Mitt Romney’s attack on Gingrich for alleged lobbying prompts full-throated defense of Bush Medicare reform

Tea partier criticism of President George W. Bush and the early 2000s’ Republican Congress as oxymoronic “big government” conservatives have always focused on his signature No Child Left Behind education accountability reforms and the addition of coverage for Rx drugs via Medicare Part D.

Then Senator Rick Santorum voted for the bill, but has disavowed that vote during his current run for the GOP presidential nomination:

In the 2012 election, Senator Santorum was critical of that program. He stated that it was not funded properly as it simply spends whatever seniors need. He stated that his vote for that program was a mistake, but that he voted in favor of the reform because of other portions of the program, and that no other option was on the table. He claimed in a debate that the overall reform program had come in 40% under budget.

Will tea partiers now turn to Santorum as the more reliable conservative over his the former Speaker who this week embraced the Bush planin the Sunshine State:

I have always publicly favored a stronger Medicare program. I wrote a book in 2002 called “Saving Lives and Saving Money.” I publicly favored Medicare Part D for a practical reason, and that reason is simple. The U.S. government was not prepared to give people anything — insulin, for example — but they would pay for kidney dialysis. They weren’t prepared to give people Lipitor, but they’d pay for open-heart surgery. That is a terrible way to run Medicare.

I am proud of the fact — and I’ll say this in Florida — I’m proud of the fact that I publicly, openly advocated Medicare Part D. It has saved lives. It’s run on a free enterprise model. It also included health savings accounts and it include Medicare alternatives, which gave people choices.

At what point must conservatives conclude that Newt and Mitt both fail the tea partier test and turn to Rick Santorum when he is the only remaining viable candidate that now opposes one of the main transgressions of Republicans that inspired the smaller government, tea party movement in the first place?

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Former Speaker finally finds his “big government” voice

The tropical climate of Tampa finally loosened the Newt’s vocal cords for singing the praises of government intervention in the economy and the biggest expansion of government after LBJ’s Great Society, before ObamaCare.

Newt Gingrich is big man with big ideas who helped balance four budgets with capital gains tax cuts, and once again proved at Monday night’s GOP presidential debate that those achievements are not mutually exclusive from support for Government Sponsored Enterprises, i.e. GSEs like Freddie Mac nor Medicare Rx Drug bills.

Finally, some honesty and a contrast with Rick Santorum, who now expresses regret for his support of President George W. Bush’s signature legislation adding drug benefits to Medicare.

This breathe of fresh air from Newt Gingrich was especially welcome after his appearance the day before on Meet the Press, where he still provided no specific allegations of wrongdoing by Romney at Bain:

MR. GREGORY: You’ve raised questions about Romney’s business background, particularly his time at Bain. As he was conceding last night in South Carolina this is one of the shots that he fired across the bow. Listen. (Videotape, last night)

FMR. GOV. ROMNEY: Those who pick up the weapons of the left today will find them turned against us tomorrow. And let me be clear, if Republican leaders want to join this president in demonizing success and disparaging conservative values, then they’re not going to be fit to be our nominee. (End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: The question, Mr. Speaker, after all of these questions about Bain, is there anything beyond the questions? Where’s the beef, as was once said in politics when it comes to his management of Bain?

FMR. REP. GINGRICH: Well, I think, first of all, you don’t get any beef because you don’t get any answers. The fact is he is trying to cleverly hide behind an argument that no high school debater would ever let stand. The questions about the character, the judgment, the record of a presidential candidate, is not an attack on business. That’s silly. That would be like saying that my critique ofRomneycare as resembling Obamacare means that I’m against any kind of government involvement. That would be silly. The governor’s trying really hard to avoid answering anything whether it’s on his–the Romneycare, for example, where the news reports are that they cleansed every single computer, we have no real record of how they developed it, and we have no real understanding of the overlap between his advisers and Obama’s advisers, although President Obama says they are the same people. So I think the governor keeps trying to make these kind of ad hominem arguments that even in high school debate he would lose if he can’t do better than that.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, by all means bait and switch from Bain to RomneyCare, where one could make specific allegations detrimental to Mitt’s conservative bona fides. Of course, the problem there is that you supported ObamaCare-like individual mandates before Romney and Medicare RX coverage expansions.

We do agree that the “lobbying” allegations against Newt are misplaced. Lobbying is free speech anyway, and we shouldn’t look back now with 20/20 hindsight and blame all who favored federal government mortgage market help as responsible for the Great Recession.

What is instructive concerning Newt’s millions from Freddie Mac for history-based consulting, is his silence from 2003-2008 on the subject.  Now that was historic!

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Our native state teaches the GOP and its now Stone Mountain of Georgia-roosted gamecock a lesson: Newt is acceptable to tea partier conservatives

Mike DeVine Law Gamecock is humbled.

That so many voters that have earned my respect for so many years have chosen to support Newt Gingrich over Mitt Romney convinces me that Mitt is not so much better than Newt, that a vote for the former Speaker is not acceptable. Newt is a worthy fighter… and the crow and humble pie ordered here, here and here… needed more sugar and salt, respectively, thank you very much.

I still plan to vote for Mitt on Super Tuesday, but I don’t dismiss the primary voters of my native home state lightly. If Newt can give up the vague Bain Capital attacks and show mature discipline over the next months, he can win my enthusiastic support for the nomination and, of course, in the general election.

Romney ought to have to prove himself worthy to bear the mantle of the Party of Lincoln and Reagan as much as Gingrich ought.

May the best man win, I will be open to the idea that we need a street fighter just now, and …much more later…

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Babe Ruth’s homers were prodigious but Hank Aaron hit more

I well remember the good old days, way back in 2011, when Mitt Romney was lauded for being the great debater among those boys (and Michelle Bachmann) of Summer. Thus is the ephemeral nature of debate moments and home runs; much as was the hope for a tea partier conservative GOP presidential nominee.

Winter and the new year are ushered in by Ruthian shots against Lefty pitchers named Juan and King from the bat of the former Speaker of the House. What conservatives don’t thrill to the sound of the crack of Newt’s bat pummeling false charges of racism and reminders of ancient marital disputes best left behind closed doors?

But ball games are decided by which team scores the most runs, not by which player hit balls the farthest. The Babe hit them a mile. Hank Aaron hit them just far enough and hit more. The Babe was undone by what he did between home runs.

Thus the voters of South Carolina face a similar choice between a heavyweight named Gingrich saddled with baggage, both marital and non-marital, that could distract voters from their Obama-emptied pockets or a steady Aaron-like experienced executive named Romney.

Last week we endorsed the latter; and a less-publicized debate-moment homer from last night illustrates, we think, the wisdom of our choice:

MR. KING: OK. A subset of the jobs conversation among the candidates in this state over the past week, Mr. Speaker, has been from you and from the now-departed Governor Perry pretty sharp criticism of Governor Romney’s tenure as the CEO of Bain Capital. I want you to be specific: What do you think he did wrongthat –

MR. GINGRICH: No –

MR. KING: — makes you question his ability as a president to create jobs?

MR. GINGRICH: I think there are specific cases — Georgetown Steel would be a case here, a company in Gaffney, South Carolina — but specific cases where Bain Capital’s model — which was to take over a company and dramatically leverage it, leave it with a great deal of debt — made it less likely to survive. I think the governor ought to explain — because it started because he cited his experience as a key part of his preparation for being president. And so I think the underlying model of that kind of investment, which is very different from venture capital, ought to be explained and those cases ought to be looked at.

Ok, Newt is asked to explain, specifically, what Romney did wrong at Bain, and after several run-on sentences about “models”, the Babe Ruth of debates fouls out while admitting that things “ought to be looked at”. But aren’t those that level charges against another supposed to have already looked at them? Of course.

Plants close all the time for all sorts of reasons, 99.9999999% of which have not been owned by Bain Capital. The plant named Bain made profits (Newt, conservatives consider profits as good) after Mitt Romney took it over and the former CEO was able to wax specific about the thousands of jobs saved or created thanks to Bain.

While we are “looking at cases” involving Mitt Romney’s executive experience, let us also gaze upon the saving of the post-911 Salt Lake City Olympics and the balancing of Massachusetts’ budget.

Yes, the dredging up of attacks from a scorned ex-wife can be despicable, but this former Democrat turned-conservative, due in large part to the class envy and economic ignorance-fueled disdain for entrepreneurs and the false allocation of blame for jobs losses of my former party, finds much more disdainful, Newt’s merit-less attacks against a good businessman  about things that need to be “looked into”.

