Media Spins Another Assault on Taxpayers

It's only a short few days until the new Congress is sworn in and Pelosi's "Corruption Free" Congress gets to work for the people. Hard to write that without chuckling. We have already had previews on the quality of Congressional appointees to various Committees, but we are also getting a glimpse of the thinking of the bulk of the new leadership and what their being in power means to the average citizen.

Does it mean we'll all have free health care, "green" power and vehicles, tougher regulations and penalties on "greedy business" and more money to America's "crumbling schools"? Although it's likely some of the above are being dreamed about by the Democrats like little kids dream of presents at Christmas, it may be difficult for them to easily enact their far left agenda.

Not the least of the obstacles facing them is their own foot-in-mouth disease. See, many of them campaigned on a spend-happy Republican led Congress being part of the nation's problems. Getting in there and spending more might be seen as bad cricket and might quickly see Congress' polls drop to where they are for the 109th Congress. See this analysis from Newsbusters of a Washington Post puff piece on the Democrats' ever-growing agenda. One of the best lines in it is attributed to Senator Kent Conrad who said:

"Raising taxes would certainly be an option...The President this is his policy. He's got an obligation to pay for it."

Actually, strictly speaking to the Senator, he's saying WE have an obligation to pay for it, and any pork the new leading Dems want to tack on along the way. The title, "Democrats Pledge to Restrain Spending" reads more like a joke than serious news.

Naturally, the article was not "Democrats plan to raise taxes", because that's true. Can't print that if it hurts the guy with whom you agree. Still, there is the possibility that an attempt to raise taxes won't be tried, at least not for the next two years. Tim Graham, I believe, accurately predicts that the new Democrat Congress will use the Clinton "cutting government" method of strictly cutting military spending. Some of these cuts will likely come in programs meant to replace the Armed Services mainstay weapons, most of which were developed in the 70's (you read that correctly). However, it is not unheard of for cuts to come in military housing, support services and pension spending. The Democrat majorities and the last President were never very friendly to our fighting men and women.

On a related note, I did hear New York Congressman Charlie Rangel's going to push the draft issue again. A measure that he wrote last year and had to vote against is designed to bring back the draft. He plans to reintroduce it this year.

"There's no question in my mind that this president and this administration would never have invaded Iraq, especially on the flimsy evidence that was presented to the Congress, if indeed we had a draft and members of Congress and the administration thought that their kids from their communities would be placed in harm's way."

Of course, the Left howls about being criticized for "politicizing the war". This is the most bare naked attempt of that you'll likely see. The idea for Rangel's draft isn't to help the military, which historically such a drastic measure is meant to assist. It's to make it harder for the President and Congress to go to war by making conscripts out of the majority of Americans. An army of conscripts, though, is not the sort of thing we should be rooting for. Consider this exchange between the late great Milton Friedman and General Westmoreland as retold by Walter Williams:

Friedman made a major intellectual contribution to the formation of a voluntary army. In testimony before President Nixon's commission on eliminating the draft, General William Westmoreland said he did not want to command an army of mercenaries. Mr. Friedman interrupted, "General, would you rather command an army of slaves?" Gen. Westmoreland replied, "I don't like to hear our patriotic draftees referred to as slaves." Mr. Friedman then retorted, "I don't like to hear our patriotic volunteers referred to as mercenaries. If they are mercenaries, then I, sir, am a mercenary professor, and you, sir, are a mercenary general; we are served by mercenary physicians, we use a mercenary lawyer, and we get our meat from a mercenary butcher."

Conscription doesn't work, doesn't produce willing soldiers, stifles the economy and degrades the combat effectiveness of our armed forces. The sheer amount of training alone needed for soldiers to be as highly trained as the average U.S. soldier today would require that a person be drafted for years. And who will be exempt? Women? That's rather chauvinistic. Inevitably, such an institution would become rife with deferments, and most of those would favor candidates with ties to power or influence, the very people Congressman Rangel insists he's targeting by making the rest of us part of his new Army. I've said it before, this is bad comedy.

Whether it's your money or your life, expect the next Congress to at least touch on if not play the harbinger of things to come, should the Left (and largest) wing of the Democrat Party remain in power. Worse, watch the RINO's remaining in Congress to run right over the cliff with them.

