This morning Dr. Bennett (and his guest Senator Jon Kyl) were making the case for compromise.  In their view, “the opponents are bigger than we are and there’s more of those guys!”

Dr. Bennett is a well-spoken intellectual with decades of contribution to the conservative agenda.  When he speaks, we ought to listen.  On this front, however, he is wrong.

Hybrid policy-making is and has always been dangerous folly.

It is dangerous folly because it loses the philosophical debate.  It shifts the entire national dialogue leftward in a move akin to a tug-of-war rope competition.  As the left pulls the right into the mud-pit center of the playing field everything changes.  Suddenly the “right” position becomes more of the moderate position and the “left position” becomes even more Marxist.   It contributes to the continual eroding of the conservative agenda.

Hybrid policy making bring about mixed results.  Mixed results that the more aggressive Democrats will blame on the “conservative” portions of the compromise over the deafening silence of the passive GOP appeasers.  It’s Saul Alinsky at his best.  The conservative policy then gets targeted, demonized and marginalized and the GOP are left to scatter to the more “sensible” middle.

It is dangerous folly secondly because the Democratic party negotiates in bad faith.  The Democratic party seldom delivers on their part of the “compromise” and almost always gets everything that they want through the one-two punch of GOP capitulation and Democratic legislative trickery.  We don’t need to pass things to see what’s in them.  History teaches us that the secret ingredient is always hidden leftist poison.

Additionally, there is a seismic shift going on in American political life that changes the game entirely.

The time for political compromise is over.  The empire is burning, the Titanic is sinking and the first shots of the revolution have been fired.  There is no turning back.

The good folks who were elected in 2010 ran on a platform of political fortitude–period.  They did not run on the joys of bending over in surrender.  This is nothing new, of course.  The GOP has made a living out of feigning some sort of Rocky-esque political can-do stick-with-it-ness in the campaign and then cutting and running once elected.  This time, however, the American people thought they were different.  The birth of the tea party movement and the entrance into politics of many political neophytes fed up with business as usual gave voters the motivation to win one more for the GOP Gipper.

Many common sense conservatives have been ready to breakup with the GOP.  After decades of being paid wooing campaign lip service and then being savagely beaten down in policy-making, we’ve had enough.  This was evident in 2008.  Many of us didn’t even really want to vote for John McCain, the poster-child of political compromise and capitulation.  Then he nominated Sarah Palin for Vice President in a rare moment of political courage that changed national politics for generations.  So when the 2010 mid-term elections came, we gave the GOP one more shot at governance.

If the GOP follows the footsteps of their predecessors there will be a very real and permanent break with the tea party folks.

Historically, the GOP is masterful at capitulating politically, legislatively and philosophically.  This is what comes of allowing the herd of RINOs mulling around the fringe of the party to become the reigning RINOcracy.  The RINOcracy has gradually frayed the edges of the GOP banner and slowly dulled the bold colors of the Reagan revolution into the very pale pastels that he fought against his entire political life.

In my lifetime, the GOP policy of “compromise” has always continued the ball down the road toward socialism if even just a few inches more.  It has also always had the rather unsavory effect of politically neutering the GOP in the next wave of elections.  And yet, the reigning GOP establishment continues to argue that unless we compromise we will lose the 2012 elections.

In the 1980s Ronald Reagan was forced to compromise on some issues and stood firm on others.  On the issues where he stood firm, Reagan continues to get high marks for his brilliant success.  He refused to cave on his foreign policy that sought to bring down the “evil empire” of the USSR and bring the decades long Cold War to a successful conclusion.  He stood by his principles and took politically unpopular positions.  He didn’t allow the media to define him or shake his resolve.  And history proved him right.

Reagan took the same stance on tax cuts.  Presiding over the largest peacetime economic expansion proved him right again.

On the issues of illegal immigration and spending cuts (and even some late-term tax increases) he capitulated.   The legacy in these areas has been devastating.  On the issue of illegal immigration, Mr. Reagan granted amnesty in 1986 under the premise that the Democrats would then agree to tighter security measures and crack down on the illegal immigration menace.  Democrats refused to follow through.  As a result, Reagan capitulated on amnesty and got nothing that he bargained for.  This “hybrid” policy of amnesty in 1986 lost the debate and gave cover to generations of RINO leaders to claim the Reagan mantle while advocating amnesty.  It took the footing out from underneath the common sense conservative argument for tougher border security and better enforcement of immigration laws.  Suddenly most GOP lawmakers enter the debate with an amnesty provision being a given, rather than a last resort bargaining chip.

Reagan’s compromise on government spending with the Democrats paved the way for the tax increase of 1990.  It worked temporarily because Reagan got the tax cuts that he needed and his bold, principled leadership on the issue ensured that the debate would continue.  Once Reagan left the national stage, however, and handed the reigns over to the lesser-resolved George H.W. Bush, the debate was lost.

Reagan’s inability to get the Democrats to cut spending caused a surge of political capital on the Democratic side of the aisle with which to demonize conservative economic policy.  It was Reagan’s tax cuts, they argued, that caused the deficit.  Trapped in the surging tide of unrest over the growing deficit, Bush continued to cede ground to the left by agreeing to raise taxes if the Democrats would just cut some spending instead of boldly defending the case for lower taxes the way President Reagan did.  Taxes were then raised, the case for lower taxes undermined, and the spending spree continued.

Bitterly clinging to the idol of compromise has led the GOP to national defeat over and over again.  George H. W. Bush lost re-election in 1992.  Bob Dole lost in 1996.  George W. Bush may have won re-election in 2004 but that was because of his bold resolve on the War on Terror and not because of his inability to confront the Democrats on spending.  In 2006 the GOP lost control of the legislative branch for exactly that reason.  The Republicans lost the 2008 election partly because Barack Obama was an unstoppable political juggernaut, partly because John McCain was a weak compromiser, and partly because of Bush’s failure in forcefully dealing with out-of-control spending.  FACT:  The only time that the McCain-Palin ticket led the Obama-Biden ticket was immediately after the introduction of the feisty fighting Palin and before McCain’s muddled capitulation on bailouts.

Continuing down the path of compromise ensures that the Republicans will lose the 2012 elections, the national debate on any number of political issues and their future relevancy as a political party.  America responds to bold leadership not weak surrender.

Instead of infighting, forming gangs of 6, and giving away the farm to the Democrats, the Republicans should be driving the debate.  President Obama is the one pushing horror-film narratives about the carnage that will result if a deal isn’t reached.  He’s also the one refusing to sign any deal that cuts spending without massive tax increases.  Shouldn’t he be outed for that far-left lunacy?

The GOP has the power to shift the paradigm.  This debate isn’t about what the GOP is willing to give up on.  The debate is whether it is wise to raise taxes in the Obama economic depression on those few folks who have the capacity to hire people.  And if it isn’t wise, why would the president have this catastrophic policy as his sticking point?  His reply will be to blame Bush.  But on every level Mr. Obama has taken the Bush economic policy of bailouts and record spending and taken it to staggering new heights.  The GOP needs to make that case.  How can Bush be solely to blame when the Obama policy has been to accelerate the Bush policies with the added ingredient of healthy doses of vacations and golf.

This is not a fight that Mitch McConnell can win.  Ditto John McCain.  Ditto Mitt Romney.  Ditto Jon Huntsman.  Ditto Tim Pawlenty. This calls for another Reagan-esque common sense conservative unashamed to take the fight to the Democrats and call them on their nefarious wheeling and dealing.  Folks like Rubio.  Folks like Rand Paul.  Folks like Sarah Palin.  This is a fight that requires an affinity for tea.  This is a fight that needs to be fought with the force of a Mama Grizzly.

As Margaret Thatcher once quipped when pressed to capitulate to the left, “the lady is not for turning.” Great victories are won by standing firm.  It’s time for the GOP to stiffen their spine and stand up for America before it is too late.

I know a former mayor of Wasilla who could give them some pointers.

Originally posted at City On A Hill Politcal Observer.

In one of his bestselling books that Bill Ayers probably wrote for him, Barack Obama seemed obsessed with race.

Apparently, he still is.

But the man born of a biracial union between a white American mother and an black Kenyan father seems increasingly to singularly identify with only his black heritage.  He seems to almost despise his white heritage and his policies, speeches and political agenda seems tinged with anti-semitism and anti-white bigotry.

That is not to say that President Obama is a racist.  There is, however, a troubling bias regarding race that is repeatedly showing up in both domestic and foreign policy.

In one of his books, Obama admitted his shame of his white heritage, ”I ceased to advertise my mother’s race at the age of twelve or thirteen, when I began to suspect that by doing so I was ingratiating myself to whites.”

You certainly don’t want to get along with whites now.

It’s more important to select your friends carefully, as Obama pointed out, “To avoid being mistaken for a sellout, I chose my friends carefully.  The more politically active black students.  The foreign students.  The Chicanos.  The Marxist professors and structural feminists.”

The man who made an issue during the 2008 campaign of his white grandmother, a woman he threw under the bus by proclaiming an irrational fear of black folks that she held despite having a black grandchild that she largely helped to raise.  Yet, he took the insinuation of his grandmother’s racism one step further by suggesting that she was just “a typical white person.”

Obama went on to share that one of the tricks he learned in dealing with whites was that if you were “courteous and smiled and made no sudden moves” people were “more than satisfied” and “relieved” to find “such a pleasant surprise” in a “well-mannered young black man,” one who “didn’t seem angry all the time.”

Perhaps that thinking on the part of the nation’s preeminent community organizer is what drew him towards his Vice President, Joe Biden.  Biden, who often speaks of needing to speak some Indian dialect to be able to shop in a convenience store, once spoke of the “storybook” candidacy of Barack Obama, in that he was the “first clean and articulate black man” running for office.

Perhaps Old Joe reminded him of his dearly departed typically racist white grandmother.

Then of course there is the famous speech during the campaign in 2008 where Obama accused Pennsylvanians of being “bitter” and “clinging to guns or religion with antipathy to people who aren’t like them.”  Oh those white people, always so racist and bitter.

Then there was the issue of Obama attending rabid anti-white racist dirtbag Jeremiah Wright’s church for 20 years.  Barry spent countless years sitting in the pews with Michelle smiling ear to ear as Wright went into another anti-American rant.  No doubt, it was a relief to be in such a rabid racist church for Michelle, who so often worries about Barack getting shot going to the gas station, as she remarked during the campaign.  Sitting snugly in the hate-soaked pews of the anti-American false prophet, the Obamas heard such spiritual nuggets as:

“America is still the number one killer in the world.”  ”WHITE America got their wake-up call after 9/11.  WHITE America and the Western world came to realize people of color had not gone away, faded in the woodwork, or just disappeared as the Great White West kept on its merry way of ignoring black concerns.”

“We (Americans) are deeply involved in the importing of drugs, the exporting of guns and the training of professional KILLERS. . . . We believe in white supremacy and black inferiority and believe it more than we believe in God. . . . We conducted radiation experiments on our own people. . . . We care nothing about human life if the ends justify the means!”

“We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards.  America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”  ”The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing ‘God Bless America.’  No, no, no, God damn America, that’s in the Bible for killing innocent people.”

Now, most Biblical scholars will tell you that the phrase “God damn America” doesn’t appear in the Biblical text in any language or translation.  Obama claims he had no idea after 20 years that Wright felt this way.  Yet, Wright is so soaked in rabid violence-inspiring racism and hatred against America that it would be difficult to miss.  Then again, Obama claims that he had no idea that Bill Ayers was a terrorist, or that any of his other close confidantes who happen to be socialists, communists, or terrorists/terrorist sympathizers had such backgrounds either.

Perhaps that’s just part and parcel of that whole “smiling” and “not making sudden moves” approach to white folks though.

Recently, President Obama, who once told a crowd that “that’s just how white folks will do you,” in another blatant display of anti-white bigotry, has begun to enact policies that demonstrate the vast influence of his deranged view of race.

One such example is the New Black Panthers case.  The case involved a bunch of violent anti-white bigots (also known as Black Panthers) donning military garb and nightsticks as they stood outside of Pennsylvania polling places taunting and intimidating white voters from entering the site.  It was an open and shut case of voter intimidation that the Bush justice department pursued and handed over to the Obama administration.

The case won a default judgment against the Panthers when they didn’t deem court important enough on the to-do list to actually show up.  No doubt, the folks in question were busy screaming to black audiences that if they want their freedom they need to “kill crackers” and kill cracker babies.” He probably threw in his favorite phrases, ones which would bring tears to the eyes of Reverend Wright, by screaming, “I’m about the total destruction of white people. I’m about the total liberation of black people. I hate white people. I hate my enemy. …”

And yet, the Obama administration dropped the voter intimidation case that they had already won, so long as this genocidal madman would agree not to go near polling places until 2012.  That date of course would leave him free to repeat his voter intimidation duties just in time for Obama’s re-election.

According to the recently resigned Justice Department official J Christian Adams, the Obama justice department made it clear that they would not be pursuing cases involving black crimes against white folks.

In the midst of this story, not a word has been uttered in condemnation of the New Black Panthers from Obama, his administration, or his political allies.  Instead, trumped up charges of racism against the Tea Party folks have been brought up to counter the story.  The glaring lack of evidence of said racism is in stark contrast to the absolute certainty by the Obama folks and their willing accomplices in the media of said racism.  Yet in the face of actual video footage of the New Black Panthers screaming and yelling about killing white folks while donning military garb and guns elicits a yawn and deafening silence from those same race-sensitive folks.

