It's About Time.

Finally, someone is taking action to restrain the typical illegal and unlawful conduct of the Obama Administration.

A group of Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have filed suit in Texas to stop the de facto "amnesty" program rolled out by the Department of Homeland Security. If you are not familiar with the program, DHS has basically decided the it will "reallocate resources" to deport only some illegal aliens, primarily only those with known felony criminal records.

As you may remember, part of the reason the Arizona Immigration Law was declared unconstitutional was that immigration and border protection is explicitly a Federal responsibility. And Federal law requires that Illegal Aliens (the correct legal name for "undocumented workers") be given a fair hearing as to their status and be deported. Some countries, like Mexico, complain about the supposed harshness of American policy. However, it's not as harsh as that of some countries, like Mexico, which imposes criminal penalties and years of imprisonment, but that's another issue.

DHS, for its part, denies there is any amnesty program in place. Rather, they say, they have utilized their "prosecutorial discretion" to determine that entire classes of illegal aliens will not be prosecuted for deportation to save resources. The DHS action is similar to a local prosecutor refusing to prosecute rape, drug, burglary cases or any crimes other than murder in order to save resources. While there is such a thing as prosecutorial discretion, it is hard to think of any case where it has been used to rewrite the law that grants it.

Vaulting over the limits of the law has been a hallmark of the Obama Administration. Amnesty is implemented in fact, with the DHS thumbing its nose at the constraints of Federal laws passed by the people's representatives. The Justice Department sets up a gun-running operation shipping thousands of guns to Mexico despite Federal laws prohibiting such transfers. Mr. Holder is summoned to Congress to explain the operation- and simply refuses to cooperate to the point of earning a Congressional Contempt citation. Like DHS, the Department of Justice thumbs it nose at the laws it swears to uphold. Remember the Gulf oil spill? Obama issued a moratorium on drilling after "clarifying" a report to say the opposite of what the authors had said, and without any legal authority. A Federal Court overturned the moratorium, and the administration then turned to "slow-walking" permit applications to stall and prevent drilling permits.

These ICE agents are doing what needs to be done, and should be done, when the Obama Administration acts illegally. Go to Court, and get the matter heard. Of course, you can't always trust the Courts to uphold the Constitution, because sometimes raw political calculation in the Courts will result in an obviously unconstitutional result, as the Obamacare decision shows. Yet, America cannot be abandoned to the lawlessness of this Administration. It's about time that someone tried to put the brakes on this lawless Administration.

GOP, hold on to your records!

The Democratic party is trying to create a stir by demanding Romney's tax records for the past decade. Harry Reid says Romney is not showing his taxes because of tax dodging; there's no evidence at all, but it plays well for the media. Madame Pelosi isn't releasing her financial information, either. Pelosi says she doesn't have to release her taxes because "she's not running for President." Which is fine, but there doesn't seem to be any legal requirement that candidates for President release tax returns.

Pelosi highlights an interesting, if perhaps psychotic, contradiction between the standards liberals hold themselves to, and those they hold conservatives to.

Remember the "birther" controversy? The entire reason that came about was Obama's claims that he was born in Kenya, and his intransigent refusal to release any records at all. Not even a certified birth certificate, until four (4) years of intense public pressure. And after four years of pressure, still nothing else; no school records, medical records, service records.

Candidate Obama simply will NOT be vetted. Given a chance, the mainstream media will continue to sit in the Obama campaign camp and point fingers at Republicans.

The GOP, and the Romney-Ryan team in particular, have a great opportunity to make "transparency" a campaign issue, and to go on the offensive if they have the guts to do so. Obama promised to have the most transparent administration. He didn't do it and never intended to: he didn't deliver anything but Chicago-style corruption and backroom cronyism.

For the GOP, it's simple. GOP, hold on to your records; release only what Obama, Biden, Pelosi, and Reid have released, and only when they do. They are the incumbents and they've had years to release important records. Let the incumbents lead by example.

And don't let the mainstream media off the hook, either. Many in the GOP worry that they will alienate the media, but they don't need to worry. The media folks are, for the most part, firmly planted in the Obama camp; they are no friend to the GOP, and some public accountability might do them some good. In fact, gently highlighting the left-wing bias in the news might open the eyes of some otherwise complacent voters, and cause them to become more aware of the subtle leftward push in news reporting. That would help level the playing field.

So, GOP, hold on to your records. Transparency should start with the Obama Administration. It's a promise they have broken for years. It's about information the public wants and needs, and information the media wants and needs to ignore.

Which Came First- the Chicken or the Egg?

If Mr. Obama has done nothing else, he has been able to help America discover the answer to an old children's riddle: which came first, the chicken or the egg? The problem, of course, is simple enough. The egg comes from chicken, but the chicken starts out as a hatchling from an egg.

The answer can be found in Obama's rant against business owners. You know the one; "you didn't build that."  In that speech, Obama suggests that business owners didn't build their business, because they use government roads and bridges, and had teachers as children, and used other government facilities along the way.

Obama bootstraps that argument as support for higher taxes on successful earners. Not, by the way, on the unearned income of the truly wealthy, but only on successful wage earners. Such people, he says, should be happy to give a little bit back.

To say the argument is disingenuous is charitable, to say the least. The first and obvious fallacy is that murderers, thieves, and drug users often have been to school, driven on roads, and used many of those same government facilities. While the availability of good schools and roads may promote the success of business, it hardly guarantees the success of a business, and never really causes business to occur, any more than schools and roads cause murder, robbery, or drug abuse.

The second, less obvious fallacy is rooted in the fact that governments don't actually have money; they have collected money to build the roads and schools, to pay the teachers and to operate any other facilities by levies of taxes. And those taxes aren't paid by the murderers, thieves, or drug users, but by the successful wage earners, and usually not the truly wealthy. So to say the successful wage earner needs to "give a little back" when their taxes paid for it in the first place is just absurd.

There are two other important points. It is true that in every society there are disabled and needy, but their care is not per se a government responsibility, but a societal choice between government and private charity. Also, while government may choose to finance projects by debt, that is not relevant, since debt repayment is also premised on taxes on the wage earners.

American history, which liberals ignore and Obama may not even know, clearly shows that business precedes government. People came to the New World, set up farms and businesses, and then created a government, and build schools and roads to service those farms and businesses.

Which answers the old question of which came first, the chicken or the egg. Without the chicken (the taxpayer) the government would never have its golden egg. In other words- government, "you didn't build that", the taxpayer did.

To Cure the Economy

One hears a great deal about the dangers of the situation in Syria these days. Right now, the Syrian Government is attacking rebels in the city of Aleppo.  Recently the massacre in Houla made world news. Whether it is styled as "civil unrest" or "civil war" isn't particularly relevant; whatever it is, Syria is a dangerous place to be.

CNN recently ran an opinion piece titled "Syria's Christian Conundrum."  The author, noting that she was a Christian herself, expressed perplexity and disappointment that the majority of Syrian Christians had not embraced the "prospect of democratic change... [to] an open, democratic, inclusive, secular and religiously tolerant society" which, she believes, should arise after the fall of Assad. Yet the kidnappings and forced conversions of Christian women in Egypt, being reported in Christian news sites (but not the mainstream media) gives the lie to the delusional belief that democratic governments rather than Islamist governments rise to power in these Middle Eastern countries.

