conservative (475)

by: Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism

 

As part of their dogma, the Left believes society only operates “fairly” when more power is concentrated in the Federal Government and fewer rights are exercised independently by individuals. In their view, one of the major purposes of the Government is to equalize outcomes across society (try to find that in the Constitution). Note that it’s the equality of outcomes, not equality of opportunities, that is their definition of fairness. To achieve that goal, Liberals need an excuse to take rights and responsibilities from individuals and shift that power to the Government. Then that Governmental power can be used to institutionalize fairness by passing laws and regulations that provide for the equality of outcomes across society. However in spite of these plans, the Left has a major cultural roadblock in their way. One of our traditional American values is to treasure and defend our individual rights. When Americans are thinking rationally, we rarely, if ever, voluntarily give up any of our rights.

 

When the Liberals want to influence American opinion on an issue, they need to overcome that obstacle. To do so, they use a consistent formula to warp the public perception in their favor. Their approach does not involve an in-depth analysis of the facts with the subsequent generation of possible alternatives to be evaluated. Frankly facts get in their way. Their strategy is simply based on manipulating the public’s emotions. Liberals want to generate guilty feelings or stir up hate or trigger rage. Their tactic is to generate strong emotions in the public and with those emotions shut down rational thought. Create a crisis. Create an injustice. Pretend there is no time to think about, discuss, or even read the bill. We have to act now! Sound familiar?  Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism Blog

 

President Reagan is probably best known for three major accomplishments: rekindling the American spirit of entrepreneurship, defeating the Soviets in the Cold War leading to the eventual collapse of the USSR, and creating the most robust peacetime economic expansion in American history. In this posting, we’ll focus on topics more applicable to Reagan’s economic accomplishments. Reagan’s economic philosophy has been referred to by many names including Reaganomics and Supply Side Economics.

 

Arguably Reagan was dealing with a much more complex economic environment in 1980 than we have today. Reagan was faced with high unemployment, high inflation, high interest rates, a slow-growing economy and a high government deficit as a percentage of GDP. Today we primarily have high unemployment, a slow-growing economy and a high government deficit. However over the last two years the policies implemented by the Obama administration have not significantly reduced unemployment, have dramatically increased the government debt and have started to increase both inflation and interest rates. Note that inflation and interest rates were not a problem when Obama entered office. Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism Blog

 

My wife was seated in the airport waiting to catch her flight back home. So far so good. She was already past security waiting in the gate area. As usual, she was reading a book trying to pass the minutes until it was time to board. My wife can be as entertained by people watching as anyone. However if she has a good book, she would rather tune out the world and slip into a well written story, but not today. On this day, she along with everyone else in the gate area were going to have their concentration shattered by a guy on his cell phone. For sake of discussion, let’s call him Barry. Barry had a pretty deep voice, and he was talking loud.

 

It didn’t matter if you had on headphones, wore hearing aids or were half-deaf, you could hear Barry. His baritone voice blasted through the atmosphere at the gate such that everyone could hear every word he was saying. It became very clear, very quickly he was trying his best to get out of the dog house. It was obvious from his side of the conversation that Barry was in deep TROUBLE. He was in trouble with his girlfriend Liberty, and she was really ticked off. You couldn’t hear her side of the conversation, but it definitely was NOT PG-13. Barry was doing his best to convince his girlfriend over the phone that he wasn’t doing anything wrong. She wasn’t buying it.

 

That’s part of the reason why he was talking so loud. Continue...
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Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism

 

President Reagan was a strong advocate of Peace through Strength. Essentially he believed that foreign powers were less likely to engage with the United States militarily if they were certain that they would receive immediate, disproportionate punishment from our armed forces. It’s the same philosophy that most of us were smart enough to learn in grade school: Bullies don’t pick on the strong kids. They pick on the weak kids. If a bully picks on you, punch them really hard in the nose. Not only will they go away, they will probably not pick on you again. They will slink off and look for a weaker target.

 

Along with Peace through Strength, Reagan had several other beliefs that guided his thinking regarding protecting America from foreign enemies. First: there is good and evil. Second, in facing evil, it is justified to use military force. Third, if we are going to use force, use overwhelming force. Fourth, nation building works if you have a nation to begin with. Fifth, technology and innovative tactics both help overcome manpower or military imbalances. Finally, always leave your enemies guessing how extreme your military response might be.

 

There is good and evil. There is right and wrong. Reagan clearly would have seen both Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda as evil and threats to the citizens of the United States.  Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism

 

The other day on a Southwest Airlines flight back to Houston, I saw him, Cooter. He was one big dude, and he was making his way down the aisle of the plane carrying his duffel bag and his hardhat. As usual, his hardhat was decorated with stickers from most of the plants where he had worked. Since Cooter does contract work, he had a lot of stickers! The row I was in was full. It just so happened that Cooter’s traveling companion, Bubba, was seated in the window seat of my row. So Cooter put his carry-on in the overhead and sat in the row behind me.

 

Ok, I didn’t really know if his name was actually Cooter, but I know a lot of Cooters. Cooter is a slang name for a group of working people across the United States. Cooter builds cars in Tennessee, raises cattle in Kansas and installs cat crackers in refineries in Texas. Cooter is good at what he does. He takes pride in his work, his family and his yard. You wouldn’t want to make Cooter mad if you were another man. However, he loves babies and little kids.