Perhaps Michelle is behind this plan, so that white folks can live in fear of getting shot at gas stations for all of the “downright mean” racism they displayed by electing her husband president despite all reason and common sense.

Obama’s warped race prism has also manifest itself in foreign policy.  A vigorous Muslim apologist, Barack Obama, has made one of the tent-poles of his administration a blanket across the board support for Muslims of all stripes and a simultaneous white-washing of their violent and Jihadist history.

During his famous Cairo speech in 2009, Obama heaped praise on the Muslim world for recognizing our new nation back in 1796 via the Treaty of Tripoli, a treaty where America agreed to pay millions in tribute so that the Muslim pirates would stop attacking our ships, taking our stuff, and selling white folks into slavery.  A laudable feat indeed.

During the Fort Hood Jihadist shooting last year, his administration was bewildered why the peace-loving Muslim military man would shoot up his own base.  He must have snapped, they argued.  It couldn’t have anything to do with his religion.  This despite the fact that he had a long history of correspondence with a radical Imam overseas, a history of public rants in favor of Jihad, the phrase “Soldiers of Allah” on his business cards, and shouted “Allah Akbar” a favorite among those blood-thirsty Jihadists as he shot up the place.

Incapable of learning from history, Obama’s administration similarly ignored the threat from the underwear bomber in December of last year.  Homeland Security Secretary Janet “Frankenstein” Napolitano declared that the “system worked perfectly” and assued us that he “worked alone.”  And by “worked perfectly” she means that he was allowed on a plane despite being on a no-fly list, the security folks missed his bombs, and he was only stopped when a passenger tackled him.  And by acting alone, she meant that he was instantly confessing in custody to having extensive training in camps throughout the Middle East.

Finally, the Times Square bomber, a self-professed “Muslim soldier,” again blocked from Jihadist triumph by a regular citizen, was said to have acted along and only after the big bad mortgage company foreclosed on his house.  It had nothing to do with his Muslim faith and the months in terrorist training camps he spent.

Yet in spite of the very real violent Jihad being waged against Americans, Obama’s administration seems singularly focused on covering their tracks and doing public relations for the Muslim faith. Obama’s counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan declared that, “our enemy is not terror because terror is a state of mind and, as Americans, we refuse to live in fear.”  This was in reference to the official directive from the Obama administration to completely wipe the terms “terrorism” or “War on Terror” from all government policies, memos and documents.

The Obama administration also removed “Jihad” as an appropriate monicker for the blood-thirsty savages trying to kill us and destroy our country.  Brennan went on to defend Jihad and why Americans should stop opposing it, “Jihad is holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam meaning to purify oneself of one’s community.”  And by “purify” he of course meant “killing infidels.”

After over a year and a half of minimizing the threat of Jihad or al Qaeda in particular, Obama recently spoke out against the true evil in the al Qaeda network.  It’s not the endless violent Jihad against the United States and the world.  It’s not the literally thousands of lives claimed by the terrorist Muslim organization.  It’s their racism in their hiring practices.

While Obama remains tight-lipped about terrorism and the threat to America, he is outraged that al Qaeda only hires blacks for suicide missions and low-level jobs.  They don’t even allow blacks to rise to positions of leadership in their organization.  As a result, the terrorist organization responsible for the largest terrorist attack in American history, one that claimed some 3,000 innocent lives in a single day, got its first stinging rebuke from President Obama for their racist hiring practices.

Meanwhile, His Israel policy is nothing short of government sanctioned anti-semitism.  From his treatment of of Prime Minister Netanyahu to his handling of the “flotilla-gate” nonsense to his outright coddling and cooing over Iran’s nuclear ambitions, Obama and his folks have demonstrated a lack of concern where those pesky Israelis are concerned.

Taken together, President Obama’s worldview, policies and public statements depict a man obsessed with race.  Obsessed not in the sense of a Dr. Martin Luther King, in which a harmony and unity between the races is sought, but rather in a warped revenge-soaked attempt at punishing the white race for their past crimes.

Every piece of his legislative agenda is soaked with his bizarre view on race.  From economic “justice” through the redistribution of wealth, to his foreign policy, to his Department of Justice’s blind approach to black on white racism, Mr. Obama has revealed himself to be not the self-professed healer and unifier but rather a very bitter man stoking the fires of racial animosity for his own political purposes.

America, and the world, deserve better.

In April, we were treated to the reports that the financially responsible folks who run our local municipalities would be fighting back against Governor Chris Christie’s property tax cap because they are just working on a shoe string budget.

The vast majority of municipalities in the state of New Jersey are run by Democrats. Democrats, led by the picture of financial solvency Barack Obama, have spent the better part of a century demonizing the corrupt business world for their waste and greed (and alleged oppression of poor people.)

Now, those same patron saints of fiscal responsibility and protectors of the poor would have you believe that you (especially those of you labeled “poor”) would greatly benefit by having your property taxes raised more than 4% in a given fiscal year. Their mantra? “Taxes good, personal wealth bad.”

Christie’s proposal, which actually limits the rate of property tax growth in a given year, would basically eliminate a fun part of the state’s property tax cap law exploited to great bureaucratic ecstasy during former Governor Christie Whitman’s failed attempts to reduce the oppressive state tax burden.

Financially responsible governing officials, without any undue influence from union thugs and party power players like the esteemed political boss George Norcross, simply ballooned local spending to record amounts to more than make up for any reductions the Whitman administration made. Their actions doomed the fiscal policies of the Whitman administration by robbing Peter to pay Paul and ensured that individual tax burdens on New Jersey residents became the most oppressive in the country.

A side note: did you ever notice that the only time New Jersey wins attention nationwide is when we have the highest property tax rate in the nation, the city with the most crime (thank you Camden!) or when a bunch of illiterate and randy degenerates get a reality show hellbent on proving just how low class, immoral and downright stupid alleged residents of the state have become?

So, the Christie administration is attempting to coerce the local county and municipal governments to embrace fiscal solvency as a business plan as well, and they don’t like it. It’s only greedy corporations that should live within their means and cut costs. The enlightened folks running our government are just too important to concern themselves with mundane details like balancing budgets and putting government back on the side of the people with as small a financial burden placed on individuals as possible.

Now comes word that Camden County, a county that has never seen a tax it can’t increase, expand, or multiply, has ordered “revaluations” in many local municipalities so that government can get their “fair share” in property taxes by making sure tax rates keep up with property values.

To be honest, when the headline first appeared in the Courier-Post, I foolishly thought that perhaps the Berlin borough and other local towns were “revaluating” homes to reduce their already oppressive tax burdens.

These revaluations are being done during a time of rampant unemployment (except for the few folks who found temporary work via the 6 week census jobs–go stimulus!) and near universal economic collapse. It’s also worthy to note that the economic collapse has impacted New Jersey far more seriously than the other states in the neighborhood due to the state’s anti-business environment and already oppressive tax burden.

Yet, Camden County, ever the Ebenezer Scrooge, wants to make sure you aren’t holding out on them.

That the one-party led Camden County government would pursue such a revaluation during this economic environment reveals the true identity of the menacing liberal overlords that run this county. The arrogance of the corrupt, fiscally irresponsible political elite of New Jersey knows no bounds and suffers no opposition. The combination of rigid leftist ideology, rampant unchecked government inefficiency through both corruption and incompetence, and the downright disdain for those they claim to serve amounts to a perfect storm of further economic collapse, unprecedented home foreclosures and record unemployment.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

It should be noted that the voters of Camden County have some strong pro-business and fiscally responsible candidates running for freeholder in November. If out of control spending and skyrocketing taxation aren’t for you, you might want to think about voting for, contributing to, and volunteering for Scot DeCristofaro and George Zallie. Just an idea, mind you. You could always just bend over in anticpation of the next round of tax increases if you prefer.

New Jersey’s war over fiscal policy and taxation is truly the war for the economic soul of America. The entrenched special interests running every corner of this state have had decades of unchecked control over the people of this state and they’ve enjoyed every second of running this state into the ground.

At the state level, Governor Christie continues to try to reduce the oppressive tax burden that has sent countless businesses and families fleeing the state like it was some sort of third world dictatorship (no offense to Camden–our own local third world theme park.) Locally, however, the very important government officials have still yet to discover the rare political treasures of common sense and sound fiscal policy.

It’s time for the residents of New Jersey and more specifically, Camden County, to stand up and hold them accountable.

Let the great voter revaluation of 2010 begin!

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Governor Christie stated, “I said all during the campaign last year that I was going to govern as if I was a one-termer. And everybody felt that it was just stuff you say during a campaign to sound good. I think after the first 12 weeks, given the stuff I’ve done, they figure: ‘He’s just crazy enough to do it.’” Indeed.

That is something to admire in an elected official.

His recent refusal to re-appoint Justice Wallace is another such example of political courage. By all accounts, Mr. Wallace is a great man personally. He volunteers in his community and is loved by everyone who knows him. He is, however, wrong on many judicial fronts and has been one of the court’s most activists judges.

Any other politician would have allowed him to serve his remaining 2 years until his mandatory retirement. Chris Christie, however, saw the opportunity to begin reigning in the activist judiciary that has played to key a role in destroying New Jersey’s economic standing through a series of bad decisions. Folks on the other side of the aisle will criticize him for politicizing the judiciary branch, but it is quite the opposite. The New Jersey judiciary branch has made itself more political in the increasingly activist decisions that legislate from the bench. Christie’s action here is a move towards restoring the judicial branch to its original jurisdiction.

The problem that someone with the raw political courage of Christie often has, however, is picking the right fights and staying on message. These are two areas where the governor is currently struggling. He would do well to follow his Education Commissioner Bret Schundler in this area.

Christie’s problem is rather unique in the political world. Too often the folks that we elect are unwilling or unable to confront the problems facing our state and our country. Too often, they let politics decide the right course instead of sticking to their principles and doing what is right. And too often, the American people reward folks who do just that. We’ve become comfortable with status quo. We like politicians that tell us what we want to hear, even if they govern in complete defiance to their rhetoric.

We have come to a time of reckoning, however, where the political paradigm is shifting unlike anything we have ever seen in our lifetime. The recent economic collapse in Greece and the potential worldwide impact that could result is causing American economists and investors some concern. With an out of control federal government charging towards the same economic cliff that Greece just careened over, every American should be concerned.

The folks at the federal level have no interest in saving America’s free market system. Everything they have done has been towards the goal of expanding government at unprecedented levels while usurping and crushing private industry at every opportunity.

President Obama and his leftist ideologues are pining away for a day when America represents European-style socialism at a time when Europe is beginning to wake up from it’s drunken binge with socialism. Germany and France already have more conservative leadership at the helm. Britain’s national election this week also saw the conservative party take the largest share of seats in decades in a clear repudiation of the failed government-centered economy by which the only growth evident is the size of government and the tax burden imposed upon struggling private citizens.

All of this adds up to a perfect economic storm in which Europe will begin recovering its economic might by undoing the destructive socialist shackles it has bound itself with for so long, even as America is tightening the economic noose of socialism around Lady Liberty’s neck.

In that sense, having Governor Christie boldly attempting to economically emancipate New Jersey from decades of financial mismanagement may put New Jersey in a prime position to lead America’s eventual financial recovery. That is why the battles he chooses to fight and how he chooses to engage himself is so important.

Although this conservative doesn’t agree with Governor Christie’s near-obsessive demonization of New Jersey’s teachers, I do value his commitment to making hard decisions and standing up for the taxpayers.

Regarding New Jersey, Christie stated that, “We are, I think, the failed experiment in America—the best example of a failed experiment in America—on taxes and bigger government. Over the last eight years, New Jersey increased taxes and fees 115 times.”

The sad reality is that he is right.

Governors Florio, Whitman, McGreevey and Corzine spent the last 20 years digging an economic hole for New Jersey that dwarfs those of other high-profile economically challenged states like California and New York. Percentage-wise, we have much harder choices and deeper cuts to make in order to get the state moving again.

The way we fund our government and the vastness of our government needs to be radically changed. New Jersey needs to become a haven for economic activity and not an economically oppressed cesspool from which people and corporations flee. Florio, McGreevey and Corzine refused to see this reality and Whitman lacked the resolve to fully take it on, offering only quasi-conservative economic policies that only masked and delayed New Jersey’s coming economic armageddon.

Christie’s current obsession is education. While local school districts have severely mismanaged the resources given them, it is by and large the state that has destroyed the education system through nefarious Robin Hood funding schemes designed to punish efficient school systems and preserve generations of New Jersey residents trapped in poverty by rewarding failure. Governor Christie represents the best chance in a generation for the people of this state to finally change the way education is funded for good.

The issue most on Governor Christie’s mind these days is related to the state pension system. When he attacks the pension system’s unfunded “$90 billion in liabilities” for pensions and health benefits, however, understand that this is a calamity of the state’s making. Instead of funding pensions promised to employees upon employment, the state has instead opted to spend that money elsewhere, much like the federal government has done with the soon-to-be-bankrupt social security. The solution to such a nefarious book-cooking move is not to rob from retirees, however. If New Jersey wants to restore its good name, it needs to keep its commitments. Reform is necessary, but reforms should be grandfathered to new hires, not to folks who have spent 30 years or more working for something promised to them by their employer. New hires will be able to choose whether or not the new reduced pensions are something they can agree to.
Governor Christie can not let his understandable hatred of the unions blind him in this. It is not the union officials who will suffer from the actions he will take. It is retirees like my father, who worked nearly 40 years in education, often working 2 or 3 side jobs in order to make ends meet.