Adios Che

Michelle Malkin has been reporting on the superstore Target's fascination with Che Guevara merchandise. Well, apparently, Target got wind that quite a negative press bubble was building regarding ole' Che and pulled the material from their shelves.

Target had touted a music disc carrying case for Che admirers emblazoned with the Argentine-born guerrilla's iconic 1960 portrait by Alberto Diaz, or "Korda." A set of small earphones was superimposed on the image, suggesting he was tuned in to an iPod or other music player.

"It is never our intent to offend any of our guests through the merchandise we carry," Target said in a statement. "We have made the decision to remove this item from our shelves and we sincerely apologize for any discomfort this situation may have caused our guests."

I actually saw this item while Christmas shopping a week or two ago. I'm sure the avowed communist would be thrilled that his image is being exploited by the American capitalist society. Irony as always has a grand sense of humor.

I've seen Che's ridiculous face plastered all over Tshirts worn by coeds at our local college campus as well. I often wonder if they'd know or care that he was personally responsible for the deaths of over 2,000 people in the glorious Cuban revolution, many of them children. Given the vacuous nature of most young college students, though (and we were this way when we were that age, although admittedly I would never have worn a Che or "I love Uncle Joe Stalin" Tshirt), most probably don't even know who the hell he is, let alone his sordid history as a degenerate and murderer.

Consider this from the normally left-leaning online rag, Slate.

...Che was a mainstay of the hardline pro-Soviet faction, and his faction won. Che presided over the Cuban Revolution's first firing squads. He founded Cuba's "labor camp" system—the system that was eventually employed to incarcerate gays, dissidents, and AIDS victims.

There are many apologists for pure evil in the world and Che is often the beneficiary of some of these apologists. Slate in this case couldn't perform for him, and it's a rare treat.

Personally, I say sell what you want. It's a capitalist society and if you want to sell things that are in extremely poor taste, you'll have lots of company. Still, if a communist icon misses another chance at immortality and idolatry, I also won't shed a bitter tear. On another personal note, I'm glad Che's dead and I'll be even happier when his revolutionary brother Fidel follows him into the fires of hell he so richly earned.

Hoppe Knows Best?

Whenever a society is ill or has problems, you will always see the Leftists scurry out of the woodwork with a variety of plans to "fix" things. It's not so much just the hard Left, opinions are like, well, you know. We all have them. I have a blog full of them. The difference between the majority of people with opinions on how to fix society's problems and liberals or hard-core Leftists is that Leftists plans inevitably involve collecting more taxes to spend more money through government to solve the problem (which has never worked) or restricting certain freedoms that "Americans can no longer afford".

Those are possibly the two most common themes of the American Left these days. In central Indiana the mayor of Indianapolis, Bart Peterson, decided that one of the main reasons Indianapolis is having a bumper crop of murders this year is violent video games. Even more amusing, David Hoppe of the local lefty rag NUVO believes the mayor is a bit of a retard to believe so, despite agreeing that violent video games might be a symptom of a sick culture, by going the extra mile and saying it's not the games, it's the GUNS!

But before I get too off-topic, let's look at Mayor Bart. The Mayor, now president of the National League of Cities, is resurrecting an idea that he had and that was shot down by the City County Council in his first term. He thinks restricting or banning coin-operated violent video games might make a big difference in the criminal behavior of Indy's youths. Well, having been a youth and known even more, I'm here to tell you that that plan is about as brilliant as a lobotomized earth worm. Not a lot of grey matter in it.

I actually agree with Hoppe that overall things like violent video games are a symptom of the fact that our culture has turned overly sick and dysfunctional in the last four decades or so and that the likelihood is that if you took away the underlying influences for that ailment, you might actually stop things like violent video games and the like because they would no longer reflect society. Attempting to ban them is a knee-jerk reaction to a very serious problem and one that doesn't even come close to hitting the mark. His attempt reminds me of Tipper Gore's campaign against raunchy rock music lyrics.