 

Cooter voted for Carter, Reagan, Clinton and George W Bush (the first time). He didn’t vote at all in the 2008 election because he was disgusted with the candidates. Cooter often chooses not to vote unless something has him fired up. He can get fired up about anything that he thinks impacts his family.    Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - American Exceptionalism

 

As a continuing part of our series What Would Reagan Do, we’re going to discuss what Reagan would do to address our current immigration problems. Clearly Reagan would have been shocked by our current situation related to rampant illegal immigration, the violence across our southern border in Mexico, and the crime being brought into American cities by illegal aliens.

 

Addressing Reagan’s views regarding immigration is complex because he had two seemingly conflicting views. For one, Reagan believed in the integrity of the borders of the United States. This view would have been only reinforced by our current international terrorism risks in a post 9-11 world. In fact one of Reagan’s most well-known quotes is: “A nation that cannot control its borders is not a nation.”

 

On the other side of the coin, Reagan believed the United States was the last great hope for the world. Reagan lived the American Dream and saw that dream as a gift from God for all free people. He fully understood the desire of the masses to come to America and to assimilate into the melting pot as Americans.  Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - Morning in America

 

Are you better off than you were two years ago? For most people, the answer is no. Compared to two years ago, more people are unemployed, the credit markets are still a mess, businesses are still being stymied by further federal regulation, and the global community has no idea what we stand for with our foreign policy.

 

What if we could roll the clock back? Roll it back a little more than two years to September 2008. At that time, the United States was at one of our more critical inflection points. We had military actions in both Iraq and Afghanistan, our southern border states were seeing a serious uptick in crime being committed by illegal aliens, the economy was starting to stagnate, and we had a looming credit crisis. Over a series of postings, we’ll address how Reagan would have addressed each of these issues. What Would Reagan Do?

 

The Credit Crisis

 

Reagan was a true believer in the free market. He believed in capitalism, American businesses, and most importantly the American people. Reagan knew that one of the key mechanisms of the free market is to correct imbalances that occur in the exchange of goods and currency. If you ever had any doubt about Reagan’s belief in free markets, look at how he handled the stock crash on “Black Monday”, stock market collapse of October 19, 1987.  Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - Morning in America

 

Hey Soul Sister

 

“What’s the difference between a hockey mom and a pitbull? Lipstick!” And with that shot over the bow at the Republican National Convention, Sarah Palin announced her arrival on to the national political stage. From her position as a relatively unknown Governor of Alaska, Palin launched one of the most exciting Vice Presidential candidacies in U.S. history.

 

From the completion of that speech, even before McCain lost to Obama, there was the question about her aspirations regarding the Presidency. Will Sarah Run? And that question is still outstanding today. Although she hasn’t announced, she’s made several moves to improve her position if she does decide to run. She’s now a frequent commentator on Fox News, has written several books, has had a brief series on cable television on TLC, formed her own Political Action Committee, and most importantly threw her support behind many individuals in their respective state level candidacies. Yes, Sarah is collecting “chips”.    Continue...
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by: Trent Derr - Morning in America

 

I swore I heard that right.  Did the President say this is our “Sputter and Nicked Up” moment?  Was this the first time that he decided to finally come clean with the American people?   I thought to myself, well at least he was being honest in his State of the Union speech.  He’s finally breaking it to everyone that after his first two years in office he’s set the economy up for another dip… and a bad one.  Yes I know that the stock market has been going up for the last couple months and other economic indicators have had minor upticks.  This temporary uptick has been due to the FED pumping liquidity into the financial markets at a level nearly matching 90% of our current GDP.

 

But Obama has decided to come clean.  He’s telling us when the FED’s stimulus runs out again, the economy is going to sputter, fall back into recession, and we’re all going to get nicked up.  The latest stimulus by the FED is known as QE2 (Quantitative Easing 2).  Why is it called QE2?  Because QE1 didn’t work.   Yes Obama was able to leverage QE1 to trigger a rebound in the stock market but that happens when the FED pours cash into the financial market.    The impact of Quantitative Easing 1 stopped working in late April 2010, and the stock market swooned. continued...

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by: Trent Derr - Morning in America

 

As I mentioned to some friends, due to the amount of money the President is borrowing from the Chinese, Obama is no longer able to refer to the Chinese leader as Hu Jintao. Now Obama is required to call him Hu JaDaddy.  To paraphrase Jay Leno, the bad news is the Chinese Leader came to the White House this week.  The good news is he said we could keep it.

 

However I’m not picking on the Chinese.  I’m opposed to the United States owing that amount of money to anyone.  Let alone a country that crushes dissent in their citizens, imprisons their Noble Prize winners, thinks that America is a temporary aberration in history, and has nuclear weapons pointed at us.    In any debtor relationship, you lose authority and the ability to negotiate from a level playing field.  Anyone who doesn’t think it matters where you borrow money is a fool.   Just ask a person who has ended up in “cement shoes” in the waters off of New Jersey whether it matters. But I digress…

 

Personally, I’m not as concerned about what our debt to China says about them as what is says about us.  The reckless increased spending by the Obama Administration is not primarily being driven by building infrastructure, fighting a war, or funding social security.  Continue...
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11prison_paper.jpg

Republican candidate for governor Carl Paladino

said he would transform some New York prisons

into dormitories for welfare recipients,

At these dormitories, the people would work in state

-sponsored jobs, get employment training and

take lessons in “personal hygiene.”


