H/T to the Alpharetta, GA 9-12 Meetup group for providing this via e-mail…

Obama provides his people a link to contact media to support the health care bill! We can take advantage of it!

We can use this same link to OPPOSE it. Dick Morris says we have to get 8% points in disapproval ratings to defeat it! Please follow this link and send your letter of opposition.

Barack Obama’s ” Organizing for America ” has put the call out for people to e-mail their local papers and write a letter to the editor. They have created a VERY easy and fast way to write all your local papers with just a few key strokes. PLEASE take a minute to do this today and jump behind enemy lines to help kill the bill.

Here’s what we need to do :

Go to : http://my.democrats.org/page/speakout/posthouseLTE

1. Put in your zip code. You will be redirected to a page where you enter all your address information - this is required.

2. Check all the boxes for all of your local papers.[and note at the bottom of this list, as you can expand to other newspapers too]

3. NOW CAREFUL THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART ! DO NOT CLICK NEXT. Instead Click ” 2. Compose Letter ” this is in the top middle of the page. This will allow you to compose your own letter to the editor against the health care bill.

4. Write your letter to the editor against the health care bill.[when you preview your letter MAKE CERTAIN that all the newspapers are there]

5. Now click Next

6. Preview your letter to the editor and click Send Email

[hint if you would like to see what others have written google 'Health Care Bill Letters to the Editor', but make sure to make yours original]

Here’s the text of the letter I sent…

On November 7th, the US House of Representatives took the unprecedented step of approving a bill that would steal the freedom of Americans to choose their own health care options. Under the pretense of providing care to those who don’t currently have insurance - some of whom CHOOSE not to have it - the Congress approved a bill that provides for significant penalties and jail time for those who do not have insurance.

If Nancy Pelosi and her Democrat friends get their way, people will only have two options - get inferior health insurance as offered by the federal government or go to jail. This doesn’t sound like the American way to me.

In addition, small businesses will face egregious fines should they not be able to afford to provide the kind of insurance that the bill mandates. Many small businesses will be forced to close down to avoid these penalties or the alternative high costs of federally-mandated insurance

The end result will be that Americans - even those who currently have insurance - will be forced into government-run programs…and we all know how efficient and cost effective government-run programs are.

Why can’t the Congress understand that what they are doing is not just un-American, it is an unconstitutional power grab by the federal government.

Instead of this trillion dollar boondoggle, Americans should be allowed to purchase insurance across state lines. This would allow for a true health insurance marketplace to be created. The resulting competition would drive costs lower and make good insurance - not the kind created in this bill - available to more Americans. If we could combine interstate insurance purchasing with tort reform, and even greater number of Americans would be able to afford quality care.

The Senate should reject the House bill out-of-hand and focus on health care reform that will actually benefit Americans.

Take a look at this portion of an interview Ted Nugent gave to Evan Smith, editor of Texas Monthly. This weasel interviewer makes it clear early on that he won’t agree with anything Nugent might say later in the interview. He does this by reminding everyone that Nugent sits on the board of the NRA. Watch as he sits back with a smug look on his face after saying, “Make your case.”

The ironic thing about this is that many, if not most, Americans feel the way Nugent does - unapologetic about their freedoms.

There has been a lot of controversy about the 2nd Amendment and what it really means. What was the intent of the Framers when they included this in the Bill of Rights? Did they really want to limit the right to keep and bear arms to those in the militia, as some on the left claim?

On this point, Richard Henry Lee said, “To preserve Liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them.” Note that he did not limit this right to just those in the militia, but rather to “the whole body of the people”.

Even if we do accept the limitation of the 2nd Amendment as applying only to the militia, the United States Code (10 USC 311) defines the militia as “[a]ll able-bodied males at least 17 years of age…and under 45 years of age who are or have made a declaration to become a citizen of the United States.” This implies that the intent here is not to limit this right to military usage.

As to Nugent’s assertion that all free men have the right to defend themselves and their property, the Second Amendment Foundation reports (scroll to item 25 down the page):

Forty-three state constitutions have specific references protecting citizen’s rights to self-defense. In the other seven states, the right is protected statutorily. The constitutions typically state that a citizen can bear arms in defense of himself, and the state.

While there remains quite a bit of controversy on the topic, it seems clear what the intentions of the Founders and their state-level counterparts were…let the people “keep and bear arms” in their own defense and in defense of the state. No other interpretation seems plausible.

It seems that liberals are fans of the “pile on” philosophy of treatment for former friends…not that that’s new to any of us. Exhibit A - the following Jay Leno video (H/T Michelle Malkin)

I have to admit, I laughed at both the Congress reference and the commercial Jay played. Can you imagine Jay or any other late-nighter having done anything like this during last year’s election? Neither can I…

It’s unfortunate, though, that these jokes hit so close to reality in both cases.