I'm sure that Hoppe's and my opinions differ on what has caused this societal breakdown. He would likely say that we haven't done enough for the poor or the homeless, despite funding a trillion dollar "War on Poverty" with LBJ's Great Society for the last forty years. That's just not enough. For a socialist, it never is. I'm sure he believes if we gave these people decent houses, fixed the problem neighborhood's infrastructure, put more money into schools and scholarships and gave these kids better or guaranteed job opportunities when they got out of school, violence would shrink away. It's a very Marxist view. Notice also, it would require a lot of our tax money to accomplish with no guarantee that it would work. Hasn't worked yet and we already do all of the above to some extent.

Hoppe could debate me on the above points, but I think he'd agree that deep down he favors most of the above programs to help things out. That wasn't the topic of the rest of his article. The rest of it was gun control. See, more of your money or less of your freedom is the only way his world is gonna get fixed. Now, he does try to assuage the fears of the average NUVO reader and gun owner (of which, I'm guessing, there are but a paltry few).

If you think that I want to try and take your guns away, forget it. This has nothing to do with the right to bear arms. But that right has nothing to do with providing a gun to anybody who wants one, whenever they want it, in any number they choose.

Actually, saying that a gun shouldn't be provided to anyone that wants one is a "right to bear arms" issue. Who decides who gets one, Dave? You? People who share your values? How do you choose? We already restrict minors, felons, people with restraining orders against them and the mentally ill from getting them. Who else do you think, in your anointed state of champion of the people, should not be allowed to have one just if they want, whenever they want and in any number they choose? Your elitist snobbery really shows through in that paragraph.

Indiana, for example, does not have a one-handgun-per-month limit on gun sales. We have no limitations on assault weapons and magazines. Our police cannot limit the carrying of concealed handguns. Minors here are not restricted from possessing guns and no license or permit is required to buy a handgun. There is no waiting period on gun sales, no requirement that all guns be registered with law enforcement, no background checks required at gun shows or on private gun sales.

No, Indiana doesn't have those ridiculous laws, and the CDC, one of the most virulently anti-gun agencies in the federal government, has a fairly recent study that says NONE of those laws has any noticeable effect on gun crime. And all registration does is set a people up for confiscation. If you don't believe me, ask the former gun owners of many major metropolitan U.S. cities as well as citizens of Canada, Great Britain and Australia. Confiscation of their firearms was made easy because the police knew who had what. It's also resulted in the greatest crime waves any of those countries has ever seen. Really progressive, eh Dave?

and the tired old line...

In Indiana it's easier to get your hands on a gun than a driver's license.

Well, looking plainly at this statement, no it's not. You have to be at least 18 to buy a long gun and 21 to buy a pistol, and you can get a driver's license at 15 with restrictions in this state. You have to fill out extensive forms and if you want to carry your sidearm you have to be fingerprinted and go through a background check to get a permit to carry (which can take a few weeks to process). Having experienced both, I can tell you getting my license was monumentally easier. I took a dinky written test and then a short drive with a very nice man with a clipboard who directed me what streets to drive on, then told me to go get my photo for my license and congratulations. The people who did my background checks, with some exceptions, were nowhere near as cordial or as quick. Here, Hoppe suffers mostly from ignorance of the process, an affliction common among pseudo-intellectual liberals.

Of course, Dave Hoppe may already know all this and just have chosen to willfully misinform his readers just to make his case. That often happens when one starts with an opinion and needs to mold the facts to fit it. It happens every day with junk science and just as often in junk punditry.

If you're interested in writing Mr. Hoppe a note challenging or countering any of his ivory tower assumptions about gun control, make sure to be well-informed before you do. Sites like GunCite will provide you with considerable ammunition for your argument. Good luck to you and the next time you're at a gun show or in a gun store buying more than one handgun a month, an assault weapon, or a myriad of firearms, think of Dave and buy some more.

The BergerMeister MeisterBerger

I would be remiss in my posting if I did not take the time to mention the recently revealed details of the convicted felon and defiler of the National Archives, Sandy Berger. The former National Security Advisor to President Clinton was only the latest in an extremely lengthy list of felons to come out of the Clinton White House.

Of course, one of the most noticeable aspects of this latest revelation is the absolute lack of coverage by the major networks. Minimalist hardly does justice to the predigested twenty some second soundbites that ABC and CNN gave the story, but at least they covered it, unlike CBS and NBC. There's been greater back and forth when discussing what each prima Donna host had for breakfast that morning than there was over this story. FoxNews at least gave it some time.