Christie has an opportunity to shift the paradigm on education spending here and create a model for conservatives to follow throughout the country. His decisions need to be wise and fair and he needs to look past the childish “death threats” and “death-inducing prayers” offered by his union counterparts. To win the debate, he needs to be above the demonization and simplistic approach that rejects everything the opposition has to say because its “a lie” or “evil” (a tactic of NJEA that he frequently denounces in public appearances.) He will diminish himself and the cause of education reform if he allows himself to respond in kind.

To his credit, Governor Christie understands that money isn’t the answer. His Education Commissioner Bret Schundler has pointed this out repeatedly. Spending $22,000 a year per student in places like Newark, where less than a third of the students graduate is foolishness. And any union that defends that should be called on it. Our inner cities have been a bastion of cronyism and institutionalized incompetence for decades. And thanks to court decisions by activists judges like Wallace done in collusion with the executive and legislative branch, this has all been funded by soaring property taxes on suburban districts.

If he’s going to govern like a one-termer, however, Mr. Christie would do well to start shining the political spotlight on some of the other ways that government can reign in spending. Capping property taxes rates, eventually reducing income taxes and moving forward with Lt. Governor Guadagno’s committee to streamline and simplify the gargantuan business regulations put into effect by former Goldman Sachs Executive Jon Corzine will help to free New Jersey from the economic albatross around her neck.

Governor Christie should move to start making cuts in other departments (including his own office) as a priority. Obsessive focus on the education spending alone is too narrow. If New Jersey is going to survive financially, it will have to cut costs in every corner of the state. Governor Christie proposed as much in his state budget proposal earlier this year. He has, however, allowed the debate on education funding to suck up all of the oxygen in the room. It’s time to start highlighting fraud and waste in other corners of the state. Right or wrong, Christie is now one of the most high profile conservatives in the nation today. He needs to advance a comprehensive conservative agenda or risk the inevitable failure of the half and half approach of Governor Whitman. In the age of government largesse, Christie needs to give voters a complete (and accurate depiction) of conservatism in action.

Right now one of the most potent arguments that the education folks have against the governor is that his focus on “financial reform” is solely focused on education when there are more egregious abuses elsewhere going unaddressed. Christie needs to prove them wrong by taking on the other fraud and waste that his budget initially targeted. He should make cutting his office budget below that of Jon Corzine’s a priority. Christie needs to show the people that he means what he says, or leave risk leaving himself vulnerable to claims of hypocrisy.

To do that, the state needs to be smart about how they trim the fat.

Looking at new ways to fund schools and hold teachers accountable is admirable, but needs to be done tactfully. We can appreciate Governor Christie’s political fortitude to take on the NJEA, but he needs to make informed choices. Cutting medical benefits for retirees and blindly brushing aside concerns raised by the unions that “teaching to the test” would result if merit pay went into effect are not productive. Instead of throwing retirees to the wolves, why not promote private industry by partnering with health insurers to see what you can do about creating a more affordable plan for your employees? Allow more health companies to compete in New Jersey, a move that will insure thousands more and reduce costs. And if merit pay is to have any credibility, every effort needs to be made to craft a system by which “teaching to the test” is avoided. There are very valid concerns that such a program brings up. He needs to consult teachers regarding this. Maybe not the foaming at the mouth political union hacks, but rank and file teachers committed to making a difference.

Additionally, Governor Christie’s political backbone sometimes fails him in leading him to take on too many peripheral issues and losing focus on the main fight. Yes, many of the union hacks are overpaid. That comes from union dues, however, and doesn’t impact the state budget. Should the union perhaps cut back on the overhead and refund some of the exorbitant amount of dues forced on their members? Absolutely. Governor Christie should keep the heat on unions for those things, but he needs to stop making it a focus of his agenda. He has bigger fish to fry.

On this front, Mr. Schundler can lead the way. He has some great ideas about reform, ideas that many teachers could get behind. These need to be pursued and improved upon with the aid of New Jersey’s teachers. His meeting this week with the NJEA to discuss partnering for the state’s application for $400 million in federal funding is a good step forward. In Jersey City, Mr. Schundler demonstrated himself to be an innovative man capable of crossing party aisles to bring about much needed and difficult to pass reforms. His governance of Jersey City and the economic recovery his tenure brought about there is a testimony to successful conservative governance in a dark blue state.

A lot is riding on Christie’s bold reforms. He cannot allow himself to get bogged down on side issues and miss the big picture. He needs to aggressively attack spending and waste in all corners of the state. He needs to shape the debate and not let the debate shape him. If he can successfully do that, he might just be more than a one term governor and New Jersey will be better for it.

The Star-Ledger today, in an article titled, “Gov. Christie’s proposed budget could cost state agencies millions in federal grants” made the case for more dependence on federal stimulus and tax money to balance the books.

But, isn’t that what we’ve been trying for over 20 years now as a state?

Consider:  The dire cuts in education are made radically worse by the fiscal slight-of-hand known as the stimulus money.  Obama stimulus money totalling $100 billion was directed to states for education.  New Jersey was one of the top recipients.  Yet the New York Times reports that “of the 20 states in the study by Michael A. Rebell, a professor at Teachers College, and two colleagues, Jessica Wolff and Dan Yaverbaum, six of them — Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, New Jersey and Washington — had allotted all of their education stabilization money to schools for this school year and last, leaving zero to spend on the school term beginning this fall.”

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The following post originally appeared on my Examiner.com page. You can access the original posting by clicking here.

Shakespeare once posed the question “to be or not to be” in his famous tragedy Hamlet. In today’s political culture New Jersey residents are treated to the contrasting economic policies of “to spend or not to spend.”

Locally in our state capitol of Trenton, we have our new governor boldly proclaiming:

“Today, we are fulfilling the promise of a smaller government that lives within its means. Today, we begin doing what we promised we would do. The defenders of the status quo have already begun to yell and scream. They will try to demonize me. They will seek to divide us rather than unite us. But even they know in their hearts, if not yet in their minds – it is time for a change. “

Nationally in Washington we have Vice President Biden, when he isn’t busy mumbling “God rest her soul” about an Irish leader’s mom who is still alive in a moment eerily similar to his 2008 campaign appearance calling upon a man in a wheelchair to “Stand up!” repeatedly, telling us we need to spend more to get out of debt and that higher taxes are patriotic.

While Governor Christie cuts over $10 billion dollars from the state budget in Trenton in hopes of bringing back fiscal solvency to our bankrupt state government, President Obama is attempting to “fundamentally transform” America by outspending all previous forty-three presidents in his first year alone.

Governor Christie promises that “today, we stop sweeping problems under the rug. We will not hide our problems until another day. And we are certainly not increasing the tax burden we place upon our people,” as he brings common sense back into the tabulation of the state budget. By contrast, President Obama’s folks intentionally structure their radical socialist government ursurpation of the healthcare industry so that we begin paying extra taxes this year (2010) to fund the project that won’t begin running until 2014 just so that it can look like it is fiscally stable on paper (by comparing 10 years of taxing and paying for it with in actuality only 6 years of paying out and even then it barely breaks even.)

By the time the American people realize that they have been bamboozled, Obama will be long gone, no doubt canoodling with Anita Dunn and Bill Ayers in the world of academia while they admire the glorious revolution of genocidal madman/human rights violator and harbinger of Communism, Chairman Mao.

Obama and his allies in congress plot to use taxpayer money to fund abortion because as unnamed democratic operatives have reportedly told Representative Bart Stupak, “If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more.” As Stupak laments, “Money is their hang-up. Is this how we now value life in America? If money is the issue — come on, we can find room in the budget. This is life we’re talking about.”

In New Jersey, however, Governor Christie has cut all $7.6 million dollars dedicated from the state to Planned Parenthood. All of it. In New Jersey, the state with the second highest teenage abortion rate in the country.

Since taking office in January, Governor Christie has already saved the state $13 billion in spending, which amounts to $9 million dollars per hour since taking office. By contrast, President Obama’s budget deficit has reached record heights, and this is before factoring in the ridiculous amounts of money that will be necessary to keep the Obamacare behemoth financially solvent.

Governor Christie has proposed not only line by line spending cuts, but a spending cut in every department of the state. Meanwhile, President Obama has increased spending across the board–except in defense spending, which he decreased–we don’t want the peaceful and misunderstood Jihadists or the president’s new best friends in Iran, Venezuela or Cuba to get offended by our arsenal.

New Jersey’s budget is being negatively impacted by the Obama stimulus money. The money which was supposed to be spend little by little over a period of years was spent in one lump sum by the Wizard of Wall Street Jon Corzine and then added as an additional expense in this fiscal year without any idea of how to fund it.

In other words, the stimulus worked just as Governor Palin and Governor Perry warned us that it would. It created new “jobs” or “programs” that the state then had to pick up the tab on the following year. Obama’s stimulus is having the same effect across the country where states are begging for more table scraps from our glorious leader as they face even worse budget deficits thanks to Obama’s goodies.

By contrast, Governor Christie is putting into place strict guidelines that will help force local municipalities and school districts to tighten their own financial belts as well or risk losing all state support. In so doing, Christie is ensuring that his frugality at the state level is not merely passed on to the taxpayer by drunker sailor themed spending binges by local government. This was the reason that Christie Whitman’s economic policies did nothing to help New Jersey’s taxpayers and actually made the situation we are currently in much worse.

In his budget address, Governor Christie cited the example made by Massachusetts when it faced a similar budget crisis. By placing a mandatory cap on the growth of government the state was able to go from 3rd place to 33rd place in terms of its property tax burden.

Christie builds a model for success, by making bold moves supported by the will of the people designed to bring about common sense. His approach to governing thus far is one of a tough, no-nonsense reformer.

Should we expect anything less from the man who was a successful prosecutor who took down corruption throughout the state and in both parties prior to his election?

On the other hand, “change” agent President Obama looks not to other successful models of economic growth or healthcare reform, but to failed dictatorships and the failed ideology of Marxism to find inspiration. Although even Communist China is becoming more free market oriented in order to grow its economy, President Obama still enamored with Marx’s idea of utopia, seems hellbent on abandoning capitalism completely. His healthcare plan is but a “first step” to “fundamentally change” the system from market-based to government-based. (A goal admitted by Rep. Rob Andrews as reported in a previous column.) Socialism has failed everywhere it has been tried, and yet the greatest, most prosperous nation in the history of the world is abandoning its union with free market capitalism in pursuit of the harlot of socialism.

Should we expect anything less from a man who was raised by communist wolves at every turn of his life?

The people of New Jersey have front row seats to the epic battle of dueling ideologies in the era of hope and change. Perhaps little New Jersey, who played such an important role in America’s first struggle for freedom, will once again lead the way for America.

Just when you think you’ve heard it all, Harry Reid strikes again.  From the man who brought you such hits as “the war is lost” comes the instant classic, “Today is a big day in America.  Only 36,000 people in America lost their jobs today, which was really good.”

Way to shoot for the stars there Harry!

Who among us wasn’t inspired by that dazzling gem of bold leadership?

He learns from the best though.

President Obama, the ever-inspiring leader of the free world, once waxed eloquent to a little girl at a campaign rally that “America, is uh, no longer what it could be.”  Although it’s not immediately clear what Obama meant by that back in 2008, thanks to his subsequent speeches designed to make Muslim terrorists join the throngs of folks swooning over his awesomeness, we know that he’s not talking about religion.  On that front, he is quite giddy in pronouncing that the “great thing” about America is that “whatever we once were” we are “no longer a Christian nation.”

Yes, aside from the euphoria liberals and socialists feel about America’s decadent decline from morality and Christianity, they find little else to cheer about.  America is “downright mean” as a nation, its citizens are “bitter” and “cling to guns and religion” as they marinate in “antipathy” toward folks who are different than they are.

And only massive government intervention, spending and usurpation of private industry and personal liberties saved us from certain economic armageddon.

Similarly, despite the polling, election results, and town hall meetings to the contrary, they hold fast to the belief that only government can save us from the coming certain healthcare armageddon.  So much so that the intellectually gifted Botox enthusiast Nancy Pelosi urged rapid passage of the healthcare bill so that we could then “find out what’s in it.”

President Obama likes to “indulge” in what Patrick Henry called the “illusions of hope” while offering no such thing.  To President Obama and his political allies “only” 36,000 people losing their jobs is a good thing.   There is a limit to the sky.  There is a boundary on the horizon.  Such is the pessimistic vision of Barack Obama.

And to him, America should diminish herself economically in favor of grand socialist experiments that have failed every time they have been tried.  Similarly, she should diminish internationally so as not to offend anyone else, particularly the peace-loving Muslim terrorists scattered about the globe.   Finally, and perhaps most importantly to Obama and those who share his worldview, Americans should diminish themselves patriotically as they ought to roll back their expectations and pride in America so as to embrace the more trendy stance of awkward shame and embarrassment toward America’s history, accomplishments and place in the world.