Consider the nations like Egypt and Libya, and Iraq, and Afghanistan, in which the West actively sought to assist or by force of arms bring about the rise of "open, democratic, inclusive, secular, and religiously tolerant society." Or such nations as Turkey, and Pakistan, and a whole host of other nations in the Middle Eastern region in which open and democratic governments were encouraged. In all of these, where there have been elections, the people have chosen to move toward Islamist fundamentalist governments; where there have not been elections, the leadership has embraced the same Islamist fundamentalism.

That is precisely why the U.S. must not become involved in Syria: too little certainty that any involvement can produce a result which has any benefit for the United States- or the West. For example, some reports attribute the massacre to Assad's regime, but others to internecine warfare between the rebels.  Similarly, Libyan Islamists are moving into Syria to assist the Free Syrian Army. Can it be assumed then that the Free Syrian Army is seeking democracy rather than Islamism?  The rise of Islamists means not only another nation rising in opposition to the interests of the U.S., but oppression of women, children, and minorities of any ideology or ethnicity.

Of course, the fact that Syria is a Russian ally, and that U.S. interference in Syria risks direct military confrontation with Russia, should serve as some disincentive as well.

Given all of that, one would assume there is no reason to go to war in Syria. Yet there seem to be many who are beating the war drums, suggesting there may be those who would prefer war. Not from any patriotic or nationalist drive, nor from any motives to pursue freedom, or compassion for that matter.

After the crash of 1929, America slid into an economic depression. The world economy depressed as well, with conditions becoming so intolerable in some countries, notably Germany, that maniacal despots like Hitler could rise to power. Financial conditions only marginally improved until the advent of World War II drove the engines of industry into high gear and gave rise to a tide of prosperity which lasted for decades after the war.

In other words, there may be those who believe a good war is needed to cure the economy. That may sound cynical, considering the human cost of war, and hopefully it will prove to be no more than cynicism. Yet it is difficult to find any other reason for the push to enter Syria, as there are no other perceptible benefits to America. The United States needs to stay out of Syria.

President Obama got it right!

President Obama got it right! At least, he got the context right. In his remarks on the Aurora shootings, he noted that his daughters attend movies, and asked, "What if Malia and Sasha had been in the theater tonight as so many kids do every day." That is a question that bears reflection.

In discussing the Aurora theater shootings, Michael Moore attempted to answer that question, "Mr.President, what if it were your children?" Now, of course, Moore draws the wrong conclusions, that if the President's children had been at the theater, the President would be calling for more restrictions on gun ownership.

Moore draws a parallel with Obamacare, stating that other countries such as Canada have socialized healthcare because they care about one another, whereas in America, we have the attitude, "I've got mine and to hell with you." Moore simply demonstrates that he, as with most liberals, has no comprehension of traditional American values. After all, "I've got mine and to hell with you," is the Liberal version of capitalism, where moral values are "personal" and do not apply to business matters, while those in need are taken under the wings of government.

The conservative version of capitalism is "I'm working hard to better myself and hard work earns its reward." There is also the corollary conservative belief that for those in real need, we give to and through charity and church, as government is inadequate for those works. And as with Obamacare, there have been few who could legitimately come forward with claims that they have not received care under the American system, as opposed to the many stories of those fleeing "compassionate" socialized medicine for American treatments.

Moore then advances the liberal pap that those who do not share their passion for gun control simply do not really care about the Aurora shootings. However, as with Obamacare, Moore's question betrays him.

Had the President's children been present, what would have happened? Remember, if you will, that these children always travel with ARMED GUARDS. In that case, the joker walks in, throws his tear gas, lifts his gun- and collapses, riddled with bullets from the guns of those ARMED GUARDS.

As the scenario played out in fact, the law-abiding citizens at the theater left their firearms at home and went into the kill-zone created by AMC's "Firearms are prohibited to law-abiding citizens" policy. The shooter strolled through the audience, unimpeded, murdering and maiming those made intentionally helpless by AMC.

In other words, Moore and his gun control cronies only succeeded in making sure that the shooter could get a high body count. And following his advice leads to more deaths, not fewer. Is that the desired outcome? Do we really want 71 dead and wounded as opposed to one dead joker? That should be a rhetorical question. After all, remember the effect one armed citizen had on two armed (would-be) robbers.  Stories like this are repeated everyday; legal gun sales go up, crime goes down, yet those of Moore's ilk can't see the connection.

So Americans are left with three options. First, take your chances in the kill-zones. Second, minimize your visits to kill-zones. Or three, don't go anywhere unaccompanied by the President's daughters.

Obama's Fundamental Transformation

As Team Obama moves the campaign into high gear, the Administration is making moves to fulfill the one campaign promise Obama actually made: to "fundamentally transform" America.

Most Obama voters didn't seem to understand what Obama meant by this, because voters generally assume politicians use generalizations and sales "puff". Therefore, centrist voters assumed Obama meant "improve the economy" or "put Americans back to work" or "reduce taxes." Those in the hard-core left- and the conservative right- understood his terminology. Obama said exactly what he meant, and meant exactly what he said. While most Americans have worked in the private sector, Obama has spent his entire life outside the private sector. So while he's seen private enterprise, he doesn't actually have any experience with it. His mentor, a communist agitator by the name of Davis, told him it was really, really bad, though.

Hence, the Obamacare health system takeover. It was not a fundamental plank of the Obama campaign, but suddenly emerged as an emergency; if the government did not take control of the health sector, Americans were told, it would just collapse. So, while the insurance companies still exist as entities, they have become mere extensions of the government. That is how private industry works in the Fascist Socialist model, with government and big business cooperating to control the behavior of the citizenry.

During the Obama Administration, it has become clear that Obama does not need legislative action to "enact" his agenda. There was Fast and Furious, a covert gun-running program designed ostensibly to find criminals, but since no guns were tracked, more likely designed as an excuse to impose gun-control agenda items. There have been the EPA regulations to limit pollution, designed to drive out coal usage in electrical generating plants and remove over 40 percent of America's capacity.

There was the "slow-walking" of applications to deny oil drilling permits in the Gulf, despite a Federal Court Order. There were the "waivers" of Immigration deportations, based on Executive Orders "reinterpreting" statutory deportation requirements. HHS is issuing "waivers" of the TANF requirements in the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, in defiance of express statutory language. So another aspect of Obama's "fundamental transformation" appears: the power of the President to transcend Constitutional limitations and statutory law without anyone in authority calling his office to account.

Another important aspect of Obama's "fundamental transformation" is consistency. Obama is not moving to reform immigration. If he did, the Democrats would lose it as a wedge issue. After all, who can compassionately be anti-immigrant (what's "illegal" mean? it's good, right?) He isn't concerned about the economy; private business is doing "fine." Foreign policy? Why, the Arab Spring! Democracy in the Middle East! Why should America be concerned about a few Islamists taking power? No, it is the direction of his administration which counts, and that is always toward a concentration of power into the hands of the government. After all, progress is the result of government action; if you are a mere citizen, "you didn't build that."

Obama's campaign slogan, "Forward", is the traditional cry of the Socialists. It is no accident, but a deliberate coming out of the closet for socialism in America. It is the open acknowledgment by the Democrat party that it has adopted Socialism as its platform. That is the "fundamental transformation" that Obama apparently has been working towards all his life.