Paladino, who is popular with many tea party

activists, is competing for the Republican

nomination with former U.S. Rep. Rick Lazio.

The primary is Sept. 14. He first described

the idea in June at a meeting of The Journal

News of White Plains and spoke about it

again this week with The Associated Press.



“Instead of handing out the welfare

checks, we'll teach people how to

earn their check. We'll teach them

personal hygiene … the personal

things they don't get when they

come from dysfunctional homes."

Throughout his campaign, Paladino has said

New York's “Rich Menu” of social service

benefits encourages illegal immigrants

and needy people to live in the state. He

has promised a 20 percent reduction in

the state budget and a 10 percent income

tax cut if elected.

New York receives a federal block grant to

provide cash and other forms of welfare to

very low income residents. Federal law already

requires welfare recipients to do some form

of work to receive benefits, but Paladino believes

it is not an effective enough measure.


http://hiphopwired.com/2010/08/22/ny-republican-
candidate-wants-to-turn-prisons-into-dorms-for-
welfare-recipients-30097/




[Teaching the less fortunate skills to take care

of themselves is excellent idea!


You won't see a Democrat mentoring citizens

like this, that's a guarantee. Because they are too busy

worrying about their own political careers

then to be concerned about citizens needs.


Goes to show "who we" need to be voting into office,

ain't a democrat]

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Matapalo

Stepping Up To Preserve Freedoms! A new novel, "Matapalo," (written by just an average guy) illustrates just what the Tea Party Movement is all about. Fictional average people, in a fictional average medium-sized city, come to grips with an over-reaching Government, and slowly realize how guarantees strangely reduce freedoms. Who and why one individual steps up is a surprise. Available at Amazon.com.

Daniel Lechner

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Newt Gingrich a wolf in sheeps clothing

Please read and pass on we don{t need this wingnut subverting the movement... Remember the Conservatives and Democrats don{t want a third party because they want the sole power that is why they are undermining us...BOO him off the stage...

 

Newt “World Order” Gingrich supported GATT, NAFTA and WTO while in Congress.

Posted by John Kabitzke on 07/07/10 8:29 PM
Last updated 07/07/10 8:30 PM

 

Please be informed by reading the following on his broken contract with Americans:

Just as report cards keep parents posted on their children's progress in school, constituents have a tool to let them know how their federal representatives measure up to their oaths to uphold the Constitution.

We should expect high "grades" from them, because it is not difficult to determine whether legislation oversteps the clearly delineated, limited powers of the Constitution. If there is uncertainty, the Bill of Rights tells the government everything else is off limits. Moreover, an oath calls God as witness to the oath-taker's honesty and integrity. In other words, it is both illegal and immoral to violate the Constitution. Why are so many Representatives bringing home Fs on their report cards? They may mean well, but a Congressman's good intentions do not fulfill his obligation before God to vote according to the law.

There are a growing number of candidates for Congress who are running in support of the Constitution. Many of them were motivated to become involved as a result of the political phenomenon in the last presidential race that became known as the "Ron Paul Revolution." But if the GOP establishment has its way, the Republicans who will go to Washington will be of the neocon variety and will offer voters looking for alternatives to the liberal Democrats more of an echo than a choice. The establishment-favored Newt Gingrich is a case in point.

The Republican?

After more than a decade out of the spotlight, Newt Gingrich is once again making headlines as a conservative author and basking in media speculation of his possibility as a presidential candidate. He is busy promoting his conservatively themed books and documentaries while touting firm belief in limited government and personal freedoms. Gingrich's rhetoric brings back memories of his old days as a staunch proponent of cutting taxes, balancing the budget, reducing bureaucratic regulations, and strengthening national defense.

Just as in those days, Newt Gingrich now positions himself as a conservative. But does his definition of conservative mean loyalty to the Constitution, or loyalty to the establishment? "Understanding the real Newt Gingrich ... is essential," said John F. McManus, president of the John Birch Society and producer of the new DVD The Real Newt Gingrich. "Americans must realize that they are being persuaded to follow false leaders, to put confidence in men who don't deserve our confidence." Both Gingrich's congressional track record and his present activities prove him no better than the current White House occupant.

Gingrich Resumé

Newt Gingrich served in Congress from 1979 until 1999. His first Freedom Index score (when it was known as the "Conservative Index") was 84, but it nose-dived from there. He achieved his lowest scores as Speaker of the House. Gingrich consistently lost points for his propensity to support unconstitutional legislation.

1. Education - Gingrich backed federal education funding from his earliest days in office, though the Constitution gives absolutely no authority over education to any branch of the federal government. He helped garner support to create President Jimmy Carter's Department of Education in 1979. Since then educational spending has soared while educational standards have plummeted. Things got worse when he was Speaker. In 1996, then-Republican Party Chairman Haley Barbour bragged that "education spending went up under the Republican Congress as much as it went up under the Democratic Congress." That is a bit of an understatement since Gingrich's Republican Congress increased education funding by $3.5 billion in 1996, the largest single increase in history.