Gone are the days when President Reagan’s optimism permeated the malaise-soaked America that he inherited from Jimmy Carter, and to coin a phrase from Sarah Palin’s palm, “lifted America’s spirits” to restore her place upon the hill of nations.

And notice too that Reagan didn’t drone on for years blaming all of his problems on his predecessor.

Sadly for us, Barack Obama is no Ronald Reagan.  Where Reagan saw the boundless limits of a free people and free economy, Obama sees dangerous commodities that need to be taxed, confiscated, and regulated from each according to their ability to each according to their need.

The prevailing pessimism and doom and gloom approach to governing as evidenced in the Obama Administration and the congressional leadership will not–and must not prevail.

America needs leaders willing to fight for our freedom and our place in the world.  In short, folks willing to fight for our very way of life.

As Patrick Henry famously stated in his famous “give me liberty or give me death” speech to his fellow Virginians in 1775, “There is no longer any room for hope.  If we wish to be free–if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending–if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained–we must fight!”

It is almost like Patrick Henry is engaging in a political debate with the Obama, the false harbinger of all things “hope” from beyond the grave.

Where leaders on the left like Obama see nothing worth fighting for but government expansion, Henry was urging his fellow citizens to defend their personal liberty and fight for greatness.  While Obama tosses out empty rhetorical flourishes about “hope” while condescendingly scolding Americans and preparing to care for them as though they were helpless school children, Henry called for America to contend with its difficulties and embrace her destiny.  Obama would have us “hugging the delusive phantom of hope” while submitting to our limitations, be they foreign or domestic, a stance which runs counter to every fiber of America’s existence.

This approach is not fitting for a leader.  Leaders throughout our history have challenged us to become bigger than our circumstances.  George Washington led the Colonial army against tremendous odds to fight for our freedom.  Abraham Lincoln fought against tremendous difficulty to preserve the union.  Americans stood firm in the face of tyranny throughout the world in the 20th century, and for over two centuries has worked hard to overcome our trials and tribulations and keep what Ronald Reagan dubbed our “rendezvous with destiny.”

It is in that spirit that America was founded, sustained and established.  It is only in that spirit that America will regain her footing.

On that fateful day in 1775 Patrick Henry was trying to rouse a sleeping giant to embrace their own rendezvous with destiny against tremendous odds: “They tell us, sir, that we are weak, unable to cope with so formal an adversary…Sir we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power….Besides sir, we shall not fight our battles alone.  There is a just God who presides over nations.”

On that day Patrick Henry called for liberty or death.  Ironically in our day, Barack Obama has made clear his aversion to liberty by using the U.S. treasury as means to usurp private industry and personal liberties, while advocating for government-sponsored death via his healthcare scheme.

It is time that America reclaims her footing, embraces her destiny and tackles the challenges of today head on.   America deserves better than to be shackled to defeat by those who profess to lead her.  America can and will do better than her current care takers will allow despite what Barack Obama reads from his TelePrompters.

And why shouldn’t we believe that?  We’re Americans.

Governor Christie ventured deep into George Norcross country to speak about the tough realities of this year’s budgetary woes. It was another sign of raw political courage by the former prosecutor as he seeks to slay the treasure-hogging dragon of Trenton.

His appearance in Camden County, home of New Jersey’s most corrupt tax-levying political dictatorships (both county-wide and in many municipalities) and the site of our state’s own third world theme park known as Camden, probably caused many of the vile serpents of political corruption in the Norcross machine to run and hide under the nearest rock.

It was against the backdrop of this rampant fiscal debauchery and pay-to-play landscape that Governor Christie soberly announced that “seventy billion dollars worth of wealth has left New Jersey in the last four years,” thanks to the ridiculously high tax rates (income, property and sales) foisted upon the state by years of liberal utopian budgeting.

He also pointed out the sad reality that in the political Olympic sport of taxing the snot out of citizens, New Jersey is currently the national champion when taking all areas of taxation into consideration. Thank you Mr. Corzine.

Speaking of the Wizard of Wall Street, Governor Christie also brought up the fact that Mr. Corzine continues to, as Save Jersey Blogger Matt Rooney puts it “seriously wound the Garden State from beyond the political grave” in his last minute deal to ban Governor Christie from firing a single public employee until January 2011.

As Christie stated, “My lawyers have now told me that I am bound by that deal. If I could stop it, I would, except the previous governor tied my hands. I cannot lay off one state worker, I cannot furlough a state worker until January of 2011. That was a great election-year deal he made for us. It is an exquisite pair of handcuffs he put on his successor, but I guess he didn’t think he was going to have a successor.”

It is just this kind of frank talk and political courage that will keep Christie in the public’s good graces even as he makes many very tough and unpopular spending cuts. It is also precisely the contrast of this responsible adult leadership soaked in common sense with the childish schoolyard stunts like Mr. Corzine’s parting gifts that is finally waking the sleeping giant of the New Jersey electorate to look “queasily upon what they have done” all these years, as the Bard might say.

It’s bad folks. Just how bad has been nefariously hidden from the light of day by the magic and dark arts of Corzine and his fellow Wall Street wizards. The state has been robbing the pension plans of teachers and public workers, as well as the unemployment insurance trust fund for years to balance budgets, while subsidizing inept money losing industries like public transportation for years just to stay in the good graces of the unions.

On top of that, the serious financial burdens levied by our government have created such a hostile business environment that New Jersey is “disproportionately affected” by the economic malaise permeating the nation under Obama-Biden’s socialist dirge.

Political leaders from both parties have too long ignored the financial woes in our state, choosing to punt the problems down the line to some future generation to deal with. Thankfully, Governor Christie tells us that the day to deal with it is today.
While serpents and scoundrels from Trenton call Christie’s attempts to seriously deal with the problems “immoral” New Jersey residents seem to understand that tough choices need to be made to stave off financial armageddon. Christie believes the people are ready to hear the truth.

As Governor Christie closed his remarks in enemy territory, he in essence closed with the classic “if I die, I die” approach to governing. A politician dedicated to solving problems and not preserving his own personal career and gravy train. In New Jersey. In Camden County. It was a sighting akin to the Loch Ness Monster or Big Foot.

It’s a wondrous thing to hear a politician say these things. In a political age where the president and his pals in congress see poll after poll, town hall meeting after town hall meeting, and election after election repudiating their vast socialist agenda as not a rebuke of their schemes, but rather a sign of our inability to understand what’s good for us, it is refreshing to see a politician not only listen, but give the American people the respect they are due.

This article originally appeared on my Examiner.com page. You can view it on that site, by clicking here.

To all my friends at Restate:

I know that Redstate has done wonders for solid conservative candidates across the country. Please seriously consider financially supporting Dale Glading for congress in New Jersey’s 1st Congressional District. Rob Andrews is actually vulnerable this time around, but without the funding, Glading will have a hard time making his case. Thanks for all you do! Here’s my column from Examiner.com:

As the old adage goes, if you want to kill the snake, you have to chop off its head.

New Jersey residents in the 1st legislative district have the opportunity to do just that to the healthcare nonsense in Washington this November by ousting Congressman Rob Andrews, co-sponsor of the various House bills on healthcare reform and perfecter of serpent-like political double-speak.

Rob Andrews, the Democratic Congressman who has represented the 1st Legislative District for what seems like an eternity, wears his co-sponsorship of the socialist health care bills in congress as a badge of honor despite the fact that polls consistently show well over 50%-60% of Americans oppose the plan.

Andrews, ever the career politician, tries to speak out of both sides of his mouth on the bill. In his earlier town hall meeting, he often would tell voters not to worry about portions of the bill such as taxpayer funding for abortion because it magically wouldn’t be in the final bill, even though it was currently in there now. He now is playing that same game when it comes to the cost of the bill. Appearing on Fox News, Representative Andrews said, “Well, I think you can reduce what the bill spends. I mean, I think one thing the public has said loud and clear is, spend less, and I think we’re looking for ways to be responsive to that.”

His solution? In recent weeks Mr. Andrews has both proposed a new tax on health care plans and opposed it. It apparently depends on the day of the week and the audience he is speaking to.

The most shocking display of duplicity, however, comes regarding the public option. Last summer those who attended the Andrews town hall meeting on healthcare were told repeatedly that the public option somehow “encouraged competition in the “marketplace exchange” that he kept rambling on about. This “competition” was to be good for everyone and not meant as a tool to destroy private health insurance. He was emphatic about this point.

However, while being interviewed at about the same time on the now bankrupt Air America by some emotionally unstable woman named Nicole Sandler, his position was quite the opposite.

Sandler spent several minutes in the run-up to the interview with Andrews crying about her own healthcare horror stories of having her daughter with “ADHD” getting dropped from a plan (albeit because, as she admits, she didn’t pay the premium) and how she needs the government to come in and save the day in a plot eerily similar to most Lifetime Original movies starring Tori Spelling.

The fork-tongued Andrews started out his interview by shocking the host in stating his opposition to a single-payer system. The reasoning behind his position of course, was not one of principle, but one necessary to save the Obama healthcare bill.

Taking us further away from free market into the world of Castro-like utopian socialism, Andrews reassured his host with the delightfully revealing portion on the public option.

The host proudly declared that the only way healthcare would be truly reformed was if we “consider healthcare a basic human right and get the profit motive out of healthcare because it’s what’s killing us.”

In response, at virtually the same time that he was assuring an ocean of constituents at Rowan University that the intent of the public option was merely competition, he said:

“You know what, that’s why we have the public option that we do in there because they will operate in a not for profit basis and we think it will probably out-compete the private insurers. When it does, people will have the right to join such a plan and have such an option, that’s the idea.”

That’s why we have the public option. To help “get the profit motive out of healthcare.”

The host, giddy with socialist fantasies of rationed care and bread lines, needed a little more clarity. Will all folks be able to opt in? Even those with private insurance?

Rob Andrews responded “eventually yes” and then talked about a “5 year phase in” where “at the end of the 5 years we reach a point where most people could join and we think eventually we reach a point where everybody could.”

The emotionally unstable host then broke down into hysterics not unlike that lunatic woman from the Obama rallies of 2008 who was relieved to know that Obama would be paying her bills for her and that she no longer had to worry about a thing.

When confronted with the charge that this government-run healthcare utopia would lead to rationing of care (as it has in every single nation that has gone to socialized medicine) Andrews scoffed that care is “already rationed…to make a buck,” and then cited the woman’s failure to pay her premiums as an example of corporate greed.

Of course, by forcing private insurers to compete against a government entity where profit is not a motive, the deck is already stacked. Making it illegal for the companies to determine their own costs to the consumer based on the amount they would have to put out to cover that individual is also a recipe for a speedy bankruptcy and devolution into single-payer Marxist utopia.

Additionally, so determined is Rob Andrews in passing this legislation, that he backs the “nuclear option” of shoving the reform down the throats of Americans through the chicanery of “reconciliation.” Calling “reconciliation” a “normal path for legislation” Representative Andrews publicly expressed his support for this approach in a recent interview with The Hill. The “reconciliation” plan is one currently opposed by Democratic Senator Robert Byrd, and previously opposed by current proponents such as Harry Reid, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton (who all find the allure of power more intoxicating than principles.)

So, apparently like his colleagues, Rob Andrews’ position varies according to what audience he is speaking to. Andrews portrays a rational and common sense public persona, but telling moments like this exchange with Air America, reveal the anti-free market leftist radical that Andrews has become after decades in Washington.

If the tea party movement is serious about stopping Obama-style healthcare reform, they would do well to support Andrews’ opponent Dale Glading. Glading, who will be largely outspent in this primarily blue region of New Jersey, could use some help from grassroots folks across the country.

Glading has released his own version of healthcare reform, and it resembles a common sense approach that most voters support. Among the highlights of his plan, Glading
calls for “meaningful tort reform” and “structural steps to make health care plans portable, so that Americans who lose or switch their jobs no longer have to surrender their health coverage.” Glading also calls for an “end to costly mandates” and allowing for Americans to customize their plans to stop paying for “coverage they do not need and cannot afford.”

Glading’s plan also calls for cutting costs by lowering premiums for folks with healthier lifestyles. The all-knowing federal government currently limits the discount rate for healthy lifestyles to less than 20%.

And yes, Glading also supports “removing taxpayer funding for abortions and disturbing ‘end of life counseling’ from the health care package” that Mr. Andrews will argue will magically disappear when the bill gets signed into law. Just trust him.

Dale Glading represents the kind of candidate that tea party folks and common sense Americans can get behind. He also represents the kind of candidate who will go to Washington to fight against the out-of-control government spending. On the other hand, Rob Andrews will, at best, offer more of the same, and in all reality be plotting the demise of the free market behind the backs of his constituents.

So devoted to this cause is Andrews that he would rather support a bad bill than nothing at all. The Congressman let this cat out of the bag during the town hall meeting at Rowan University when he expressed remorse for voting against Hillarycare in the 1990s. That bill hasn’t evolved over time to become more moderate in its approach, it is Mr. Andrews that has drifted more to the left.

This year marks the return of “common sense” to the public square. For that to happen, left-wing ideologues in sheep’s clothing like Rob Andrews need to be defeated in November.