Just Throw Money At It

The Euro crisis drags on, and nobody in Europe, at least, seems to know quite what to do about it. Greece, of course, is headed for more elections as it dithers about with no solution in sight. Germany, seemingly the only economy in Europe with any sort of financial strength, is being hammered from all sides; every country in Europe wants German money, but no one is willing to accept any strings. The leaders of both France and Greece have gone so far as to demand money from Germany.

Worse, the debate is being misdirected and obfuscated by the adoption of new terminology by liberals and socialists. Liberals and socialists, at least in America, used to be somewhat distinct groups; since the Obama Administration, America's liberals have practically adopted socialism into the Democrat party platform.

Within the paradigm promoted by this new terminology, the debate is defined by the terms "pro-growth" and "austerity." Both of these terms misdirect the debate. "Pro-growth" in this context is limited to government growth. Those who use "pro-growth" in this context assume the government alone is responsible for all job creation and economic growth; the private sector is tacitly deemed irrelevant. The flip-side of the coin is "austerity." Anyone who seeks to limit the size of government is guilty of seeking to harm the poor citizens, who will suffer from the resulting economic collapse and loss of jobs (or benefits).

By embracing this paradigm, any real debate of alternative proposals is effectively foreclosed. If the private sector is irrelevant, the only question is whether the countries with money (the Germans) will be "caring" enough to "help" those who don't (everybody else.) In this scenario, "austerity" is the culprit, and it's just obvious that the bailouts will have to occur.

However, this is a false scenario. First, the private sector is not irrelevant in any country which is not totally Marxist; only in the old Soviet Union and its satellites did the government hold all property and create all jobs. Second, in Europe, as in the U.S., the private sector is far more responsible for economic growth and job creation; government employment only accounts for a certain portion of the jobs market. Third, increasing the size and power of government suppresses private sector growth, by removing capital from the private sector to the government and increasing the costs of the regulatory burdens. Government "austerity" can lead to an increase in a nation's economic performance when it frees up the private sector.

It's now a liberal article of faith that Europe is having economic problems as a result of austerity; yet austerity was imposed as part of the bailouts required by the collapsing economies in the Eurozone. And the nations needing bailouts are not the bastions of capitalism, but those which lean to socialism. As Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher famously said, "The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money."

The socialist-leaning nations of Europe have not only run out of other people's money, but they have borrowed nearly all of the other people's money they can lay their hands on. They have incurred massive debt loads which they cannot pay. Yet they are trapped in a paradigm which prevents them from reaching any workable solutions, so they pretend the debt problem will magically vanish if they continue to borrow more money and just throw money at it- but they are quickly running out of other people's (the German's) money.

Unicorn in the (Rose) Garden

A liberal group, Left Action, is charging that the GOP's presumptive nominee, Mitt Romney, should be required to prove he is not a Unicorn. CNN, of course, has picked up the story. The liberal activists say they are just extending the logic of the "birthers" who question whether Obama was born in the U.S., and that they are satirizing the birthers.

It's not odd that CNN would pick up the story; CNN has moved so obviously left in its reporting style and leftward bias that many Americans are simply rejecting it as a credible news source. CNN's ratings for viewership made news as they reached a twenty-year low.

It's also not odd that a liberal group would try to tie the "birther" groups together with Romney's campaign. The media has done everything possible to avoid vetting Obama, and thanks to their hard work, virtually nobody really knows who Obama actually is or what he believes. And as part of the process of avoiding a vetting of Obama, the media and liberal groups have worked hard to marginalize and demonize those who do try to vet Obama.

The "birther" controversy arises out of claims that Obama may be ineligible to serve as President since he may not meet the citizenship requirements of the Constitution, and it is the perfect example of liberal's demonizing of those who question them.

By comparing the "birther" controversy to the fabricated "unicorn" controversy, Left Action and CNN suggest that the "birther" controversy is likewise without merit.

Despite that effort to mislead the electorate, the "birther" controversy does have merit. First, the "birther" controversy could have been stopped years ago by Obama simply releasing a certified long-form Birth Certificate (as Romney has already done); by choosing to refuse to release any records and dodging any vetting, Obama has subverted the electoral process into a guessing game of rhetoric, finger-pointing, and name-calling. Secondly, there are those whosuggest the copy of the Birth Certificate is a forgery; if Obama cared about truth, he and his campaign would go to some lengths to disprove that claim. Third, and not least, assuming the Birth Certificate is accurate, why did Obama, his supporters and the media claim he was born in Kenya for so many years?  

You see, Romney never claimed to be a Unicorn; that's just another liberal strawman to entertain and mislead the gullible- and by releasing his Birth Certificate (a fact CNN should know but chose or neglected to mention), he has already proven he is no unicorn. Obama and his cronies, however, have long claimed Obama was born in Kenya, themselves raising the spectre of ineligibility. The Hawaiian Birth Certificate, if true, indicts them of lying- maybe not all of them, but in that case Obama himself had to know "Kenyan-born" was a palpable lie. America is already watching the Senate campaign of Elizabeth "Cherokee" Warren deal with allegations that she lied to claim minority status as a native-American when in fact she had no proof and even the Indian tribe is denying her status.  With Obama, we see the same problem. The question is only whether he lying then, or is he lying now, and can America afford to have a proven liar as President?

Obama has changed his back story so often that even he seems to get confused. And we thought we had an actor in the White House when Reagan was President. With apologies to Thurber, perhaps Obama is as mythical as a Unicorn in the White House Rose Garden.

Salut Inclusivity!

The Muslims in France are worried, or so we are told; they don't feel included. According to a CNN article, the Muslims in France feel that they are being scapegoated for France's economic woes.

Now, it's pretty obvious that France's economic problems are not really the result of the actions of its Muslim residents, or any other minority group. Since World War II, France has embarked on a leftist course, regularly electing socialist and left-of-center leaders. French leaders, following enlightened socialist thought, always increased the role and size of government, expanded citizen dependency, burdened business, shrunk private capital- and borrowed to make up "revenue shortfalls," timorously at first, and then in increasing amounts as a regular practice of budgeting.  They've simply run out of other people's money.

The real problem that the Muslim community is facing is that they are being asked to give up their religious identity. According to one Louisa Zanoun, who appears to be sympathetic to the plight of these poor Muslims, the Muslims are finding it hard to integrate into French culture. That shouldn't be surprising; French culture since the revolution has been secular, and groups with religious identity have, to say the least, not been particularly well accepted.

Ms. Zanoun says, "Originally, it was supposed to be inclusive. It was about including all the people who believed in the values of the Republic. Nowadays, it's very exclusive because to belong to the Republic, you have to give up your religion." Inclusive should be captialized here, because this is the definitive example of the liberal version of Inclusion. Read that quote more carefully. Ms. Zanoun says that "inclusive" meant including only the people group that held the values of the Republic. Salut Inclusivity! Anyone but a liberal would recognize that as the very definition of exclusivity. It's worth repeating; to be included in the secular Republic by definition meant that a citizen necessarily gave up values other than those of the Republic.

It is not a corruption of the ideals and values of the Republic to require Muslims to suppress the public expression of their religious beliefs. Rather, it is a tenet of liberal secularism. In America, liberals have to be cautious of overt attacks on religion, framing them with at least a specious argument that the purpose of a regulation or law is not to infringe believers' First Amendment rights. France, on the other hand, has no real limitations in that regard, and the French Muslims find themselves caught between the exclusivist nature of Islam and the exclusivist nature of secularism.