2. Foreign Aid - Gingrich voted numerous times throughout his 20 years in Congress to increase and expand unconstitutional foreign aid and trade. He supported both subsidized trade with the Soviets and federally funded loans to foreign governments through the Export-Import Bank. Between 1994 and 1995, Gingrich voted for $44.8 billion in foreign aid. He also helped push through federally funded loan guarantees to China. Today, that murderous communist regime is the largest holder of U.S. debt in the world.

3. NAFTA, GATT, WTO - In 1993, Gingrich proved himself invaluable to Clinton and the Democrats in Congress when he garnered enough Republican support to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the precursor for development of an eventual North American Union, following the same trajectory that has occurred in Europe with the emergence of the EU. (See the October 15, 2007 "North American Union" issue of The New American, especially "NAFTA: It's Not Just About Trade" by Gary Benoit.) The next year he followed suit by supporting the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO). As Minority Whip, he could have postponed the lame-duck vote on GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) that subjected Americans to the WTO. Gingrich's Benedict Arnold act helped to hand over the power to regulate foreign commerce, a power reserved in the Constitution to Congress alone, to an internationally controlled body, making America's economic interests entirely at the mercy of the WTO.

Gingrich knew GATT sounded the death knell for American sovereignty. In testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee prior to the lame-duck session, he said, "We need to be honest about the fact that we are transferring from the United States at a practical level significant authority to a new organization.... This is not just another trade agreement. This is adopting something which twice, once in the 1940s and once in the 1950s, the U.S. Congress rejected.... It is a very big transfer of power."

 

4. Contract With America - Another con-game Gingrich played was the much-acclaimed "Contract With America," the Republican Party's supposed answer to big government. It turned out to be a public relations smokescreen to cover various unconstitutional measures that Congress planned to pass under Gingrich's leadership. The Contract included a "balanced budget amendment," which amounted to a Republican excuse to continue spending while claiming to fight for fiscal conservatism. If the government only spent money on constitutional programs, the deficit would take care of itself.

Other areas of the Contract With America dealt with measures to reduce welfare programs and relieve tax burdens on families and businesses. That sounds good until one considers that the Constitution prohibits welfare programs and taxes that the Contract proposed only to reduce. If Gingrich had been loyal to his oath of office, he would have worked not to trim but to purge them. Ironically, but hardly surprisingly, federal spending in all the areas addressed by the 1994 Contract rose in subsequent years. Edward H. Crane, president of the Cato Institute, observed that "the combined budgets of the 95 major programs that the Contract With America promised to eliminate have increased by 13%." Crane also pointed out, "Over the past three years the Republican-controlled Congress has approved discretionary spending that exceeded Bill Clinton's requests by more than $30 billion."

Another of the problems with the Contract was that it called for stronger federal crime-fighting measures, despite the Constitution's prohibition on federal involvement in police matters outside of piracy and treason. Countries that do not have such strict constitutional safeguards on federal police end up with Gestapos, KGBs, and Departments of Homeland Security.

5. School Prayer Amendment - The proposed balanced budget amendment was not Gingrich's only attempt to change the Constitution. He also pushed hard for a school prayer amendment to allow America's children to pray in schools. It was just another shameless publicity stunt, for Gingrich knows the main obstacle to prayer in schools is not a faulty Constitution but an overambitious Supreme Court. Had he truly wanted to release the federal stranglehold on prayer in schools, Gingrich could have employed Congress' constitutionally authorized power to restrict the Supreme Court's appellate jurisdiction of the issue.

 

6. Clinton's GOP (Grand Old Pal) - In 1995, Time magazine named Newt Gingrich "Man of the Year," characterizing him as a states' rights conservative and the Republican answer to Bill Clinton. The ironic thing about Time magazine's 1995 claim is that in June of that year, Gingrich and Clinton both agreed at a debate in Clare-mont, New Hampshire, that they were "not far apart" in their views. Later Clinton publicly thanked Gingrich for his support of the President's pet projects in areas such as welfare, education, labor, the environment, and foreign affairs. He made special mention of Gingrich's support of the $30 billion Violent Crime and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 that shackled gun owners with new restrictions, federalized a number of crimes, and handed the feds police powers that the Constitution reserves to the states.

On numerous occasions, Gingrich showed himself a friend to Clinton's military policies, with a flagrant disregard for the constitutional mandate that Congress alone may declare war. He made a formal appeal to the House of Representatives in 1995 to "increase the power of President Clinton" by repealing the War Powers Act. He praised Clinton's unconstitutional use of the U.S. military to inflict a communist regime on Haiti in 1994, the same year he voted for an extra $1.2 billion for United Nations "peacekeeping" missions. He also urged the President to expand U.S. military presence in Bosnia the following year.

This partial resumé does not include Gingrich's support of abortion and anti-family measures, federal welfare, a presidential line item veto, the National Endowment for the Arts, confiscation of private property, amnesty for illegal immigrants, higher taxes, and a myriad of other unconstitutional legislation. But it is enough to prove he lied each time took his oath of office. The question is, why this disdain for the rule of law? A close look at Gingrich's associations provides the answer to why he had such a propensity for claiming conservatism while voting with the establishment.