CASE 1 - CONGRESS: Congress has gotten out of control. (tell me something I didn’t already know…) Exhibit B - Fox News had on their screen crawl yesterday that the sum total of taxpayer-funded travel for all Congresscritters and Senatedwellers was 6,901 days and 9.4 million dollars! AMAZING! Why can’t I get the taxpayers to fund my vacation by claiming it’s a fact-finding mission?

Exhibit C - How many laws do they expect us to follow that they have exempted themselves from? Hello Charlie Rangel!

Exhibit D - Bawney Fwank, Granny Nan Botox, Dingy Harry, and the list goes on…’nuff said about that.

CASE 2 - ACORN: Leno’s video emphasizes the diversity of ACORN’s unsavory behavior. We all know about the voter registration fraud, voter intimidation, and - for lack of a better term - working girl education program. I wouldn’t be surprised if they also advised drug dealers narcotics entrepreneurs on avoidance of certain penalties for their activities. So many employees fired, arrested, indicted and whatever else we don’t know about…

Exhibit E - Even the aforementioned corrupt (non-)Representatives and Senators were forced to stand up against funding ACORN - well, most of them anyway. 7 Senators and 75 Representatives didn’t have the (fill in the blank with the word of your choice - guts, cojones, or whatever) to see the writing on the political wall and stand up for what’s right. Let’s hope it comes back to haunt them in their next campaign.

(H/T Hot Air )

Who knew that Jon Stewart over at The Daily Show could have a sense of right and wrong? (Warning: Stewart uses some “salty” language only some of which is bleeped out but even the bleeped ones are easily discernible.)

It’s pretty amazing to see someone so reliably liberal showing this kind of reaction to the ACORN videos. Pay particular attention to his parting shot - at himself and other nitpickers - in a response to a clip of Michelle Malkin from Fox News. What’s next, Olbermann praising O’Reilly for, well, anything?

If Stewart knows what’s going on and can have this reaction to it, what’s wrong with Charlie “Bush Doctrine” Gibson and the other MSM’ers who don’t have a clue?

H/T to my friend Cathy Bell for pointing this video clip out to me. Congressman Mike Rogers (R-MI) makes comments about one of the many health care bills…

I love how Rogers unwaveringly makes his points - using facts and quoting from the bill, although I don’t think this is Granny Nan’s favorite bill (HR 3200) that he’s referring to. There are so many House versions of Obamacare that sometimes it’s hard to keep them straight.

Cathy’s comment that accomanied the video is also instructive - “I’m part of this 15% uninsured population, but I’m 100% in agreement with this congressman. There just HAS to be a plan that doesn’t involve government control. Why is that so difficult for BO to consider? I terribly need insurance …offered to me (w/pre-existing conditions), but not at the cost of what this “reform” means for America.”

While this is anecdotal, it is evidence that even people who don’t currently have insurance don’t the government takeover. Wonder why we don’t hear about that in the MSM, huh?

Have a great day!

P.S. Just one question…doesn’t this make Rogers a racist?

I am amazed at the turnout for the rally in DC on Saturday.  For so long, it seemed like we as conservatives were willing to work only behind the scenes to accomplish our goals.  Conventional wisdom had it that conservatives would never show up for any sort of populist rally…guess conventional wisdom has been turned on its ear.

Neal Boortz asked a question on his radio show today - how does the GOP keep this activism and intensity going?  I think that question hits at the heart of the matter.

We’ve seen the original Tea Party rallies in April, the town hall protests throughout August, and now the 9/12 rally in DC (along with a vast number of local rallies for those who couldnt make it to DC).  So what’s next?

It seems to me that the best way to keep the momentum going is to schedule more rallies more frequently.  We need to keep ourselves in the public eye, whether the MSM wants to pay attention or not.  We don’t need to wait for an issue or for a bill we don’t like.  Join your local 9/12 group or your county GOP.  Volunteer for conservative causes.  In other words, do what you can to help the movement keep moving.

The DC rally showed that we can be positive and upbeat about things even when they look bleak.  We need to transfer that positivity to our everyday lives.  Let those around us know who we are and what we believe in.  Take advantage of opportunities to spread the conservative message.  As you tweet or update your status on Facebook or have any other contact with people, make sure to include your conservatism in the conversation and do it with pride.  LET IT SHOW!

Just this weekend, I had a Facebook “conversation” with a liberal friend of mine on the Left Coast.  At first, he was incredulous about the DC rally in general, but soon focused in on his belief that the health care bill did not actually create “death panels.”  He said it was one of his biggest disagreements with the GOP.  In previous debates we’ve had, I allowed his negativity to pull me into arguments rather than discussions.  This time I took another tack…I did my homework.

I presented him with the facts about HR 3200, quoting extensively from the bill itself, as well as from articles in the Washington Post.  Most convincingly, I pointed him to Ezekiel Emanuel’s article “Principles for Allocation of Scarce Medical Interventions,” in which Emanuel suggested that “promoting and rewarding social usefulness” should be used to guide the allocation of medical resources.