In a nutshell, here's what we're looking at. We knew he stuffed several documents in his underwear and socks and lighted out with them from the National Archives. We also knew he cut several up and threw them in the trash can. After he was caught, he claimed first that he was just taking some documents home to review more thoroughly (without officially checking them out of the Archives - minor lapse) and later that he had "accidentally" cut them up and threw them in the trash thinking they were something else. Liar liar, pants on fire.

Now in the hindsight of that moment, after his full conviction, which was laughable in the sentencing aspect, we know a little more. He took not one copy, but five copies of one particular document. Five. That sort of screams trying to hide or destroy evidence. Willfull destruction, anyone? Then there's also the small note we now have discovered regarding him taking documents out, hiding them on a nearby construction site, then returning for more.

I must've missed where this could have been seen as innocent or minor. In the midst of all the screaming about how we needed a full and thorough documentation of who knew what and when they knew it with the 9/11 Commission, a Commission mind you that the antique media was screaming for and then cheerleading bigtime, we get a man who was closely linked to the inner circle of the previous administration and serving as advisor to another contender for the Presidency (Kerry). This guy, Sandy, who does look curiously like the BurgerMeister MeisterBurger of the old claymation Santa Claus specials, uses his security clearance as one of the highest remaining Clinton appointees not convicted of a felony and infiltrates the National Archives. There he proceeds to find certain documents that he especially would know could be damning of his former President. He then steals these historical documents in a premeditated fashion (you can't say it's an act of passion if you come back for more). Lastly, he destroys all these documents and lies about it until confronted with overwhelming evidence.

Did I miss anything? And this isn't worthy of a few stories. The Mark Foley pedo story generated hundreds of runs in the morning and nightly news shows, and the guy wasn't even convicted of anything, other than being a huge perv. Another guy steals critical intelligence documents that directly address his side's (the Left's) biggest beef over how 9/11 was allowed to happen, gets convicted, astonishing details come out about how he did it and we don't even get a yawn.

If you can figure that one out, let me know, because right now I'm at a loss.

What probably galls me the most is that in his sentencing, he was only banned from access to classified documents for THREE years! Three years! Did I say he could go back to the scene of the crime and easily do it again in THREE years?!!! Why don't we just purpose-build a time machine just for Sandy, give him some matches, and send him back to the Great Library at Alexandria? While we're at it, see if we can send him back to 1776 so that he can use the Declaration of Independence as a dinner napkin. Don't forget to get all the copies, Sandy!

Truthfully, if he destroyed those documents, what's next? And why do we let people like that near our national treasures? The man deserved to be marched out into the National Mall and stood up before a firing squad. All he got was a ridiculously small fine and a minor slap on the artist. Where are our priorities in this country?

Washington felons always seem to have an easy time of it, though. They get convicted and then go on the lecture circuit. I wonder what Sandy will lecture about? Boxers or Briefs when stealing incriminating memos? Tube socks or dress socks? Does one wear wingtips or high tops for best concealment? Yes, these topics and many many more will grace the marquees of colleges and think tanks across the land as Sandy gets away with his morally and criminally repugnant crime. Justice is not only blind, it would seem her book was taken and cut up as well.

Why I Have Not Been Against The War

I am not now nor have I been against the United States’ involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. That puts me at odds with most of my libertarian brethren, and in the same league as the likes of Larry Elder. Although I am a strong advocate of limited government and individual liberty, I cannot pretend that our nation exists in a vacuum.

Isolationism has its attractions, there is no doubt. During the ‘90’s, I saw the allure of it as our greatest enemy was no more and we became entangled in U.N. “humanitarian” angles that cost us blood and treasure but saw no one any benefit. I count the U.N. action led by the U.S. to remove Iraq from Kuwait in this messy period. For the record, my initial thought with our current invasion and occupation of Iraq is that it’s something we should technically have never been involved in. We were operating under the assumption that we were the world’s policeman and that through the U.N. we could make everyone play nice. We had no idea what we were getting into and although I would certainly offer every ounce of my support to the poor ground pounders that had to fight that run, I wasn’t too keen on back H.W. Bush’s machinations.