Futurist

In 1994, Gingrich described himself as "a conservative futurist." He said that those who were trying to define him should look no further than The Third Wave, a 1980 book written by Alvin Toffler. The book describes our society as entering a post-industrial phase in which abortion, homosexuality, promiscuity, and divorce are perfectly normal, even virtuous. Toffler penned a letter to America's "founding parents," in which he said: "The system of government you fashioned, including the very principles on which you based it, is increasingly obsolete, and hence increasingly, if inadvertently, oppressive and dangerous to our welfare. It must be radically changed and a new system of government invented - a democracy for the 21st century." He went on to describe our constitutional system as one that "served us so well for so long, and that now must, in its turn, die and be replaced."

Gingrich recommended The Third Wave as essential reading to his colleagues when he became Speaker of the House. In his forward to another Toffler book, Creating a New Civilization: The Politics of the Third Wave, he grieved at the lack of appreciation for "Toffler's insight" in The Third Wave and blamed politicians who had not applied his model for the "frustration, negativism, cynicism and despair" of the political landscape. He went on to explain that Toffler advocated a concept called "anticipatory democracy," and bragged that he had worked with him for 20 years "to develop a future-conscious politics and popular understanding that would make it easier for America to make the transition" to a Third Wave civilization.

The Internationalist

Another explanation for Gingrich's liberal voting record is that he has been a member, since 1990, of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a group founded in 1921 as a think tank of influential politicians and policymakers dedicated to sacrificing national independence to create a global government. He showed his fidelity to internationalism in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Affairs in July of 1995 when he brazenly admitted his disdain for our founding document.

"The American challenge in leading the world is compounded by our Constitution," he said. "Under our [constitutional system] - either we're going to have to rethink our Constitution, or we're going to have to rethink our process of decision-making." He went on to profess an oxymoronic belief in "very strong but limited federal government," and pledged, "I am for the United Nations." That is certainly no surprise since his mentor is none other than former Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger (also a CFR member and one-world internationalist).

On other occasions Gingrich expressed his admiration and regard for establishment insiders Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and George Catlett Marshall, praising what they had done to bring about international government. Gingrich scorned any connection with "isolationists" (a dirty word used to describe anyone who defines free trade as the ability to conduct international business unfettered by unconstitutional regulations) in a speech given at the Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom on March 1, 1995. He cited his work on NAFTA, GATT, and various foreign aid measures, and concluded saying, "I'm always curious why there's some presumption that [I am] in any way isolationist."

Newt and Improved

What about Gingrich today? Isn't it possible he has changed since he served in Congress? He has a new wife and a new religion, converting to Catholicism earlier this year. He still says he is conservative, but maybe that definition has changed, too. Indeed, he positioned himself as a hero of this past April's Tax Day Tea Party movement, partnering with that group in his position as chairman of American Solutions for Winning the Future (ASWF). He issued a general invitation to all Americans on YouTube to join local Tea Parties across the nation. "The fact is that we need a smaller government, a more effective government, and we need lower taxes," he said. "Let's communicate to our leaders, 'We want you to fix it, or we're gonna want new leaders.'" He used even stronger language in a rousing delivery at the April 15 Tea Party in New York, when he warned big-spending legislators to straighten up or "we're gonna fire you."

Yet it seems Gingrich is still up to his old tricks. In front of a Tea Party crowd, he expounds the virtues of limited government, but elsewhere he is still the futurist conservative devoted to internationalism. His blog biography brags about his work as Speaker of the House and then boasts of such unconstitutional credentials as serving on the CFR's Terrorism task force, co-chairing the UN task force to "reform" (i.e., strengthen) the United Nations, and receiving credit for the DHS being his brainchild. "Newt Gingrich is a leading advocate of increased federal funding for basic science research," reads the bio. Gingrich's ASWF endorses federal involvement in areas such as energy, education, labor and the environment. He also founded the Center for Health Transformation, which advocates its own version of socialized medicine.

Global Government Gingrich

It would seem the CFR has done a good job schooling Gingrich in foreign affairs over the past 10 years as well. No longer the novice, Gingrich supports continuing the "war" in Afghanistan despite the fact that Congress never actually declared war as required by the Constitution. The Baltimore Sun noted on October 22 that Gingrich supports expanding the U.S. military presence in the Middle East. He claimed, "Afghanistan is a skirmish in a long war.... We need a much larger grand strategy that deals with the whole war." He even had the audacity to invoke George Washington as a model for Obama in making "morally correct" decisions in Afghanistan. Careful, Gingrich, you're quoting one of those nasty noninterventionists! Washington had this to say about foreign policy in his Farewell Address: "The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible." Yet National Review quoted Gingrich in opposition to the Father of Our Country. "You can pull out of Afghanistan, and then what?... We pulled out of Somalia, and now we have pirates," he said, ignoring what U.S. support of the UN puppet regime in that unfortunate country has done to promote terrorism, and parallel scenarios in Afghanistan and across the Middle East. His statements leave little doubt as to how Gingrich would conduct himself as Commander in Chief.