War on Women?

War on Women? War on Women is the latest empty slogan loudly proclaimed by those who want to avoid discussing issues- like the "hope and change" mantra that gave us Obama. Obama promised us his nearly trillion dollar stimulus was necessary to avoid 8 percent unemployment. He must have been right; it hasn't been that low since. Obama gave us the highest number of people pushed off unemployment and out of the workforce in years, the highest number of people on food stamps, and the lowest homeownership rate. Evidently, Obama does love the poor, since he wants us all to be. Further, he gave us another little change; spending ten trillion dollars and borrowing five trillion dollars over three years, without once passing the legally required yearly federal budget.

So what about this alleged "War on Women"? Liberals simply use this slogan as a code for abortion, as they do "reproductive health services." They aren't talking about health checkups or medical care at all; remember, pro-abortion liberals fight tooth and nail against medical oversight of abortion clinics because they know it's not about women's health care. It's about babies, and babies aren't healthier when they emerge from an abortion clinic; they are dead.

If there is a war, it was started by Obama and our former governor when they issued the HHS regulation that all businesses- including churches- must provide "health services" including contraceptives, abortifacient drugs and abortions. The churches objected; the GOP stood with the churches, and the Liberals responded with the hysterical rant about the new GOP "War on Women".

The liberal socialist mantra is that rights are given by the government, so if you oppose a government mandate, you are opposing a newly minted "right". So you find liberals angrily demonstrating for their "rights" because the government mandated Obamacare and "reproductive health services" (until the government changes the rules again).

Conservatives believe that rights are not fabricated, but are found in the moral structure of the Bible. Yes, the Constitution does require separation of the Church and the State as institutions, but nowhere does it require separation of morals and State. The Founders could and did explicitly choose Christian morals as the basis of American government. To quote James Madison: "We have staked the whole future of our new nation, not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments." James Madison, Father of the Constitution and author of the Bill of Rights, probably understood Constitutional government.

Yet anyone making such a comment today is typically branded an intolerant radical, for liberals in education, media and the Courts have worked hard to wash America's heritage out of the history books, confusing and misleading many, and ensuring that the brains of the youth are washed as well. They may not perform academically, but they feel very good about themselves and they believe in socialism.

This is the crux of the culture war in America: whether the people will follow God or government. The Founders chose God, and they built a country which they told us cannot work if the citizens reject God's laws.

If you accept blindly the socialist views of the liberals, rejecting God and refusing to see or acknowledge the suffering and millions of deaths socialism has caused just in the last century alone, you will choose government. Once you surrender your freedoms for the chains of government, all the cute slogans in the world won't make them go away. Samuel Adams, Father of the American Revolution, had a word for those who would choose government dependency and socialism:

"We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." Adams meaning was and is clear: Americans must choose between the independence of freedom, and slavish government dependency.

Preparing a Good Crisis

There is a saying today that has been popularized by liberals: never waste a good crisis. Both Rahm Emanuel and Hillary Clinton have publicly espoused this position. A "good crisis", in their opinion, is one which permits them to enact into law policies or measures which advance a typically leftist political agenda and which are in themselves so otherwise unpopular or contrary to the prevailing political views that they would be rejected out of hand. The "good crisis" provides the either sufficient political cover to explain why these unpopular policies must be enacted, or sufficient distraction to keep the citizens attention elsewhere.

Of course, one must make certain that a "good crisis", or at least one which the media can propagate and hold forth as a crisis, is highlighted before the public.

Also, there is the possibility that a "bad crisis" could occur. A "bad crisis" would prevent the enactment of the agenda-driven policies. A "bad crisis", from a liberal point of view, would be actual or impending loss of political control. An example would be lowering poll numbers suggesting a loss of the next Presidential election by Mr. Obama.

Worse still, in order to achieve certain results, the "good crisis" must occur at the right time. Fortunately, this is a field in which liberals have a great deal of experience to draw on. While social conservatives typically have moral restraints upon the creation of crises, liberals, who typically draw on Socialist theory and pattern, do not suffer such impediment. Remember how Hitler, a Fascist Socialist (Quadrant 4) created the pretext of the Polish "attack" on Germany to justify his invasion of Poland, by killing a few Poles and staging the aftermath of the "attack" for his media. Now that is not to claim American liberals are Fascist, but only to demonstrate the mastery of ruthless propaganda that has exemplified socialism of all stripes in the last century.

The vast right-wing conspiracy which so bedeviled the Clinton Presidency, made up of talk radio hosts and ignorant Americans holding on to their guns and their religion, turned out to be a bust. They held a Tea Party; no shooting, no looting, no crisis. Tea Partiers even cleaned up after themselves, and all they used was the electoral process to vote in some new representatives.

So it appears that it is time to prepare a good crisis. Like most things, if you want it done right, you have to do it yourself. And that is what the Socialists are doing. The Occupy Movement is partnering with socialist and workers-anarchist movements to initiate "direct action" on May Day, to shut down the American economy, to bring America to its knees for a day. All of these movements share some form of the raised clenched fist in their logo; the symbol of resistance to authority, and of unity in the progressive cause of socialism, and they share the common goal of promoting socialism.

One investigator links these activities to a variety of Soros-funded groups.  It's hard to know if that is true, and one hopes it isn't. Unfortunately, the media cannot be expected to investigate the question, either. But if it is, then the activities are not only not random, but are coordinated efforts which seem intended to undermine U.S. security.

After all, if there are "riots" in the U.S., would the President be able to sit by and do nothing? Of course not; he might even "be forced" to declare a national emergency. In that case, the President might even be forced to bring his Executive Order for National Defense Preparedness into play.  And it doesn't have to happen all at once; that's the great thing about a do-it-yourself crisis with a cheerleading media, the timing is so manageable. Hopefully, such a cynical ploy is not intended, but with this Administration, one never knows.

War on Women?

There is a war on women. It's not the one you think it is; this isn't really about the "war on women" as the liberals have framed it. That debate, as framed and narrated by liberals, suggests that the right to abortion, abortifacients and contraceptives, trumps all other rights and privileges, even those embedded in the Bill of Rights. If you don't agree, you are part of the "war on women". Conservatives can't frame it that way; it's not about the woman, or women's rights. We see a woman carrying a live, unborn child (i.e. fetus, latin, unborn child) to an abortionist, and when the woman emerges, the living child has been killed. It is the baby-killing which offends us, or more accurately, which we understand offends God. So that "war on women" should be recognized as part of the Liberal's War on Children.

No, this is about the Liberal's War on Women. Madame Senator Feinstein recently wrote Senate Majority Leader Reid asking that no votes be scheduled on two bills which would ensure reciprocity of concealed-carry laws between states. The unspoken political rational, of course, is two-fold. The erstwhile Democratic Senators ardently oppose gun rights for anyone but their own bodyguards; and as with Obamacare, they just don't care what the Constitution says. Equally importantly, they don't want to be on record against gun rights before an election, because many Americans do believe in the Constitution.