Newt’s debate home runs tell us that the former Speaker is one of the most articulate expositors of conservative principles alive today, but what does his attack on Bain tell us about him? What does the fact that he is held in contempt by so many of his former colleagues in the House? Why all the silence or worse from his “home” state of Georgia when straining to hear encouraging words? When is Newt scheduled to make another unprincipled U-turn onto a couch with Nancy Pelosi to espouse policies that would kill more jobs that did bad Freddie Mac loans?

America is suffering. Yes, the unemployment rate as measured by the preferred MSM metric is now under 9% and if enough people quit looking for work, it could get to zero. The unemployment rate on Mars is also Zero.

Capital is on the sidelines for many reasons, most all of which begin and end with the presence of Barack Obama in the Oval Office. The policies he voted for as Senator with new Democratic  majorities from 2007-08 helped precipitate the Great Recession. The policies he signed into law passed by the super-majorities of his party in 2010-11 made the economy worse. His refusal to cut spending and reduce regulations at the behest of the tea partier-produced Republican majority in the 2011-12 House have kept the so-called “recovery” tepid.

The denial of the re-election of President Obama would kick-start a real recovery. History shows that the Election of 2012 should be the GOP’s to lose.

Why would we take a chance and nominate a man with proven character flaws that got him fired as Speaker and that could alienate voters we need to garner 270 electoral votes? Just because he hits occasional tape measure debate homers? I think not.

A vote for Rick Santorum in my former native state of South Carolina tomorrow, given his improved campaign skills and integrity, including his refusal to defame venture capitalism, would be a principled vote for a man that would most likely defeat Obama.

A vote for Mitt Romney would end the back-and-forth between Republican friends and allow the campaign against the Democrats to begin now. We have had enough vetting of our own dirty laundry.

Let’s return Newt to full-time Chattering Class status where we can enjoy his home runs in safe mode.

It is Mitt that can win the pennant.

Braves pitchers and catchers report on February 19…just saying.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Palmetto State poised for pragmatic pick over preening vulture anti-capitalists

South Carolinians have seen too many shuttered textile plants never visited by Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital to fall for Newt-Perry slurs that blame the buyers of companies already failing due to the internal policies of the sellers or external policies of governments.

Vultures eat the dead. Bain, under Romney, saved jobs worth saving in the private sector (unlike the now government motors taxpayer -funded welfare “jobs” saved by President Barack Obama at a loss) by salvaging the identifiable living and the profits earned saved and created jobs, sight unseen:

The problem with the entire discussion is that jobs are being used as the only measure of the “good” done by Romney. Profits are also good as they allow companies to grow and as they return capital to investors who can then fund the creation or growth of other companies. Indeed, despite our being surrounded by Keynesian-thinking politicians who believe that nothing is as important as consumers having spending money, the indirect benefits to society of profits to investors are arguably at least as large as the indirect benefits of employment.

We have to assume that conservative movement leaders like the former Speaker of the House and a twice re-elected governor of the Lone (jobs-producing in the 21st Century so far) Star State are familiar with the the economic fundamentals that define free market capitalism and that constitutes the foundation of modern day American conservatism. Hence this2000 conservative epiphany-defined gamecock’s disdain for Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry when they launched their respective efforts in my native home state by hurling the “vulture capitalist” epithet at the successful former CEO of Bain Capital and related companies, savior of the post-911 Salt Lake City olympics, and balancer of Bay State budgets.

Mitt Romney turned Bains around three times. His job was to make a profit. He did. Profits are good. This is fundamental to conservative principles. Disparaging the buyers of troubled companies as “vultures” is anathema to conservative values and principles and must not be rewarded with the historically dispositive prize that is the SC Republican Primary.

Conservatives want Reagan (or Coolidge). We find none.

We thought Perry was the closest facsimili thereof, and while he seemed the most reliable conservative in the field before his desperation-driven avian mis-sighting, but his debate-gaffe driven microscopic caucus and primary showings prompted a second look a decidedly non-reliable Gingrich. Then he devolves into vulture anti-capitalism after being forced to defend accepting hush money from Freddie Mac. What would you expect from a guy so concerned with Air Force One plane seat accommodations. And for those that cried Huntsman when we eenie-meenie-minie-moed between Romney and Santorum, Jon dropped out today.

Evangelicals, and any conservative concerned about life, marriage, Iran, and manufacturing jobs are naturally drawn to the Roman Catholic son of a coal miner and father of enough future conservatives to swing future Iowa caucii or man a basketball team with players to spare on the bench. Good job Daddy Santorum!

We forgave Rick Santorum his support of Arlen Specter when we learned of the loyalty angle, are impressed with his arguments for tripling the child tax credit and manufacturing tax incentives, and will always respect his denunciation of the Newt/Perry vulturism when he was arguably poised to benefit the most from disingenuous, anathem-to-conservative appeals to supposed class envy-starved South Carolinians. Then we sought counsel from our fellow Southern Baptist, Richard Land:

Will evangelicals support Mr. Romney if he is the nominee? Yes, and by substantial percentages. Never underestimate the unique ability of President Obama to unify social conservatives, of every faith tradition, around his eventual opponent.

Will Mr. Romney’s Mormonism be a negative factor for evangelicals? It will for some, but remember that in Iowa the 60% of voters who identified themselves as evangelicals gave 42% of their votes to a Mormon (Mr. Romney) or a Catholic (Messrs. Santorum and Gingrich), while giving only 38% of their vote to fellow Protestants (Messrs. Perry and Paul and Mrs. Bachmann). So much for narrow denominational prejudices.

One should note also that several prominent evangelicals, such as former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson, are enthusiastically supporting Mr. Romney.

Even Pastor Robert Jeffress, who may be Mr. Romney’s most vocal evangelical critic and last fall referred to Mormonism as a “cult,” has stated: “If it comes down to Romney versus Obama I’m voting for Romney.” I’ve heard the same sentiment from hundreds of evangelical pastors over the past two months.

This USC Gamecock knew as much even before he made his roost atop Stone Mountain of Georgia, supported Mitt early on in 2007 before Fred Thompson teased us, and after Bachmann, Cain, Perry and Newt imploded.

Santorum would make us proud as President. So would Mitt. They both exude American Exceptionalism and would either’s election as president would inspire the re-entry of billions if not trillions of currently sidelined dollars into the economy.

I recently made my executive experience-driven choice in Mitt Romney. But what is most important about this stage of the GOP nomination contest is that conservatives not reward vulture slurs against economic liberty.

I am confident that home of the winner of the last two College World Series will not let me down.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Originally published January 16, 2007 in The Charlotte Observer.

Achieve King’s dream with equal treatment
Misguided liberal policies assume blacks are inferior victims
MIKE DEVINE
Special to the Observer

“Daddy, why would somebody want to shoot a preacher?”

That was a precocious little boy’s first reaction upon seeing the headline of The Spartanburg Herald announcing the assassination of the 39-year-old leader of the civil rights movement, Martin Luther King Jr.

No holiday cries out for a progress report more than the one President Ronald Reagan signed into law in 1983 and that America celebrated yesterday. Where do we stand nearly 39 years after King’s death on April 4, 1968?

Brandon Woolfolk, a 23-year-old African American junior at UNC Charlotte presently working as a hotel clerk, told me last week that “One change is that back then blacks feared whites. Today, they fear other blacks.”

Dewey Tullis, a life-long educator and prominent black member of the Spartanburg County Democratic Party, told The Wall Street Journal before last fall’s election he was supporting the Republican running for South Carolina’s top education post because, “Frankly, I’m tired of seeing our young black men graduate high school without knowing how to read and write.”

One main reason for these disturbing assessments: the well-intentioned but misguided liberal policies implemented immediately after the race-based “Jim Crow” laws were abolished. New race-based laws were passed, old non-race-based laws were misinterpreted by liberal judges, and new welfare policies kicked the black father out of the house and made Uncle Sam daddy.

Character building a priority

By contrast, King’s dream was that people be judged based, not on skin color, but rather on the content of their character. There is hope, however.The Charlotte-Mecklenburg African American Agenda conference earlier this month, whose agenda “priorities” could have been written by whites, shows that more and more blacks get it and are about the business of character building. Event organizers even invited as a featured speaker National Public Radio correspondent and Fox News commentator Juan Williams, author of “Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America — and What We Can Do About It.”

