Old Politicians Never Die, They Just Smell Like it.

Do you remember the good old days when ex-Presidents would build their libraries, make a few stops on a speaking tour and write their memoirs? Now it seems that not only ex-President’s like Jimmy Carter have no idea when to keep their mouths shut but even those that ran for President and lost just have to put their two cents in as well.

Actually, it has nothing to do with the current date because there are large gaps between the Presidents that left office determined to allow the next President to shape policy and the course of the nation as they see fit and then there are those that must emanate an irritating buzz from the sidelines just to remain in the fringe of the spotlight. In fact, it seems that the proclivity of pestilence seems to be a product of ideology with liberals displaying a general inability to afford any measure of courtesy to future administrations; the same courtesy that they would have demanded for themselves had they actually stayed in office.

Former Presidents understand the searing responsibility of holding the highest office in the land even though none of them knew the depth of that responsibility when they began their race to become President. As such, there has always been a certain amount of sympathy that is afforded the next President because of the demands associated with that job. Even George Washington commented to John Addams that he felt sorry for him as he took the oath of office as the nation’s second President. While some serving President’s have invited criticism by blaming every failure of their administration on the previous one, it is a very rare occasion when a former President responds in kind but it still happens.

What is different as of the late twentieth and continuing into the early twenty first century is that for the first time, the losers are twice as vocal as the former Presidents. Most Americans know that Truman ascended to the Presidency after Franklin Roosevelt’s death in 1945 but how many know that Truman was FDR’s third Vice President. The first, John Garner, resigned at the beginning of FDR’s second term and the second, Henry Wallace, was too liberal even for Roosevelt. In fact, Wallace believed that the Russian Revolution was on par with the American Revolution and both represented equal and important parts of man’s march to freedom. Truman was selected as the Vice Presidential nominee for the 1944 election as Roosevelt’s health wavered and Wallace was believed to be too radical to chance his elevation to President should Roosevelt die in office.

How many know that Truman had no Vice President in his first term and that the Vice President in his second term, Alben Barkley, was not his running mate in the general election? Most know very little about former Vice Presidents that did not attain the Presidency and even less about those that lost elections for President or Vice President because there was still some measure of decorum back then. Now, the losers take the stage, still striving for the fame they feel they were cheated from attaining. Al Gore, unlike his predecessors, refused to call for unity behind the new President and instead, fanned the flames of the left’s outright hatred of George Bush after the election of 2000.

Gore used the notoriety he had gained from the attention surrounding the 2000 election re-count to push his radical (and wrong) agenda to foster awareness of the so-called threat of global warming. This thrust him into the limelight once again and like any other attention starved brat, only served to reinforce his ill behavior. As an irritant to Bush administration climate policy, Gore sought to inculcate the radical environmental movement and eventually, the youth of the western world with a religious fervor about coming disasters that will befall the planet because of global warming. Even now, as the IPCC and the CRU have been caught red-handed manipulating and even suppressing climate data to support their hokey theories; Gore persists, spewing out these outrageous claims while his so-called “irrefutable” evidence crumbles bit by corrupt bit. You know, you almost feel bad for him. He couldn’t handle losing the 2000 election without a tantrum and now, in the absence of real proof, he’s acting like the proverbial madman on the corner shouting “The end is near!” as people cross the street to avoid eye contact with him.

Of course Gore could have avoided this embarrassment if he weren’t so vain and simply accepted his defeat with dignity. In fact, he could probably have lived out the balance of his life as a respected political analyst much as Henry Kissinger has. Even Richard Nixon managed to redeem himself and in the later years of his life, had been in high demand by news programs that were analyzing the, then current, Clinton administration. Nixon became a serious voice in the political discussion again because he displayed the confidence of a serious man and not the dour attitude of a sore loser.

By now, we are all used to the nonsensical drivel that emanates from the mouth of former President, James Carter. Most of what Carter says only serves to remind us why his Presidency marked the low tide stain for the modern Democratic Party and more importantly, why his bid for reelection was rejected by the American people. The naiveté of his recent statements are perfectly consistent with the simplicity that he exhibited during his Presidency. Unlike Gore, Carter isn’t lashing out over sour grapes, he just doesn’t know any better. Truthfully, I had always held that I liked Jimmy Carter personally. I think he is one of the few Presidents that followed his heart. Hid did what he believed was right; however, his idea of right did not serve the nation well and as much as he is an honorable man, he did not possess the necessary qualities that a modern nation demands of a President.