You may not agree that this is part of any Liberal War on Humans, or even that there is a Liberal War on Humans, but it is. Liberals are at war with everyone; they want abortion, euthanasia, population control, free access to deadly addictive drugs, you name it. They seem to approve of anything that kills people; humanity is, in their mind, a great danger and offense to the planet, if nothing else.

In this case, they have presented a ludicrous argument against these concealed carry bills. Madame Feinstein writes, "Imagine that a man who has been convicted of a domestic violence crime against a woman he had been dating seeks — and obtains — a permit to carry a concealed firearm from his state of residence. Under the concealed carry reciprocity bills, he could legally travel across state lines and confront his former girlfriend ..."

Obviously, you have to imagine it- what man has ever filed an application to legally carry a firearm across state lines for the stated purpose of killing his girlfriend?

Have you ever seen the old Bugs Bunny cartoons out of the Fifties? In some of them there appears the dapper little gangster, Rocky, and his outsized loutish henchman, Mugsy. Try to imagine these in Madame Feinstein's incredulous scenario:

Rocky: "My goilfriend has run outa state. Get da guns, we are teachin' her a lesson."

Mugsy: "But, but, but, Rocky! Our guns ain't licensed, and we don't got permits! We can't take da guns outa state!"

Rocky: "C'mere, Mugsy." (Pow! Whack!) "Now get dis. We are da bad guys. We don't license our guns and we don't get permits, got it? We are goin' to commit a crime and we DON'T take registered guns! We DON'T tell da cops, get it?"

In the cartoons, it's comedic; in the real world, it isn't.

Consider the reality. Without reciprocity, the abuse victim moves or travels out of state. As a law-abiding citizen and crime victim she leaves her gun behind- prohibited by law from protecting herself.

Yet none of these legal niceties about licenses, permits, and reciprocity is likely to deter or even occur to the murderously enraged and demented abuser.

It is the abuse victim whom Madame Feinstein endangers, even in the scenario she proposes. As with all liberal gun control proprosals, it is the innocents who are rendered helpless and left to die. In the liberal mind, though, this presumably works toward the greater good of population reduction, a primary goal of the Liberal War on Humans.

Channeling Jimmy

Last year, as fuel prices rose precipitously, Mr. Obama appointed a panel to look into the situation. Originally, Energy Secretary Chu had indicated that the price increases were desireable to bring costs into line with European energy prices. The high prices would force people to reduce driving and bring down consumption. In response to public pressure arising from public discontent with the rising gas prices so ardently desired by Chu, the Administration (publicly) backtracked and decided that the better solution, politically, was to seek lower energy prices- at least through the election.

Now, obviously, the rise in fuel prices could not have been due to the policies of the Obama Administration. As Obama says, America is producing more barrels of petroleum now than in the past, and the Bush Adminstration can't be given credit for that- even though its policies encouraged and expanded drilling and production. After all, it's not as if the Obama Administration has ignored Court orders to lift moratoriums on drilling and issue permits, or slow-walked permit applications, or closed Federal lands to drilling- even though the Obama Administration has in fact done all that.

It may be presumed that Obama 1) wants to be re-elected so he will have the "flexibility" to implement his policies of "change" without accountability to the electorate, and 2) wants to ensure that prices don't go higher until after the election. So Obama, channeling Jimmy Carter, has come up with what a big-government statist would see as a win-win solution. The solution? More regulation and more government control of the oil market. Obama has asked for 52 Billion Dollars to tighten his grip in this arena. Isn't it blindingly obvious that highly trained and compassionate government bureaucrats could deal with the vagaries of supply, demand, availability, and price more efficiently than bumbling businesspeople? Jimmy Carter thought regulation wasthe answer too, and it led to some serious problems back in ancient history, back in the '70's.

The possible problems are irrelevant to Obama, though; spotty supply and shortages resulting from regulations won't affect him, and price hikes after the election won't keep him out of office. So he considers it a win-win; he gets re-elected and extends intrusive government at the same time.

Is it Stupid Conservatives?

- or another Carefully Flawed Study!

A new study has been released by a research team at the University of Arkansas which finds that "conservatism" is a default condition for those who are "cognitively impaired" or have "low brainpower."  The authors of the study suggest that it is likely to offend both the left and the right wings of the political spectrum, but that is disingenuous as best, since the study panders to the left's preconception that those on the right just need to be "educated" to overcome their prejudices.

First of all, the study appears to be based on a definition of conservatism which is obviously not related to conservatism: "an emphasis on personal responsibility, acceptance of hierarchy, and a preference for the status quo." This is mostly meaningless drivel. After all, if you visit nearly any activist group meeting or website, whether conservative or liberal, you can be sure that you will be implored to take personal responsibility and act toward the goals they propound. Just look at Greenpeace or PETA websites. Does that make these groups "conservative"? Not hardly; both conservatives and liberals would be offended by any claim that these are conservative groups.

And "acceptance of hierarchy and a preference for the status quo" as conservative qualities merely express the erroneous built-in liberal assumptions that liberals do not have a preference for the status quo, that they do not accept hierarchy. Both assumptions are demonstrably untrue; look at the liberal uproar that surrounds court cases which seem to imperil liberal institutions like Affirmative Action, or the imposition of Obamacare with its hundreds of Boards, Panels, and Agencies. Liberals actually love the status quo and hierarchy when it's their status quo and their hierarchy.

Second, the study seems to be based on the premise that people fall back on preconceived positions when they are busy, impaired (as by drugs or alcohol), or under stress, and that these positions may be either poorly or not thought through. In accord with the liberal dogma, the assumption is that all conservative positions are poorly or not at all thought through. Yet it would be a surprise if people didn't remain in or fall back to a comfort zone when busy, under stress or impaired. The culture is made up of about twice as many conservatives as liberals, so any random group can be expected to contain conservatives by about a two to one ratio. If a study like this is to be valid, you would have to make a study of self-identified liberals and determine how many become conservatives when they are busy or drunk.

Third, the authors noted that their study subjects were mostly "political centrists". By definition, this is one group that does not strongly hold political ideologies. Even with a reasonable definition of "conservative", which the study clearly did not have, political centrists could not be expected to be reasonable candidates for such a study.

This is clearly just another example of the axiom "garbage in, garbage out." This is a "study" engineered and designed expressly and solely to give liberals a talking point- and nothing else. It is not a case of stupid conservatives, but a carefully designed and deeply flawed study. The authors of the study are correct; both the left and the right should feel offended by the study- as a waste of time and public funds. Beware, however; you can be sure the left-wing academia is busily creating more of these little carefully flawed jewels to influence the uncritical voting public during the campaign season.

April Fool: Liberal vs. Liberal

By now, everybody "knows" about the death of Trayvon Martin. Martin was a young black man; his shooting at the hands of a "white" man has enraged many in the black communities.

The national media has pressed the story hard, pushing the theory that the motive for the shooting was clearly Racism. It is important to remember that Racism, like Tolerance, has a specific definition when used by liberals; Racism is racially motivated harm toward a member of the Black community. By definition, liberals know that Blacks therefore cannot be Racist; witness the deafening silence in the national media about the two (Black) teenagers who ran down a (White) preteen, setting him on fire with gasoline. You aren't hearing Al or Jesse preaching hate about that- it's not Racist.

Yet as more facts come out, it becomes increasingly clear that Zimmerman is anything but "white". He apparently has black family members and tutors black children. He is clearly Hispanic.