Now, what about Caucasians?

I became active in the Democratic Party mainly due to my disdain for the racism I saw in the 1970s. Happily, I watched most of the Republican racism melt under the weight of King’s mainstream American and Judeo-Christian moral arguments. Unhappily, I watched disturbing pathologies develop within my party and its members.

Then, during my five years in Atlanta before moving to the Queen City, I experienced what I call a “conservative epiphany,” in large part due to the covertly racist behavior of fellow liberal Democrats in their treatment of blacks as inferior victim dependents and their overt disdain for the Christian faith that inspired King.

Radio talk show host Dennis Prager recently described being shown a video of people reacting to a talk show organized by a firm that specializes in analyzing such shows for their producers. Prager noticed that the carefully chosen panel included no blacks. The firm explained that in their previous experience they discovered that after a black person gave their opinion about a show, white people would rarely offer differing opinions for fear of being deemed racist.

This condescending and misplaced white guilt and fear of the Political Correctness Police must end.

Face down the PC crowd

I don’t remember Daddy’s answer to his eldest son’s innocent inquiry some 39 years ago, but there is nothing I better remember than the way he lived his life. Dad employed the non-race-based Golden Rule found in Matthew’s Gospel as he coached some of the first racially integrated little league baseball teams in my hometown and insisted that blacks employed with him at Southern Railway be held to the same standards as whites.

King based his civil rights message largely on that New Testament passage, which admonishes us to do unto others as we would have them do unto us, as well as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, which acknowledge equality before our Creator and require equal treatment under the law.

Quite simply, whites must stop treating blacks as inferiors, and muster the courage to face down the PC crowd to make King’s dream more of a reality.

This was Gamecock’s first column in the Main Stream Media after 5 years as Legal editor for The (Decatur) Champion, the DeKalb County(Ga) legal organ weekly newspaper and three years as a conservative blogger.

Link to Observer Column: http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/16468980.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp

This former Rick Perry supporter recently announced his post-vulture Bain capitalist-attacks decision to express my preference that Mitt Romney (in a close call over Rick Santorum, with Jon Huntsman now a distant third for me) win the South Carolina primary as I think it critical to the conservative movement that a win my native state not be attributed to anti-capitalist, class warfare-aiding attacks. I think a win by either Newt Gingrich or Rick Perry would be bad for the movement.

I also think that Florida has now edged S.C. as the most important Republican Party contest.

My question to current Perry supporters is who they think is the second best choice.

Mitt’s free market capitalism brand is the best bet to drink at an Obama re-election denial tea party

The depths of Great Depression II and the historic 2010 tea partier conservative-driven Republican Party mid-term landslide encouraged dreams of a Reagan-like 2012 GOP nominee to retire President Barack Obama to a resumption of his autobiographical writing career.

The crashing sounds of Bachmann’s looseness with the facts, Cain’s knowledge gaps and Perry’s non-creative vulture mis-sighting-destruction awoke this South Carolina gamecock from Utopian REM eye-battings to the reality of imperfect choices absent Gippers and Silent Cals.

We so wanted one of the most historically reliable conservatives to be the 2012 standard bearer for our Party of Lincoln. But we learn anew that voters can’t rehabilitate those with character lapses or lacking the campaign skills required in the second decade of the 21st Century. We can’t blame voters in Iowa, New Hampshire nor the Palmetto State for weighing electability based on actual campaign performance, much less 11th hour anti-capitalist attacks against companies that make offers to buy other companies that are accepted by those other companies.

We are proud of our fellow social conservative from the Keystone State for vigorously defending the heart of conservatism, i.e. the free market capitalism of Mitt Romney, even if he is the lone remaining obstacle to a Rick Santorum as GOP presidential nominee. We would be proud to support him or Jon Huntsman in the Fall. Rick Perry and Newt Gingrich lost us with their leftist attacks on BainCapital.

But when we factor in all of the issues and electability, George Will’s minimization of the urgency of the latter notwithstanding, we must now endorse the former governor of the Bay State and believe that the primary voters of our native Palmetto State will once again choose the GOP nominee when a plurality of them vote for Mitt Romney in 11 days.

Do I think Rick Santorum could defeat Barack Obama? I do. The smug President of Food Stamp Nation that voted for all the policies that led to this recession and who focused on stimulus pay-offs to state government union dues paying workers, oil drilling moratoriums, Keystone Pipeline job delays and fundamentally changing America via ObamaCare, would have a hard time garnering more electoral votes than even a warm bucket of non-Ron Paul-flavored spit.

But Mitt Romney is the better choice between those left standing on the issues, campaign skills and electability.

President Obama must be removed from office. His removal alone will spark a major economic recovery by bringing investor capital off of the sidelines where fear of what Obama could do next, and the certainty of what he won’t do, now rules.

Obamacare must be repealed and it won’t be if Obama is re-elected. The beltway George Wills counsel that we have “survived” equally bad presidencies and that no “apocalypse” will result from an Obama “stymied” by a GOP-majority House and Senate.

Mere survival and stymieing? Avoiding apocalypse? Is that the standard for a GOP “win”, even if that were the only goal? We can’t reverse any of the decades-long big government creep that Will bemoans with mere stymieing.

Mitt Romney will unleash the American economy, defend the nation from evil enemies and be a social conservative advocate. Yes, I believe his pro-life epiphany was sincere.

Mitt Romney believes in America. His goals are not George Will minimalism “informed” by a fantasy of a Congress-led 19th Century America. Since Washington, America is best governed, first and foremost, when we choose at least one man with courage that can make a majority. Mitt can be that man.

In the wake of Romney’s Granite State win, we hear:

And this President wakes up every morning, looks out across America and is proud to announce, “It could be worse.”

It could be worse? Is that what it means to be an American? It could be worse?

Of course not.

What defines us as Americans is our unwavering conviction that we know it must be better.

That conviction guides our campaign.  It has rallied millions of Americans in every corner of this country to our cause.

Over the last six months, I’ve listened to anxious voices in town meetings and visited with students and soldiers.  In break rooms and living rooms, I’ve heard stories of families getting by on less, of carefully planned retirements now replaced by jobs at minimum wage.  But even now, amidst the worst economy since the Great Depression, I’ve rarely heard a refrain of hopelessness.

Americans know that our future is brighter and better than these troubled times.  We still believe in the hope, the promise, and the dream of America.  We still believe in that shining city on a hill.

We know that the future of this country is better than 8 or 9% unemployment.

It is better than $15 trillion in debt.

It is better than the misguided policies and broken promises of the last three years – and the failed leadership of one man.

The President has run out of ideas.  Now, he’s running out of excuses.  And tonight, we are asking the good people of South Carolina to join the citizens of New Hampshire and make 2012 the year he runs out of time.

President Obama wants to put free enterprise on trial. In the last few days, we have seen some desperate Republicans join forces with him. This is such a mistake for our Party and for our nation.  This country already has a leader who divides us with the bitter politics of envy. We must offer an alternative vision.  I stand ready to lead us down a different path, where we are lifted up by our desire to succeed, not dragged down by a resentment of success. In these difficult times, we cannot abandon the core values that define us as unique — We are One Nation, Under God.

Mitt Romney has the Reagan vision and will make us proud as the next President of the United States.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Apportioning blame in case Ronald Reagan Jr. is not the 2012 GOP presidential nominee

After the historic tea partier-inspired conservative Republican landslide that was the Election of 2010, we had every reason to believe that Reaganites-a-plenty would be vying for the opportunity to retire the disaster that is President Barack Obama.

Surely there are scores, if not hundreds, of articulate, experienced and reliable conservatives on fiscal, social and national security issues who posses the skill sets to campaign and govern effectively? Maybe they exist, but we haven’t seen them in Des Moines, Dubuque or Davenport of late.

Yet, we are told that if Iowa social conservatives turn to reliable pro-lifer Rick Santorum in larger numbers than for Newt Gingrich, Michelle Bachmann or Rick Perry that they will be “shooting us in the foot again” by “ensuring [that] Mitt Romney wins the nomination”.

We largely share what we think is the underlying fear of the esteemed (by us as well) leader of Redstate.com, i.e. that a Mitt Romney nomination would be another McCain-like lost opportunity for bold conservative leadership. Hence our own preference for Rick Perry as the most reliable conservative and several others before we would “settle” for Romney. But while we understand that this is the nomination bout and that there are stark differences between conservatives, those differences pale in comparison to those between any of our non-Paul contenders and the Leftist disaster that has occupied 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for the past three years, but I digress.