In these actions, I agree with my good friend Mike Kole that we should’ve heeded Washington’s warning against becoming involved in foreign entanglements. We were, under an idealist non-leader of a President, engaged in feel-good police actions, assuming despots and tyrants would understand that because the paternalistic U.S. (under the U.N.) said something, they must do it. Well, the world never worked that way and it certainly still doesn’t. Most of the world only understands the language of war and those same feel-good policies made the U.S. look weak in their eyes.

Should we have cared? Normally, I might have said no, but 9/11 proved to me that we should not be so complacent. It wasn’t the start, just the waking up to what we had so blindly ignored for all those years, even through the 70’s and 80’s. Iran was fomenting world Islamic revolution with an odd combination of Marxist-Islamic apocalyptic thought. Al-Qaeda and to a lesser extent the other Sunni states (Syria, Arabia, Egypt, etc.) were all working to establish their own influence through a relic fascist-Islamic system. This is the basis for Palestinian terrorism that has flowed from that region. The European states, weak though they are due to the internal decay of socialism and atrophied militaries, still seek an edge against the United States. Russia fights to retain its importance while still trying to stick its proverbial finger in our eye whenever it can. And the inscrutable China has quietly been building an economic and military machine for its own reasons, not the least of which will require the economic and/or military collapse of the United States.

We ignored these threats at our peril. We still ignore most of them. If we were Paraguay or Kenya or even Luxembourg, the machinations of all these countries would mean little. But we are the United States of America, an economic juggernaut and the world’s current remaining Superpower. That means if any of the above entities want to see their dreams come to fruition, they must first get past our nation. That paints a big target on our back and 9/11 was the first noticeable dart in the ring.

We cannot ignore or avoid these threats. We can either appease them or defeat them. There is no compromise that I can see nor is any desired. Eventually, war had to be the answer. Historically, we should have known. When a rival comes at you spoiling for a fight, you rarely can talk them out of it. You either kneel and accept your fate or make sure you get in the first punch.

I want to see us get in the first punch. We haven’t even begun to face the myriad of threats to the future of this country, but we have stepped right in the middle of the hornet’s nest of the Islamic radicals, both those who used fascism as their base model and those who used Marxist-Leninist ideals. We cannot disengage, nor were we ever really disengaged. We have been engaged since Hezbollah blew up our Marines in ’83 and we are suffering for their victory to this day. What is necessary is for the United States to break the will of those who seek to do us harm and if the Islamic radicals that we fight have one thing in abundance, it’s will (one could say the same of the Chinese). That may require perception, or just straight-out fear, but it is possible short of glassing over the region. Most of that region understands power and might and they understand those who have the will to use it. They must be made to know that the United States is not to be trifled with and that they are slowly learning, either in this life or in the next.

I don’t pretend to be a national policy expert or a general or even one of the guys fighting and dieing on the front lines of this conflict, but I do try to understand what I can of it. What I understand is, Democrat or Republican or Libertarian, it doesn’t matter. Politics really does stop at the water’s edge. My stance on how our government is at best a necessary evil inside our borders is unchanged, but one of its basic functions is to protect us and sometimes it’s had to go outside our borders to do it. This is one of those times. Economically and militarily, government has to provide the tools to beat our foes and that’s why I can’t turn against the choice to go and fight in Iraq or anywhere else for that matter.

We may have started as simply a resolution to a failed U.N. endeavor from the early ‘90’s, but in Iraq and Afghanistan we have a chance to turn at least some of the tide in this region. We will never solve its problems or quench its hatred and intolerance of others, but we might redirect it, at least away from us and our allies. That is worth the attempt and we have the might to do it.

Victory should not be a dirty word.

Worse Than I Thought

The release of the Iraq Study Group's report produced items far worse than I thought. When Hezbollah and Hamas began applauding the report, I knew we were in for even more trouble. It's not exactly been a secret in Washington that James Baker hates Israel. The whole lot of country club liberal Republicans that Bush Sr. had operating in his stall weren't keen on them, especially after they failed to make a working peace plan during 41's administration. But to see what came out of Baker's committee's report is shocking. James, Lee and company have advocated throwing Israel to the wolves while handing over Free Iraq to the two remaining biggest terror sponsors in the region, Iran and Syria (followed closely by the Saudis).