Because I used facts instead of emotional responses and stayed positive and level-headed, I got this response, “Well researched and supported. I’ll have more time to give this later today, after work. But I’m impressed, to say the least. I will concede that you’ve done your homework…I will re-read later today and respond more fully. But I expect not to disagree with much of what you’ve said. I appreciate the time you’ve put into this, and I do feel educated about some things I didn’t know fully.”

While I won’t say that many liberals will have the same reaction, it never hurts to try.  I can say, though, that I feel a lot better about the way I handled the situation, and that has left me more energized than I was before to take on other misconceptions of the left.  If we can all cultivate that energy and pass it on through our words and actions, nothing can stop us as we move to protect our faith, families and freedom!

1. We should honor the memory of the 9/11 victims by recommitting to the principles that have made America the best country in the world - self-reliance, limited government, and personal responsibility…LET’S ROLL!

2. In that same vein, h/t to my friend Dan Norton for posting this quote from David Wood’s Mindset on Facebook today - “ATTITUDES ARE CONTAGIOUS…. Is yours worth catching?”.  Things seem to have been going our way lately and we need to be upbeat and positive about it.  The more we can do that, the more it will spread and the more we will be able to have a successful 2010 election cycle.  Get out there and be positive!

3. Good on James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles for exposing the ACORN shenanigans in Baltimore, waiting for the inevitable “isolated incident” canard, and then releasing the DC redux today.  Kinda makes the lefty excuses look silly, doesn’t it?

4. Check out this Eagle Scout project…what a kid!  H/T to another Facebook friend, Howard Tayler, for this one…http://bit.ly/CwwRm.  Nice to see there are kids like this in the world…I think he deserves the Eagle more than just about anyone I’ve ever heard about.

5. Also check out Dan Perrin’s excellent post here today called Obama, Organizing Our Community. Who knew Oblahblah would be the best conservative organizer right now?

Have a great weekend!

Of all the arrogant things I’ve seen…

I just saw a video organized by Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher.  (see it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51kAw4OTlA0)  It has all kinds of Hollywood types telling what they pledge to do now that President Obama has been sworn in.  Things like, “I pledge to smile more,” “I pledge to laugh more,” “I pledge to love more,” “I pledge to never give anyone the finger when driving again.” You get the idea.  If that was as far as it went, I woudn’t really have a problem.

It’s when they start saying things like, “I pledge to help free 1 million people from slavery in the next 5 years” that I start to wonder where these pledges were for the past 8 years.  Was someone in the room with a gun to their heads telling them they weren’t allowed to help out at all…on any problem…anywhere?  Did they only wake up this week to see that these problems even existed?  It’s amazing to me that these self-righteous do-gooders think we won’t notice that they’ve refused to do anything to help over the past decade - in fact, they’ve actually hurt things instead of helping.

That being said, there was something much more subtle and bothersome that I heard a couple of times in the video.  Anthony Kiedis (of Red Hot Chili Peppers) said this, “I pledge to be of service to Barack Obama.” (while kissing his tatooed biceps).  Demi and Ashton said it this way, “I pledge to be a servant to our president and all mankind.”

What I want to know is…since when did the American people (or any of us as individuals) serve the President?  Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around?  Isn’t he supposed to be serving us?  Didn’t we (as a nation, not individually) elect him to do just that?  Now these self-serving, wanna-be-important people have the nerve to say they’re going to serve, when they spent the past 8 years bad-mouthing our President and our country?

That just makes my blood boil…

I recently viewed Ronald Reagan’s inaugural address from 1981.  You can find it on C-SPAN (and a lot of other sites, most likely).

The themes he talked about in the address could easily have been given this past Tuesday…fighting terrorism, dealing with economic crisis, and personal responsibility.  Sound familiar?  Maybe the Messiah Obama should have taken his cue from his Veep and lifted a few paragraphs.

Seriuosly, though, my favorite part of Reagan’s address came near the end.  He told the story of a fallen WWII soldier named Martin Treptow.  After Treptow died, his diary was found in his pocket.  Written on the fly leaf was his personal pledge - one which each of us should try to live up to.  I post it here as read by Reagan:

“America must win this war.  Therefore, I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice, I will endure.  I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone.”

Not long, but so profound.  Substitute the word “crisis” for the word “war” in the first sentence and this could be a conservative call to arms in our coming conflicts with President Obama as he tries to take us down the path to socialism.  Each of us must work, save, sacrifice, endure, and fight for what is right.  Note that Treptow emphasized fighting cheerfully.  We should avoid shrill tones, but fight we must.  Make no mistake - the whole struggle does depend on each of us, both when we act alone and when we act in concert with each other.

Once again, the Great Communicator’s words prove timely and timeless.  We could do worse than focusing on his messages of hope and renewal as we try to revitalize the conservative movement.