Iowa not a bellwether

Why the seeming priority of pre-maturely assessing blame for a Romney nomination victory to a small group of unique social conservatives making choices between a crowded field of flawed non-Reagans in a state that rarely has even a minor effect on subsequent contests? As Michael Barone so succinctly stated, “as goes Iowa…so goes…Iowa” and not the nation.

Have those that would cast stones at Iowa social conservatives been rock solid for an obvious best non-Romney-facilitating choice from jump street? Hardly. Moreover, the argument being made about the supposed “danger” of an Iowa caucus vote for the Keystone State loser to Bob Casey, itself, factors in viability. So shouldn’t Iowa social conservatives be afforded the same privilege in finding the more reliable tea partiers wanting based on poor debate performances and other campaigning deficiencies? Obviously.

Who knew social conservatives preferred pro-lifers?

Yes, one can construct a long list of conservative grievances against Rick Santorum. Is his list so much longer than those against the other non-Pauls that a vote for him is akin to assaults on extremities with a deadly weapon? We think not.

Coalescing around one tea partier would be a viable tactic if the main strategic concern is that Mitt Romney not be the nominee, but merely bemoaning the fact that particular Iowa results will not supposedly be a net negative in advancing that concern and blaming “social conservatives” for finally settling for a pro-life candidate in a crowded field, and staking out  a position to blame that group for a possible result down the road is quite unfair to social conservatives in particular, and Iowans generally.

If Perry doesn’t defeat Romney, its Perry’s fault

If Mitt Romney wins the GOP presidential nomination, it will overwhelmingly be the “fault” of his opponents for not running better campaigns.

Moreover, social conservatives in Iowa are not the same as those in Dixie. Iowa caucuses are “closed” in name only, given that one may register Republican at the caucus, rather than having to have been so registered for weeks or months earlier as in truly closed primaries or caucuses. Voters are not so easily defined and pigeonholed and most social conservatives are three-legged stool Reaganiteconservatives more so than any other hyphenated conservative or at least within the margin of error in such comparisons.

How would one not be deemed to have “shot us all in the foot” thus ensuring that Mitt Romney wins the nomination given such a crowded field of poor tea partier campaigners? One would think that not voting for Romney would be the sine qua non for escaping blame? But no, one must engage in the supposed exact science of assessing viability going forward based upon a lack of organization and money outside Iowa?

Would an anti-Romney vote for the three-headed Perry/Newt/Bachmann entry really be for a campaign juggernaut flush with money and volunteers in the non-Iowa Lower 47? Of course not. There is no such non-Romney machine out there.

This social con doesn’t get the seeming need to define the race as anti-Romney in the first place and then to assess blame for a Romney nomination against social conservatives that don’t vote for Romney.

Moreover, if one seeks to assess blame, shouldn’t one specifically define exactly where to aim to miss our feet? I think so.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Mike DeVine Law Gamecock (note barrister’s wig) roosted atop Stone Mountain of Georgia, resolves that Americans, Canadians and/or Swedes:

1) Hold the last, first-in-the-nation caucuses, in Iowa; and the last, first-in-the-nation primary, in New Hampshire, respectively

2) Show photo IDs to vote

3) Nominate a tea partier conservative as the Republican Party nominee for President of the United States

4) Elect the Republican Party nominee to be the 45th President of the United States

5) Overturn ObamaCare in the Supreme Court of the United States

6) Build a large, new oil refinery in the United States for the first time since 1976

7) Build Boeing planes in South Carolina

Build the Keystone pipeline from Canada to Texas

9) Award Nobel Peace Prizes to those that actually achieve (Gamecock nominates the Armed Forces of the United States of America)

10) Make an actual person 2012′s Time Magazine Person of the Year

Cockstradamus, still on semi-permanent sabbatical in The Azores, predicts that the following will occur in 2012 A.D.:

1) The Fighting Gamecocks of the University of South Carolina (USC Founded 1801) will defeat the Nebraska Cornhuskers and thus set a single season school football record with 11 wins and will finish in the Associated Press Top Ten for the first time in their history.

2) An SEC team will “win” the “mythical” BCS “national championship”, the offenses of Oklahoma State Cowboys and the Stanford Cardinal, notwithstanding.

3) Super Bowl XLVI winner: Saints and an alien for Planet Purdue named Brees

4) Final Four: Ohio State, Kentucky, Indiana and Murray State

5) USC will return to the College World Series seeking their third consecutive NCAA baseball national championship.

6) The Atlanta Braves will defeat the Los Angeles Angels at Anaheim by way of Burbank and Malibu in the 2012 MLB World Series.

7) The winner of the Florida primary will be the Republican nominee for President of the United States.

The GOP will retain control of the United States House of Representatives after the Election of 2010.

9) Democrats will lose control of the United States Senate after the Election of 2012.

10) President Barack Hussein Obama will not be re-elected in the Election of 2012.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

The Palmetto State’s new law actually provides free state-issued photo identification cards to all that need them just like the laws of all the other states with such laws that the Department of Justice either pre-cleared or decided not to contest.

So what is the difference between the South Carolina law as opposed to the laws of Georgia (also upheld by their state’s highest court), that DOJ approved and Indiana (also upheld by the nation’s highest court) that DOJ declined to contest?

It is not the language of the respective laws, all of which avoid any semblance of a Jim Crow-style poll tax by, not only providing for the issuance of free photo ID voter registration cards, but also by authorizing a proactive educational campaign as well as allowing for non-photo ID voters to cast provisional ballots on Election Day that can be authenticated later with photo IDs obtained after Election Day.

Despite the above, no less than former President Bill Clinton has characterized photo ID laws as a “return to Jim Crow”, but I digress.  I defer:

The court’s liberal lion, then-Justice John Paul Stevens, wrote for the majority that Indiana’s law “is unquestionably relevant to the State’s interest in protecting the integrity and reliability of the electoral process.” Indiana offered free voter ID cards to all citizens, so the inconvenience of picking up an ID at the Department of Motor Vehicles wasn’t an undue burden and was reasonably balanced by the state’s interest in reducing fraud, Justice Stevens wrote.

So, could it be that South Carolina’s sin was the passage of their law too soon after the failure of President Barack Obama’s economic policies became apparent and too soon before his re-election bid?

Holder’s assistant deputy AG in the Civil Rights Division claims in his pre-clearance denial letter that the new law “abridges” the right to vote of an alleged 81,938 “minority citizens who are already registered to vote [in S.C.] and who lack DMV-issued identification”, thus rendering them “effectively disenfranchised”; and that the state has not yet finalized the proposed procedures to implement the issuance of free photo IDs and an education campaign necessary to “mitigate” the new law’s “discriminatory effects”.

S.C., not DOJ, purposefully identified non-photo ID holders for the purpose of facilitating the issuance of free state-issued such voter ID cards to them.

The irony in this claim is that South Carolina, unlike Indiana and Georgia, mandated that the state identify all those registered voters without photo IDs solely for the purpose of making sure that they were issued photo IDs!

The claim of such effects is based upon a disparity of 1.6% between whites and non-whites who lack photo IDs. Disparities of this kind do not and should not legally establish illegal discrimination, which should ordinarily require proof of intent, but even judged by the standards of the “pro-institutional racism” crowd, 1.6% is microscopically and insignificantly puny.

S.C. law treats all citizens equally. Is that what upsets liberal Democrats?

But let us return to the fundamental, underlying allegation, i.e. that to require that voters present photographic proof of their identification as a valid registered voter somehow “abridges the right to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group” under the Voting Rights Act of 1965.  How so, especially when one can obtain the required photo-ID for free from the state?

Does there exist a constitutional right to vote without showing a photo ID? Of course not. But there does exist the right of the DOJ under Section 5 of the 1965 law to harass, er ah, I mean, “pre-clear” voting law changes in mostly Southern states. Those states have the burden of proof under the Act to show that proposed changes have neither the “purpose or effect of denying or abridging” the right to vote.

Shouldn’t the fact that citizens of all races, colors and language minority groups, i.e. ALL voters, must submit photo-Ids to vote meet that burden? Obviously.

Real Jim Crow vs. Democratic Party-versions of same

We should remind those that think South Carolina circa 2011 A.D. equals the antebellum or pre-1965 A.D. Jim Crow South, that neither involuntary servitude nor one-drop rule, race-based voting laws applied to ALL citizens or voters. The progress obtained after the War between the States, Brown v. Board and the Civil and Voting Rights Acts was that no person could be a slave of another and that all citizens are entitled to equal protection of the laws.