I'm not quite sure where to begin. We were in a war against Saddam's Iraq that we've won, and now are having to battle a mixed bag of Baathist/Sunni loyalists with a liberal sprinkling of foreign fighters (which we're kid gloving, unfortunately). This means we, the United States, possessor of the most powerful military in the world, are in danger of losing? To them??? I'd think it was just a really poor joke if I hadn't seen Baker's face when he read the punchline. They actually believe this crap.

And the only way to "win with honor" (man, Vietnam Vets should be screaming NO right about now) is to diplomatically engage the two terrorist nations who are sponsoring and arming most of the fighters coming into Iraq to kill both Americans and Iraqi's? What inmates made it out of the asylum? Can we check the cages? That's like us asking in 1945 the mostly defeated Germans and Japanese to sit at the table with the USSR and make sure we could exit honorably with no more American lives lost. There is zero difference. It is assinine and a bit insane to advocate this plan and to think anything other than more dead Americans, civillian and military, will be the result is equally delusional. Consider the quotes of the leaders of the terrorist organizations who are apparently open for interviews.

"The report proves that this is the era of Islam and of jihad," said Abu Ayman, a senior leader of Islamic Jihad in the northern West Bank town of Jenin.

"It is not just a simple victory. It is a great one. The big superpower of the world is defeated by a small group of mujahedeen (fighters). Did you see the mujahedeens' clothes and weapons in comparison with the huge individual military arsenal and supply that was carrying every American soldier?" exclaimed Abu Abdullah, who is considered one of the most important operational members of Hamas' Izzedine al-Qassam Martyrs Brigades, Hamas' declared "resistance" department.

"America must understand that with anti-American governments in Latin America and with Islam growing and reinforcing, including in the U.S. itself, the next step would be a total defeat on their (American) land, not a relative one like they are facing in Iraq," he said.

That's not just my ranting or predictions. That's not some conservative pundit or the President telling you that if we don't fight them there, we'll be fighting them here. That's them. That's the enemy and make no mistake the views they express are not in the minority. This has been the plan of such groups going back to the Muslim Brotherhood in the early part of the last century, and now they're getting the money, resources and followers to carry it out. Don't so naively accept the reformed Marxist view that everything in the world that's wrong is America's fault. There are plenty of monsters in the world ready to devour entire nations without one American having to set one foot outside the country or influence one other country.

And speaking of these particular monsters, Baker, the anti-Israeli, wants Israel to give up the Golan and the West Bank in order to play Neville Chamberlain and appease the terrorist nations of Syria, Iran and Arabia. I lump the Saudis in because most of the Wahhabist schools in the world and the most radical madrassah's are funded by the Saudi Royal family. That pretty much says it all about them.

It's unclear why the Palestinian problem is being lumped into the Iraqi conflict, but consider this. In light of all that's been done to Israel even in the last decade, it's hard to understand Baker's reasoning (other than his hatred for Israel) that Israel must be the one to give in, yet again and fall back once more before what really is evil in our time.

The current Hamas-led P.A. government had refused to recognize Israel, halt terrorism or abide by existing, signed agreements between Israel and the P.A., Steinitz noted.

According to the Oslo Accords, signed between Israel and the PLO in 1993, the Palestinians undertook to give up terrorism as a means of achieving their political goals.But terrorism never stopped, and P.A. security forces - established and armed under Oslo - were themselves frequently implicated in the violence against Israel, particularly over the past six years.

The Oslo Accords arose out of the process initiated with the Madrid peace conference in 1991 - a conference at which Baker played a key role and which the ISG wants to emulate: The report calls for "unconditional" meetings between Israel, Lebanon and Syria, and between Israel and the Palestinians "to negotiate peace as was done at the Madrid Conference."

