White House has unveiled the latest tweaks in its plan to take over the U.S. medical care system. Both parties in Congress should beware: You vote for it, you own it.
Survey after survey, including our own IBD/TIPP Poll, shows that Americans firmly oppose more government control over health care. Yet President Obama's new reform plan does just that.
He and other Democratic leaders seem willing to ignore both the voters and the well-founded doubts of opponents to ram a plan down our collective throats — making the grand bet that Republicans, even if they retake Congress in November, will have neither the political clout nor the guts to undo the damage.
Worse, they cynically manipulated us into this situation. Last week, at the much-ballyhooed health care "summit," the president pretended to take ideas from Republican foes to "improve" his wildly unpopular plan. But it was just window dressing.
On Wednesday, the president made clear he'll use the budget reconciliation process to get his radical plan through with as few votes as possible. In short, he'll pass a bill that takes control of 17% of the economy without any GOP support.
So much for bipartisanship.
Worse still, this requires the House to vote up or down on an already-passed Senate bill, with only a vow from the Senate and Obama that they'll go back later and "fix" all that's egregiously wrong with the measure.
So, neither House members nor the citizens they represent will really know what's in the bill until after it's passed. Is this what the White House and Democratic leaders meant last year when they repeatedly promised "transparency" in health reform deliberations?
Still more troubling, no one seems to know the plan's true cost. Obama puts it at $1 trillion over 10 years. But just this week, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowed a "much smaller" bill, while Majority Leader Steny Hoyer insists there is no "scaled-back" version.
Who's right? We'll just say this: Because of accounting tricks that front-load costs but delay benefits, the real price of ObamaCare is more like $2.5 trillion over a decade. This will require massive tax hikes on the middle class, rationing of care by government bureaucrats and deep cuts in Medicare.
The president also said on Wednesday: "The proposal I've put forward gives Americans more control over their health care by holding insurance companies more accountable." Not true.
Americans will be forced to buy health insurance — something we believe is unconstitutional. By adding 31 million new buyers to the health care market and requiring coverage of pre-existing conditions, private insurance prices will inevitably soar. That will force businesses to drop coverage for millions of workers.
"I don't know how this plays politically, but I know it's right," Obama also said. But he knows darn well his scheme is highly unpopular, and that resorting to reconciliation is the only way he'll get the main item on his presidential agenda passed — even if it ends Democrats' control of Congress.
Surely moderate Democrats and Republicans won't be swayed by talk of joining in a "historic opportunity." Their constituents clearly see the flaws in this government takeover of the best health care system in the world, and a vote in favor of it will likely bring their political careers to a sudden end.
The news media and “our” liberal politicians see themselves as so elitist and righteous that they are resorting to attacking the American people who disagree with their policies. They disparage us as ignorant or benighted simply because we are exercising our Constitutional (and inherent) rights to oppose their far-left positions. Democracy has suddenly become an inconvenience for them as it has made passage of their various bills which would further restrict and control our rights and freedoms and plunder more of our hard earned wealth, nearly impossible.
This is also exactly why they are viciously attacking and denigrating the Tea Party Movement, a grass roots movement that represents an angry middle America. We are sick and tired of politicians imperiously foisting expensive and irresponsibly solutions on us, ransacking ever increasing amounts of the fruits of our labor, and destroying our economy, jobs and freedoms yet they live by another set of rules (including their gold plated healthcare plan), corruptly aggrandize themselves with our tax dollars and evince a general antipathy toward the people who are suppose to be their bosses.
This must stop. These despicable, arrogant, corrupt politicians must be voted out of office ASAP!
As for much of the news media, a boycott of their products and programs can be quite effective. In the following article alone, several of these are quoted from that excoriate Americans that we can place on this list:
Times Magazine, Newsweek, New York Times, Washington Post, New Yorker
To this we can add other far-left media like: MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS
Money, or the lack of it, talks. Let’s be quite loud on this issue!
Blame Americans First
Democrats lose patience with democracy.