It seems that too many liberals and Democrats refuse to be content with equal rights. Holder’s own DOJ has expressed the sentiment that the intent of civil and voting rights laws are only to protect non-white victims from white perpetrators, which sentiment was vividly on display when charges were dropped last year against billy club-wielding, voter suppressing-New Black Panther Party members in Philadelphia.

Not being content with equal protection of the laws, having to run for re-election during Great Depression II despite the passage of the liberal Democrat legislationwish list that was supposed to fix the economy two years ago, and not being able to defend liberal legislation wish lists but desiring to retain and wield power anyway; the Bill Clintons, Eric Holders, and Barack Obamas (and, sadly, even civil rights hero John Lewis) of the world end up contorting themselves into positions that essentially insult the intelligence of Blacks and other minorities as too stupid to obtain a free, state-issued photo ID.

The contortions continue when they deny the fraud-prevention intent of new photo Id laws by insisting that we “know” that voter fraud is not a problem in the United States. Really? This from the same crowd that still thinks the presidency was stolen from Al Gore in Florida 2000 and that a conspiracy between President George W. Bush and Diebold rigged voting machines in Ohio in 2004 to deny John Kerry the office?

Will 90%-plus of African-American voters continue to say “Thanks, may I have another” after having their intelligence insulted once again by the Democratic party?

Now, we are confident that the Democratic Party of Joseph Kennedy and Richard Daley can still get photo IDs for enough dead to re-elect Rahm Emanuel, but can anyone deny that photo Ids serve the purpose of accurate identifications? Of course not. But then again, the Attorney General that makes fast and furious claims of racism against he and Obama when confronted with his Fast and Furious incompetence or worse, let us know last week that he favors “universal and automatic” voter registration!

So much for identification due diligence from the Obama Administration unless you are a minor child or octogenarian seeking to Fly Delta?

The real denial of equal protection is the application of the Voting Rights Act as a racist tool against Southern States, which Justice Clarence Thomas deems unconsitutional. This action, coupled with NLRB’s coercive and unjustified actions against Boeing that cost South Carolina 20,000 jobs for the past three years; Obama’s gangster/Chicago-style government threatening Bank CEOs with pitchforks; court order-violating oil drilling moratoriums; EPA executive overreach; and vows by the nation’s Chief Executive to “go around” Congress while not enforcing the Defense of Marriage Act reveals a Candidate as President willing to do anything to gain a second term.

Would he really refrain from Motor Voter-style, universal Democratic, citizen or non-citizen suffrage to garner at least 270 Electoral College votes? If you think so, I have a bridge to sell you so you can get to future Brooklyn Nets games.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. – John 1:14

Third Century Christian theologian Origen deemed the celebrations of birthdays the work of sinners, not saints; and so opposed the celebration of the birth of Jesus as if he were a pharaoh or king.

Seventeen hundred winter solstices later, we wonder if he would more vociferously bemoan the attention given the passing of the most celebrated atheist of the 21st Century. (Especially given Scriptural references to the Son of Man as “King of kings”, but we understand that Christ’s realm is “not of this earth” and that we are not qualified to cross theological swords with the distinguished Alexandrian scholar.)

Christopher Hitchens, the author of God is not Great: How Religion poisons Everything, died ten days before Christmas and it has been curious to see how his passing has been received by our divided culture, especially given his excommunication from The Left over his support for the war in Iraq.

For instance, last night on Hugh Hewitt’s talk radio show, the self-described catholic evangelical conservative re-broadcast a three-hour interview he conducted with Hitchens soon after the release of his Hitch-22 memoir in 2010. Why would such a strong Christian develop such an attachment to the author of such venomous diatribes against Mother Teresa and celebrate his passing just two days before Christmas Day?

Yes, we conservatives were thrilled to have him join us in compassion for the Kurds and other victims of Saddam Hussein and in opposing the radical Islamist threat generally; and we appreciated his contempt for the corrupt acts of Bill Clinton. But let us weigh the glory of a liberal partially mugged by conservative-converting reality with this polemic on Mother Teresa and the Roman Catholic Church:

This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan.

As to the latter, we are reminded of Aunt Esther’s “I’ll take money from the Devil to do God’s work” after discovering that Nephew Fred Sanford’s contributions to the church were gambling winnings.

But what are we to make of Hitchen’s vitriol against a woman that chose to live and serve with the poorest of the poor of her own free will. There’s more:

One of the curses of India, as of other poor countries, is the quack medicine man, who fleeces the sufferer by promises of miraculous healing. Sunday was a great day for these parasites, who saw their crummy methods endorsed by his holiness and given a more or less free ride in the international press. Forgotten were the elementary rules of logic, that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and that what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. More than that, we witnessed the elevation and consecration of extreme dogmatism, blinkered faith, and the cult of a mediocre human personality.

Clearly Hitchens’ conservative epiphany is incomplete if he thinks there is a “cure” for poverty and that the ONLY cure was made manifest only after man first utilized rubber trees to form Trojans. Surely the British-turned American scholar had read Adam Smith and Milton Friedman, but I digress.

I think the key to Hitchens’ contempt for God, religion and Mother Teresa and so much of the chattering class’s indulgence of him lies in his above-expressed resentment of the “elevation of…the cult of a mediocre human personality.”

The Apostle Paul warned us:

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;… – 2 Timothy 4:3

The Hitch made our ears itch and we loved to scratch them, especially when the scratching was a shared contempt for liberals and their blindness to mass murder.

But aren’t we all partially blind, and can’t said blindness be, ironically, traced to the opening of our eyes:

For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. - Genesis 3:5

Ah yes, to be as knowing gods! Feels right doesn’t it. Feels so good to scratch the itch we share, that we ignore the contempt for God and his servants.

Yes, Eve bit the apple. God knew she would do so before he created a world in which he could grow sons and daughters that could choose to live with him forever. God knew that he would have to become flesh (See Christmas), dwell among us and give his only begotten son to make this miracle come true from those that believeth on him.

God knew we would fall and that the only way to pick us up would require that he do what to us would be the equivalent of us becoming a dog to save the souls of dogs.

I’m not a Roman Catholic and so don’t pretend to speak for them on beatification or purgatory. I am a Christian, though, and so share what matters most with my fellow Christians, including the flawed Mother Teresa, and can safely say that someone who on their life’s journey finally sees the light and departs from the political left over the persecution of the Kurds, had no business regressing to hate on Mother Teresa.

In his Divine Comedy, Dante describes his Purgatorio, as life’s journey in surrendering our life to God and letting him help us overcome deadly sins like pride, greed and envy. In this regard, Christians and atheists share the journey of life and the overcoming of, or succumbing to, such sins.

Christopher Hitchens was a life in progress. I don’t pretend to read hearts and souls; and while the utterances of his lips bespeak unbelief, he also reminds of God’s admonition in Revelation 3:16 to the ambivalent that, “So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.”

Clearly then, Christopher was too cold to be spued out from God’s mouth and so I pray that Dante’s vision extends to the after-life, for Hitchens’ sake. Meanwhile, I am reminded to “Go ye” and bear witness to Scripture that admonishes us to rely not on any such purgatorial wishes, and to make more Christmases merrier by turning people hot for Christ before they leave this earth.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

DeVine Law Gamecock’s Stone Mountain of Georgia roost-view of what matters most about the news, politics and law of 2011:

Unemployment and the Economy

If enough Americans give up on finding a job, the regularly reported unemployment rate (U-3) could fall to Zero percent. As it happens, the current U-3 rate of 8.6% would stand at over 11% if the labor force were as large as it was in 2007. The more comprehensive U-6 rate measuring all those that are unemployed and those only able to find part-time work is now at Depression Era levels over 17%, which rate doesn’t count self-employed individuals nor those that have dropped out. Over one in five American men are no longer in the labor force.

Jobs Plans, Occupiers and Class Warfare

Three years after President Barack Obama and super-majorities of his fellow Democrats in Congress enacted their Stimulus-Dodd-Frank-ObamaCare-GM takeover/UAW Bailout-Solyndra, anti-Keystone Pipeline and anti-Boeing jobs in right-to-work states, Gulf Oil and ANWR oil-drilling moratorium agenda; Gross Domestic Product (GDP) stands at an anemic 1.8%.