Israel offered to give the Palestinians all that they wanted, and Arafat walked away, despite the revisionist history that is now spewed by the Left, because the Palestinian Arabs wanted Israel's destruction, and a small bit of land isn't going to be enough for them. This whole idea of "we'll give them a little more and a little more and a little more and eventually they'll be appeased" is how Constantinople fell to the Ottoman's and how Vienna almost fell. It's also how Israel will die and the United States, according to James Baker, should and will be the one to slit its throat. Who needs enemies when you have friends like the United States, eh?

Madness is all i can truly consider this as. There's no easier explanation. I hear Bush is defeated and stunned since November and that he's out of the loop. I hear these things will happen regardless now that the ISG has proposed them because they have a complicit Congress, an absentee President who has lost the will to fight and a willing, sleeping and ill-informed public. I'm going to have to try for being the optimist on this one and hoping none of that comes to pass and that the world steps back from the brink yet again. There's always faith to sustain us when reason can no longer and this time certainly does not show the mark of reason.

Notable Quotables

You actually have to hear the Left sometimes to believe just how crazy they can get.

Remember this one?

"A cultist is one who has a strong belief in the Bible and the Second Coming of Christ; who frequently attends bible studies; who has a high level of financial giving to a Christian cause; who home schools their children; who has stored up survival foods and has a strong belief in the second amendment; and who distrusts big government.

Any of these may qualify a person as a cultist, but certainly, more than one of these would cause us to look at this person as a threat, and his family as being in a risk situation that qualifies for government interference."

Probably not. It was our former Attorney General, Janet “The arsonist” Reno giving an interview to Sixty Minutes on 6/26/99. In the words of the immortal Hans Gruber in Die Hard, I must have missed Sixty Minutes that night, what was she saying?

Looks to be that she’s saying if you’re anywhere near a devout Christian, believe you have freedoms endowed in you by your Creator, especially the right to defend yourself, distrust big government, tend to give to Christian charities or home school your children then you’re a cult freak and dangerous individual that the government should keep a close eye on, or possibly incinerate like she did the poor women and kids at Waco.

For all the harping I heard from my left-of-center friends back in the day about John Ashcroft and how he was going to be some jack-boot thug who would see all liberals and Muslims in death camps and being prayed over and persecuted by figures that would’ve made Torquemada blush, I never heard them utter a peep about the former Miami-Dade prosecutor who saw the citizenry as dangerous insects to be crushed if they stepped too far out of line. And at least he didn’t order the mass murder of people just because they were Christian. Janet holds that distinction. I wish to God (oh, look at me, Mr. Dangerous) more people would realize that, but perhaps it’s easier to forget history when it’s a part you’re either not proud of or when your side was in charge…or both. Right?

Here’s another good one. Stephen Breyer, one of our illustrious Supreme Court Justices and arguably one of the most left-leaning (after perhaps Ruth “Mao” Ginsburg) had this to say recently on his job regarding the Constitution of the United States, as excerpted from an article at NewsMax.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer says the Supreme Court must promote the political rights of minorities and look beyond the Constitution's text when necessary to ensure that "no one gets too powerful."

Nowhere do I recall in the Constitution where it lists the Supremes duties as above. They have no mandate to “promote the political rights of minorities” and they certainly don’t have any enumerated powers that allow them to “look beyond the Constitution’s text”. The Supreme Court has assigned itself powers since its creation (see: Judicial Review), but the likes of this sort of thinking borders on the insane. It does explain, though, why it’s a popular fad of the left-leaning Justices to pick and choose court decisions and laws from other countries.

They so despise their own and the Constitution which governs it, that they’ll use anything to tear it down. I don’t typically use the term in regular debate, but these are the truest forms of America-haters you will ever see on the Left.

And wouldn’t one assume that usurping that kind of authority, as Justice Breyer indicates he thinks he has, make one a bit “too powerful” in and of itself? That wreaks of a tyranny of the minority, a very small minority in fact as all he and his ilk has to do is convince “Shades” Kennedy to stand with them and they can write de facto laws of the land in violation of the U.S. Constitution. Congress should’ve impeached him when they had the chance.

Are There No Prisons?

It should surprise no one that the alleged “culture of corruption” the Democrats spent the last several months beating the drums about extended to their side of the aisle as well. Well, it should surprise no one whose sole source of news wasn’t the antique media. To hear Brian Williams, Matt Lauer, Andrea Mitchell and like-minded empty suits, the Republicans were the only ones touched by the evil of criminal wrong-doing. As we see, if you have a capitol in a swamp, you breed a lot of vermin and it doesn’t matter if there’s an R or D after their name.