The Vice President of the United States was allowed in public yesterday. His face frozen by multiple injections of Botox, his eyes rapidly blinking like one just released from a darkened room and into the light after months of seclusion, and his scalp covered with freshly planted artificial hair, Mr. Biden is the living embodiment of dishonesty and falsehood.

His interview on Meet The Press was no different.

Attempting to refute the claims of former Vice President Dick Cheney by making up lies, plagiarizing others’ successes and weaving together a tapestry of tall tales that even toddlers wouldn’t deem credible, Mr. Biden reiterated exactly why he isn’t allowed in public much.

Even for a man with a striking lack of coherence and freed from the constraints of reality in his rhetoric flourishes, the task at hand was huge. How does one in a single interview claim that Iraq “wasn’t worth the price” and yet take credit for the successful conclusion of the war via a war surge strategy that both Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama voted against in the senate?

Apparently, however, for the man that claims paying higher taxes is patriotic and holds “transparency meetings” behind closed doors, anything is possible.

The hapless statesman who once suggested that the international community carve up Iraq into three parts based on ethnicity, proved to be nearly Obama’s match for self-promoting hubris. Mr. Biden acted shocked that former Vice President Cheney would dare suggest that President Obama didn’t think there was a war anymore. Citing Obama’s sole reference to the “overseas contingency plans” as actually being a war again in his State of the Union, Biden attempted to re-write and thus negate the entire first Nobel Peace Prize winning year of the Obama presidency.

Then he did it. Vice President Biden actually took credit for President Bush’s hard-fought successes. Successes that the vice president fought hard against.

Still, credit is due to the Obama Administration. A huge re-writing of history is necessary, and who better to do that than a Washington blowhard who never did care much for facts or reality.

The reality is that Mr. Biden and Mr. Obama voted against President Bush’s surge plan for Iraq.

In fact, Mr. Biden is on record in the Boston Globe during the summer of 2007 as saying “The surge isn’t going to work either tactically or strategically. Tactically it isn’t going to work because … our guys go in and secure a neighborhood, but because we don’t have enough troops, we have to turn it over to the Iraqis, and they can’t hold it or won’t hold it.”

In the spring of 2008, Mr. Biden reiterated his concerns saying that “I believe the president has no strategy for success in Iraq. His plan is to muddle through, and hand the problem off to his successor.” On the “failure” of the surge itself, he argued that “Violence has come down, but the Iraqis have not come together. There is little evidence the Iraqis will settle their differences peacefully any time soon.”

His boss, the esteemed military expert, Barack Obama declared the following about the surge in July 2008, “So far, I think we have not seen the kind of political reconciliation that’s going to bring about long-term stability in Iraq.”

Now, Mr. Biden has the audacity to claim that the successful conclusion of the war in Iraq will be “one of President Obama’s greatest achievements.”

Of course, by “achievement” he means something that was in place thanks to President Bush and a policy which the Obama administration has not changed. Apparently only the bad things that happen during Obama’s administration are President Bush’s fault. Good things accomplished by Bush before leaving office fall under the category of “Obama’s successes.” Even the actual withdrawal of troops from Iraq is being completed on a time table established by the Bush Administration. In short, besides a lot of hot air, anti-American drivel, and a healthy dose of pessimism, Obama and Biden have nothing to do with the success in Iraq.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney was also a little surprised to hear Biden’s self-aggrandizing over Iraq: “Well, I — I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by my friend, Joe Biden. I’m glad he now believes Iraq is a success. Of course, Obama and Biden campaigned from one end of the country to the other for two years criticizing our Iraq policy. They opposed the surge that was absolutely crucial to our getting to the point we’re at now with respect to Iraq. And for them to try to take credit for what’s happened in Iraq strikes me as a little strange.”

Strange indeed.

Of course, this is the man who claimed to regularly visit a restaurant in Delaware that’s been closed for 20 years. Reality waved good-bye to him decades ago.

In the almost the same breath, the Vice President went from patting himself on the back to claiming that the war in Iraq was “not worth the price.”

Now, one expects an anti-American radical like the intellectually bankrupt and slovenly propagandist Michael Moore to make such comments. The sitting Vice President of the United States however, should never publicly demean the mission our soldiers are currently fighting–and dying for. Privately, he can stew all he wants about the injustices of liberating millions of people from a brutal regime that used biological weapons on its people, committed mass acts of genocide and the brutal torture of women. Publicly, however, he should just shut his trap.

In Biden’s world, not only is Iraq a dazzling success of the Obama Administration, but Iran is not “an immediate threat,” despite near daily warnings of working towards a nuclear arsenal and grand designs to deliver a “striking blow” to either the West (i.e. America) or Israel.

Just because they openly talk of wiping us off the map via nuclear weapons doesn’t mean it is a concern according to Biden’s way of thinking. His larger concern is that if Iran “continues on the path of nuclear weapons” then “you know the Middle East…Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, etc. would be under pressure to acquire nuclear weapons.”

So a nuclear Iran with all of its anti-semitic and anti-American threats of violence via nuclear weaponry is not a threat, but a nuclear Turkey or Egypt, well that’s cause for concern.

On this Biden has been consistent. In the fall of 2009 he told CNN that he was unfazed by Iran’s plans for worldwide Jihad, “I am less concerned — much less concerned — about the Iranian potential. They have no potential at this moment, they have no capacity to launch a missile at the United States of America.”

So delusional is Biden that he even thinks that America’s debt-holding overlords, the Chinese, will eventually come around and be on our side regarding Iran. Sure, Joe, sure they will. We have such a bargaining chip to tell them what to do at this point.

Don’t worry though, he also assures us that the chances of another massive terrorist attack (or pesky manmade disasters) on the United States is unlikely. Of course, in his world the Fort Hood Jihadist was acting alone and just experiencing a bad day completely separate from Muslim extremism while the Christmas Day underpants bomber similarly was just a crazy lone wolf stopped by a perfectly working system. You’ll forgive us for not taking your word on it Joe.

We are often told that “nobody messes” with America’s court jester, Joe Biden. Americans better hope so. Mr. Biden and his administration are not taking the threat from Iran or Muslim extremism seriously. From show-trials of enemy combatants to willfully ignoring the growing Iranian threat pursuant to his own faux peace ideology, (also known as the Carter doctrine of “peace through weakness”) this administration is making our national security every bit as ludicrous as Biden’s incoherent gaffe-laden fantasy world. And while Joe’s tall tales are always good for a laugh, when our lives are on the line, it isn’t funny.

To listen to the media’s tired narrative regarding Sarah Palin, a stupid “redneck woman” stumbled onto the stage in Nashville this weekend and had to scribble her thoughts via crayon onto her palm in stark contrast to the brilliant reading skills of the President. In fact, within 48 hours of the speech, there were well over 2,000 articles listed on Google as being about “palmgate.”

The “story” as presented by the mainstream media and the Obamamania pep squad on the socialist left, however, see things differently than most of America. A political tsunami is coming, one that will shake both political parties to the core and will redefine American politics for a generation to come.

People are tired of the lectures, scorn and utter disdain of Washington’s ruling elites. President Obama was elected largely to root out this arrogant Washington beast, and instead has become the face of it. He is, as Sarah Palin astutely pointed out, not “a Commander-in-Chief” but “a professor of law at the lectern.”

Republicans and Democrats alike have made a living of saying one thing and then selling out their principles once in Washington. Amid the countless sex scandals from both parties, the back room deals, the corrupt earmark-laden sweetheart deals and quid pro quo spending bills, the American people have finally seen the truth about their arrogant ruling class and are poised to do something about it. The elections of 2006 and 2008 were just the beginning. The power-hungry and ideologically adrift Republicans were tossed out after President Bush and the Republican congress paid lip service to conservative principles before embracing massive government spending and back-room dealing.

The American people by and large still favor conservatism, they just want to vote for honest folks who are genuine about it.

The elections of the last year have affirmed that and given context to Obama’s 2008 triumph. His victory was not so much the birth of a new political renaissance, as it was the yearning for something authentic and new. One year after coming to office, however, Mr. Obama turned out to be nothing more than a kept man answerable to the plethora of lobbyists, union thugs, socialist activists, and corporate fat cats that put him in office.

Suddenly the “hopey, changey thing” isn’t working out too well.

In addition to an overall hostility to the political swamp of Washington, a recent Rasmussen Poll found that an astounding 75% of Americans are angry about government’s CURRENT policies. (The emphasis on “current” was mine.) They are not angry with George Bush’s policies. They are angry with the “fundamental change” being ushered in by America’s professor.

Yet in spite of this and with an anemic overall approval rating for the president, and his approval on the economy and healthcare at 32% and 36% respectively, Mr. Obama arrogantly continues to read from the same script. Hope. Change. Yawn.

Mr. Obama’s response is to double down and take the position that our opposition has no other plausible foundation besides our own ignorance and stupidity regarding his grand vision for “fundamental change” in America. It couldn’t possibly be a principled disagreement. Only a dunce would reject hope and change.

On the rare occasion that Obama does pay lip service to “listening” to the American people, it falls on deaf ears. Several years of saying one thing and doing another have seriously destroyed the reputation of the harbinger of all things change and caused Americans to see him as one of the dirtbags he claimed he was going to guard us against.

Sarah Palin, however, conveys a genuine belief in free market principles, a strong national defense, and a return to America’s roots. In a politically poisoned environment, she stands out as something pure and genuine. Palin’s willingness to walk away repeatedly from political power to fight an injustice only further cements her reputation that she is something different. Her sincerity and authenticity speak to a “diamond in the rough” who is unafraid to make tough choices and unwilling to sell out her core beliefs.

Americans are looking for authenticity, integrity and common sense. And Sarah Palin gets it. The political forces are converging to form a perfect storm for folks like Palin, and grassroots conservative candidates like Marco Rubio in Florida. Standard run-of-the-mill politicians of either party need not apply.

And authentic is something that the President is not. While the media has been busy drooling over Sarah Palin’s last minute talking points inscribed into the palm of her hand (something that many of us who have done public speaking can relate to) they intentionally chose to cover up yet another major gaffe from President Obama.

While the authentic Palin gave her speech working occasionally from notes and having written a few points on her palm, the inauthentic Mr. Obama has demonstrated a disconcerting dependence on the text-scrolling panes of glass. He needs TelePrompters at staff meetings and to deliver brief introductions of his cabinet members. He even recently had to rely on TelePrompters to speak to a room full of sixth grade students. This week while intently reading from his beloved text-filled glass panes, the President referred to a Navy corpsman as a “Navy corpse-man” twice in the same speech. This trickster of a monicker also befuddled Obama in October 2009 when he also uttered the seemingly undead zombified phrase of “Navy corpse-man.” Yet, still neither Obama nor any of the smarter administration in history has figured out how to pronounce a very basic military title, or more likely, simply don’t think that it matters.

And as the political tsunami continues to barrel down on their anointed one and his cronies, the media continues to underestimate the hockey mom from Wasilla and the everyday Americans who stand with her.

First, a rarity for these parts: a compliment to the president. It was nice to see President Obama make time this year to attend the National Prayer Breakfast, after skipping the event last year. His speech was largely appropriate, and it was nice to hear the president speak of prayer and faith. His references to the role faith has had in dealing with things ranging from ending slavery to the Civil War, to tragedies like 9/11 and natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the earthquake in Haiti were highly commendable.

The sentiment of his speech was one of uniting through faith and reaching out in love. In tone and word, it was appropriate and presidential. It is unfortunate, however, that this speech can be filed under “just words, just speeches” for its lack of connection with reality.

In rhetoric, Obama spoke of a “spirit of civility” and claimed he was the “first to admit” that he wasn’t always right. In practice, Republicans have been shut out of any meaningful discussions on issues ranging from spending to the “cap and tax” energy scheme to healthcare, and have been reminded by Obama that he “won” when seeking to have some input into the process. In practice, wayward Democrats have been told that Obama is “keeping score, bro” and labeled by Rahm Emanuel as “f-ing retarded.”

Even ordinary Americans who question the Obama administration’s agenda are labeled as “tea baggers” and “racists” by folks close to Obama, and repeatedly told that they only reject Obamacare because they aren’t capable of understanding it. Massive failures by the Obama administration are treated as the “system working perfectly” by top officials only to be apologized for days later and only in the fine print.

In these grand speeches, Mr. Obama has demonstrated an uncanny ability to lie directly to the American people on a level with the finest actors hollywood could offer.

In the midst of his empty political rhetoric, the words which serve as cover fire for his radical (and often contradictory) actions, often accidentally reveal a telling nugget that gets to the heart of who Mr. Obama is and what exactly his worldview looks like.

Nestled in the heart of his speech to the National Prayer Breakfast, Mr. Obama casually tossed out a telling pearl of wisdom to the swine-like masses. Speaking about his pet project of socialized healthcare, the president lamented that:

“Sadly, though, that spirit is too often absent when tackling the long-term, but no less profound issues facing our country and the world. Too often, that spirit is missing without the spectacular tragedy, the 9/11 or the Katrina, the earthquake or the tsunami, that can shake us out of complacency. We become numb to the day-to-day crises, the slow-moving tragedies of children without food and men without shelter and families without health care. We become absorbed with our abstract arguments, our ideological disputes, our contests for power. And in this Tower of Babel, we lose the sound of God’s voice.”

Tower of Babel you say? Interesting.