Little Green Man

But he isn't all fight. There's also the kinder, gentler Newt who, in April 2008, cuddled up with current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on a love seat at the National Mall to make a "We Can Solve It" television commercial (for Al Gore's $300 million global-warming ad campaign) urging constituents to pressure their Representatives in Washington to go green. He said that "our country must take action to address climate change." Yet when he explained his participation at newt.org, he admitted, "I don't think that we have conclusive proof of global warming [or] that humans are at the center of it." This is ludicrous. If Gingrich intends to take a side in the debate, he is de facto conceding that climate change is real and humans are the cause. He is yielding to a false premise, and any "compromise" solution based on it will be disastrous.

Gingrich's blog explains further, "There is a big difference between left-wing environmentalism ... and a Green Conservatism that wants to use science, technology, innovation, entrepreneurs and prizes to find a way to creatively invent the kind of environmental future we all want." (Emphasis added.) He fails to acknowledge that the Constitution prohibits federal involvement in those areas, but the really troubling word is "prizes." This has cap and trade written all over it. Gingrich already sanctioned cap and trade on sulfur dioxide emissions in the 1990 Clean Air Act. He claims to oppose Obama's plan but instead wants the government to lower prices on alternative energy sources, "because I think you're going to get faster acceleration of new innovation if you lower the price of good products ... rather than raise the price of obsolete products." So Gingrich's "conservative" answer to the concocted energy crisis is price regulation and government subsidies, both of which use tax money to stifle the economy, giving advantage to faulty products and services that cannot support themselves in a free-market economy. Gingrich's "Green Conservatism" seems much like the "left-wing environmentalism" that he disapproves.

Education Reform à la Al (Sharpton)

Pelosi and Gore are not Gingrich's only strange bedfellows. He recently toured the nation with Reverend Al Sharpton and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to promote President Obama's education reforms and charter schools. Of course, there are a number of problems with that scenario, not the least of which is Gingrich's association with Al Sharpton, a controversial left-wing activist, or his contemptible pandering to the dictates of the liberal Obama administration. The main problem, as usual, is Gingrich's endorsement of patently unconstitutional measures. The tour agenda recommends increased local control of schools to be regulated and subsidized by the federal Department of Education. That's right: increased local control through increased federal regulation.

The proposal also calls for "the ability of parents to pick the right school for their child." Parents would already have that ability if it weren't for the Department of Education. Rearranging how the federal government regulates education may be "reform" of the current system, but the current system is unconstitutional.

Rearranging how the federal government regulates education may be "reform" of the current system, but the current system is unconstitutional.

Republican to the Oh-so-bitter End

If all this weren't enough to expose Gingrich's fidelity-at-all-costs to the establishment, he endorsed an ultra-liberal Republican over a conservative third-party candidate in New York's 23rd Congressional District special election held November 3. Republican Dede Scozzafava supports same-sex "marriage," big labor, and abortion. She won the Margaret Sanger Award from Planned Parenthood in March of 2008. The liberal ACORN-affiliated Working Families Party backs Scozzafava, and conservatives within her party call her a RINO (Republican In Name Only). When the New York Post came out in support of her Conservative Party opponent, Doug Hoffman, it said, "a Republican should adhere to certain minimum GOP principles. Scozzafava is just too far to the left too often." Yet Gingrich described her in a letter to supporters as "our best chance to put responsible and principled leaders in Washington." Gingrich explained his endorsement on newt.org, saying his "number one interest in the 2009 elections is to build a Republican majority," and to do so it is sometimes necessary "to put together a coalition that has disagreement within it." Considering that the publisher of the liberal Daily Kos endorsed Scozzafava as "willing to raise taxes" and "to the left of most Democrats on social issues," it's fair to ask if Newt has any principles at all.

Scozzafava dropped a campaign bomb-shell when she withdrew from the race just four days before the election, leaving a two-man fight between Hoffman and Democrat opponent Bill Owens. Gingrich then endorsed Hoffman, not on principle, but to prevent the Democrats from gaining another seat in the House. Owens got an endorsement from Scozzafava the very next day and proceeded to win the election by a narrow plurality. So Republicans lost a seat in the House, and Gingrich lost an enormous amount of credibility among conservatives.

Jekyll and Hyde vs. the Constitution

With outrageous national debt and out-of-control federal spending, loss of sovereignty to the likes of the UN and the WTO, spiraling taxes, and a bloodsucking bureaucratic leviathan, America can no longer afford to gamble on such a Jekyll-and-Hyde "conservative" as Newt Gingrich. What we need in Washington instead are constitutionalists who know that it is against the law to violate the Constitution no matter what anyone's opinion may be. The easiest way to tell a phony conservative from the true constitutionalist is to ask a few simple questions. Does he support federal education and welfare programs? Foreign aid? An interventionist foreign policy as opposed to staying clear of foreign quarrels? If yes, he is not a constitutionalist. We will never get back to good government unless we urge lawmakers to use the Constitution as their guide, and only support candidates who adopt the Constitution as their platform, regardless of party.

 

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How, Why the Republican Party has Failed both America
and Conservatives and What's to Be Done about It

Liberal Yahoo and the ultra- liberal Associated Press have both shown great insight and generated greater incitement (stimulus to action) for the opposing parties in the November elections and outlined how they’ll probably play out . . . .