First and foremost, of course, there was William Jefferson, the corrupt bribe-taking Congressman from Louisiana. His stink was so bad, even the see-no-Democrat-evil media had to notice. Amazingly, he still has his seat in Congress and his party has not called for him to step down. I wonder if his lawyers are still trying to find a way for him to keep the $90,000 in bribe money he took from the federal sting operation that busted him.

Then there was ABSCAM Jack Murtha, a man who through sheer luck was not indicted almost three decades ago when several members of Congress (mostly Democrats, not surprisingly) were caught in a sting accepting bribe money. Jack survived as an unindicted co-conspirator by chance. See, the Speaker of the House at the time, Tip O’Neil, was also looking to be caught up in the same scandal, but a quick appointment to the right committee of someone who owed Tip a favor got the investigation into his office and Jack Murtha’s (who was next on the list) killed. So, Jack was not fully investigated, but the FBI still wasn’t letting him go without a label, hence “unindicted” co-conspirator.

The media seemed to forget about old Jackie, focusing only on his service in the military as they used him as a bludgeon to take on the President’s war strategy. His ABSCAM link only surfaced AFTER the election among the antiques when it was apparent Nancy Pelosi was going to back him as new Majority Leader. The antiques weren’t too crazy about that, so all of a sudden he’s damaged goods. Sorry Jackie, maybe next time.

Then Nancy “I’m going to rid Congress of Corruption” Pelosi pushed to get Alcee Hastings, one of the few federal judges in history to be impeached (his conviction still stands, by the way) on charges again of bribery and tampering with evidence, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. You have to have a security clearance to take a leak at the Pentagon, and here the new Speaker was seriously considering giving access to the nation’s most sensitive secrets a man who had already proven to be easily corruptible and very willing to take a bribe. Why not just truck the whole of the file system of our intelligence services over to the New York Times and Al-Jazeera and get it over with? A diligent new media made sure Alcee was exposed and people were reminded of how corrupt yet another Democrat truly was. Alcee won’t be getting that Chairmanship.

Apparently, crooks are like roaches in Congress, because another one has scurried out into the light seeking a Chairmanship from Incorruptible San Fran Nan. Representative Alan Mollohan of West Virginia, a long-time Democrat Congressman (wonder if he’s attended any of Sen. Bob Byrd’s (aka Conscience of the Senate and longest serving Senator) Klan barbecue’s) is currently in line to take over the House panel that oversees the budget of the FBI. That in itself is not that remarkable until you consider that Al’s finances are being investigated by that same FBI. Sort of a proverbial fox guarding the chicken coop kind of story isn’t it? Well, that’s the Democrats for you.

When Republicans are corrupt, we can usually expose them quickly and get them out of office just as quickly. It helps that the antique’s are more than eager to pounce on any Republican who shows a character flaw, regardless of its magnitude. Most hang their heads in shame and move on and rightfully so, especially if their flaw directly impacts their ability to serve their constituents. Democrats seem like a pack of ticks. You can’t pull them loose of their seat. In cases like the Democrat candidate who lost in Katherine Harris’ old district in Florida, you can’t even seem to pry them loose even if they lost and never had the seat.

If you’re unsettled by corruption in Washington, and you voted out your Representative or Senator with that in mind, know that you just switched well-documented corrupt Congressmen for shadier corrupt Congressmen and women. Congratulations…to you.

Most of the corruption is in the true veterans of Congress, the ones who will be getting all those Chairmanships and Panel assignments. The same thing happened in ’94 when Republicans took over. Older, liberal Rockefeller Republicans from the ‘70’s took Chairmanships that had been won for them by young turk conservative Republicans. Now far left Democrats are getting those Chairmanships based on the efforts of moderate to conservative Democrats who campaigned on more accountable and conservative government all across America. Wonder when the next batch will cycle through.

My greatest concern, I suppose, is that the examples above are the ones we’ve heard about. How many are we not hearing about?

Update #1: CNS News has a good piece on this very issue.