The point that President Obama is seeking to make here is that his political opponents won’t “compromise” (see also “give in”) to the Lord’s work in nationalizing healthcare. The ensuing confusion is because there are too many “cooks in the kitchen.” Those arguments then create a rhetorical maelstrom and in the whirlpool of confusion, God’s voice is lost. The implication, or pretty straightforward assertion here is that God’s voice is calling for healthcare reform, but the “confusion” of those arguing against such reform is drowning out His divine vision for our nation.

This is not the first time that Obama has sought to make the healthcare debate a matter of faith by implying or stating directly that this is the will of the Lord. In August of last year, President Obama held a conference call with the nation’s leading ministers and rabbis where he told them that he was going to “need their help in accomplishing necessary reform,” and told them that “we are God’s partners in matters of life and death.” The President even asked them to “tell the stories of health care dilemmas to illustrate what is at stake” in their sermons.

To the president, healthcare reform is central to his personal faith and worldview. It is central to who he is because it puts the government firmly in control of the lives of ordinary Americans. His socialist religion demands that government be the arbiter of all things, granter and protector of all things, and indeed the source of all things. Tapping into the Christian theology that all mankind is “sinful” and “fallen” Obama attempts to co-opt the Christian Gospel and replace Jesus Christ with the federal government. It is subtle wordplay indeed, but drastically different in principle. To most religious folks, particularly Christians, God is the final arbiter, granter and protector of all things. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are “endowed by our Creator” and not the state. To Obama and his band of socialist activists, God is “helped out” in this department, and becomes an absentee Father who abdicates His responsibilities to the all-power, all-knowing and incorruptible government. The more Obama can reduce the American people’s independence or reliance on other sources of power like their personal faith in God, the more he can be their father-like provider (and thus secure his own political power.)

Ironically, however, as Mr. Obama tries to make a Biblical allusion work for his purposes, the selected story actually works to contradict Mr. Obama’s agenda when seen in the original context.

The actual “Tower of Babel” story appears in Genesis Chapter 11. In verse one of the story, the people of the world are not twisting around in a world of rhetorical confusion and dueling arguments. They are of “one language” and a “common speech” and are pretty successfully working together to craft the massive Tower of Babel. There is no great confusion that leads to a drowning out of God’s voice. The folks can hear God alright, they just don’t want to listen to Him. Instead, they are crafting “a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves,” (verse 4). In essence, they are seeking to replace God in their lives with their own accomplishments and “making a name” for themselves.

The confusion comes in when God steps into the story to thwart their plans. The Lord goes down to see the tower, and announces His plan in verse 7 to “go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.” So the confusion actually comes from God, not too many cooks in the kitchen. It isn’t the case of man getting in the way of God, it’s God getting in the way of man for his own good.

So why does God create this confusion in the story? Well, that has to do with why the folks are building the tower to begin with. The word for “Babel” is of Akkadian descent and means “gateway of heaven.” That confirms their stated intent in verse 4 of a “tower that reaches to heaven.” In the Hebrew it also conveniently sounds like the word for “confusion.” Additionally, the NIV Study Bible points out the repeated use of “us…ourselves…we…ourselves” as very telling of their motive. Like President Obama, they can’t stop talking about themselves. To be fair, we have no record of them referring to themselves 132 times in one speech as Obama has done, but everything that they are doing is to bring glory to themselves. The entire project is an experiment in delusional narcissism by a bunch of dopes who think themselves capable of besting God, or at best, thumbing their noses at Him.

Obama’s reference that he and his allies are in a “partnership” doing “God’s work” by nationalizing healthcare, only to be brought to confusion because of partisan bickering is totally wrong contextually for use with this scripture. The confusion clearly comes from God to stop a project designed to elevate man above God. The project has become their god and God has become an afterthought. Much like the President of the United States who travels the world boasting that “whatever we once were, America is no longer a Christian nation,” while also rallying the faithful to his side as though he is God’s prophet to bring about the miraculous wonders of nationalized healthcare.

As usual, Obama’s intentional misrepresentation of the facts (like his reference to the Treaty of Tripoli in his now infamous Cairo Speech) reveals a telling truth to those who know their history. Obama continues to rely on the belief that the American people will not do their homework and instead cling to the nice-sounding rhetoric that he flings at them from his TelePrompters. They are, after all, “bitter” and “clinging” to their guns and religion.

This is rather telling for a man who has demonstrated time and time again that he is willing to stretch any truth, tell any lie, and misconstrue any detail, trivial or significant, to advance his agenda. His arguments and allusions to historical events in the life of America and those contained in the Bible are blatantly false and the resulting narratives and arguments that come out of this falsehood are then built on a foundation of quicksand.

Besides the already-bad-enough-problem of taking the entire Biblical story out of context and turning it on its head to suit his radical agenda, the other major problem with Mr. Obama’s “Tower of Babel” moment is the tendency by this president to ascribe his own will as intertwined with the will of God. In the past presidents have invoked God’s will as a guiding force in their particular governing philosophy or their desire to promote or defend freedom. They have not typically associated the will of God with a specific policy position outside of moral issues that have direct foundational support in the scripture. As an example, President Bush didn’t attempt to push his tax cuts by declaring that God willed America to have lower tax rates, or ram through the first bailout bill with a conference call to pastor’s asking them to push the policy as an example in their sermons. He did, however, often make appropriate allusions to God when dealing with the sanctity of human life and the divine mandate for freedom and human rights when dealing with the war on terror. Similarly, President Reagan incorporated his faith in his lifelong fight against Communism, a type of government that crushed religious freedom and demeaned human life.

Those of us on the right have no problem with our leaders being men and women of faith. The left, however, begins spewing anti-Christian bigotry the second George Bush mentions Jesus as his favorite philosopher, or when Sarah Palin or Ronald Reagan speak of God’s hand in their public and personal lives (again with no specific policy proposals attached.) So afraid of the crazed Christians are the left, that our own resident “Big Sister” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has been warning against the evils of pro-life and Bible-believing Christians while ignoring Muslim terrorists at all costs. In fact, Christians are often made to be the moral equivalent of deranged Muslim terrorists hellbent on killing as many “infidels” as they can. Hollywood and the liberal governing majority scoff at religious folks, belittle our intelligence, question our integrity, and do everything they can to dehumanize and discredit us and our God in the eyes of the general public.

Yet, when Mr. Obama repeatedly asserts that God’s divine plan is for America to have socialized medicine, one can hear the proverbial crickets chirping on the left. To the left, Obama’s repeated attempts to position himself as our own personal Messiah or modern-day prophet is just another brilliant “leg-tingling” truth dripping like honey from the lips of “the one we have been waiting for.”

Nestled in the midst of an otherwise appropriate speech, Mr. Obama’s TelePrompters have once again given us a telling glimpse of the man’s core and why he won’t abandon his socialist dreams to assure his re-election the way President Clinton did during the 1990s. Obama is a true believer in the government-centered life. Healthcare is but a first step to a paradigm shift in American government that will take the fundamental rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” from being placed directly in the hands of the people by their Creator, to being a commodity to be collected, regulated, and redistributed by the government as it sees fit.

One can only pray that Obama’s “Tower of Babel” never gets past the planning stages.

One year after “the one” took office, his approval ratings are in the toilet and Republicans are experiencing a dramatic reversal of fortunes. Many a pundit on both the left and the right spent the early days of Obama’s tenure lecturing about the sorry state of the GOP and the fact that they would not be a viable national party for a long time.

Then Obama entered the scene and weakened our national defense while making excuses and/or covering up for Islamic extremists, increased our national debt to the largest levels ever, weakened the dollar, launched an all-out assault on free market capitalism, apologized around the world for the horrors of America, coddled dictators, swooned over Communists, and attempted to bring about socialist revolution in this country.

It turns out that this was “change” the nation refused to believe in.

The first warning signs came with the thousands upon thousands of everyday folks who turned up in the Tea Party rallies all throughout the spring. The summer saw many of these folks swamping the previously near-empty town hall meetings around the country to voice opposition to Obama’s healthcare nonsense. They were greeted with condescending arrogance.

In the fall, Virginia and New Jersey elected Republican governors. Keep in mind that both states voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and that both President Obama and Vice President Biden made every effort to link the Democratic candidates with them. No less than five trips were made here to New Jersey and the landscape was littered with billboards depicting Obama and Corzine locking arms under the banner of “Keep It Going.” Mr. Biden even went so far as to credit the befuddled New Jersey Governor with being the brains behind the stimulus plan.

In essence New Jersey was told that if we liked Obama’s stimulus plans we should vote for Jon Corzine. Both Corzine and Obama were awash with arrogance as they told New Jersey voters in no uncertain terms that they were re-elect Obama’s finance man.

The result was that Corzine lost by 5 points in a state that voted for Obama by 20 just one year prior.

Immediately the blame was laid at the feet of both Mr. Deeds of Virginia and Jon Corzine in New Jersey. They “weren’t good candidates” and didn’t “campaign hard enough.” President Obama even tried to downplay the results having his spokesman claim he was watching basketball and had no idea who won either election, and that he never really intended to campaign for Jon Corzine, he just stopped by a rally because he and Michelle came to Newark for a date. (Perhaps they couldn’t get reservations in Camden.)

Yesterday as New Jersey’s new Republican governor was sworn in, the angry mobs struck again. Too stupid to know what is good for them, they rejected Obama once more.

Scott Brown won the senate seat from Massachusetts by 5 points. This was a seat held by Teddy Kennedy before, during and after he drove Mary Jo Kopechne off the bridge into the bay and left her for dead for half a day or more before bothering to call it in. In other words, since the early 1960s and after Kennedy’s involvement in a murder, a scandal which would have sunk even the best of politicians. Prior to Teddy, the seat was held for a few years by a Kennedy family sycophant, who merely warmed the seat for young Teddy until he was drunk enough, er, old enough to run for the seat. Prior to that man, the seat was held by John F. Kennedy.

This is not just a seat that the Democrats have held for 60 years or so, but it is one of their treasured liberal institutions. Most folks can’t remember the time before the Kennedys (and thus the liberal wing of the Democratic party) held onto this treasured vote in the senate.

Thanks to Barack Obama, that seat is now in the hands of a Republican. This feat is quite astonishing. President Obama sealed the deal for Senator-elect Brown by taking enough time off from his photo op at the Red Cross headquarters (where instead of doing something helpful or even acting sad, he gushed over his ability to “tweet” all by himself, something that surely brought comfort to the dead and dying in Haiti just as powerfully as his jovial manner and “shout outs” at the beginning of his first public statement on the Fort Hood shooting did) to insert himself into the race by campaigning with the hapless Marcia, er, Martha Coakley.

Obama and his supporters have been quick to throw Coakley under the same bus that already ran over Corzine and Deeds. The problem with the idea of Coakley being such a weak candidate, however, is that this woman won her current statewide office with 73% of the vote in 2006. She wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but it was not her campaigning skills that lost this one.

Obama’s appearance was the latest in a string of angry-sounding arrogance-soaked scowl-fests, where Obama lectures the listeners in what can only be described as a temper tantrum, about their foolish rejection of his deity and supremacy. In fact, this event was even classier. Just hours after standing next to former President George W. Bush at the White House, where he asked President Bush to help him with the Haiti situation, President Obama was in Massachusetts bashing him and blaming everything on him. “Blah blah blah, he had eight years to mess this up, blah blah blah, we only had one year to clean it up.”

Americans are sick of the victim routine. It might work to incite rabid anger among the community misanthropes when serving as an all-important “community organizer” but it falls flat when you are actually attempting to lead people, particularly Americans.

The GOP victories in the very blue states of Massachusetts and New Jersey and the at best purple state of Virginia was not anger over George W. Bush. That was 2008’s election results. The anger is directed at President Obama and his band of merry socialists hell-bent on destroying America and “fundamentally changing” it into something altogether new.

If Americans were upset with Bush’s spending, they are not likely to be comforted by Obama’s spending, which dwarfs all previous administrations combined.

If they are unhappy about the growing burden that the life-sucking government is having on their businesses and pocketbooks, they are likely not reassured by Obama’s reaching deeper and harder into their pockets with his government tentacles.

The results yesterday further cement that the Democrats are in a dangerous place. The coming midterm elections are likely to be a bloodbath, which will in all probability hand BOTH houses of congress back over to the Republicans. Senator Barbara Boxer of California and Harry Reid in Nevada are in trouble according to polling. Joe Biden’s son looks like he is headed for defeat in Delaware. Those are just a few of the big names looking to end their career in the Obama-backlash tsunami that is sweeping the country.

The Democrats now have a clear choice. They can stand together and shove through the Obamacare because this is their chance, or they can be re-elected. For most Democrats, these two have become mutually exclusive. Losing Teddy Kennedy’s seat should be a clear warning sign that no Democrat is safe this year, just as the elections of 2006 should have warned the then hapless Republicans of the upcoming 2008 election. If the Democrats fail to learn the lessons of these recent failures, they risk heading down the same path to political oblivion that the Republicans took.

Massachusetts showed us that all bets are off regarding “safe” Democratic seats. In the age of Obama, there is simply no such thing. In this political environment not even our own Rob Andrews is safe from the voter’s wrath!
The preceding column appears on my own blog site as well as my Examiner.com page.