Now we have John Kerry. Kerry is only one of a long list of Massachusetts politicians that is quite popular in the liberal rat’s nest of Massachusetts but has failed miserably on a national level. Kerry comes from a wealthy family (Forbes) and married into a wealthier one (Heinz). Like so many born to wealth, the political scene was alluring to Kerry as he drooled at the thought of testing out all of the Socialist theories he had learned in Yale. After all, the lives of the general population are only pawns for wealthy socialists to play with and if they are wrong and their policies ruin the nation, they still have their fortune to escape with. It is all an exercise in theory for them.

Kerry had served in the United States Navy during Viet Nam. Assigned to a swift boat in what veteran’s call “the brown water navy”, Kerry was reportedly injured in combat several times and was decorated for bravery. Kerry had requested early release in January of 1970, for the purpose of running for Congress that fall and was discharged in March of that year. Rather than running for Congress, Kerry decided to join the anti-war movement after his release from the Navy and had made a number of high profile appearances as a decorated war veteran opposed to the war. Of course Kerry had to go just a bit too far and while speaking out against the war ended up denigrating the President, the nation and even his fellow sailors in the process. This would prove to be a critical mistake later in life.

Kerry did run for Congress in 1972 but that bid would fail as Kerry's younger brother Cameron and campaign field director Thomas J. Vallely were found in the basement of the opposition’s campaign headquarters. Charged with breaking and entering with the intent to commit grand larceny", the two fenced with the courts for a year with the case being eventually being dismissed a year later but not before Kerry lost the election.

After completing law school and embarking on a brief career in law, Kerry was eventually elected to the position of lieutenant governor of Massachusetts under Michael Dukakis in 1982 and then to the United States Senate in 1985. In 2004, Kerry decided to run for President. During his campaign, a group of swift boat veterans protested his candidacy and brought his service record and military honors under severe criticism citing inconsistencies in the recorded events. Statements Kerry made during earlier “anti-war” interviews resurfaced in which he admitted that he tried to avoid combat by asking for duty with the swift boats which up till then had been used only for coastal patrols. Of course his voting record as one of the most liberal progressives in Congress was too much for main street America and only served to seal his fate. His 2004 bid for the Presidency with running mate John Edwards, ended in a close but failing race with Bush beating Kerry by only 2% of the popular vote at a time when Bush was also wildly unpopular.

Now that Iran is on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons and Obama is facing harsh criticisms from other world leaders for vacillating in the face of Iran’s refusal to obey international law, John Kerry is stepping to the foreground for his fifteen minutes of fame again. He is demanding more negotiations with Iran even though negotiations have only proven to allow Iran the time continue the development of nuclear arms without fear of reprisal. In fact, Kerry tried to arrange a visit to Tehran to speak with Iranian officials as if to say that he can do alone, what the current administration in its entirety could not. Apparently, Iran can spot an elitist publicity hound faster than the people of Massachusetts can and denied access to Mr. Kerry.

John Kerry should accept that outside of the “People’s Republic of Massachusetts”, no one really cares what he thinks. For that matter, we really don’t care what any of the political figures that Massachusetts has cursed the nation with has to say about much of anything. If things continue as they are, we are going to see a lot more liberals stamping their feet in the press and on the news shows after the 2010 election send many of them home so I guess we should thank Gore and Kerry for preparing us. It only goes to show that old politicians never die, they just smell like it.

Paul

Tea Parties and Politics

The otherwise silent majority are suddenly finding their voice. Tea Party protests, town hall meetings, letters and phone calls to Congress. This is all new territory and the left has no idea what to do about it other than resort to the strategy they have traditionally used with their opponents on Capitol Hill and talk radio. They’ve made the mistake of denigrating individual citizens that were speaking out for their rights which only serves to infuriate them even more. More subtle Presidents would have pretended to listen and offer gentle platitudes to calm the unsettled nerves of a fearful electorate but this President is far too elitist for that. Only Obama, his radical advisors and his left wing, progressive friends in the democratically controlled Congress know what is best for you and they intend to drag you along, by your hair if need be.