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100705/ap_on_el_ge/us_nationalized_election

In the excellent article linked just above, Charles Babington of the AP says that “Democrats and Republicans are framing the elections in starkly different terms, with GOP strategists painting it as a national referendum on President Barack Obama and the party in power, and Democrats working feverishly to make all politics local.” Rajjpuut who, in his school teaching days could boast of coaching several Colorado State Chess Team Champions, agrees whole-heartedly because the art of politics should be successfully conducted as a strategic magic act for the have nots; and a strategic trench warfare for the haves. Just as the Democrats were in most people’s eyes, the haves in 2006 and 2008 (they were perceived as having the issues on their side); in 2010, clearly conservatives have the issues favoring them. In a larger sense, however, this strategic view clearly underlines the failings of the Republican Party to represent the needs of the nation and of its conservatives over the last 109 years as Progressivism^^ has progressively brought the country more and more evil and closer and closer to utter ruin.

When good men fail to act effectively, evil gains a toe-hold. When good men fail to understand their cause, evil makes its case. When good men fail to act, evil comes to power. When good men fail to act and to understand, evil comes to dominate. When good men act wrongly either by failing to act or failing to understand or both evil WINS. This short paragraph outlines why and how the Republican Party has failed conservatives and the country in the past, is failing them now, and will (unless serious change occurs) continue to fail conservatives and America in the future. More on this later

. . . .

When coaching his scholastic champion chess teams, Rajjpuut made a point of hammering away at tactics as a blended-subsidiary to strategy so that whether elementary, middle school or high schoolers were involved . . . the big picture always stood out stark and clear: own the center, develop and coordinate your pieces, before you touch a piece or pawn (touch-move rule in championship events) prefer attack to defense; then stop, ask yourself the question “What could go wrong?” If nothing could go wrong, you’ve selected your move and except for finding a better one which also has no downside . . . you’re moving toward victory. Throw in good tactics and knowing how to crush in the endgame and victory was virtually assured.

This approach was gained from studying management principles at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas via the Kepner-Tregoe Management System . . . clearly the Republican Party could benefit from understanding and complying with good management principles, the basic economic and constitutional imperatives of Republicanism, and the underlying common sense fundamentals of free market economics.

Our neighborhood was recently plagued by a Democratic campaign worker for the more liberal of that party’s senate candidates (Ex-speaker of the state house Romanoff who was running against semi-moderate Bennett. Romanoff had been considering running for governor but didn’t wish to contest the seat against popular ex-Denver mayor and the whole nation is, thanks to Obama’s efforts to influence Romanoff to drop the race against Bennett as well as the Sestak issue in Pennsylvania, aware of this particular race). The fellow was a polite and curious sort and discussed politics with Rajjpuut for roughly 25 minutes. Here’s what impressed him – our progresive opposition -- the most:

1. That our $13 TRillion national debt was the least of our problems.

2. That the $110 TRillion in unfounded liabilities (Social Security, Medicare and the federal side of Medicaid) were not being addressed by either party.

3. That congress had recently done a great thing with its Pay-Go law requiring that before any new spending measure can be passed a way to pay for it either by instituting a new tax or by cutting spending be found . . . . but that congress had since passing that law refused to use Pay-go even once since, just as it had failed to honor the set-asides for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and thus since 1934 has built up that $110 TRillion in unfunded liabilities.

4. That Obama has told the nation his energy policies will “necessarily make the price of electricity skyrocket” and that he’s told the San Francisco Chronicle his policies will “bankrupt the coal industry.”

5. That Obama has promised (threatened?) to create five million new green jobs when green technology is NOT yet viable. That Spain in 1997 led Europe with a booming economy and only 3% unemployment before they turned to green jobs and today Spain has 21% unemployment and is, next to Greece, the weakest economy in Europe. That according to a Spanish study each green job required $667,000 in subsidies which cost the real economy 2.2 jobs. And because only 10% of the green jobs proved permanent (the vast majority lasted from three months to eighteen months) that meant that IF Obama instituted his five million green jobs it was likely that only 500,000 of them would prove permanent at the cost of eleven million jobs in the real (unsubsidized) economy a 22/1 ratio that perfectly explains why Spain’s economy went south.

6. Yes, green tech would be ideal, but green tech is not yet viable. So it would make much more sense instead of subsidizing $677,000 for one green job . . . to subidize instead $6.77 Billion for research for the top hundred winners in green-tech viability from a national contest judged by the best scientists available and seeing if that stimulus can get us a green-tech Edison and a highly desirable green-tech future based on independent American innovation.

7. And tah-dah! more than anything else the following information impressed the Democrat and he took down the particulars to research later on his home computer:

A. This crucial website (the most famous brief essay in ecomics and the simple and utter refutation of Keynesian approaches such as Obama’s stimulus-stimulus and more stimulus approaches) explains what free markets are and what their strengths are:

http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/rdPncl1.html

B. Information about this site:

http://jim.com/econ/

and after hearing the “one lesson” (from “Economics in One Lesson” by Henry Hazlitt, linked just above) he too realized that: when you look at economic situations which present themselves you must get the whole picture not just the supposedly desirable government spending stimulus plan. And then illustrating the one lesson with the briefest of fables: “The Broken Window Parable,” which utterly and totally caught him by surprise and clearly delighted him (both linked right here) . . .

http://jim.com/econ/chap01p1.html

http://jim.com/econ/chap02p1.html

Thus we now come to the logical question, how has the Republican Party failed the nation and its conservatives for 109 years? Remembering that Rajjpuut is a Libertarian and NOT a Republican and that the Republican Party is the minority party in this country . . . .