America’s ruling class in 2010 bears a closer resemblance to the oppressive British rule which she broke free from during her founding than her founders. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are no longer “inalienable” and “endowed by our Creator.” An air of self-importance and superiority has so marinated our elected officials that they seem infected with the madness of King George, rather than the laudable liberty-soaked intellect of Jefferson.

Instead, today’s leaders go to great lengths to to conceal the real impact of policies on the economic health and individual liberty of their constituents even while no pretense is made about the same leaders’ personal disdain for those same constituents. Any American lucky enough to attend a town hall meeting this summer can attest to that fact.

Leaders of both parties have, at best, lost the fire in the belly to defend America’s free market system of individual liberty and economic opportunity for all; and, at worst, openly declared war on that same system in hopes of perfecting a Communist utopia where the “city on a hill” once stood.

America in 2010 is just as in need of liberty loving patriots as it was in 1776.

Caesar Rodney was one of those patriots.

Missing from many history classes in today’s schools, Rodney is indeed a much needed hero for a generation dangerously close to handing freedom over to the clutches of government.

Such was the case in 1775-1776 during the American Revolution. Not all the folks in America were interested in independence and “liberty and justice for all.” Many colonists favored reconciliation with the crown, and did not seek any break with the monarchy.

General George Washington and the John Adams and Thomas Jefferson led Continental Congress understood this and did what they could to lay out cogent arguments for the case for independence while trying to fight off the vastly better equipped British army.

While Mr. Washington led America in war, and the Continental Congress prepared to birth America’s Declaration of Independence, the good Mr. Rodney served in both capacities. Caesar Rodney was a delegate from Delaware to both the Stamp Act Congress and later to the Continental Congress. Mr. Rodney was also a military leader for the colonial militia, having begun his military career in the French and Indian War. After Lexington and Concord and the “shot heard around the world” Mr. Rodney remarked that, “Now one was neither Tory nor Whig; it was either dependence or independence.”

Of Rodney’s military experience at Trenton, General Washington remarked:

“The readiness with which you took to the field at the period most critical to our affairs, the industry you used in bringing out the militia of the Delaware State and the alertness observed by you in forwarding on the troops from Trenton, reflect the highest honor on your character and place your attachment to the cause in a most distinguished point of view.”

Despite his wartime heroism however, it is in the legislative capacity that Caesar Rodney’s most heroic accomplishment can be found.

At home, Mr. Rodney helped lead the Delaware Assembly in voting on June 15, 1776 to sever all ties with Britain. He also took part in the Continental Congress that drafted the Declaration of Independence.

By early July, however, Mr. Rodney had returned home to Delaware to tend to many of his other official duties and to rest. Caesar Rodney suffered from both asthma and a rare form of facial cancer that left him disfigured and in constant discomfort. The cancer slowly ate away at both Caesar’s face and his energy. Referring to his disorder, Caesar called it “that horrid and most obstinate disorder.”

As the final vote came near, the delegates had decided on an all-or-nothing approach to the vote. Every state had to agree to ratify this Declaration of Independence and stand together against British oppression, or together they must sink back into a serf-like dependence.

As the vote neared, Delware’s other two delegates were at a deadlock. Thomas McKean favored independence while George Read found it too radical a move. Thus the Delware delegation was deadlocked and in danger of voiding the entire Declaration. Mr. Jefferson’s eloquent call for a revolution to protect the rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” almost went unheeded.

Caesar Rodney could not let that happen. Upon being notified of the situation, Mr. Rodney made a midnight ride from Delaware to Philadelphia that dwarfs even the famous ride of Paul Revere in importance. Mr. Revere’s ride was indeed a call for readiness in the defense of liberty, but it was Mr. Rodney’s ride that quite literally turned the wheel of history and changed the world.

Caesar Rodney’s ride spanned 80 miles during oppressive summer heat, violent summertime thunderstorms and the accompanying torrential rain. It was a ride that would have challenged a man in good health, but to a man in Rodney’s condition, it was almost certain to be fatal.

Through the mud and cobblestone streets, Caesar Rodney somehow made his way alone to Philadelphia. He was racing toward his destiny. A destiny which would make him a marked man in the eyes of the British crown and quite possibly serve as his death sentence (assuming he survived the ride!)

Through a mixture of the hand of Providence and his own indelible passion for liberty, Caesar Rodney made it to the floor and cast the deciding vote for Delaware in favor of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. As he casted his vote, it is recorded that he said,”As I believe the voice of my constituents and of all sensible and honest men is in favor of independence, my own judgement concurs with them. I vote for independence.”

Thus, defying the elements and the illness that ravaged his body, Caesar Rodney put his own sacred honor on the line in the defense of liberty. His vote put Delaware in the “yes” column ensuring that the Declaration of Independence would pass and that a new American nation “conceived in liberty” would rise from the ashes of monarchical oppression. The world had its shining city on a hill to serve as a beacon of freedom to the world.

It is Caesar Rodney’s irrepressible spirit of liberty that America needs in its citizens and government officials today. As Thomas Jefferson famously asked, “what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?”

A free America requires self-sacrificing patriots like Caesar Rodney willing to pledge their life, their fortune and their sacred honor in defense of liberty. Our history has been enriched with the noble sacrifices by men like Caesar Rodney. It is now our duty to continue that proud legacy by transforming that glorious “spirit of ’76” into the next great American renewal in 2010.
This article was originally posted on my blog and my Examiner.com page.

Echoing President Harry Truman, the current leader of the free world tried to reverse public perception of him being al Qaeda’s “yes man” by declaring that the “buck stops here.”

“Ultimately the buck stops with me,’’ he said on January 7, “When the system fails it is my responsibility.’‘ Of course, he then had the esteemed White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano follow up by explaining that the failure was because of policies that were George Bush’s doing. So the buck stops only temporarily with Obama, until he finds a way to make it stop with Bush. In the good cop/bad cop routine that he has mastered, he can take the responsibility personally while his underlings can explain to us why it isn’t really his fault. Saul Alinsky would be so proud.

This who attempt to “take responsiblity” is quite the turnaround for America’s Next Top Model. Tyra was no doubt impressed with Obama’s pouty face when he sternly delivered this line to the nation, but it would have to ignore the entire duration of his presidency thus far (not just those glorious first 10 days that were so packed with accomplishment as to warrant a Nobel Peace Prize) to believe it.

Truthfully, even the First TelePrompter was surprised when this nugget scrolled across its face. After all, Mr. Obama has spent his first year in office blaming George Bush for the economy, for his own massive spending and deficits (which outdo Bush and all previous 42 presidents combined) for his decision on Afghanistan taking so long, and for the worldwide animosity that led to the loss of the 2016 Olympics. He also sat at the Summit of the Americas listening intently as dictator after dictator got up and bashed America. His retort was to thank Daniel Ortega for not blaming him personally for things America did when he was just a young kid. (A remake of his similar attempt to minimize the terrorist bombings conducted while he was just a boy soaking in the morning calls to prayer in Indonesia, by Bill Ayers, his political mentor and ghostwriter of “Dreams of my Father” and “The Audacity of Hope.”)

In this speech, the great responsibility taker also “talked tough” about terrorism. The “overseas contingency operations” became a “War on Terror” (albeit without the manly Texas drawl and swagger of President Bush) and the “manmade disasters” became “terrorist attacks.” Of course, this is the same man who spent the year making sure we all understood that there was no war and that we could all relax. From Afghanistan to Iraq, Iran to Gitmo, from threatened prosecutions of CIA agents to miranda rights for terrorists, Obama’s “kinder” and “gentler” view of dealing with worldwide terror has been made abundantly clear.

By the way, if it’s back to being a “war on terror” someone might want to tell Attorney General Eric Holder. He’s still in pre-production on the New York stage show of “Jihad: The Musical” where the masterminds of 9/11 will be put on a public trial with a heap of evidence that won’t be considered “constitutional” and then handed a megaphone to let us know just how happy Allah is about those dead American infidels.

While the president is right in the assertion that we need to get tough on the terrorists, he went on to make a series of very vague and toothless proposals to fundamentally transform our nation’s security such as “strengthening our analytical process” and distributing our intelligence reports “more rapidly and more widely.” John Wayne he is not!

To be fair, communicating the threat has been a problem and it is nice to see Mr. Obama try to correct it. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano had no problem “widely” and “rapidly” distributing her report from earlier this year in which we were told to cower in fear from pro-life activists and Bible-believing Christians who have the Jesus fish on their cars.

For some reason, however, since then Ms. Napolitano has been unable to get the word out (or in many cases even get the memo herself) that Muslims are still trying to kill us via worldwide Jihad. This even after the father of one such zealot comes to our embassy to warn us or one of our military’s psychologists preaches Jihad to anyone who will listen and becomes a pen pal with a radical Imam associated with al Qaeda.

On CNN, the esteemed Homeland Security Chief boasted just days after the Christmas Day attempted attack that, “Right now we have no evidence that this incident was part of anything larger.” Mr. Abdulmatallab’s father would beg to differ. So would the fine folks in Yemen who trained him and lovingly stitched the explosives into his undies. Details that most of us heard on Christmas day when the story broke. Perhaps Ms. Napolitano was too busy staking out James Dobson to notice.

“I’d like to point out today that the system worked,” Napolitano further asserted of the incident where we were warned about a known terrorist trainee, allowed him on a plane without an air marshal, somehow missed the explosives in his undies and had to rely on a brave passenger to stop him (and the plane) from exploding as his crotch was on fire.

Time and time again this administration through both word and deed, has demonstrated that national security isn’t their forte. Mr. Obama’s stilted and robotic response to the Christmas Day attack only further destroyed his credibility in this area.

Even though he has finally acknowledged that mistakes were made, he still seems unwilling or unable to make the tough choices necessary to keep our nation safe. People in the field of foreign policy are often classified as either “hawks” for their aggressive stance on national security and engaging our enemy or “doves” for their desire for a false peace where America retreats within her borders and hopes that the bad guys leave us alone. Obama’s folks would merit a third classification, that of the “ostriches” who are unable or unwilling to see evil for what it is. May this incident be an eye-opening experience for our ostrich-led administration, and may brave “hawks” like Dick Cheney talk some sense into this great American sleeping giant.

Somewhere in a cave in Pakistan, Osama bin Laden is thanking Allah for Janet Napolitano.

It’s almost as if the United States has selected the befuddled cartoon character Mr. Magoo (and there is a striking physical resemblance between the two) as our Homeland Security Secretary.

For those of you too busy celebrating Christmas to notice, yet another extremist nutbag Muslim has been caught trying to blow us up. In a move sure to be highlighted by President Obama in a future speech as one of Islam’s latest positive contributions to the nation (see his tomfoolery on the Muslim pirates from the time of Thomas Jefferson in his Cairo speech) a Muslim extremist was thwarted while trying to blow up a plane landing in Detroit. This tragedy was averted only by quick-thinking passengers and a rather inept Muslim loon.

Or, as Secretary Napolitano would describe it, “the whole process…went very smoothly.”

Now, in Napolitano and Obama’s world, it is admittedly more important to make Muslims feel special than it is to actually protect Americans from their Jihadic wrath. However, one must have at least a little bit of concern over the Secretary’s complete lack of concern and clear-thinking in this matter of national security. Unless of course, you are an intimate associate of Mr. Obama’s like Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, Mark Lloyd, Cass Sunstein, Carol Browner or Van Jones, in which case it’s time to break out the bubbly at the thought of the evil “capitalist” America suffering.

Napolitano is probably too busy tracking down the real threat in her mind–radical Christians and pro-life activists. After all, one deranged individual from that group gunned down the saintly church-going late-term abortion doctor (see also conductor of infanticide) Dr. Tiller. Why that one murder alone should override all of the countless acts of terrorism (and thousands murdered) that have happened around the world in the last few decades and almost exclusively (especially in recent years) by the hands of Muslims.

Still, let’s not make any of these fine Muslim Jihadists feel uncomfortable.

Napolitano, with one eye glued to Rick Warren and his dastardly plans for America, was unable to notice the clearly terrorist intentions of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, even though his own father had visited an U.S. Embassy to warn our country of his crazed religious ideology and under the suspicion that he was in Yemen attending a terrorist training program.

Yeah, but was he pro-life? Was he a Christian? Because if he’s just a crazed Muslim extremist getting trained in the deadly arts of terrorism 101 in Yemen perhaps even by an offshoot of al Qaeda, well that certainly isn’t grounds to deny him a travel VISA.

Despite the warnings FROM HIS OWN FAMILY, our national security folks, guided by the Obama-inspired wisdom that the “see no Jihad, hear no Jihad” approach to the War on Terror, excuse me, “overseas contingency operations” is best, chose to do nothing.

As a result, a crazed Muslim terrorist gets on a plane bound for Detroit, and as he attempts to blow himself and the other passengers into paradise with the waiting virgins, he is stopped by…a passenger. This had to be the case because this flight didn’t have an air marshal on board. So, thankfully a brave ordinary joe saved the day. In the most sacred obligation our government has (that is keeping us safe) we were left to fend for ourselves.

So a scenario involving ignoring blatant warnings from credible sources about a terrorist, failing to stop said terrorist with chemicals necessary to blow the plane up on his person (and in one report without even a passport) from getting on the plane, and failing to provide the plane with the security necessary to handle a crisis situation like a nutcase trying to blow himself up, is a crystal clear example to the Secretary of Homeland Security of the system working perfectly.