By Matthew Continetti March 1, 2010
What’s the clearest sign the Obama agenda is in trouble? That’s easy: the string of jeremiads in the pages of the New York Times, Washington Post, and other outlets of fashionable opinion. Unable to tout the administration’s successes, and worried about Republican ascendancy, liberals have assigned responsibility for the mess they’re in neither to their program nor to their methods but to larger, structural faults in American politics and society. Beginning with you.
You aren’t too bright, for one thing. After all, opines Jacob Weisberg in Newsweek, the “biggest culprit” behind “our political paralysis” is the “childishness, ignorance, and growing incoherence of the public at large.” You simply do not know what’s good for you. “On many issues these days,” writes the Washington Post’s Steven Pearlstein, “the American people are badly confused.” “The people may have spoken,” writes the New -Yorker’s James Surowiecki. “It’s just not clear that they’re making any sense.” In a blog post titled “Too Dumb to Thrive,” Time magazine’s Joe Klein cuts to the chase: “It is very difficult to thrive in an increasingly competitive world if you’re a nation of dodos.”
The problem, as Weisberg sees it, is that America “simultaneously demands and rejects action on unemployment, deficits, health care, and other problems.” Note the myopia. For Weisberg, the only conceivable “action” on any issue is limited to the policy preferences of liberal Democrats. No other options spring to mind.
This is nonsense. Just because the public says the economy is important does not necessarily mean it has to support a stimulus measure that has added massively to the debt without much benefit. Just because the public is concerned with rising health care costs does not mean that it has to support a bill that could alter existing health care arrangements and increase costs in the long-term. Steven Pearlstein writes that Americans “want to do something about global warming.” No they don’t. Global warming came dead last in a recent Pew survey of public priorities.
The reason health care, cap and trade, and the other blocks of Obama’s New Foundation are unpopular isn’t public ignorance. It’s that the public sees them as counterproductive—and in many cases beside the point. The people’s representatives have responded to a variety of signals, from falling poll numbers, to town hall protests, to GOP victories in -Virginia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. Which is precisely how democracy is supposed to function.
And that’s the problem, says Kurt Andersen in New York magazine. “American democracy has gotten way too democratic.” The “thoughtful, educated, well-off, well-regarded gentlemen” who designed our Constitution “wanted a government run by an American elite like themselves.” But the “populist impulse” abroad in the land today has scared legislators into obeying the people’s demands.
It was not always thus. “In the old days,” Andersen laments, “the elite media really did control the national political discourse” and “presidents and congressional leaders could pretty well manage the policy conversations” without the public trying to butt in. But there’s no going back now; “maybe our republic’s constitutional operating system simply can’t scale up to deal satisfactorily with a heterogenous population of 310 million.”
This liberal uneasiness with democracy is not new. In 2003, in The Future of Freedom, Fareed Zakaria made the case against too much public involvement in government. In 2008, in Hot, Flat, and Crowded, Thomas Friedman dreamed of America becoming “China for a day” so that he could impose his environmental agenda on a truculent populace. In a 2009 New York Times column, Friedman wrote that a dictatorship, “when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today,” has “great advantages” over democratic systems. In the Atlantic Monthly, James Fallows writes that “whatever is wrong with today’s Communist leadership [in Beijing], it is widely seen as pulling the country nearer to its full potential rather than pushing it away.” Nevertheless, the Democrats probably aren’t going to run on “Communist China Does It Better.”
What makes the liberal jeremiads confusing is that they work at cross purposes. On one hand, you’ve got the attacks on the people’s intelligence and representative government. On the other, you’ve got the attacks on American institutions for not being representative enough. Which is it? Are the people the problem, or is their government? According to Fallows, it’s the latter: “Our government is old and broken and dysfunctional, and may even be beyond repair.”
The culprit is the Senate, which gives equal say to states with small populations and requires 60 votes to pass legislation. Fallows says these minority rights have turned the Senate “into a deep freeze and a dead weight.” “America is not yet lost,” Paul Krugman writes in the New York Times, “but the Senate is working on it.” In a Huffington Post blog, Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, writes that special interests are “using the filibuster to stop legislation that would benefit the little guy,” whether the little guy likes it or not.