A. Republicans have failed to understand who and what the enemy is. That enemy is and has been Progressivism and Progressives since Teddy Roosevelt, a Republican, became the first notable Progressive. Not saying that Teddy Roosevelt didn’t do any good . . . just that he was the first president to champion Progressive causes which later in the hands of Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter and to a lesser extent Bill Clinton and George W. Bush led us to our present disastrous economic collapse. Republicans haven’t been able to effectively oppose progressivism and get support against progressivism from would-be conservatives because they don’t understand it themselves.

B. Most Republicans do NOT understand Republicanism (the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution is the most Republican document in the history of the world; and the 10th Amendment of the Bill of Rights taken in conjunction with the doctrine of Separation of Church and State are by far the most important parts of the Bill of Rights the spark plug for all the other Amendments) and . . . because they do NOT understand Republicanism, they cannot and do not explain Republicanism well and thus educate liberal, Democratic-conservative and independent-conservative voters.

C. Many Republicans continuously and deliberately violate Republicanism by opposing Separation of Church and state in Public Schools. The Founding Fathers (virtually all of them Christian) did NOT set up a Christian nation, they deliberately set up a nation where ALL religions would be welcome but in which no one particular religion could dominate (remembering the problems with England's state supported church) and endanger our freedoms. If you want one reason why Independent and Democratic conservatives are more likely to abstain or to vote Democtat, this is the one.

D. Two isues here, Republican corruption as shown in sexual and business scandals on the one hand and the simple fact that most Republicans have ceaselessly been UNTRUE to fundamental Republican principles such as fiscal conservativism; limited federal government; adherence to the Constitution; protection of our borders; and balanced budgets. Most Americans are conservative on these issues and have been routinely disappointed by Republican candidates promising to adhere to these principles and then abandoning them once in office. ALL Americans are conservative on political integrity.

E. Anti-abortion and even Anti-contraception are linked in much of the public’s collective mindset as Republican values. History has linked the Republican Party to this stance and it is why many women vote for Democrats. If Republicans had a stance that the Independent voter could buy into that would be one thing, and it would probably NEVER cost even one vote. However, Republicans have adopted a losing argument and paraded it before the public as the most visible aspect of Republicanism.

That losing argument is that abortion should be denied to victims of incest; victims of rape; mothers whose health is endangered; very young girls; and other victims in extraordinary cases.

Americans pride themselves on rooting for the underdog and the victim and consider old Republican opposition to contraception and family planning as totally unjustified state interference (10th Amendment again) into their personal lives.

Because that old Republican stance is so unwieldy, progressive opponents have made the Republican Party look outdated and uncaring. Abortion (unfortunately abortion virtually on demand), has been the law of the land for thirty-eight years now. One could argue that abortion (freedom over one’s body in exigent circumstances like those named above) and contraception and the resulting freedom to plan one’s family size and spacing are actually Republican causes, but in any case, because the Republican Party deliberately adopted the losing argument outlined in italics above . . . for most voters abortion on demand by contrast to the obdurate Republican stand seemed preferable. For women, in particular, this hardened Republican anti-victim stand has made the Republican Party a political destination to avoid.

To sum it up: politics is a game of strategy and tactics. The United States Constitution is the greates winning political game plan ever created. The U.S. Constitution is a decidedly conservative document designed to protect state, county, and local freedoms as well as individual freedoms against the ever-present tendency of centralized governments to expand and become more expensive and more intrusive. We are now in big trouble because for roughly 109 years, the Republican Party, the standard-bearer for conservativism has not stood strong against progressivism. In all strategic encounters, the basic rule of victory is this: find a strategic and tactical path that makes your own strengths the single most important consideration at issue and your opponent’s strengths of negligible import, while effectively managing your own weaknesses and exposing your opponent’s weaknesses and making them them of paramount importance. So let it be written, so let it be done . . . .

Right now and for all the foreseeable future, only overt and honorable conservativism (fiscally and Constitutionally) can save us. The Republican Party needs to re-invent itself in light of and in line with the party’s original conservative, Libertarian values (fiscal and Constitutional conservativism, strong borders and strong national defense, and largely a live-and-let- live social** agenda). No single election has been more crucial in the history of our country and the Republican Party must deliver or the nation is quite likely LOST!

Ya’all live long, strong and ornery,

Rajjpuut

** for example, gay unions are fine and allow them all the rights of cohabiting common-law people, but don’t call it marriage and NEVER allow gay adoption
^^ It's important for ALL thinking Americans to carefully consider this definition of Progressivism: "The perceived need to 'progress' beyond our 'out-dated' and 'ill-conceived' United States Constitution." Rajjpuut believes this is NOT only the most accurate definition of progressivism but also the most telling of the evil inherent in that movement. Progressivism in practice becomes a creeping (Fabian) socialism and moves the nation toward utter statism and communism.

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