Democrats have no frame of reference for this because Republican and conservative voters were never protestors before. That is a tactic and trait of the left and there was never a need to quiet their dissent; in fact, it was encouraged because it was always directed at “the enemy”; i.e. the Republican Party. Independents, for the most part, were exempt from direct assaults by the Democrats because independents usually draw votes away from Republican and Conservative candidates, broadening the lead of Democrats in a three-way race. But this time is different; the attacks are citizens fighting against big government, socialist policies and the Democrats that proposed them. So in a Pavlovian response, the “party of the people” turned on the people as though they were an adversarial political party.

Tea Party protestors and those that passionately voiced their concerns at the town hall meetings were called “Astroturf” and “tea-baggers” by the Congressional leadership. The White House Senior Advisor and long time Democratic strategist, David Axelrod, refused to address protestor’s concerns in recent interviews saying only that “they are wrong”. Nancy Pelosi equated otherwise peaceful Tea Party protests with the violent acts of the radical left; her radical left; that occurred during the anti-war movement of the late ‘60’s and early ‘70’s, saying they made her fearful. They struggled to make their case through their allies in the media that this was only manufactured anger bought and paid for by big business and the Republican Party, then organized counter-protests bought and paid for by unions and the Democratic Party.

Unfortunately for the strategists, the people they were trying to sway through the media were the same people they were attacking. The “Tea-Partiers” and “9-12ers” watched in disbelief. They know who they are. They know that these are the “grass-roots” and not some phony effort organized by business, pharmaceuticals or a political party. They know they aren’t violent; in fact, the only violence they encountered had been launched against them by the supporters of healthcare reform organized by the Democrats using Move On, SEIU and Organizing for America as their foot soldiers.

This culminated in a surge in Tea Party membership. By September 12th, these groups had gained so much momentum that nearly a million people converged on Washington D.C. in a massive demonstration against healthcare reform, cap and trade, the unchecked growth of the Federal Government and the continued bloating of regulatory bureaucracies.
The main stream media continued to misrepresent the protestors and the protests. They understated the attendance and created stories of violence and bigotry where none existed. The September 12th protest in Washington was reported to have had anywhere from thirty-thousand to sixty-thousand in attendance. It is widely known today that this figure was under-reported sixteen fold, as nearly one million people marched on the Capitol. For the one million that attended, there were no altercations, no arrests and for the first time since organized marches began on the Capitol, there was no garbage to clean up when they left. Not even the environmental movement can claim that!

The protests will continue as long as it is apparent that our elected officials are ignoring the message. In fact, as the public becomes more irate over being ignored and misrepresented, the latest round of protests were directed at the media headquarters and local offices of ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and their print equivalents. People are finally seeing the bias of these so-called “news” organizations through the overt whitewashing and lack of accurate coverage given to the nefarious actions of Congress and of the President. Shouts of “Can you hear us now” and “We’re the angry mob; have a nice day” echoed through the streets in front of, and around CNN headquarters in Atlanta Georgia. Similar protests took place in every major city and at every network and newspaper accused of playing “lapdog” for the Obama administration.

With all of this going on, one would think the message would have gotten through loud and clear by now. For some, it is. There are Democrats running for re-election in states that overwhelmingly voted for McCain that are seriously reconsidering support for any legislation that is this divisive. After all, the town hall meetings showed a massive lack of support for these initiatives and those that came to speak against healthcare reform outnumbered the supporters ten to one. Congressional approval is at its lowest point in decades with only a twenty-five percent favorable rating. Both Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid’s approval have also halved since Obama began his grand push for a socialized America this past January.

Well, the White House and Congressional leadership are still trying to insulate Democratic Representatives and Senators from the voice of the people. Reid and Pelosi are pushing hard to get the healthcare bill through Congress before the Thanksgiving break in order to avoid another round of damaging town hall meetings and local protests. The mass media has “stacked the deck” in recent polls to show favoritism for the healthcare bill, that is until it was disclosed that the poll data contained thirteen percent more Democrats than Republicans, slanting the results in favor of reform. Curiously, the poll didn’t show a spread of thirteen percent in favor, indicating that even Democratic voters are finding this bill a “hard pill to swallow”. Since Fox continues to be the only network that is willing to provide unfiltered coverage of the news, they have been singled out for attack by the White House in a strategy that is proving to be less than effective.