You can make a persuasive argument that the filibuster has been deployed too frequently in recent years, especially when it has prevented presidents, Republican and Democrat, from staffing their administrations. Nevertheless, the Senate and the filibuster are there for good reasons: to defuse momentary passions that could have unintended and harmful consequences for the country.
The system is designed to ensure broad consensus before Congress enacts major reforms. Such consensus existed during the New Deal and Great Society. And there was consensus behind certain elements of Reagan’s and Bush’s and Clinton’s programs, as well. That was not the case when George W. Bush attempted to overhaul Social Security, however. The public agreed with Bush that there was a problem, but it did not like his solution. It has had the same reaction to Obama’s proposals.
The liberal program is in disarray because liberals have failed to establish general agreement. They have found that simple majorities do not automatically translate into programmatic success. And when they are met with public opposition and institutional resistance, they do what comes naturally. They blame Americans first.
Matthew Continetti is associate editor of The Weekly Standard and the author, most recently, of The Persecution of Sarah Palin (Sentinel Books).
America was once the quintessential free economy that served as a paragon for the rest of the world to emulate. Unfortunately, with an ever increasingly intrusive and regulatory government, we have fallen from this enviable position and are now looking up at those ahead of us. Embarrassingly, that includes socialized healthcare Canada as well. The consequences are quite significant and will restrain the growth of our economy - short and long term.
America's 'Free' Falling Economy
Investors Business Daily 02/01/2010
Competitiveness: The latest index of economic freedom shows America falling fast, being ranked for the first time as "mostly free." We've fallen behind Canada, and it's look out below.
Our accelerating descent into a command-and-control economy with government pulling the strings is taking its toll.
The Heritage Foundation's 2010 index of leading economic indicators shows that the land of the free is only mostly free, falling to eighth in the world from sixth last year, now sandwiched between Canada and Denmark.
That Canada, long considered a bastion of socialized medicine, is ranked as economically freer may surprise some. But our neighbor to the north has at least been trying to develop its domestic energy reserves, from hydroelectric to natural gas to oil extracted from its tar sands. Energy is the lifeblood of a free economy.
We have shackled our domestic energy producers with environmental regulations, leaving vast pools of energy lying offshore and in the ground. We regulate what you can build, where you can build it, even how. Endangered critters rank above equally endangered entrepreneurs. Climate change is more important than the business climate.
We have allowed our government to be the engine of stimulus when the only thing that's being stimulated is government itself. The public sector booms while the private sector languishes as the federal government sucks the financial oxygen out of the room. Businesses are afraid to move because they are unable to plan in an environment where government is trying to tax or regulate everything that moves and most things that don't.
Our government has taken upon itself the task of picking winners and losers, instead of letting the free market decide, and as a result we all lose. From car companies to financial institutions, the long arm of government has grabbed freedom by the neck, seeking to decide who gets paid what and how big companies and banks can grow.
Then there are the taxes, which are to business what vampires are to blood banks. A nation's corporate tax rate is important. Its effect on a country's competitiveness and its ability to draw or repel investment has a direct impact on economic health.
Companies are being driven offshore by a combined 39.1% federal and state tax rate that is second only to Japan's. In some states, the combination leads the world. California, which would have the world's eighth largest economy as an independent country, teeters on bankruptcy. If you were a CEO, would you headquarter there or in Switzerland or Ireland, which also rank above us?
The 2010 index shows the U.S. dropping from 80.7 points out of 100 in 2008 to 78 in 2009 and slipping from the "free" category to "mostly free." America's 2.7-point decline is among the fastest ever, ranking right up there with those of such socialist paradises as Bolivia, Libya and Hugo Chavez's Venezuela, whose policies our administration czars are seeking to emulate.
The authors of the Heritage report — Kim Holmes, Anthony Kim and Terry Miller — cite the gargantuan growth of government in both size and power, noting that government spending last year equaled 37.4% of GDP. Spending increases totaled well over $1 trillion in 2009 alone, up more than 20% from 2008.
"Uncertainties caused by ongoing regulatory changes and politically influenced stimulus spending have discouraged entrepreneurship and job creation, slowing recovery," the report states.