Many in the Democrat party, including the President, jumped quickly on board the mindless, we-don't -need-facts condemnation of the shooter as a Racist.

There seems one inescapable issue here for the Democrat Party, however. Both the Black community and the Hispanic/Latino community are typically considered solid Democrat voting blocks. The Democrats seem to be using the tragedy to try to score points with the Black Community. If they continue to do so, they risk alienating Hispanic voters by sacrificing Zimmerman to the "mob justice" lynching that the likes of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are screaming for.

Worse yet for the Democrats, the Hispanic community might begin to realize that the Republican conservatives- who are for the most part asking that a sane and measured investigation take place- are not "anti-Hispanic" as the Democrats crow, but are actually "anti-illegal." While that is the truth, truth is not something most liberals are heavily in favor of when it interferes with the narrative, as witnessed by the fact that the media has already tried to claim that Zimmerman, actually a registered Democrat,  was driven by right-wing ideology.

Gun control might become the Democrats ultimate issue here, but Democrats are also on record having supported "stand your ground" laws, having voted unanimously for the Florida law.  It's not even certain that the "stand your ground" law applies since it could be a question of self-defense.

In short, the Republicans hardly have a dog in this fight; this is liberal vs. liberal, and it's really no April fool's joke.

Can you tell the difference?

Rick Santorum is taking a lot of heat right now. When comparing Obama and Romney, Santorum said that voters might as well keep what they have. The media is trumpeting this as an endorsement of Obama by Santorum; both Foxnews  and CNN have articles to this effect.

Which is just silly. In fact, it is little more than another example of how hard the media is working to make Romney the GOP candidate.  Seeing that Romney has historically held to the farthest left views of any GOP contender, liberals in the mainstream media look at Romney as the weakest GOP contender and the easiest for Obama to beat.  Establishment GOP'ers, blinded by their convictions that conservatism is both dead and undesirable, and despite all evidence that it was conservatives who gave Republicans control of the House in 2010, are convinced that Palin and not their choice of McCain cost them the 2008 election.

Taken in context, Santorum is merely pointing out the obvious: that there is not much difference in the views held by Romney and Obama. After all, imagine a Presidential debate between candidates Obama and Romney.

On Obamacare:

Obama: "Obamacare's a wonderful law, and before I say more, I want to thank Mr. Romney. Obamacare was modeled on Romneycare and even written by the same team."

Romney: "Er, thank you."

End of Obamacare as campaign issue.

On gay marriage:

Obama: "I want to thank Governor Romney for leading the way in issuing gay marriage licenses in Massachusetts even before the law required him to.

and on abortion:

Obama: "I'm not anti-abortion."

Romney: "I'm not anti-abortion."

End of values issues as campaign issue.

On gasoline prices:

Obama: "It's not my fault, it's Congress' fault, big oil's fault, wall street's fault, Bush's fault. And anyway, I'm okay with higher gas prices, just as Governor Romney said back when he was governor."

Romney: "Er, yes I did, but I was governor then."

Obama: "Yes, you were governor, I said that. Don't repeat everything I say."

End of energy costs as a campaign issue.

And that is the point Santorum is trying to drive home, and that the media is trying hard to make the voters miss. About the only thing Romney can campaign on is his balancing the state budget without raising taxes. Which he did, but by raising state fees substantially instead. Whoopee; sounds like a winner.

Just what is it that the GOP stratagists see in Romney that makes him an "electable" candidate when he is already drawing record low turnouts to Presidential caucuses? Santorum is simply asking- between Obama and Romney, can you tell the difference?

From Russia With Love

From Russia with love. Well, probably not "with love."

There are reports that Russia is propping up the Assad regime not only with weapon sales, but that Russia has actually sent troops into Syria. For America, if not the world, that may strangely enough be a good thing.

Recall the angst of the media in the past few weeks. Reports almost daily on the atrocities of the Assad regime, of snipers and death squads, of journalists killed while trying to report from Syria. The upshot was a push for increasing pressure from the U.S. and the UN on Syria, with calls for sanctions and intervention. Some pundits even went so far as to suggest that the U.S. should militarily intervene in Syria.

The Obama-Clinton Foreign Policy Disaster Machine does not need yet another opportunity to bring down another Middle Eastern regime and raise up yet another Islamist regime. After helping bring down Mubarak, the U.S. will fund Islamist Egypt as an "ally." And after spending a billion dollars to bring down Qaddafi in Obama's "Not A War" war, the U.S. will no doubt help establish another Islamist "ally."

After fighting two wars in the Middle East to stop terrorism and "spread democracy," and with Obama cutting the U.S. military (while both Russia and China substantially increase theirs), America is not well positioned to take on the task of spreading democracy in Syria. Especially since such an action might well have drawn the U.S. into a confrontation with Syria's ally, Russia.

So the news that Russia has seized the initiative by sending its own troops into Syria should be something of a relief to Americans. At least, it should be for those who don't want another few billions of dollars or a few thousands of American lives spent on the task of establishing democratically elected Anti-American Islamist regimes. It can be hoped that even a foreign-policy-challenged duo like Obama and Clinton will not risk bringing American troops into direct confrontation with Russian troops and starting a world war. And it may be hoped that Russia can influence Assad to deal more calmly with his countrymen.

Now an important disclaimer. The point here is not that Americans should embrace Russian foreign policy. That is just irrelevant, because Russia is already allied with Syria; the balance of power in the Middle East is not affected. Rather, cooling the tensions in the Middle East, whether or not it was "with love," is a good thing for everyone.

It isn't the economy, stupid.

There is a lot of talk in the Republican primary race, and the media, about the "electability" of a certain candidate. You know who. He's the guy the voters in his party don't really believe in and can't really connect with. He's the guy who says he can work with people from both parties; he will give the Democrats what they want and the Republicans what they want, even though their goals are mutually exclusive. He is for gay marriage if he is leading a liberal state like Massachusetts; he's not for gay marriage if he is campaigning for conservative votes. He is pro-abortion, but not personally. His moral values, as such, simply follow the polls like a weathervane the wind.

However, the inside-the-beltway establishment pundits, tell us to rest assured that he can fix the economy. The media assures us that he is the one the liberals are scared of, that the possibility of his winning the nomination has Obama shaking in his Wall Street shoes, because he can fix the economy.

Bill Clinton, when he was campaigning, is said to have kept a sign on the wall to remind him, "It's the economy, stupid." It was never the economy, though; that was a reminder to redirect reporters who asked tough questions to economic issues. And it serves the same purpose here. After all, this candidate wrote the healthcare bill on which Obamacare was modeled; Obama even used the same people to write it. It really takes the whole Obamacare question out of the campaign. Does this candidate's economic performance in Massachusetts show him to be such a clear choice over the incumbent? Maybe, but as of 2009, Massachusetts was the most debt-ridden state in the Union. Not a good sign, and Obama will know it.

Elections are never about the economy, anyway; both parties promise to "fix" the economy.

Elections, campaigns and politics are actually all about worldview. Democrats are always intransigent about social issues and political correctness. They don't reach across the aisle if it means giving up a social or politically correct position; they always craft legislation to forward their social concerns. Remember, when Obama ran, his theme was "hope and change." It wasn't "Dollars and Cents." And while some politicians use crony capitalism and self-dealing to enrich themselves, that is a reflection of the fact that they believe they are entitled to by virtue of their position; they do not have in their worldview the moral constraints to recognize that their position is one of trust.