The response? Democrats and their Community Organizer-in-Chief embrace the American “Occupy Wall Street” iteration (We address the foreign Arab Spring element further below)  of Time Magazine’s 2011 “Protester” Person of the Year, and class warfare, that echo President Obama’s threat to release the “pitchforks” against CEOs two year in ago. Meanwhile too many Republicans bemoan their occupation of a mere one-half of one-third of the government and refuse to refute the alleged “moral” case for taxing millionaires, as more and more Americans earn less “unequal” and lower incomes.

Admittedly, it would take much courage to risk subjection to leftist media spin during a government shutdown for the GOP to insist upon a halt to compromises dominated by job-killing factions a/k/a the Democratic Party in lieu of a return to the greatest job creating plan on earth, i.e. The free enterprise empowered by the Constitution of the United States.

Arab Springs never go out like a lamb

Leading from behind produced a draw in Libya and neither the U.S., Israel nor the civilized world are better off with the Muslim Brotherhood of terrorist progenitors ruling Egypt instead of Hosni Mubarak. Iraq, the only democracy in the Middle East thanks to massive U.S. and freedom-loving Iraqi sacrifices after 911, after three years of elections with no radical sectarian factions gaining traction, is sacrificed to Obama’s appeasement of Iran project.

But don’t forget, Usama bin Laden is dead. Feel safer? After all, the Commander-in-Chief didn’t offend Members-Only-Jacket-ijad by destroying our fallen drone on Persian soil.

Crime, Punishment and Selective Rules of Law

On the heels of 2010′s Justice Department (DOJ) refusal to prosecute billy club-wielding New Black Panthers, comes Attorney General Eric Holder’s embrace ofBill Clinton‘s moral equivalence evaluation of Voter ID laws with a return to Jim Crow, the whistle-blowing of Alabama’s former Democratic Rep. Arturs Davis notwithstanding. DOJ Obama appointees make clear their interpretation that the Civil and Voting Rights Acts only protect non-white victims.

As 2012 nears, no Obama/Biden-hosted Beer Summit resolutions are scheduled. But, the FBI reports that crime is down and the Fast and Furious assault on the right to bear arms in self defense has come to a halt. President Obama and Atlanta’s King & Spaulding law firm refuse to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act due to “diversity” concerns. Meanwhile, K&S continue their pro bono defense of illegal enemy terrorist combatants in U.S. courts. Feel safer?

Weak Tea?

Tea partying conservatives made the mid-term elections of 2010 the biggest GOP landslide since 1948, yet none of their 2011 nominees for 2012 are named Newt or Romney. The hope of Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 Plan and Perry’s Texas jobs miracle have given way to higher Ron Paul floors in Iowa. Yes, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney have been nudged to the right by the conservative base, but could either be relied upon to resist their instincts to “reach across the aisle” for Beltway media approval after they prevent Obama’s re-election? Stay tuned for for our 2012 Year in Review exactly 366 days from today.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to Examiner readers and writers all!

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

During the ten years of my writing career, I have concluded each column with the famous quote of my fellow South Carolinian, War of 1812 hero and former President of the United States, Andrew Jackson: “One man with courage makes a majority.”

Returning to Atlanta in 2009 ravaged by the bursting of the housing bubble after a 2+year stint in Charlotte, N.C. as corporate counsel for a real estate investment firm that went bust, a friend of my best friend arranged for me to lease a portion of a her friend’s house as an office and residence. That housemate, landlord and friend became my female Jacksonian hero and is my entry in Examiner.com’s America Inspired competition.

No, Suzy Kilgo wasn’t struck by a British soldier as a teen, nor did she twice rescue her country from dissolution by first leading a ragtag army to defeat the greatest military force on earth at the Battle of New Orleans or  prevent her home state from secession while President. But Suzy sure has rescued people and at-risk animals, despite the required  sacrifices of time and money, in ways that this beneficiary of her charity deems heroic and inspirational.

Things started out well for this writer when I arrived, but within a year our economic fortunes took a sharp turn for the worse as Great Depression II picked up steam. A native of DeKalb County and a fixture in the Stone Mountain community, Suzy was not immune.

Like so many in the naughts of the 21st century, she became immersed in the real estate industry both as an employee of major firms and as a self employed agent from time to time. Suzy developed a reputation for relentless hard work and developed special skills that enabled employers to essentially have their firms run by her. But, during the past year as the housing industry reached depths unknown since even Jackson’s days of the early 19th century, Suzy’s hours of work were greatly reduced, thus threatening her ability to keep her underwater home.

Throughout these years, Suzy continued to lead her homeowners association and rescue those worse off than herself with shelter and food, whether they were other victims of the economy or abused and/or abandoned dogs and cats, due to her passion to alleviate the suffering of all of God’s creatures. She maintained a Christ-like love and tolerance for people and helped the disabled with fellowship and assistance, all while overcoming much adversity in her own life.

Suzy is my hero and example of how to live in troubled times. Suzy is a true Georgia Peach that inspired this South Carolinian and will now inspire America via this contest. And it warms my heart that no matter the outcome of the competition and no matter the economic suffering Suzy has endured and continues to endure, that this story has a happy ending.

Suzy was married a few weeks ago to a wonderful man. May God bless Suzy and her new mate with a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

[I encourage readers to register with Examiner.com and vote for Suzy Kilgo in the America Inspired competition.]

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Claiming fatigue from kicking cans down the road, Speaker of the House John Boehner engineered a rejection of a Democratic Party-controlled Senate-passed bill that would have cleared the way for the Canadian Keystone Pipeline project that President Barack Obama has delayed for three years of “study”.

The bill, which also extends unemployment benefits and the payroll tax cut for 60 days, would have authorized construction on the oil pipeline from Canada to the Gulf unless the President explicitly rejected the project before March 1, 2011.

Instead, not only may the Obama Administration play both sides of the debate while raking in campaign funds from unions and environmentalists, but the Republican Party will more easily be depicted as Scrooges raising taxes on the poor and middle class and killing 20,000 jobs.

All because of a sudden ideological aversion to temporary tax measures that do nothing to provide incentives for job creators? How can this be when this same Speaker has had no trouble in kicking many such tax cut cans down the road over the past year. Other cans kicked down the road by the GOP House for fear of government shutdown ad campaigns have been refusing to remove ObamaCareimplementation funds from continuing resolutions; corporate welfare for food inflation-causing ethanol subsidies; and draconian debt ceiling “super-committee” defense sequestration cuts.

Before today’s action President Obama owned the killing of 20K good paying jobs at the behest of radical EPA regulators. Now, the mass-murderer of millions of jobs via non-stimuli, Dodd-Frank, Gulf Oil Moratoriums and ObamaCare bills gets a reprieve, courtesy of an early Christmas present from the most powerful Republican in America.

Is Boehner tired of being Speaker of the House of Representatives? Does he pine for the days of minority status and the resulting free time for more Marlborosand tee times?

How else to explain the rejection of the first gift from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democrats in over three years?

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation reports that crime in America is down, but too many in state and federal governments wouldn’t know a crime if billy club-wielding New Black Panthers intimidated white voters outside of a polling booth on election days. But just let an election registrar ask a black person for a photo ID before they vote for sheriff and the “return of Jim Crow” is at hand, according to a former President of the United States and faux civil rights “leaders.”

Moreover, the current President of the United States has even deemed the police as criminals when they questioned a man trying to jimmy his way into a Harvard professor’s house. Only a “Beer Summit” at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue got Barack Obama’s mind right about such crime-identification stupidity.

Into this milieu comes the just released FBI’s Preliminary Semiannual Uniform Crime Report which finds Metro Atlanta crime rates generally down in the first six months of 2011 as compared to the first half of 2010.

Atlantans are reminded of similar reports of crime down in 2009 from 2008, with much of the drop in crime thought to be due in large part to self-deporting illegal immigrants in the wake of the Great Recession and a new Georgia law making it harder for illegals to obtain employment.

Surely it is good that crime is down, relatively speaking, and it is most assuredly heartwarming to have drops occur as poverty has increased, especially given decades of assurances that crime is a result economic deprivation. It seems the “experts” have missed some “data” on morality unencumbered by Marxist economic theory?