"Tax rates are increasingly uncompetitive, and massive stimulus spending is creating unprecedented deficits. Bailouts of financial and automotive firms have generated concerns about property rights."
On these pages last November, former Microsoft COO Robert Herbold and Hoover Institution fellow Scott Powell noted that "ambiguity and the threat of new taxes from Washington, such as cap-and-trade, have already prompted 11 major U.S. companies to move offshore in the past year."
They can be accused of being greedy, but not of being stupid.
We must stop bailing out failure and punishing success through regulation and taxation. Only then can the land of the free be economically free to thrive and prosper.
Too many Americans either do not have the perspective to appreciate the freedoms that we have or adhere to a perverted sense of a world utopia (ie. Hollywood liberals) - often after they have benefitted from these very freedoms. Fortunately, as evidenced by the Tea Party movement and the national groundswell of support for recently elected U.S. Senator, Scott Brown, millions of Americans are cognizant of how precious freedom, rights and individuality really are and how ephemeral they can be as evidenced by the proposed and effected changes under the imperious government of the Obama Administration and far left Congressional Democrats.
The following editorial is another prescient editorial written by Svetlana Kunin, a Russian immigrant who persevered under Russian rule and now lives in America.
Perspectives Of A Russian Immigrant (No. 5)
By Svetlana Kunin 01/21/2010
Visitors to national parks are warned not to feed the wildlife because this interferes with the natural survival ability of the animals. Progressives do not make the same connection with human nature.
The image of a country where government takes care of its citizens attracts the liberal mind. This image has two dimensions: fairness and equality.
Many American intellectuals admired the Olympic opening ceremony last summer in Beijing: Hundreds of expressionless men moved and beat their drums in perfect unison, an impressive and symbolic image as, in real life, each man has an allocated and regulated place and function.
Serving Ideology
Hollywood liberals are impressed with Venezuela, where the evil capitalists are kicked out of the country and the government controls the media.
Democratic congressmen admire the idea of the Cuban system. They ignore the fact that the government prohibits its citizens from leaving the country, and foreigners are allowed to see only what the government wants them to see.
Released Soviet archives show how a society can project an image of glory and prosperity, as long as the intended audience is shown only two dimensions. But they also reveal the third dimension: the dimension of cruelty.
In such societies, individuals, science, education, art and sport are subservient to ideology. There are numerous examples.
A whole branch of science — genetics — was eliminated for 20 years when party leaders declared it to be a bourgeois pseudoscience and a "whore of capitalism" because it contradicted the theory of Marxism-Leninism.
Scientists were sent to labor camps or killed. Leading Soviet geneticist Nikolai Vavilov died in prison.
The control of mediocrity over talent is the defining structure of these societies. There are political rules. If you conform, then you are living among equals. If you break the rules, then you suffer. If you are part of the ideological machine, you are a beneficiary of the system. That is why there are former citizens who have fond memories of the USSR.
American Zoo
Such ideological oppression is insidious, and we increasingly find it in America. Already, American parents are forced to send their children to failing schools. Americans will soon find the same to be true of their medical care. Political correctness limits their speech and corrupts their actions, as was on display in the Fort Hood attack.
How can correctness be political? If it is political, then it is an agenda.
In contrast to the progressive vision, the strength of America is built on ideals such as individual liberty and the law of the land. These two dimensions gave life to the third dimension: opportunities.
Americans have the opportunity to make choices free from any centralized control. Free individuals have the opportunity to escape a bad situation, and explore their talents and aptitude. The American Constitution protects individuals from oppressive government.
How do our current political leaders propose to transform America? They ignore the Constitution. They will collect the income of citizens living today and those not yet born. They envision a zoolike country where the citizens are assigned a place to live, to work, the medical care they can get and the food they eat.
Our leaders will be our zookeepers, fairly distributing services and goods. People will rely on zookeepers and forget how to plan their own lives and take care of themselves.
The image of a fair and equal society will be projected, but the third dimension — a bureaucratic cruelty over defenseless individuals — will result. This is not a progressive society; it's an oppressive one. There is no escape from oppressive centralized state control.
Those who support this transformation cannot see beyond the flat two-dimensional image of utopia.
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