Fox News has been continually gaining viewers and network ratings show that their most controversial shows now possess as many viewers as all of the opposing network news shows combined. Even competing news outlets have become extremely uneasy about the White Houses attempts to silence Fox. On Thursday, October 22nd, White House launched its most blatant attack when “Pay Czar” Feinstein called a press conference of all the news networks except Fox. To their credit, the White House Press Corp replied with a refusal to attend if the ban on Fox was not lifted. Perhaps they are finally seeing that this President intends to shape news, not make news. After all, if I were part of the man stream media I would be incensed at Anita Dunn’s revelation this week, that the press was intentionally manipulated all through the campaign, being spoon-fed glorious and glowing stories about Candidate Obama while direct access and interviews were severely limited. To add insult to injury, newly appointed Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor also revealed that her appearances were carefully crafted right down to administration personnel choosing what clothes she would wear.

The American people continue to be shocked by the relentless, almost daily stream of new and more ridiculous actions in Washington. The difference is that now, Washington and the press are finally getting their own dose of daily assaults through the efforts of the grass-roots opposition. I know how hard it is to keep this pressure up. It’s tiring and we don’t have a staff of people to do this for us. We have jobs and families that rely on us but remember, there is nothing more important for their well being than the future of a free and prosperous United States.

Now that the efforts are beginning to show dividends, it is time to redouble our efforts. Attend your Tea Party meetings, join the rallies, call and write your congressmen; most importantly, remain awake, aware and vigilant. There are efforts under way to sneak these bills through in the dead of night as attachments to existing legislation and we must never allow that to happen. You know, instead of making fun of us Congress should be happy it was only a Tea Party in Boston and not an “Anvil” Party! If it were, Nancy would really have something to cry about.

Paul

Why Don't We Teach Civics Anymore?

Today we are embarking on an entirely new path. Not that the healthcare debate isn’t important, but what good is discussing healthcare when the nation is facing a crisis of far more serious consequence. When I went to school a million years ago, we not only learned about American History but we also took the required civics classes that taught us about our Constitution and how our government is supposed to work. Today, civics is no longer taught in grade schools and American History, in fact, all of history, seems to be under a constant state of revision with the passing of each successive year. As George Orwell said “He who controls the present controls the past and he who controls the past controls the future.” That lesson was not lost on the new generation of progressives.

Colleges focus on political science studies which for the most part, spend their days dissecting and interpreting the Constitution through the lens of social change. Even though the Federalist papers tell us the exact intent of the founding fathers, weaving them into the studies would deny the social architects that teach these courses the ability to convince the students that the Constitution is dynamic and should be interpreted to meet modern political conditions. Let’s not forget that a good number of today’s college professors were the same people that “turned on, tuned in and dropped out” back in the 60’s; never having left their beliefs that America could in fact, become a social utopia if only the right people were in charge.

Considering today’s political climate I feel it would be beneficial to revisit the documents that founded this country and the principals of the men who drafted them. Only through a complete understanding of the times in which they were written and the true intentions of the founders of this nation can we begin to steer the ship of state safely back to her intended course.

Why go so far back in time? After all, this is the twenty-first century. Because it was the genius of men like Thomas Jefferson, John Addams and Benjamin Franklin to name just a few, that created a completely new promise of a fair and just government. A nation, self-governed by its own citizens and not by a monarch or an emperor; a nation where free men wrote the laws that guaranteed the liberties of all and for the first time, imposed those laws on their own leaders so that no man would be exempt.

Agreeably, there were times in our history that were not quite so idealistic. The men that wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were aware that grave social issues such as slavery, had to be addressed for this nation to aspire to the goals they had set for themselves. They met fierce opposition from the Southern states who would kill the motion for independence if the document dared interfere with their sovereignty on such issues. Rather than lose the moment, they yielded to the Southern states so that the nation could be formed knowing that they could revisit the issue at a later date once the United States was actually united.

We must go back in time today, because those laws and principals are being tested by an administration that believes the Constitution is an inconvenience to the “work” they insist needs to be done and they have already taken steps to alter the understanding of that precious document until it resembles something that is convenient to their cause.