But who has time to celebrate less crime two years ago or this year, when:

• Atlanta Public School teachers conspire to essentially steal federal taxpayer No Child Left Behind money as they leave students behind in the wake of a test score teaching scandal?;
• Georgia Tech students are the victims of a violent crime wave in the heart of the City too Busy to Hate and when the City of College Park is number one in metro crime?; and
• Atlanta is home to DeKalb County prosecutors that wouldn’t even seek the death penalty against a Sheriff that murdered his successor after losing his bid for re-election and Fulton County juries that wouldn’t exact the ultimate punishment against a mass-murdering perpetrator in their own county courthouse?

The problem is that crime remains high and too many people simply won’t do what is necessary to take criminals off the streets and deter crime generally.

For instance, will Georgians now favor a proposed concealed carry law that would allow students to arm and protect themselves as do college students in Utah? Heard of any Beehive State crime waves at BYU? I didn’t think so.

Gun-free zones invite crime. Georgia Tech is a gun-free zone. So was Virginia Tech. It still is.

Praise God for the drop in crime but when the race lobby has invaded Attorney General Eric Holder’s Justice Department who view the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts as only applying to non-whites and who have so much disdain for the right to self defense that they conspire with foreign criminals to wage a “Fast and Furious” fraud campaign against the Second Amendment, we know that there is no time to celebrate statistics.

Mike DeVine

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Does the Job Killer-in-Chief have the “courage” to execute 20,000 Keystone jobs in public?

Did I miss another BP oil spill or did President Barack Obama declare his latest moratorium outlawing productive work based upon studies affirming fetal soil pain during impacted red clay abortions?

Yesterday, Congress called Obama’s veto-bluff by requiring him to make a decision on the Keystone Pipeline project within 60 days, rather than after the 2012 election.

Liberal business regulation policies carried out by Obama and the Democrats over the past three years have slaughtered millions of jobs in private. But that’s just a statistic cloaked by deniability and the low volume of Atlases shrugging.

The lethal injections administered to those domestic pursuits of happiness did not require Senate ratifications administered at dawn before press corps witnesses. But now that a foreign agent dares to compensate Americans outside of Food Stamp offices, any assassinations will, of necessity, have to be carried out before town criers.

We presume the presidential calculus behind the Congressional mandate for life or death in less than 60 days will weigh the value of votes that can be bought with Sierra Club donations versus votes lost from those that love humans more than snail darters.

Of course, we are talking about a Commander-in-Chief that studied the killing of Osama bin Laden for nine months after locating him. Professorial prudence demands patience before action, unless Harvard professors cry racism against police that dare to protect the property rights of black men.

It is criminal that 20K good paying jobs and the enhancement of U.S. national energy security has been delayed so that the federal government could justify borrowing money from China to pay government bureaucrats at EPA.

How about we lay off the EPA for 3 years while we study the danger of allowing them to continue to ravage the U.S. economy?

Obama must be fired next year, but the laws he has used to re-invent the wheel on behalf of taxpayer-funded jobs as political prizes have been in place for decades.

Obama is a Democrat. There are millions waiting to take his place and that are in place in Washington, D.C. They must go or the next 3-year study will be the decline and fall of the last best hope of man on Earth.

Mike DeVine

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Congressional Republicans should take President Obama up on his sudden concern for taking money out of the pockets of Americans, across the board.

This past week, President Barack Obama defended his push for extending the federal payroll (Social Security/FICA) tax cuts for a second year and unemployment benefits for a third year, thusly:

Independent economists, some of whom have in the past worked for Republicans, agree that if we don’t extend the payroll tax cut and we don’t extend unemployment insurance, it will hurt our economy. The economy won’t grow as fast and we won’t see hiring improve as quickly. It will take money out of the pockets of Americans just at a time when they need it.

Given all the money taken out of Americans’ pockets during Obama’s first three “fundamental change before recovery” years, I suspect that the “time” that he deems that Americans need more money in their pockets is during the President’s re-election campaign.

Now would be a great time for Speaker John Boehner to one up the White House and fashion a bill that puts more money in Americans pockets during all the other times they need it, i.e. permanently, and finally fashion a tax policy of certainty that might have a chance to stop some Atlases from shrugging.

Forget any arguments about the fiscal soundness of Social Security just because to do so would highlight the hypocrisy of past Democratic Party arguments. Hypocrisy is a puny sin and besides, the FICA “lockbox” myth was shattered years ago. Federal taxes all go into the same kitty to pay current bills anyway.

Rather, why not fashion a bill that addresses all of the ObamaDem policies that take money out of Americans’ pockets? The elected GOP is off to a good start with the insistence that three years of Keystone pipeline study is enough.

And won’t the ObamaCare individual mandate take money out of Americans’ pockets? I think so. And don’t Americans need money in their pockets in non-Obama re-election years? Yes they do.

Of course, members of the Grand Old Party will have to muster the courage to stand their ground when the Kansas reincarnation of a TR progressive threatens a veto with the class warfare card and insists that only non-rich Americans really need more money in their pockets.

Standing their ground means allowing a government shutdown to start the new year, but as far as we know, the Bowl Championship Series would not be affected and public employees guarding Old Faithful could be paid back pay after Obama caves around Martin Luther King Jr Day.

It sure would be refreshing to see Republicans seize the moral high ground for a change on the tax, spending and jobs front, which would be made easier withObamaDems forced to choose between allowing money to be taken out of the pockets of the poor and middle class due to class envy.

We suspect that the so-called 99% would not be willing to go down that ideological road, even post-Osawatomie, if it means less money “at this time”, i.e. a time when they need money to eat.

Mike DeVine

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: To ignore evil is to become an accomplice to it. …Someone else said “All that needs to happen for evil to prevail is that good men do nothing.” (Edmund Burke)

In the Election of 2010, tea partiers and conservatives sent the loudest message associated with the Grand Old Party of Lincoln since 1948. Hence, the aversion to nominating another McCain Establishment-type named Mitt Romney as the Republican Party standard bearer to replace President Barack Obama after next year’s election.

That aversion is so strong that even the man that lead the GOP out of a forty year Mosaic-like exodus from control of the House of Representatives was an afterthought when the campaign began several months ago.

Sadly, those with the best tea partier credentials in the race have proven such great disappointments that master debater Newt Gingrich now stands as the leading anti-Romney front-runner, despite his numerous non-conservative machinations (Attack on J.C. Watts, embrace of Jesse Jackson, Era of Reagan is over, Cap and trade Pelosi partnership, Paul Ryan as right-wing social engineer, etc ad infinitum) that have accumulated since his ascension to the Speakership in 1995.

That Newt rose to his present lofty poll positions in Iowa and nationally despite the above, even before the revelations of his Freddie Mac ties were revealed, is a testament to just how stark have been the flaws exposed in Michelle Bachmann(reckless with the facts), Rick Perry (foot-in-mouth disease) and Herman Cain (gaps in knowledge).

Tea partiers hold out hope that one of the above can earn a second chance at a first impression, but in the meantime, what are conservatives to conclude about a Gingrich that was paid over a million dollars by a major contributor to the housing bubble and ongoing Great Depression II?

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are government sponsored entities (GSEs) that distorted the housing market at the behest of President Bill Clinton and the Democratic Party beginning in the mid to late 1990s by requiring banks and other lending institutions to lower mortgage loan standards so that lower income families could buy homes.

Many of us have wondered why Republican control of the White House and Congress for six years in the 2000 naughts didn’t reverse the policies. Yes, Democrats led by Representatives Barney Frank and Chris Dodd in the House and Harry Reid in the Senate fought against change, including filibuster threats. Yes, Republicans including President George W. Bush and Senator John McCain warned of the danger of Fannie/Freddie policies that also included the mortgage-backed securities that later became the toxic assets that TARP never removed, but we don’t recall any conservative cacophony of opposition before Democrats took over Congress in 2007 and the financial crisis in late 2008.

Now we know why: Fannie and Freddie paid hush money to Newt Gingrich and other Republicans.

There is no problem with one cashing in on their name, power and influence, perse. There is no problem with “lobbying”, i.e. exercising one’s First Amendment rights, per se. There is no problem with giving advice in exchange for monetary compensation, per se.

But what one is being compensated for does matter.

Newt declares that he didn’t lobby for Freddie Mac. Fine and dandy. Voluminous are the things that most people don’t do. Newt declares that his advice to Freddie Mac was to stop guaranteeing bad loans. Wonderful.

Problem is that we can find no evidence that he ever uttered  a word in public against his GSE benefactor before the housing bubble burst.

Newt was not paid to give advice to Freddie Mac nor to lobby. Democrats were paid to lobby for them. Newt was paid to prevent him from lobbying against Freddie Mac as he earned his exorbitant fees.