That should make you sleep better at night.

Mr. Obama couldn’t be reached for comment, because he and the family are out in Hawaii partying the year away and “monitoring” the situation from there. And by “monitoring” he means completely ignoring it while importing steak from Japan, dancing the night away to Earth, Wind & Fire and reading GQ magazines about himself. It’s only national security. That’s never been one of Mr. Obama’s pet projects.

It gets better though.

In addition to her absurd proclamation of success in this situation, Secretary Napolitano also lectured that there is no “indication of a larger terror plot.” There were the warnings by his family, the report that he attended a terrorist training camp in Yemen, the reports that he is allegedly connected to al Qaeda for starters. None of these, however, connect him to the real threats in Napolitano’s mind. There is no smoking gun linking him to any pro-life or Christian organizations just yet. Until such time, the stoic Secretary Napolitano will be unmoved in her position.

Of course, Napolitano’s assessment is counter to that of the suspect. Investigators have found that his bomb-making materials were “sewn into his underwear” by “al Qaeda leaders in Yemen.” The suspect himself has “provided detailed information” on his being recruited and trained by al Qaeda for a Christmas day suicide attack.

So, after witnessing Janet Napolitano’s idea of “security” unfold on the national stage, it has become abundantly clear that this administration is staffed with unserious people charge with very serious jobs and our nation is in a much more vulnerable state because of it. The Obama/Napolitano “See no Jihad, hear no Jihad” policy may make Muslim extremists feel better about themselves but it is playing political games with the lives of American citizens.

It is time to put pressure on Washington to commit seriously to the issue of national security. Our nation deserves better security than that which buffoons like Napolitano can offer.

There is no better teacher than history.

As President Obama begins his own surge policy in Afghanistan, it is important that our leaders heed the lessons of history. Throughout our nation’s history, there is no more glaring failure in wartime than Vietnam.

President Obama would do well to consider President Ford’s folly in Cambodia before ordering his pre-ordained 2011 retreat.

As America was tailing it out of Vietnam, pro-American forces in Asia were consigned to their own brutal future of torture, murder and oppression. The “shining city on a hill” and “last best hope” of the world had left the building and in so doing, turned the lights out.

As South Vietnam was steamrolled by North Vietnam tanks, liberty died a slow and painful death as Communism took more lives. At the time U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger sent a letter to pro-American ally and leader of Cambodia, Sirik Matak. The letter offered to evacuate our ally from the certain death hurtling toward him by the recently appeased and seemingly unstoppable Commies.

Matak’s response is one of raw human courage, the likes of which we only see among our greatest of leaders. In a letter to Kissinger, Matak replied:

“I thank you very sincerely for your letter and your offer to transport me towards freedom. I cannot, alas, leave Cambodia in such a cowardly fashion. As for you, and in particular your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would…[abandon] a people which have chosen liberty. You have refused us your protection, and we can do nothing about it. You leave, and my wish is that you and your country will find happiness under the sky. [If I die here] I have committed only this mistake of believing you.”

When the newly emboldened Communists took Phnem Penh, Matak was shot in the stomach and left for dead. He took 3 days to slowly bleed to death.

By contrast, we now know that Soviet prisoner Natan Anatoly Sharansky heard the courage (or folly if you listened to liberal elites) of President Reagan’s words when he denounced the Soviet Union as an “evil empire” while in the Soviet prisons. Those words brought him hope and they were conveyed to his fellow prisoners as he tapped out Reagan’s courageous message in morse code on the bars of his cell.

America has an obligation to not abandon our allies in the face of brutal oppression.

Before the pre-ordained retreat of 2011 (and subsequent Taliban “surge”) begins, President Obama would do well to drink deep of the American courage demonstrated time and time again in the face of brutal regimes determined to crush liberty, instead of parroting one of America’s most embarrassing failures. The women and children of Afghanistan should not be abandoned to the same fate as Sirik Matak.

If there remains any doubt on the part of our president, he needs to resolve himself to the cause of liberty. He needs to understand America’s role in Afghanistan is the same as it has always been–one of liberation and not of conquest.

President Reagan’s speech celebrating the great World War II veterans of the battle of Normandy on June 6, 1984 made this point about America crystal clear:

“The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or on the next. It was the deep knowledge–and pray God we have not lost it–that there is profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.”

Let there be no doubt from the White House to the villages of Afghanistan to the caves of Pakistan that America will stand for freedom–no matter the cost.

The following originally appears on my Examiner.com page.

The embattled Senate Majority Leader, Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada, sure stepped in it this week. No doubt filled with child-like excitement on the prospect of successfully usurping one-sixth of the nation’s economy into some geezer-offing, price-raising, ineffective socialist healthcare plan, Mr. Reid couldn’t contain himself.

As with many Democrats (Senator Lieberman excepted of course) Mr. Reid’s euphoria over yanking more money from private citizens in his “wrong side of history” attempt to make socialism/communism successful and/or cool, got the best of him and he experienced some verbal gaffing worthy of Joe “Barack Obama is the first clean and articulate black man to run for President” Biden.

The esteemed Senator Reid, destined to lose his re-election bid next fall, declared that opposing healthcare is so like those Republicans. Being always on the wrong side of history, they even thought slavery was a good idea. His actual words:

“Instead of joining us on the right side of history, all the Republicans can come up with is, ‘slow down, stop everything, let’s start over.’ If you think you’ve heard these same excuses before, you’re right. When this country belatedly recognized the wrongs of slavery, there were those who dug in their heels and said ‘slow down, it’s too early, things aren’t bad enough.’
When this body was on the verge of guaranteeing equal civil rights to everyone regardless of the color of their skin, some senators resorted to the same filibuster threats that we hear today.”

So, while the senator didn’t actually specifically charge Republicans with being the ones who “dug in their heels” against making slavery illegal, he clearly lumps them in with such folks, and hopes that an ill-informed public will just take this nugget and connect it with the vast left-wing conspiracy that proclaims all Republicans racists and all Democrats peace-loving proponents of tolerance. In short, the man engaged in some political double-speak designed to fool people into pious rage against the evil, racist, greedy, and obstructionist Republicans.

The problem with the good senator’s argument, is that he and many of his fellow Democrats, are on the wrong side of history on this one–as usual.

This is now the second blatant misrepresentation of historical fact that liberal Democrats have thrust upon an unsuspecting public more knowledgeable about the Kardashians than they are about American history. In the spring, in the famous Cairo speech that apologized for America and Christianity while falsely lauding Islam for it’s praiseworthy “contribution” to America in the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, President (and citizen of the world) Obama beamed with pride while highlighting this as “one of the first recognitions” of America by another country.

Mr. Obama was clearly banking on the fact that many Americans would miss the fact that this treaty was nothing more than a blackmail agreement between Tripoli and the Adams’ administration whereby we agreed to pay millions in tribute to avoid further attacks on our merchant ships by Muslim pirates. In the end, we paid and the Muslim pirates continued attacking our ships, taking our loot, and selling Americans (see also Christian infidels) into slavery. This practice endured until President Jefferson ended it by sending in the newly-formed Marines to deal with our loving allies in Tripoli. Thus was born the famous “shores of Tripoli” reference in the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”

Given the propensity for Democrats to play fast and loose with the facts concerning American history, it is high time to correct the record of who exactly is on the “wrong side of history.”

Slavery was a volatile political football in the 1850s and the issue was dominated by extremists on both sides and a bunch of squishy folks in the middle determined to stay neutral. Democratic Presidents Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan failed to do much to end slavery during their presidential terms in the 1850s. Pierce, as Christopher Merola writes on Townhall.com, “broke his promise to the Congress by refusing to restrict slavery in the newly founded western states of America. Pierce allowed slavery to expand in the western states after saying he would not.” Pierce was replaced as the Democratic nominee in 1856 when it was clear that he lacked the fortitude to deal with the growing frontier violence rising from the stench of slavery. James Buchanan was nominated in his place, largely because he wasn’t in Washington during any of the volatile slavery debates accompanying the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Upon his election, Democrat Buchanan largely punted the slavery issue to the court systems in a “hand washing move” that would have made Pontius Pilate proud.

In short, the politically driven and cowardice Democratic party was unable to deal with the issue of slavery. Their main competitor at the time, the Whigs, were also unable to do so. This “digging in of the heels” of Democrats in the cowardly punting of the slavery issue further down the timeline actually gave birth to the Republican party.

Their first successful presidential candidate was elected in 1860. Perhaps you have heard of him? He’s Abraham Lincoln, the “great emancipator” of the slaves and preserver of the union. Confronting the issue that would tear the union asunder for several years, Lincoln spoke in clear terms by encouraging those who viewed slavery as a moral evil to “do their duty” as they understood it. He boldly urged the anti-slavery folks not “be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves.” He concluded with, “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand it.” Three years later, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation that declared “that all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states “are, and henceforward shall be free.”

In the Civil War years of the 1860s, Republicans were the “extremists” in wanting slavery abolished and southern slave holders punished severely. President Lincoln, with history in his rearview and a hopeful future around the bend, sought to end slavery as soon as possible, but kept the Republicans in check in the hope of bringing re-unification post-war. Democrats, on the other hand, who were “War Democrats” suddenly became anti-war zealots on Lincoln when he openly declared that one of the goals of the Civil War was ending slavery. The anti-war Democrats of today would have been so proud. Just as today’s Democratic dove society wants to retreat from war and leave women and children in Iraq and Afghanistan to certain genocide, the anti-war Democrats of the 1860s were all about abandoning the shackled black Americans in favor of maintaining their political status. In fact, Mr. Merola notes that Republican Abraham Lincoln gave a speech at the beginning of his second term calling for newly freed blacks to even have the right to vote. This plan, of course, was thwarted when Lincoln was assassinated by Democrat John Wilkes Booth.

Nearly one hundred years later when Democratic President Lyndon Johnson attempted to get the Civil Rights Act of 1964 passed through congress, it was again the Republicans who got the job done. The recently assassinated President Kennedy had lobbied unsuccessfully for the bill’s passage for some time. Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. spoke eloquently in Washington during his “I Have A Dream” speech by making his case based on the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution.

Democrats, however, led by Robert “KKK” Byrd and Albert Gore Sr. couldn’t stand this civil rights cause, and led efforts to filibuster the bill. An astounding 80% of those in favor of the filibuster were the Byrd and Gore-led Democrats. After Republicans helped end the threat of the filibuster, they went on to vote for the Civil Rights Act by 27-6 in the senate. Overall 82% of Republicans voted for the act that ended segregation. By contrast, senate Democrats were divided 44-23 in favor of the bill, and a full 31% of Democrats in congress voted against ending segregation.

In 1966, the “racist” and “wrong side of history” Republicans nominated and successfully elected Edward Brooke to the U.S. Senate from Massachusetts. Brooke was the first black senator since Reconstruction. The first black man elected to the U.S. Senate, of course, was in 1870, and that senator, Hiram Revels, was also a Republican.

It should be noted that Democrats were also the folks who ended World War I in such a way as to lead directly to World War II. Democrats also lost the Vietnam war and are doing their darnedest to repeat that in Afghanistan and Iraq. Democrats like Joe Biden have been against American energy independence since the 1970s. Democrats also didn’t view Communism as a problem, given the plethora of communists in the FDR administration and their subsequent horror at President Reagan’s tough approach and “evil empire” speech. (And by Teddy Kennedy’s conspiring with KGB agents to undermine the Reagan Administration during the height of the Cold War.) Many on the left, like Obama’s former Communications Director Anita Dunn, still admire genocidal communist dictators like China’s Chairman Mao and Michael Moore’s beloved Castro brothers in Cuba.

Economically, the Democrats brought us the Jimmy Carter years and currently the stimulus plan that would “absolutely guarantee” that unemployment wouldn’t top 8% (so far it has reached 10.2%.) This same stimulus has spent $246,436 per “saved or created” job, which has an average salary of $59,867. And for those who want to blame Bush for the out-of-control spending, you will be interested to know that government spending skyrocketed in the last 2 years of the Bush Administration, during which time the Democrats had taken back both houses of congress.

Democrats also forced the economic meltdown through their nefarious dealing with lending practices over the repeated objections of Republicans.

On immigration, Democrats are the party largely for illegal immigrants having amnesty (and free healthcare.) To be fair, many Republicans are absent on this one too.

It is also the Democrats who are bringing 9/11 terrorists to New York City for public trials, amid a backdrop of international apologizing for America, and sycophantic praises of brutal dictatorial regimes, and Islamic fundamentalists.

So, though the Republicans are against a behemoth governmental takeover of the healthcare industry (bills totaling in the thousands of pages and trillions of dollars) they are remaining consistent with their history–standing on the side of liberty. This Obamacare bill is a “death panel” for our economy and healthcare industry. It leads to rationing (say good-bye to grandma after you give her a pain pill), fining Americans who lack insurance and/or imprisoning them, penalizing special needs families, paying for abortions, and generally creating an environment that will drive private insurers out of business. Stopping and causing the disinfecting light of truth to shine brightly onto the never read pages of this monstrosity isn’t being on the wrong side of history–it’s common sense. (A trait admittedly lacking on the left.)

So, Harry Reid was right in noting that one party does often “dig in their heels” and stand in the way of progress and liberty. Unfortunately, it’s the very party he represents and the home of our current menacing liberal overlords.