And if you still think it's about the economy, ask yourself when you last saw the Democratic Party run a candidate like this: "I am Anti-Gay and Pro-Life, but I can fix the economy." You haven't seen it, and you won't, because despite what Bill said, it isn't the economy, stupid.

Claiming the Moral High Ground

Rush Limbaugh is in the middle of a firestorm. After the Congressional testimony of one Sandra Fluke, an apparently thirty-something law student, who beseeched Congress to pay for her protected sex, Limbaugh referred to her with the unflattering term "slut." Now, to be fair, that's pretty strong language. On the other hand, Ms. Fluke testified that many college students "struggle financially" to bear the ($1,000 per year) cost of protected sex while in college; according to some calculations, that is 5 sexual escapades per day, so Limbaugh might be forgiven for thinking Ms. Fluke and her companion students are more occupied in the sex trades than occupied as students.

Furthermore, despite all the hoopla, it seems that liberals actually embrace the word "slut." A website has been created to encourage people to embrace their inner "slut." So it is obvious that liberals are complaining at Limbaugh not because liberals object to the term, but because they simply don't like Rush Limbaugh and they hope conservative sensibilities will be offended by the term; it is simply a tool to create a wedge between conservatives.

After all, look who's talking here. These liberals who are claiming the moral high ground with loud and self-righteous outrage are the same people who attack conservative women with the worst possible vulgarities- and laugh about it. Look at what Bill Maher says about Sarah Palin, for example. Or better yet, if you have any shred of decency, don't, because Maher certainly doesn't. The only difference is that Democrats simply approve of these attacks.

As with all things "moral," liberals believe that what makes you feel good is "right." It's relative truth in practice. These folks are so self-centered and conceited that they believe all who disagree with them are obviously wrong and must be either stupid or immoral; and it's "right" to attack stupid or immoral people with every weapon available lest they stand in the way of progress.

This country is in a culture war, and this firestorm around Limbaugh uncovers the nub of it;  who determines what is moral and right. Liberals believe there is no god, and they as the narcissistic educated elite make the rules and determine what is moral and right based on what makes them feel good. Moderates don't care if there is a god, so long as they do well financially. Conservatives believe there is a God, and He makes the rules and determines what is moral and right.

Liberals are claiming the moral high ground, but they have no inherent right to. Instead, their claim raises the fundamental question which Americans must address. The Founding Fathers built this country on Christian principles, on a faith in God, which they referred to as the hand of Providence. Americans can choose whether to accept or reject God, but if Americans refuse to follow God's principles or place their faith in God, Americans will get "change." It will not be for the better; socialism has demonstrated its truly vicious nature in every society which has fallen prey to its siren song.

Aborting the Mandate

Everyone knows the definition of"abort;" it is to terminate a process prematurely. Then there's the term "abortion;" the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus. It's useful to be clear on those terms, especially since the media talking heads and the folks in the Obama Administration seem to be completely lost about their meaning. Liberal pro-abortion folks always carefully omit "death of the fetus (latin, unborn baby)" from discussions about abortion. These liberals always presume that a woman will be healthier and happier after hiring her baby killed, so abortion is cheerfully rolled into the term "women's health care."

In the recent mandate for "women's health care," the HHS proposed, and then finalized, a rule requiring essentially all employers to pay for sterilization, abortifactients, and contraceptives for women as part of Obamacare's insurance requirements. There is a purported exemption for religious organizations, but it exempts only organizations which perform solely religious functions. As defined by HHS, of course, not by the organization. The exemption is so narrow that Jesus Himself could not qualify for the exemption.

Initially, there was a hue and cry about the mandate, so the Administration offered a compromise of sorts: an additional, even more egregious mandate which would require the insurance providers to give these services to religious organizations for free. As if the cost of the services was the issue. And as if the President has any authority to order any business to provide anything to anyone at all, let alone for free.

This mandate flies directly in the face of the teachings of Bible-based churches. The Catholics, in particular, are hard-hit by this rule, since they fund many hospitals and charities. If this mandate is not aborted, these institutions will be forced to choose between conscience and compliance.

The Administration has presented this as a women's rights issue, of course, with the media chorus line singing backup, while the Church has correctly pointed out that it is a Constitutional issue. In countries where "rights" are privileges temporarily granted by government fiat, "religious freedom" and "women's rights" may be "balanced" by unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats secreted in a conference room. In a country founded by a grant from the people (the Constitution), subject to the people's inalienable rights, "religious freedom" is guaranteed.

The Democrats talk about polls which, they claim, show that many people support the use of contraceptives. They don't talk about polls which show that fewer people, and probably a minority, support abortion. Polls provide nice talking points to mislead the unthinking, but they are not relevant.

The entire point of Constitutionally-guaranteed rights is that the majority cannot vote them away. The best way the government can show it still respects the Constitution is by aborting the mandate. Or perhaps that is the point: it may be the Obama Administration no longer is comfortable with the "restrictions" on its "authority" that silly old Constitution saddles the it with.

Team Obama- "Race to the Bottom"

Team Obama may have found their new campaign slogan. Gene Sperling, Director of the White House National Economic Council, is pushing for a new source of revenue: a global tax. Just on what and on who isn't clear yet, because what Director Sperling calls the "gory details" have yet to be worked out. National Review included a clipof Rep. Ryan discussing Obama's 2013 budget; it includes calls for nearly $1.5 Trillion in new entitlement spending and nearly $2 Trillion in taxes, so you can be sure the details will be gory. And you can be certain you will feel the most pain if you are a wage earner, and not that staple of the Democrat voter base, the entitlement bought-and-paid-for Liberal.

At any rate, Director Sperling thinks the problem of capital flight can be addressed with (surprise!) more taxes, saying, “We need a global minimum tax so that people have the assurance that nobody is escaping doing their fair share as part of a race to the bottom or having our tax code actually subsidize and facilitate people moving their funds to tax havens.”

America is already having a problem with the wealthy leaving the country because they view the tax burden as onerous and disproportionate. And we are talking about the real 1% here, the 1% that actually has wealth, not the top wage earners who are typically substituted by verbal sleight of hand when the Administration, Occupy Welfare Services, and media folks weigh in with their "fairness" talk. 

Yet that isn't the really interesting part of the quote. Class warfare, massive government regulation and spending coupled with economy-crushing taxation has always been de rigueur for Obama; it is part of the Obama prescription for all the "little people." Probably along with an Obamacare prescription for 1984's mind-numbing drug, Soma.

No, what is interesting is Sperling's comment that nobody should escape their fair share of the "race to the bottom." It seems to be a fundamental attitude, a core belief, to Team Obama that America must be reduced to third-world status. And Obama is in a hurry to win this "race to the bottom." He has always sought to drive up the price of motor fuels to European levels, and look at the price of gasoline since he took over. It has nearly doubled, but the media doesn't seem to notice, and it certainly isn't Obama's "fault." If it's anyone's "fault," it is obviously and always former President Bush's. Obama has also worked to shut down electrical generation plants, and has quietly instituted burdensome and expensive regulations toward this end. And the EPA is working to regulate the average American's carbon footprint to pre-industrial levels.