Oh yes, I know that inside the Beltway his fees are considered reasonable. Problem is that the Beltway isn’t reasonable. Hence the tea partier movement that Newt has never been a part of.

Payments to Newt gave cover to Freddie Mac.

Now Newt wants conservatives to trust him to get rid of Freddie Mac?

Open letter to Rick Perry: Get your A-game on and but quick.

Mike DeVine

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.

[A post-Florida Gator-devouring USC gamecock's Stone Mountain of Georgia roost-view of his undergrad alma mater, Wofford College and Spartanburg hometown's hosting of the South Carolina, CBS/National Journal, Republican Party presidential debate]

Let the Big Dog eat!

The motto of Wofford Terriers’ (pictured) sports teams is “Let the Big Dog eat!”, and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich looked like the Big Dog eating away at GOP presidential nomination opponents’ leads last Saturday night.

The Speaker’s mastery of foreign policy was equaled only by Former Massachusett’s Governor Mitt Romney, both of whom made clear that they would be willing to take unilateral military action to prevent the Islamist mullahs ruling the terrorist state of Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Unfortunately for those, like me, that consider it imperative that any President of the United States maintain a credible deterrent and that we have a nominee with a bold jobs plan (like 9-9-9) fit for the depths of the present economic crisis, Herman Cain turns out to be with Ron Paul in publicly and dovishly taking the military option off the table over the issue that could drastically change life on Planet Earth one minute after Iran demonstrates its enty into the world’s Nuclear Club.

The critical exchange:

Major Garrett: This week, a U.N. nuclear watchdog agency provided additional credible evidence that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon. If you were president right now, what would you do specifically that this administration is not doing to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon?

Herman Cain: The first thing that I would do is to assist the opposition movement in Iran, that’s tryin’ to overthrow the regime. Our enemies are not the people of Iran, it’s the regime. And a regime change is what they are trying to achieve. Secondly, we need to put economic pressure on Iran, by way of our own energy independence strategy. By having our own energy independence strategy, we will impact the price of oil in the world markets, because Iran uses oil not only as a– means of currency, but they use it as a weapon.

One of the reasons that they are able to afford that nuclear weapons program, is because of oil. Secondly, we would then work to increase sanctions on Iran, along with our friends and our allies. So whereas we will not be– so that’s why I do believe that they have a nuclear weapons program and they are closer to having nuclear weapon, stopping them– the only we can stop them is through economic means.

Major Garrett: A quick follow up, Mr. Cain. You say assisting the opposition, would you entertain military assistance and opposition?

Herman Cain: I would not entertain– military opposition. I’m talkin’ about to help the opposition movement within the country. And then there’s one other thing that we could do. We could deploy our ballistic missile defense capable (UNINTEL) war ships strategically in that part of the world. We have the biggest fleet of those warships in the world. And we could use them strategically in the event that they were able to fire a ballistic missile.

Cain’s, not quite the Spartan-like fighting stance

Spartanburg is named for the Pelopennisian War/Sparta 300-like fighting spirit and skill of General Daniel Morgan’s (whose statute stands in his eponymously-named Downtown Square of the debate’s host city) “Spartan Rifles” that defeated the British in the pivotal nearby Revolutionary War Battles of Cowpens and Kings Mountain.

Aside: The late great Smokin’ Joe Frazier was born and reared by a Low Country Sharecropper in Beaufort. Later, he would be treated like an “Uncle Tom” by Nation of Islam’s Muhammed Ali and the press like the Leftist Drive-by Media has treated Herman Cain, but I digress.

President Barack Obama’s foreign policy has been to appease Iran between the killings of high-profile terrorists like Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-awlaki and Libya’s Gadaffy. Mitt made it clear that he would consider using pre-emptive military action against Iran to prevent their development of nuclear weapons. Newt made clear that Iran is and has been at war with the United States since their 1979 Islamist revolution was hastened by an Ayatollah-appeasing Democratic Party President Jimmy Carter. Michelle Bachmann bemoaned thebetrayal of our victory in Iraq, thus further emboldening Iran.

Sadly for this proud neo-con rooster, our most recent, pre-debate champion, Herman Cain made clear that Iran need not worry about the armed forces of the United States if he is elected to replace Barack Obama.

If a President won’t defend us, we won’t be defended. Congress can’t force a Commander-in-Chief to fire one shot at an enemy, no matter how many antiquated “declarations” of war they pass. The United States is The Target of would-be despots. Iran is and has long been the  greatest world sponsor of terror that has killed Americans in numbers that only al Qaeda has exceeded.

Cain’s deterrent? Help dissidents and prepare for a Cold War with SDI as our only protection? We don’t know if the Fifth Imam-seeking apocolyptic Shiites can be deterred like the Soviets. We do know that Islamists like those in Iran killed 3000 Americans on September 11, 2001 without weapons of mass destruction save for hijacked planes.

And now we know that Herman Cain’s boldness ends with tax reform at the water’s edge. This rooster still crows for a 9-9-9 Reagan-like recovery, but we can no longer lean to Cain for the nomination when he rules out preemptive action against Iran that we favored when despotic-regime changer and Muslim-Liberator  President George W. Bush had Iranian Quds and Republican Guard forces and their whole Persian country surrounded on three sides.

Leading up to the debate, it seemed that Cain had survived the faux outrageous sexual harassment accusations, as the Penn State scandal reminded that there are work-reporting requirements of the truly outrageous, as opposed to the lawyer-created victimization of hurt feelings 12 years after sweet nothings or scoldings assaulted and battered serial accusers’ feminine ears.

We were happy to hear the only female on the Wofford debate stage, devoid of any identification save for a giant “CBS” logo (Could have been a movie set near the La Brea Tar Pits…We think Wofford’s Old Main logo, pictured, would have looked better…) , defended the waterboarding of captured terrorists and that the same Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann disabused David Gregory on NBC’s Meet the Press the following morning of any notion that the federal government get involved in the continued demonization of Coach Joe Paterno, who, incidentally, followed all reporting laws.

You see, liberals imagine that with just the right laws, humans can change human nature and prevent any crime from happening in the first instance. So that, any occasion of the violation of current laws is also an occasion for passing new and improved laws. Bachmann rejected that notion as well as Gregory’s insistence that only the federal government could properly investigate child rape in the Keystone State.

We were thrilled to hear Newt voice our many crowings on the critical need to rebuild the United States Navy and maintain it as the superior and ubiquitous force across the seven seas.

We wish that the occasion of a stoppage of the Great Republican Debate Marathon 2011-2012 could have also addressed how occupier leftist Democrat-types continually demonize free market capitalists like Roger Milliken of Spartanburg who helped build the modern-day GOP and who was instrumental in  the integration of Wofford College. Never properly celebrated by the Civil Rights Industry solely-owned subsidiary of the modern day Democratic Party because he kept destructive labor unions out of his largest private textile company in the nation.

Ironically, the number three Democrat in Congress, James Clyburn, representing a congressional district in South Carolina mostly devoid of organized labor, lobbies for labor laws that would end the secret ballot and thus help to keep his constituents unemployed by emboldening the foes of Boeing’s expansion to North Charleston. It seems that union money in his party’s campaign coffers matters more than jobs, while he gives only lip service for Boeing as having “broken no laws”. Not a word against Obama’s NLRB.

So, from the home of President Harry Truman’s Secretary of State, James F. Byrnes and Henry Kissinger’s former Army base at nearby Camp Croft we see the emergence of an Army brat turned Speaker as the next challenger to an establishment-ordained nominee whose ills no RomneyCare can cure.

Meanwhile, a certain University of South Carolina Fighting Gamecock and Wofford College matriculator roosted atop Stone Mountain of Georgia is reminded of an album by Spartanburg’s own Marshall Tucker Band, Searching for a Rainbow, that will lead us to a Tea partier promised land of Bachmann, Gingrich or even another Texas Governor?

As of now this rooster announces dawns leaning to no one but never forgetting that only the Party of Lincoln elephant can defeat the jack asses that have this country unexceptionally on its knees.

Mike DeVine

Editor - Hillbilly Politics

Co-Founder and Editor - Political Daily

Atlanta Law & Politics columnist –  Examiner.com

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

More DeVine Gamecock rooster crowings at Modern Conservative, Unified Patriots,  and Conservative Outlooks. All Charlotte Observer and Atlanta Journal-Constitution op-eds archived at Townhall.com.