You know, I won’t apologize. I voted for McCain. Not because I thought he was some blazing example of what I wanted to see in a President, but honestly, I felt he was the lesser of two evils and none of the independent candidates were in a position to be considered serious contenders. When Obama won, I threw my hands up and said “Oh well, here comes another four years, or eight years of tax and spend policies, especially with the Democrats controlling both houses of Congress. At that moment, I had no idea what this election really meant.

This President has been engaged in the business of cultivating powers within the White House that have provided him the means to elude Congressional oversight. Of the dozens of “Special Advisors” (Czars) that he has appointed, to date only one has been vetted by Congress through the required Senate Confirmation Process. The Czars have been given powers to act without Congressional direction and have even been accused of withholding information from Congress in what some critics have begun to call a “Shadow Government”.

There are wide and disturbing connections between the President, his advisors and people outside of the Federal Government that have a long history of affiliations with radical organizations and groups that can only be described as domestic terror cells. At least one of the President’s closest advisors is a self-avowed communist and many more are radical social engineers, some with ties to groups that in the past actively sought to cripple the government in favor of a Marxist regime.

One of those “affiliates” is Jeff Jones. Jeff Jones was one of the co-founders of the Weather Underground, a domestic terror group. Mr. Jones, having served his debt to society now sits as the NY Chairman of the Apollo Alliance. This is the group that has been credited for writing key parts of the stimulus bill that earmarked nearly eight-hundred billion dollars to revive the economy. $5.2 billion dollars of that money is scheduled to be distributed to non-profit community based organizations such as ACORN and The Apollo Alliance. Van Jones, the self proclaimed communist and “green jobs” Czar is also a member of the board of the Apollo Alliance. That is quite a coincidence and one of those things that just makes you go Hmmmmm?

Jeff Immelt is the CEO of General Electric, a company that stands to make billions by providing smart grid technology that is a key infrastructure component of the climate bill. As it turns out, Mr. Immelt, who was recently appointed by President Obama to the board of the NY Federal Reserve, also wrote parts of both the healthcare and the climate bill.

Excuse me? Since when do we allow private citizens to take part in the writing of legislation, especially when they stand to profit from the provisions contained in that legislation? That used to be called a conflict of interest when I was growing up. When you look at the enormity of the bills and the trillions of dollars these will cost the American tax payer I have a far better name for it. It is nothing less than the wholesale looting of the United States Treasury.

Senator John Conyers (D-MI) was quoted talking about the people that are shouting "read the bill, read the bill" at the town hall meetings and said they make him laugh; then added "What good is reading the bill if it's a thousand pages and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?" Well Senator, if Congress is not writing the bills, and Congress is not reading the bills then how can you claim to honor the oath you took to support and defend the Constitution when you blindly vote on the bills with little or no understanding of what is in them?

Fortunately, the Constitution is still intact at least for the time being, so the ship of state still has a rudder. However, the wrong hands are now holding the wheel. This is a rare opportunity that we have been given. If reasonable people shed the light of truth on this assault on our Republic, we can bring our nation together again. The factions that seek to dilute the Constitution and usurp power from the American people are a dangerous and focused group but they are still small in number. Our Constitution is still the supreme law of the land. Speak boldly and demand answers while we still have our authority as citizens of a nation that is of, by and for the people. Do it now, while the Congress is still required to answer to us and while the President is still required to answer to Congress.

The petty partisanship that has kept the political parties at each other’s throats needs to end if we are to face this crisis and endure. We must all realize that disagreements on policy are the discussions that take place in any democracy and those discussions are far different than the “change” these people are trying to slip in under the radar. This is an insidious and vile attack at the very core of our country and should be treated no differently than if it were a direct assault on our land by a belligerent nation. We must unify to possess the strength to defeat them. Our nation, like an oak tree, can withstand nearly any assault from the outside. It is when disease penetrates the bark and rot takes hold from within that the mighty oak falls.

Tomorrow, we will begin at the beginning with the document that announced the birth of our nation; The Declaration of Independence. Please join me as we trace history for the roots of that Declaration and reaffirm our status as a liberated people, free of the bonds of tyranny.

Paul