The goals of Obama and his liberal supporters, particularly those seeking to move America down into Quadrants III or IV (the socialist quadrants, as explained elsewhere on this site), demands that the average American live a virtually pre-industrial lifestyle. Obama's only shortcoming, in the view of his socialist cadres, is that he isn't moving fast enough toward these goals. For Obama and his cronies, it truly is a "race to the bottom," not for them, of course, but for everyone else. Everyone else needs to pay higher taxes, everyone else needs to be tightly regulated, everyone else needs to do without so that the climate can be saved- for the benefit of Obama and his fellow elites.

For Team Obama, "Race to the Bottom" would probably the most accurate campaign slogan that could be applied to the Obama 2012 campaign. Who knows, maybe it can replace his current slogan, "It's not my fault."

Obama- SAD instead of MAD?

In the decades following the Second World War, America has employed the MAD doctrine to provide a reasonable level of protection in a nuclear world. MAD, of course, stands for Mutually Assured Destruction; the premise being that no nation with nuclear weapons could attack another nuclear-armed nation without expecting that both nations would be destroyed in the resulting nuclear exchange. In that case, no nation could gain from attacking another nation, and so, they don't.

Pacifists and liberals have for all those same decades called the MAD doctrine simply mad. No conflict, they say, is worth destroying the world for. They also argue that there is no need for an arsenal capable of destroying the world several times over. The oft-heard slogan is "let's give peace a chance" (which would be fine if we could convince everyone else to hold hands and sing Kumbaya with us.) So from the liberal point of view, MAD has been a terrible failure; the world proceeds along balanced on a razor's edge, with obliteration just one political miscalculation away.

Yet from the conservative point of view, MAD has been a spectacular success. Consider that the First World War ended in 1918, and by 1931 Japan had invaded China to begin the long road that led to the Second World War in 1939. Twelve years or maybe as long as twenty years elapsed between World Wars, and on that schedule, another one might have been expected by 1965. Didn't happen, but there was a pretty active "cold war." Conservatives prefer the posturing and politics to the death and destruction; liberals just want to pretend it can't happen.

So the Obama Administration, firmly in the utopianist liberal camp (which conservatives refer to by its short name, "la-la land,") is apparently pondering a substantial reduction in America's nuclear arsenal. From some 8,000 warheads to as little as 300, which is fewer than China is believed to have, and many fewer than Russia's well over 11,000.  And we are apparently talking about a unilateral reduction here.

Now the point of MAD is that a counter-strike would have sufficient clout to ensure destruction of the attacker. With only 300 warheads available for an American counter-strike, an attacker might conclude they have good odds of surviving, and the deterrent effect is simply lost. In that case, Obama is giving us SAD (that's Singly Assured Destruction- of America) instead of MAD.

Of course, there may be another possibility. Perhaps this will be as successful as Obama and Hillary's other foreign policy initiatives, like the "Arab Spring" successfully bringing democracy (or is that "Islamists") to the Middle East! Or perhaps Obama's Stimulus in ensuring that unemployment never reaches 8 percent? The Solyndra success? With Obama's track record, we'd be safer if we buy umbrellas and wear sunglasses- does anyone know the words to "Kumbaya?"

Waive Bye-Bye

 For decades, the American Judiciary has referred to the United States Constitution as a "living and breathing" document, which judges can freely interpret to support whatever public policy the Courts may choose to impose. Arguably, this view of the Constitution, which was judicially fabricated and is not found in the Constitution, effectively destroyed the Constitution as a limit on government powers, as it places the Judges over not only all other governmental functions but over the people as well, since it allows the judges to place themselves over the people's elected representatives.

Even during the explosion of cases since the 1960's seeking the use of this Judicial Review as a policy weapon, the various branches of the government continued at least as a pretext that the government adhered to the Constitution, if only as a guideline.

During the present administration, however, there has been a sea change. Mr. Obama promised that he would bring change to America, and he has. His Stimulus didn't do it; that has been a colossal failure. He promised that America wouldn't see 8% unemployment, and that is only true if he meant unemployment would never be that low while he was President. In each of his years as President, Obama has added over $1 Trillion in debt, but that's just an acceleration of Federal borrowing- an exponential acceleration, to be sure, but that's all, and it hasn't really changed anything.

Nonetheless, Obama and his administration, and the Democrat Senate, have made one major change in America. They have discarded all but the pretense of Constitutional governance. The Democrat-controlled Senate has not passed a budget since Obama came into office. Harry Reid and his cohorts refuse to take up or debate any of the dozens of bills passed to them from the House, and then have the temerity to complain about the do-nothing Congress to a complicit media. With this bunch, government according to the Constitution's plan just can't happen.

What the Senate has done is nothing compared to the Executive branch, however. For example, early in Obama's tenure, lobbyists came to the White House. When FOIA requests were made to find out the names of the visitors, the "most transparent administration" strenuously resisted. They lost. So after that, administration operatives go elsewhere to meet the lobbyists; when doing backroom Chicago-style deals which might be perceived as shady, you can't have publicity.

Then there is Obamacare. First, it imposes a requirement to buy a product. Not everyone wants it, but the government says everyone must because it's good public policy. They say they will "help" with the cost, and good luck with that. But "good" public policy and financial "assistance" (or dependency) does not impute the Constitutional power to the government to enact this. Second, there is the matter of waivers. Ms. Pelosi, then Speaker, pushed the bill through, and there was a provision for waivers in the application of the bill. Madame Pelosi's district, surprisingly(?), was granted a large percentage of the waivers, while waiver requests from more conservative districts seem somehow not to have met the requirements. Third is the IPAB, a commission purportedly beyond the reach of Congress or the Courts, with power to set policies affecting the lives (and deaths) of all citizens, which raises the question of Congressional authority to set up such an agency.

And this administration is taking the concept of "waivers" to a new extreme. Obama is now granting waivers to ten states from the requirements of the No Child Left Behind law. Like so many Federal efforts to fix a problem, that law created a multitude of new and more complex problems. Many states want out, and that's fine; Congress is working on changing that law, but it's still law. Obama, however, has a better plan. Rather than let Congress legislate, he'll do it, with a myriad of new regulations. If a state chooses to give his administration obeisance by adopting his new regulations, they can have a waiver from the law. 

Illegal aliens benefit from this waiver process, too. Long-established Federal law says illegal immigrants are to be deported; Obama simply passes new rules. He even works on granting "waivers" to illegals to work in the U.S.  Protecting America's borders is one of the very few duties affirmatively imposed on the Federal government; Obama plans to waive it. 

And then there is the new birth-control requirement issued by his administration. The administration says there is an objection for religious organizations, but it is so narrow that practically nobody qualifies. As a result, religious organizations are complaining that their Constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion is being assaulted. Obama's solution? You guessed it; a waiver program. He won't agree to change the law, but he will grant "waivers" so they don't have to (immediately) comply. When the waivers expire, it'll be too late to complain, but it will buy their silence and shut them up during the upcoming elections.

What you are seeing in the Obama Administration is a wholesale disregard for the Constitution and the rule of law. When the President wants to reward political cronies, he grants them a waiver; if he wants to silence critics, he grants a waiver. If the GOP, and particularly the conservatives don't call him on this lawless behavior, America can "waive" bye-bye to representative Constitutional government.